When I was up in Newcastle, I often listened to Karl Kruszelnicki's science show on JJJ . He is an obviously intelligent and knowledgeable man, who doesn't suffer from the arrogance that often comes with it. One of the features of his show was the ease by which he admitted he didn't know, and would either go off to research it so he had the answer next week; or people would ring in with the answer to the question which stumped him. I recall Karl saying once on the radio, after someone calling in helped him, "There is much wisdom in people".

The Federal and State governments are populated by professional politicians who are become more and more entrenched each year. They are managing the media in such a way, that they can make decisions with impunity, and only have to take notice of the electorate in a short period prior to elections. This is leaving us with inferior outcomes. Our government institutions lack vitality, vigour and relevance. This can be amended partly by greater participation of non-professional politicians in the government process. Basically tapping the profound wisdom that, as Karl commented, can be found in the people.

Non-elected Cabinet Ministers

The Imagining Australia folks in their book have a section on expanding eligibility for the Executive Cabinet. In the Westminster system the formal power of the Executive is spread across the Executive and Legislative. By the Constitution, the Executive is the Queen of England. Her representative in Australia is the Governor-General, who is constitutionally guided by Parliament.

The Governor-General heads the Executive Council. This contains the Governor-General and the Executive Cabinet. The Executive Cabinet is a collection of the Prime Minister and other Senior Ministers, such as the Treasurer, Foreign Minister, etc. The Prime Minister heads the Executive Cabinet and by convention guides the Governor-General. The real power of the executive lies in the hands of the Prime Minister, no matter how ambiguous and obtuse the Australian Constitution is in this area.

The Imagining Australia folks call Australian Government, "responsible cabinet government". Built as it is on the British tradition of responsible government. Even though self-government has survived in Australia since the 1850s to provide a relatively stable political structure, the Imagining Australia folks ask if it can be improved. They see one area of improvement being in opening up the Executive Cabinet to non-elected appointees.

There are two issues surrounding this. The Prime Minister through the wielding of absolute party discipline has become the dominant member in parliament, and has warped the cabinet system to a presidential style of singular executive. Another issue is that those that make up the numbers of the cabinet are often professional politicians with little experience of private industry, or of a non-political speciality. For instance, John Howard was last in private industry in 1974. Since then, a total of thirty-two years, he has been a professional politician.

The Imagining Australia folks write;

We propose broadening the pool from which ministers can be drawn. The prime minister should be able to appoint Cabinet ministers from outside of parliament. Any Australian with the appropriate expertise and experience should be eligible. These people need not be experts - after all, policy experts are often best situated in the public service. Rather they could simply be individuals who have been successful in relevant fields and who, by virtue of their political and managerial skills, would excel in a ministerial role.

As the authors note, it is not a radical idea. The US Executive Cabinet is entirely composed of appointments, rather than elected officials. The President and Vice-President are the only ones elected in the US cabinet. The danger in this system is that individuals who have been rejected in an election will still get appointed into powerful positions. A good example of this is former US Attorney-General John Ashcroft. He failed to win election in Mississippi, yet was appointed into a senior position in the cabinet despite being rejected by voters as unfit for public office.

Another issue that is not covered in the Imagining Australia book, is how the appointments would be approved. In the US system the Senate approves the Presidents appointments. This often means that those who appear unfit for an appointment are closely scrutinized. For instance Alberto Gonzalez, who had given legal opinion on Guantanamo Bay and the practices that were condoned there. Another is the current appointment of John Bolton. It would be in the interests of separation of powers that the Prime Minister puts any outside appointments to the Executive Cabinet through the Senate first, where they can be approved or rejected.

The Imagining Australia folks write;

Such people [those that may be suitable for an appointment to cabinet] could inject new life and ideas into policy-making, informed by sustained practical engagement with particular issues. In a nation of just 20 million people, governments should draw on talent from all walks of life - and should aim to produce a Cabinet that is representative of Australia in all its diversity.

While that is a nice sentiment, nowhere in their book do the Imagining Australia folks seek to draw on anything but specialists. The Imagining Australia book follows closely a doctrine of increasing the number of non-elected specialists into Australian government, economy, policy and culture - with a decreased level of accountability to the public. This is the weakness of the book in my opinion.

However I am comfortable with appointed cabinet ministers as long as the appointments are known well in advance of an election, and that they have to be approved by the Senate - and maybe Ratifiers and a People's Chamber too.

A People's Cabinet

Nicholas Gruen in a recent post to troppo armadillo, advocated a People's Chamber . Nicholas based it upon the shallowness, and homogeneity of political culture - the same base from which the Imagining Australia folks worked from in proposing appointed Cabinet members. In proposing a People's Chamber Nicholas instead saw inspiration in the original democracy itself, Athens . Athenian democracy incorporated aspects of sortition and direct democracy. Sortition is the process whereby officials are chosen through lottery, rather than election or appointment. Unlike post-enlightenment democracy, the Athenian model did not incorporate the principle of separation of powers, nor universal franchise.

The People's Chamber would be a third house in the parliamentary system. One where its representative would be chosen by sortition from the population to participate in government. The chamber would be approximately one hundred people. From a later thread, Ken Parish tentatively agreed with the principle once he determined it didn't require physical presence in Canberra to be effective. It should be noted Nicholas made no determination on any requirements in the physical presence of the chamber in his post, or subsequent comments, but Ken thought small periods of face to face meeting for the chamber were acceptable;

Maybe it could work if the People's House met for (say) 3 or 4 fortnight blocks each year. Any more than that and too many people would be precluded from membership, not only people in my position but single parents, most small businesspeople (including trades), and anyone who is still carving out a career where 3 years absence would adversely impact promotion prospects. That sort of length of time ought to be enough to work, although any shorter wouldn't. And I guess you could turn over the membership every year rather than every 3 years.

The important aspect of this proposal is that there is wider recognition that there is no legitimate voice of the people despite Australia's reliance on proportional voting. Pluralism has largely been destroyed by the parties, absolute party discipline and professional politicians.

Citizen's Representatives and Citizens Auditors

Scrymarch in the past has proposed sortitionists being injected directly into parliament. Chosen by lottery, and serving alongside elected politicians to be involved in forming government, opposition and independents. I cannot find a link for it, as much of Scrymarch's political philosophy is spread across comments rather than articles, but IIRC a considerable percentage was proposed - in the order of twenty-five percent.

Again this was to inject the people directly into the process and take advantage of their wisdom, ability to excel, and their non-political experiences while they are fresh. From a comment ;

I like indirect democracy, and community representatives; but the current mob are not representative. Which is where sortition and ratification comes in. Sortition puts people representative of the population in Parliament. Ratification ensures the consensus reality of the parliamentary village does not become too detached from the people. I see the process of ratification as a final referee, similar to a presidential veto, but with a clearer and less factional mandate.

