{"id":8750,"date":"2019-07-04T14:31:58","date_gmt":"2019-07-04T14:31:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/?p=8750"},"modified":"2019-07-04T14:57:59","modified_gmt":"2019-07-04T14:57:59","slug":"scotlands-citizen-assemblies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/2019\/07\/scotlands-citizen-assemblies\/","title":{"rendered":"Scotland’s citizen assemblies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Polarisation. Paralysis. Politicians at each other\u2019s throats. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The crisis engulfing Westminster for the past year has not given the best impression of British parliamentary democracy at work. Theresa May\u2019s failure<\/a> to get her Brexit deal through after three attempts resulted in her losing her job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Surely Britain can do better?\nEven members of the public chosen at random might be more effective than the\ncurrent crop of politicians. Well, in Scotland that theory is going to be put\nto the test \u2013 at least in part. The prospect of a similar process happening at Westminster<\/a> also seems likely on the issue of\nclimate change \u2013 although the details are vague. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In April 2019 the Scottish government announced<\/a> its plan to launch a citizens assembly in the autumn. It will randomly select 120 members of the public who will reflect Scottish society in terms of age, gender and ethnic background.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scotland has had its own constitutional debate since the 2014\nreferendum, when a majority voted against independence. Revealing a similar\npolarisation to Brexit with a divide of 55-45%, this has not altered\nsignificantly in the subsequent five years, with opinion polls showing a\ncountry split down the middle<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this, the Scottish government has not exhibited the same level of dysfunction as its UK counterpart in London. Even though both are  minority<\/a> governments, Holyrood has managed to get legislation through by working with other parties \u2013 including those which oppose its position on independence. But what can the fairly radical idea of a randomly selected citizens\u2019 assembly add to the constitutional situation in Scotland? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mike Russell<\/a>, Scotland\u2019s minister for\nconstitutional relations, said that one of the aims was to bring people\ntogether to learn from each other \u201cincluding those with whom we might otherwise\nprofoundly disagree\u201d. It\u2019s a big claim \u2013 so what is its purpose?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The initial three (very\nbroad) questions the assembly has been asked are simple: What kind of a country\ndo you want Scotland to be? How can Scottish people overcome challenges\n(including Brexit) and, what further work is needed?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The participants will\nmeet over several weekends to consider these questions and hear evidence from\nexperts, who they will be able to cross-examine. Ultimately the assembly will\ncome up with proposals to present to the Scottish parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking from the\noutside, one might ask if this is not the role of politicians and established\ndemocratic institutions. These proposed questions seem to go to the heart of\nthe issues surrounding Brexit and independence. Yet Russell stated this is now\nan \u201cestablished way for mature democracies\u201d to deal with difficult questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Irish example<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Russell has drawn\ncomparisons with the situation in Ireland. Last year the Irish people voted in\nhuge numbers to repeal Article 8 of their constitution and legalise\nabortion<\/a> \u2013 this followed proposals from their citizens\u2019 assembly\nconvened in 2016. Scotland\u2019s first minister Nicola Sturgeon saw this as one of\nthe inspirations for introducing the idea in Scotland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet there have been\nother citizens\u2019 assemblies internationally where success is debatable. Two\nCanadian provinces (British Colombia and Ontario) convened assemblies<\/a> in\nthe 2000s to look at the specific issue of electoral reform. The model that the\npeople put forward was defeated by referendum. In 2006 the Netherlands asked\ncitizens<\/a> around the country what they wanted their cities to be in the\ncoming decade, but the proposals were rejected by the government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The assembly in\nIreland grew from a Constitutional\nConvention<\/a> set up in 2012 to look at the written Irish constitution.\nThis was made up of of both elected politicians and members of the public. At\nthat stage Ireland was still reeling from the financial crisis of 2008, and\nthere was a widely held belief that the constitution was out of step with\nmodern times and needed updating. With this structure the assembly could\naddress specific questions \u2013 such as legalising same-sex marriage (also\napproved by referendum in 2015).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People v the politicians<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The problem is that Scotland and the UK do not have a written\nconstitution. There is no specific framework for a Scottish citizens\u2019 assembly\nto apply to the questions they are being asked \u2013 which are much broader and\nmore vague than in Ireland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, the relationship between the established Scottish\nparliament and the new citizens\u2019 assembly seems, at the moment, ill-defined. A\ndisconnect between the two could be seen at best as frustrating and at worst a\nsituation of dual power between \u201cthe people\u201d and the politicians. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such a scenario occurred in Iceland<\/a> after the disaster of\nthe financial collapse in 2008 prompted a new constitution that was created by\nordinary citizens. This radical document was seen as a model for participatory\ndemocracy everywhere. It was endorsed by a referendum yet rejected by politicians\nin 2012 and has still not been introduced. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Constitutional\nstalemate?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The SNP government clearly does not want such a stalemate to\noccur in Scotland \u2013 but, in the absence of a legislative framework, it is\nunclear what the precise relationship will be between elected Scottish\npoliticians and this selected assembly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the Scottish government is keen to stress the\ninvolvement of all political parties, the Conservative and Lib Dems have\nalready said they will not participate \u2013 the former calling it a \u201cnationalist stunt<\/a>\u201d tied to the government\u2019s\ndesire for a second referendum. Another objection is that the assembly\u2019s remit\nis not limited to specific issues, like in Ireland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the conveners of the assembly is to be former Labour\nMEP David\nMartin<\/a>, who has stressed its independence from the Scottish\ngovernment and the transparency of its procedures. But Martin thinks it was a \u201cmistake<\/a>\u201d to launch it at the same time as\ndiscussing a second independence referendum. Martin maintains \u201cbinary questions\nare destroying politics\u201d and the assembly should not put forward one single\nposition on independence or Brexit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In less turbulent times, this kind of participatory democracy in any society would be a challenge. In the current polarised tumult of British politics it will be intriguing to see how the Scottish citizens\u2019 assembly develops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First published by The Conversation<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Is the proposed new citizens assembly in Scotland an SNP stunt designed to swing behind #indyref2 \u2013 or a genuine democratic gain?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125],"tags":[384],"class_list":["post-8750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-scottish-citizens-assembly"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8750","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8750"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8750\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}