Table of Contents
The majority of methods we identified were useful for the integration of judgments. Here, we define judgment as the ‘ability to judge justly or wisely, especially in matters affecting action; good sense; discretion [and] the forming of an opinion, estimate, notion, or conclusion, as from circumstances presented to the mind’ (Macquarie Dictionary 2005).
As we described earlier, Yankelovich (1999) went further than this, pointing out that, in making a judgment, people took into account the facts as they understood them, their personal goals and moral values and their sense of what was best for others as well as themselves.
In tackling real-world problems, it is common that research data alone are not sufficient to provide full understanding of the problem and a clear path for action. In addition, action often needs to be taken before all the research that can have a bearing can be conducted. Synthesising a range of informed judgments is then often the best way forward.
In research integration, the focus of the dialogue process is on a research question and the process aims to enable the formation of a combined judgment between the participants, with that judgment being informed by the best research evidence. Research-informed judgments can be achieved in various ways. One is to present research evidence to those whose judgments are being synthesised—through, for example, presentations, documentation or questions and answers. This is commonly done in dialogue methods that concentrate on integrating the (informed) judgments of lay people (citizens’ jury and consensus conference). Another is to concentrate on research experts and to integrate their judgments (for example, in a Delphi technique). Still another is to involve research experts and lay people and to share the research evidence through discussion (for example, in open space technology).
The research integrator is most likely to take the lead in organising the dialogue and in bringing the results to the attention of decision makers. Tasks undertaken by research integrators can therefore include determining the topic for the dialogue and the particular dialogue method, the selection of participants, as well as what research evidence will be presented and how. They are likely to also be responsible for documenting the outcomes of the dialogue and ensuring that the process is evaluated, as well as deciding to whom the results should be presented and how that is best done.
A citizens’ jury is a dialogue method that was developed by the Jefferson Center in the United States. The centre has registered the term ‘Citizens Jury’ as a trademark in that country. This method is used by organisations wishing to receive and understand the views on complex issues of a well-informed, representative group of ordinary citizens.
The process involves providing the citizens with information from subject-matter experts, advocates and other stakeholders and then bringing together the range of judgments of the citizens into a single judgment.
The core approach (as used by the Jefferson Center) is as follows:
In a Citizens Jury project, a randomly selected and demographically representative panel of citizens meets for four or five days to carefully examine an issue of public significance. The jury of citizens, usually consisting of 18 to 24 individuals, serves as a microcosm of the public. Jurors are paid a stipend for their time. They hear from a variety of expert witnesses and are able to deliberate together on the issue. On the final day of their moderated hearings, the members of the Citizens Jury present their recommendations to the public. (Jefferson Center 2004:3)
This source explains that the main characteristics of a citizens’ jury are:
representative: selected by a recognised sampling method
informed: witnesses present to the jury a variety of facts, information and opinions on the matter under consideration, and are questioned by the jury
impartial: those organising the process select witnesses whose evidence is carefully balanced to ensure fair treatment to all sides of the issue
deliberative: the jury deliberates in a variety of formats and is given sufficient time to ensure that all of the jurors’ opinions are considered.
As originally designed, the process operates in nine stages (Jefferson Center 2004), but as the cases below show, variations are possible.
Establishment of an advisory committee of four to 10 people with sound knowledge of the issue to be deliberated on. They advise the organisers about focusing the topic, the selection of witnesses and development of the agenda.
A telephone survey is conducted of a random sample of the public to obtain demographic and attitudinal information on the topic under consideration. Those polled who express interest in the topic are sent information about it, and about the citizens’ jury process.
Jury selection occurs using techniques that aim to ensure that the jury is representative of the community from which it is drawn. Potential jurors are people who have been selected in the previous step and have agreed to have information on the topic and the jury process sent to them. They are categorised on the basis of demographic and attitudinal variables and jurors and alternatives are then selected to ensure representativeness.
Witness selection is the next step. The aim is to involve neutral resource people, as well as advocates and stakeholders. Care is taken to ensure balance in the witnesses’ inputs.
The charge is determined—that is, the question or questions that the jury will consider and on which they will reach a judgment. Care needs to be taken to ensure that the scope of the charge is neither too narrow nor too broad.