I think the pace and detail of legislation is inherently too great to be sensibly weighed by a large electorate. Some delegation is required, by sheer division of labour. Mencius made the same point 2300 years ago.

Direct democracy mechanisms can be used well. The Swiss use Citizen Initiated Referenda to great effect. I'm a fan of that system. But the Swiss are pretty civic minded, and that takes time to cultivate. The number of proposals are also an order of magnitude less than legislation.

Another proposal of Scrymarch's was Citizen Auditors. These are spontaneous citizen groups which rise up to audit government - a kind of flash-mob for government auditing. I think this would bring superior solutions, not in government waste, but in identifying expensive, ineffective and impractical policy - which ultimately has to be funded to be implemented. This would definitely take advantage of the wisdom and application of the people and in my opinion would bring some of the fastest returns and improvements.

This proposal would require supporting legislation, which I doubt parliament would implement - government prefers acting privately and avoiding the public space as much as possible. This is also used to avoid criticism. Given the slow oscillication of the Australian system in the change over of government, the incumbent needs to be exposed to more pressure and criticism so that they take responsibility for their actions.

A Ratification Model

In an article titled, "The Fourth Estate" , I proposed a ratification model of parliament for an Australian Republic. In this model the Ratifiers exist mainly to kill repugnant legislation and bills that are not in the public interest. A good example of this would be the US Patriot Act, or Copyright extensions and DMCA like clauses that came with the Au-US FTA.

The Ratifiers would be a flash-mob chosen by sortition for each bill that passes the Senate. They are like jurors for legislation, and only exist for a single bill, in the same way jurors only exist as a group for one case before disbanding. Each group of Ratifiers will consist of approximately one percent of the population. I wrote;

The Ratifiers;

• will have its members chosen by sortition.
• will consist of at least 1% of the population to vote on a bill or a judicial nominee.
• will not be allowed to excuse themselves from the process, however an abstinence will be counted as no.
• will require a greater than 50% no vote on a bill to send it back to the Senate.

Note that the Ratifiers are intended to be anonymous - a secret ballot for each bill. They are also not intended to meet face to face, nor to offer policy suggestions as Ratifiers on a bill. Though they may comment as citizens or affected individuals as part of the normal political discourse. I constantly write on the inability of Australian Government to adhere to legislation that respects our rights and liberties. This would address that issue.

Conclusion

The above article contains four different innovations on the parliamentary model, but all come from the same standpoint; tapping the profound wisdom of the people, and the knowledge that the people know what is best for them - consequently injecting them directly into the political process will only benefit the country above and beyond the current system.

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Steven Pearlstein has an article in the Washington Post titled, "Aid Recipients Might Have the Best Ideas About Allocation" which covers alternate methods to allocate aid funding to needy states. The article challenges the orthodoxy that a small group of specialists are the best to determine what to do with donor money. Instead, GlobalGiving is using technology and the "wisdom of the crowds" to produce outcomes that are more efficient. This methodology has political implications, especially for models which incorporate ratification and sortition .

GlobalGiving

Dennis Whittle and Mari Kuraishi have set up GlobalGiving to connect individual and institutional donors directly to to projects around the world. They claim this gives higher impact as the donors know where their money is going and it avoids the donors money being lost in bureaucratic overhead of non-profit organisations.

The GlobalGiving site has a Donation Wizard which can identify projects that need funding. it is remarkable how little money some of these projects require. For instance this project in India to provide computer education to the rural poor involves a total cost of $5,000 of which $1,840 has already been donated. Another is the founding of a Women's University in Afghanistan which needs $10,000 of which $3,106 has been donated thus far. There are numerous variations in the projects, from Child journalists in the Congo , lead contamination in Peru or rural micro-credit in Honduras .

GlobalGiving recently conducted an experiment on their website;

On its Web site, GlobalGiving provided brief descriptions of 112 development projects, asking site visitors to rank them on a scale of 1 to 10. About 50,000 individuals generated 200,000 evaluations. Simultaneously, a much smaller group of several hundred aid experts was asked to perform the same task. Of the 12 projects chosen by the experts, nine were also chosen by popular vote.

Part two of the experiment involved allocating $100,000 in prize money among the 12 finalists. Hundreds of wealthy donors at a conference in Palo Alto, Calif., were given five-minute presentations on each project and asked to immediately divide the pot. At the same time, a jury of nine of them was told to spend several hours reaching consensus on how best to allocate the money -- a proxy for the committee-driven process by which most grants are now made. Again, the choices made by the more deliberative jury were strikingly similar to the collective, seat-of-the-pants choices made by the larger group.

This has been called the "wisdom of the crowds" by James Surowiecki. More often this is seen from a market point of view, where decentralised groups, made up of individuals, acting in their interest, and from information they can discern; make more accurate decisions than small groups of knowledgeable specialists. A good example of this is Index Funds beating managed Mutual Funds for returns. Another example is Bryan Palmer and Andrew Leigh checking any polling data against Centrebet .

Surowiecki places some caveats on what makes a crowd smart however;

There are four key qualities that make a crowd smart. It needs to be diverse, so that people are bringing different pieces of information to the table. It needs to be decentralized, so that no one at the top is dictating the crowd's answer. It needs a way of summarizing people's opinions into one collective verdict. And the people in the crowd need to be independent, so that they pay attention mostly to their own information, and not worrying about what everyone around them thinks.

He also sees it important that the crowd not be biased, in Surowiecki's opinion this is why specialists fail as well - they bring their bias with them, that leads to inferior outcome. The groups must be truly decentralised, and genuinely diverse.

Democracy

Political parties are the casting of political bias into the representative system. I have made the comment in the past that people are pretty much the same all over the world, the difference is in the quality of government which runs from bad to suckitude. Part of the reason for government's inferiority is that it is inherently biased by the political parties which inhabit it, entrench themselves in it, gorge themselves at its trough and project their bias onto the people.

To temper this skewing of the system from inferior outcomes, and the bias of political specialists, the wisdom of the crowds can be used instead to make policy decisions. These would be anonymous ratifiers, chosen by sortition for each issue; and casting secret ballots on their policies or ordering of priorities.

This would not exclude the professional politicians, policies would still need to be made, even if ratifiers line item vetoed them, or voted on prioritising different aspects of different policies. This would also not exclude citizens, who could present their own policies and legislation to compete with that of the professional politicians.

