About the Center For Wise DemocracyWe offer a set of social innovations by which to facilitate "all the people" to come together as "We the People" and achieve breakthrough progress on the most urgent impossible-seeming issues.Center For Wise DemocracyCWD_40b398b4-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea00CWD Board & Key SupportersJim RoughCo-founder and President ~ Jim is a social innovator and Director of the Center for Wise Democracy. He is a speaker, seminar leader and author of the book, “Society’s Breakthrough! Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People.”(2002). As a business consultant Jim developed “Dynamic Facilitation” and “The Wisdom Council Process.” He teaches seminars on these tools all over the world so individuals, organizations and politics can benefit. His formal education includes an AB degree in physics from Occidental College, plus Masters degrees in Electrical Engineering and Business from Columbia University.Markus GoetschArtistic Director ~ Markus learned the craft of Dynamic Facilitation ‘in residence’ with Jim and Jean Rough in Port Townsend. He has conducted many interviews on film with core practitioners in the field, as well as collaborative film projects with Martin Rausch to further illuminate the application of this model. He studied communication design and film production, working in television and later in film production. A documentary project on the Wisdom Council Process in Vorarlberg got him in touch with Dynamic Facilitation. A couple of years later he joined Jim and Jean Rough to study the social innovations of Dynamic Facilitation, Choice Creating and the Wisdom Council Process. Markus teaches Dynamic Facilitation and works as a Content Creator, Mediator and Organizational Developer out of Bregenz and Vienna, Austria. Markus is a founding member of the Dynamic Facilitation Munich Group and also serves on the Advisory board for Wise Democracy Santa Cruz County in California.Born in Vienna, resident in Vorarlberg, Austria.Corrina McFarlaneWisdom Councils Program Director ~ Dynamic Facilitation facilitator and program director of Wise Democracy Santa Cruz County, California. Corrina is a human potential counselor, certified in conflict resolution. She has served in the probation department of her community on the Restorative Justice​ board for first time offenders. She was a podcaster for the award-winning World Without Oil Alternate Reality Game, and was a long-time moderator for the presenters at the annual Ecological Farming Conference at Asilomar, Pacific Grove, California.​ ​ Corrina is​ president of the Great Questions Foundation, a founding member of WomenRise for Global Peace, and serves on the 1,000 Hummingbirds Women’s Council. The common thread is honing how we access and engender inspiration and reciprocity from divergent perspectives for shifts and breakthroughs as a People and as a species.Corrina was born in the British Isles and has resided in California, in the San Francisco Bay Area, for the past ​30​ years.Johanna Lor Rain ParryWisdom Councils Development Director ~ Johanna is a long-time environmental/social change activist who has worked successfully for landscape protection, traditional indigenous lands recovery, sustainable housing promotion, and elder support. She has assisted multiple nonprofit organizations to achieve their specific missions.Today she has come to believe that the Wise Democracy approach of Dynamic Facilitation of small local groups to generate powerful solutions to monster problems “offers a way through” for "we the people" to regain our democratic control over our localities, our states and our global countries. Johanna is the founder of the organization Natural Villages, and co-founder of Womenrise for Global Peace. She still serves the 1000 hummingbirds women's council. She was born in Redwood City, Ca, and currently resides with one of her three sons, in Washington state.Essential Wisdom Program AdvisorsNancy Borge-RiisNancy has deep roots with Jim and Jean Rough and shares their penchant for transformative models and practices, originally through the Guild for Psychological Studies. The Essential Wisdom series was her cue to step in to help shepherd a national citizens Wisdom Council for the United States. Nancy is a Marriage & Family Therapist - practicing in Mckinleyville, California.Jim LeeJim is a retired sales and marketing executive, but his real passion is good public policy. He believes that the Wisdom Council Process is the essential missing ingredient (the “secret sauce”, as Jim Rough says) in formulating sound policies.Jim serves on the Boards of Fix Democracy First and JUUST Washington. He organized the Global Climate Rally in Spokane, opposition to the TransPacific Partnership, and the oil train ban that was ultimately adopted by the Washington State Legislature.Jim is a third generation Eastern Washingtonian, and currently lives in Spokane.John Mc NamaraJohn is a business owner near Munich. He is a societal activist having organized seminars and speaking engagements on Dynamic Facilitation and the Wisdom Council Process. He is a founding member of the Center of Excellence for Dynamic Facilitation based in Munich and an enthusiastic member of the Center for Wise Democracy.​CWD Sounding Boards​CWD essential “sounding boards” over time and spaceMartin Rausch​As a filmmaker, Martin, over many years, has created a range of Dynamic Facilitation & Wisdom Council shorts and animations, including collaboratively with Markus Goetsch, especially focused on making the model more accessible to a broader public.Martin: “A large part of humanity is becoming more and more aware that we have an influence on the ecology of the earth and that the life of future generations is even being called into question. While researching a documentary film project, I noticed that the great civilizations in world history have failed in dealing with complexity and that their own actions have brought about their ecological or social collapse. The question therefore arose for me, what we can learn and do in order to be able to think, learn and act together regardless of our differences and origins - starting in the families up to the globally active organizations.”Born in Bern, Switzerland and raised in South Africa, the USA and Switzerland;Resident in Thun, SwitzerlandNed CrosbyA fellow social innovator, Ned is the originator of the Citizens Jury