Equality by Lot 2023 statistics

Posted on December 24, 2023 by Yoram Gat

Below are some statistics about the 14th year of Equality-by-Lot. Comparable numbers for last year can be found here.

2023 Page views Posts Comments
Jan 2,611 7 12
Feb 2,845 10 68
Mar 3,343 9 68
Apr 3,274 9 27
May 2,417 9 26
June 2,558 6 45
July 2,502 5 14
Aug 3,604 4 74
Sept 3,020 9 64
Oct 2,894 10 28
Nov 2,118 8 9
Dec (to 24th) 1,781 7 7
Total 32,967 93 442

Note that page views do not include visits by logged-in contributors – the WordPress system does not count those visits.

Posts were made by 12 authors during 2023. (There were, of course, many other authors quoted and linked to.)

This blog currently has 161 email followers and 362 WordPress followers. (As part of the upheaval at Twitter/X, automatic publishing to Twitter has been discontinued and “Twitter followers” are no longer being counted.)

Searching for “distribution by lot” (with quotes) using Google returns Equality-by-Lot as the 2nd result (out of “about 80,000 results”), but it is not among the first few dozen results when searching for “sortition” (out of “about 3,740,000 results”). On the other hand, asking ChatGPT “what are good websites about sortition?” does return (for me, at least) Equality-by-Lot as one of the recommendations.

Happy holidays and a happy new year to Equality-by-Lot readers, commenters and posters. Keep up the good fight for democracy!

Filed under: Distribution by lot, meta, Sortition | 1 Comment »

Sortition in 2023

Posted on December 22, 2023 by Yoram Gat

Equality-by-Lot’s traditional yearly review post.

In terms of interest in sortition, 2023 saw a continuation of the trend of previous years. Throughout 2023, there was a steady beat of activity around the world proposing or reporting the application of sortition in various ways for various purposes, along with a stream of condemnations and warnings against the idea.

This included some fairly high profile pieces, with the most notable one being an op-ed in the New York Times. Among the most high profile applications was the French End-of-Life panel. The head of the CESE, the institution that organized this body, proposed expanding the use of allotted bodies.

While the The academics continued their back-and-forth, sortition found a new fairly high-profile advocate in Martin Wolf, the chief economics commentator at the Financial Times, who was introduced to the idea by Nicholas Gruen.

An even more influential sortition advocate this year was Yanis Varoufakis, who put allotted citizen councils as a main component of his democratization agenda. His organization, DiEM25, created a deliberative democracy collective devoted to discussing this idea.

Two notable books dealing with sortition published this year were the late Maurice Pope’s The Keys to Democracy that was originally written in the 1980’s and Yves Sintomer’s The Government of Chance.

This activity indicates a level of interest that is generally comparable to that of the last couple of years. There is a persisting sense of recovery of the prevailing elections-based system from the crisis of 2016 which diminishes any immediate interest in sortition as a tool for contending with popular discontent. As long as there is no widespread unrest, it is likely that interest in sortition will continue to simmer. However, it is important that sortition activists continue to look for ways to spread awareness of the idea in the population so that when a new crisis does occur, sortition is a present viable alternative to the status quo. If it is not, then in all likelihood anti-democratic sentiments would gain ground as a result of popular frustration. Examples of such outcomes already appeared in 2023 in Argentina and the Netherlands.

Filed under: Academia, Applications, Books, Elections, Press, Sortition | 2 Comments »

Upcoming drawing of a Michigan redistricting commission member

Posted on December 21, 2023 by Yoram Gat

The U.S. state of Michigan has an allotted redistricting commission. Following the resignation of Dustin Witjes, one of the commission’s four Democratic members, a replacement member is going to be allotted on January 3rd. The allotment is going to be live-streamed on the internet.

Following Witjes’ resignation on Wednesday, [state Rep. Ann] Bollin said it was long overdue.

“His prolonged absence from Michigan while collecting pay as a member of the redistricting commission is unacceptable. This situation has exemplified a lack of accountability and a disregard for the responsibilities tied to this crucial role,” she said.

With Witjes’ resignation, the Michigan Department of State will host a random selection at 3:30 p.m. Jan. 3 to choose a replacement.

The Michigan constitution requires new commissioners to be randomly selected from the remaining pool of semi-finalist applicants who affiliate with the same party as the departing commissioner.

“Of the 200 semi-finalists randomly selected in June 2020, there are 52 remaining who affiliate with the Democratic Party,” stated a release.

The drawing will be livestreamed on the MICRC’s social media accounts.

