Commonlot's Blog

Chapters 4 & 5 of “The Common Lot: Take Off”

Chapters 4 through 6 of “The Common Lot: Take Off”

These are the first three chapters of a 225 page novel about what a sortitionally-chosen federal Citizen Legislature in the U.S.A. might look like.

It is as much a character study as a political investigation.

Hoping for feedback and discussion on the blog of https://commonlot.wordpress.com/

More comment to follow.

Professor Donald Kraybill on Amish use of sortition (4 min 40 sec) from David Grant on Vimeo.

Take note that Common Lot Productions is seeking donations (not tax-deductible) and SALES — of DVD, manuscripts and presentations. Please recommend the site and the effort to re-establish the true hallmark of democracy: sortitional selection.

It is accepted as democratic when public offices are allocated by lot; and as oligarchic when they are filled by election.  — Aristotle

Here’s an example that demonstrates that citizens can effectively grapple with the difficult issue of budgeting.  The only piece missing, as far as true ‘government by the people’ is concerned, is that the groups convened to make these decisions should be randomly selected.  Otherwise, it is only those who have the time and personal interest who ‘solve’ the community’s issues.==========

Let citizens solve budget battles – “Governments can’t solve budget battles? Let citizens do it!” argue Josh Lerner and Daniel Altschuler in the pages of Christian Science Monitor article. The piece lays out the bipartisan appeal and latest applications of participatory budgeting in the U.S. http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2011/0405/Government-can-t-solve-budget-battles-Let-citizens-do-it

Using the ’20-20′ discipline as presentational format (i.e., 20 panels, each strictly 20 seconds long), “Next Step for Democracy” explains why sortition (random selection) is — as Aristotle said of the first democracy — the defining hallmark of democracy … and why elections are the hallmark of oligarchy.

“Next Step for Democracy” is a plea for a government by the people, all the people.

See the video at http://www.TheCommonLot.com