This summer, I visited Folkemødet, Denmark’s annual democracy festival held in the coastal town of Allinge on the island of Bornholm. It’s a place where citizens, politicians, NGOs, and businesses gather in a relaxed, open-air setting to engage in democratic dialogue and debate.

What struck me most wasn’t just the scale – over 2,500 events and tens of thousands of participants – but the tone. Disagreements were aired, but rarely did they descend into hostility. The environment – sunshine, sea breeze, and informal spaces – seemed to soften the edges of political conflict. It made me wonder: does the setting shape the spirit of our democratic conversations?

In Scotland, our democratic spaces are often formal, adversarial, and disconnected from everyday life. Trust in our institutions – parliament, government, political parties – is in decline. Westminster’s electoral systems distort representation, and many feel unheard. But Folkemødet reminded me that democracy is not just about structures, it’s about relationships, rituals, and place.

Lessons for Scotland

1. Democracy Needs Place
   Folkemødet is rooted in a physical space that invites openness. Could we imagine a Scottish equivalent – perhaps on one of our islands – where citizens and leaders gather annually to talk about the future? A “Scottish Folkemødet” could be a civic ritual to reconnect people with politics.

2. Trust is Built Through Proximity
   When politicians sit beside citizens on hay bales rather than behind podiums, something shifts. We need formats that break down hierarchy and foster genuine dialogue. Scotland’s Citizens’ Assembly, launched in 2019, was a step in this direction, and now we are working with others to see if local assemblies like the one we are piloting in Dunfermline could become part of the everyday fabric of governance.

3. Electoral Reform is Only Part of the Puzzle
   The Electoral Reform Society has long argued for proportional representation, and rightly so. But we also need civic infrastructure, such as festivals, assemblies, and forums, that make democracy feel real and inclusive.

4. Responding to Distrust Means Reimagining Democracy
   A major study from the University of Southampton shows that trust in representative institutions is falling across democracies, including the UK. Yet, support for democratic ideals remains high. This suggests that people aren’t rejecting democracy, they’re rejecting how it’s currently practised.

Looking Back to Move Forward

Scotland has a proud history of civic mobilisation. The Scottish Constitutional Convention, formed in 1989, brought together parties, churches, and civic groups to shape the framework for devolution. It was messy, imperfect, but it worked – because it was rooted in dialogue and shared purpose.

Folkemødet offers a modern echo of that spirit. It’s a reminder that democracy can be joyful, messy, and deeply human. In Scotland, we have the creativity, the community spirit, and the hunger for change. Maybe it’s time we built our own spaces—literal and metaphorical—where democracy can grow and flourish.

Find out more about the Dunfermline New City Assembly

Discover more about the project

At the ERS, we’ve long campaigned for more involvement of citizens in the decisions that affect them. For politics to work for people like us, it needs to include people like us.

Too often, public debate collapses into argument and division. But it doesn’t have to be this way, we can have more productive ‘deliberative’ discussions.

Deliberation is long and careful discussion crafted towards making a decision. Deliberative meetings emphasise the importance of reflection and informed discussion in decision-making. We want things like this to become embedded into policy-making through the use of Citizens Assemblies: we’ve even helped to run two.

So what exactly are they, and what are the benefits of using them?

In simple terms, a Citizens’ Assembly is a group of people put together like a jury, who have been brought together to think about an important policy issue, with a view to make a final recommendation to policy-makers.

They bring together people from our community – teachers, doctors, scientists, shopkeepers, friends and family members, with checks in place to ensure that the group is a representative cross-section of society as a whole.

The assembly will be presented with all the evidence in order to learn together about the issue in question, before engaging in the deliberative process: a process of discussing and reflecting on the information they have learned, and how it might have shaped their thoughts on the policy matter.

The recommendations that Citizens’ Assemblies make are not binding, but rather act as a public compass in parliament, making sure decisions on key issues go in a direction that favours people like us, rather than politicians and their parties.

Learn more about what goes on in a Citizens’ Assembly

How do you participate in a Citizens’ Assembly?

