Yoram Gat

Jose Baez: Our jurors are the lifeblood of justice

Posted on October 29, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Jose Baez, who was Casey Anthony’s defense attorney, writes in the Orlando Sentinel:

Almost four months ago, the jury in the trial of Casey Anthony found her not guilty of murder, aggravated child abuse and aggravated manslaughter of a child — and the jurors have paid for it ever since.

They have paid for it at the hands of pundits and so-called veteran court watchers, who have relentlessly denounced the verdict and the jurors.

[…]

Some argue that the judicial system is broken and that this jury is to be scorned. They could not be more wrong. Our system of criminal justice has a presumption of innocence and a constitutional guarantee that we will face a jury of our peers.

As Sir William Blackstone said in his “Commentaries on the Laws of England in 1765”: “… a competent number of sensible and upright jurymen, chosen by lot from among those of middle rank, will be found the best investigators of truth, and the surest guardians of public justice.”

Filed under: Juries, Press | Leave a comment »

People’s Senate Party in Canada

Posted on October 20, 2011 by Yoram Gat

www.peoplessenate.ca:

People: You, me, all of us.

Senate: An ‘upper house’ of parliament that reviews the government’s proposed laws and policies and gives them a thumbs up or thumbs down.

People’s Senate: A senate formed from the random selection (lottery) of the public.

People’s Senate Party: A party that believes BC needs this.

Politicians seem all the same, banding together in order to disparage their opponents. We might wonder why these members of parliaments cannot make consensus decisions in a civilized way, why the group in power must bully through their policies. (And why the policies are often contrary to the needs of the 99%) Unfortunately it couldn’t really be any other way than it is because the elected members are by-products of a system that demands these actions from them.

The People’s Senate Party accepts the adversarial nature of the legislative assembly but does not accept that these elected men and women should have the final say on the legislation and policy that affects us. We believe BC needs a Senate, but formed from a random selection of citizens similar to a courtroom jury. This Senate would use mutual deliberation and consensus to approve or reject the legislation and policies devised by the politicians. Our proposed senators, normal people like you and me (in fact you could be one if you win this senator lottery), could even suggest legislation of their own.

This political jury, we’re calling a People’s Senate.

Filed under: Proposals, Sortition | 42 Comments »

Fishkin: How to Fix California’s Democracy Crisis

Posted on October 12, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Prof. James Fishkin has an op-ed piece in the New York Times:

One hundred years ago today, California voters added the ballot initiative to the State Constitution, allowing citizens to use petitions to bring proposed statutes and constitutional amendments for a public vote.

In the article Fishkin entwines two themes. On the one hand, according to Fishkin, multiple cycles of legislation via the initiative system have encumbered California with various laws that cannot be overturned by the legislature, and make California “virtually ungovernable”. He cites the two-thirds rule for raising taxes, mandatory funds allocation (40% to education), the “three strikes law” and term limits for legislators. (He also originally cited a two-thirds rule for passing the budget – this reference was removed from the article since last year Proposition 25 eliminated this rule in favor of passage by regular majority.)

The other theme is the troubles with the Proposition system itself – supposedly the cause for the passage of the problematic laws.
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Filed under: Athens, Ballot measures, Opinion polling, Press, Proposals, Sortition | 25 Comments »

Sortition in France

Posted on September 23, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Gil Delannoi will be presenting a seminar under the title “Sortition and conceptions of equality” on October 11th in Paris (I presume).

The announcement mentions Delannoi and Dowlen’s Sortition: Theory and Practice (Imprint Academics, 2010), Delannoi’s report Le retour du tirage au sort en politique, briefly reviewed in Libération, and a recorded interview with Delannoi:

Filed under: Press, Sortition | 4 Comments »

Sortition in Spain

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Jorge Cancio writes:

As you perhaps know, Spain is undergoing some difficult times, both economically and politically.

Since May a new social movement, demanding “real democracy now” has taken the streets. Its main focus is to criticize the lack of democratic participation rights and the hegemonic position of the two main political parties.

Some discussions and debates tend to concentrate on possible direct democratic institutions, already present in other countries, such as referenda, recall and legislatitive initiative.

However, discussion of sortition as a democratic tool is for the first time seriously hitting the streets. During the local elections in May a small political party favouring sortition launched its initiative in Galicia (www.sorteopolitico.com).

On November 20th we will have general elections for our parliament and a new initiative to form a party is being launched: www.partidoazar.com. It is worthwhile to spend some minutes visiting the website and reading its well written and argued contents.

