Gene Park: The Thirst for Engagement — and Coffee
If you spent a little time in the Civil Cafe, you wanted more. That much we learned Wednesday night.
“Absolutely riveting” and “intelligent” were some of the terms used to describe University of Hawaii law professor Randy Roth’s discussion on civic engagement. Even if you’re intimately familiar with the story of “, like an old tale, it was exciting to hear about it now, from Roth, with a decade and a half of hindsight.
Citing an old Chinese adage, Roth said, “Words don’t cook rice.” And he noted that much of his work, from editing and co-authoring “The Price of Paradise” books to writing the “Broken Trust” essay that brought down Bishop Estate trustees, had to do with words. That’s why he eventually decided to venture into policy-making as a senior adviser to then-Gov. Linda Lingle.
“I don’t need to be loved by people, I don’t need to be liked by people,” Roth said.
“But if you do, maybe civic engagement isn’t the best thing for you.”
In Hawaii, where being confrontational, even for a good cause, is often discouraged, he recounted the flack that he took for his various efforts. Those were words that many in the audience took to heart, including a group of activists who are working to encourage “smarter” development in the fast-growing Kakaako district of Honolulu.
Rather than get into the nitty-gritty, I encourage you to check out the entire livestream, which is available below. Please skip the introductory section and begin at the 22-minute mark. That is when the discussion begins.
During the talk, we set up an online chat, using , which is essentially a micro-blogging platform that can be used for live blogs at events (like Civil Cafe or sports), live chats and curating social media to provide greater context. We expect to re-use it in the future — and we hope that you will take to it. (Unlike on our articles, you don’t need to have a Facebook account to comment in those chats.) ScribbleLive lets you chat under any name you want. I sometimes use it as Mr. Bojangles.
For the online listeners who lamented that they couldn’t hear the audience, we will set up a live audience mic for such events in the future.
After the event, we asked some members of the audience how often they would like to attend our Civil Cafe. A few suggested that they would come to our newsroom “every week.” We love seeing you, and the excited response, but for practical and logistical reasons, we’re currently planning on doing them every two months or so.
And, given how long people stayed, we may make them longer so that people can enjoy more face to face discussions after the main talk and Q & A. We are also open to hosting Civil Cafes at other venues.
Before leaving you with the livestream link, I just wanted to say that it was a privilege to host the event, ask questions of our guest speaker, and renew our commitment to live forum discussions around crucial topics. And, as always, we are always happy to hear your ideas about potential topics or individuals to anchor future discussions.
