History

The Canadian Community for Dialogue and Deliberation (C2D2) is a Canadian not-for-profit organization that was incorporated in 2006.  C2D2 is a network of individuals and organizations, across Canada, sharing the belief that dialogue and deliberation (D&D) can help build better communities, better organizations and stronger democracies. 

The C2D2 initiative originated with the launch of the first-ever Canadian Conference on Dialogue and Deliberation held in Ottawa in October 2005, which brought together practitioners, researchers and citizens interested in the emerging D&D community in Canada.  The success of the 2005 Conference provided driving force to the creation of C2D2 as an organization/community in the following year.

C2D2 conferences, currently held every other year with a theme(s) and focus unique to each conference, are designed to provide a medium through which the D&D community can share ideas, best practices and discuss future trends in the field.  C2D2, as a community, intends to use its conferences as a tool to support the fulfilment of its mission of “enhancing the decision-making process for communities, organizations, businesses and governments through D&D, and playing a leadership role in supporting a community of practice and promoting excellence within the discipline”.  As such, while individual conferences may have their respective themes/focuses and sub-objectives, they are designed to contribute toward the achievement of the overall objective.