Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: [C-L] Consensus (Again)

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

On 12/24/2002 1:44 PM, "Rob Sandelin" <floriferous [at] msn.com> wrote:

> Consensus, as you all know, does not mean I agree. It means I give my
> consent, which means I give permission. Experienced consensus folks
> understand that it can be in the best interest  of the group to give
> permission to something you disagree with.

I'm more and more leaning toward the sociocratic definition of consensus as
"no objections" rather than "consent." It gets one out of the bind of even
having to decide if you agree or disagree that such and such an action is in
the "best interests of the group." Deciding what is or is not in the best
interests of the group is an abstraction that in and of itself can cause
terminal paralysis.

We recently tried just asking "is there any alternative on this list of
options that anyone can't live with" and it shortened our discussion by
several hours, if not weeks. We were trying to make a decision on what kind
of fence we wanted around a plot of land and what we wanted to do on the
land. 

(1) We made a list of options.
(2) We eliminated the options that some "could not live with" and no one
else strongly wanted
(3) Asked people who wanted various options to "adopt" them and come to a
planning meeting to work out implementation.
(4) Eliminated the options no one wanted to work to implement

This left a short list of options that the team will work on and come back
with a proposal that includes costs and implementation of all the options
that are doable and compatible on the land with such and such a fence.

Just eliminating unworkable and unsupported options up front was so helpful
in both (1) seeing what the final proposal might look like and (2) knowing
who was willing to work on what tasks.

> Humility is foundation for
> consensus to be able to function.

I don't think humility is the word you wanted. From the OED:

"The quality of being humble or having a lowly opinion of oneself; meekness,
lowliness, humbleness: the opposite of pride or haughtiness."

If having a low opinion of oneself is the quality needed to reach consensus,
then pride and haughtiness would be the cause of not reaching consensus. Can
one prove that one is not proud or haughty by  never objecting to anything?

Merry Christmas to Everyone!

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

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