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< Back The Political Economy of Devolution in Britain from the Postwar Era to Brexit Nick Vlahos 2020 , Palgrave Summary Bringing together ten leading researchers in the field of deliberative democracy, this important book examines the features of a Deliberative Mini-Public (DMP) and considers how DMPs link into democratic systems. It examines the core design features of DMPs and their role in the broader policy process and takes stock of the characteristics that distinguish them from other forms of citizen participation. In doing so, the book offers valuable insights into the contributions that DMPs can make not only to the policy process, but also to the broader agenda of revitalising democracy in contemporary times. Read more Previous Next

< Back DIGITAL PLATFORMS AND ISSUE POLARISATION: CITIZENS' DEBATES ON ABORTION, RACIAL QUOTAS AND SAME-SEX MARRIAGE IN BRAZIL FROM 2021-2019 The relationship between digital platforms and political polarisation has gained priority attention from scholars in the last two decades. About this event Digital platforms have become the main mediators of public debate: it is where citizens, social movements, activists, journalists, experts and political representatives discuss topics of common interest. The relationship between digital platforms and political polarisation has gained priority attention from scholars in the last two decades, but the empirical evidence is complex and ambiguous: while some research shows, for example, how specific characteristics of digital platforms lead to fragmentation of the public, other research shows that the use of platforms actually helps people to have contact and dialogue with diverse opinions. This is an important topic in Brazil today because in the last decade we began (returned?) to face a specific type of polarisation: one in which divergent groups face an absence of common ground and they see each other as deep-seated enemies. Two events mark this process: the huge protests of June 2013 (where protesters were located in different parts of the political spectrum), and the election of Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 (where we saw the prominence of conservative groups, which were away from the public scene since the Military Dictatorship). Bolsonaro explicitly opposes dialogue between different positions, saying, for example, that "minorities must bow to the majority". In this presentation, I show how abortion, racial quotas and homosexual marriage were discussed by citizens on Facebook from 2012 to 2019. These are typically controversial topics, and they play a leading role in disputes between progressives and conservatives in Brazilian political conflicts over the last decade. Tariq Choucair is a PhD candidate in the Communication Graduation Program at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (Brazil). Tariq studies reciprocity and polarisation in online debates on controversial issues. He has been a member of the Media and Public Sphere Research Group for 9 years, working with the group on research projects such as “Deliberative System and Social Conflicts” and “The potential of deliberation in divided societies”. Tariq's work is published in Political Studies, Political Research Exchange and E-COMPOS. Seminar series convenors Hans Asenbaum and Sahana Sehgal . Please register via Eventbrite . Previous Next

< Back Creative publics: Deliberation in Canada and the story of MASS LBP Peter MacLeod, Principal, MASS LBP Wed 9 May 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract Since its founding in 2007, MASS LBP has led some of Canada's most original and ambitious efforts to engage citizens in tackling tough policy choices. From privacy legislation to community planning to health policy, MASS has conducted more than 35 major reference panels, citizens’ assemblies and commissions involving more than 1500 Canadians, and reaching more than 300,000 households. Today, MASS is an internationally recognised leader in the design and delivery of deliberative processes for government. About the speaker Peter MacLeod is the founder and principal of MASS LBP, and one of Canada's leading experts in public engagement and deliberative democracy. He is a former researcher at Britain's Demos think tank, and a long-time friend to Denmark's Kaospilots, a school for business design and social innovation. He writes and speaks frequently about the citizen's experience of the state, the importance of public imagination, and the future of responsible government. He currently serves on the board of Tides Canada, a national environmental charity, and chairs Toronto's Wellesley Institute, a leading think tank dedicated to improving health equity and the social determinants of health. He also lectures in the politics and governance department at Ryerson University. Previous Next

