Majoritarian or Consensus Decision Making?

[Raúl Duke]

I would like to know anarchists' (or anyone really) opinions/experience on these 2 forms of decision making and which one they think works best and why (and also explain why you think the other doesn't work as good as your choice.).

Also, I would like to hear people's ideas on how to avoid "group think" (i.e. agreeing on something just to get the discussion/debate over and done with, etc) and which decision making system, in their opinion/experience, is better at handling this problem.

[syndicat]

the point to the "consensus decision-making process" that seems worthwhile is the idea of trying to assay the various viewpoints that exist in an organization/community, and give people the opportunity to air their views, and also the idea that trying to achieve unity is worthwhile, because a movement is stronger if it's unified.

that said, i think the big problem with the "consensus" concept as a formal decision-making method, is the requirement of unanimity. this ends up undermining the very idea of allowing people to express their views. that's because if people dissent, under such a system, they raise the threat of preventing the group from doing anything, from agreeing, unless people kowtow to their viewpoint, since anyone can "block" or veto a decision. this often has the effect of putting intense pressure on people to not express their viewpoint. or it leads to papering over the disagreement with some compromise that no one really believes in, and which people soon start ignoring in practice.

the idea of requiring unanimity is inconsistent with real diversity. it can function if a group remains fairly homogeneous in its composition -- ethnically or ideologically. but it becomes unworkable in a larger or more diverse setting.

the alternative to "consensus" is the idea that we have an open discussion, allow the views of the participants to be aired, but if after a reasonable length of time, agreement isn't reached, we take a vote and the majority is the direction we go. if the majority can't control an organization, they will fade away.

another problem with "consensus" is that it can lead to endless meetings. working class people who have jobs and families can't spend endless hours in meetings. young people with no commitments or people with more autonomous work situations, can arrange their schedules to do this, but it ends up being a bit elitist in who is empowered by it if it is excluding people.

those who prefer "consensus" decision making often (but not always) fetishize small groups and informality. but small groups have little power. the power to affect society requires mass movements, and requires developing unity among a diverse population. this does require respecting the different perspectives and experiences, but this can't be formalized into a procedure, and requiring "consensus" can actually stifle discussion, as I've pointed out above. also, a problem with informality is that it encourages domination by informal leaders or cliques, it leads to a lack of accountability. accountability requires that decisions are kept track of (through things like minutes of meetings or at least of decisions made and commitments of people to do things) and that people are elected for limited terms to be responsible for certain things, to ensure they get done.

[Schrödinger's Cat]

A hybrid of first allowing consensus decision making through public forums and falling back on a majority vote when a consensus has not been met is, in my opinion, the best solution.

[Bilan]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13, 2007 06:33 am
I would like to know anarchists' (or anyone really) opinions/experience on these 2 forms of decision making and which one they think works best and why (and also explain why you think the other doesn't work as good as your choice.).

Also, I would like to hear people's ideas on how to avoid "group think" (i.e. agreeing on something just to get the discussion/debate over and done with, etc) and which decision making system, in their opinion/experience, is better at handling this problem.
They're both good, it just depends on the context.