Across 68 hours from October 7 to December 18, 2021, the Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis brought together 100 citizens around the world to produce recommendations addressing the question: how can humanity address the climate and ecological crisis in a fair & effective way?
Problems and Purpose
Following a year that brought unprecedented rises in natural disasters and environmental decay, the Global Assembly convened the Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis, bringing together 100 citizens worldwide to determine best practices for addressing the mounting climate crisis. The Global Assembly took place ahead of the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) and aimed to provide ordinary citizens a voice in international discourse surrounding the climate crisis—making it, according to the founder of the citizen participation agency Involve, “the greatest experiment in global democracy ever attempted” [1]. The findings of the Global Assembly were presented at the COP26 Summit and formally published in March 2022 [2].
Background History and Context
As the effects of climate change continued to roil communities worldwide, members of the Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis noted that “powerful countries and large corporations ha[d] a disproportionate influence on the process to the detriment of others” [3]. As such, the Global Assembly was founded on a desire to make global assemblies a permanent fixture of international governance, as well as combat climate change in an equitable and inclusive way (i.e. led by countries and entities with the greatest organizational and fiscal capacity).
The Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis’ main focus was its 100-person Core Assembly, which learned about the climate crisis from scientists and other experts, participated in group discussions on realistic methods of combating climate change, formed recommendations based on its deliberations, and presented its proposals at the COP26 Summit in November 2021. [4] However, the Global Assembly’s reach also extended to Community Assemblies, which were run around the world by independent entities using a standardized toolkit created by the Global Assembly’s organizers. The outputs of these Community Assemblies fed into a Global Assembly report published in early 2022.
Organizing, Supporting, and Funding Entities
The Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis’ founding partners included citizen engagement specialists like the OSCA, Innovation for Policy Foundation, Sortition Foundation, Deliberativa, Danish Board of Technology, the University of Canberra Center for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance, and Global Dashboard. Their work was made possible by global delivery partners who recruited community organizations from each of the 100 parts of the world where a citizen participated in the Core Assembly; these included the School of Collective Intelligence (Morocco), Shimmer SDG Hub (China), UDaan (Pakistan), Delibera (Brazil), G1000.nu (Netherlands), iDeemos (Colombia), MSU-Iligan Institute of Technology (Philippines), Centre for Environment Education (India), Community Organisers (UK) [5].
The Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis received nearly $1 million in funding from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation UK Branch, Climate Emergency Collaboration Group (CECG), European Climate Foundation (ECF), One Project, and Scottish Government. Individuals from various civil society organizations, international organizations, and academic institutions also participated in the Global Assembly’s core delivery team and governance committees [6] [7].
Participant Recruitment and Selection
The Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis’ Core Assembly was composed of 100 randomly-selected citizens from around the world. The selection procedure for this global body had to be quite different from those for national citizens' assemblies, to ensure that it was truly representative of the global population. Under-represented communities like refugees, nomads, migrants, the homeless etc. are less likely to be captured by national census databases and electoral registers, so these could not be used as a basis for selection.
Participant recruitment could not be done centrally, so resources like flyer templates, calling scripts, and email templates were created in English, then translated by volunteers to fit local contexts. For the most part, participants came from within a 200 kilometer radius of the originally selected location point.
The makeup of the Assembly was controlled to reflect global distributions of age, gender, ethnicity, geographic location, views on climate change, and income. Overall, Assembly members spoke over 30 languages, 35 percent of participants were not entirely literate, and the majority of the participants earned daily incomes of less than $10. Participants received a stipend, translation services, and technical support for their time [8] [9] [10].
