Cohousing-L Mailing List: Consensus and the Concept of Blocking

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

> There is also a very important function of having a backup. It makes people
> more cooperative. If I know that I can't stop the group just by blocking
> consensus, and that they will outvote me at a future meeting, then even the
> most uncooperative person is likely to make some moves towards compromise,
> because they know they will simply get outvoted a couple meetings down the
> road.

It makes sense, if only to satisfy the bank, to have a back up voting
procedure established to cover impossible situations that could occur.

But in general I find the concept of  "blocking" to be meaningless.

Whether consensus is defined as either full agreement or the absence of
objection, there is no consensus until there is full agreement or no
objections. No one can block what doesn't exist.

The lack of consensus means the group has not found a solution (or explained
it adequately) for everyone to feel comfortable with it. To view someone who
disagrees as uncooperative is to disparage the position of that person.
Those who are agreeing are just as uncooperative from the objector's point
of view. 

To hold that the one person is the uncooperative person, not the majority is
an attitude that is not part of the _spirit_ of consensus. Once you start
thinking this way, you are in the majority rules system.

The other reason for having a back up voting and majority rules system in
place is that consensus requires that the group have shared goals. There
comes a time when the group does not have shared goals, the majority vote
essentially splits the group or splits off a small minority. It would seem
that sometimes this would be necessary and a mechanism in place to do it.

After a majority vote in a cohousing community, I can't imagine continuing
as before. It would be broken. Perhaps fixable, but definitely broken.

Sharon
-- 
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org


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