Filed under: Applications, Elections, Press, Sortition | Leave a comment »

Americans’ views about what drives politicians

Posted on December 10, 2023 by Yoram Gat

A Pew poll conducted in July this year probes the views of U.S. citizens about the motivations of politicians. There is widespread agreement that politicians are in it for money, ambition and fame.


Continue reading →

Filed under: Elections, Opinion polling | Leave a comment »

Call for 2023 review input

Posted on December 8, 2023 by Yoram Gat

This is the yearly call for input for the year’s end review. As in previous years, I would like to have a post or two summarizing the ongoings here at Equality-by-Lot and notable sortition-related events over the passing year. Please respond in the comments below with your input. You are invited to refresh your memory about the events of the passing year by browsing Equality-by-Lot’s archives.

For previous years’ summaries see: 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010.

Filed under: Distribution by lot, Sortition | 2 Comments »

Random selection in funding art

Posted on December 6, 2023 by Yoram Gat

Martin O’Leary, Studio Community Lead at Pervasive Media Studio, Watershed, writes in Arts Professional magazine.

An ancient practice of balloting is being put to use in application processes with the twin aims of reducing unpaid labour and increasing fairness

In the world of funding schemes, many organisations have experimented with random selection, led by the New Zealand Health Research Council in 2013. These experiments have been intended to increase the variety of work funded, by reducing the need to write ‘safe’ proposals. Organisations like the Swiss National Science Foundation, Innovate UK, the Nigerian government, and the Volkswagen Foundation, have all trialled random selection processes for funding science and innovation.

In the arts, there have been several schemes from large organisations like Jerwood Arts, as well as smaller, more DIY organisations like The Uncultured. Alongside aiming to increase the variety of projects funded, random selection is seen as a fairer way of distributing funding, which reduces the power differential between artists and funders.

Reducing unpaid labour

For the last year at Watershed in Bristol, we’ve been experimenting with random selection across a range of our programmes, as an alternative to more traditional selection processes for applicants. We were initially inspired by Jerwood Arts and their 1:1 Fund, in which they introduced randomness to increase the fairness of their application process. We’ve found the real benefit of the system comes in reducing the stress and unpaid labour demanded from applicants.

Before we introduced random selection, our annual winter residency programme typically received up to a hundred applications, competing for two or three places on the programme. Each of these applications included a written project proposal, which could take days to produce. By our estimates, adding up the total time spent across all applicants, we were asking for months of unpaid work — far more than the amount of funded time we offered to successful applicants.

In our new model, we ask applicants to complete a simple form to confirm their eligibility. Then we randomly select a pool of twelve applicants who form a shortlist for the residencies. Each of these applicants has time with our team to discuss their idea, after which they write up a full proposal and have a more formal interview. Because of the limited numbers, we’re able to pay a small stipend to everyone on the shortlist to cover their time preparing the full proposal.

Three models: total, early, late

When we talk about random selection, people often assume we’re giving out residencies entirely at random, removing ourselves completely from the process. This is a version of the process that we call ‘total’ random selection. It’s the simplest way of doing things, and it has real advantages in terms of speed and transparency. However, it’s a difficult process to control, and may lead to undesirable outcomes.
Continue reading →

Filed under: Applications, Distribution by lot | Leave a comment »

Point of View: Shoring Up Democracy

Posted on December 4, 2023 by Yoram Gat

Jack Graves writes in the East Hampton Star:

An Op-Ed in The Times not long ago [the author presumably refers to this. -YG] suggested that the ballot in this country be replaced by “sortition” — appointment by lot, which democratic Athens used in the 5th and 4th centuries B.C.E. to stock its populous Council, Assembly, and jury courts.

While the level of participation was very high, putting to shame our apathetic turnouts, Athenian democracy wasn’t at the root all that democratic: Women had no voice, neither did resident aliens, who could not own property; there were slaves, as many as 100,000 in the 4th century, it’s estimated in Thomas N. Mitchell’s “Athens: A History of the World’s First Democracy,” and in its Golden Age an aristocratic general and gifted orator, Pericles, essentially called the tune.

Socrates, who was to be sentenced to death for impiety, wasn’t a fan, nor were Plato and Aristotle, though he saw some potential good in it. Socrates said, “It is absurd to choose magistrates by lot where no one would dream of drawing lots for a pilot, a mason, a flute player, or any craftsman at all though the shortcomings of such men are far less harmful than those that disorder our government.”