The hearings are then conducted and moderated by professional facilitators. The staff prepare the venue, the order of witnesses, and so on. The hearings typically run all day for five consecutive days. Ample time is provided for jurors to discuss the issues among themselves (in small and large groups) as well as with the witnesses. The presentations end on the afternoon of the fourth day. On the morning of the fifth day, the jurors have their final discussions and prepare an answer to the charge—that is, determine their judgment. They also review an initial report from the process.
Recommendations are issued by the jury members, along with their findings, at a public forum on the final afternoon.
Evaluation, which involves all the jurors, is undertaken, with an important evaluation question assessing whether or not they feel that the process has been biased in any way. They are also invited to write a personal statement about the process. The evaluations and personal statements are included in the final report.
Public outreach occurs throughout the life of the project, sometimes entailing a web site with transcripts of evidence and media liaison activities to promote public interest in the process and awareness of its conclusions.
The Jefferson Center met difficulties that reflected aspects of the US political system and closed in 2002. (The Internal Revenue Service revoked the centre’s tax-deductible status and it was threatened with legal action owing to its work in evaluating election candidates’ policies.) Nonetheless, citizens’ juries continue to be conducted in the United States and other countries, notably Germany, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Spain and Australia.
What was the context for the integration?
The Fens is a large, low-lying area near Ely, Cambridgeshire, in the United Kingdom. It was formerly a wetland (hence its name), but it was drained and turned into arable farmland, although there were moves to return at least some of the area to the original wetland state.
What was the integration aiming to achieve and who was intended to benefit?
A citizens’ jury was conducted by researchers to explore the question ‘What priority, if any, should be given to the creation of wetlands in the Fens?’ (Aldred and Jacobs 2000). The organisers used the citizens’ jury approach to dialogue because ‘[t]he premise behind this method is that, given enough time and information, ordinary people can make decisions about complex policy issues’ (Aldred and Jacobs 2000:218).
What was being integrated?
The process aimed to integrate the judgments of 16 lay people (jurors), ‘acting in their capacity as citizens concerned with the public good rather than [as] consumers concerned with private interests’ (Aldred and Jacobs 2000:217) once they became well informed about the issues as presented by witnesses. The report on the jury process did not identify the characteristics of the witnesses and the topics on which they made presentations, stating simply that they were ‘experts on different aspects of the question being considered’ (Aldred and Jacobs 2000:220).
How was the integration undertaken and who did the integration?
This citizens’ jury was freestanding in the sense that it was not commissioned by a body that had the power to implement the jury’s findings, as would occur in most traditional citizens’ juries. (Such a freestanding nature is likely to be common in research integration.) It was established, however, with the support of an advisory group made up of representatives from organisations with varying interests in the development of the Fens—that is, a range of stakeholders. Although the members of the advisory group did not commit themselves to be bound by the jury’s conclusions, they ‘agreed to receive the report and take its recommendations seriously’ (p. 219). The question deliberated on by the jury was developed jointly by the researchers and the advisory group, as were the options that the jurors were asked to discuss. Some of the witnesses who gave evidence to the jury were representatives of the organisations on the advisory group.
Sixteen jurors were selected from among members of the public living in the local area. As the researchers who conducted the project pointed out, they had first to decide whether to choose a representative sample based on statistically random selection (impossible if there were to be just 16 jurors, they concluded) or whether to obtain a jury that was representative of the various local interest groups. They adopted the second of these options. In doing so, however, they explicitly excluded from selection people with strongly held views on the specifics of the topic. Instead, they selected a jury that included all relevant perspectives on the issues. This was done by having a market research firm interview local residents, telling them that the jury would
discuss issues that are important matters of concern to people living locally. These issues will include farming, job creation, tourism, wildlife and the environment in Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and the Fens. The Jury is supported by Cambridgeshire and Norfolk County Councils and a group of other public bodies…[They were advised that] [t]o be a member of a CJ, you need no special training or experience. You are being asked to contribute your views and opinions as an ordinary member of the local community. (Aldred and Jacobs 2000:219)
Jurors were each paid £200 plus travelling expenses for four days, and were asked to sign a contract committing themselves to attend each day and to participate fully.
The agenda, prepared by the researchers and the advisory group, was presented to the jurors on the first day. It set out the overall question to be tried (‘What priority, if any, should be given to the creation of wetlands in the Fens?’) and covered four options for developments in the Fens area: turning the farmland into a nature reserve; establishing a wetland as a Fen centre; incremental development; or not taking any deliberate action at all. The first three options were proposals being advocated by various local organisations, and the fourth gave jurors the option of rejecting the idea of a wetland area in the Fens.
