“This is what democracy looks like!” This is a slogan I have heard chanted at various rallies and protests. During those experiences, I agreed. After working at the Sego Lily School for four months, where democracy is integrated into the culture of the school, I have formed different ideas. Perhaps people marching in the streets holding signs that display their convictions is more a reflection of a system that lacks enough entry points into the decision making arenas, and less a demonstration of true democracy. Now I perceive democracy to be a system in which people have equal and readily available access to participate in making decisions that affect their lives. In the Sego Lily School, democracy is the pillar upholding our actions and decisions.

With its roots in Greece and later Locke and Hobbes, democracy rests on the assumption that the state of human nature is despicable and thus people agree upon a set of codes to escape the war of all against all (Audi, 1995). While I do not hold such pessimistic views of human nature, I do value democracy as an egalitarian way to construct laws and governments that serve society. I am more in alignment with author Reinhold Neibuhr’s analysis that “The human capacity for good makes democracy possible. The human capacity for evil makes it necessary. Democracy is integral to and made possible by the capacity of human beings to forge purposes beyond themselves” (1998). Democracy recognizes people as being able to intelligently govern themselves and incorporates diverse perspectives to reach compromises. People get the opportunity to voice their needs, concerns, values, and inspirations. Decisions can be made through either majority rules or consensus.

A Living Democracy
The founding fathers designed the republic we in which we participate today based on democratic principals. Republics rely on elected representatives to make decisions. Representative politics minimize bureaucracy and maximize efficiency. However, they also limit the public’s capacity to shape laws that affect their lives. Politicians receive much of their campaign funds from large corporations with profit as their agenda. Thus, it is easy to see why it is difficult to for them to write laws and policies that reflect the views of the public majority.

I came across author Frances Moore Lappe while researching for my senior thesis in college. She introduced the concept of a “living democracy” as a way to revitalize democracy in the United States. She envisions a dynamic culture of community cooperation and problem solving (Lappe, 1995). A living democracy means people in all sectors of society directly make decisions regarding their communities’ problems, needs, and goals. She illuminates this concept further with the following excerpt: “the best solutions draw on the insights and creativity of those who have had direct experience of the problem at hand” (1995).

Lappe makes it clear that the skills to be an active participant in a living democracy are currently lacking in our culture. People gain the skills of listening, conflict resolution, long range planning, compromise, mediation, and analytical thinking through practice (Lappe, 1994). How do we raise democratic citizens? Lappe points to the obvious: our schools.

Lappe suggests creating school systems that are more than “factory models.” She wrote, “But in truth, the factory model of education allots teachers very little. They just work the learning assembly line: Screw on some science here, attach a little math there, pound in a little history, and out comes a shiny new graduate. Teachers aren’t co-creators of the process: they simply are conveyors of mandated data” (Lappe). Alternatively, we can revitalize the culture of education to create a living democracy in schools so that youth realize that democracy is not just a form of government, but a way of life (Lappe).

When I first came across these ideas I imagined students with limited decision making power. Perhaps they would vote on a given set of choices for an assignment. But after participating in the Sego Lily School, Lappe’s ideas have new meaning for me. I am no longer theorizing about participating in a living democracy, I am experiencing one. We fully embody the concept of a “shared culture of responsibility” (Lappe).

In the Sego Lily School Meeting, each student and staff member has one equal vote and we practice majority rules. We don’t just make mundane decisions; we face tough issues. We have debated profane language, the safety of pets in school, and budget allocations. A theme that we often examine is how to balance one person’s freedom and expression with another person’s comfort. School Meeting Members get the opportunity to forge solutions beyond this dichotomy.

Sego Lily School students are acquiring a sense of agency, the ability to exert power. In one School Meeting in which staff had requested voting on a hot issue the following week, a student declared, “The staff are just afraid to vote because they know we out number them today.” I loved witnessing this student’s suspicion that we were infringing on justice. We need people closely protecting fairness in our society. I explained that as long as the students choose to come to the School Meeting, they always out-number staff. The look on the student’s face changed and I could see his understanding of his agency deepen.

To the Future
As the United States helps other countries establish democratic practices, I think it is important to take a closer look at freedom and democracy in our own country. How free are children that have to ask to do something so innately human as go to the bathroom? Why do we demand that they follow rules that they did not help form? This practice conditions them to accept a role of subordination. This has nothing to do with democracy and egalitarianism. If we want our children to be democratic citizens, then schools that practice democracy are necessary.

I see the Sego Lily School as a colossal force of hope as we move further into the 21st century. We are reshaping the culture of our country by taking giant steps towards a more democratic society. The children that graduate from the Sego Lily School will take their skills of dialogue and compromise and continue to lay the foundation of a living democracy.

Now I understand clearly. If you have not been to a Sego Lily School Meeting, imagine a group of people comfortably seated on chairs and couches. The chairperson reads a rule that would affect them all. She says, “All in favor?” and those that feel inside that the rule is just and worthy raise their hands. “All opposed?” She says, and those that do not see it as just and worthy raise their hands. A count is taken, a decision is made. This is what democracy looks like.

Audi, Robert. The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
Lappe, Frances Moore and Paul Martin Dubois. “Beneath ‘ politics’: don’t let people off the hook. Social policy v 26, n1 (Fall, 1995): 25.
Lappe, Frances Moore and Paul Martin Dubois. “Educating real-world problems solvers”. National civic review v 83, n3 (Summer-fall, 1994): 240.
Neibuhr, R. The Nature and Destiny of Man. New York: Scribner, 1964.