Methods and Tools Used
Regarding methods, the Global Assembly on the Climate Crisis was a citizens' assembly (a diverse group of people—designed to be microcosms of the populations they represent—who gather to learn about a particular topic, deliberate on potential solutions, and formulate proposals to governments [11]). It also used iterative co-production, which refers to an iterative process of deliberation, consolidation, commenting and review, and voting. The process is meant to emphasize collaboration, flexibility, and the gradual shaping of an output that reflects the producers’ perspectives as they develop alongside repeated discussion and reflection. [12]
Regarding tools: firstly, the assembly was frequently broken up into 20 breakout rooms for small group deliberations. This had the benefit of increasing participant engagement, though it reduced diversity on a micro level. [13]
Secondly, for each statement in both the Assembly Members’ Conversation Principles and the People’s Declaration on the Sustainable Future of Planet Earth, Assembly members voted “yes, approve”, “no, do not approve”, or “abstain”, along with an explanation of their vote. Statements that achieved a simple majority passed and were included in the final document. Statements that failed entered a process of reformulation, wherein Editors incorporated dissenters’ reasons for opposition, before being voted on again. If Assembly members did not reach a simple majority on a statement in the allotted time, it was not included in the final document. [14]
Thirdly, citizens were given access to informational resources to provide them a solid basis from which to begin their discussions and develop their perspectives. These materials included an information booklet, a supplemental, workbook, and video recorded presentations. There were presentations from both speakers, whose role was “providing participants with evidence in an accessible and engaging way, and to highlight the trade-offs to be considered”, as well as witnesses, whose role was presenting their perspectives or interpretations on the climate crisis. [15]
Finally, participants engaged in Q&A sessions with experts. [16]
What Went On: Process, Interaction, and Participation
Before the Assembly began, the Knowledge and Wisdom Committee developed an information booklet to serve as a basis for discussion. The Knowledge and Wisdom Committee’s purpose is “to ensure that the Global Assembly’s learning phase is grounded in evidence.” [17] The booklet was created by a committee of experts—all of varying professional experiences and climate-related viewpoints—and introduced the reader to key aspects of the climate crisis. The Knowledge and Wisdom Committee also came up with leading questions that would shape the Assembly’s discussion, which proceeded in six blocks. [18]
Block 1: Understanding the current situation (October 7-13, 2021)
Participants were inducted into the Global Assembly and were split up into breakout rooms to share personal stories about their own great-grandparents and what they hoped for their great-grandchildrens’ lives. They also discussed potential Conversation Principles they wanted to establish. This was followed by an opening plenary, in which the Conversation Principles went through the iterative review process. Assembly members were given the information booklet and supplemental workbook, and discussed the climate and ecological crisis, its causes and impacts, and the governance of biodiversity. [19]
Block 2: Reviewing scenarios, pathways, and principles (October 14-20, 2021)
Participants voted on the Conversation Principles. They also discussed global governance on climate, reviewed climate models and projected changes to the climate, and reflected on climate actions from the past, present, and future. They heard from two speakers, COP26 President Alok Sharma and climate lawyer and advisor Farhana Yamin, as well as two witnesses, Vaine Wichman, President of the Cook Islands National Council of Women and Saad Alfarargi, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Development. [20]
Block 3: Developing principles to guide discussions at COP26 (October 21-30, 2021)
Participants discussed the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, as well as the Rights of Mother Earth. In preparation for their presentation at COP26, they produced potential submissions, iteratively reviewed them, and then voted on statements to include. Participants also heard from three witnesses: Jojo Metha, Executive Director of Stop Ecocide; Paul Ekin, professor of resources and environment policy at the University College London; and Christopher Jackson, petroleum geoscientist at PetroVision Energy Nigeria Ltd.. [21]
Block 4: Participation and observation of COP26 (November 1-20, 2021)
Participants delivered the People’s Declaration on the Sustainable Future of Planet Earth to COP 26 and observed the rest of the Summit online. Based on their reflections, they then reviewed the Declaration and generated ideas for topics and speakers for Block 5. They also heard from four speakers regarding COP26 outcomes and their connections to the Declaration: Bob Watson, Chair of the Knowledge and Wisdom Committee; Purnamita Dasgupta, environmental economist at the Institute of Economic Growth; Sameemul Hug, Director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development; Hazel Healy, co-editor of the New Internationalist; and James Dyke, Assistant Director of the Global Systems Institute at the University of Exeter. [22]
Block 5: Review commitments and future agenda-setting (December 4-18, 2021)
Participants continued their reflection on COP26 and its connection to the Declaration, but within the context of their own lives and communities. They then split into three breakout rooms based on the topics they crowdsourced in Block 4, which were Awareness and Education, Monitoring and Enforcement, and Energy Transition. Based on these topics, they reviewed and commented on changes they could make to the Declaration. They heard from three speakers, one for each topic respectively: Stuart Capstick, Deputy Director for the Center for Climate Change and Social Transformations at Cardiff University; Ipshita Chaturvedi, partner at Dentons Rodyk LLP in the firm’s Environment and Natural Resources practice; and Julia Steinberger, professor of Ecological Economics at the University of Lausanne. [23]
Following deliberation and the speakers’ presentation, Assembly members performed an iterative review of the proposed changes to the Declaration and voted on them. As this was the final plenary session, members conducted a final review of the Declaration and voted on their future role as alumni in the Global Assembly and what they envisioned for the future of the Assembly. [24]
Block 6
The final report of the Global Assembly was scheduled to be published March 2022, but at the time of writing, the report appears unavailable to the public.