Gary Sauer-Thompson asked the question whether the internet had transformative power in the area of democracy. Gary quoted Mark Poster while exploring this issue;

The Internet seems to discourage the endowment of individuals with inflated status. ...If scholarly authority is challenged and reformed by the location and dissemination of texts on the Internet, it is possible that political authorities will be subject to a similar fate.

I would argue that the decentralised data networks will flatten the present system of status entirely, making us all equal, and wiser for it. Gary comments;

If this is so, then it represents a rupture with the old politics of the active expert addressing a passive audience and which only grants the space for the audience to ask a few questions at the end of the speech.

The challenge is to adapt our system of government so that where ratifiers and sortitionists provide superior outcomes to representatives, parties, factions and professional politicians, they are injected into the process. I suspect the present politicians, who enjoy their ability to spray bias at a passive audience from the pinnacle of Australian power will have to be brought kicking and screaming into the new decentralised democratic era.

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Newspapers, magazines and other centralised media earns its trust quotient through the audience knowing there is a paid, professional and expert editors. With new emergant media, such as Wikis, Chris Anderson argues we give up microscale errors for macroscale efficiency.

From the article;

Our brains aren't wired to think in terms of statistics and probability. We want to know whether an encyclopedia entry is right or wrong. We want to know that there's a wise hand (ideally human) guiding Google's results. We want to trust what we read. When professionals - editors, academics, journalists - are running the show, we at least know that it's someone's job to look out for such things as accuracy. But now we're depending more and more on systems where nobody's in charge; the intelligence is simply emergent. These probabilistic systems aren't perfect, but they are statistically optimized to excel over time and large numbers. They're designed to scale, and to improve with size. And a little slop at the microscale is the price of such efficiency at the macroscale.

As Anderson argues, centralised systems deal in errors of omission rather than commission. It is not unusual for news or talking heads to influence debate and accuracy on an issue by leaving out details. It allows their editors to sleep in bed straight at night as they have not bent truth - just portrayed a lop-sided version of it.

Emergant systems, such as Wikis, blogs, aggregates etc swamp the world in information. At the macro level they scale far beyond a small group of editors ability to convey information, or an elites' capability to control that information either. Anderson writes;

The good thing about probabilistic systems is that they benefit from the wisdom of the crowd and as a result can scale nicely both in breadth and depth.

Probablistic systems have a political role as well, ratification and sortition would improve the political process which is a highly centralised one and currently largely immune to wisdom of the crowds.

British Columbia is a Canadian province. In 2001 they set up a Citizen's Assembly on Electoral Reform where citizen's were chosen by sortition to put forward a recommendation for which electoral system voters should judge in referendum.

South Sea Republic has covered sortition methods in articles before. One article titled; Tapping the Wisdom of the People included a discussion of Nicholas Gruen's idea for a citizen's chamber. So how did the sortitionists in British Columbia do?

Campbell Sharman has an article; Citizens' Assemblies and Parliamentary Reform in Canada [pdf] on the Australian Parliament House website from March 2006 which discusses this event.

British Columbia is a Canadian province with a unicameral parliament and a first past the post [FPTP] electoral system. In single member districts a a FPTP system can accentuate swings against the government. The downside is that members can be elected without a true majority. Another problem is that it punishes minor parties, keeping them from any representation in parliament. This can focus the special interests of major parties and hinder parliament from being truly representative of the community which elects them.

The circumstances which precipitated the formation of the Citizen's Assembly was the 1996 elections. The New Democratic Party was elected with a majority of seats, despite not having a majority in the popular vote. At the end of their five year term they were in disarray from allegations of corruption and poor governance. In the 2001 election the New Democrats won just two seats, with the Liberals winning seventy-seven!

Apparently Gordon Campbell, the Liberal leader, went forward with the Citizen's Assembly on Electoral Reform despite reservations from his cabinet.

How Were They Chosen

Sharman writes;

First, invitations were sent to a randomly selected, age stratified, panel of electors from the electoral role in each district inviting them to attend a meeting in that district.

At the meeting, there was a presentation by Citizens' Assembly staff explaining that members of the Assembly would have to be willing to spend 12 weekends in the coming year (2004) and travel to Vancouver for each meeting (expenses would be paid by the Assembly).

At the end of the meeting, those who were willing to make such a commitment had their names put in a hat, and one man and one woman were selected. This process was repeated for all 79 electoral districts in the province.

So citizens that were chosen by sortition were given the chance to opt-out if they wanted to. The Assembly met over several weekends learning about the electoral system and the political process. They also attended several public hearings with the final six weekends spent deliberating over whether British-Columbia needed a new electoral system.

The knee-jerk reaction to average citizens doing what is seen as a professional's job - ie politicians - is usually "people are dumb". Yet everyday of the year people over-achieve, with their families, in their jobs, in the economy, culturally and socially. An individual is a ball of achievement waiting for new opportunities to excel.

Sharman writes on the media response to the Citizen's Assembly;

The news media were initially sceptical about the ability of 'ordinary people' to become familiar with the complexities of electoral rules and their parliamentary consequences but, as the Assembly's meetings progressed, the tone of media reporting moved from mild condescension to admiration both for the substance and the tone of the Assembly's discussions.

The faith in 'ordinary people' being able to make decisions on complex political issues had been overwhelmingly endorsed. The public goodwill towards the Citizens' Assembly process was perhaps its most important achievement.

So what did the Citizen's Assembly come up with? They decided a proportional system similar to the Tasmanian and ACT systems offered the best outcome. They also decided that keeping a member close to its electorate as more important over a majority party government. Unsurprisingly political parties see it the other way around.

In Australia the only altruistic electoral change was Steele Hall in South Australia who removed malapportionment from the electorate even though he knew it would cost him his government. He did it anyway.

Most of the electoral changes to secure permanent majorities in Australia have back-fired anyway. The biggest clanger was Chifley changing the Senate from winner takes all to proportional. Since then Labor has never had a majority in the Senate. That change also led to the rise of the Australian Democrats giving them in a niche in Australian politics for a quarter of a century.

So what did the British-Columbian politicians think of the Citizen Assembly's recommendation. Sharman writes;

The Assembly's recommendation of PR-STV [a variant of proportional representation by the single transferable vote] had been signalled during the final weeks of the Assembly's deliberations, but the recommendation still came as a shock to many of the political class.

For parliamentarians and established political parties it represented at best a major challenge to the existing pattern of electoral and parliamentary politics and at worst a threat to the influence of the major parties.

