A few months ago I attended the funeral of a water campaigner for Lough Neagh. Alan Keys began his working life as an intensive poultry farmer. Like most farmers at that time, he spread nutrient-rich chicken litter across his fields, unaware that the practice was helping to choke aquatic life downstream in the nearby Ballinderry River, which feeds into Lough Neagh. In 1995 he gave up farming to dedicate himself full time to protecting rivers. He helped found the Ballinderry River Enhancement Association which evolved into Ballinderry Rivers Trust (BRT). I, as with the many many people he quietly taught and inspired, learned a great deal from him over the years. His practice was guided by a simple principle: Think like a fish. Before developing any work in and around waterways, he would first ask: “What would the fish want?”. Alan hated big generalisations and sweeping answers. He knew that we need to hold the complexity of issues, that we are entangled in them to a greater or lesser extent, and that our agency begins in the particular and the local.
In the past few weeks, Lough Neagh has continued to draw media attention. The ongoing debate and commentary reminds me of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s powerful TED Talk on the Danger of Single Story.
Many of us are experiencing the dangers of reducing ourselves, each other and the rest of the natural world to a ‘single story’.
Another way to think about this is through the old Indian parable of the elephant and the six blind men. Each one touches a different part of the elephant - a tusk, a leg, the belly, an ear, the trunk, the tail - and draws a different conclusion: “the elephant is like a tree,”, “the elephant is like a rope”. When they compare notes, they disagree so fiercely that they quarrel and fall out. Each is partly right, but are telling a different story because they can only touch a particular ‘piece’ of the problem and none of them are able to see the whole.
The power of deliberative dialogue, which is the foundation of a citizens’ assembly, is that it surfaces, values and engages with the multiplicity of stories that exist in a system whilst also naming how power works in prioritising certain ones. Put simply, deliberation allows us to move past our single stories and begin to see the entire elephant.
As we consume ourselves with the highs and lows of politics, many species are on the move as we approach the change of seasons. As I write this, it is a time of migration, the foundational practice of all living beings, including humans. Within the Lough, the eels are starting their epic migration of 4,000 miles to the Sargasso Sea, in the North Atlantic Ocean, to breed for a single time and die.
Another story in the Lough is that of cyanobacteria. Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, come in many forms and have become the ‘bad guys’ in relation to Lough Neagh. However, they are among the oldest organisms in the world, dating back 2.1bn years, and we owe them a debt of gratitude. Cyanobacteria were the first living things to make their own food using sunlight. In the process, they released oxygen, a gas that was rare on early Earth. Over a long time, this oxygen built up in the atmosphere, making it possible for other life forms, including humans, to evolve and thrive.
“In their untold trillions, in almost every environment where there is water, even on damp rocks in deserts, they continue this valuable service, keeping the atmosphere safe for mammals to breathe.”
The problem is when there is nutrient-rich water, created by farm waste and sewage released into rivers and lakes; they multiply fast, especially in warm sunshine, creating all the problems that are now familiar to anyone who has followed the scenario at Lough Neagh - harm to the health of humans and animals, the unravelling of delicate ecosytems, unswimmable, undrinkable water, devastated livelihood. The long story of cyanobacteria generates another interesting question, and one that came up in the Assembly Motion this week on Lough Neagh. How do we name responsibility without demonising or scapegoating?
There was frustration by all the parties in relation to the failure of existing governance systems with a shared priority given to the need for more engagement and participation of communities, and key partners in the design of solutions.
In the same week, we launched our report exploring how a Citizens’ Assembly might bring value to Lough Neagh. (You can read it here: Who Speaks for the Lough.) Whilst everyone at our launch recognised the urgency, one question remained: could a Citizens’ Assembly take the time to consider the deep systems change that is needed? Such change asks us to grow new stories, new forms of governance, and relationships centred on care — relationships that could bring the Lough back into balance, where cyanobacteria find their rightful place and size again. At the heart of this lies Alan’s simple but searching question: “What would the fish want?
And with Alan’s question in mind, Involve is now asking a wide range of people, communities, and statutory organisations with an interest in the future of Lough Neagh to help shape a Lough Neagh Assembly. Together we will co-design its remit, structure, content, and mandate.
Information on the co-design process can be found here: Lough Neagh Project Page. You can submit nominations using this form Co-Design Nomination Form
The deadline for nominations is Monday 6th October.
As Alan’s funeral closed, the minister wished us well “May you have wet feet and wet hands for the purpose in hand.”