Sortition | Equality by lot

Participatory & Deliberative Democracy in Ireland

Posted on October 25, 2015 by peterstone

Last week, I went to the Annual Meeting of the Political Studies Association of Ireland (PSAI), in Cork. While I was there, I attended the business meeting for the PSAI’s Participatory and Deliberative Democracy Specialist Group. The group has created a new website, which offers forums for discussions, a news page, and list of relevant publications. Everyone interested in participatory and deliberative democracy (which I would think most sortition advocates would be), especially in an Irish context, should consider checking it out. (Getting active on the page does require joining the PSAI, I believe.)

The specialist group page is at http://psai-pdd.org/.

Filed under: Academia, Sortition | 3 Comments »

Lasserre: Sortition in politics – the false good idea, part 1

Posted on October 24, 2015 by Yoram Gat

André Sauzeau referred me to a polemic against sortition by Tommy Lasserre. This text is the most elaborate argument against sortition ever written (as far as I am aware) and it is therefore of significant interest to sortition advocates. In view of that, and despite my essentially non-existent French I have undertaken to translate it from the original French to English. The first part of the outcome is below. If your French is better than mine I’d be happy with any corrections.

Sortition in politics – the false good idea

By Tommy Lasserre, September 2014

Immersed in scandals, disconnected from the realities of the majority in society, demonstrating every day their total submission to finance and the dogmas of liberalism, and therefore their complete incapacity to pull us out of the crisis, the political caste today is largely discredited, in France as in the rest of Europe. This is expressed well in record low turnouts and in the rise of false alternatives, but equally, fortunately,, reflection, shared by increasingly significant number of citizens, about the ways to change politics. Suggestions for changing the Republic through a constitutional process, proposals for giving citizens greater control over our elected officials, in particular opening the way for recallability, garner, therefore, significant response on the Web.

Among all the ideas that emerged in the blogosphere or on the social networks, one idea, that could appear absurd keeps appearing frequently: putting the reins of power in the hands of an allotted assembly. It is often mentioned in conversations on Facebook, or in argument between bloggers, the controversial intellectual Étienne Chouard has made it his battle cry and the political party Nouvelle Donne (“New Deal”) even made an argument for this idea during the European elections.
Continue reading →

Filed under: Athens, History, Participation, Press, Sortition, Theory | 48 Comments »

Istanbul Event

Posted on October 23, 2015 by peterstone

Hello All,

I’m giving a talk in Istanbul next week entitled “Is Sortition Part of Our Democratic Future?” The talk will be part of an event entitled “A Pilot Meeting for the Democracies of the Future Conference,” which will be taking place as part of the 14th Istanbul Biennial. There’s not a lot of information posted yet about the event, unfortunately, but the following page is available:

http://14b.iksv.org/event.asp?id=63

Filed under: Academia, Sortition | Leave a comment »

21st Century Democracy Conference in Alexandria Egypt

Posted on October 22, 2015 by tbouricius

I have been working with a number of sortition academics to organize the sortition element of an international conference being hosted by the Library of Alexandria in Egypt starting December 9, 2015. Presenters will include many names familiar to sortition activists including John Gastil (U.S.A.), David van Reybrouck (Belgium) and Janette Hartz-Karp (Australia). The first two days of the conference will be addressing the “deficit of democracy” in the modern world and introduce participants to such alternative democratic reforms as sortition, participatory budgeting and varieties of direct democracy. The third day will be largely devoted to sortition and mini-publics. The Library anticipates having around 200 attendees (about half from the Arab world), and can accommodate a small number of additional people who have special interest in sortition. If you would like to attend the conference (paying your own way) please get in contact with me, so I can forward your information to the Library staff. Email me at terrybour(at)gmail.com.

Filed under: Academia, Sortition | 3 Comments »

Rethinking Athenian Democracy

Posted on October 13, 2015 by keithsutherland

I’ve just finished reading Daniela Cammack’s PhD thesis (one chapter was presented recently here by Peter Stone) and would warmly recommend it — it’s mercifully short and extremely readable (available to download on the Harvard website). Chapter 3: The Most Democratic Branch? The Assembly vs. the Courts is of particular interest as it seeks to overturn the view that a) the assembly was the primary institution of Athenian democracy and b) the fourth-century reforms were conservative in nature. Cammack’s interpretation supports Yoram and Terry’s view that the switch in emphasis to randomly-selected institutions was in order to enhance the rule of the demos, rather than being a juridical a check on popular sovereignty (the view of Hansen, Ostwald, Sealey [and myself]). The courts (both legislative and juridical) were much less open to manipulation by elites as a) speech rights were restricted to litigants and persons elected by the assembly, b) isegoria was balanced by the use of a water clock and c) secret voting meant that it was harder to intimidate citizens into voting in any way other than by their considered judgment (aided by the higher minimum age and need to swear the dikastic oath). She provides several examples of assembly decisions that were heavily influenced by factional and elite domination
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Filed under: Academia, Athens, Distribution by lot, History, Juries, Sortition | 83 Comments »