< Back When the talking stops: Deliberative disagreement and non-deliberative decision mechanisms Ian O'Flynn, Newcastle University Tue 5 December 2017 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract Deliberative democracy entails a commitment to deciding political questions on their merits. In the ideal case, people engage in an exchange of reasons and arrive together at an agreed view or judgement on what is right or best. In practice, of course, an agreed view may be impossible to reach—among other things, there may not be enough time or information. Yet while deliberative democrats accept that compromise or voting may therefore be required to resolve the disagreement that deliberation leaves unresolved, the nature of that acceptance remains unclear. Is there something in the logic of deliberative democracy to commend it or does it signal something important about the limits of the model? To address this question, this paper uses the much-neglected distinction between conflicts of judgement and conflicts of preference to show why greater attention needs to be paid to the character of the decision to be made. This paper is co-authored with Maija Setälä. About the speaker Dr Ian O’Flynn is a Senior Lecturer in Political Theory at Newcastle University. His main research interest is in deliberative democracy, but he also works on topics such as compromise and political integration. He teaches modules in contemporary political theory and in the politics of deeply divided societies. He is the author of Deliberative Democracy and Divided Societies (2006) and his articles have appeared in journals such as British Journal of Political Science and Political Studies. He has held visiting positions at Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania and the Australian National University. Previous Next

< Back Catherine Clutton Associate About Cathy Clutton has over thirty years’ experience of public administration within Australian Government departments. She has developed and managed programs that provided financial and management support for community organisations, developed evidence-based clinical practice and public health guidelines and policy, and provided support for health and medical research in Australia.

Former PhD student < Back Louise Clery Former PhD student About Louise Clery completed her PhD in 2006 at the Australian National University. Her dissertation ‘Social movement strategy between pragmatism and praxis: environmentalists and regional forest agreements’ was supervised by John Dryzek, with Robert E. Goodin and Val Plumwood in the panel.

< Back Citizen agency in democratic innovation: insights from citizen-led governance innovations (CLGIS) Carolyn Hendriks & Albert Dzur Tue 17 July 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract Many aspects of contemporary politics and its institutional practices frustrate citizens. But what kinds of democratic reforms do citizens wish to see, and how do they wish to achieve and sustain them? Most scholars and practitioners of democratic innovation assume that citizens would prefer to engage in politics via more deliberative and participatory forums. However, as critics have argued participatory forums can be piecemeal and tokenistic, and often disempower and co-opt citizens by serving the state and corporate interests (e.g. Lee, McQuarrie, and Walker 2015). For insights into how to make democratic reform more substantive and sustained, we examine citizen-led, action-oriented, and highly pragmatic forms of democratic innovation. We are particularly interested in the collective journeys that citizens themselves embark on to resolve — not just participate in — traditional public policy problems. In this paper we empirically examine various cases of Citizen-Led Governance Innovation (CLGI) where citizens are creating democratic pathways to their own policy and reform endeavours. We show how these citizen innovators are not waiting to be invited into government, or agitating from the sidelines. Instead they are taking proactive and pragmatic steps to address policy failures or dysfunctional institutions. In so doing, citizens self-organise and adopt simple, inclusive, and replicable procedures that foster citizen buy-in and ownership. Citizen agency in CLGIs differs from what is found in other forms of democratic innovation, and related civic practices, such as activism, community organising, and volunteer work and may help address concerns about substance and sustainability. We consider the implications of our findings for debates on democratic innovation and, more broadly, deliberative democracy. About the speakers Carolyn Hendriks is an Associate Professor at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University. Her work examines democratic aspects of contemporary governance, particularly with respect to participation, deliberation, inclusion and representation. She has taught and published widely on democratic innovation, public deliberation, interpretive methods, network governance and environmental politics. Her current research projects are exploring the possibilities of democratic innovation within conventional and alternative modes of political participation. Carolyn is an appointed member of newDemocracy's Research Committee and sits on the editorial board of several international journals, including the European Journal of Political Research. Albert W. Dzur is a democratic theorist with an interest in citizen participation and power-sharing in education, criminal justice, and public administration. He is the author of Democracy Inside: Participatory Innovation in Unlikely Places (Oxford, in press); Rebuilding Public Institutions Together: Professionals and Citizens in a Participatory Democracy (Cornell, 2017); Punishment, Participatory Democracy, and the Jury (Oxford, 2012); Democratic Professionalism: Citizen Participation and the Reconstruction of Professional Ethics, Identity, and Practice (Penn State, 2008);and a co-editor of Democratic Theory and Mass Incarceration (Oxford, 2016). His interviews with democratic innovators appear in Boston Review, The Good Society, Restorative Justice: an International Journal, and National Civic Review. He is a professor in the political science and philosophy departments at Bowling Green State University. Previous Next

