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The Government of Chance
This book provides the first systematic reconstruction of sortition in politics and democracy from Athens to contemporary experiments.
Sortition and Democracy
After two centuries during which it had nearly disappeared in Western countries, sortition is used again as a method of selecting people who could speak for, and in certain cases decide for, all the citizenry. What is the meaning of this comeback? To answer this question, this book offers a historical analysis. It brings together a number of the best specialists on political sortition from antiquity to contemporary experiments, in Europe but also in the Ancient Middle East and in imperial China. With a transdisciplinary perspective, this volume demonstrates that sortition has been a crucial device in political history; that the instruments and places where sortition was practised matter for the understanding of the social and political logics at stake; and that these logics have been quite different, random selection being sometimes an instrument of radical democracy and in other contexts a tool for solving conflicts among elites. Will sortition in politics helps to democratize democracy in the twenty-first century?
Anti-politics in Contemporary Italy
This book explores the discourses, attitudes and behaviours of professional politicians and ordinary citizens alike characterized by hostility towards the political sphere, political parties and, above all, professional politicians. It furnishes a clear, consistent depiction of the anti-politics phenomenon in general using Italy as a “laboratory” where anti-politics is widespread. After an original reconstruction of the concept of anti-politics, the author charts the rise of Silvio Berlusconi, the success of Umberto Bossi's Northern League, the resounding electoral victories of the Five Star Movement and the League (La Lega), all rooted in the anti-political rhetoric of Italy's leaders and the anti-political sentiment of its population. The author also traces the socio-political profile of the anti-political citizens of the main European democracies. This broad, consistent view of anti-politics will attract academics, journalists and policy makers interested in anti-politics in Italy and elsewhere. Students and scholars of party politics, party leaders, democracy and political participation will also find the volume of great interest.
Legislature by Lot
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 public officials might seem unbridgeable in the modern world, but Legislature by Lot presents a close examination of 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...
Legislature by Lot
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 ...
Democracy in Crisis
The storming of the US Capitol building in January 2021 focused attention on the multiple threats facing contemporary liberal democracies. Beyond the immediate problem of Covid-19, the past two decades saw political polarization, a dramatic rise in inequality, global warming and other environmental threats, as well as the growth of dangerous cultural and political divisions. Western liberal democracies find themselves in the midst of what political theorists call a legitimation crisis: major portions of the population lack confidence in the ability of governments to address our most pressing problems. This distrust in government and traditional political parties opened the door to populist l...
The Keys to Democracy
Sortition - also known as random selection - puts ordinary people in control of decision-making in government. This may seem novel, but it is how the original Athenian democracy worked. In fact, what is new is our belief that electoral systems are democratic. It was self-evident to thinkers from Aristotle to the Renaissance that elections always resulted in oligarchies, or rule by elites. In this distillation of a lifetime's thinking about the history and principles of democracy, Maurice Pope presents a new model of governance that replaces elected politicians with assemblies selected by lot. The re-introduction of sortition, he believes, offers a way out of gridlock, apathy, alienation and ...
Rationalized and Extended Democracy
In this book, Giovanni Molteni Tagliabue asserts that the realization of the values and the implementation of the objectives as indicated in democratic constitutions (political, social rights and the people’s welfare) are hindered by structural defects of the legislative/government architecture and processes. Expertise and science have scarce say in politics and policy. The author suggests an innovative view through the ‘REDemo Project’. 1. Rationalization: the insertion of public scientists into legislative/executive mechanisms, with the creation in each democracy of a National Scientific Assembly – parallel to the extant partypolitical Chamber of Representatives – consisting of a...
The Lottocratic Mentality
In recent years there has been great interest in new forms of citizen participation, such as citizens' assemblies or deliberative polls that involve ordinary citizens in political decision-making. Many see these innovations as the best solution to the current crisis of democracy. The most radical among them propose replacing elections with the random selection of ordinary citizens, transforming electoral democracy into a lottocracy. These developments are driven by a lottocratic mentality that is deeply transforming our understanding of democracy, political equality, representation, and more. In The Lottocratic Mentality, Lafont and Urbinati focus on this way of thinking, which is flourishin...
Polytropos Ajax
Meanings are realized at the point of reception and this volume intends to offer an in-depth discussion of some of the meanings associated with and raised by the figure of Telamonian Ajax at various, specifically contextualized, and yet somehow connectable ‘points of reception’. Part 1 looks at how, and from where, and with what effects, the epic and tragic figure of Ajax is constructed and re-defined in archaic and classical Greece. Part 2 moves on to Roman Ajax(es), evaluating how he is used in and by Latin literature as a tool for window-references and innovation, and for reflecting on national identity and cultural categories. Part 3 discusses various ways in which the myth of Ajax, especially in its Sophoclean version, has been translated into theatrical, psychological, and philosophical discussions. This is not an attempt to look for Ajax’s true nature (an ill-posed question in itself). Nor is it a claim to evaluate Ajax’s features as if they could be placed on a straight evolutionary line (they never can be). On the contrary, the volume provides a multiform and interconnected ensemble of relevant patterns, always particularly situated, and constantly changing.