Just like a jury, you can’t just volunteer to take part! This isn’t about a group of the ‘usual suspects’.

Most of us are familiar with the fact that juries are put together through a lottery. Participants are chosen for citizens assemblies in a similar way, however unlike jury service, attendance is not mandatory.

Are they truly representative?

Commendably, when citizens assemblies are done right, they’ll bring together a genuinely representative group of people.

The process – which is a type of ‘sortition’ –  is designed to counteract under-represented groups’ barriers to participation, and to ensure that groups who are less likely to accept the invitation to attend will still be represented. Furthermore, participants are paid to attend, making economic concerns less of an obstacle.

This means that people from all walks of life will be able to have a say on the policy issue in question – not just the people with the loudest voices, or the most spare time.

What are the benefits of citizens assemblies?

Citizens assemblies are beneficial for a number of reasons.

For a start, because they are designed to be highly representative, they provide an opportunity for ordinary citizens to become more involved in politics. This means that people who might be too busy to get involved locally, and who may otherwise have been less likely to get involved in politics, will have a say. That is undoubtedly a win for democracy.

It’s also been argued that citizens assemblies, when they’re done right, might be a useful vehicle for driving up trust in politics. Given that, at the time of writing, the electorate’s trust in Britain’s system of government is at a record low, this potential benefit can only be a good thing.

Citizens’ Assemblies are also uniquely positioned to help resolve complex or polarising policy issues that lack a clear ‘correct’ answer – such as approaching the climate crisis, or assisted dying. For example, in 2020, Climate Assembly UK brought together over one hundred citizens to discuss how the UK should meet net zero targets. And in 2018, Ireland held a Citizens’ Assembly on abortion, which helped to shape policy on a divisive topic.

Following the 2024 General Election, the new government needs a clear insight into public opinion – opinion which has been shaped by key information and a thoughtful deliberative process. Citizens’ Assemblies are just the vehicle for this.

Let us know your thoughts on Citizens’ Assemblies

Last Saturday the final session of the Citizen’s Assembly of Scotland concluded. The assembly, the largest deliberative event in Scotland’s history brought together ordinary people to deliberate over the issues that will shape Scotland.

As we all wait to see the final outcomes of the process, setting out a shared vision for Scotland’s future, we cannot allow ourselves to fall back into the old ways of doing politics.

Now more than ever, Scotland’s success depends upon the power of people working together to tackle the real challenges – whether that’s on the economy, Brexit, climate change or healthcare.

The Citizens Assembly for Scotland was commissioned because we all benefit when people here work together to identify problems – and create a vision for how to improve our nation’s quality of life.

We’ve seen the power of ordinary people coming together, given the time and space to deliberate, negotiate and discuss the big issues that affect us all.

But right now, decisions about us are not made with us. Too often the we feel locked out outside of election time. Democracy isn’t just putting a cross in the ballot box every five years – it’s feeling like all of us have a permanent stake in how decisions are made.

That’s why, ERS Scotland and other grassroots democracy groups in Scotland are proposing a permanent deliberative assembly that could ‘level up’ Scottish democracy – a ‘House of Citizens’ to complement Holyrood’s existing chamber.

The second chamber – drawn from a ‘democratic lottery’ – could represent Scotland’s full range of experience and talent and is an idea overwhelmingly backed by representatives of the Citizens’ Assembly of Scotland, by 83%.

This week exclusive polling by YouGov revealed that support for the House of Citizens proposal among Scots outnumbers opposition by around 3 to 1,  with 45% backing the plans, to just 14% opposed – support spread across all major parties – including an overall majority of Labour and SNP supporters.

Another poll earlier this year revealed that support for institutionalising Citizen’s Assemblies is higher in Scotland than the rest of GB, with a majority of Scots supporting establishing Citizens’ Assemblies to inform the decisions of local councils and even replacing the House of Lords with a rotating Citizens’ Assembly.

Working with Common Weal, Royal Society of Arts and the Sortition Foundation we’ve helped map out how a House of Citizens could work in practice and asking you to sign our petition to back the change.

