The Reinventing Governance Conference brought together over 600 students and members of the public in pre-conference and conference activities. Fourteen different countries were represented, along with over twenty CU-Boulder departments and academics from CU-Denver and CU-Colorado Springs. Many participants from the University of Denver and Colorado State University, as well as from universities and organizations around the country and world, made valuable contributions as conference participants. Voices as diverse as the United Nations, the World Bank, Shell Oil, Aveda Corporation and over a hundred different organizations and community groups actively deliberated on critical governance issues of our time.
Why Do We Need to Reinvent Governance?
The environmental, economic, and social challenges facing business, communities, nations, and the world as a whole are becoming increasingly complex and intertwined. Current practices of government, public deliberation, and sector independence are often not providing the creative and sustainable decisions needed.
In order to act effectively in this environment, new forms of decision making and governance must be established that allow for greater creativity, flexibility, and collaboration across boundaries. New governance processes provide the possibility of higher-quality decisions, higher degrees of decisional legitimacy, creative answers to diverse complex human goals, better assurance of social good and commercially successful business practices, and the reduction of unproductive conflict and violence.
Four different and often disconnected communities have been significant in advancing new decision making practices and can gain from joint discussions:
members of the business community promoting more socially responsible and sustainable business and working directly with local communities;
government officials, academics and NGOs working to improve the institutions of governance;
specialists in processes of dialogue, deliberation and community decision making; and
professionals and activists in peace building and alternative dispute resolution.
The conference is designed to:
1) establish new relationships among participants from these four groups,
2) take the best ideas from the four communities and synthesize them into a broader set of principles of collaborative governance,
3) disseminate these and other related ideas on a post-conference website,
4) continue the “conversation” among participants and others through online discussions, and
5) develop education and training materials on innovative governance that will be distributed through the Conflict Information Consortium and partner websites and integrated into CU courses.
Conference Format »
Conference Format
Pre- and Post-Conference Dialogue with People Facing Similar Issues and Challenges
What’s Your Story? Prior to the conference we’ll introduce practical cases that talk about making decisions across diferent groups. We invite you to submit a brief (2-page) case description that tells about an issue you have faced in your work, the people it involved, the interaction processes you experienced, the criteria for decision making, the successes and difficulties, and the lessons learned and ongoing questions that came up in this case. These cases are meant to incite online discussions and will receive further focus at the conference.
Daylong Pre-Conference at CU, Friday October 8th
We’ll kick-start the conference with a day of talks and workshops on the CU campus. This pre-conference will explore issues of peace, sustainability, public deliberation and governance, local communities, gender in peace and governance, the campus and community as collaboration laboratories, social justice and power relations, collaboration across the curriculum, and environmental activism and governance impacts. These sessions will be co-sponsored by different groups on campus and become part of the state celebration of Conflict Resolution Month endorsed by Governor Ritter and conflict professionals across the state. These events will be free of charge and are sopen to students and the public as well as conference participants.
Interactive Conference, Saturday and Sunday October 9-10th
The formal day and a half conference will include short addresses and in-depth guided discussions of cases pertaining to community planning environment, land use, water rights, mineral extraction, development, global governance, and violence prevention. These will be intensive, facilitated dialogues rather than paper presentations, meaning all present will be participants. You’ll experience:
Stories from the field on how businesses, communities and governments are confronting new challenges and forging effective relations
Collaborative working sessions led by leaders in conflict management, alternative governance processes, community decision making, intercultural communication, and community development
Multi-perspective case analysis around community planning, environmental and natural resource management, sustainable business, international development, political negotiation
Continued Networking and Dialogue Beyond the Conference
The conference is designed to establish new relationships among participants from the business, government, and civil society sectors and to keep these relationships going as we take the best ideas from these communities and synthesize them into a broader set of principles of collaborative governance. We’ll post a list of who’s coming to the conference before you arrive in Boulder, and emphasize networking and interaction among all conference participants throughout.
Through regular colloquia presented by the 3CG, and through online discussions and social networking media, we’ll “continue and expand the conversation” among Reinventing Governance participants and others. We’ll also disseminate our findings online and develop education and training materials on innovative governance that will be integrated into CU course and distributed through CU’s Conflict Information Consortium and Governance Forum websites. In other words, you’ll develop ongoing relations that will support the challenges you face in your daily work through ongoing affiliation and post-conference resource assistancefrom the University of Colorado’s Center for Conflict, Collaboration, and Creative Governance (3CG).
Participant Bios, Full-length Videos and More from the Conference »