Following the usual procedure, a number of expert witnesses (selected mostly on the advice of the advisory group) made presentations to the jury and were questioned closely by its members. The 16 jurors regularly split into three groups (with varying membership) over the four days to consider particular topics in detail. This took the integrative work to a greater depth. The deliberations were captured by means of summaries prepared by the jurors on flip charts during small group work and plenary sessions, written records kept by the facilitators, tape recordings (everything was recorded) and evaluation questionnaires completed by the jurors at home after the jury concluded its work.
What was the outcome of the integration?
The jury’s conclusions and recommendations were unanimously in support of option one (establishing a nature reserve in the Fens) and option three (incremental development). Careful attention was given to, and recommendations made about, a range of related issues, some of which were raised by jurors themselves—that is, matters that were not included in the pre-prepared agenda.
The jury process apparently worked well:
The design and execution of the Ely Jury was in general considered very successful. The atmosphere in the meeting room over the 4 days was appropriately relaxed, with much laughter and all jurors appearing at ease to speak. All jurors were given an evaluation form on the final day; the comments on the forms returned (14 out of 16) were generally very positive. Most of the significant criticisms raised had already been recognised and acknowledged by the researchers. (Aldred and Jacobs 2000:222)
The full report on the Ely Citizens’ Jury is available online (<http://alba.jrc.it/valse/pdf files/rap.fin.chapter6-a.pdf>). No information was provided on how successful the process was in informing decision makers or what action, if any, was taken based on the citizens’ jury findings and recommendations.
What was the context for the integration?
South West Burnley is a town in Britain characterised by high levels of social exclusion, social deprivation and complex community needs regarding health, housing, employment, education, and so on. Over the years, a number of needs assessments had been conducted, mostly using consultation with the residents, but nothing came from them. In 1999, the then Burnley Primary Care Group commissioned a citizens’ jury. Oversight of the process was the responsibility of a community-based Health and Social Care Group, which had close links to the Primary Care Group, as well as action researchers from Lancaster University.
At the time, Primary Care Groups were part of the UK National Health Service’s Area Authorities (they have now been replaced by Primary Care Trusts). Each Primary Care Group organised and funded primary healthcare services within a particular region, either through other National Health Service organisations or through other bodies including private medical practitioners and not-for-profit organisations. This meant that the Primary Care Group had considerable capacity to implement the recommendations of the citizens’ jury.
What was the integration aiming to achieve and who was intended to benefit?
The citizens’ jury approach was selected for three reasons:
to build up a body of evidence through the testimonials of jurors, witnesses and other members of the community
to resolve a specific longstanding problem regarding local service provision
to open up debate about what people living in that community would prioritise for change (Kashefi and Mort 2004).
The authors of the report on the citizens’ jury added that, ‘[a]s action researchers, we were keen to see whether the jury process could hold service providers and policymakers accountable to the community, and to explore whether the process could be used as a tool for health activism’ (Kashefi and Mort 2004:292).
Importantly, the key planning and service agencies agreed that this would be the final consultation and that action would flow from its findings. Deferring action on the community’s pressing concerns was no longer a viable option.
The steering group, drawn from the Health and Social Care Group, set the question to be tried by the jury: ‘What would improve the health and well-being of the residents of South West Burnley?’
What was being integrated?
There is little in the report about the information provided to the jurors as part of their deliberations.
How was the integration undertaken and who did the integration?
An innovative approach to juror selection was used. The steering group analysed census data on the demographics of the area and determined the characteristics jurors should represent. A professional recruiter, who had worked in the area previously, spent some weeks informally discussing the proposal with community members with the goal of finding potential jurors who matched the profiles set by the steering committee. A diverse group of 12 local residents, aged from seventeen to seventy years, was eventually recruited as jurors. They had two evening preparatory sessions at which they got to know each other and the other people involved in the process, including the researchers. A local community worker and four people who had served on a previous citizens’ jury in the area designed a training session on the practical aspects of being a juror. The jurors were paid for their participation.
The deliberative phase of the jury was conducted over five days. A wide range of witnesses gave evidence, including health workers, community development workers, community activists, general practitioners and a social worker. Most were local residents. There were two closed sessions in which the jurors focused on their own ideas and experiences. Four pieces of research were commissioned before the deliberative phase to bring local community views to the jurors and the resulting research reports were presented as evidence by various witnesses. Jurors engaged in dialogue in pairs, small groups and separate female/male groups. The process was supported by two facilitators, a chairperson and a ‘jury investigator’. The last person’s role was to research and find answers to questions that arose in the course of the trial, and to rapidly (that is, within the trial time) report back to the jury.