Iterative co-production
Iterative co-production would not have been possible without facilitation by non-participants. Participants’ discussion outputs were recorded by Notetakers. These notes were then consolidated by a team of four Editors, headed by an Editor Coordinator, to create a document reflecting the deliberation across all the breakout rooms. In the interest of transparency, the consolidation process was tracked on templates and people could track how each of the participants’ original comments had been dealt with. [25]
Influence, Outcomes, and Effects
Analysis and Lessons Learned
See Also
References
[1] Harvey, Fiona, and Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent. “Global Citizens’ Assembly to Be Chosen for UN Climate Talks.” The Guardian, October 5, 2021, sec. Environment. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/05/global-citizens-assembly-to-be-chosen-for-un-climate-talks.
[2] Bürgerrat. “Global Assembly Demands Climate Action.” Bürgerrat. https://www.buergerrat.de/en/news/global-assembly-demands-climate-action/.
[3] Bürgerrat. “Global Assembly Demands Climate Action.” Bürgerrat. https://www.buergerrat.de/en/news/global-assembly-demands-climate-action/.
[4] Harvey, Fiona, and Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent. “Global Citizens’ Assembly to Be Chosen for UN Climate Talks.” The Guardian, October 5, 2021, sec. Environment. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/05/global-citizens-assembly-to-be-chosen-for-un-climate-talks.
[5] Bürgerrat. “Global Assembly Demands Climate Action.” Bürgerrat. https://www.buergerrat.de/en/news/global-assembly-demands-climate-action/.
[6] Harvey, Fiona, and Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent. “Global Citizens’ Assembly to Be Chosen for UN Climate Talks.” The Guardian, October 5, 2021, sec. Environment. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/05/global-citizens-assembly-to-be-chosen-for-un-climate-talks.
[7] Global Assembly. “About Us.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/about-2.
[8] Bürgerrat. “Global Assembly Demands Climate Action.” Bürgerrat. https://www.buergerrat.de/en/news/global-assembly-demands-climate-action/.
[9] Atlas of the Future. “The People Power Lottery.” Atlas of the Future. https://atlasofthefuture.org/project/global-assembly/.
[10] Harvey, Fiona, and Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent. “Global Citizens’ Assembly to Be Chosen for UN Climate Talks.” The Guardian, October 5, 2021, sec. Environment. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/05/global-citizens-assembly-to-be-chosen-for-un-climate-talks.
[11] Participedia. “Citizens’ Assembly.” Participedia. https://participedia.net/method/4258
[12] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[13] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[14] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[15] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[16] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[17] Global Assembly. “Information Booklet.” Global Assembly.
[18] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[19] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[20] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[21] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[22] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[23] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[24] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
[25] Global Assembly. “The Core Assembly process.” Global Assembly. https://globalassembly.org/the-process.