Frankly, I see no reason why sortition would work any better in the United States, a vastly larger country, than the representative democracy (or democratic republic, if you will) that we already have; though it’s clear that the Electoral College has skewed things, according to smaller states’ disproportionate power, and, because of the winner-take-all allocation of electoral votes, focuses presidential campaigns on battleground states.

Filed under: Athens, Elections, History, Press, Sortition | 3 Comments »

Chris Forman Making the Case for Deliberate Democracy in America

Posted on November 28, 2023 by Yoram Gat

Chris Forman, PhD, an Author, and Fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts was interviewed on the Unity Now podcast and discussed his advocacy for Deliberative Democracy and how it relates to his work in physics. Forman discusses how he inadvertently created a deliberation process, how this process can be adopted in the West, and how we can protect it from power-hungry individuals.

Filed under: Deliberation, Elections, Sortition | 2 Comments »

Selection by lottery can make the university system more egalitarian

Posted on November 24, 2023 by Yoram Gat

ِA proposal by Sam Mace for randomization in university admittance. Conall Boyle’s work on this idea gets a mention.

It’s Time to Sort the University

University is the gateway to a better life. But the gap between elite and non-elite institutions and their admissions contradicts our self-convinced myths about meritocracy that we have developed. The best and the brightest do not necessarily attend our highest caliber and best funded institutions. Instead, all too often, it is the most well connected, the richest, and a lucky few others who are allowed to grace so many hallowed halls.

The reasoning behind the expansion of universities in the 20th century was to dramatically alter people’s economic and social status. But today, what kind of university someone goes to all too often determines their life path. Attending an Oxford or a Harvard may radically change a young person’s life, whereas for someone attending a Bradford or an Alabama State, this is far less likely to happen. Given the increasing pressures on funding for humanities and other scholarly subjects such as ancient history and classics, attending certain universities will soon include an irrevocable decision on what a student can study.

Therefore the question must be not just how many people can go to university but how fair is the admissions process for the very best universities. This question and similar ones about the role of universities has not just been asked by progressives but also by conservatives such as Christopher Lasch and Patrick Deneen. The fear of elite concentrations of economic, social, and cultural capital is keenly felt across the ideological spectrum. It is a problem that plagues the Anglosphere.

The exams to assess who gets a spot at university are more ruthlessly competitive than ever before. We use invigilators to ensure fairness and tie ourselves in knots over the ethics of using tools such ChatGPT, yet few of us are questioning the fairness of the admissions system in the first place. The enormous demand for the most prestigious universities sparks an ugly reality of fraud and inequality.
Continue reading →

Filed under: Academia, Books, Distribution by lot, education, Press, Proposals | Leave a comment »

Allotted assemblies for overcoming coalition discord

Posted on November 20, 2023 by Yoram Gat

An op-ed in the Belgian La Libre.

How allotted citizen assemblies could have prevented the failure of the fiscal reform

By Eric Jourdain

Whereas the necessary fiscal reform plan is figured in the government agreement, the seven parties of the Vivaldi government have not reached an agreement. It is time to put the brakes on the particracy, to reanimate democracy and to give an unexpected role to the prime minister.

On July 22nd, our prime minister Alexander De Croo was extremely disappointed. He published an open letter in the written press deploring the fact that “the political class is sometimes so preoccupied by its own matters that it forgets the people and the causes that it must serve”. This was after the failure of the fiscal reform, when the prime minister realized with bitterness that the seven parties which compose the Vivaldi coalition would not reach an agreement on approving yet another version of the fiscal reform presented by the finance minister.

The reform project did figure in the federal government accord presented in September 2020, which explicitly planned for a balanced budget and the reduction in the fiscal pressure on the workers (employees, civil servants and self-employed).

In a country which has the ambition to reach a work participation rate of 80%, one would think that this reform would serve the general interest. In fact, more people at work translates automatically to an increase in contributions to social programs and to fiscal revenue, and a decrease in social expenses by the community.

How to allow a prime minister to resolve this impasse in the future?

By adding a few articles to our constitution specifying the following points:

  • Define what is an allotted citizen assembly.
  • Stipulate that when a reform project set out in the government accord is not adopted within 3 years after the formation of the legislature, the head of government may invoke a new article in the constitution. The new article, say Article X, would allow the prime minister to convene a Citizen Assembly via sortition to which he would propose to adopt the legislation that the parties refuse to adopt. The vote of the Assembly would be binding.

In case of a positive vote, that would mean that the prime minister and the Citizen Assembly have together prevented an impasse, and possibly a governmental crisis. This would get around the harmful effects of particracy.
Continue reading →

Filed under: Academia, Elections, Press, Proposals, Sortition | 1 Comment »

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