Lev Rickards's blog

High Point

Formation of student group - seeing all of us work together to get it off the ground. Incorporate deliberative democracy into information work. No longer just a research assistant, but actually a professional with something to say. (Also an Aha! moment.) Reunion weekend. (Aha! moment was the talk with Richard Fuchs.) Actually thought the theoretical overview worked well at the end - "we would have been lost at the beginning."

We listed class members and rotated by two to determine which DFE proposal you read and comment on. Comments due by Monday 12/11. Final posted version by Thursday 12/14. (Is that right? -- Last day of class + 1.) What to watch for:

• If your mentor gets sick and can't be there for the first two weeks, would you have any idea what to do?
• Try to assess mentor's qualifications - will you get good guidance?

Paul used to think that there was no public interest work, just work in the private interest. Then he came around to this definition: Public interest work is work that creates public goods, or reduces inequality. Something for which the benefits accrue to everyone. Ask yourself: is the work or internship you're involved in creating a public good?

Public goods

• At the margin, my use doesn't use it up.

I'm going to be emailing Peter Keller-Transburg to initiate the interview process with him. I'll track progress here at this blog posting. I guess you could say this is my way of holding myself accountable to the group.

Background

Please note the final version of this proposal: Tracking Social Performance Indicators. With much help from alumnus Sara Naab, here is my DFE proposal. I'd like to do this as an independent study this winter, if possible. The organization is "Freedom From Hunger," a training organization focusing on microfinance, health and food security. They have also have a CMS up. Edit: I wonder how the public goods/public information work concepts map to FFH. Their mission is to build capacity in microfinance institutions. Micro loans aren't public goods. I guess you could argue that the knowledge FFH provides to institutions is a public good. ie. My using the knowledge to make my institution better doesn't stop you from using the same knowledge to make your institution better. And it's difficult to exclude people from benefiting from the knowledge ...Is that right? Knowledge is hard to fence in, and all of the recipients of loans are benefiting from the dispersal of best practices. (However, FFH is trying to make money by training people in those best practices, so there must be some barrier to using the knowledge.) If this works, then my proposed DFE fits into our Public Information Work scheme as "enhancing the internal operations of organizations that perform public work." It's an information input to public work.