The People Vs Climate Change - film review

There are a number of stories you can tell about a Citizens’ Assembly. There’s a policy story; how ordinary people will often push for bolder political solutions than professional politicians. There’s a process story; how refreshing it is to shed the binary hostility of politics as usual, in favour of deep listening, compassion and consensus. And there’s a people story; how ordinary people respond to being given real agency, how open they are to new perspectives, how they surprise themselves with their ability to engage with complex subjects, how they grow into the role of citizen.

Amy, 27, postal worker from Scarborough

Not surprisingly, given its title, The People Vs Climate Change mainly tells the people story of the UK’s first Citizens’ Assembly on Climate Change. The result is a novel and disarming approach to the subject of climate change. The common sentiment in a trawl of Tweets on the #ThePeopleVsClimateChange hashtag is that this is a warm, human and relatable film, and that is down to the storytelling around the assembly delegates that the filmmakers chose to focus on. They come from all four corners of the UK, they are different ages, they have different backgrounds, and they entered the assembly with different levels of knowledge and different perspectives on the topic of climate change. They are all sympathetic characters. They are all quietly charismatic in their own ways.

Folajimi, 43, University Lecturer

We are given space to get to know these people. We get some back story and context for each person. We understand how their lives have shaped their opinions. And their opinions on climate change vary considerably. The credibility of the assembly, and the credibility of the film, are greatly enhanced by giving a voice to people who are deeply concerned about making personal sacrifices, who are yet to be convinced by the science, who abhor government intervention and tax penalties on lifestyle choices. Folajimi, who grew up in Lagos, where electricity might only be available for six hours a day, quietly but powerfully gives the African perspective: ‘How do you bring climate change to someone thinking about food.’

Marc, 47, British Gas employee from County Durham

In a Q&A with its makers, the producer and director of the film, Harriet Bird, makes a crucial observation about its storytelling approach. These are not scientists or activists. These are not people telling an audience what to think and do. Instead, the audience watches them deciding what to think and do, as a result of being presented with the facts and deliberating with other delegates. Watching someone else change their mind is more powerful than being told to change your own.

Richard, 75, retiree from Kent (RIP)

The People Vs Climate Change is a people story not a process story. We see snippets of presentations. There are snatches of conversation between delegates, where they assimilate new information and work their way towards consensus. There is a short description of how the assembly was constructed and how delegates were selected. And some people might take issue with Professor Rebecca Willis when she says that 100 people is a ‘perfect sample of the country as a whole,’ or that, ‘it really is the country in miniature.’ But, overall, there is no discussion of the assembly as a democratic innovation. Indeed, there is no mention of the concept of democracy at any point. Nonetheless, the film does a good job of showing that anyone, regardless of background or education, can make a positive contribution to policy making. We all have an active citizen inside ourselves.

Charley, 25, frequent flyer from Northamptonshire

This is a people story, not a policy story. We get a broad idea of the issues on which the assembly deliberated and voted. We know that a detailed report was produced containing its recommendations. But the film is light on the details of how bold people are prepared to be when they immerse themselves in the issue of climate change. It would have been good to spend more time on just how far, just how much further than politicians, well-informed people are prepared to go with climate policy.

The least satisfying aspect of the film is its ending. We’ve been on a journey with some interesting people. We care about them and what they think. The topic of climate change has subtly breached our defences and got under our skin. But, predictably, inevitably, there’s a point where deep democracy - deliberative and participative - meets the brick wall of politics - aloof and evasive. Alok Sharma, Secretary of State for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy, deserves an Oscar for his portrayal of a typical condescending politician, committedly committing to not committing to the wishes of concerned citizens: ‘The assembly’s report will help to inform our plans. I’ve asked my officials to look at its recommendations in detail.’

Alok Sharma, 53, typical politician from Westminster

We can only hope that this film will play a part in giving both politicians and the mainstream media greater confidence to be more bold with their approach to climate change. It’s a charming portrait of active citizenship. But it can’t hide the frustrating limitations of assemblies that take place at arm’s length from power. The people behind the UK Climate Assembly designed and assembled an engine of democracy. But they had no influence over the transmission system. In the end, the delegates find their car stuck in neutral, with none of the power of their ideas reaching the wheels of change. The People Vs Climate Change is a heartwarming people story, but it lets the system off lightly.

