Equality by lot

A 2021 paper in Acta Politica by Sacha Rangoni, Camille Bedock, David Talukder analyzes interviews made with French-speaking Belgian politicians on the subject of policy making citizen bodies (which they call Deliberative Minipublics, or DMPs). A large majority among the interviewees is in favor of consultative citizen bodies, either allotted or self-selected, a minority is in favor of bodies with binding decision making powers, and a small minority (all men, it turns out) is against both.

More competent thus more legitimate? MPs’ discourses on deliberative mini-publics

Abstract: MPs face a dilemma when it comes to deliberative mini-publics (DMPs): in a context of distrust they may see it as an opportunity to re-legitimize themselves and solve complex policy issues. But it could also challenge the quasi-monopoly they used to have on political decisions and undermine the role of the Parliament and the primacy of elections. The article is founded on 91 face-to-face interviews with French-speaking Belgian MPs sitting in federal or regional parliaments. First, we describe the profile of supporters of DMPs. We then identify three ideal-typical discourses: the power-sharing discourse, the consultative discourse, and the elitist discourse. The contribution of this article is twofold. First, it analyzes the argumentative frames used by MPs to assess deliberative mini-publics using a large number of interviews. Second, it demonstrates that their discourses depend on their evaluation of ordinary citizens’ competence to participate and on their resulting vision of representation. Political actors mainly perceive DMPs as power-sharing instruments that would alter their elected position and the legitimacy of the election.

Table 2 in the paper summarizes the positions associated with the three types discourse regarding allotted bodies:

	Power-sharing discourse	Consultation discourse	Elitist discourse
Preferred forms of DMPs	Allotted DMPs on major issues with binding decision powers	Self-selected consultative DMPs on local issues	Rejection of all forms of DMPs
Evaluation of citizens’ competence	Politicians and citizens placed on an equal ground and universally competent	Many incompetent and unmotivated citizens who should not take part in DMPs	Citizens seen as incompetent, selfish and unable to consider the general interest
Definition of political representation	Permanent processes of co-construction and co-decision with citizens alongside elections	Election as the main process of representation complemented by regular consultations of the citizens	Election as the only source of legitimacy and citizen participation
Typical profile	Green and left-wing MPs with limited political experience and access to political power	No typical profile	Male from traditional governing parties

The article offers some excerpts from the interviews. As can be expected, the juiciest are those by politicians objecting to the institution.

The citizen jury (…) almost replaces politicians, at some level. In that case, I think that is somehow a misuse of participatory democracy, because I wonder what the elected politician is for. (…) I don’t claim to be an expert on everything, but I am accountable to the voter at some point to have a small fragment of power which I have to use as well as possible, and that always pisses me off when this small fragment that I hold, someone tries to take it away from me to give it to another actor.

[P]eople are incompetent. (…) There is a great illusion (…), which is to believe that the citizen is able to surpass himself and to think about the general interest.

[T]he fact that one is on a list and to stand for an election is already the result of a filter. This already means that, well, you are dealing with people who either are able to represent something, or people who can defend their ideas, people who dare to stand for their ideas.

[C]itizens can vote, they can run for elections… If they don’t want to do politics, if they don’t want to run for election, if they vote badly… They shouldn’t put all the blame on politicians.

Participatory democracy is a word that tarnishes democracy. (…) we give the
impression that democracy is a dictatorship, that without participation it isn’t
democratic. No! Representatives are democratically elected! They are legitimate!

Filed under: Academia, Elections, Sortition |