Some groups which favoured electoral reform

were not happy with the Assembly's commitment to PR-STV. The electoral system of choice for several of these groups was MMP [mixed member proportional - like NZ], and the rejection of this system by the Citizens' Assembly undid the image of MMP as the perfect electoral system and the unquestioned choice for reform minded people.

Even the Greens, who had much to gain from a proportional electoral system, were divided over the virtues of PR-STV; several of those in executive positions in the party liked the idea of MMP with closed party lists as a way of ensuring a socially diverse slate of candidates.

The electoral system still had to pass a referendum which required 60% of all British Columbians as well as 60% in each district. There were no funds put toward the yes or no campaign and the without anyone campaigning for electoral change the issue was swamped in the day-to-day party politics as the Liberals and New Democrats positioned themselves to try and take government.

The in the end all but two districts got the required 60%, but throughout the whole province the number who voted for the referendum was 58%. It was two percent short. Sharman writes;

This result was remarkable. Even though the referendum did not fulfil the requirements for acceptance, a substantial majority of the electorate had voted for electoral change in spite of an almost complete lack of organized campaigning.

One of the surprises to come from the aftermath was that many voters, despite not understanding the complexity of the PR-STV system, trusted the Citizen's Assembly because it was randomly drawn from the citizenry and voted for the referendum.

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Hardt and Negri on Liberalism;

The arguments of Madison, who thought representation the key to breaking apart any monarchy of power, now seem merely like mystifications; Montesquieu, who advocated radical division of constitutional powers, has been silenced by the unity of the system; and Jeffersonian free expression has been monopolized by corporate media. The political lexicon of modern liberalism is a cold bloodless cadaver.

They continue;

Liberalism never really even pretended to represent all of society - the poor, women, racial minorities, and the rest of the subordinated majority have always been excluded from power by explicit or implicit constitutional mechanisms.

Today liberalism tends not even to be able adequately to represent the elites. In the era of globalization it is becoming increasingly clear that the historical moment of liberalism has passed.

Big statements.

Is representation purely liberal? It was a democratic advance for its time that connected the increasing equity of social and technological organisation.

On South Sea Republic we are constantly discussing post-representative forms of governance such as ratification and sortition . These technologies were not unknown at the time of the American revolution. Juries are an essential part of American Constitutional rights.

Juries are used to ensure that an individual is judged by the peers under the technical guidance of a specialist, ie a Judge. This was deemed the most efficient, and just form of judicial organisation.

There is no reason why modern liberalism cannot adjust those same principles to Executive and Legislative government. A Harpurian Republic reflects the most advanced form of social organisation that capable at the time.

Madison's beliefs on representation have been overtaken by advances in education, technology, health and enfranchisement. They have also been undercut by political organisation which seeks to increase the alienation and abstraction between representative and voter. Gerry-mandering is one such technique.

Our recent discussion on appointed or elected Ministers raised the issue of division of constitutional powers. The consensus was that factionalism has combined to make the government run pay party than by division of powers. Yet, many parliamentary systems, including Australia's, are specifically set up this way.

Australian government has no real recognition of division between executive and legislative responsibilities. Unicameral systems such as Queensland's and the ACT's have even less recognition of that separation.

Queensland's upper house was suicide squadded by Labor members, but the ACT and Northern Territory systems were created when people were more sensitive to separation of powers. Parliamentary systems are specifically set-up to ensure there is as little conflict between Executive and Legislative as possible.

Is that a failing of Liberalism? I think it is rough to throw that in its lap.

As to the corporate media being monopolised to such an extent that it is a statist mouthpiece, this is nothing new, and something that individuals have chafed under, even back in Jefferson's time. Jefferson himself, was an extraordinary muck-raker who would happily co-ordinate attacks on his opponents through the publishing media of the time.

But is the political lexicon of modern liberalism limited to representation, separation of powers and a free mass media?

It can be argued, rightly in my opinion, that sites like South Sea Republic represent modern liberalism as much as any other; and innovations such as sortition, independent constitutional review, abundant media, technology, etc are all part of the common lexicon on this site.

The American Republic had to update the responses in political science and philosophy to eradicate the ills they saw that damaged liberty and democracy. Republicanism is not static, nor is it conservative. It is an expression of the maximal political innovation and achievement of the time.

Today our list of ills is larger than in 1787 or 1901. The lexicon advances to innovations and technologies that can eradicate the attacks on liberty, democracy and justice.

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My entry into the Constitution Fun Challenge. It has three separate branches and attempts to divide any power structure under a principle of elected, specialist and sortitionist.

This started out as a Westminster style system with some modifications that we have discussed in the past like a Rights Referee Governor-General. Then I added a People's Chamber in the house which was a quarter of the house; but I turned it into a sortitionist's body with only a couple of specialists left, with the Treasurer leading the house.

The Senate becomes a supra-national body, able to accept representation outside of Australia itself as needed. The Senate is also composed of elected specialists (ie politicians) and act as the main check on a separate executive.

The Executive contains the Governor-General and Cabinet. The Governor-Magistrate is like a vice-president, but is part of the Judicature. Kind of a mix between VP and Chief Magistrate. The GM is tasked with actively intervening in the executive's actions and setting forth commissions and inquiries. Probably needs some more refinement, but I like the active watchdog role on the executive. The Judicature also has a Citizens Council which is the sortitionist body for the Judicature.

The states get more of a role too, as a federalist system, they get the most involvement in the Judicature which watches the Executive (who corrodes state power the fastest).

Thanks to Avocadia for the use of his Bill of Rights which makes up section 2.8. This entry is incomplete and I will return to it next CFC.

1.Constitution

1. A constitution for the Republic of the Southern Seas.
2. This document defines the Commonwealth Government.
3. The constitution defines the responsibilities of the three equal, but separate, branches of Australian republican government; Executive, Legislative and Judicature.

2.Commons

1. The republic recognizes that the commons cannot be reduced or suspended; by referendum, emergency, or a declaration of war by parliament.
2. The republic recognizes that a citizen is any individual under the jurisdiction of the government of this constitution.
3. The republic recognizes that an individual's political rights are inviolable.
4. The republic recognizes that an elector is a citizen born in Australia, or an individual within the jurisdiction of Australia who is above the age of majority.
5. The republic recognizes that no election is legitimate without a secret ballot; where the ballot sheets are of uniform shape and colour; and where the elector's ballot is cast anonymously.
6. The political limits espoused in this constitution are not complete, and the limits on legislative, executive and juridical authority are far greater, however history has shown these political rights are the ones most commonly transgressed by corrupt and tyrannous government.
7. The Governor Magistrate has the authority to instigate criminal proceedings against the Governor-General, members of parliament or members of the judicature, should the commons be abrogated by an act of the Executive, bill of the Legislative, or legal decision of the Judicature.
8. The Executive shall execute no law; the Legislative shall make no law; and the Judicature shall endorse no law as constitutional; that:
   
   Freedom
   1. deprives an individual of life
   2. limits or deprives an individuals freedom to express their beliefs, opinions or lifestyle.
   3. limits or deprives an individual's freedom of movement
   4. limits or deprives an individual's freedom of association
   5. limits or deprives an individuals freedom to peacefully assemble with other individuals.
   6. limits or deprives an individuals right to peaceful protest.
      
