Page 172 - Enabling National Initiatives to Take Democracy Beyond Elections

170 A Project of the UN Democracy Fund (UNDEF) Step 1: Getting started 1 Pre-deliberation survey A pre-deliberation survey is a useful tool to gather the thoughts of your participants before they enter into ‘the room’ (not to be confused with a deliberative poll). You should ask questions around values and principles and not for their answer to the remit. This might include questions around their trust in government, previous involvement in community engagement and their likelihood of future involvement. Asking for answers when they have not heard information or deliberated can contribute to encouraging them to form views that they may find hard to shift from (this makes your task even harder). For example, if in your pre-deliberation survey you ask participants if they think you should have a new airport, you may end up placing your participants into for or against groups that will now focuses the conversation around who does or does not want an airport. Most people are not sure how they feel about any given policy problem because they have not seen a diversity of information or spent much time thinking about the problem. If you ask them for views on solutions at the outset you risk nudging them toward premature conclusions.