The assembly’s recommendations are contained in a report called The path to net zero.

The Deliberate Rebellion

The Deliberate Rebellion is the second film commissioned by Extinction Rebellion and produced by All Hands On. It is about being deliberately deliberative. It is about being deliberate in the quest for a deliberative approach to addressing the climate and ecological emergency. It explains why Extinction Rebellion are demanding that a Citizens‘ Assembly dictate climate policy. And it details how Extinction Rebellion would want it to be implemented.

The film was screened at The Byline Festival as part of an ambitious live Citizens’ Assembly involving audience members. And it was officially launched on 27th August 2019.

Music for the film is by Massive Attack. They generously donated Hymn Of The Big Wheel, which Robert Del Naja remixed over our pictures.

The film took pride of place on the homepage of Extinction Rebellion’s website in support of the launch.

As part of Extinction Rebellion’s events at The Byline Festival, co-founder Roger Hallam spoke about the importance of the Citizens’ Assembly to the organisation’s plans, pithily summarising the deliberately deliberative philosophy highlighted by the film.

“A Citizens’ Assembly is not just some incidental add-on. It is essential to creating a semi-decent transition. We’re holding out for a progressive transition. And the essence of that is political legitimacy. A Citizens’ Assembly will have a profound legitimising effect.”

— Roger Hallam, Co-founder of Extinction Rebellion

The mood music in the room

“If only you could experience the mood music in that room.”

So said David Farrell, Professor of Politics at University College Dublin, and research leader of the Irish Citizens’ Assembly. David was a panel member at the Shaping Scotland event organised by The Electoral Reform Society Scotland. He was talking about how every participant in the Irish Assembly rose to the occasion to tackle complex political issues, in a toxic political environment, whilst dramatically improving the tone of political discourse.

Change of tone was a common theme of this well attended and actively engaged forum, the purpose of which was to discuss the Scottish Government’s proposal for a Citizens’ Assembly to deliberate on issues of constitution and national values.

“The Citizens Assembly is going to try to change the tone of the debate to one of respectful discussion. We want not just 100 better informed citizens, but a better informed society as a whole.” David Martin MEP

“We need to do better than shallow exchanges. Democracy needs to evolve to meet the challenges of our time.” Dr Oliver Escobar

“We are moving beyond a vote-centred democracy to a voice-centred democracy.” Professor David Farrell

“Politicians allow red lines to kill progress. Party politics is designed to create division where it doesn’t exist.” Lesley Riddoch, Journalist

The mood music in this particular room was one of optimistic curiosity. The questions from the floor examined both general principles and detailed practicalities, but the general subtext appeared to be that people want this to work and were looking to be convinced. This was encouraging given that the assembly has already become a party political football.

Indeed, the panel members were at pains to emphasise the independence of the assembly.

“This is about what can be achieved when we put aside tribal affiliations.” Joanna Cherry MP

David Martin MEP, the Convenor Designate of the Scottish Citizens’ Assemble, suggested that the Assembly could effectively have its cake and eat it. It will benefit from the enhanced status of being sponsored by the Government, whilst operating completely independently from the Government.

This sentiment was echoed by Dr Oliver Escobar, Senior Lecturer in Public Policy at Edinburgh University. “People criticise these things when they come from the top down for lack of independence. But they also criticise them when they come from the bottom up for lack of influence. You can’t win.”

The mood music in the room was that of citizen empowerment. The most enthusiastic responses, from both panel members and the audience, were reserved for stories of assembly participants rising to the democratic occasion. And there was a strong sense during the questions, and on Twitter, that the presence of the Irish panel members, who “have the deliberative democracy T shirt”, was a huge bonus to the proceedings. Louise Caldwell, who was randomly selected to participate in the Irish Citizens’ Assembly (and who features in our film, When Citizens Assemble), spoke convincingly from first-hand experience in response to some detailed questions of procedure - how facilitation worked, the duty of care shown to participants, how media involvement was sensitively handled, how consensus was arrived at, how ballot decisions were made.

