Deliberative democracy and the Tasmanian forest peace process

ABSTRACT

Decades of contention regarding Tasmania's forests have been accompanied by several attempts for peace. Most recently the ‘forest peace process’ culminated in the 2012 Tasmanian Forest Agreement (TFA). We evaluate the peace process that led to the TFA, and its subsequent dismantling, from the perspective of deliberative democracy, which promises to achieve democratically legitimate outcomes in the toughest conflicts. Using normative criteria to evaluate the deliberative democratic quality of the process, our analysis shows that trades-offs were needed, and not all normative criteria could be achieved equally and simultaneously. Despite its shortcomings, and short-lived life, the peace process illustrates the possibility of achieving meta-consensus in deep value conflicts, and the crucial role of this consensus for sustaining deliberation.

围绕塔斯马尼亚森林的冲突曾有过几次和平的尝试。最近，“森林和平进程”终于以2012年塔斯马尼亚森林协议告终。本文从协商民主（承诺在最残酷的冲突中取得从民主而言合法的结果）的角度，评估了导致塔斯马尼亚怎林协议的和平进程以及该协议随后的废除。作者使用了规范性标准来评估该过程中协商式民主的质量。根据我们的分析，需要妥协，而且并非所有规范性标准都可以公平而自发地实现。除了这些短板及短命，和平进程也显示了在很深的价值冲突中实现元共识的可能，以及这种共识在维持协商中起的关键所用。

KEYWORDS:

• deliberative democracy
• environmental conflict
• forest management
• Tasmanian forest peace process
• Tasmanian Forest Agreement

Acknowledgements

This project was approved by the University of Canberra Human Research Ethics Committee (approval 12-187). We thank the many people who provided their time and perspectives in interviews. We thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful feedback on the article. The lead author was directly involved in one of the stages of the forest peace process, being one of the experts engaged to provide advice as part of the IVG process.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Jacki Schirmer is an Associate Professor at the Centre for Research and Action in Public Health, University of Canberra, where she is undertaking research examining how natural resources affect health and well-being.

Melanie (Lain) Dare is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis, University of Canberra, where she is undertaking a project exploring alternative governance approaches for rural and regional Australia.

Selen A. Ercan is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance and the Institute for Governance and Policy Analysis, University of Canberra. Her work focuses on the merits and limits of deliberative democratic approach in the face of irreconcilable value conflicts.

ORCID

Jacki Schirmer http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3443-4686

Melanie Dare http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3134-7723

Selen A. Ercan http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3649-2882

Notes

1 Tasmanian peace process participants included: Forest Industries Association Tasmania, the National Association of Forest Industries which later became the Australian Forest Products Association, the Australian Forest Contractors’ Association, the Tasmanian Forest Contractors’ Association, Timber Communities Australia, the Tasmanian Country Sawmillers’ Federation, the Australian Conservation Foundation, The Wilderness Society, Environment Tasmania Inc. and the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the Cooperative Research Centre for Forestry.