Five Core Principles of Civic Engagement
Distinguished Practitioner-in-Residence Norman B. Rice, a former City of Seattle mayor, is laying the foundation of the Civic Engagement for the 21st Century project. A number of major initiatives were in the Rice Administration were guided by five core principles of strong community engagement:
- Center the engagement on policy rather than politics.
Framing questions around values first and issues second allows for building common ground and eases the divisiveness that is prevalent in today’s political environment.
- Have meaningful civic engagement or no engagement at all.
Giving citizens the opportunity to shape the questions and answers requires compassionate leadership, trusting the process rather than controlling it, and not having presumptions about what the results of the process will be like.
- Hyper-communication is key.
A public endeavor will never fail from too much communication. Today’s technology has expanded the toolbox for communicating and can help move people along a continuum from being informed - to interested - to involved.
- Civic engagement requires political will.
Communities need to identify and support leaders who:
- Have the political will of investing in civic engagement,
- And continue that investment even when putting their own re-election chances at risk.
- Civic engagement should look beyond governance.
Leaders must learn to leave boundaries and biases aside in order to get the heart of policy issues. This requires strategies at the regional level where silos of governance are brought down, working through territorial disputes, and prioritizing collaboration.
These same five core principles are used in all Civic Engagement for the 21st Century events hosted by the Evans School, which will put the project’s research to practice in discussing regional policy issues.
Find out more about the foundation and scope of the project.