      Liberty
   7. detains an individual indefinitely without charge.
   8. limits or removes an individuals right to have counsel with them upon arrest or questioning.
   9. limits or removes an individuals right to a writ of habeous corpus upon detention.
   10. back-dates punitive measures for an offence.
   11. permits an individual to be detained for longer than six months without trial or resolution
   12. enabling an individual to be tried for an offence more than once.
   13. limits or removes an individual's right to refuse law enforcement access to their property, or permission to search their person and property, unless there is a warrant issued to search specific property for evidence of a specific crime.
   14. limits or removes an individuals choice to divulge no information other than their identity, verbally, when under suspicion from law enforcement for a specific crime.
   15. limits, reduces or removes an individual's right to own property
   16. deprives the individual of property, or devalues an individual's property without fair exchange or consent.
       
       Equity
   17. discriminates against an individual on the basis of race, age, gender, sexual preference, wealth, health, religion, associations or prior criminal record.
   18. limits or removes equal treatment under the law for an individual on the basis of race, age, gender, sexual preference, wealth, health, religion, associations or prior criminal record.
   19. limits or removes access to government services for an individual on the basis of race, age, gender, sexual preference, wealth, health, religion, associations or prior criminal record.
       
       Democracy
   20. disenfranchises an elector.
   21. denies an elector representation
   22. denies an elector the ability to run for election
   23. reduces or removes an individual the ability to petition their representatives for a redress of grievances.
   24. abolishes the secret ballot
   25. increases the period between elections beyond eight years.
   26. criminalises, or outlaws a political party.
   27. removes access to the Public Service for parties with elected parliamentary members.

3.Executive

1. The Executive is the sole body in the republic authorised to execute laws.
2. The Executive shall, as demanded in this constitution, faithfully implement and execute the laws passed by the legislative.
3. The Executive shall, as demanded in this constitution, submit to juridical oversight of the execution of laws.

3.4.Governor General

1. The Governor General shall be elected by popular election.
2. The Governor-General cannot serve more than two terms of office or eight years, depending on which comes first.
3. The Governor-General shall veto any law, bill or act which contradicts the limits of Legislative authority in the commons.
4. The Governor-General shall veto any law that does not meet the holder's approval and return the law to the Legislative along with written objections.
5. The Governor-General is the head of the Executive Council.
6. The Governor-General shall nominate the Ministers that comprise the Executive Council.
7. The Governor-General shall nominate a Minister, to replace any Ministers removed by successful no-confidence motions in parliament, who has resigned, or replaced by the Governor-General's choice.
8. The Governor-General shall nominate the Ministerial Departments required to execute the laws passed by the legislative.
9. The Governor-General shall present, to a dual sitting of parliament with the Executive Council present, a report on the Executive Ministries.

3.5.Executive Council

1. The Executive Council shall consist of Ministers who head a Ministerial Department as constructed by Legislative bill.
2. ...

4.Legislative

1. The Legislative is the sole body in the republic authorised to make laws, acts and bills.
2. The Legislative shall make no law that persists beyond twenty-five years.
3. The Legislative shall be composed of two bodies; the Senate and House.
4. The Legislature shall not present a bill to the Governor-General to be signed into law unless both Senate and House have passed the exact same bill.

4.5.Senate

1. The Senate shall be composed of multi-member districts consisting of constituent states, territories and/or extra-national territories.
2. The Senate electoral districts shall be apportioned members based on population of the constituent districts.
3. A Senator cannot serve more than twenty-five years in Parliament.
4. The Senate shall conduct non-budgetary commissions and inquiries into the conduct of the Governor-General, Executive Council and Public Servants in the Executive Ministries.
5. The Senate shall conduct commissions and inquiries into the conduct of the Judicature.
6. The Senate shall, upon majority vote, recommend further investigations into the Executive to the Governor-Magistrate for conduct by the Citizens Council.
7. The Senate shall approve or reject any Judicial nominations.
8. The Senate shall approve or reject any Executive Council nominations.
9. The Senate shall not initiate any money bills.
10. The Senate shall not initiate any no-confidence votes on the non-elected members of the Executive Council.
11. The Senate shall be able to pass by two-thirds majority, no-confidence motions on non-elected members of the Executive Council.

4.6.House

1. The House shall be composed of two internal bodies, of which one will be elected, and the other chosen from the general population by sortition.
2. A House member cannot serve more than twenty five years in Parliament.
3. The elected members shall be known collectively as the House Elected Body and individually as House Electors.
4. The sortitionist members shall be known collectively as the House Citizens Body and individually as House Citizens.
5. The House elected body shall consist of a maximum of one House Elector for each state, and territory.
6. The Treasurer shall be chosen by majority in the House Elected Body as the head of the House.
7. The Treasurer shall chair, or delegate the position of chair, all inquiries and commissions into the budgetary needs and financial conduct of the Executive, Legislative and Judicature.
8. The Treasurer shall present each year, to a dual sitting of parliament with the Executive Council present, a report on the budget.
9. The House Citizens Body shall not consist of less than one sortitionist for each twenty thousand of population.
10. The House Citizens Body shall vote on all bills.
11. The House Citizens Body shall be chosen by lot each year.
12. A citizen who has been chosen for consecutive House Citizen Bodies shall be disqualified and another sortitionist, who is not a current, nor immediately prior member of the House Citizens Body, shall take their place.
13. A House Citizen shall be able to vote in absence.
14. A House Elector shall not vote in absence.
15. The House shall be able to pass by two-thirds majority, no-confidence motions on non-elected members of the Executive Council.
16. A House Citizen may introduce legislation, in person or anonymously.

4.7.Sergeant at Arms

1. ...

5.Judicature

5.1.Governor Magistrate

1. The Governor-Magistrate shall be appointed by the States.
2. The Governor-Magistrate cannot serve in office more than two terms of or eight years depending on which comes first.
3. The Governor-Magistrate can divert bills or acts, prior to their signing into law by the Governor-General, deemed to be of dubious constitutionality to the High Court to determine their constitutionality.
4. The Governor-Magistrate can recommend commissions and inquiries into the conduct of the Legislature for the Citizen's Council to conduct.
5. The Governor-Magistrate shall forward all Senatorial recommendations for commissions and inquiries into the Executive for the Citizen's Council to conduct.
6. The Governor-Magistrate shall present all findings of commissions and inquiries into the conduct of the Executive and Legislature to joint sittings of Parliament with the Executive Council present.

