Skip to main content.
Bard HAC
Bard HAC
  • About sub-menuAbout
    Hannah Arendt

    “There are no dangerous thoughts; thinking itself is dangerous.”

    Join HAC
    • About the HAC
      • Our Staff
      • About Hannah Arendt
      • Our Location
  • Programs sub-menuPrograms
    Hannah Arendt
    • Our Programs
    • Autonomies
    • Bill Mullen Recitation Prize
    • Courage to Be
    • Virtual Reading Group
    • Affiliated Programs
    • Hannah Arendt Humanities Network
    • Democracy Innovation Hub
    • Meanings of October 27th
  • Academics sub-menuAcademics
    Hannah Arendt

    “Storytelling reveals meaning without committing the error of defining it.”

    • Academics at HAC
    • Undergraduate Courses
    • Practice of Courage Courses
  • Fellows sub-menuFellows
    HAC Fellows

    “Action without a name, a 'who' attached to it, is meaningless.”

    • Fellows
    • Student Fellowships
  • Conferences sub-menuConferences
    Hannah Arendt

    Fall Conference 2023
    “Friendship & Politics”

    October 12 – 13

    Read More Here
    • Conferences
    • Past Conferences
    • Registration
    • Our Location
  • Publications sub-menuPublications
    Hannah Arendt
    Subscribe to Amor Mundi

    “I've begun so late, really only in recent years, to truly love the world ... Out of gratitude, I want to call my book on political theories Amor Mundi.”

    • Publications
    • Amor Mundi
    • HA Journal
    • Further Reading
    • Video Gallery
    • From Our Members
    • Podcasts
  • Events sub-menuEvents
    Hannah Arendt

    “It is, in fact, far easier to act under conditions of tyranny than it is to think.”

    —Hannah Arendt
    • HAC Events
    • Upcoming
    • Archive
    • Citizens' Assemblies Summer Workshop
  • Join sub-menu Join HAC
    Hannah Arendt

    “Political questions are far too serious to be left to the politicians.”

    • Join HAC
    • Become a Member
    • Subscribe
    • Virtual Reading Group
    • Join HAC
               
  • Search
Main Image for Democracy Innovation Hub

Democracy Innovation Hub

Across the world, democracies are evolving and innovating.
Learn and collaborate with us.

 

  • Image for How are democracies innovating?
    How are democracies innovating?
    From the permanent citizen assemblies in Paris and Brussels, to the large scale use of digital tools such as Pol.is in Taiwan, democracies across the world are finding ways to involve their citizens directly in policymaking. 

    Some of these changes actually represent a return to the roots of democracy. In ancient Greece, most officials were not elected, but instead chosen using a lottery system. In recent decades, civic lotteries have reemerged as a promising way to reinvigorate democracy, harness the collective intelligence of large and diverse communities, and tackle complex issues with the nuance and inclusivity they require. 
  • Image for Workshops for Stakeholders
    Workshops for Stakeholders
    Are you a public servant, elected official or community advocate? Learn about our annual summer workshop on citizens assemblies. Wanting to bring a workshop or an assembly to your community? Contact us. 
  • Image for Teacher Fellowship Program
    Teacher Fellowship Program
    Are you a teacher wanting to learn about these contemporary trends and bring deliberative democracy into your classroom? Apply for our Teacher's Fellowship and 10 Credit CTLE (Continuing Teacher and Leader Education) course. The two-day course introduces secondary teachers to the expanding use of lottery to bring diverse groups of citizens together to form policy recommendations.

    Learn more

What are citizens' assemblies?

  • Image for Watch our online course
    Watch our online course
    Our short course is made up of 13 short video lectures, and is available online for free. It features the world's leading experts on deliberative democracy. 

    Go to the course
  • Image for More resources and organizations
    More resources and organizations
    In North America, Healthy Democracy, MASS LBP and the Center for New Democratic Processes have decades of experience bringing deliberation to the public.

    At the global level, Democracy Next is demonstrating that deliberative democracy can be institutionlized at the local level, helping to design permanent assemblies in Paris and Brussels. 

    The blog Equality by Lot offers updates on and thoughtful criticism around civic lotteries and assemblies around the world.

    Subscribe to Amor Mundithe weekly publication of the Hannah Arendt Center, to stay in touch regarding all of our programs.
     

Videos from around the world

Testimony from Participants in Petaluma, California

How the Irish Citizens' Assembly broke political deadlock on Abortion
 

The French Climate Assembly
 

Nationwide Deliberative Poll in Chile

What is deliberative democracy? What is sortition?

Whenever you have a political decision-making body, composed of people picked by lot (random selection), you are looking at an example of sortition. Sortitionate decision-making bodies are most widely known as Citizens’ Assemblies (CAs). The organization MASS LBP in Canada has popularized their form of CA under the name “Citizens’ Reference Panels”, referring to their process as “civic lottery”. In Germany, CAs are known as Planungszellen or Bürgerräte. In Holland they are referred to as Burgerforum. While all sortitionate bodies can broadly be referred to as Citizens’ Assemblies, other names will sometimes be more fitted to the specific form. Citizens’ Constitutional Conventions, Peoples’ Senates, Consensus Conferences, Peoples’ Juries, Mini Publics: these are also variations on the theme of sortition. 

In each case, however, the appointment of decision-makers has not come about by election, as is the case in the now dominant electoral-representative model of democracy. In this way, sortition constitutes an alternate lineage, going back to the very birth of democracy in Ancient Athens, but rendered to obscurity after the Renaissance, until recent decades. 

In recent decades, sortition has reemerged into the public eye as a promising way to alleviate pressure on representative democracy, harness the distributive intelligence of large groups, and address complex emerging issues with the nuance and inclusivity they require. By removing the competitive element, where interests must be pitted against aggregate interests a.k.a. the party policy platforms, sortition allows for the inclusive articulation of commonalities.
            
Here are the three core building blocks of any effective sortitionate body: 
I: Citizen Power: the citizens freely, honestly and sincerely discuss an issue that is (more or less) in their purview of power to decide on or make recommendations for.
II: Good Debate: the citizens hear and deliberate with experts, interest groups and witnesses on the issue.
III: Random Selection: the citizens are chosen by lot.

The results from CAs and other sortitionate bodies, have been overwhelmingly positive. Decisions produced tend to include full nuances of the debate preceding them and are always social. Experience of political responsibility in CAs has been shown to awaken people’s “civic sense” or “hive thinking:” they begin to view issues from the perspective of a collective long-term interest, above their own short-term interest. This de-stigmatizes the vital element of compromise in political decision-making and allows for hard choices that sometimes need to be made, to be made as amicably and inclusively as possible.

More information

For more information, contact 

[email protected]

Footer Contact
Contact HAC
Bard College
PO Box 5000
Annandale-on-Hudson, NY 12504
845-758-7878
[email protected]
Join the HAC
Become a Member
Subscribe to Amor Mundi
Join the Virtual Reading Group
Follow Us
Image for Twitter
Image for Facebook
Image for YouTube
Image for Instagram