Upcoming events + welcoming our new U.S. Lead 🇺🇸🗽
Rahmin Sarabi joins the DemNext team to lead our work in America
🇺🇸 The DemNext team continues to grow! We are delighted to share that Rahmin Sarabi has joined us as U.S. Lead as of last week. Rahmin has been leading The American Public Trust to grow the field of deliberative democracy in the United States, and has been working intimately with the Democracy R&D Network on strategy. He is based in San Francisco, CA where he brings a background in innovation and human-centered design, spanning the non-profit to startup world.
Here’s how Rahmin announced his new role:
5 years ago, I left the startup world with a deep sense that the systems that needed the most innovation were in fact our systems of democracy and governance.
From this journey, I’m pleased to report there are powerful, emerging democratic approaches beyond elections that can bridge divides, resolve the stuckness and dysfunction of typical politics, and help communities and the country move forward on our most pressing issues.
Through this role, I’ll work to help cities, counties, and states build new institutions for this next democratic paradigm of citizen participation, representation, and deliberation. If you’ve been following along, this does indeed include Citizens’ Assemblies and related innovations. In fact, in over 600 cases around the world in the past three decades, they’ve proven to be transformative on many of the kinds of challenges we face here in the US.
Are Citizens' Assemblies a silver bullet? No. But evidence shows that there is real potential if this becomes a cornerstone of the wider democratic architecture.
There are of course already some great US-based organisations doing work in this space, and we're excited to collaborate!
I’m grateful for Claudia Chwalisz's leadership and for the many colleagues who have been pivotal in my journey into this work including Lauren Higgins, Peter MacLeod, David Schecter, Sarah Yaffe, Tom Atlee, Adam Cronkright, Linn Davis, Alex Renirie, and Philip Lindsay, to name a few. There are countless more in this space I'm honored to work with and call community.
We’re incredibly excited to have Rahmin aboard. You can reach him on Twitter or at rahmin@demnext.org.
📚 A reminder that next Tuesday, March 21, at 5:30 p.m. CET, DemNext board member Hugh Pope and Professor Yves Sintomer will explore new insights into democracy with the launch of two brand new books.
Throughout history, sortition has represented an important yet often neglected dimension of Republican and democratic government, and has been reintroduced in the Global North, China and Mexico. So, what lessons can be drawn from this history? Why is sortition is returning today, how is it coupled with deliberation, and why are citizens' assemblies flourishing?
We’ll discuss all of these questions at this double book launch—hosted by DemNext Founder/CEO Claudia Chwalisz and moderated by James Harding, cofounder and editor at Tortoise Media.
Virtual attendence is limited to 150 people, so if you want to join, grab a ticket here. We’ll also record the event and publish it on our YouTube channel afterward.
🌅 As part of the leadup to U.S. President Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy this spring, Claudia and DemNext Founding Head of Research and Learning Ieva Česnulaitytė will present on the future of democracy in a Global Democracy Coalition virtual session on March 27 at 4:30 p.m. CET.
There is another democratic future beyond broken electoral politics or autocracy. At the centre of it is the use of Citizens’ Assemblies—a democratic model that has been perfected and implemented close to 600 times, and embedded into public decision making in permanent ways. How do we build that future?
More information and tickets on Eventbrite.
🇳🇿 Particularly for New Zealanders, tune in to an online panel on March 29 hosted by Auckland University’s Koi Tū: Centre for Informed Futures and The Europe Institute, featuring Claudia and DemNext advisor and author Jon Alexander: “Another democratic future is possible: Inspiration from Europe.”
In this seminar, we’ll talk about the drivers of this “deliberative wave”, its successes and challenges, and reflect together on the opportunity for Aotearoa New Zealand to adopt some of these approaches - and perhaps even lead the world into a deeper form of democracy.
⚖️ Also next week, Ieva will present on March 23 at The Hague Academy for Local Governance to discuss trends and challenges in local democracies with Kamaran Palani, Associate fellow at Al Sharq Strategic Research and IOM-advisor, Joost Valk, integral security advisor of the municipality of Urk, and Cecile Meijs, Director of the Hague Academy for Local Governance.
This event is invite-only, but if you are interested in it, please contact Ieva at ieva@demnext.org.
🏴🇫🇷 As citizen-members of the Paris Citizens’ Assembly deliberated this week, they received a visit from a Scottish Parliament delegation, who are exploring creating an assembly in Scotland. The Paris body is a powerful example of a permanent assembly, and we are proud to have helped facilitate this visit so that others can learn from its example.
🎧 Finally, in case you missed it, Claudia recently appeared on Season 4, Episode 4 of Baratunde Thurston’s How to Citizen podcast to discuss democracy without politicians — instead of electing politicians to represent us, what if we just represented ourselves? Peer to peer. Neighbor to neighbor.
Have a listen: the full show is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and on the show website.