The connection problem – how local councils can resolve democratic disconnect through citizen assemblies

This article explores the potential of deliberative democratic practices in reconnecting people with local government and enhancing their experience of democracy. Focusing on citizens’ assemblies and their unique ability to bring diverse perspectives together and build trust, it unpacks how to achieve a fair and representative panel, which is well-informed and supported. 

Democratic disconnect is evident across Australia. In what should be a key incubator of democracy, the local council, there are some alarming statistics. In Victoria, for example, more than 80% of councillors serving between 2020 and 2024 faced threatening or intimidating behaviour. While the current media narrative has been focused on police inaction and lack of redress, the behaviour points to a larger concern about democratic decline. Local democracy is no longer seen by most people as a guarantor of freedom, but as merely another layer of party political bureaucracy.

There are a host of reasons for this disconnect, from misinformation and the decline of local media to the centralisation of authority and resources. There are, however, ways we can reconnect people with local government and enhance their experience of democracy, educating them on the mandate and limitations of local councils and how they can make a difference at the local level. In Victoria, one of these approaches, deliberative democracy, is even mandated under the Local Government Act 2020. Unfortunately, the Act neither offers any minimum standards for engagement in deliberative democracy nor defines what constitutes deliberative democracy. Therefore, if councils want to get maximum benefit from engaging in deliberative democracy, they are largely on their own.

There are at least three components recognised as key to deliberative democracy. The first is that people are chosen by a democratic lottery, which ensures that every person in the local area has a fair chance of being selected. While the initial invitation process is equal, the chosen panel is selected based on specific criteria to accurately represent the broader population. For example, if you have an open invitation to a panel, the people who respond are generally older, better educated and often skewed along gender lines (for local council deliberations, there are more women, while at a national level, men are more likely to respond). The lottery process compensates for imbalances in age, education, and gender that often occur when panelists self-select – working to ensure that the final panel is as close as possible to the local population.

The second step is taking the time to inform the panel. This means the members of the panel must be presented with a range of high-quality information and potential solutions from a wide variety of experts and organisations, curated by an independent panel. It’s vital that the deliberative panel is able and indeed encouraged to interrogate both the evidence and the experts in a safe and supported manner.

The final step is a period of deliberation, during which panel members can share their perspectives and craft their own solutions to the problem presented. This part of the process is where magic occurs. In the second step, where the panel learns and researches, people often get a better understanding of the council and its role in society. Then, in this final step, they gain a better understanding of the other people who make up their community and their views, experiences and perspectives. In our experience, meeting and working together with others radically different from ourselves in this way almost universally builds trust and respect among the panel members, as well as sympathy for the range of views that council has to represent. It is these horizontal connections within the panel that are vital for long-term benefits of community-building, inoculation against extremism and creating advocates for democracy.

However, to maximise benefits from a deliberative process, it’s also key to bear in mind some other factors. Councils should have, for example, a clearly defined, achievable remit to ensure that panel members are realistic about what council can and will do. They should also engage with the process to help guide this thinking, while allowing the panel independence in deliberations. In line with this, there should also be transparency about the level of influence a panel will have, with council committing to this before engagement begins.

The panel itself is often only 30-40 people, so the process should be complemented by broad public engagement to inform the deliberations. This could be a public process of sourcing suggestions and comments, made available to the panel; the information made available to the panel could also be recorded and made public; or community groups could be invited to send observers to watch the process.

Both the public engagement and the response rates to the initial invitation can be boosted by a detailed media and communications strategy. The media engagement should talk not just about outcomes, but also every aspect of the deliberative process, from selection onwards. Media engagement builds public buy-in for the outcomes. Research in both Canada and Northern Ireland has shown that the more the public understands the process, the more likely they are to support the outcomes, even if they don’t individually benefit from those outcomes or even see them as being to their individual detriment. In other words, increasing understanding of the process increases the perceived legitimacy of the recommendations of the panel.

Lastly, councils should consider how to build in ongoing engagement with those involved, possibly as ambassadors for the process or the outcomes. Importantly, they also often hold council to account.

The ability for citizens’ panels to bring diverse perspectives together and build trust has been repeatedly demonstrated. One process that I was involved in (at the recruitment stage) was the Burnaby Community Panel held between February and June 2024. According to one assembly member, “The BCA has been a highlight of my journey as a naturalized citizen. It exemplifies the spirit of civic engagement, and has left me with a profound appreciation for the collaborative efforts that shape our city. This experience has strengthened my sense of belonging and commitment to the community.” The Burnaby experience included many of the components listed above, including outreach to ensure that members of the community who were not selected from the panel were able to contribute ideas to the Panel, and also to give feedback to the panel through the course of their deliberations. The Panel was run by a team from the Simon Fraser University, all sources of information were published and 95% of the participants felt that facilitation was neutral. All these factors combined to heighten the legitimacy of the process. To emphasise the way in which it helps to respond to community division, 97% of participants felt that “their understanding of others’ opinions increased”. These results echo what we have found in Australia. In processes led by Members of Parliament just prior to the last Federal Election, 84% of participants “agreed that they now have a better understanding of the views of people who have a different point of view from them.”

Right now, it often seems as though we’re losing a fight against those forces that are atomising and dividing communities. We can only win if we double down on our commitment to democracy, and build faith in our fellow residents and in our democratic institutions, starting with high-quality deliberative processes commissioned by local councils.

This article was written by Dr Sonia Randhawa. Sonia is a graduate in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from the University of Oxford, and as country lead at the Sortition Foundation has worked on recruitment for over 85 deliberative processes, primarily in Australia. She is also a writer and broadcaster, and sits on the board of two non-profit organisations aimed at deepening democracy and defending freedom of expression.