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I believe it is clear that our current government is no longer "of the people", "by the people", and "for the people". There are no longer any politicians that don't assume they are elected for life, and would never deign to be 'of the people' (like 'flyover country'). Given the first is true, then 'by the people' is clearly false, and 'for the people' is also false, as politicians now do whatever is "for them".

I would like to see a constitutional convention formed, and I would maintain that our current political lunacy make such an event much more likely now. Once a constitutional convention forms, there are NO limitations on what it can do. At the very least, term limits for congress-critters would go a long way toward renewing the "by the people" and "of the people" pillars of American democracy, and if this happens, I believe "for the people" would come naturally.

I see no value in any sort of 'mini-public' because it would be much too easy to manipulate. I don't think it would have either 'input' or 'output' legitimacy, and unless I missed too many Civics classes, I don't remember any mechanism for translating the output of a 'mini-public' to any sort of 'maxi-public' (i.e. referendum) result.

Just my $10.04 ($0.02 adjusted for inflation)

Frank

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I think perhaps the answers are different depending on the scale and nature of the deliberative enterprise. I am familiar with collaborative governance as used on federal lands in the US. There is a substantial academic literature on this and generally cheerier outcomes.

Also in our case, the universities would be seen to be biased, and there are environmental conflict resolution NGOs that are seen to have a good and unbiased track record.

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Any form of such "citizen participation" can only be about deliberation, never about decision-making. The usefulness of such palaver remains to be proven.

These initiatives, even if they are organised under the aegis of parliament (Ireland) or of the government (France), are in fact exercises in pseudo-democracy that disavow the role of institutions.

When a group of people unfamiliar with a topic must (a) get up to speed and (b) sort out priorities and propose solutions within a few weeks, it is exceedingly easy to manipulate them from the start, depending on who are chosen as the 'warm-up' persons. This was evident at the French Citizens' Climate Convention where no voice of any dissent was presented or tolerated.

And if the group is already familiar with the issue, then its work resembles that assigned to the elected parliament and its committees.

The only way to involve citizens is to get their vote, not to blah blah beforehand. This is what we have in Switzerland, where laws decided by parliament are subject to referendum, provided that, within three months, 50,000 citizens sign up for a popular vote to accept or reject a law (yes/no). There is also the possibility that 100'000 citizens take the initiative to propose a change of the constitution. Here again the vote is binary yes/no to approve or reject the proposed text.

The vote always turns out to be about the issue in question, not about the people involved. The debate is national and takes place in the month and weeks before the vote.

The most important thing about this system is that this semi-direct democracy influences preventively the work of the parliament and the government, that must always ask themselves whether their action could be sanctioned by the people ("able to convince a majority"). This also implies that the people should never be taken for manipulable fools.

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In principle, this could result in better policies. But in our unprincipled world, the Public expects almost instant action / gratification - DD is too slow. Those who want to drive action are either on the Left or Right ideologically, while most of us are in the muddle-through Middle. DD generally should yield recommendations reflecting the majority Middle, which neither of the ideologues are likely to accept. And we have a mainstream media which is trying to drive us all toward a single narrative.

Sadly, DD is not the cure for what ails us. If we want better policies, we need better politicians. Ones who have the courage to consider all the facts, and not just cherry pick those that fit their narratives. Ones who will strive for real cures for our ills, and not just feel-good placebos. Ones who will recognize that our society and country are too complex for one-size-fits all solutions for all of our problems.

In short, we need politicians who have internalized the words of Bastiat (I've substituted politician for economist):

"There is only one difference between a bad [economist] politician and a good one: the bad [economist] politician confines himself to the visible effect; the good [economist] politician takes into account both the effect that is seen and those effects that must be foreseen.

Yet this difference is tremendous; for it always happens that when the immediate consequence is favorable, the later consequences are disastrous, and vice versa. It follows that the bad [economist] politician pursues a small present good that will be followed by a great evil to come, while the good [economist] politician pursues a great good to come, at the risk of a small present evil."

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founding

"Any such exercise should be outsourced to those with expertise and experience (there are not many, but some, mainly in university settings);"

Your Progressive bonafides affirmed!

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Mar 2, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

I don’t get it. Why do we elect parlaments then?

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author

Right

Re-inventing or seeking to augment existing democratic processes is a big ask and a big risk

Think Brexit

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