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The Governance Commons: A CL3 Project

CL3 stands for Challenge-oriented, Long-term, Large-scale, Learning system.  As a CL3 project, The Governance Commons (TGC) is a reference, education, training and networking tool that incorporates the following key features:

• Challenge-Oriented Focus
  The system is built around the goal of finding better ways of dealing with nine difficult, but critically important, challenges that we see as being at the core of most governance problems.
   
• Long-Term Focus
  While significant short-term improvements to governance processes are possible, we recognize that major progress on the big challenges will require a long-term effort.  OEF and the Commons is exceptional in its long-term commitment to addressing the governance problem.  It is a commitment that recognizes that new, innovative thinking will be required to challenge paradigms that aren’t working and offer more constructive alternatives.
   
• Large-Scale Focus
  The very large scale of modern society, along with a large number of specialized governance roles, makes governance a truly complex problem with no simple "one-size-fits-all" solution.  Instead, people facing largely unique governance challenges need to be matched up with the best available ideas for meeting those challenges.   The Commons facilitates this by systematically cataloguing the best available information on strategies for dealing with the full range of governance problems. This information is then provided to users through a variety of "information overload control" tools.
   
• Learning System
  To improve governance, the Commons seeks to provide users with information in a format appropriate for their needs.  It also supports a large-scale learning effort designed to advance the frontier of the field.