How to run a civic lottery

A guide to designing fair selection mechanisms for deliberative public processes.

Civic Lotteries are an important tool that governments and public agencies can use to broaden participation while also guarding against the disproportionate influence of organized interests hoping to move a crowd and sway an outcome. They are also based on one of our oldest democratic traditions which is called sortition, and means a process for randomly selecting people to serve a public function much as we do when we convene a jury. Civic Lotteries use similar principles. They make it possible for governments and public agencies to assemble a broadly representative sample of people to discuss and decide on an issue, free from the pressures of outside influences.

In this resource, you’ll find a clear and comprehensive step-by-step guide on how to run a Civic Lottery. No matter how big the population you serve, no matter how many participants you wish to engage, and no matter how tricky the problem you’re looking to address, this guide sets the standard for organizations and governments who wish to invite and select individuals to become a part of a deliberative decision-making process.

Source: Mass LBP
Author information: David Moscrop, Joanna Massie, Patrick Baud

Year of publication: 2017