TIME FOR PLAN B(RATISLAVA)
OCTOBER 18, 2019 — EDWIN VAN DE SCHEUR
Photography and Cinematography: Jordy Nijenhuis
Imagine this: you’re in a hospital with a severe appendicitis and you need surgery as soon as possible. The nurses immediately put you on the brancard and stroll you off to the operating room. As they start giving you the anaesthetics, you see a man in a blue suit with messy blonde hair and a bit too over-tanned of a skin tone confidently come up to you as he flints two surgeonical knives against each other: “this situation is unacceptable! I’m gonna fix you up TRE-MEN-DOUS-LY. It’s going be HUGE. It will be the best surgery ever performed. Really, EVER. The people love me so much and so will you!”
The nurses uncomfortably avoid your confused gaze. Their trust in the surgeon seems to be just as low as yours, but what can they do? He’s the surgeon people want, after all. You want to panic, but the sedation has already kicked in. As your eyes close, there’s nothing left to do but hope for the best.
“Policymakers are in dire need of a Plan B.”
The so-called surgeon-metaphor is often used to address a supposed flaw in our democratic system: the fact that we can elect people into a public office who actually have no clue how to run it. That should be weird. After all, we don’t select the surgeons in our hospital based on a popularity contest, so why should we in the case of public offices? Don’t we want an expert running our government?
To me, it’s a compelling argument, albeit with a number of troublesome anti-democratic implications. And clearly, a lot of people are not convinced by it whatsoever. We only need to look at the 2016 elections in the US, the results of the Brexit referendum, or the wider rise of anti-establishment parties, to see that many people are actually fed-up with the argument that we should leave politics to ‘the expert’.
Of course, there’s a lot going on behind these frustrations: corruption, globalisation, and of course polarisation. And while there are for sure plenty of rotten apples out there, I also still believe there are many potential and expert policymakers who are dying to make a positive impact.
The thing is, these policymakers are in dire need of a Plan B. The old-style ‘trust me, I’m the expert’ argument has run its course. Luckily for them; this Plan B has already been written. Not by an established think tank or a professor who’s been studying the subject for over a decade, but by a small movement of enthusiastic professionals in Bratislava, Slovakia.
THE BRATISLAVA PLAN
‘Platform for Bratislava’ is a movement that was founded around 2016 by urban architect Matúš Vallo. The movement started out as a collective of over 70 experts, all residents of Bratislava, who regularly came together in their spare time to discuss the future of their city. Gatherings, roundtables, debates, and town meetings; they were all held in a period of two years with the intention of gathering as much feedback as possible to eventually publicise the results in a final document: ‘The Bratislava Plan’ or simply ‘Plan B’.
At its core, ‘Plan B’ is a manifesto for a new, modern Slovakian capital. Its twelve chapters are divided according to the various working groups of the platform, and cover topics such as healthcare, environment, and accessibility.
We spoke with Lukas Zorad from the organisation PDCS (Partners for Democratic Change Slovakia) which has consulted ‘Platform for Bratislava’ on various occasions. Lukas explains that Plan B isn’t designed to offer final solutions. Instead, it offers a platform where solutions are constantly being discussed, reviewed and revised:
“Nothing is set in stone. It’s normal for members of the movement to disagree with one another. The movement is fundamentally different from your usual political party that constantly enforces an ideological party line from the top down.”
“Plan B managed to break the global trend.”
“Here, politics were often considered ideological, intertwined with personal interests, and even dirty sometimes,” Zorad elaborates. “Proposals were barely judged on their merit. Rather, politicians judged them by the people who put them on the table: if they were a political opponent, you wouldn’t support their policy, no matter what.”
This status quo has led to frustrations amongst many Slovakians. It was part of the reason why the Platform for Bratislava started to come together: to think of impactful improvements for the city that were barely being discussed at the higher political levels. However, it didn’t take long for the Platform to realise that if they actually wanted their ideas to be implemented, they needed to shake up the status quo drastically. By 2018, and with the ‘Plan B’ book ready to publish, the Platform’s gaze was set on the city’s mayoral elections of December.
Matúš Vallo (source: SME - Gabriel Kuchta
Signifying their intended break with the political establishment, Vallo enlisted as an independent candidate. However, he was far from the campaign’s sole focal point. It were the Platform, the experts, and, of course, Plan B that formed the actual centrepieces for Vallo’s bid for office.
It all proved to be a sound strategy as Vallo managed to win the mayoral elections with 36,5 percent of the votes, making him the first outsider in Slovakia’s entire democratic history to attain this position.
As ordinary as Plan B seems to be, it’s actually quite unique in the level of enthusiasm that seems to surround it. It managed to break the global trend. Suddenly, people describing themselves as experts won a popular election. The question is then of course: how?
OUT OF THE IVORY TOWER
According to Zorad, their attitude was key: “Their campaign was very refreshing. They combined the content of their plans with form and humor. Instead of attacking others, they decided to elaborate their own ideas.”