A House of Citizens would represent a shining example of trust in our communities when compared to Westminster’s fully appointed House of Lords, It would exist to inform and challenge the decisions of parliament, selected by ‘democratic lottery’ – and it would reflect the make-up of Scotland in terms of things like age, ethnicity, gender and income.

A House of Citizens would bring together Scottish people from all walks of life, to lay down new tracks or update our destination along the way. That will get us where we need to be – a better future for everybody.

Photo: Rab Lawrence, Flickr

Sign our petition for a Scottish House of Citizens

Democracy isn’t static, it is a process. It isn’t always simple or easy, and today it is being tested under the strain of a crisis of trust, one which affects political institutions, the public square and politicians themselves. That means we have to be innovative and bold in our response.

That’s why, for several years now, ERS Scotland has been trying to develop a new approach: of genuinely deepening democracy, not just tinkering around the edges. Local government in Scotland is the most remote and centralised in the whole of Europe, with incredibly low levels of local representation.

What makes a good democracy?

Our work to change this has its roots in Democracy Max, an independent inquiry initiated by ERS Scotland into ‘What makes a good Scottish democracy’ in 2012. ERS Scotland organised a ‘deliberative’ discussion event which brought together as representative a sample as possible of Scottish society. The People’s Gathering saw over 80 delegates come together in Edinburgh to engage in radical thinking about Scotland’s democracy.

Building on this, we helped form Our Democracy - a loose and open coalition of organisations, campaigners, and politicians who are dedicated to improving local democracy in Scotland. The campaign organised ’Act As If Councils’ which brought together local communities to discuss collectively the problems and solutions that could make their locality a better place to live – founded on the principle that people should ‘act as if they own the place’.

The campaign also gave a platform to the many examples of citizens organising locally to make a positive impact (projects we sought to ‘Amplify’). The aim has been to bring together these fantastic examples of community organising with a new framework for local government structures. People want to have a say in their communities: they should have that right enshrined.

That brought us to 2018, where we assembled activists and local democracy campaigners to work up a strategy around the forthcoming Local Democracy Bill, at our Impact event.

All these networks evolved into a partnership with the  Coalfields Regeneration Trust, with whom we partnered to focus on three deprived communities. That led to real funding being invested into the communities, disbursed not from top down but through what the communities wanted: deliberation using a range of discussion and decision making tools developed through our Act As If councils. We have just released a publication to look in depth at this collaborative experiment in local democracy.

This local work fed into the national level, with the ERS organising Democracy 21. With over 500 participants, this landmark event in June 2018 was the largest gathering on local democracy Scotland has ever had.

Our aim was to translate the big themes of democratic crisis into what that means for the local level. It included community representatives, voices from across the political spectrum, international guests who talked about local democracy in their country, as well as innovators and keynote speakers on deliberation and democratic structures.

Here we launched some founding principles: ‘The Declaration On Local Democracy’ – principles that formed the basis for our contribution to the government’s Democracy Matters Local Governance Review. This has now  published the results of its first phase of consultation, citing clear evidence “that people do want to have more control of decisions on issues that matter to them”.

We took this vision for the future of Scottish democracy to councils across Scotland, where councillors were invited to discuss with us their ideas for change. And we took it to sympathetic MSPs, as well as presenting evidence to the parliamentary committee responsible for local democracy. These messages had a highly positive reaction, as this official committee report shows.

This is eight years of really fruitful work linking the grassroots with formal political structures and representatives.

Where next?

Now, as the world becomes even more uncertain and as our institutions grapple with massive challenges, we want to re-energise and rebuild the coalition we have developed on local democracy over recent years.

Our proposals have provoked real discussions inside the institutions that need to evolve, building a movement to make the Scottish Government’s Local Democracy Bill as transformational as possible. That has meant working with the Democracy Matters team, as well as partners in the Scottish Parliament and local councils, all the while bringing it back to local communities and what powers and roles they want and need.

There are huge questions being asked of our democratic institutions, at a time when many feel alienated from the political process. The answer to this instability and crisis of trust we’ve seen is more, not less, democracy.

