What Are Assemblies?

Deliberative democracy is rooted in good information and shared understanding in order to make informed decisions.

Assemblies, a form of deliberative democracy, allow people to have informed, open conversations, express opinions and share ideas in an inclusive, structured way.

It is important that the process is communicated clearly and kept to for anyone to have confidence in the outcomes.

Assemblies may be more or less formal. Assemblies can vary in length, complexity, and cost, according to whether the decision affects a few people taking part in a small activity, or the population of an entire country. The three types below are just a few examples of how assemblies can work.

• People's Assemblies - On-the-hoof, ‘casual’, particpants are self-selecting, for quick decision making or gathering of ideas.
  
  

• Community Assemblies - These have input and more planning is required. Although participants are self-selected they should be advertised widely to encourage diversity of attendance. Plans should be in place to process outputs in inform policy and decisions. The partipants should be aware of the impacts they can make by giving their time to this process. This type of assembly is to be used for XRUK's Movement Assemblies.
  
  

• Citizens' Assemblies - The most formal type, they are informed by experts, participants are chosen via 'sortition' (like a jury) to be representative of the population, usually run over a number of days and should inform policy. They are embedded in XR's third demand.