< Back Reasoning together: Understanding and measuring the deliberativeness of a situation Simon Niemeyer and Francesco Veri, University of Canberra Tue 4 June 2019 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract Deliberative democracy concerns the collective process of reasoning undistorted by the exercise of power, but can this be captured empirically? Where most emphasis in the field has been on understanding good deliberative procedure, the focus here is on understanding a reasoned ‘outcome’ in a deliberative sense — beyond the problematic measure of preference change as a proxy for deliberativeness. The presentation considers what it means conceptually for individuals to “reason together” in the absence of pathologies or political manipulation and how this might be revealed in observed positions. A middle-level theory is proposed that models intersubjective reasoning in terms of how underlying issue considerations collectively map onto courses for action (preferences). The nature of the relationship indicates the deliberativeness of a situation. To the extent that a group ‘reasons together’ it is possible to observe a shared rationale, even if there is little actual agreement on preferences. This property is empirically tractable, using intersubjective consistency (IC) which can be applied to both small groups and population surveys to assess consistency of agreement on considerations versus agreement on preferences. The approach is illustrated using fourteen deliberative case studies, as well as wider application comparing climate sceptics to non-sceptics. The mechanics of the methodology, as well as implications for deliberative theory at both micro and deliberative systems levels are discussed. About the speakers Simon Niemeyer is an Associate Professor and co-founder of the Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance. His research ties together the themes of political behaviour, the public sphere and observations from deliberative minipublics, such as Citizens’ Juries, to develop insights into potential interventions and institutional settings that improve deliberation and governance. Francesco Veri is a Research Associate at the Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance at the University of Canberra. He is currently working on the Australian Research Council's (ARC) project " A Meta-Study of Democratic Deliberation: Advancing Theory and Practice” led by Simon Niemeyer, Nicole Curato and John Dryzek. Francesco is specialized in the field of configurational comparative methods with an emphasis on fuzzy logic applied to social sciences. His methodological research focuses on concept operationalization and strengthening the quality of parameters of fit in set theoretic methods. Francesco is also member of the Lucerne Cluster for Configurational Methods (LUCCS) which regroup scholars who make major contributions to social science methodology at the crossroads between quantitative and qualitative research. Previous Next

< Back The migrant voice in public policy deliberations: The health story in Australia and Canada Catherine Clutton, Australian National University Tue 7 April 2015 11:00am - 12:00pm Fishbowl, Building 24, University of Canberra Abstract If there is a criticism of deliberative democracy it is that those who are included in deliberations frequently represent the well-educated, articulate, generally male, dominant majority who can engage in rational debate. This effectively excludes citizens who are less articulate, who may prefer different styles of interaction, or who are otherwise subject to discrimination such as women and visible minorities. Many immigrants fit the profile of those who are generally excluded. My research project takes the policy maker’s perspective and focuses on the engagement of immigrants in the development of health-related public policy, comparing Australia and Canada at both the national and State/Territory/Provincial levels. Noting that both Australia and Canada have explicit national policies in favour of multiculturalism and citizen engagement, it is pertinent to review how public officials engage with citizens from increasingly culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. In this context critical multiculturalism provides an opportunity to examine the institutional structures in place that may exclude immigrants from participating in government deliberations. Equally, the norms of deliberative democracy provide a framework to enable the inclusion of immigrant voices. Together, the facilitating features of these frameworks should enable the inclusion of immigrant voices. Within these frameworks I ask whether and how paying greater attention to cultural competence can enhance public policy deliberations and thus policy outcomes. Today’s presentation will be illustrated with findings from my fieldwork to show how governments are addressing the objective of inclusion expressed in these frameworks. About the speaker Cathy Clutton is a PhD Candidate at the ANU Medical School, College of Medicine, Biology and Environment. Cathy has over thirty years’ experience of public administration with the Australian Government (1978-2012), almost all of which was in the federal health portfolio. The majority of this time was spent with the National Health and Medical Research Council. Her responsibilities have included developing and managing programs that provided support for community organisations, developing evidence-based clinical practice and public health guidelines and policy, and providing support for health and medical research in Australia, including the ethical conduct of research. A recurring theme in her work has been citizen engagement. Previous Next

< Back Albert Dzur Associate About Albert W. Dzur is a democratic theorist interested in citizen deliberation and power-sharing in criminal justice, education, and public administration. He is the co-editor of Democratic Theory and Mass Incarceration (Oxford, 2016).

