DemNext x Seattle, Bend, and Los Angeles
And: Claudia Chwalisz is recognized as a 2023 Obama Foundation Leader!
We have a quite a bit of news to share! First off…
🏔 DemocracyNext Founder and CEO Claudia Chwalisz continues her U.S. West Coast tour this week with an event in Seattle at Town Hall on March 3 at 7:30 pm. She’ll be in conversation with award-winning journalists Marcus Green and Brandi Kruse. Depending upon staffing at the venue it may be livestreamed, but if not, we’ll share a recording later.
If you’re in Seattle, please come through! Tickets are available on a sliding scale here.
Seattle Times writer Alex Fryer interviewed Claudia in his Sunday column, “Seattle, here’s something we haven’t tried: A people’s assembly.” He writes:
Feel like local politics has devolved into ideological proxy battles and dysfunctional echo chambers?
Maybe the solution is you. Yes, you.
To boot, DemNext Communications Director Ansel Herz published an argument for a Seattle Citizens’ Assembly at The Stranger newspaper (where he used to be a reporter): “A Random Group of People Could Solve Seattle’s Problems Better Than Its Politicians.”
After Seattle, Claudia’s travels continue southward:
7-8 March: Jury Duty for Democracy in our Offline & Online Worlds, Information Quality Summit, Bend, Oregon
9 March: A Citizens’ Assembly for LA meeting with organisers, stakeholders, and volunteers, Public Democracy LA and Berggruen Institute
10-11 March: Democratizing Finance Workshop, Berggruen Institute, LA
🏛 In other news, DemNext is proud to share that Claudia has been selected as an Obama Foundation Europe Leader! We're thrilled by this recognition of Claudia's years of research and her persistent, thoughtful efforts to build the future of democracy.
As a non-partisan institute, our goal is to collaborate with as many groups as we can from all quarters — left, right or center, big or small, established or little-known — to shift power to everyday people for a more just and joyful future. Claudia is excited to meet with fellow Europe Leaders over the coming months, and we’ll continue to share updates from her experience here.
🇪🇺 On March 13, our Founding Head of Research and Learning Ieva Česnulaitytė will speak about the future of Citizens’ Assemblies at a European Commission event called Deliberative Democracy Days in Brussels—part of the commission’s two year “Citizen Z” project applying deliberative methods to stimulate interest in civic life among young people and involve them in the decision-making process.
If you’d like to attend, register here!
🌿 Claudia recently published a powerful meditation on hope, curiousity and complexity… even fractals as they relate to our work, inspired by three podcasts with James Bridle, Amanda Ripley, and adrienne marie brown. Here’s an excerpt:
I felt like they were in conversation with one another, and it brought out some new ideas and questions for me. They wove similar threads about the deeper practices and culture underpinning democracy. In different ways, they each brought forth to me why and how we can make the next democratic paradigm one defined by joy, agency, dignity, wonder, and being in relationship — with others, and with our planet and all its species.
Claudia’s been receiving messages and feedback about it all week. We invite you to share your thoughts and read the full piece here.
📚 We’re also excited to share that on March 21, DemocracyNext board member Hugh Pope will launch his late father’s brilliant book, The Keys to Democracy: Sortition as a New Model for Citizen Power, in a joint event with Professor Yves Sintomer, who is also releasing a new book, entitled The Government of Chance: Sortition and Democracy from Athens to the Present.
Together, the two authors will discuss some of the reasons for the historic drift away from democracy by lot, as well as explore why it’s been making a comeback lately in what we have called the deliberative wave (#delibwave).
This promises to be a fascinating event, hosted by Claudia and moderated by James Harding of Tortoise Media — so don’t miss it and register here.
Is there any online option to participate in Deliberative Democracy Days in Brussels?