Matthew Gray is a computer science researcher and history buff passionate about sortition, a method of allocating public offices by lot rather than by election. In this episode we explore the potential benefits of sortition, and Matthew explains the computer science that could make it work securely and efficiently at the national level.

Matthew’s writings on sortition

Matthew’s website

Join the conversation about sortition: https://equalitybylot.com/

Sources:
Wikipedia entry on sortition
Aristotle’s Politics
David Graeber – The Democracy Project
Wendy Brown – Undoing the Demos

Further Reading:
Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast episode on sortition
Of By For (an organization working to implement sortition in the U.S.)
Random sample voting (an interesting method of randomly selecting voters)
Stanford’s Center for Deliberative Democracy (using random sampling and democratic deliberation to improve opinion polling)

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Solarpunk Now! is hosted & produced by Luka Dowell. The solarpunk theme is by Red Keener, with additional music by Gabriel Rivas. You can follow the show on Instagram or Mastodon, and support my work at Buy Me a Coffee. Keep dreaming big, and keep up the good work!