< Back Belgium: The rise of institutionalized mini-publics Julien Vrydagh, Vrije Universiteit Brussel and UCLouvain Tue 28 January 2020 11:00am-12pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract In less than a year, Belgium has witnessed a large and sudden rise of institutionalized mini-publics. After the Ostbelgien model, the Regional Parliament of Brussels has institutionalized Citizens’ deliberative commissions, while multiple municipalities of Brussels are launching neighbourhood councils and a political party got elected based on a single promise to organize citizens’ assemblies. Belgium seems to become a leading laboratory of deliberative democracy and citizen participation. This ‘revolution’ is nonetheless surprising, for Belgium was known to be a copy-book example of neo-corporatism, whereby citizens tended to be excluded from political decision-making. How can we explain this increase? Is it a revolution or an incremental change? What do these new institutionalized mini-publics entail? What are their promises and pitfalls? This informative seminar will try to answer these questions by discussing dimension of this rise. First, I present its genesis and background. Examining Belgian mini-publics from 2001 until 2018, it provides both a descriptive analysis of what preceded and a narrative accounting for this expansion. Second, it explains in detail the design and competencies of four specific institutionalized mini-publics : a brief remainder of the Ostbelgien model; the Brussels’ Deliberative Commission (composed by elected representatives and randomly selected citizens); the atypical Citizens’ Assemblies organized by the political party Agora the neighbourhood mini-publics (sometimes combined with participatory budgets), which are mushrooming in Brussels’ municipalities. About the speaker Julien Vrydagh is a PhD student and a teaching assistant at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and the UCLouvain. His PhD thesis investigates the conditions under which mini-publics influence public policy in Belgium. His other research interests include the link between the mini- and maxi-public, the integration of mini-publics in collaborative governance, and youth parliaments. Julien Vrydagh also provides the City of Brussels with advices on its randomly selected neighbourhood councils. Previous Next

Latest News - Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance < Back Call for Papers: Deliberative Democracy Summer School 2024 18 Apr 2023 APPLY HERE! Please submit the completed form to our research assistant, Hans Asenbaum at hans.asenbaum@canberra.edu.au by 30 June 2023. For questions, please contact the summer school convenor, Hans Asenbaum at hans.asenbaum@canberra.edu.au .

Latest News - Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance < Back Deliberative Democracy and Refugees: Ensuring they have a voice 9 Dec 2022 Our PhD student Mohammad Abdul-Hwas shares his passion to study and research refugee crisis with UC's UnCover . Mohammad's parents’ and grandparents’ lived experiences of the ongoing Palestinian refugee crisis, that has lasted the past 70 years, has created a deep empathy for refugees. Connecting with Syrian refugees in Jordan who have similar lived experience drove Mohammad to research deliberative democracy, with the ambition to improve the experience and agency for people caught in a refugee crisis. Following multiple visits to Jordan – where his extended family is from – between 2012 and 2018, Mohammad’s interest and studies would pivot toward an underlying passion for refugee governance. His visits took place shortly after the Syrian conflict escalated from the Arab Spring protests in 2011 – an event that displaced millions, many of whom have ended up in neighbouring countries. He reached out to universities around Australia, looking to secure his PhD candidature in the space, including UC, and started reaching out to possible supervisors for his project. He succeeded in finding a supervisor ─ Dr Nicole Curato, Professor of Political Sociology within the University’s Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance . “Connecting her areas of expertise – deliberative democracy and paying attention to vulnerable people in disaster contexts – gave me a foundation to approach my PhD project about the Syrian refugee crisis,” Mohammad says.

< Back James Bohman Associate About James Bohman's primary areas of research include political philosophy (deliberative and transnational democracy) and the philosophy of social science (rationality and normativity). He holds the Danforth I Chair in the Humanities and is Professor of Philosophy and Professor of International Studies.

