The Unfinished Work*
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Interestingly enough on the day before this eventful Friday in which the USA government transfers leadership, I got my copy of a book in which I have a chapter about democracy: “The Unfinished Work”: Organizational Democracy.
The chapter is one of several in this brand new book: “International Librarianship: Developing Professional, Intercultural, and Educational Leadership”.
My chapter describes the “Democratic Workplace” class I have been teaching at the University of Latvia in Riga since 2012. This Spring I will teach the 6th iteration of the class.
Aimed at librarian practitioners and graduate students, the class introduces democratic concepts to how people (not just librarians) organize to pursue their cooperative mission.
I discuss how the class came into being, its goals, and provide a brief discussion of content and methodology. The latter may be of interest to anyone engaged in training initiatives because my approach is more of the “flipped” pedagogy than the lecture/textbook variety. I rely heavily on the students teaching themselves and their peers – if you will, I expect the students to “coach” each other and to take responsibility for their learning. In other words, it models democracy in action.
So, have a gander. The Amazon listing permits a peek.
*Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg, November 19, 1863 spoke of the “unfinished work” (democracy); that it was up to us to confront this “great task”, ensuring “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
© Copyright John Lubans 2017
John Lubans - portrait by WSJ