A five-step plan to restore trust in government
Like most of us, Bill Ruckelshaus sees a decline of public trust in government. Unlike many of us, he believes there is a way to reverse the decline. More unusual, he has pioneered a model that has established a track record.
Ruckelshaus, who served two tours of duty as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, minces no words in describing our dilemma: "Mistrust engenders a vicious, descending spiral. The more mistrust by the public, the less effective government becomes at delivering what people want and need.
"The more government bureaucrats in turn respond with enmity toward the citizens they serve, the more ineffective government becomes and the more people mistrust it. And so on, down and down. If that spiral continues to whirl, the laws will cease to be administered and, when the inevitable chaos starts to bite, the society will become less free," Ruckelshaus observes.
His antidote to reversing this vicious cycle is "collaborative decision-making processes" that are being used throughout the West to develop watershed management plans, and in our state to aid salmon recovery and protect river-based ecosystems.
So far, environmental disputes have been the main arena for applying this process, but Ruckelshaus believes it is relevant to other fields, such as urban planning, pollution control and social policy.
In venues ranging from the Seattle Garden Club to the National Council for Science and the Environment, Ruckelshaus has cited five key principles on which a successful process relies:
First, every important stakeholder must be brought in at the start. If all parties likely to be affected by a decision are involved, an agreement "is much more likely to effect a sustainable decision than one handed down by a remote government or court." Ruckelshaus notes that time spent on the process at the front end can save enormous amounts of time on the other end.
Second, the relevant government authorities must "signal in unambiguous terms that this is the only game in town, and that what comes out of it will more-or-less prevail as public policy." Ruckelshaus believes "there has to be the threat of consequences from nonaction, and protection from endless reviews and appeals" at the end of the process.
Third, professional facilitation and access to extensive technical advice is essential. Related to this, "it is sometimes best for the actual cooperative decision-making group to operate under the auspices of a demonstrably neutral organization" -- specifically, one other than the government agency enforcing laws in the area of conflict.
Fourth, economic issues must be confronted directly and in detail. "Make no mistake -- these processes are ultimately about who gets what," Ruckelshaus observes. "Their real genius lies in discovering that sometimes different sides can each get what they need." He notes that "facts won't resolve disputes but they can narrow them," and then "the pie can be artfully cut so as to be bigger than we thought."
Finally, the process must have "a deep and permanent solution" as its goal. This energizes the commitment of participants. "Only when people are united despite their differences by hard-earned trust, does the astounding political power of such a process become effective," Ruckelshaus believes.
He envisions the possibility that "we may one day observe an upward virtuous spiral, where trust engenders success and satisfaction with government actions, which in turn creates higher levels of trust that will make government actions either less necessary or easier to accomplish."
Ruckelshaus' hope is that "if cooperative processes are seen to work over the long run, if they continue to yield creative solutions, if neither side feels co-opted, ... then (such mechanisms) will establish a permanent place among our civic institutions."
A specific step to support this goal is the recent creation by the University of Washington and Washington State University of a Policy Consensus Center. The center's prospectus states that it is designed to draw on the expertise and neutral setting of the state's two premier research institutions "to build consensus and resolve conflicts around difficult public policy issues."
After two years of successful operation, it's proposed that the entity be renamed as the William D. Ruckelshaus Center. A $6 million endowment drive, headed by Seattle civic leaders Jack Creighton and Anne Farrell, accompanies the name change. The endowment would "secure basic support for research, training and operations" and "assure the center's independence and neutrality and ability to respond to areas of need and impact."
Ruckelshaus says, "Our purpose is to be receptive to public and private requests for help. The problems and the players' willingness to work toward a common solution will be analyzed and a process suggested" that fits each situation.
He believes this fits a larger vision of American values: "The real virtue of democracy is that it is a school. In it we learn how to manage the public aspects of our lives, and thus, unlike any other system of government, it is progressive -- we can actually get better at it as time goes on."
GLENN R. PASCALL's column appears regularly in the Puget Sound Business Journal. He is a Seattle-based economic and public policy consultant, and a senior fellow at the Center for the New West. Since 2001, Pascall has served as coordinator of the West Coast Corridor Coalition.