Research Fellow < Back Hedda Ransan-Cooper Research Fellow About Hedda Ransan-Cooper's research interests include the human dimensions of global environmental change, the theory and practice of sustainable development and the intersections between human mobility and climate change.

< Back COMPARING DEMOCRATIC INNOVATIONS Matt Ryan, University of Southampton Tue 5 June 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract Systematic comparisons of democratic institutions, devices, and processes provide a unique quality of knowledge that helps us learn how to improve governance in democracies. The research agenda inspired by the deliberative turn in democratic theory has moved in an increasingly empirical direction, with large scale data-collection an ever more prominent feature of research in the subfield of democratic innovations. Nevertheless, systematic comparisons of more than a handful of cases are still rare. Comparing a large number of democratic innovations presents conceptual challenges and sampling and publication biases have often reinforced a scholarly focus on ‘best practices’ at the expense of learning from failure and variation. In this presentation I report the results of systematic comparisons of more than a handful of cases of democratic innovation by systematically cumulating existing research. In particular I highlight different combinations of conditions that explain citizen control of decision-making worldwide. I show that even though comparing a large number of cases presents methodological and conceptual challenges, engagement with the task is a requirement if our explanatory theories are to be improved. About the speaker Dr Matt Ryan is Lecturer in Governance and Public Policy at the University of Southampton. His research focuses on democratic innovation and participation in politics, the policymaking process, and social science research methods. His most recent publications appear in European Journal of Political Research, Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Local Government Studies, Journal of Public Deliberation and PS: Political Science and Politics. Previous Next

< Back A humble ethos for democracy Christopher Hobson, Waseda University Tue 1 March 2016 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract In the quarter of a century since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the confidence surrounding democracy has been replaced with growing concerns about whether it is now in crisis. What is needed is an approach to democracy that avoids both the excessive optimism of the 1990s and the more corrosive pessimism that has emerged in recent years. Responding to this situation, this paper considers the old idea of humility, which has moved from virtue to vice to now seeming irrelevance. This may seem like a strange alternative to explore at a time when democracy is facing a growing array of serious challenges, especially given that humility has often been associated with self-abasement or accepting a lower position than one is due. Certainly such passivity does not cohere well with democracy, but if humility is understood in terms of an awareness of one’s limits and an acknowledgement of what has yet to be achieved, it has the potential to offer a powerful way of approaching democratic government. This paper explores the different meanings the idea has taken, and considers what a humble ethos for democracy might mean. It is suggested that humility entails reflection on one’s own standing, but this is done in reference to others. In this sense, there is a social dimension to humility, which can have productive consequences for democracy. In developing this approach, the paper will also consider recent arguments by Aikin and Clanton (2010) and Kyle Scott (2014) that humility plays a valuable role in facilitating deliberation. If this is indeed the case, humility may be an idea that deserves greater attention by deliberative democrats. About the speaker Christopher Hobson is an Assistant Professor in the School of Political Science and Economics, Waseda University (Japan). He has previously held positions at the United Nations University and Aberystwyth University, and has a Ph.D. in Political Science and International Relations from the Australian National University. His work lies at the intersection between democracy and international politics. He is the author of The Rise of Democracy: Revolution, War and Transformations in International Politics since 1776 (Edinburgh University Press, 2015), and has co-edited three books including The Conceptual Politics of Democracy Promotion (Routledge 2011). For more information, visit his website: http://christopherhobson.net or check his Twitter feed: @hobson_c Previous Next

< Back Janosch Pfeffer Associate About Janosch Pfeffer's work concerns Earth System Governance and the intersection of environmental governance and the systemic perspective in deliberative democracy. He is also affiliated to the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS) in Potsdam.