“From the very start, they’ve held openness and transparency in high regards,” Zorad continues. “Even now in office, they’re not afraid to share bad news. For example, their plans for modernising the city’s infrastructure has often lead to roads being closed down, but they tell it well in advance, are open about potential delays, and explain why it’s necessary. They take the citizens of the city seriously.”
“The rise of the movement has been this snowball effect.”
However, the explanation of Plan B’s success goes far beyond mere transparent communications. From the start, the Platform was clear in their goal to involve as many people as possible. The experts wouldn’t just argue with each other in the working groups, they would often get out of their ivory tower to discuss their ideas with a larger audience before pinning them down.
Zorad describes how he saw the process unfold over the years. Starting at a couple of gatherings, more and more people slowly began to understand the Platform’s intentions: “The rise of the movement has been this snowball effect that even now, after the elections, hasn’t stopped yet.”
Today, the initiators of Plan B are coming up with a lot of creative ways to involve the citizens in their policymaking: "For example, on a couple of city squares, they placed entire installations for people to express their opinion on the squares’ future,” Zorad explains. “It takes more time, but because they involve more people, the city’s policies yield better results and, in the long run, prove to be much more fruitful investments.”
We also spoke with Ctibor Kostal, a city manager at the Bratislava City Hall. He was a founding member of the Bratislava Platform and part of multiple of the initial working groups. In his eyes, the involvement of larger audiences is crucial for good governance:
“I think civic engagement is crucial for Slovakia, for Europe, but also for a city like Bratislava. And not just when people go out and vote during elections. When you want to have a transparent government, you need someone who oversees your policies and the way you implement them.”
“It’s important they ask questions. It’s good feedback for us, and also allows us to improve our communication when something is not clear.”
Watch the entire interview with Ctibor Kostal below, text continues after.
A NEW CITY, A NEW EUROPE
Vallo and his team are bridge builders and that is not only seen in the way they tackle policymaking. This year, Vallo visited Bratislava Pride as the first mayor ever to do so. With over 10.000 visitors, it was the biggest pride celebration in the country so far, and according to Zorad, there was barely any backlash to be found: “His visit was a big gesture,” he says enthusiastically. “It proves that positive narratives are important!”
Even more impressively, Vallo’s focus on positive narratives seems to have brought about a drastic change in the city’s political culture. Whereas previous administrations were usually caught between ideological fault lines, Vallo’s team is constantly negotiating with both sides of the aisle, often finding cross-party agreements.
“The landscape is changing rapidly.” Zorad explains. “The nature of the discussions is different, more solution-orientated.” Just as the Platform allows its members to form their own opinions, it allows members of other parties to join in the discussion. More than ever before, policies are judged on their merit, and not by other, more personal factors.”
“We need to be successful. Not just for our own future, but for the future of this kind of approach.”
All in all, Zorad would describe the overall mood of the city’s population as positive: “Even the sceptical people seem to slowly turn around. Take my father for example, he was definitely not a fan of Vallo at the start of his campaign. He didn’t know him and therefore didn’t trust him. With Vallo in office for a couple of months now, he has turned around quite a bit. He’s constantly going out taking pictures of the things that are happening and changing, and overall he’s just enjoying them."
It’s a positive example that is also being followed by other cities in the country. And just as Bratislava has learned a lot from other European cities in their new approach to policy, so too can other cities learn from Bratislava.
Kostal believes that the stakes are high: “We need to be successful. Not just for our own future, but for the future of this kind of approach. An approach that’s not just about populism and politics, but about content and expertise. We need to be successful to show future generations that when you do it properly, and when you work hard, you can make actual impact.”
THE NEW SURGEONS
For a while now, the ‘experts’ have been struggling to maintain their reputation. Enough so that many citizens across Europe and America are more comfortable with placing inexperienced surgeons in the operation room, rather than allowing the established surgeons to continue carrying out their profession. As people seem to be frustrated with an established generation of experts, the Platform for Bratislava offers a hopeful yet serious wake-up call.
The Platform was built up from one central philosophy: to allow for open deliberation amongst its members. It was a principle that fundamentally broke with Slovakia’s established party traditions and, by conquering the mayor’s seat in Bratislava, set about a rapid change in the capital’s political culture.
What’s crucial however is that they’ve taken this internal philosophy outwards. Even though they considered themselves to be the professionals, they were not afraid to reach out to the wider public. They didn’t just put trust in each other’s perspectives, but also in the perspectives of those who might not initially classify as an expert. They understand that the citizens of Bratislava, as they need to undergo the implemented policies, are also experts in their own regards.
Besides its potential for Slovakia’s political future, this break in political culture is also a great opportunity and lesson for policymakers in other parts of the world: showing them that truthful and open deliberation, while costing a lot of time and energy, can go a long way. Experts need to climb out of their ivory towers and enter the scene of the streets. Only by opening yourself up to new perspectives, can truly revolutionary policies be introduced that break away from the trends of polarisation.