That is why we believe that the final Local Democracy Bill must stem from more than just traditional forms of consultation, but with real and thoughtful engagement, which will directly shape the eventual next step local democracy in Scotland takes.

We will play our part, bringing together all the networks, experience and feedback we have received in recent years, as we work together to build a democracy fit for the challenges of the 21st Century.

On Saturday 26^th and Sunday 27^th October, The Citizens’ Assembly of Scotland kicked off at the Grosvenor Hotel in Edinburgh, with one hundred people from across the country meeting for the first time.

The Assembly has been selected by an independent third-party to create a ‘mini-public’ reflecting Scotland’s population based on age, long term life limiting condition, ethnicity, political belief, voting intention for the Scottish Parliament, attitudes to UK membership of the European Union, attitudes to Scottish independence, education and geography. The breakdown of Scotland’s demographic and recruitment methodology can be found on the official website.

Until they were recruited, many of the participants had never heard of a Citizens’ Assembly, yet Professor David Farrell, lead researcher of the Irish Citizens Assembly, remarked on the “incredible (and so familiar) buzz in the room during the first period of small table deliberation”.

Focusing on outcomes can overlook the importance of the process of a citizens’ assembly. During the introduction, co-conveners David Martin and Kate Wimpress spoke of the importance of the Assembly for Scotland’s democratic future and the value of each person’s experience in order for it to become a rich and potentially transformative journey for everyone involved.

The Assembly was introduced to the independent research team, which will be analysing how their views and attitudes develop over the next six months in response to high quality, balanced information and deliberation. The outcome of the research will be presented as a report alongside open access to the data, putting Scotland’s experience on the international stage and support the development of best practice.

Over the weekend the Assembly was given the remit that it is setting out to address:

• What kind of country are we seeking to build?
• How best can we overcome the challenges Scotland and the world face in the 21^st century, including those arising from Brexit?
• What further information will Scottish citizens need in order to make informed decisions.

This was followed by a presentation from Professor Nicola McEwan, an independent researcher of Scottish and UK constitutions at The University of Edinburgh, covering three themes:

1. The way decisions are made and the processes that lead to this.
2. The powers of the Scottish Parliament, its relationship to Westminster and how it has evolved.
3. Different constitutional options for the future

The Assembly is designed around constant input from the participants. An example being that the assembly has asked for more information on how UK tax structure operates. While the Assembly retains sovereignty, the guidelines state that members will avoid discussing general merits of constitution outcomes, nor be a substitute for elections or referendums.

In the next meeting on the 30^th Nov and 1^st December the Assembly will be asked to draw upon their own experiences and hear from their fellow members what a ‘good life’ means. This will be supplemented by official research on happiness and well-being. This will be the starting point from where it will decide what social policy issues it wishes to explore and their relationship to the constitution.

Scotland’s Citizen’s Assembly represents the opportunity to advance Scotland’s participatory journey and move towards institutionalising these processes.

According to David Martin, the participative and deliberative process sets out “new standards for the quality of the information provided with and new standards on how the discussion on contentious issues are concluded”. In an effort to bridge the potential polarisation of constitutional issues such as Independence and Brexit, the Assembly’s conveners believe the recommendations will be critical to ensure the country can take informed decisions to move forward by agreement.

One certain output of the Assembly will be report given to the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament in May 2020 and then debated in parliament. The Scottish Government has committed to taking forward the Assembly’s recommendations and acting on conclusions.

Meanwhile, an ongoing conversation continues around how communities and voices outside the room engage with the Assembly’s process and the issues raised about the future of Scotland. How it relates to wider society will enrichen the vision and support actualising it; by both compelling political commitments, and incentivising practical actions inside and outside traditional institutions.

Whatever happens over the next 6 months, hopefully, this is just the start of Scotland’s journey towards a more active democracy.

The next meeting of the Assembly will take place in Glasgow on Saturday 30^th and Sunday 1^st December. The Electoral Reform Society and The University of Aberdeen will be hosting a public discussion with co-convener David Martin and Dr Clodagh Harris from Ireland’s Citizens’ Assembly on 5^TH December in Aberdeen.