5.2.High Court

1. The High Court shall be the sole authority to interpret the constitution.
2. The High Court shall contain a Chief Justice and as many other Justices, but no less than two, as parliament determines necessary.
3. A Justice shall not serve on the High Court, for more than twenty-five years.
4. A Justice shall not serve on, or be appointed to, the High Court if they are above seventy years of age.

5.3.Citizens Council

1. The Council shall be composed of sortitionists chosen by lot from the states and territories.
2. A citizen who has been chosen for consecutive Citizen's Councils shall be disqualified and another sortitionist, who is not a current, nor immediately prior member of the Citizens Council, shall take their place.
3. The Council shall ensure fair access by citizenry to the data and documents produced by government.
4. The Council shall grant or reject; as well as oversee, freedom of information access by the citizenry.
5. The Council shall grant or reject, as well as oversee, national security access by the citizenry.
6. The Council shall conduct commissions and inquiries, as recommended by the Governor Magistrate, into the conduct of the Legislative.
7. The Council shall conduct all commissions and inquiries into ethics for the Legislative.
8. The Council shall conduct all commissions and inquires into corruption for the Legislative.

6.States

1. The States shall nominate a qualified Judge, by majority, to fill any vacancy in the High Court.
2. The States shall bring forward proceedings of impeachment against a member of the High Court who has approved into constitutional law legislation that abrogates the Commons.
3. Upon impeachment the decision shall only be over-turned by a super-majority of Senate and House.
4. ...

7.Other

1. Auditor General
2. Citizen Auditors
3. Referendum
4. Citizen Referenda

A sketch of a new Queensland constitution. The main change is the revival of the Legislative Council (Upper House) as a jury selected by lot from the population at large. The constitution is divided into two elements, a static constitution changeable only by popular referendum, and a dynamic constitution changeable by a supermajority of both houses of parliament.

The Government of Queensland exists at the behest, and to defend the liberty and well-being of, the people of Queensland.

Only the Parliament may pass laws; an identical text must be approved by the Legislative Assembly, Legislative Council, and the Governor.

The government shall pass no law infringing the rights of the electors, as laid out in this constitution.

The government shall conceal no document from the public for more than 30 years.

1. Definitions

1.1 An elector is any Australian resident, who is also a resident of Queensland, and is 18 or more years old. Voting in elections is compulsory for all electors.

1.2 A person is considered partisan if
    a. They are a member of the Legislative Assembly
    b. They are appointed to a partisan position in the Legislative Council
    c. They are a member of a state or federal registered political party
    d. They have filled any of the above criteria in the last 10 years

2. Mechanics
    2.1 A 50% + 1 majority in any vote is termed a simple majority
    2.2 A two-thirds majority of both the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council is termed a joint supermajority
    2.3 All general elections and referenda must be fair secret ballots with no distinguishing mark inherent in the ballot paper or device
    2.4 All uses of sortition must be fair lotteries where each candidate of n candidates has a 1/n chance of being drawn

3. Legislative Assembly
    3.1 Lower house of parliament
    3.2 Parliamentarians elected from either
        a. single member geographical districts of similar size.
        b. multi-member geographical districts of similar size. Each electorate must
        return at least 20 members, where seats are allocated in proportion to the number
        of votes cast
        c. For either type of electorate,
            c.1 the largest and smallest electorates by population may not differ in size
            by more than 2000 electors.
            c.2 Mainland electorates must be contiguous
            c.3 Electorates may follow well established geographic features, but must
            favour area over circumference, ie, tend towards circles
    3.3 The Premier commands the confidence of the Legislative Assembly
    3.4 Passes bills with a simple majority
    3.5 May contain at most 400 members
    3.6 Members may serve in parliament for at most 25 years total
    3.7 The Assembly must be dissolved and a general election held at most every 5 years
    3.8 Members are dismissed if they are convicted of a criminal offence
    3.9 Members must be electors

4. Legislative Council
    4.1 Small house of review
    4.2 At least 20 members must be appointed by sortition from a pool of citizen nominees
    4.3 At most 3 partisan and 3 non-partisan members may be appointed by the government of the day
    4.4 Passes bills with a simple majority
    4.5 The Legislative Council must be smaller than the Legislative Assembly
    4.6 May not vote on money bills
    4.7 May summon witnesses as before a court of law, and may delegate this power to committees
    4.8 May instruct the Commission of Audit to investigate
    4.9 Members serve for one year, but may choose to extend that service to 3 years
    4.10 Any member may serve in the Legislative Council at most 10 years
    4.11 Members are dismissed if they are
        a. Convicted of a criminal offence
        b. Dismissed by a two-thirds supermajority of the Legislative Council, which
        is then confirmed by a simple majority of the Legislative Assembly
    4.12 Members must be electors

5. Governor (or Referee)
    5.1 Signs bills into law and is Head of State, but is limited to the powers listed immediately below
    5.2 May ask the Supreme Court to rule on the constitutionality of a bill before signing it into law. The Supreme Court must begin consideration of such bills within a year of them being so referred.
    5.3 Summons and dismisses parliament
    5.4 Serves a single term of at most 7 years
    5.5 Is appointed as follows
        a. A joint supermajority approves a list of non-partisan candidates. There must be
        a minimum of three candidates.
        b. The Governor-elect is chosen from this list by sortition.
        c. The Governor-elect becomes Governor at the expiration of the predecessor's term,
        or immediately, if the predecessor has been dismissed or incapacitated
    5.6 May be dismissed by the same mechanism
    5.7 Appoints and dismisses Cabinet ministers following the advice of the Premier or parliament
    5.8 Appoints and dismisses a Premier following the advice of the Legislative Assembly

6. Premier
    6.1 Is a member of the Legislative Assembly
    6.2 Commands the confidence of the Legislative Assembly
    6.3 Is Head of Government
    6.4 Nominates cabinet
    6.5 May not serve beyond 10 years, including previous terms as Premier
        a. A Premier retiring because of this term limit must also retire from the
        Legislative Assembly
        b. A retired Premier may not be appointed to a partisan position on the
        Legislative Council
    6.6 Must be a member of a registered political party

7. Cabinet
    7.1 Appointed from partisan members of either house of parliament
    7.2 Members of cabinet are ministers, and head departments
    7.3 Ministers are responsible to parliament for the actions of their department
    7.4 May be dismissed by joint supermajority

