2023 Trends in Deliberative Democracy: OECD Database Update

From 1979 to 2023, at least 80 622 citizens have been randomly selected to participate in a deliberative process. Want to know more? Explore the trends of the OECD Deliberative Democracy Database.

Globally, there is a widespread perception that democracy is working well for some, but falls short for others. The degree of democracy enjoyed by the average citizen has deteriorated to 1986 levels, with 72% of world’s population living in autocracies in 2022. The results of the 2021 OECD Survey on Drivers of Trust in Public Institutions show that less than one third of people (30.2%) say the political system in their country lets them have a say in what the government does and only one third of people (32.9%) think their government would adopt opinions expressed in a public consultation.

Whilst globally, we see a transition from democratic optimism to democratic pessimism, there are reasons to remain hopeful. Governments continue to move beyond consultations towards representative deliberative processes as a way to improve citizen participation beyond elections. Between September 2021 and September 2023, the OECD collected 160 new cases of representative deliberative processes (such as citizens’ assemblies, councils, and juries) where randomly selected citizens are invited by a public authority to learn, deliberate, and come up with informed recommendations to address a concrete public problem. Deliberation combined with sortition can broaden participation to a more diverse group of people and create the conditions for everyday people to exercise public judgement, complementing representative democratic institutions.

Trend #1: The deliberative wave continues to grow — from 2021 to 2023 it reached five new countries and 11 812 citizens.

This new evidence underscores the sustained growth and expanding reach of the deliberative wave. The steady adoption of representative deliberative processes suggests that it is seen as a trusted mechanism for public authorities to engage citizens and enhance the quality of public decisions.

Since 2021, the deliberative wave reached five new countries, including two OECD Member countries (Colombia and New Zealand) and three non-OECD member countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, and Montenegro). The Database now includes data from 34 countries, with 96% of the cases situated within OECD members.

Trend #2: Environment and other long-term policy issues are the main topic addressed by deliberative processes

Democracy suffers from a “myopia” — partly due to the short-term incentives of electoral democracy — that diminishes its ability to solve long-term challenges and protect the interests of future generations, Graham Smith argues. Greater citizen participation in combination with democratic representation can support long-term governance by broadening the spectrum of participants (for example to future generations), improving the quality and inclusion of the decision making, and strengthening the legitimacy of the whole system.

In 32% of the new cases, citizens were tasked to produce recommendations related to the green agenda. For example, in Estonia 55 citizens deliberated to shape a more climate-friendly future in Tartu, and at the European level 150 citizens presented 23 recommendations to reduce food waste. This reinforces the trend observed in 2021 were other policy issues that require long-term thinking such as urban and strategic planning were the top topics addressed by deliberative processes.

Trend #3: Permanent and institutionalised processes multiplied from 2020 to 2023

Institutionalising a deliberative processes refers to establishing a legal or cultural form of recurrence to go beyond one-off processes and embed such mechanisms into existing decision-making structures such as local councils. This helps ensure their continuity regardless of political change and increases the opportunities for citizens to participate in such processes. There are different ways to embed representative deliberation into public decision-making, as shown by the OECD’s eight models and examples. For example, it can take the form of connecting deliberation to parliamentary committees, like in Belgium, or by giving people the right to demand a deliberative process, as is the case in Austria.

The institutionalised or permanent cases collected by the OECD multiplied from 2020 to 2023, going from 22 to 41 — the majority of which are implemented by subnational governments at the local or regional levels. For example:

• The Paris Citizen Assembly (100 members) is currently deliberating on how to support individuals experiencing homelessness as well as on the barriers currently faced by the city to increase green spaces.
• The Lisbon’s Citizen Council (50 members) deliberated in 2022 on how to enable the city to face the climate crisis and, in 2023, on how to make Lisbon a 15-minute city.

Embedding deliberative processes into existing representative institutions (like Parliaments or Local Councils) can help reduce the frictions between representative and deliberative democracy and support a move towards a systemic or continuous approach to democratic decision-making that combines different forms of participation to complement electoral processes.

Trend #4: Digital is becoming a central element of deliberative processes, yet traditional face-to-face deliberation remains the preferred mode

Technology offers new routes for public participation, with huge potential to increase their scale and scope. In 2020 and 2021, online deliberation was the most used medium for conducting a deliberative process. Recent data suggests that this was due to the sanitary restrictions of the Covid-19 pandemic as in 2023 the use of online deliberation dropped significantly.

In 2022 and 2023, 64% of processes preferred face-to-face deliberation and one third opted for a hybrid setting (online and offline).

In addition, digital tools can support deliberative processes in different ways:

1) To bridge the gap between participants and the broader population: This can be done by embedding other forms of participation that target a wider public, like consultations or surveys. 55% of the cases that used a complementary form of participation opted for a digital solution.

2) To increase transparency throughout the process and ensure the continuous communication of its stages and outcomes. In 40% of cases, communication was done through online or digital channels including social media and dedicated websites.

Trend #5: Deliberative processes can be more inclusive and impactful than other forms of participation

The OECD Good Practice Principles for Deliberative Processes promotes inclusive and accountable processes. OECD evidence shows that representative deliberative processes can address the inclusion problems usually faced by other forms of participation such as open consultations. For example, participation is often encouraged and supported through remuneration, coverage of expenses, or by providing childcare. In 74% of cases, participants received a form of compensation to support their participation.

Public authorities tend to be more responsive and accountable to deliberative processes’ participants. In most cases, they respond to participants and implement at least half of the inputs received. Further data demonstrates that when responding to participants public authorities favoured a face-to-face setting showing commitment and respect to the engagement of citizens (54% of cases).

Nevertheless, the question of a deliberative process’ impact deserves further research and consideration. Increasingly, scholars and practitioners have pointed to other equally important outcomes of a deliberative process that could be used to measure their impact. For example, deliberative processes put emphasis on learning and receiving information from diverse sources to build public judgment instead of individual opinions. The learning aspect of a deliberative process is usually highlighted as a key outcome. It not only allows for the production of better results, but also informs participants about the policy issue at stake and the role of public authorities in addressing the problem. Other positive spillover effects include reduced mis and disinformation, decreases in polarisation through informed deliberation, and increased empathy among citizens.

The OECD supports public authorities at all levels of government in understanding, implementing and evaluating deliberative processes. For more information, you can consult the OECD Deliberative Democracy Toolbox.

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The OECD Deliberative Democracy Database is a compendium of representative deliberative processes and institutions from all over the world originally published in 2019 and first updated in 2021. The cases included meet the following criteria: 1) Deliberation: Minimum of one full day of face-to-face, online, or hybrid meeting; 2) Representation: Group of randomly selected citizens stratified to be broadly representative of the community they intend to represent, and 3) Impact: Commissioned by a public authority. While we aim to gather all the existing cases, we acknowledge that this compendium is not an exhaustive list. The data collection consisted of an open call for submissions, rounds of consultation with the OECD Innovative Citizen Participation Network and desk research. If you are aware of a case that is not included, please contact us at opengov@oecd.org

The 2023 update benefited from the contribution of dozens of practitioners, researchers and civil servants. The objective is to inform OECD work on democracy and citizen participation as well as to maintain a public good that can help further research on the topic. We welcome any interested researcher, practitioner, institution, or public authority that would like to build on this collective knowledge. You can access the database here.