What is the outcome of the integration?
On day five, the key recommendations were collated and pairs of jurors presented them using simple visual representations. These presentations were made to the sponsors of the jury and the local Member of Parliament. The researchers prepared a written report in consultation with the jurors (see <http://www.lancs.ac.uk/fass/ihr/publications/elhamkashefi/burnley citizens’ jury report.pdf>). The jury’s report covered the strengths and weaknesses of the community and included some 80 recommendations—some rather general and others very specific.
The Health and Social Care Group established a system to manage the dissemination of the report to the local community and other stakeholders, and to manage the implementation of its recommendations. Some of the jurors were actively involved in this for an extended period. As the authors of the paper describing this citizens’ jury advise:
Three months after publication [of the jury’s report], all health and social care agencies mentioned in the report attended a public meeting to respond formally to the recommendations. Hopes were high for this event, that concrete action would be reported and plans outlined to work on the wider concerns raised by the jury…every agency sent a formal, written response to the Health and Social Care Group outlining their proposed course of action on the recommendations. (Kashefi and Mort 2004:298)
Funding bids were submitted and a multifunction community health centre was established and staffed. This was a centre for continuing community participation and service delivery for overcoming many of the problems faced by Burnley’s citizens. The researchers involved in the case describe the importance of integration, as follows:
[By integration] we mean that the jury process must be embedded within the community where it happens. The subject under discussion must be of relevance to community groups and organizations, as well as individuals, and these should participate from inception to realization; knowledge from previous consultations must be integrated using local expertise, e.g. as witnesses and advisors; recommendations must be implemented using links with existing local networks in order for these to be credible and workable. Without integration, juries and other consultative activities will remain isolated and irrelevant. (Kashefi and Mort 2004:299–300)
For our cases, we could find examples of research integration in only two of the four areas of interest (the environment and public health). Even so, it is noteworthy that the role of the researchers was not particularly clear and had to be inferred from the available documents. Even more importantly, in neither case was the evidence that was being integrated into the judgments described.
Use of the integration framework shows that, in terms of research integration, the available descriptions are very uneven. In both instances, the selection of the jurors is presented in considerable detail, while, as mentioned above, the information they were given is almost completely ignored.
This method was not developed for research integration; rather, it was aimed to be part of a broad democratic process in that it elicited and channelled information from concerned citizens to policy-makers, alerting them to the judgments of informed citizens on complex policy issues. Nevertheless, as the examples show, it can be used for research integration.
The method is valuable for integrating the informed judgments of citizens but not the judgments of other stakeholders, including those having to make decisions on the topic under consideration, and those potentially affected by those decisions. This means that it tackles only part of the research integration task. Other, complementary methods are needed to integrate the views of other stakeholders.
The origins of this dialogue technique are in deliberative democracy. It is closely linked to the consensus conference (see below) and citizens’ panels.
The citizens’ jury method was developed at the Jefferson Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, which was founded in 1974 to undertake research and development on new democratic processes. The first citizens’ jury was held the same year to pilot and explore the method; it addressed the topic of a national health plan for the United States. The centre closed in 2002 but still maintains a website <http://www.jefferson-center.org/> and conducted 32 citizens' juries before closing.
Carson, L., Sargant, C. and Blackadder, J. 2004, Consult Your Community: A guide to running a youth jury, NSW Premier’s Department, Sydney, New South Wales.
Coote, A. and Lenaghan, J. 1997, Citizens’ Juries: Theory into practice, Institute for Public Policy Research, London.
Crosby, N. and Nethercut, D. 2005, ‘Citizens juries: creating a trustworthy voice of the people’, in J. Gastil and P. Levine (eds), The Deliberative Democracy Handbook: Strategies for effective civic engagement in the twenty-first century, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, pp. 111–19.
Jefferson Center 2004, Citizens Jury Handbook, Revised and updated edition, The Jefferson Center, <http://www.jefferson-center.org/>
Wakeford, T. 2002, ‘Citizens juries: a radical alternative for social research’, Social Research Update, no. 37, <http://sru.soc.surrey.ac.uk/SRU37.html>