“We were all very proud of the work that we had done. We stepped outside of the black and white to sit in the grey area.” Louise Caldwell

“The power is with people who are actually experiencing life, rather than people who are used to commentating on life. You can see the strength that is in inherent to citizens. It is the averageness of the group that gives it its strength.” Lesley Riddoch

The mood music in the room was one of transparent realism. The panel balanced their conviction about the opportunities for positive change with a willingness to acknowledge and embrace the challenges. These challenges include how to balance protection for participants with a desire for transparency and inclusivity through the media, how facilitation works in practice, how the Assembly will deal with what appear to be relatively broad (vague?) topics and questions, and the various issues of process design and administration.

“There are challenges for citizens, challenges for politicians, and challenges for journalists.” Dr Oliver Escobar

“The magic is in the activity of doing it. If you [the media] wait for consensus, you’re going to miss the point. The point is the process.” Professor David Farrell

“Facilitators must be impartial on content, but they can not be neutral on dynamics.” Dr Oliver Escobar

So the mood music in the room was a combination of optimistic curiosity, citizen empowerment and transparent realism. These three notes should combine to make a pleasing democratic chord change.

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You can watch a video recording of the event here. And thank you to Electoral Reform Society for allowing us to borrow their image to illustrate this post.

Money, movies, momentum.

Making friends is as important to us as making documentaries. Doing both at the same time makes us very happy.

So we are thrilled that Guerrilla Foundation and La Fondation Pour Les Générations Futures have both given us grants to make our introductory episode in Athens. Please take a closer look at them. They are kindred spirits. They see the same problems as us. They are looking for solutions in similar places.

We have also received our first individual donations. Some lovely people have given us money out of their own pockets. Wow. They have been moved to back an idea, and that moves us. We’re grateful and touched

Thanks to these friends and foundations we now have around €20,000 to plan, shoot and edit our Athenian episode.

That might seem like a lot of money but it goes super quickly, even with our frugal mindset, on things like travel, accommodation, camera and sound equipment, professional crew, and local hired help. We’ll be shooting for five days straight in Athens, which involves a mountain of work to get us there, to do the research, to shoot everything that needs to be shot, and then edit a finished product that we hope will inspire the changes we dream about.

We have the perfect moment to compare democracy as originally imagined with what it has now become - something imposed on us rather than composed by us.

We’ll explore these themes in the city that gave us our word for government by the people - to the backdrop of the democratic mirage which is the European Parliament elections.

It’s the perfect place to explore the origins of deliberative democracy, at a perfect time to expose how its ideals have been corrupted by elections, with the perfect people to show us what a revival of people-powered democracy can look like.

Though we describe our Athens episode as ‘introductory’, this will be our third film. When Citizens Assemble featured Ireland’s ground-breaking Citizens’ Assembly and the deliberations leading up to the country’s historic referendum on abortion. Then Extinction Rebellion commissioned us to make Welcome To The Rebellion, a film giving the background to its demands for a UK citizens’ assembly on climate and ecological justice. We hope there will be more to come from that collaboration, budgets permitting.

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Become a quiet hero of democracy

So, if you don’t mind us asking: “Will you be our friend too?”

Conventional foundations and media organisations have been slow to support this project, even ones promoting themselves as funding radical progressive change and justice. We get that what we’re doing can be hard to wrap your head around - we’re the naive kids calling out the naked emperor that is representative democracy. Elections don’t work. The system’s bust. Not many people really want to hear that. It sounds too tricky and threatening, especially to those in power.

We won’t hide it - we’re promoting radical ideas about how democracy could be, in fact how it has to be if we’re to bring the peaceful changes to our societies that we urgently need. There’s a place in that future for everyone, if they can only imagine it.

Better democracy works best when everyone comes along for the ride. Participation can not be exclusive. Guerrilla Foundation and La Fondation Pour Les Générations Futures are good friends who understand this.

We like to meet more soulmates like them, and more pals like you.

If you or your friends could help fund our next production please get in touch with us at quiethero@allhandsondoc.com. Thank you, or ευχαριστώ as our friends in Athens say.

