Who should decide?

Consensus is a slow process, and is usually reserved for the decisions that require real buy-in and commitment to follow through. It is the day-to-day minor decisions that don't benefit from that time requirement that shouldn't be a consensus process. We make those decisions every day in our families, in our work, and in our community affairs. So part of the art in leadership is figuring out when to flatten that hierarchy and engage in a process that is more inclusive than any other, consensus. The decision spectrum is, in a simplistic sense: 

Command-and-control_______representative democracy________consensus process

Each of these models is good for something and absolutely terrible at other things. The extremists who want one and only one are not wise, just doctrinaire. We see that in politics but also in so many areas of life.