What TGC is:

The Governance Commons (TGC) is a large-scale, online knowledge base, as well as a network of people and organizations working to improve governance at the local, national, and global levels. We call it a CL3 system: a Challenge-oriented, Large-Scale, Long-Term, Learning System.

Why TGC is needed:

TGC's developers believe that ability of human society to surmount any of the daunting challenges we currently face is ultimately limited by problems with our systems of governance -- problems which make it difficult for society to wisely develop and equitably choose between alternative courses of action. All of our pressing economic, environmental, security, health, and social challenges are, fundamentally, governance challenges.

Although many people and organizations have already made important progress toward tackling society’s tough problems, those making key governance decisions are often either unaware of these new ideas, or are unable or unwilling to implement them. The result is often the continuation of inadequate, "business-as-usual" policies; frequent, and often unsuccessful, efforts to "reinvent the wheel;" and the general failure to build on existing knowledge in ways that advance governance or solve a particular problem.

The Governance Commons utilizes the latest information and networking technologies to provide a "learning curve accelerator" capable of helping overcome these problems. The Commons also demonstrates that solutions are possible and that widespread cynicism about governance is unwarranted.

TGC Goals:

To provide those in governance-related roles with easier access to the best available information on strategies for dealing with particular problems,
To enhance the visibility of those doing quality governance related work,
To provide a virtual "place" where people interested in improving governance can share ideas about better ways of doing so,
To collaboratively identify research and development challenges at the frontier of the governance field and help people meet those challenges,
To provide students and educators with easier access to quality governance learning materials,
To facilitate collaboration among those working to improve governance, and
To promote general awareness of governance-related problems and possible solutions.

TGC Structure and Contents:

TGC is organized around 3 sets of three governance challenges and four "portals" (essentially entry-points) for

Practitioners
Students, educators, and trainers
Researchers and Developers and
Everyone - for whom we have created frequently changing Chronicle pages that highlight pressing issues, insightful analyses, and innovative responses to each of the nine governance challenges.

The practitioner portals contain practical, immediately-usable advice on dealing with a wide-range of governance issues related to each challenge,

The education and training portals contain background information for students and new practitioners (as well as teaching materials for educators)

The Research and Development pages describe ongoing research, leading researchers and research and development organizations, along with lists of topic in need of further work.

TGC Afflilates and Contributors:

OEF is very eager to get as many different people and organizations involved in the further development of TGC as possible. The goal is to build a large network of experts from a wide variety of fields who will contribute their own knowledge and gain knowledge by interacting with experts with differing substantive and/or geographical expertise. A list of initial contributors and affiliates is found here.

Participating in the Commons:

Participation in the Governance Commons is being offered at a variety of levels, depending upon an individual’s or organization’s level of interest, background, and willingness to contribute to the Commons.

General Public Access -- "read-only" access to the basic system, freely available over the Web to anyone who might be interested.
Basic Membership -- available to anyone who fills out a simple online application, entitles members to take advantage of opportunities for posting comments and content throughout the site. (Contributed content is subject to review and approval by Commons moderators, and major contributions must pass a peer review process.)
Partner/ Contributor Membership -- available to those with substantial governance background who are willing to play a significant role in developing the site. These contributors will be publicly and quite visibly acknowledged on portions of the site reserved for this purpose.
Sponsorships -- for those who help to provide the financial support needed to maintain and operate the Commons. These too are quite visibly acknowledged.

Further participation options are listed on the participation page.

Guidlines for Using Commons Resources:

TGC allows personal use of and links to TGC resources free of charge. For people who want to re-use or reprint Commons resources online or in paper form (articles or books), we ask that you follow the Commons Use Guidelines.

Acknowledgements:

Many people have helped bring TGC to life. They include:

Marcel Arsenault and Bob Haywood

First and foremost, many thanks to Marcel Arsenault, founder of One Earth Future Foundation, who generously provides the resources for this project. Equal in importance to TGC is Robert Haywood, who, at the time of TGC's beginning, was aptly named OEF's "Chief Vision Officer." Bob’s vision of a knowledge base on governance that would help OEF and governance practitioners world-wide share innovative ideas and transform broken systems into well-working ones. He came to the Conflict Information Consortium inquiring about knowledge bases, and together we developed the vision which has grown into TGC.

Guy Burgess, Heidi Burgess, and Michael Torley

The Conflict Information Consortium's Heidi Burgess and Guy Burgess also were Co-Directors of the TGC project from its inception until January 2012. Guy was the primary designer; Heidi worked primarily in the area of content development. Michael Torley, CIC’s multitalented Professional Research Assistant, built the system. They continue their incredible work at beyondintractability.org, something OEF is very proud to have supported through the creation of the Commons.

Jeffrey French

Jeffrey French strategically planned and managed OEF’s contributions to the Commons since May 2010, serving as OEF's representative on the TGC Executive Committee with Heidi and Guy. He now supervises the system during its transition period to GovIT.

Randi Abels, Lauren Bader, Caitlin Kauffman, Karen McKenna, and Vicky Wei

A number of student research assistants have helped screen and code data to go into the knowledge base: Randi Abels, Lauren Bader, Caitlin Kaufmann, and Karen McKenna, all with CIC, were the initial "editors" of the Governance Chronicle, and have screened material to be included in the other portals as well.

Paula Fierstein, Roberta Spivak, Eamon Aloyo, and Daniel Klein

Paula, Roberta, and Eamon are all employees of OEF who have worked on TGC in differing capacities. Paula documented the data entry procedures; Roberta edited submitted articles and has been helping with data uploading; and Eamon has written (with a co-author here and there) the Rights, Legitimacy, and Politics portal pages. Dan Klein was IT Director of OEF for several months, during which time he helped with developing OEF's IT capacity to work on TGC.

Andrea Bartoli and John Paul Lederach

Additional support and development ideas have come from Andrea Bartoli, Dean of the School of Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University and John Paul Lederach, Professor of Peacebuilding at Notre Dame University. Andrea and John Paul travelled to Boulder in May 2010 to attend our "Proof of Concept" meeting where we demonstrated the feasibility of the system. We would not have been able to do that without Andrea's and John Paul's support.