Patrick's De Correspondent article. Published on referendum day.

Patrick wrote this article for the Dutch radical journalism platform, De Correspondent. It sets out the context for the referendum on whether to repeal the 8th amendment to the Irish Constitution. And it describes in detail the machinations of the Citizens' Assembly, whose deliberations led to the referendum.

All Hands On believes that we require radical, systemic changes to our democratic processes if we are to address systemic issues such as climate change and inequality. Citizens' Assemblies and the sortition process by which they are selected are an example of such change.

But we also require fundamental, systemic changes to the media and the role of journalism. De Correspondent is a shining light in this respect. It is an advertising free, participative journalism platform, funded through a membership subscription model. It has over 60,000 paying members at the time of writing. Its manifesto is based on ten principles, which describe its business model, its dedication to journalistic ideals rather than any political ideology, its social aims, and its desire to shift the emphasis from passive readers to active participants. Patrick experienced the latter at first hand as he took part in a live Q&A session in the article's comment thread.

The thread was joined by Citizens' Assembly member, Mike Loughnane. At the time of writing there are 81 comments in the thread. The discussion reflects deep both a dissatisfaction with democracy's status quo, and consequent admiration for what the Irish have achieved with their Assemblies. The quote below is indicative.

“Mistrust and a growing gap between the elected and the electors and as such a distrust in Democracy (democratic elected parties) and malfunctioning of Democracy and agenda setting and decision making is obviously a major issue within the vast majority of EU (and Western) countries.”

— Christophe Rocour

The thread also had an unexpected "guest" appearance from De Correspondent contributor and author of Against Elections, David Van Reybrouck.

“Underlying idea is: a subset of society that is informed can make better decisions than an entire society that is uninformed.

Democracy is not: the majority of gut feelings. It is reasoned debate on a number of options. Ideally, this is what classical representative democracy ought to do, but the electoral dynamics often hamper reasoned debate.”

— David Van Reybrouck

Patrick's article is published in Dutch. An English transcript is shown in full below.

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Ireland’s immaculate conception – a step forward for democracy?

By Patrick Chalmers

Irish voters will weigh countless women’s stories today in deciding how to balance the rights to life of a mother and her unborn child. These life-and-death dramas have dominated months of impassioned campaigning, years even for some, each one an individual truth about a pregnancy.

They include Sorcha’s, who described travelling to England for a termination she couldn’t have had in Ireland. A mother already, she wanted no further children and also feared a recurrence of severe post-natal depression and possibly having a still-born child. And Tracey’s, who went to Liverpool in England to have her terminally-ill daughter Grace induced early, an illegal act at home. Her baby’s ashes arrived back by courier three weeks later.

On the other side were those of women such as Carina. She first knew her son Benjamin had Down Syndrome after his birth. She fears more liberal laws would have Ireland following the likes of Britain, Denmark and Iceland in aborting most Down Syndrome babies. Or Emma, who says someone like her might abort their unplanned baby, rather than keep it, if abortion were more easily available.

The binary nature of a referendum means only one side will win on an issue that’s far from black and white. For Ireland, abortion pits traditional Catholic morality and rural conservatism against the modernising morals and ethics of its more urbanised, youthful population. It’s not any easy mix.

So there’s a deeper story buried here, one beyond any single woman’s pregnancy experience, however poignant. Its core concerns Ireland’s use of a democratic device inspired by Ancient Greece to resolve this highly contentious question. Not the referendum itself but what made it possible – a randomly selected jury of Irish people whose collective wisdom broke through a decades-long deadlock over abortion.

During dozens of hours those everyday Irish jurors considered the medical, moral and ethical issues involved. Their main recommendations – to repeal a de facto constitutional ban on abortion law to free politicians’ hands on the matter – surprised pretty much everyone. The evident seriousness of the work, and clear-cut conclusions, opened the doors for an all-party committee of politicians to follow the assembly’s lead.

