Project description DEENESFRITPL Advanced statistical methods for political lotteries’ investigation Recently, political lotteries have been used to randomly select citizens to make decisions on polarising issues, such as disaffection, abortion reform and climate change. These lotteries have allowed greater access to minorities and have contributed to stabilising political conflicts through robust deliberative systems. However, despite their potential significance, these natural experiments with lotteries have not been thoroughly investigated. To address this gap, the ERC-funded POLLOT project will compile a comparative data set of these political lotteries, legislators, parliamentary activities and offices across Europe. It will also analyse the decisions made by randomly assigned groups within each natural experiment by drawing on past experiments during democratisation in Europe and conducting new lotteries in online citizens’ assemblies today. Show the project objective Hide the project objective Objective Political lotteries randomly select individuals to take a political decision. Recently, lotteries have put citizens together to find solutions to today’s contentious, polarizing issues, such as disaffection, abortion reform, and climate change. What explains their varied success? Lotteries equalise opportunity of access to all. Random chance can strengthen those otherwise in the minority. A wider variety of opinions can also improve debate and reduce polarization. The ideal, but unfeasible experiment would randomly vary group characteristics, assign real political power, and observe effects over time. Instead, this project draws lessons from past experiments during democratisation in Europe - whereby legislators were randomly assigned to groups within legislatures - and experiments with lotteries in online citizens’ assemblies today. Lotteries ensured that minorities participated in deliberation in small groups, and were assigned influential legislative tasks. These natural experiments with lotteries have never before been investigated using modern statistical methods, and their role in opening access to politics is almost entirely absent from empirical studies of democratisation. This project compiles a novel, comparative dataset of these political lotteries, legislators, parliamentary activity and offices from different European countries. Next, the decisions of randomly assigned groups will be analysed within each natural experiment. A theory of debate in randomly drawn groups reducing polarization will be verified by cross-national comparison across experimental contexts, and in a present-day experiment that allows controlled conditions. By opening access to minorities and contributing to strong, deliberative party and committee systems, lotteries stabilised political conflict. They have the potential to do so again today. The research will help inform evidence-based innovation of our representative democracies, as experiments with lotteries have already begun. Fields of science social sciencespolitical sciencesgovernment systemsdemocracynatural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesatmospheric sciencesclimatologyclimatic changes Keywords lotteries legislation legislative procedure selection deliberation parliaments Programme(s) HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme Topic(s) ERC-2022-STG - ERC STARTING GRANTS Call for proposal ERC-2022-STG See other projects for this call Funding Scheme HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants Host institution FONDATION NATIONALE DES SCIENCES POLITIQUES Net EU contribution € 1 499 999,00 Address RUE SAINT GUILLAUME 27 75341 Paris France See on map Region Ile-de-France Ile-de-France Paris Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Total cost € 1 499 999,00 Beneficiaries (1) Sort alphabetically Sort by Net EU contribution Expand all Collapse all FONDATION NATIONALE DES SCIENCES POLITIQUES France Net EU contribution € 1 499 999,00 Address RUE SAINT GUILLAUME 27 75341 Paris See on map Region Ile-de-France Ile-de-France Paris Activity type Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Total cost € 1 499 999,00
