1. Achieving consensus by nonviolent opponents is the third major challenge to power. The first is

an individual's decision to participate. Second, is the affirmation of nonviolence. Third, is the

crafting of collective wisdom.

2. Consensus is both an opening of debate to all voices and a narrowing of opportunities for swift

and sometimes imprudent action. What appear to be diametrical opposites sometime follow

divergent paths around the circle before meeting.

3. Consensus is the opportunity, not the necessity, for wisdom. Method exempts us neither from

circumstance nor human frailty.

4. Consensus is best served by groups long struggling with one another, not by those who share the

same opinion uncritically.

5. Consensus as a living process is nurtured by the active participation of those who remember their

strong reservations about the use of consensus.

6. Consensus as an attribute of nonviolence is indeed an experiment with truth, the convergence of

means and ends. The rights of each respected; the voices of all heard; the community as guarantors

of both the one and the many.

7. Consensus decision making is the beginning of a nonviolent action, not just an administrative

practice. An action consensus achieved through intimidation and coercion is the root of divisions

that will be exploited by power.

8. Consensus reached by groups most concerned and knowledgeable about contentious issues

should be most highly valued and supported as consensus and given much weight by the larger

group, not carelessly discarded as simply another proposal.

9. Consensus, like history, cannot deny the influence of the past. Consensus as a stultifying process

means the abuse of past decisions as fall backs to prevent action in response to changed

circumstances. Consensus as a liberating process is the ability of one member speaking the truth to

change the minds and the decisions of the multitude.

10. Consensus process should not cede success to those with the hardest asses and no kids, willing

to sit at endless meetings.

11. The most important result of any consensus decision making meeting is to strengthen the

respect of participants for one another, whether or not they have decided to make a decision. A

productive consensus can be a recognition that differences prevent groups from working together in

the immediate future.

12. The power of the weak lies in our unity, and ultimately in our power to withhold our consent

and participation in the designs of power. Unity is much dependent upon how we feel about our

decisions. This is reflected in the strength of our consensus, not the physical force of our actions.

13. Consensus is a powerful process whose strength lies, in part, in its ponderous vulnerability, and

the care each member must exercise to protect it.

14. Autonomy is the ally, not the enemy of consensus. Consensus as a tool for liberatory social

change is an expression of the interdependence of freedom and community. Without community,

freedom is the lonely and desperate assertion of ego. Without freedom, community withers and

consensus means obedience.

15. As the size and complexity of groups increase, the number of consensus decisions and their

complexity made by the group as a whole should decrease. Decisions need be made by those most

directly effected and at a scale that permits effective action. An affinity group can decide to take

public transportation instead of driving cars. A neighborhood can reach consensus to close streets

to cars traffic. A nation needs to decide by consensus to replace 500 million automobiles.

16. Consensus can work on any scale. It needs to be informed by agreements that guide its conduct,

provide means for change, recognize the need to make some decisions in a timely fashion, and

accept the fundamentally voluntary nature of participation and continuation of unity.

17. Consensus is ultimately not the expression of nation states, but of the multitude of individuals

and of their differing and diverse communities. Consensus is inclined to nurture confederations, not

centralized power.

18. Consensus organizations fail not when they when they find themselves divided, but because

they are not longer capable of creative synthesis and equilibration of concerns. They succumb to

the competing tyrannies of the blockheads.

19. Consensus groups weaken themselves by making facile compromises between opposing

imperatives, instead of resolving differences.

20. Quaker consensus is through a loving struggle for agreement. But in groups whose members

can in no sense be called friends, consensus more easily deteriorates into power politics. Majorities

intimidate dissenters and their expression of dissent; minorities use the consensus process to

prevent action. When words cannot be spoken, and when spoken are not heard respectfully, the

exercise of power robs consensus of its strength.

21. It is far easier to fight for control of an organization and its doctrine using consensus as cudgel

than it is to contest with oppressive power for the sake of liberation.

22. Just as violence may sometimes appear necessary or unavoidable, so is some form of

majoritarian voting. Consensus should represent the convergence of means and ends, not a trap that

forecloses necessary action.

23. Humility and humor help provide a perspective on ends and means and improve the prospects

for nonviolent action.