Today’s vote is the third leg of this unique process, a mandatory requirement for any change to Ireland’s constitution. It gives all Irish citizens a direct say on abortion law. For all the imperfect bluntness of referendums, let’s not talk about Brexit, the electorate has a bedrock of facts and testimony  on which to decide. Many countries wouldn’t dream of giving citizens a say on abortion still less with such high-quality support materials. A brake on targeted political advertising on social media has also helped keep things more transparent.

That means whatever the outcome, some will quietly celebrate having radically changed the rules for doing democracy.

No Irish joke

So, in a country of renowned story tellers, it’s this one that may endure beyond all others. Its essence is that Ireland has changed the rules for doing democracy – for all of us, everywhere – no joke.

The referendum emerged from a process far closer to original Athenian ideas of power to, or government by, the people. We’ve not seen anything like it in a couple of centuries, when the modern version of government by elections took root. Without the assembly, there might not even have been a referendum, so entrenched had abortion become for Irish people and politicians of all parties.

Ireland’s message for the world is simple enough: that ordinary citizens, given time and the right conditions, show deep, collective wisdom quite unlike what comes from adversarial politics. The implications go way beyond a single referendum, whatever the result, and way beyond one country even.

That’s why I went to Ireland in July last year - to get a close-up look at what seemed like a different way of doing democracy. Inside a North Dublin hotel, nestled by a sea front dotted with sailing boats and other small craft at anchor, I met members of a public jury fresh from five weekends spent pondering their country’s abortion laws.

My trip was the latest step on a journey I’d first thought of more than two decades earlier as a news reporter in Brussels. Back then I’d been shocked at how EU’s leaders had tossed aside, with little evident debate, environment ministers’ attempt to install a European carbon tax. What struck me then was how the leaders guillotined months of negotiations on tackling climate change, telling journalists nothing of their closed-door meeting’s who, why or how.

My thinking had evolved over the years into an all-encompassing critique of elections themselves. Part of that was the skewed outcomes of my native Britain’s first-past-the-post electoral process. Another was the growing body of books unpicking representative democracy’s claims to be either representative or democratic. They included the revelation that Ancient Greeks – think Aristotle – saw democracy as requiring public assemblies and random selection of public office holders. They barely used elections, devices they saw as inevitably oligarchic or aristocratic, meaning they inevitably favoured an elite few.

The Irish jury process I came to see – the Citizens’ Assembly – was firmly in the original democracy camp. Its 99 members comprised randomly chosen citizens intended to represent ordinary Irish people by age, gender, social class and region.

Quiet pride

What struck me most was participants’ quiet pride in what they’d done. That quality shone through on camera, and again in phone interviews I did with other participants for a Guardian newspaper article. These story tellers spoke about personal transformation, how they’d deeply engaged in the jury process and even moved their positions as a result.

David Keogh, a truck driver in his late 40s, was one of them. He couldn’t have been more enthusiastic.

“It’s been the best experience of my life and I mean that genuinely. It’s, what can I say? It’s the inside of the machine – we’re inside the machine.”

A step back from participants I met Dimitri Courant, a French researcher in political science at the Universities of Lausanne and Paris 8. Speaking to him after the Assembly ended, in 2018, he described a process that put Ireland in the front rank of democracy innovation.

“There’s a new standard, a new norm to be taken seriously – and that’s the Irish example.”

Assembly enthusiasts highlight two aspects of the approach that set it apart from electoral politics. The first is to randomly select participants to represent more accurately the views of wider society. That pricks the narrow bubbles of elected politicians, making policies less elitist. The second is to create the necessary conditions required for people to deliberate. That means having balanced panels of experts address participants, presenting different perspectives and arguments, and giving time for reflection and exchanges among members.

Gender bias impacts

The first element certainly matters in Ireland when it comes to questions of women’s reproductive health, not least abortion. That’s because Irish women are chronically under-represented in politics. Despite hitting an all-time high in the 2016 general election, they still hold just one in every five seats in parliament.

So, while men may take part directly in most conceptions, they never do gestation and are rarely left holding any baby. Hardly the place of deep knowledge from which to craft women-friendly policies, to put it mildly. That imbalance plays out in serial policy failures.

