Civic Learning, Dialogue, and Connection
to Advance Health Equity: A Deliberative Approach
If the Covid-19 pandemic has taught America anything, it is that there is no consensus about our individual or collective obligations to protect and promote human health. With overall U.S. life expectancy in decline and race- and class-based disparities entrenched and growing, a new project at the Center asks, “Can people from all walks of life learn and talk together with mutual respect and concern about what, if anything, we should do to address America’s most pressing health challenges?”
Using the tools of deliberative democracy and population health science, this project is in the first stages of building a circuit of civic learning, dialogue, and connection about population health challenges in Missouri and Kansas. Democratic deliberation convenes diverse members of the public to learn about, discuss, and weigh in on shared challenges in search of solutions (1,2,3). Over the last three decades, deliberative methods have been used in the U.S. and around the globe to gather well-informed, carefully considered public input on ethically complex questions.
The project is founded on the belief that under good deliberative conditions people with varied identities and interests can learn and talk together and find shared purpose.
The Center’s John B. Francis Chair, Erika Blacksher, PhD, leads this project with a superb research team and advisory committee comprised of local, regional, and national experts in deliberative democracy, population health science, and health and social justice. County Health Rankings & Roadmaps, a program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, has funded the first phase of this project. Since Fall 2020, these experts have been working to create a democratic deliberative toolkit that will be used in subsequent years to convene racially, socioeconomically, and geographically diverse Kansans and Missourians to learn and talk together about our most pressing population health challenges.
¹ Burkhalter S, Gastil J, and Kelshaw T. 2002. “A conceptual definition and theoretical model of public deliberation in small face-to-face groups.” Communication Theory 12(4):398-422.
² Chambers S. 2003. “Deliberative democratic theory.” Annual Review of Political Science 6(1):307-326.
³ Blacksher E, Diebel A, Forest PG, Goold SD, and Abelson J. 2012. “What is public deliberation?” Hastings Center Report 42 (2):14-16.
The Research Team
Marion Danis, MD
HEAD, SECTION ON ETHICS AND HEALTH POLICY; CHIEF, BIOETHICS CONSULTATION SERVICE
NIH CLINICAL CENTER
The Expert Advisory Committee
John Gastil, PhD
PROFESSOR
COMMUNICATION ARTS & SCIENCES AND POLITICAL SCIENCE, SENIOR SCHOLAR AT THE MCCOURTNEY INSTITUTE FOR DEMOCRACY
PENN STATE COLLEGE OF LIBERAL ARTS
Marthe Gold, MD, MPH
PROFESSOR EMERITUS,FORMER CHAIR, DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY HEALTH AND SOCIAL MEDICINE
THE CITY COLLEGE OF NEW YORK
Hedwig Lee, PhD
CO-DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF RACE, ETHNICITY & EQUITY PROFESSOR, DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY DIRECTOR, UNDERGRADUATE STUDIES, DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY FACULTY FELLOW
UMRATH & ZETCHER RESIDENTIAL COLLEGE WASHIGTON UNIVERSITY
IN ST. LOUIS
Bobby Saunkeah, RN, MSHCE, CIP
DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF RESEARCH AND PUBLIC HEALTH; CHAIR, INSTITUTIONAL REVIEW BOARD
CHICKASAW NATION DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH
Lancer Stephens, PhD
ASSOCIATE DEAN/ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA HEALTH SCIENCES CENTER, HUDSON COLLEGE OF PUBLIC HEALTH
Sean A. Valles, PhD
DIRECTOR AND ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
CENTER FOR BIOETHICS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE,
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
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