< Back Deliberative democracy and federal constitutional design and building in Myanmar Baogang He, Deakin University / Dr Michael Breen, University of Melbourne Tue 30 October 2018 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract The recent deliberative democracy literature has addressed many issues on constitutionalism. In particular, John Dryzek’s seminal work on deliberative democracy in divided society and James Fishkin’s deliberative polling on constitutional matters offer a new fresh approach and thinking. This paper aims to engage and advance the current theorizing on deliberative democracy and constitutionalism through a case study of deliberative forums on federal constitutionalism in Myanmar. Myanmar is in an important phase of its democratic transition as it tackles the form of federalism most suited to its conditions and aspirations. Since the 1947 Panglong conference, demands by the ethnic nationalities for ‘genuine federalism’, which have been a primary factor behind conflict, have remained unmet and continue to foment unrest and mistrust. The opportunity for substantive federal reform, and associated peace-building, is present and being progressed at the national level, through Union Peace Dialogues, involving elite level representatives from the military, ethnic armed groups and political parties. However, these forums suffer from problems of democratic legitimacy, significant delay, and polarisation. As one supplement to this process, and in order to demonstrate the value of a deliberative, rather than majoritarian, approach to reform, the presenters organised four deliberative forums based on the deliberative polling methodology. Two deliberations involved mostly members of political parties, ethnic armed groups and civil society organisations, while the other two involved mostly laypersons selected by civil society organisation. Designing the deliberative forums in this way helps to address competing recommendations for deliberation in constitution-making and on identity-based issues – namely those that regard such deliberation as best occurring among laypeople, who are more likely to change to their minds but have limited understanding of technical issues, and those who suggest elite-based forums. We found that in each case participants did change their minds, sometimes against expectations, but to a different degree. Technical matters, like the division of powers, were more pertinent to the elite, while issues like whether or not there should be federalism saw more substantial changes among laypeople. Further, involving political parties and ethnic armed groups established a semi-detached link to the official constitutional change process, in this case the Union Peace Dialogues (21st Century Panglong), and the potential to contribute to the establishment of a more deliberative system. About the speakers Baogang He is Alfred Deakin Professor and Chair in International Relations since 2005, at Deakin University, Australia. Graduated with a PhD in Political Science from Australian National University in 1994, Professor He has become widely known for his work in Chinese democratisation and politics, in particular the deliberative politics in China. Professor He has published 7 single-authored books and 63 international refereed journal articles. His publications are found in top journals including British Journal of Political Science, Journal of Peace Research, Political Theory, and Perspectives on Politics. In addition, he published 3 books, 15 book chapters and 63 journal papers in Chinese. Professor He has also held several honorary appointments and research fellowships at renowned universities including Stanford University, University of Cambridge, Columbia University, Leiden and Sussex University. Michael Breen is a McKenzie Postdoctoral Fellow in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Prior to that Michael worked at Deakin University, after completing his PhD at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Michael's research focuses on federalism in Asia, and the management of ethnic diversity. He is the author of 'The Road to Federalism in Nepal, Myanmar and Sri Lanka: Finding the Middle Ground' (2018, Routledge) and has participated in Nepal's constitution-making process that established it as a federal democratic republic. Michael's research also explores the role of deliberative democracy and the use of deliberative polling in constitution-making and conflict management. Prior to academia, Michael was a policy maker, negotiator and project manager in various government departments in Australia and international organisations including the United Nations Development Programme. His professional background is in Indigenous rights and native title, political inclusion and environmental conservation. Previous Next

< Back The potential of deliberative democracy in like-minded settings Kimmo Grönlund, Åbo Akademi University Tue 14 February 2017 11:00am - 12:00pm The Dryzek Room, Building 22, University of Canberra Abstract When groups consisting of like-minded participants discuss among themselves, their views tend to become more extreme. This phenomenon is known as group polarization. Cass Sunstein (2002, 2009) calls this discussion in like-minded groups ‘enclave deliberation’. Enclave deliberation has become increasingly common, especially in online communities, where it is easy to find like-minded contexts. In the long run, the tendency to discuss in enclaves may threaten democracy, since cross-cutting deliberation with different viewpoints and interests is needed in order to find common solutions for political conflicts. Finnish population-based experiments confirm that like-minded groups tend to become more extreme when they discuss freely. However, when like-minded groups discuss under specific deliberative norms, they do not become more extreme. This finding is relevant to both deliberative theory and policy-making. If the increased polarization tendencies in western democracies can be alleviated with certain rules (especially online), a less hostile, depolarized public sphere could be achieved. About the speaker Kimmo Grönlund is Professor of Political Science and Director of Research of the Social Science Research Institute at Åbo Akademi University in Finland. He is Convenor (together with André Bächtiger) of the Standing Group on Democratic Innovations at the ECPR and Director of the Finnish National Election Study Previous Next