That’s not to say gender questions led directly to the assembly as their antidote, though they certainly fuelled enthusiasm for it. One of the 2016 intake of new Teachta Dála or TDs – members of the Irish parliament’s lower house –  was Kate O'Connell. Her political ambitions flowed directly out of experiences she’d had after diagnosis of a potentially fatal condition in her unborn son, one that might have required her to have an abortion, in England.

A Citizens’ Assembly was already in prospect for the Fine Gael minority coalition government in 2016, part of an attempt to restore voters’ trust in politics. The idea harks back to something more like original democracy’s meaning of government or rule by the people.

History’s lessons

The Greeks of antiquity understood implicitly the pitfalls of elections. To avoid them, they embedded random selection of citizens and assemblies as their political mainstays. Downgrading elections meant would-be candidates couldn’t lie about their plans, themselves or their opponents. It also prevented the handing of powers to elites, they called them aristocrats or oligarchs then, who usually win most ballots.

Those basic elements, then and now, make for very different political dynamics from what we’re used to. Instead of fractious debates between rival parties or candidates for election, assembly participants are more likely to tackle issues on their merits. That difference certainly jumped out in the style of exchanges witnessed within the Citizens’ Assembly versus those of the joint parliamentary committee that took up its recommendations.

“There was no major arguments or disputes here at the Citizens’ Assembly even though there was serious disagreements, as there would always be on this subject,” said John Long, a 56-year-old electronics technician from the southern Irish city of Cork.

Long was another of the 99 random strangers brought together for the assembly. They spent their first five weekends over five months tackling abortion law, ending in April 2017.

“I would say we probably put a couple of hundred hours of total time into it, which is probably more than any parliamentary party committee would have… So, we're probably the best-informed amateurs in the country on this topic at the moment.”

He, like some others on the assembly who spoke publicly, said his views gradually moved towards liberalising abortion laws.

That’s not to say assemblies alone could solve the pervasive crisis of trust in election-led political systems around the world. They’re fragile entities, needing transparency in their use so as to build public trust in their potential. That means choosing genuinely representative samples of jurors. It means politicians buying into the process, giving the necessary budget and support staff to make things work. They must also commit to act on assembly recommendations, even those they might not agree with. None of this is guaranteed.

The point is to create space for people to grasp complex issues, and perhaps change positions as their opinions evolve. That’s why Ireland’s decision to hold one on abortion and put its core recommendations to politicians and then a referendum, marks a quantum change worldwide for the approach.

While Ireland’s recent efforts may make it the poster boy for those advocating for more assemblies, it’s not an only child. This year saw the launch of Democracy R&D, in Madrid. Its members’ collective focus is to explore ways to do democracy better. Core principles involve using randomly selected juries, so-called sortition, coupled with deliberation.

An Irish “yes” vote would certainly boost case for sortition, vindicating politicians’ choice to use it to test voters’ deliberated thinking. A “no”, rejecting the Assembly’s recommendations, would weaken the idea’s appeal though probably not fatally. British Columbia used a citizens' assembly to consider electoral reform in 2004 but then saw the recommendations rejected in a referendum. Despite the result, the process won praise for the seriousness and quality of members’ thinking, engagement and conclusions. The same would likely be true of Ireland.

Either way, playing the long game looks like any would-be reformers’ best option. That an assembly took place at all in Ireland was thanks to seeds planted during fallout from the global financial crisis of 2007/2008. The credit crunch knocked the stuffing out of several leading Irish banks and burst the local property bubble. Political scientists saw economists digging into the causes and reckoned they should too, arguing Ireland had to change.

“Without radical reform, we are in danger of sleepwalking into a different crisis in 20 years’ time,” they said.

Ireland has certainly moved on since then, not least in the “yes” vote for same-sex marriage in a 2015 referendum that emerged from that very reform process.

For Kate O'Connell, the pharmacist-and­-mother-of-three-turned-politician, just holding a jury had worked wonders for abortion questions, even before May 25.

“I think this issue, in Ireland, could never have gotten to the point we're at today, were it not for the Citizens' Assembly. I think we would have been years getting there, if we ever got there.”

Pilot film screenings (and the wisdom of crowds.)

There was no red carpet and there were no paparazzi. Fittingly, there was not a whiff of elitism about our premiere.