24. Consensus thrives on truth, often from unexpected sources than can weigh more heavily on the

scales of liberation than the impassioned and informed plans of leaders.

25. In consensus, the first to speak may be the quickest and most confident, but not necessarily the

wisest.

26. Large groups broken into small groups with different tasks can often move mountains by

breaking them into pebbles.

27. Consensus should embrace the common will and wisdom when it is apparent, deciding first that

we will follow the path with a heart and act, then working step by step on the how, not struggling

with attempts to agree first to everything, or to nothing at all.

28. Consensus is predicated on the willingness to accept that even opponents have at least a piece of

the truth.

29. Consensus thrives on trust, withers before the sense of betrayal and violations of the process

even through the benevolent imposition of the wisdom of leaders.

30. Consensus is sometimes alleged to be a process. This is true, but also a dead metaphor.

Process can be the mace wielded by technicians, every bit as deadly as Roberts Rules. Consensus,

like love, happens not in pieces, but all at once.

31. Real consensus is hard to define. But like pornography you believe you know it when you see

it.

32. Consensus is often contrasted with majority rule, but the real comparison is with empire.

Consensus being more an assertion of ends than means, inclined to serve the interests of people

instead of power. But, of course, consensus is also corruptible and subject to abuse.

33. Good facilitators give a group every opportunity to find its way.

32. Facilitators work best in pairs, ideally balanced by age gender, temperament, inclination,

experience to equilibrate both one another and the group’s perceptions.

33. The matrix of consensus then is a relationship among crystallized opinions and nascent or

fossilized factions.

34. Good facilitators help bring groups together or to the place where they clarify and redefine

their differences. Given this,the frission between group and facilitators, as well as between the

facilitators is often of co-equal or greater importance to consensus.

35. Consensus sometimes relies upon unfocused or lightly guided discussions, waiting for truth

and direction to emerge like the sudden appearance of a crystal from a supersaturated solution.

36. General discussions, brainstorming ideas without comment, small group discussions, proposal

generation, more discussion, proposal modification, even straw votes, returning to member groups

for guidance can all be useful, but they are not the consensus version of how a bill becomes a law.

37. The big mistakes are often made in the first few minutes. Our assumptions usually define and

forecast our ends. As a creative collective process, consensus allows us to unearth unexamined and

closely guarded assumptions that masquerade as truth and common sense.

38.Power then is propped up both by what we say and by what we cannot say.

39. What is most important in consensus is usually not what groups finally decide to do, but how

they feel about their decisions. Solidarity and nonviolence trumps clever action.

40. In consensus two people can enter a meeting with what they believe are antithetical and

irreconcilable ideas, and both leave feeling they have satisfied their intentions fully.

41. Autonomy, confederal relationships, charters of rights and responsibilities are consensual

solutions to sometimes intractable disputes.

42.Consensus often involves changing the terms of debate.

Consensus thus discloses and challenges underlying power relationships.

43. Consensus by its action brings to light what is hidden.

44. Consensus means to nurture the personal power of all, and encourages the still small voice of

wisdom within each of us to be heard.

45. Consensus reduces the formal power of leaders, but not the influence of leadership, which can

be wise or foolish. Thus consensus cannot save us from ourselves. We can only do that together.

46. Someone facilitates the meeting; someone proposes the agenda; someone watches vibes;

someone writes the minutes; someone implements the decisions. The natural tendency to gravitate

to our roles is the seed from which bureaucracy and hierarchy grows.

47.Consensus as natural tendency is antagonist to nation states and nurturer of confederations. As

such it is consonant with a social anarchism. But consensus can also reproduce its own version of

unitary hierarchy and bureaucracy.

48. Consensus as liberation cannot avoid and, in fact, need embrace, the reality of conflicting and

divergent interests. Consensus is thus not a universal solvent for political and social problems. It is

a tool whereby means may approach ends. Consensus becomes a summary statement of the

relationship between the one and the many.

49. Consensus democracy transforms majoritarian factions into voices that seek the fulfillment of

diverse interests, encouraged by their power and the limits placed upon it. Consensus power then is

the ability to seek fulfillment for both oneself and others.