Gillian Dymond writes in The Conservative Woman:
AN article in the online publication Civil Service World last February announced that former civil servant Sue Gray is working with Labour on plans to introduce citizens’ assemblies should the party, as is likely, win the next election. These assemblies are very much in vogue, with recent examples having allegedly helped secure ‘yes’ votes for abortion and gay marriage in the Irish Republic. The less enthusiastic amongst us, however, might conclude that they are just another charade to be played out within the parameters of permitted debate, with a view to ensuring, in the words of Nick Cohen back in 1999, that ‘the public can only want what the public gets’.
Choice of subject matter is only one of the many ways in which citizens’ assemblies may be subverted and controlled.
How, for instance, are the questions put to participants chosen, and what are the implications of the wording in which they are framed?
Again, how do you ensure that those randomly selected are, in fact, ‘representative’? Who decides which ‘representative’ groups merit inclusion and in what proportion?Is it sensible, in any case, to act on the assumption that some select group characteristic is the most important indicator of a person’s ‘representative’ credentials?
And what about the inevitable constraints of time on ordinary people with jobs and families to accommodate? How would this affect fair representation?
Even if, by some miracle, the participants constituted a perfectly representative cross-section of the population, what about the ‘evidence presented to assembly members during the learning phase’? Who ensures that this evidence really is ‘balanced, accurate and comprehensive’? The BBC, perhaps?
Citizens’ assemblies have been misleadingly compared to juries but in a jury trial, if competent barristers are employed, all the evidence for both prosecution and defence will be comprehensively presented in adversarial debate: something which has never, to date, taken place in a public forum with regard to covid, or climate change, or mass immigration, and which is unlikely to be permitted in respect of any other divisive issue put before these government-approved panels.
Besides, what about group dynamics, particularly at a time when we are being taught to keep our true opinions to ourselves or face social ostracism, and possibly the closure of our bank accounts? Even supposing that everyone is prepared to brave the contempt of a bien pensant neighbour, some people are easily led. Others, even those who would stick firmly to conclusions based on their own experience and judgment in the privacy of the ballot box, may lose confidence and yield to an uneasy ‘consensus’ if they perceive themselves to be in a minority, or if overawed by those claiming superior knowledge and expertise.
As long as public figures who dare to buck the required ‘consensus’ and highlight popular concerns are thrown out of our institutions or lose their party whip, while the BBC is allowed to continue extorting money from the public while insulting our intelligence with its declarations of ‘settled science’, the promotion of tiny groups of ‘representative’ people by governments well versed in the techniques of propaganda and manipulation will not persuade the bulk of the population that their views are finally being taken into account.
Filed under: Applications, Press, Sortition |
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Equality by lot 
Thanks for this, Yoram. These are the sort of objections I expected would be thrown up against CAs as their promoters attempted to employ them more widely.
Keith and I have the answer to the four paragraphs below. Our allotteds’ main role is to either merely vote on the arguments put forward by contending debaters (Keith), or (under my “demiocracy”) between a debating legislator and his shadow-legislator critics on the next Election Day, and/or perhaps to issue a non-binding straw-vote, not to thoroughly chew over the topic among themselves and reach a consensus. (Although less fraught informal chatting among themselves can go on by those who wish to comment.)
These debaters or contending politicians are not restricted in what questions to address—i.e., there is no “agenda.” And the allotteds may put any questions to them.
Social pressure to conform would be much diminished if sessions are conducted over the Internet (as I propose in “Demiocracy”), where voting would be private, commenting optional, and identities concealed.
“Choice of subject matter” would be automatic under Demiocracy, in which the allotteds would be divided into small electorates that are assigned to oversee one of two dozen special-topic legislatures.
“Choice of subject matter is only one of the many ways in which citizens’ assemblies may be subverted and controlled.
“How, for instance, are the questions put to participants chosen, and what are the implications of the wording in which they are framed?
“Besides, what about group dynamics, particularly at a time when we are being taught to keep our true opinions to ourselves or face social ostracism, and possibly the closure of our bank accounts?
“Even supposing that everyone is prepared to brave the contempt of a bien pensantneighbour, some people are easily led. Others, even those who would stick firmly to conclusions based on their own experience and judgment in the privacy of the ballot box, may lose confidence and yield to an uneasy ‘consensus’ if they perceive themselves to be in a minority, or if overawed by those claiming superior knowledge and expertise.”
======
“And what about the inevitable constraints of time on ordinary people with jobs and families to accommodate? How would this affect fair representation?”
Under Demiocracy, internet sessions would occur no more often than monthly, and real-time attendance wouldn’t be mandatory. Allotteds could view recorded sessions at convenient times, not necessarily the whole session at once, played back at 1.5 speed, and skipping through the boring parts. Or they could have texts read aloud to them while they eat or do housework. This is not ideal, but not all would act this way, and it would amount nevertheless to considerably more attention than the average current voter pays,
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“Again, how do you ensure that those randomly selected are, in fact, ‘representative’? Who decides which ‘representative’ groups merit inclusion and in what proportion?
“Is it sensible, in any case, to act on the assumption that some select group characteristic is the most important indicator of a person’s ‘representative’ credentials?”
These objections do not arise under Demiocracy, because its ballottery process is intended to produce an UNrepresentative extract of the populace—I.e., its self-selected “choice” worthies, betters, or able-men; not its churls, knaves, and varlets. They are the persons whom the people have anointed as their proxies, and to whom they have lent the orb and scepter—to be further passed along to the legislators whom they elect.
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“Citizens’ assemblies have been misleadingly compared to juries but in a jury trial, if competent barristers are employed, all the evidence for both prosecution and defence will be comprehensively presented in adversarial debate: something which has never, to date, taken place in a public forum with regard to covid, or climate change, or mass immigration, and which is unlikely to be permitted in respect of any other divisive issue put before these government-approved panels.”
“As long as public figures who dare to buck the required ‘consensus’ and highlight popular concerns are thrown out of our institutions or lose their party whip, while the BBC is allowed to continue extorting money from the public while insulting our intelligence with its declarations of ‘settled science’, …”
Not a problem under Demiocracy or, I trust, under Keith’s arrangement. The debating-stage would be open at regular intervals to contending officeholders and would-be officeholders, at least one of whom would be able to enlarge the Overton window with advocacy of what are currently fringe positions—or at least to question current conventional wisdom. The time allowed to fringe advocates would initially be tiny, say one minute, expanding only in proportion to receiving a sufficient ongoing approval rating (e.g., 10% gets you 10 minutes) from the allotteds. Perhaps also or instead, non-politician fringe advocates could be given stage-time by officeholders and their shadow-candidate opponents.
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“… the promotion of tiny groups of ‘representative’ people by governments well versed in the techniques of propaganda and manipulation will not persuade the bulk of the population that their views are finally being taken into account.”
This touches on the vital matter of legitimacy, which Demiocracy would have much more of than sortition, because it would be the nominations of the populace that would go into the ballot box, and come out of it, not mere lots. Its allotteds would thus be truer proxies of the people. And more acceptable ones to current publics, having the sanction of the public’s blessing (by its nominations).
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We had a “Citizens Assembly” to deal with a major n’hood rezoning in the Grandview area of Vancouver, BC. It was a disaster. Saying the issues were otherwise too complex, the Planning Dept sequestered their hand-picked assembly members and spent several months “coaching them” (brainwashing them) in the planning worldview before any sessions took place. I wrote about this in detail in my book “Battleground: Grandview”.
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Hi Jakking,
That sounds very interesting. If you would like to share some excerpts from your book, that would be great. Especially interesting would be testimonies by the allotted themselves, if you have any of those.
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