The Athenian Option

Download or read book The Athenian Option written by Anthony Barnett and published by Andrews UK Limited. This book was released on 2017-01-17 with total page 124 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Before New Labour came to power and when even the prospect of reform of Britain's House of Lords was regarded with scepticism, Anthony Barnett and Peter Carty developed the idea of selecting part of a new upper house by lot: creating a jury or juries, that are representative of the population as a whole while being selected at random, to assess legislation. This new edition of the original proposal includes an account of the reception of the idea, their evidence before the Commission on the Lords established by Tony Blair, and a response to the great advances in citizen-based deliberation that have taken place since the mid-1990s. It concludes with a new appeal to adopt their approach as efforts to reform the Lords continue.