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Consultation ideas … even in ex-Soviet Central Asia…

The UK has long been a magnet for countries to send their brightest and best to learn about democratic principles and pubic services. Strange, given our current convulsions but our reputation for training civil servants and developing civil society remains high. And this is often thanks to relatively little-known organisations, some of which have worked below the radar for years.

One of these is the John Smith Trust – founded in 1996, two years after the death of the Labour Party Leader  whose name it bears and which focuses on the ex-Soviet republics in Asia, and the Middle East and running Fellowship programmes for …”exceptional individuals the chance to explore issues of good governance, social justice and the rule of law in an intensive four-week programme in the UK”. It gives participants the chance to explore their leadership styles, and develop key skills.

The latest programme provided 25 fellows from Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan – young people committed to promoting good governance rule of law and social justice in their home countries. Four weeks in the UK spent hearing from keynote speakers, participating in workshops and having one-to-one meetings with specialist in their subject areas to help them develop an individual project.

Astana’s population of 1m+ has doubled in 15 years

One of them, Botagoz Zhumabekova, is a senior Town Planner from Astana in Kazakhstan and in November, spent time with the Institute in Bedfordshire equipping herself to introduce more consultative practices in the planning of one of the world’s most dramatic and fastest-growing cities. Penny Norton, author of the seminal book on Public engagement and consultation in Planning was on hand to provide expert advice.

https://youtu.be/ciBcuwH09f4

On Tuesday evening this week, Rhion Jones and Elizabeth Gammell – authors of The Politics of Consultation  – were guests at the end-of-programme debate at the English Speaking Union. It is an occasion for participants to exercise Western-style debating skills which can then be adapted to their own political cultures. The chosen subject – that Social Media has caused more political harm than good – could scarcely have been more topical, and highlighted the different speed of adoption in less open and transparent societies.

For Institute Directors, it was an opportunity to learn from young people from different environments how, despite a huge democratic deficit, the principles of talking to local communities and the concepts of stakeholder engagement still apply. However imperfectly, the trend in most of these countries is towards greater public involvement and there were opportunities to explain how mature democracies like the UK have learnt many lessons over the years, and that there are opportunities for other parts of the world to learn and avoid our more damaging mistakes.

Consultation is now spreading around the world at speed and the Institute is keen to hear of developments in this direction from members, academic observers and website visitors from other countries.

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