Filed under: Initiatives, Sortition | 77 Comments »

Mark Fredrickson: Citizen responses under election and sortition

Posted on August 21, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Mark Fredrickson writes:

I am a follower of the Kleroterian blog, and I am excited to announce
that I have something to contribute. As a possible lead up to a field experiment for my dissertation (Department of Political Science, University of Illinois), I undertook a survey experiment in which subjects either read a story about an elected committee or a randomly selected committee (along with several other manipulations). I recently completed my first draft and have published a working paper: Returning to the Cradle of Democracy.

The data and computations for the analysis are also available online: election-sortition-corruption-survey-experiment.

I hope your readers find it useful, and I look forward to their feedback.

The paper’s abstract:

The hallmark of modern democracies is the competitive election. This
institution is seen as the primary connection between leaders and the population. This has not always been the case. Sortition, the random selection of leaders from the population, served as the primary institution of democracy in ancient Athens. How would citizens in a modern democracy react to the use of sortition to select leaders? This study employs a survey experiment in which subjects read about a local development grant, overseen by either an elected or randomly selected committee. I find that sortition encourages more citizens to seek leadership positions, though other forms of participation remain unchanged. I also find that despite a stated preference for election, subjects see the two committees as equally capable and responsible, even when confronted with corrupt acts and closed door meetings.

Filed under: Experiments, Participation, Sortition | 5 Comments »

Lawson and Simms call for a People’s Jury to represent public interest

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Harald Korneliussen found the following item:

A People’s Jury of a thousand angry citizens

From banking to hacking public horror has failed to tame Britain’s feral elites. We need a People’s Jury

A new routine is emerging. First, a crisis occurs in a vital part of our lives: banks crash, MPs fiddle expenses, a media empire hacks phones. Public anger and outrage rises. Everyone says that something must be done. But frustration and apathy set in as it becomes obvious that nothing is done. A moment for change slips through our fingers. Meanwhile the next – possibly bigger – crisis lurks round the corner, perhaps banking again, or the energy companies. Why is this happening and what can we do about it?
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Filed under: Press, Proposals, Sortition | 4 Comments »

One of Bill McClellan’s readers writes in

Posted on July 29, 2011 by Yoram Gat

Google Alert netted another fine catch:

Democracy seeming like Greek to U.S.

Bill McClellan
stltoday.com, July 29, 2011

Not long ago, I wrote a column in which I suggested we select our leaders through a lottery [Stupid vs. immoral? Let’s leave governing up to chance, June 8, 2011]. We would avoid tiresome campaigns and the lies and misrepresentations therein, and we would rid ourselves of campaign contributions and the time-honored practice of buying influence and favors.

It was a whimsical idea. Or so I thought. But one of the joys of writing a newspaper column is hearing from people who know more than I do about the subjects I write about.

David C. sent me this note: “Today’s column made me think of ancient Athens, one of the most thoroughgoing democracies in western history (at least for those who weren’t slaves). They had a system of government very similar to your idea of government by lottery. As the Marxist historian C.L.R. James wrote in his essay, ‘Every Cook Can Govern’: ‘Perhaps the most striking thing about Greek democracy was that the administration (and there were immense administrative problems) was organized upon the basis of what is known as sortition, or, more easily, selection by lot. The vast majority of Greek officials were chosen by a method which amounted to putting names into a hat and appointing the ones whose names came out.'”

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

Edip Yuksel: Lotteries elections: Disinfecting democracy from lobbies

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Yoram Gat

In 1998, Edip Yuskel, “an Islamic reformer”, wrote an article proposing selecting Congress using sortition:

Every citizen who meets the qualifications enumerated in Article I, sections 2 and 3 of the Constitution could become a candidate by filling out a simple application form. This application can be automatically done during voter registration. Every registered person will have an equal chance of becoming a member of Congress. The election or selection can be conducted by mechanical devises or computers with sufficient security and supervision.

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Filed under: Elections, Participation, Proposals, Sortition | 45 Comments »

Poll finds most Americans think their government is a plutocracy

Posted on July 18, 2011 by Yoram Gat

A poll taken in May asked some pointed questions about who people feel controls government and benefits from its policies. The answers were in line with previous findings.

CBS News Poll. May 20-23, 2011. N=1,020 adults nationwide.

“How much say do you think people like yourself have about what the government does: a good deal, some, or not much?”

A good deal Some Not much Unsure

% 9 21 69 1

Continue reading →