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We Should Let a Lottery Decide Our Government (2019)
Politicians are often older, wealthy, and white. Could randomly selecting average citizens lead to better representation?
Randomly selecting members of legislative assemblies would, he argues, enable “descriptive representation”—meaning representatives would mirror the preferences of their communities and their demographics across categories such as class, race, and gender. British sociologist Colin Crouch describes the process of campaigning as a “controlled spectacle, managed by rival teams of professionals expert in the techniques of persuasion, and considering a small range of issues selected by those teams.” With the prevailing power of business interests and the constant noise of social media and paid advertising, citizens’ participation in politics is often reduced to ticking off a box once every couple of years. In 2017, for example, Ireland’s citizen’s assembly recommended repealing the country’s restrictive abortion laws and legalizing same-sex marriage, issues long considered divisive in Irish politics.
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