Hello! I've been down a rabbithole on Aristotlean thought about democracy and the academic who introduced me to the topic off-handedly used the phrase "juries without judges" (or something to that effect). And my interpretation of this was basically a system of courts by sortition-based tribunal. And ever since my mind has been overrun with ideas about how such a concept might be acted upon: would it be a stratified sampling; would there be further selection akin to American "voir dire"; how many people should make up a tribunal; are they selected for a term or per trial; should they have full power as adjudicators; what might the authority of legal representation; what would be the process of appeal?

With all these questions, I naturally sought out some sort of historical implementation or something adjacent to it. As of yet, the closest I have come is this rather niche movement to have sortition for the United States Supreme Court. It's far more modest in its aims—it proposes existing circuit judges are randomly selected for one year of cases. It's a genuinely refreshing idea in the blatantly partisan state of the SCOTUS at present, ro be sure.

An important part of the argument is whether random people would have the expertise. But sortition does not exclude having experts do their jobs.

D.M.: Your colleague and accomplice, Edgar Morin, talks about the generalist and the specialist. Politics requires both: the generalist who knows next to nothing about a little of everything, and the specialist who knows everything about a single thing but not the rest. How is a good citizen made?

C.C.: This dilemma has been posed since Plato. Plato said that the philosophers, who are above the specialists, must rule. In Plato’s theory, they have a view of ev- erything. The other alternative was Athenian democracy. What were the Athenians up to? Indeed, something very interesting. It’s the Greeks who invented elections. It’s a historically attested fact. Perhaps they were wrong, but they invented elec- tions! Who was being elected in Athens? The magistrates weren’t being elected. The magistrates were being appointed by drawing lots or by rotation. For Aristotle, remember, a citizen is someone who is capable of governing and being governed. Everyone is capable of governing, so lots are drawn. Why? Because politics is not the business of specialists. There is no science of [26] politics. There is opinion, the doxa of the Greeks; there’s no episteme.9 I’d like to point out, moreover, that the idea that there aren’t specialists of politics and that all opinions are of equal worth is the only reasonable justification for the principle of the majority. Thus, for the Greeks, the people decide and the magistrates are chosen by drawing lots or appointed by rotation. There are specialized activities because the Athenians weren’t crazy. Indeed, they did rather significant things; they made the Parthenon, etc. For these specialized activities—the setting up of shipyards, the construction of temples, the waging of war—specialists are necessary. Therefore, such special- ists are elected. That’s what an election is, because “election” means election of the best. And what is the election of the best based on? Well, that’s where the education of the people comes in, since they are led to choose. A first election takes place, a mistake is made, it’s noticed, for example, that Pericles is a deplorable strategist; well, then, he is not re-elected, or he’s even dismissed. But the postulate accord- ing to which doxa, opinion, is equally shared, is of course an entirely theoretical postulate. For this postulate to have a bit of substance, doxa most be cultivated. And [27] how can a doxa concerning the government be cultivated? Well, through governing. So democracy—this is what’s important—is a matter of educating citizens, something that does not exist at all today.

Yes. Most probably.

I need to code a super mod that'll handle the process of sortition. Once I get enough applicants, I'll deploy the bot. I haven't coded the bot yet, but I'm giving myself 2 weeks, post which I'll start the cycle.

Tentatively, 14th of next month is when this com will get new mods. And application process would tentatively start around the start of September.

The bot would run on service that'll have my credentials, I'll need to figure how that'll work and how to include that in sortition process without compromising it. Any suggestions on that are welcome.

Till then, I'm the mod of the subreddit.

Sortition is a practice of forming government by choosing people at random. It was practiced in ancient Athens and in modern times is practiced as an advisory committee.

This community is for talking and discussing about sortition.