Elections take as given the basic institutions of democracy and determine who will represent the people. Yet the electoral process provides little incentive for voter competence and participation. Let us take a step back from the elections and ask how to improve the basic institutions of democracy and the incentives they provide. Are there reforms that can foster more effective citizenship and more responsive government?
The symposium will compare and contrast two spheres of innovation for democracy: the market (individual stakeholding) and the forum (collective deliberation). We will showcase fresh ideas in each sphere and begin a conversation between proponents of market-based innovations and proponents of forum-based innovations.
Are the various innovations desirable and feasible? Are they rivals or complements? Can they get traction in the status quo? Can we test and implement them by accretion—or do they require a fundamental redesign of democracy?
We invite discussion from the floor at the symposium and comments at this website!
I. New markets to improve the forum
Robin Hanson, “Shall We Vote on Values, But Bet on Beliefs?” [Symposium paper, 243KB PDF]
Discussant: Hélène Landemore
[Comments on Hanson, 65KB PDF]
Arnold Kling, “Competitive Government vs. Democratic Government” [Symposium paper, 145KB PDF]
Discussant: Howard DeLong
[Comments on Kling, 66KB PDF]
II. Mechanisms and institutions to improve collective deliberation
Hélène Landemore, “Mechanisms of Democratic Reason: on the Proper Use
of Deliberation, Majority Rule, and Information-Markets for Smarter
Democratic Decision-Making” [Symposium paper, 164KB PDF;
Background paper, 385KB PDF]
Discussant: Arnold Kling
[Comments on Landemore's background paper, 54KB PDF. Comments on Landemore's symposium paper will be posted when available.]
Howard DeLong, “Courts of Common Reason” [Symposium paper, 160KB PDF]
Discussant: Robin Hanson
[Comments on DeLong, 44KB PDF]
Robin Hanson is Associate Professor of Economics at George Mason University and a principal blogger at OvercomingBias.com.
He explores institutions that would establish separate spheres for values (democracy) and beliefs (prediction markets) - an arrangement he calls “futarchy”. Thus he focuses on incentives for accuracy in beliefs.
Arnold Kling is a principal blogger at EconLog.EconLib.org and the author of Economics 2.0 (forthcoming, Encounter Books) and Crisis of Abundance: Rethinking How We Pay for Health Care (Cato Institute, 2006).
In an ongoing series of blogposts at EconLog he explores institutions—exit options among an open bricolage of jurisdictions—that would enhance and harness individual freedom to discipline government and to make government more responsive.
Hélène Landemore is Postdoctoral Research Associate in Political Science at Brown University and the author of Democratic Reason: Politics, Collective Intelligence, and the Rule of the Many (MS) and Hume: Probabilité et choix raisonnable (PUF, 2004)
She organized a major conference about “collective wisdom” recently at the Collège de France. Her research explores how diversity can enable groups, in deliberative settings, to outperform experts.
Howard DeLong is the Brownell Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Trinity College and the author of Perfecting the Pursuit of Happiness: The American Revolution in the Twentieth-First Century (MS), A Profile of Mathematical Logic (Addison-Wesley, 1970; Dover, 2004), and A Refutation of Arrow's Theorem (University Press of America, 1991)
He proposes a new institution of deliberative democracy: courts of common reason. The new institution would integrate efficiency (small samples of citizens and division of labor by topic), representativeness (random samples of citizens), mechanisms to improve individual competence (e.g., intensive use of expert testimony), and the mechanisms of collective wisdom in deliberation.
Contact us
John Alcorn (Symposium organizer)
Gerald Gunderson (Shelby Cullom Davis Professor of American Business and Economic Enterprise, Davis Endowment)
Patricia Ann Maisch (Administrative Assistant, Davis Endowment) 860 297-2562