---
authors:
  - Brian Khuu
title: "Q&A on deliberative democracy for council candidates (Victoria, Australia)"
date: 2024-09-28T00:00:00.000Z
categories:
  - deliberative democracy
  - council
  - election
  - discussion
summary: "Interesting upcoming event on deliberative democracy in council context"
created_at: 2024-09-28T09:06:35.831Z
layout: post
published: true
location:
  latitude: -37.81453053995718
  longitude: 144.9628829956055
  name: "Melbourne (Online)"
event:
  url: https://actionnetwork.org/events/qa-on-deliberative-democracy-for-council-candidates
  title: "Q&A on deliberative democracy for council candidates"
  host: Dr Sonia Randhawa
  cta: "View event (RSVPs closed) →"
  date: 2024-09-29
  time: "17:00"
  end_time: "18:00"
  note: "This was a Victorian council-candidates event, not a DOD event. Registration closed after the event took place."
---

This event in victoria is of interest to us so passing around the telegram chat and to various other Designing Open Democracy members in Victoria, because it's about open governance but via [Citizen Assemblies](https://www.designingopendemocracy.com/concepts/citizens-assembly/).

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Dr Sonia Randhawa will answer questions from Victorian council election candidates on how best to use Citizens' Assemblies and other forms of deliberative democracy at the local level. She helped to establish the Sortition Foundation's Australian branch and has worked on recruitment for over 50 democratic lotteries.

The Local Government Act Victoria (2020) requires councils to use deliberative engagement to inform the development of their strategic plans including the Community Vision, the Council Plan, the Long-Term Financial Plan and the Asset Plan.[^lga-2020] However, as currently implemented, these processes often fall way short of the standards recommended by experts.

Citizens’ Assemblies (also known as Citizens’ Juries or Citizens’ Panels) are a useful approach to tackling complex, values-based policy problems. These harness the good sense of ordinary people and circumvent the influence of powerful vested interests. Public authorities convene groups of people representing a wide cross-section of society for at least one full day – and often much longer – to learn, deliberate, and develop collective recommendations that consider the complexities and compromises required for solving multifaceted public issues. They are advised by independent experts and aided in their deliberations by skilled facilitators.
Such processes are increasingly used to help break political stalemates and generate options for solving complex values-based problems – particularly those for which there is a need to consider the greater good, and/or future generations.

[^lga-2020]: "Councils must, at a minimum, apply their community engagement policy in the development of the following:" — including planning and financial management, the community vision, the council plan, the financial plan, revenue and rating planning, and the asset plan. ["Local Government Act 2020 — Principles: Community Engagement"](https://www.localgovernment.vic.gov.au/__data/assets/word_doc/0027/167913/Local-Government-Act-2020-Principles-Community-Engagement.docx), Local Government Victoria.

