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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer. https://www.canva.com/policies/onedesign/
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer. https://www.canva.com/policies/onedesign/
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer. https://www.canva.com/policies/onedesign/
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer. https://www.canva.com/policies/onedesign/
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer. https://www.canva.com/policies/onedesign/
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iStock image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer.
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer.
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer.
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Canva image. Licensed to Wayne Liebman, web designer. https://www.canva.com/policies/onedesign/
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Sortition Foundation. Credited in hover.
Sortition Foundation
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Let’s do democracy differently
Let's do democracy better
Image courtesy The Sortition Foundation
In eight minutes, Brett Hennig lays out the case for Democracy by Lot
Ted Talk video image
The premier website for information about democracy by lot
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The premier website for information about democracy by lot
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This podcast of Malcolm Gladwell's details the work of Adam Cronkright in Bolivia to organize student councils by lottery.
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What would democracy be like if the people were really thinking in depth about the policies they must live with? If they really 'deliberated' with good information about their political choices?
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Do you believe holding elections every couple of years means you live in a democracy? Short, powerfully argued and carefully researched, Hennig shows how elections have for a long time been known to serve the interests of the powerful - and how ordinary citizens can regain control of their government.
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https://images.cnrs.fr/en
Not used.
CNRS image
A non-profit working to get beyond parties and politicians and put everyday people front and center.
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Designing fair selection mechanisms for deliberative public processes.
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A modest proposal for the random selection of legislators. Free, downloadable book, written 1985
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International leaders in civic participation, deliberation, and engagement, driven to design the future of democracy, primarily through citizens' juries.
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A book by David Van Reybrouck arguing in favor of sortition. The original purpose of elections was to exclude the people from power by appointing an elite to govern over them.
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Few people know that randomness was a key political technology throughout the history of democracy. In different times, thinkers and social reformers saw sortition as a way to avoid concentration of power and corruption by special interests.
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While we might consider elections to be the cornerstone of democracy, the Athenians who coined the term actually employed a lottery system to choose most of their politicians.
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Does the government represent the people? The opinions of 90% of Americans have essentially no impact at all.
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Countries worldwide are experimenting with permanent citizen engagement in public decisionmaking. Could "ordinary citizens" become a new cornerstone of democracy?
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Experts in deliberative democracy have been working across the world for around twenty years. Now, all of a sudden, their expertise is in high demand. Interview.
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By examining use of civic lotteries through history – a tradition that remains at the core of our judicial system – this pamphlet explains how sortition can lower the barrier to political participation and extend a meaningful, new franchise to cit- izens wishing to serve their communities.
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A new platform of digital exchange on questions about the future of democracy
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Innovative Citizen Participation and New Democratic Institutions. A report on close to 300 representative deliberative practices
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Special Webinar: Revitalizing Democracy: Sortition, Citizen Power, and Spaces of Freedom. Bard College
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DDC is an alliance of leading organizations and scholars working in the firld of public engagement, participation, and deliberation.
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Highlights from Catching the Deliberative Wave: Innovative Citizen Participation and New Democratic Institutions (downloadable PDF file)
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“If you believe an ideal democracy involves informed deliberation among a representative group of people, the current electoral system fails on both counts,” says Hennig, who has a Ph.D. in astrophysics. He believes something called “citizens’ assemblies” offer a better way to elicit policies in line with people’s real interests—with a little help from an algorithm.
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Working to elevate citizen voices and improve public discourse. In states. In communities. In schools.
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Short, clear, powerful.
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As 2020 continues, it has become increasingly easy to believe that the institutions of American democracy are breaking down. How, then, do we save American democracy? Sortition.
It has become increasingly easy to believe that the institutions of American democracy are breaking down. How, then, do we save American democracy? Democratic Lotteries! (aka Sortition).
Philadelphia Citizen: Citizens’ Assemblies are opening and changing minds
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Real Democracy Now! a podcast answers the question: can we do democracy differently? If you're dissatisfied with the current state of democracy but not sure how it could be improved this is the podcast for you.
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To protect the climate, not only are technical solutions needed but also an efficient democracy to implement these solutions. What we need is a form of democracy that supports thinking in categories of common good, long-term planning and that allows making brave and thoroughly considered decisions. This is the way in which citizens’ assemblies organized with a randomly selected group of citizens, operate.
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When given the authority, time, and information, everyday people take the tough questions, side-step party lines, and deliver sensible answers.
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We want to build a more vibrant democracy, with people at the heart of decision-making.
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In this series, we will be talking with practitioners, advocates and academics about the history of public deliberations and the various approaches to facilitating them.
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A handbook for local authorities based on the Innovation in Democracy Programme
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Each chapter has a specific intended audience. While we hope everyone has the time and interest to read cover to cover, everyone should start with the introduction followed by their intended section.
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The Economist weighs in on Citizens' Assemblies
The Economist image ???
Citizens' Assemblies: the better way to do democracy
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“A citizens’ assembly provides us, the people, with a way to request radical change. Such a request gives government legitimacy to act and allows for cross-party support. To carry on failing to act is no longer an option. It’s time for a citizens’ assembly.”
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The Rivendell Model is a set of rules and procedures for citizens’ assemblies. Despite being designed for the town of elves at the foothills of the Misty Mountains, it can serve as a model for any city or country around the world.
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The mission of The Democracy Collaborative is to help catalyze a moral and political transformation of the US political economy into a next system that is inclusive, just, and ecologically sustainable—in contrast to today’s amoral economy of financial extraction.
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In 2015 the city of Toronto implemented a planning review panel with panelists chosen by democratic lottery.
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Ireland's efforts to break a political deadlock over its de facto ban on abortion inspired a bold response - the creation of a Citizens' Assembly to tackle on the issue.
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This resource guide will assist educators in the development of comprehensive classroom curriculumtoexplore concepts related to a student’s readinessfor active, engaged citizenship
Image courtesy The Sortition Foundation.
Voters Not Politicians is a pro-democracy organization and we've demonstrated our ability to enact real pro-democracy change. In 2017, we launched an anti-gerrymandering campaign to create a fair, impartial, and transparent redistricting process in Michigan. On November 6, 2018, Proposal 2 passed with 61% of the vote and created an Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission.
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One thing I want to do on this show is give space to truly radical ideas, to expand the boundaries of our political and moral imaginations. And Hélène Landemore, a political scientist at Yale, has one of those ideas. She calls it “open democracy,” and the premise is simple: What we call democracy is not very democratic.
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Public Domain
Public Domain
Citizens’ assemblies can help us better address societal challenges, overcome polarization and strengthen trust.
Asako Masunouchi for Noema Magazine
What Happened When a Sonoma City Convened Citizens to Figure Out What to Do With Its Fairgrounds
AP Images
Europe’s smallest federal entity is setting a big precedent.
Armando Babani/EPA

Democracy Without Elections advocates the use of democratic lotteries and citizens’ assemblies in the United States, and is affiliated with the Sortition Foundation.

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