Examples Of Sortition

Freedom of Representation—Sortition

The freedom to representation guarantees that citizens will be free to have their views represented in whatever group makes decisions about national laws or budgets. Deciding who will represent the views of the people, whether it is a group or an independent leader, often creates conflict. Elected representatives are vulnerable to corruption, bribery, and bias. Sortition, or selection by lottery, protects the legitimacy of the election process and ultimately allows for a more truthful representation of the people. Examples from history and contemporary politics have proven that sortition is a practical and impartial system of voting that should be integrated into any new society and its constitution.
Sortition is rarely seen in contemporary politics, but it has been utilized in other modern day procedures.
It appears we resort, or have resorted, to lottery, or sortition, for allocating organ transplants, judicial case assignments, tax audits, hunting licenses, military service, and jury pools, among others. For most, allocation by sortition seems to be available as a tie-breaking device. It is brought forth when two or more people have equal claims to a scarce good or service that cannot be divided among them by appealing to other allocation mechanisms (DeNardis 20, 2011). This idea of a tiebreak, when two people having equal claims to a good or service, could essentially be the solution to the conflict we have with political parties now. Both parties have equal claims that their way is the right way. Rather than electing representatives from these two polarized ruling parties and allowing gridlock, a lot could be used to vary the pool of representatives. Because of well-known statistical characteristics of large numbers, the views of members of Congress would correspond much more accurately with the views of the whole population than those of our present congressmen do. Once in Congress, members would be free, as they are today, to "vote their consciences." But those consciences would be typical, average consciences, rather than the atrophied consciences of dedicated power-seekers (Moore 39). In this way a lottery selection is impervious to bribery, intimidation,
ambition or personal influence of any kind (Dowlen 308, 2009). Additionally, more Americans will feel that they are being represented fairly.
The Athenians were the first to utilize sortition, and it was widely successful. Obviously, Athenian politics and contemporary politics are very different. The Athenians sought out a system that would prevent competitive pressures intense enough to ignite civil strife and split the elites into warring parties (Rosenstein 46, 1995). If such a split were to occur, the Athenians would have not made any political progress, much like the U.S. Congress now. If the U.S. Congress were to be chosen via lot, in which the pool of potential members included qualified persons of all political affiliations, there would be no threat of stalemate from polarized factions. Although, this raises the question of who is a “qualified person.” One of the biggest opponents of the lottery system was Plato, who thought sortition was the mainstay of arbitrary and inherently chaotic rule by the poor and that its primary function was egalitarian. Additionally, he argued that lottery promotes citizens into government irrespective of their ability or suitability for office (Dowlen 299-300, 2009). In other words, it allowed unqualified citizens to hold office. A system of pre-selection could prevent unmotivated, unstable and therefore unqualified persons from being elected. In Athens, scholars are not sure about the exact procedure used [to choose the pool of candidates in a lot]; although the evidence is inconclusive, it seems likely that "sortition from among volunteers" was the rule, at least in a number of cases.
Holders of the most important offices, the archonships, were selected from a short list (probably one hundred) preselected candidates of the two highest classes of citizens. After about 460 B.C., all four classes of citizens were eligible for archonship (Knag 1, 1998). Clearly, this system was prejudiced. A similar system of pre-selection could be integrated into a contemporary lot, but it would be based on a citizen’s hard work and achievement, rather than their class or social status. This way any self-motivated and reputable person could be a potential candidate, regardless of race, gender, or income-class. This would perform a valuable service by keeping such objectionable prejudices out of the election process (Steele 665, 1995). Although, this would still not guarantee a fair election in which every citizen had equal opportunity of being elected. Ultimately, there is no simple solution or test to use when choosing the potential
candidates.
In conclusion, freedom of representation depends on a system where the opinions of the people are most equally and honestly represented. The economic interests of a few and not the interests of the American people dominate today’s elections and parties that are becoming progressively more polarized are leaving many citizens’ opinions altogether discounted. Sortition, or selection by lottery, protects the legitimacy of the election process and ultimately allows for a more truthful representation of the people.

Annotated Bibliography

Rodriguez, A., & DeNardis, L. (2011). Can Allocation by Sortition Resolve the Connecticut Education-Financing Impasse?. International Journal Of Education, 3(2), 1-28. doi:10.5296/ije.v3i2.1138

Dowlen, O. (2009). Sorting Out Sortition: A Perspective on the Random Selection of Political Officers. Political Studies, 57(2), 298-315. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9248.2008.00746.x

Lockard, Alan. (2011). Sortition: Theory and Practice by Gil DeLannoi; Oliver Dowlen Review by: Alan Lockard. Public Choice , Vol. 147, No. 1/2 (April 2011), pp. 255-257

Rosenstein, N. (1995). Sorting out the lot in Republican Rome. American Journal Of Philology, 116(1), 43.

Knag, S. (1998). Let 's Toss for It. Independent Review, 3(2), 199.

Steele, D. (1995). Why Stop at Term Limits?. National Review, 47(17), 38-43.