1 Deliberative Democracy and Dispute Resolution * LAWRENCE SUSSKIND ** I. INTRODUCTION Imagine the following: a small city of about 30,000 must decide whether to allow construction of a controversial industrial facility. The plant will generate sorely needed jobs and tax revenue, but it might also pose serious environmental and public-health risks. Under normal circumstances, the city council would require the developer to undertake a set of technical studies that city departments would review before a permit could be granted. Then, the city government (including several elected and/or appointed boards) might hold a hearing, and ultimately vote on whether to approve the project. Along the way, there might be a lot of letters to the editor of the local newspaper and even a referendum. Consider this alternative: city council hires a professional neutral—a mediator—to meet privately and confidentially with all relevant stakeholders, both in and outside the city, to learn their concerns about the proposed project. Along with the developer of the proposed facility and appointees from a range of city and regional departments, carefully selected stakeholder representatives are invited to engage in joint fact-finding to see if they can resolve their differences. After a year of highly transparent and mediator- facilitated problem-solving, the forty (or so) stakeholder representatives sign an agreement. It spells out the circumstances under which they can all support a revised version of the project. It also commits them to making a series of voluntary payments and other contingent commitments from the developer and the city—maybe even the state and federal government, too— that go well beyond what the city has a statutory right to require. They all present the agreement to the city council, which ratifies it. Its details are added as conditions to the various formal permits granted to the developer. The agreement creates a joint monitoring committee whose staff is paid by the project developer. The project goes forward with little or no political opposition. * This article is based on the Schwartz Lecture on Dispute Resolution given by the author at The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law on April 10, 2008. ** Lawrence Susskind is the Ford Professor of Urban and Environmental Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Vice-Chair for Instruction, Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School; Founder, Consensus Building Institute. He can be reached at susskind@mit.edu.