David Grant’s play about sortition to be read in St. Louis

Posted on October 2, 2015 by Yoram Gat

The St. Louis Post Dispatch reports:

Global movement towards representative legislatures

St. Louis, Missouri, 18 October: A world-wide movement towards establishing legislative bodies that are fully representative finds expression in the staged reading of “Our Common Lot” by David Grant. The short play is written for an international conference, “Democracy for the 21st Century,” to be held in December at the Library of Alexandria, Egypt.

In the play, Marisa, Alma, Sami, and Ali live in a city embroiled in conflict and violence — the Regime, the Opposition, the Opposition to the Opposition. When the fighting stops, they ask themselves: What is the best way to move forward? “Our Common Lot” argues for choosing legislators in the way that the first democracy did – by random lot, known as ‘sortition.’

In the original Athenian democracy, sortition was regarded as a principal characteristic of democracy. Most recently the city of Melbourne, Australia has used a random sample of citizens to determine its ten-year financial plan. Two-thirds of the recent Irish Constitutional Convention was composed of sortitionally-chosen citizens.

The reading of “Our Common Lot” is its world premiere. The ensemble includes Adam Flores, Carl Overly, Jr., Erin Roberts, and Jacqueline Thompson.
Continue reading →

Filed under: Action, Books, Fiction, Press, Sortition | 1 Comment »

A real democracy would use sortition – the video!

Posted on September 29, 2015 by Brett Hennig

The Sortition Foundation‘s take on what is sortition, how it might work, and why they like it – all in a very short video!

Filed under: Sortition | 2 Comments »

Sortition on ideochina.com

Posted on September 28, 2015 by Yoram Gat

The Chinese language blog ideochina.com – 思想中国 – has an article about the troubles of the elections-based system of government (what may be termed “eklogocracy”). Among other ideas for reform, the article mentions proposals involving sortition.

Abstract:

In the past quarter of the century，democracy has won the day，with most countries in the world claiming themselves to be democracies. However， the glory is fleeting. In exactly the same period of time， the advancing step of western democracy starts faltering， and its theory is being challenged in an unprecedented way. The idol of democracy is entering into twilight， surrounded by more and more pessimistic views. Theorists of democracy have now started to reflect on the inherent deficiencies of representational democracy， rethink electoral democracy， and seek to return to real democracy by exploring various institutions that can involve the participation of the populace.

The author appears to be an Equality-by-Lot reader.

Filed under: Elections, Juries, meta, Participation, Sortition | Leave a comment »

News: Democratic Reason wins 2015 Spitz Prize for work in democratic theory

Posted on September 28, 2015 by Ahmed R. Teleb

Hélène Landemore’s book Democratic Reason won the 2015 Spitz Prize for work in democratic theory.

That makes the second Spitz (for outstanding work in democratic theory) to a Sortinista in three years, following John McCormick’s Machiavellian Democracy in 2013.

Filed under: Academia, Books, Sortition | Comments Off on News: Democratic Reason wins 2015 Spitz Prize for work in democratic theory

Coming Soon – Sortition in the UK

Posted on September 25, 2015 by Brett Hennig

This is a repost from the Sortition Foundation blog.

Sortition is coming soon to the UK!

Or at least three citizens’ assemblies and one forum presenting aspects of sortition are happening in the coming months:

A 200-member Citizens’ Assembly, as part of the NHS Citizen project, will occur on Wednesday 25 November in London.
Two 45-member Citizens’ Assembly Pilot Projects will each be held over two weekends, in Sheffield on 17-18 October and 7-8 November, and in Southampton on 24-25 October and 14-15 November.
The Policy Network, who recently published a report that included a call for the House of Lords to be replaced with a Citizens’ Assembly, are organising a forum on 15 October in London, “Contact Democracy in the modern world: An Australian perspective on democratic renewal.”
Jon Trickett MP, Shadow Communities and Local Government Secretary, has promised that “Labour will organise a series of citizens’ assemblies across the country.” It is unclear at this point if these will use sortition or not.