Process and the Citizen Initiative Review. In 2011 the Oregon state legislature adopted into law the Citizen’ Initiative Review which uses the Citizens Jury process to evaluate initiatives and publish the results in the official voters guide.Larry MorrellChief Operating Grandpa. Lucid sounding board for Jim through Seasons of weekly coffee meetups. Deep roots in organizational development; strategies and skills for creating effective organizations acquired from over 30 years in various semiconductor capacities.Larry on Dynamic Facilitation: "It's a tabula rasa, a blank slate; it works every time... not sometimes sorta maybe...If you run the model it works every time." CWD Champions & Foundational FiguresDeAnna MartinEmeritus: DeAnna served on the Board from its earliest inception. In 2002, Jim and Jean Rough, with DeAnna Martin, co-founded the Center for Wise Democracy to encourage experiments with the Wisdom Council (the same year in which Jim published his book Society's Breakthrough! Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People).Don Miller PhDEmeritus: Don served on the Board of the Center for Wise Democracy from 2006. He is a retired professor, author, consultant, and facilitator in Dynamic Facilitation. He worked 10 years as an internal consultant with Xerox and IBM and taught for 25 years at Virginia Commonwealth University in the School of Business.Kay VogtEmeritus: Kay Vogt is a family business advisor, dynamic facilitator and licensed psychologist. After serving as a manager for AT&T she went back to school to earn a doctorate degree with a focus on Community. An original board member of the Center for Wise Democracy, she has witnessed the unparalleled power of the Wisdom Council to empower ordinary citizens to take their rightful place in the governance process.Dan RoughDan has been practicing and teaching Dynamic Facilitation since the 1990s. He facilitates meetings in corporate settings. In 1994 he initiated the first Wisdom Council ever as a high school project.Jean RoughCo-founder ~ Jean co-founded the Center for Wise Democracy. She died June 22, 2019.Societies​Global society...To solve issues like the climate crisis or to adequately manage the global commons (e.g. soils, fresh water, oceans, the gene pool, overfishing, species extinction, etc.) requires a collective thinking process that is creative and collaborative. ... All of us need to start thinking together as a global "We the People", facing the big impossible-seeming problems like climate change, species extinction, etc., discovering what we all want, and determining what to do. We (a few of us) can FACILITATE this essential "We the People" conversation into being.NationsNational society (e.g The United States) ... The founders of the United States designed a system of government based in competition. But this 18th century design is breaking down as we become more inter-dependent, needing to cooperate. How do we preserve the progress and benefits of the current system, yet safely transition to a system based in collaboration?StatesStates... The Wisdom Council Process has already been adopted into the constitutions of two states of Austria. There it is being used to help resolve issues like the influx of Syrian refugees, land use planning, etc. Here's a way to dramatically reduce partisan wrangling. Elected officials benefit from this new voice of the "public will".LocalitiesLocal towns, cities & communities ... A group of community leaders (or government) can implement the Wisdom Council Process at the local level to facilitate "the people" to address and solve difficult issues.TownsCitiesCommunitiesOrganizationsOrganizations ... The Wisdom Council Process can also be used in organizations, churches, conferences and other human networks. (See examples: a food co-op, a conference, corporations)Co-opsConferencesCorporationsBreakthrough progress on the most urgent impossible-seeming issues_40b39a3a-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea00To facilitate "all the people" to come together as "We the People"_40b39b5c-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea00StrategyOffer a strategy for addressing Monster issues_40b39cf6-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea00At the Center for Wise Democracy we offer a breakthrough strategy for addressing Monster issues, a way that "we" (a few of us) can facilitate "all the people" to face these Monsters; reach wise unity through shifts and breakthroughs; and provide responsible leadership to governments, the economy and the culture. This strategy is safe. It leaves our current System alone, except it adds a new ongoing "We the People" conversation, which transforms the System. For the U.S. this simple change would address a whole list of Monster Issues. And turn our "constitutional republic" into a "true democracy", a "Wise Democracy".CoicesReach clarity on situations and choices about what to do_40b39e0e-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea001Choice-creating ... is a form of thinking where groups face impossible-seeming issues and reach clarity on what is the situation and what to do. Choice-creating is "opposite" to decision-makingFacilitationFacilitate groups in the spirit of choice-creating_40b39f30-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea002Dynamic Facilitation (DF) ... is a way to reliably facilitate groups into the spirit of choice-creating, where they face difficult issues and achieve win/win unity.WisdomFacilitate large groups of people in the spirit of choice-creating_40b3a07a-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea003Wisdom CouncilsThe Wisdom Council Process (WCP)... is a way to facilitate large systems of people into the spirit of choice-creating. It combines an ongoing series of randomly selected people, Dynamic Facilitation and opportunities for the public to hear and consider the results. Using it a large system of people (e.g. community, corporation or nation) can face and solve big problems together (i.e. "wise democracy")TransformationTransform societies toward collective consciousness_40b3a1ba-c583-11ec-9d15-70e52583ea004​Society's Breakthrough ... is when we apply the Wisdom Council Process to society itself, global or national. Here's how a society can transform itself toward collective consciousness — i.e. economics, governance and civic life.2022-04-26https://www.wisedemocracy.org/OwenAmburOwen.Ambur@verizon.net