8. Supreme Court
    8.1 Hears serious criminal cases
    8.2 Interprets the state constitution
    8.3 Is non-partisan
    8.4 Is nominated by the Legislative Assembly and confirmed by the Legislative Council; a simple majority of each
    8.5 Members may stay until their death or resignation

9. Commission of Audit
    9.1 May summon witnesses as before a court of law, and may delegate this power to committees
    9.2 Is nominated by the Legislative Assembly and confirmed by the Legislative Council
    9.3 May be prompted by parliament to start an investigation
    9.4 May initiate investigations
    9.5 Must report to parliament and to the people

10. Civil Service
    10.1 The government shall maintain a civil service for the staffing of ministerial departments
    10.2 The Civil service exists to provide impartial and expert advice to ministers and parliament

11. Bill of Rights
    11.1 [left as an exercise for the alert reader]

12. Amending This Document

    12.1 The static constitution may be amended by
        a. A Referendum of all electors:
            a.1 Either:
                a.1.1 A resolution to hold a referendum must be passed by both houses, or
                a.1.2 2% of the electors must sign a petition calling for a referendum
            a.2 For the purpose of the referendum, the state shall be divided into two electorates.
                a.2.1 Mainland electorates must be separated by a single line
                a.2.2 The largest and smallest electorates by population may not differ
                in size by more than 2000 electors.
                a.2.3 The state's largest city must be entirely contained within one of
                the electorates.
                a.2.4 A majority in each electorate must affirm the referendum for the
                constitution to change.

    12.2 The sections above are termed the Static Constitution.

    12.3 The sections below are termed the Dynamic Constitution.

    12.4 The dynamic constitution may be amended by
        a. The mechanism described for changing the static constitution, or
        b. A joint supermajority

[In practise I imagine this being filled out in more detail of the precise algorithms etc used]

13. Terms of parliament
    13.1 Elections for every member of the Legislative Assembly shall be held at most every
    three years.
    13.2 Elections shall be called by the Governor on the advice of the Premier, or if no member
    commands the confidence of the Legislative Assembly

14. Composition
    14.1 The Legislative Assembly shall have one multi-member seat, returning 20 members.

15. Methods of election
    15.1 Elections for single member seats shall be conducted by compulsory preferential voting
    15.2 Elections for multi-member seats shall be conducted by compulsory preferential
    proportional voting

16. Methods of appointment to the Legislative Council
    16.1 Rounds of appointment by sortition to the Legislative Council shall occur at most
    every six months.
    16.2 Members selected to sit in the Legislative Council must pass a brief examination on its
    function, [contained in an appendix. This would be a short 10 question quiz, possibly
    even multi-choice]

17. Reimbursement
    17.1 The Governor, and the members of the Legislative Assembly, shall be paid a salary
    by the state
    17.2 Members of the Legislative Council shall be paid at least the minimum state salary
    drawn by members of the Legislative Assembly

18. Resource Rights
    18.1 [These consist of water, land and other resource rights]

The most common form of sortition is juries. Recently in the United States anonymous juries have started appearing. The media do not like them, as they believe it fosters secrecy in the court system and violates the principle of being tried by your peers. But is there a role for anonymous sortition in politics?

The first fully anonymous jury in the United States was in 1977 when druglord Larry Barnes was tried in New York City. The reason for making the jury anonymous was fear of retribution from an organized crime figure's operation.

Political retribution can be a fear for ordinary citizens, and for many is a valid reason why they would never want to get involved in the political process. Unfortunately, the present state of politics and media means that the public and private life become one; with smearing a common tactic.

It is interesting to note, as the citizen commenteriat have increased in power and influence, this tactic has been used by opposing commenteriat as well. The Domenech and Armstrong scandals or affairs being good examples.

By sortition an individual can be thrust directly into the political process, which is a positive for the public process, but for many, maybe feared as a personal negative.

For small groups of sortitionists that would be taking a very public role, such as Alan's Citizen's Assembly who would appoint a President, or Adam's highly visible Queensland Legislative Council sortitionists , it would be difficult to promise any sort of anonymity.

The organised parties, using their wealth, influence and political knowledge, will most likely try to divide and conquer within the sortitionists.

Similar to the problem Labor found in the 1890s when it entered politics as the newly politically naive party. Labor responded by party discipline from the national executive being absolute. But what would sortitionists do?

It makes sense that sortition need not be compulsory. An individual needs to be able to opt out. This would allow them to be private, by avoiding public life.

The other option is to increase the franchise of the sortitionist body by using larger and larger numbers. This would dampen the statistical effects of a small body skewing the outcome, and not being representative of the people.

The problem with this is that it is impersonal. Obviously. Small bodies such as legislative ones, or committees deciding appointments, will need to be far more personal in their decision making.

An anonymous sortition body would work for the Ratification model I proposed however, where the ratifiers are an anonymous jury, chosen for each bill, and decide if the bill gets from the Parliament to the Governor-General.

The limitation being they do not make legislation, only judge it for its repugnance.

Political retribution and anonymity will most likely have an effect on whether individuals will get involved in political sortition. These issues will need to be explored in more detail.

The Westminster system of the Executive Cabinet being embedded in Parliament grew from the need to route executive power away from the monarch while leaving the King with ceremonial authority. This is in contrast to the Washington system which separated the Executive entirely from Congress. The Westminster system, as practiced in Britain, also contains the upper house as a left over from the period when the King-Lord-Commons form of political philosophy dominated. Wentworth proposed this model for NSW when the colony was seeking self-government. Deniehy famously pilloried this illiberal model of government. Reform for the House of Lords in Britain is a common form of discussion, a new think-tank and advocacy group for a modern House of Lords has recently been formed, the Lords Reform Institute. They are proposing a sortitionist model.

Sortition

Sortition is the process of choosing public officials by lot. This is not a new technology, we have been using sortition to choose jurors for quite a long time now. Where this technology has not had traction is in selecting members of the three branches of government, Executive, Legislative or Judicial.

One of the arguments against sortition is that the parliamentary positions require specialists. This argument is true for the judicial branch, which often requires a great deal of legal knowledge to fully function efficiently, but in the legislative branch many members are professional politicians or party members, rather than specialist legislators.

The rise of lobbying in the US as the special interest legislators is a good example of politicians outsourcing the legislative process. This has accelerated in recent years as re-election requires more and more money in the US system. The Washington system of discipline in Congress has recently taken on Westminster characteristics, where legislation is made in the senior party leadership with party discipline - and threat of fiscal retribution - are used to ensure the party votes as a block.

