I'm drawn to randomness as it's elegant, simple and wholesome. By the people for the people and being judged by a jury of peers in court also seemed to suggest a comfort in vesting power to ordinary citizens briefly as needed.
What really sold me is how this would obviate the need for election season polling and the tired prediction estimation and pontification for all those months leading up to elections.
Power and elected office almost certainly corrupts as well. Having brief and rare opportunities to perform this as an honor and duty would bring out the best in people and surface voices and considerations that would better reflect the concerns of the common people.
Idk it just seems like a nicer idea every time i come back to it. Most people here are good people. Yet we're governed by a consortium of the absolute worst (ironically this appears to be completely bipartisan).
Anyways thanks for sharing sortition and it's history here :) this is exactly what I was hoping to find in the discussion and why I enjoy HN
Now, don't get me wrong, sortition may improve things for a time. But like code, people figure out how to take advantage of laws. Re-writing the US Constitution on a regular basis is very risky; instead, SCOTUS changes it's opinion on what the Constitution means periodically; it's like updating the interpreter's code instead of changing user-submitted code.
You might also be interested in the districting method in which you draw district boundaries through the middle of high-population areas. Half the population would be on either side of each boundary. You keep subdividing until you have as many districts as needed. (Sorry, I don't remember the name for this, but it was the best option I could find when I last looked into this topic more than a decade ago.)
It's called the SplitLine Algorithm. Here is what 2010 US would look like under it - https://rangevoting.org/SplitLR.html - It has some issues. like grouping people who are far apart together. (i.e., someone in rural Colorado gets grouped in with someone in downtown Denver)
I was always a fan of the "compactness" criteria, where you draw the most compact (circle like) districts possible. Like this - https://bdistricting.com/2010/
duncangh•4h ago
WarOnPrivacy•4h ago
There's a question of supporting families while spouses get called up. One thing that helps a draft is the low percentage of late teen parents.
duncangh•4h ago