"A sense grows that the electorate as a whole is defenseless against the leviathan state," writes Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor in his book The Ethics of Authenticity. "A well-organized and integrated partial grouping may, indeed, be able to make a dent, but the idea that the majority of the people might frame and carry through a common project comes to seem utopian and naive. So people give up."

Referring to the general malaise experienced by many living in Western democracies, Taylor points out that the common people feel detached from the processes whereby any meaningful action or change can take place in their societies. Rather than moping around like pessimistic teenagers, suggesting we should burn the system down, he insists instead that we should get active and bring the system back to life. This is exactly what happened this past Thursday, Oct. 11, in the Bulman Centre at the University of Winnipeg, where members of the cycling advocacy group Bike to the Future met to flex their socially concerned muscles at their second annual forum, "From Imagination to Creation: The Future of Cycling in Winnipeg."

Forum organizer Molly McCracken urged the over 200 cyclists gathered to speak up, take action, and make the city of Winnipeg a better place for cycling. "All of the knowledge is here in this room," she said, "and all of the right people are here in this room, so we have a lot of experience and knowledge because we ride our bikes and we know what it's like, so we can do it." With these confident, democracy-rousing words, the group split up into smaller groups according to area of specialization or interest to hash out the specifics.

To hope that such a small group of people could affect change could be called naive, but considering the concrete results of last year's forum, the word "ambitious" is much more fitting, no irony attached. Bike to the Future outlined some of the key successes in a press release earlier this month: "the city hired an Active Transportation Co-ordinator ... we expanded our trail systems ... and new zoning bylaws require bike racks in parking lots." Funding for trails also jumped this year from $200,000 to $1.7 million. Far from naiveté, it is informed optimism that set the goal for this year's forum, which was "to celebrate advances and explore options to create a future Winnipeg as a great cycling city."

To be sure, what happened at this event must happen elsewhere, but it was my first real experience of participatory democracy. While casting a vote in federal and provincial elections is technically referred to as participating in a democracy, it is nonetheless a very hands-off process with a very limited number of choices that doesn't seem to have much to do with me beyond placing a checkmark inside a box. The process at the forum was quite different and much more involved.

Participants split up into groups under broad category headings such as "Safety and Education," "Civic Issues," "Bikes and Police," "Sharing the Road," and "Mapping Galore." This is when participants could voice individual concerns and ideas which ranged from "how to prevent death while riding on ice" and "there's nowhere to lock my bike when I go to the salon on Academy" to "but I like going through stop signs" (that one was mine) and "drivers need to know that bikers are not as soft and durable as pillows." Everyone willing to speak was listened to, suggestions, ideas, and concerns were written down and then at the end of the small group sessions the top issues with greatest consensus were compiled and presented back to the entire gathering so that the group as a whole would know what they were about. Findings and recommendations are going to be presented to city council later this year.

Karin Kliewer, membership co-ordinator and city planning grad student, talked to me about the importance of consensus building in working for social change, but was realistic about the speed at which that sometimes happens. Citing an example given by one of her professors about the Quakers, she said: "They do everything by consensus building and it took them 90 years to build consensus that they were against slavery. Even then they were way ahead of actual thought at the time. But when they had finally built that consensus, they came out so strong and were such an active voice for it. So I think that groups like Bike to the Future, when we can slowly build a critical body, a critical mass, I think that's what will make the most difference."

Though the group still seems small, they've already accomplished quite a lot, and the larger critical body is actively growing. When the forum opened at 7 p.m., Bike to the Future had 175 members. When they shut down at 9:30 p.m., it was announced that membership had surpassed the 200 mark. Despite the obvious successes, Karin still emphasized that significant progress and growing membership does not automatically guarantee that the city will continue moving forward based on the recommendations of Bike to the Future, nor even on the recommendations of city planners. The final decisions end up being entirely in the hands of politicians.

But just because the final say is technically out of the people's hands, it does not mean that if a recommendation gets blocked people should give up and fall back into the apathy Charles Taylor describes. Politicians are supposed to represent the voice of the people and they can only do so if the people keep speaking loud enough to be heard, which is exactly what Bike to the Future is doing. Bolstering the confidence and resolve of the participants during an intermission at the forum, the Purple Pirate, children's performer and bicycling advocate, wore bright spandex and rhymed, "Expecting I was to peddle alone, all 900 kilometres away from home, people said, 'Not possible, to peddle that far without a car.' But I knew I could do it, I could see it in my mind. I trained for it daily and then I would find that people can talk only about what they know. People say, 'There are places you can't go, it isn't possible, you can't do it.' But I know better. I plan to prove it."