What Goes Wrong with Assemblies?

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The OECD, Council of Europe and others have put a lot of time and energy into establishing principles and standards for citizens’ assemblies. These have been important to inspire good practice and as a way to challenge malpractice. At KNOCA, we work towards ensuring high quality processes and outcomes. But rather than try to establish another series of standards for climate assemblies, this workshop approaches the issue from the other end. Namely, what goes wrong with climate assemblies.

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We can and should learn from our mistakes (wilful or otherwise). They generate insights that can help inform future climate assemblies to improve commissioning, design, delivery and follow-up. With this workshop KNOCA aims to provide commissioners, organisers, and other stakeholders with clear examples of common failings to avoid. We will not name individual assemblies but rather focus on the specific issues that can undermine the legitimacy and effectiveness of climate assemblies.

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Before the workshop, KNOCA will circulate a short draft of examples of failings in practice to catalyse thinking in the workshop. We will also hear short interventions from practitioners and evaluators about the most common failings that they have come across. Together we aim to provide a roadmap of what not to do when commissioning, organising, and responding to climate assemblies.

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More details to follow.

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