Attend our Aberdeen event

The likelihood of politicians reaching a consensus on Brexit appears to be diminishing by the day – to consternation on all sides. But what if there’s another way?

Parliament is split on May’s deal and even that is not along party lines. There are what appear to be unbreachable schisms within both the Tories and Labour.

Bringing the country together on this issue can seem almost an impossible task. But there is a tried and tested way of doing this: a Citizens’ Assembly.

Bringing the country together on this issue can seem almost an impossible task. But there is a tried and tested way of doing this: a Citizens’ Assembly. Click To Tweet

You may not have heard of a Citizens’ Assembly before, but it is not something to be afraid of. It’s a simple way of reaching answers to difficult questions.

On Brexit, it would involve a representative group of people, initially selected at random, meeting over a few days to learn about and discuss the various issues and possible solutions.

At the end of these sessions, which can involve independent experts in an educative role as well as thinkers and campaigners on all sides, the Assembly reaches recommendations.

It’s a simple idea, but one which has proved to be very effective. The 2016 citizens’ assembly in Ireland has been credited with finding a way forward through complex and contested constitutional issues including laws on abortion and same-sex marriage.

The huge benefit of a Citizens’ Assembly is that it provides a constructive setting which emphasises knowledge and constructive debate.

When compared to the bickering we see in the House of Commons, or the outright bullying we see online, it could be just the forum needed to unite the country on Brexit.

When compared to the bickering we see in the House of Commons, or the outright bullying we see online, it could be just the forum needed to unite the country on Brexit. Click To Tweet

It is a solution the Electoral Reform Society have now backed, having had experience running civil society-led assemblies in the past. The way citizens came together to find solutions across divides was inspiring.

Lots of people agree, it turns out: including the likes of Damon Albarn and former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams.

Below is the full text of a letter published in the Guardian this week:

Our politics and our parliament is in deadlock over Brexit. But if we choose to learn from other countries in how we resolve our differences, this could be a moment when Britain comes together rather than falling apart in constitutional chaos.

Looking on, we cannot see how a majority can be found for any proposition in parliament: some want to remain, some want no deal, some want Norway, some want to vote again. The same rifts exist across the UK. Anger and resentment are growing, splitting families, communities and our country. Without a new intervention, the toxic culture which has infected public life will irrevocably damage democracy and the future for us all.

Each of us individually has different views on what should happen next when it comes to Brexit, but we all agree that finding a way forward is vital to restoring faith in our democracy. We are not MPs and we respect the important work they do. Yet we also recognise that there are important ways to help heal this rift and involve the public in deeper and more meaningful ways.

Citizens’ assemblies operate around the world to create a neutral forum for evidence-based, participative decision-making. In recent years, they have been used in Ireland, British Columbia and Iceland, and in national and local government in the UK, as democratic “circuit-breakers” on contentious and complex issues. Taking eight weeks to organise, such assemblies are constructed of a randomly chosen representative group of up to 500 members of the public. They hear a broad range of evidence and arguments on a subject, which they discuss and weigh up before making considered recommendations to their political representatives.

A forum led by the public, not by politicians. People talking and listening to each other, not shouting and arguing on or offline, to find common ground. Not superseding MPs by judging the outcome, but offering recommendations on how Brexit should be decided, to help break this deadlock and start to heal the nation’s bitter divisions.

Brexit has come to test the patience of the British public. To make progress we should instead trust their wisdom and use it to resolve our differences, deepen our democracy and unite us all.

Rowan Williams, Damon Albarn,  Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner, Jonathan Coe, Ian McEwan, Caitlin Moran, Neal Lawson Compass, Dr Jess Garland Electoral Reform Society, Ruth Lister Labour, House of Lords, Anshu Srivastava The Full Brexit, Alexandra Runswick, Unlock Democracy,  Prof Graham Smith Centre for the Study of Democracy, Francesca Klug Human rights expert, Nick Lowles Hope Not Hate, Anthony Barnett Co-founder of openDemocracy, Michael Wills Labour, House of Lords, Graham Allen Citizens’ Convention on UK Democracy, Tim Hughes Involve, Prof Nick Pearce Institute for Policy Research, University of Bath, Nick Baines Bishop of Leeds, Peter Cross Sortition Foundation

There’s a way through this Brexit impasse – let’s embrace it.