We showed our pilot film - When Citizens Assemble - to audiences in Edinburgh and Glasgow. And we combined these screenings with expert panel sessions to discuss the issues raised. In the process we made some friends and maybe influenced a few people too, in the nicest possible way. We were grateful for the healthy turnout in both locations, we were encouraged by the warm reaction to the film, and we were bowled over by the quality of discourse.

When Citizens Assemble was filmed in Dublin in July 2017. It documents the context, the purpose and the deliberations of the Irish Citizens' Assembly, which was convened to make recommendations on the possible liberalisation of the 8th Amendment to the Irish Constitution. The 8th Amendment gives an unborn fetus the same right to life as its mother and, at the time of writing, is effectively a de facto ban on abortion.

The purpose of this film, indeed the purpose of this entire project, is to demonstrate that ordinary citizens, given the opportunity and a conducive environment, are perfectly capable of making well-considered policy decisions. This is a topical issue in Scotland. The introduction of citizens' assemblies to tackle specific issues, and the possibility of a citizens' second chamber to the Scottish Parliament are both live discussions. So Scotland felt like a good place to give our first film its first public airings.

In Edinburgh the film was shown to an audience of civil servants in the Scottish Government building on Victoria Quay, at an event kindly organised by Doreen Grove and Angie Meffan-Main. With the added stimulus of input from panel members, Dr Roslyn Fuller and Maia Almeida-Amir, there was a high-energy discussion about the merits of sortition and assemblies, and the potential to apply these ideas to policy making in Scotland.

The Glasgow event was organised and supported by our friends at Common Weal. And we were grateful once again to Maia and Roslyn who joined our own Patrick for the panel session, which was chaired by Isobel Lindsay.

The conversation was notable not just for the quality of the contributions from both audience members and the panel, but also for the quality of the listening and a universal willingness to consider alternative points of view. It was all a far cry from the adversarial politics that we have come to know and loathe. Finding consensus in the pursuit of progress is a refreshing change from conflict in the pursuit of power.

There was a lively discussion about suitable issues to be addressed by citizen assemblies - including universal basic income, a second chamber to parliament, and "hot potato" issues where career politicians fear to tread. There were questions about how the principles of random selection and citizen participation can work at scale, which drew an informed response from Roslyn. Maia talked from first-hand experience about the case for over-representing minority groups in order for their views to be adequately represented. Echoing one of the Irish Assembly participants featured in our film, Maia also challenged the idea that young people lack the appetite and sophistication to tackle complex political issues - witness the social media savvy of Parkland students in Florida. And there was much talk of the need for genuine political authority to be given to assemblies, alongside the tools and environment for deliberation. Amen to that.

Patrick described these screenings as being akin to planting acorns. Judging by the reaction to the film, and the constructive, forward-leaning responses of both audiences, those acorns have been planted in fertile soil.

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Dr Roslyn Fuller is a renowned democracy academic and author of Beasts and Gods: How Democracy Changed Its Meaning and Lost Its Purpose.

Maia Almeida-Amir is an intersectional feminist activist who also took part in the Citizens' Assembly on Brexit. She is completing an MA in Philosophy and Politics at the University of Edinburgh.

Common Weal is a 'think and do tank' campaigning for social and economic equality in Scotland.

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99 strangers in a Dublin hotel: Patrick's Guardian article about Ireland's abortion referendum.

Ireland's Citizens' Assembly, which is the subject of the All Hands On pilot film - When Citizens Assemble - is also the subject of an article by Patrick in The Guardian. The Citizens' Assembly is chosen by lot and is an excellent example of participative, deliberative democracy in action. Patrick's piece tells the story of how a randomly selected, representative sample of 99 citizens has brought about a national referendum.

The article is "part of a series on possible solutions to some of the world’s most stubborn problems". This could hardly be more apposite to our project. The Citizens' Assembly has allowed Ireland to make progress on the abortion issue after 34 years of deadlock, during which conventional politics has failed to make progress. Several commentators have suggested that, for this reason alone, randomly selected citizen juries can act as a useful bolt-on to conventional government to address challenging political issues.