An argument for sortition is the increasing education of the citizen population. When the American Republic was founded there was a great education gap between the elites of the time - Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison etc - and the regular citizen.

Today that gap is much smaller and many are as well educated, if not better, than the current leaders such as John Howard, George Bush or Tony Blair.

Due to British Columbia's [Canada] embrace of sortition for the creation of legislation that led to a referendum, we know have empirical evidence of public perception and reaction toward sortition in this context. Campbell Sharman writes;

The news media were initially skeptical about the ability of 'ordinary people' to become familiar with the complexities of electoral rules and their parliamentary consequences but, as the Assembly's meetings progressed, the tone of media reporting moved from mild condescension to admiration both for the substance and the tone of the Assembly's discussions.

The faith in 'ordinary people' being able to make decisions on complex political issues had been overwhelmingly endorsed. The public goodwill towards the Citizens' Assembly process was perhaps its most important achievement.

There was another curious emergent effect of using sortition and that was many voters cast ballot in the positive on the basis that they trusted the judgment of the 'ordinary people' in the Citizen's Assembly.

This is in direct contrast to Australia's experience in federal referendums where a campaign to 'not trust the bastards in Canberra' often works - and for good reason.

Lords Reform Institute Model

The Lords Reform Institute [LRI] contains their guide to reforming the house of lords which espouses the principles of improved representation and upper house independence. Given the hereditary and appointed nature of the House of Lords, any improvement in the selection process will increase democratic participation and outcomes in my opinion.

The LRI raises an important question relating to liberty;

There is a second question of principle involved, namely that of personal freedom. Jury service is compulsory, and any compulsion curtails the freedom of the person being compelled. We justify this in the case of jury service by saying the civic duty thus rendered is so valuable that it justifies taking perhaps a few weeks of their time.

The LRI solves this issue by removing the requirement for compulsion. They also argue for making service in a House of Jurors (to replace the house of lords) attractive with benefits such as good pay, advisors, administrative support and family relocation subsidy.

CFC Sortitionists

Sortition proved popular in South Sea Republic's recent Constitution Fun Challenge where readers were given the challenge of creating a constitution. There were four final entries, three of which were focused on the Australian Federal Government, with one state constitution for Queensland which currently lacks an upper-house. Of the four entries, three included sortitionist elements.

The interesting aspect was that those three applied sortition in different areas; I chose the house, adam chose the Senate and alan chose the executive to be chosen by lot.

Since the LRI is focusing on the upper-house, which in a bicameral parliamentary system is the only check and balance on the Executive from the legislative branch, it might be a good time to revisit adam's model.

4.

4.1 Small house of review

4.2 At least 20 members must be appointed by sortition from a pool of citizen nominees

4.3 At most 3 partisan and 3 non-partisan members may be appointed by the government of the day

4.4 Passes bills with a simple majority

4.5 The Legislative Council must be smaller than the Legislative Assembly

4.6 May not vote on money bills

4.7 May summon witnesses as before a court of law, and may delegate this power to committees

4.8 May instruct the Commission of Audit to investigate

4.9 Members serve for one year, but may choose to extend that service to 3 years

4.10 Any member may serve in the Legislative Council at most 10 years

4.11 Members are dismissed if they are

a. Convicted of a criminal offence

b. Dismissed by a two-thirds supermajority of the Legislative Council, which

is then confirmed by a simple majority of the Legislative Assembly

4.12 Members must be electors

This model is interesting in that it mixes appointed specialists with sortitionists. The issue of blocking supply is firmly in Australian Constitution memory and adam solves this by disqualifying the Legislative Council from voting on money bills.

The ratio of appointees to sortitionists is deliberate as well, as a super-majority can dismiss a councilor. A unanimous vote by the sortitionists can stop this process.

cam

In 2003 South Australia held a constitutional convention to look into improving the state's parliamentary system. The convention went for just over two days and included "Deliberators". These were citizens chosen by sortition from the South Australian voting age population.

The final report [pdf] has some interesting observations;

• A better understanding of the parliamentary process improved the sortitionists impression of parliaments effectiveness.
• Opinion amongst the sortitionists for a bicameral parliament with the capability for either house to block legislation firmed. The endorsement of bicameral parliament increased from 65% prior to deliberation and 80% afterwards.
• A majority supported shorter terms for Legislative Councilors, from eight years to four. Attitude and support for proportional representation in the upper house firmed to a majority.
• After deliberations 50% wanted more Assembly representatives, while 47% thought 47 Assembly Representatives was enough and 7% thought less. The sortitionists had no problem with the Executive Cabinet being drawn from both houses with 75% agreeing with it.
• The sortitionists wanted an independent speaker who is not involved with their party. A significant minority even agreed that the speaker should resign from their party and be an independent MP.
• Citizen Initiated Referenda [CIR] had support amongst 65% of sortitionists, and this dropped to 64% after deliberations with 35% opting for specialists to fulfill that role and against CIR. After deliberations 70% of the sortitionists believed that CIR should apply to existing and new laws. There was no consensus on the type of CIR.
• The three most popular reforms ordered by the sortitionists were; Optional preferential voting, Citizen Initiated Referenda and Four Year Terms for the Upper House.

Even though the convention only went for two and half days, the sortitionists involved became active citizens taking their duty seriously and trying to discover all they could on the issues. For such a short period of deliberation they also learnt a great deal about the system of government of South Australia.

The convention is a very cheap cost for civic involvement and education. For instance prior to the convention on the question of; Do all states [not including territories] have bicameral parliaments with only Queensland being unicameral? Prior to deliberation 29% answered this correctly, afterwards 96% did.

The sortitionists became engaged because of direct involvement;

Consistent with the observation from previous Deliberative Polls that committed delegates do indeed prepare for their deliberations. Most of the Representative South Australians (93%) who attended the Constitutional Convention had read at least half of the Discussion Papers they were sent prior to their attendance at the Convention.

A majority (57%) had read most or all of those materials. Further, when asked about the extra research activities they did in preparation for their deliberations, around half the delegates engaged in additional research activities than their usual pattern of behaviour.

The sortitionists also found the experience valuable, informative and worthwhile;

when asked about their overall level of satisfaction with the group process, an overwhelming 95% said they were satisfied, with almost 85% citing "very satisfied" or "extremely satisfied."

In my opinion people do want to be involved, but on their own terms and not through parties or the media. The explosion of the Australian political blogosphere is a good example of this. Sortition processes allow a citizen and individual to engage themselves in politics without the normal organisational mechanisms that have probably led to the perception of political alienation in the first place.