The way people talk about ‘Leavers’ and ‘Remainers’ is enough to make you think they have always been at loggerheads – two irreconcilable opponents, fated to oppose each other forever and ever. But it’s not actually like that.

As we noted last year, there was huge overlap in what people wanted when they went to the polls on June 23^rd last year – from Remainers wanting tougher immigration rules within the EU to Leavers wanting stronger workers’ rights. The binary nature of that ‘yes/no’ question though contributed to a divide.

But when big constitutional questions have created – or shone the spotlight on – rifts across the world, countries are turning to a very interesting model for closing the gap.

That model is the ‘Citizens’ Assembly’. Ireland’s Constitutional Convention, established to look at a swathe of constitutional issues, is what led to the legalisation of equal marriage.

Citizens’ Assemblies and similar approaches have been used across Europe and North America over the past decade, from electoral reform in British Columbia, to participatory democracy in Iceland rewriting the country’s entire constitution of following the economic crash.

It is a way of bringing people together to settle key policy and constitutional issues often associated with referendums.

Well, we’re bringing it to the Brexit debate. Leading academics and democracy campaigners are to hold a Citizens’ Assembly on Brexit this September, in a bid to bridge the Brexit divide and ensure the public’s voices are heard in the process of Britain leaving the EU.

The ESRC-funded project will bring together a diverse sample of citizens to contribute to the Brexit process – and provide the first example of meaningful public deliberation on what form Brexit should take.

Citizens will engage in detailed and informed discussions to reach well thought-out conclusions, in a process organised by leading academics at the UCL’s prestigious Constitution Unit, in partnership with the University of Westminster’s Centre for the Study of Democracy, the University of Southampton, Involve and the Electoral Reform Society.

Over two weekends in September (the 8^th and 29^th) a diverse group of voters will learn about the options for Brexit, hearing from a wide range of experts and campaigners from all sides of the debate, and deliberate on what they have heard.

Crucially, the Assembly will then agree recommendations that will be written up in a final report and presented to key decision makers at a high-profile Westminster event.

The project has secured high-profile backing from across the spectrum – from Remain’s Chuka Umunna and Will Straw to Leave’s Bernard Jenkins and Suzanne Evans.

This has the potential to be a powerful force for unity – and giving a genuine opportunity to citizens on all sides to engage in the nitty-gritty, the deep policy stuff that seemed missing from this year’s election.

Though a process of ‘deliberation’ – informed and reflective debate – the Citizens’ Assembly on Brexit will bring people together from both sides to find a positive way forward. It won’t be easy, but we know from other countries that it’s eminently do-able.

There is widespread agreement that the Brexit plans should respect and respond to public opinion – as demanded by both democratic principle and the need for broad public legitimacy. This Assembly is a unique and innovative way to gauge the opinions of citizens on the most pressing constitutional issue we face as a country.

Public involvement in major constitutional issues shouldn’t end on polling day. And it’s fair to say the real policy issues around Brexit were not given the space they deserved in this June’s election.

This project is an exciting way of allowing much deeper public engagement than what we saw last year – and letting voters truly influence the debate.

The idea there’s an unsolvable rift between ‘52 per cent’ and ‘48 per cent’ is a myth. We know given the chance to talk to each other and meaningfully engage in the issues, people have much more in common than many realise.

The project team already has a great deal of expertise in running similar assemblies – including conducting the UK’s first ever assemblies on local devolution in Sheffield and Southampton in late 2015.

We were blown away by the level of detail in which people were willing to talk about this quite technical democratic issue. And we have faith in the public that if they can do it on something like local devolution, we can have that similarly inspiring process for Brexit.