Your editorial (“Biden’s domestic agenda is beginning to stall”, June 18) suggests the gridlock of representative democracy in the US needs to be overcome by appealing to what the polls repeatedly show is an electorate which is far less polarised than its representatives.
Democracies across the planet are now proving the new tools to make this happen.
A microcosm of a nation’s citizens — impartially selected and independently deliberating — could easily offer to the presidency and legislature a legitimate and public consensus on a key range of issues starting with police powers, voting rights and infrastructure spending.
These gifts of citizens’ assemblies would carry immense weight, meriting serious consideration from all elected representatives.
They could be used regularly by the US and other democracies including our own. Since winning the concept of one person one vote, it has been effective citizens’ engagement between elections which has been the missing piece in the evolution of our democracies.
The 1770s were an epoch-making decade for democracy. The 2020s can be a time for a quieter, but no less significant, step to help us win the battle between democracy and autocracy.
Graham Allen, Convenor of the Citizens’ Convention for UK Democracy; Chair of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform