Comments on: Consensus Proposal of 10/8

By: Brenda

Brenda — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 23:31:12 +0000

Consense is now in our vocabulary. ‘con’ means “with” in Spanish and, delightfully, the rest is just sense, sometimes common but I guess in your agreements it would mean “visible” which beautifully takes a count of all the bodies present.

By: brush

brush — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 21:57:13 +0000

final version of consensed proposal can be downloaded at: http://dp.tlcfarm.org/tmp/open.consensus.pdf

integrated and “cheat sheet” versions still pending.

By: blue

blue — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 17:15:22 +0000

The people will always define their own language. Many of us feel that the school system, as part of the establishment, perpetuates our deleterious circumstances. If you can support your views without deferring to the school system, you’ll find much more support among the people.

By: brush

brush — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:18:40 +0000

Note: this amended proposal was consensed at GA on 10/10 with minor revisions: in particular, only 90% will be required to agree to move agreement of the assembly as urgent/necessary. full revision to follow soon, including both a full version that integrates with the proposal process and the GA skeleton. we’re also working on short “cheat sheet” versions. watch this space.

By: brush

brush — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 20:17:48 +0000

“consense” has emerged over the decades as a specific description of the type of agreement achieved in consensus process.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/consense

By: Steve's New Best Friend

Steve's New Best Friend — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 19:32:31 +0000

I think I just fell in love with you. “Consense?” REALLY? Could that sound any more like someone attempting to be just one more corpspeaking idiot? Making up words isn’t really the way to get people to take you seriously, and given that one of the big ongoing agenda items is “forgive the student debt that I willingly incurred because I thought an education would increase my earning potential” I think maybe we should switch that to “make the school that didn’t teach me to use real words give my money back for pretending to educate me.”

By: shizukosan

shizukosan — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 21:55:28 +0000

It would be great if this could be made into a handout or something, I think it is a good explanation of the model. Was this model consensed upon at the GA on 10/8?

By: brush

brush — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 21:21:20 +0000

the following is the revised proposal that came out of monday morning meeting.

Open Consensus: a framework for building consensus in an open assembly

[This proposal results from a series of Occupy Portland General Assembly discussions, referred to open meetings for further development. Most recently, this proposal was consensed by 80%+ of the 10/8 7pm General Assembly. Further refinements were suggested, which were discussed and integrated on Monday 10/10 at 10am. This version, with variants, will be proposed at Monday 10/10 7pm GA.]

OPEN CONSENSUS PROPOSAL
(as revised Monday, 10/10/11)

• After discussion of a proposal , facilitators will ask to “see the degree of consensus of the assembly”, by asking who agrees, who disagrees, and who stands aside. These proportions will always be recognized and recorded, as the basis for further development of the proposal, and/or autonomous action by those that agree.
o Stand asides will be distinguished from abstentions. Stand asides refer to those that have concerns with the proposal but do not block it, and will be recorded and count towards the degree of consensus. Abstentions are those that lack adequate information or investment to affect the decision, and will not be counted.
o The notetaker will announce a “rough estimate” of the degree of consensus. Then, if there is dispute about whether a threshold has been reached, anyone may ask for an actual count.

• If there is very strong support for a proposal, the facilitators may ask to see if there are any remaining blocking concerns. If there are not, this can be considered a “full consensus of the assembly”. This has the greatest legitimacy for action on behalf of the whole.

• In limited situations, particularly urgent ones, a consensus of 90% or more of the assembly, regardless of blocks, can be considered an “agreement of the assembly”. Depending on the proportion, this has relatively less legitimacy as “speaking for the whole” and should be used cautiously with understanding that there are unresolved major concerns.
o If it’s important for a proposal to “speak for the whole,” full consensus will always be sought first. If it cannot be reached, the assembly will engage in at least two rounds of seeking changes to the proposal that adequately address the blocking concerns, either between assemblies or, for especially urgent matters, within the same assembly. Those that block are responsible for meeting with proponents and trying to address all the needs.
o If, after at least two rounds, there remain blocking concerns, the proponents may ask the assembly to recognize the decision as an “agreement of the assembly” with only ≥90% consensus. The facilitators will ask the assembly, “Is this proposal so urgent or otherwise necessary that we are willing to override the blocking concerns of up to 10% of the assembly?” If 90 / 99% of the assembly agree to do so, then the proposal may be considered an “agreement of the assembly” with only ≥90% consensus.

NOTE: the Monday morning meeting did not agree whether 90% or 99% should be the bar required in order to accept less than full consensus as an agreement of the assembly. Both should be proposed at the GA.

By: Sean

Sean — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 15:54:25 +0000

Please empower the “stack master”
Maybe someone is in charge of taking stack, and another in charge of enforcing stack?

If someone inturrepts, please stop them and immediately add them to the end of stack.

80-90% really needs to be incorporated, how long will the facilitators be willing to handle meetings that can go on forever?

–With the rainy season coming, maybe will find some office space with projectors. We could have a twitter stream showed in the background with a hashtag, so people can see what others are things, something like #occpdxGA1 , #occpdxGA2 We live in the technology age, and we’re trying to run this meeting like primatives.

–After 1 hour, any proposal is automatically tabled, unless we can reach consensus to continue the discussion (with 80-90%) in 5 minutes.

Those are my ideas. I hope they are expressed somehow in the meeting today.

By: Steve

Steve — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 07:31:11 +0000

I’m pretty sure that “consense” is not a word. I think you’re looking for the word “consent”, although “agree” or “support” are probably more fitting words for the places where you’ve written “consense”.