Democracy means rule by the people, but in practice even the most
robust democracies delegate most rule making to a political class
The gap between the public and its representatives might seem
unbridgeable in the modern world, but Legislature by Lot examines
an inspiring solution: a legislature chosen through "sortition" -
the random selection of lay citizens. It's a concept that has come
to the attention of democratic reformers across the globe.
Proposals for such bodies are being debated in Australia, Belgium,
Iceland, the United Kingdom, and many other countries. Sortition
promises to reduce corruption and create a truly representative
legislature in one fell swoop. In Legislature by Lot, John Gastil
and Erik Olin Wright make the case for pairing a sortition body
with an elected chamber within a bicameral legislature. Gastil is a
leading deliberative democracy scholar, and Wright a distinguished
sociologist and editor of the Real Utopias series, of which this is
a part. In this volume, they bring together critics and advocates
of sortition who have studied ancient Athens, deliberative polling,
political theory, social movements, and civic innovation. Without
obscuring its limitations, the contributors offer a wide variety of
ideas for how to implement sortition and examine its potential for
reshaping modern politics. Legislature by Lot includes sixteen
essays that respond to Gastil and Wright's detailed proposal.
Essays comparing sortition to contemporary reforms see it as a
dramatic extension of deliberative "minipublics," which gather
random samples of citizens to weigh public policy dilemmas without
being empowered to enact legislation. Another set of essays
explores the democratic principles underlying sortition and
elections and considers, for example, how a sortition body holds
itself accountable to a public that did not elect it. The third set
of essays considers alternative paths to democratic reform, which
limit the powers of a sortition chamber or more quickly establish a
pure sortition body. With contributions by Arash Abizadeh, Tom
Arnold, Terrill Bouricius, Deven Burks, Lyn Carson, Dimitri
Courant, Donatella della Porta, David M. Farrell, Andrea Felicetti,
James S. Fishkin, Brett Hennig, Vincent Jacquet, Raphael Kies, Tom
Malleson, Jane Mansbridge, Christoph Niessen, David Owen, John
Pitseys, Min Reuchamps, Yves Sintomer, Graham Smith, Jane Suiter,
and Pierre-Etienne Vandamme.
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