G1000 - Analysis
Contents
Inclusiveness
Phase 1: selecting Issues
G1000 started with a call for citizens to suggest propose issues for deliberation. Thousands of issues were proposed by online participants. The participants also rated the different ideas. From the thousands of ideas, 25 issues were selected. The in a second round 3 issues were selected form the 25 issues. The three issues became the subjects of the next step of deliberation[1]. Although internet site may seem to be an inclusive option, it is less inclusive then mini-publics. In the report it the number of participants in the online survey, but if we take into account that every participant suggested one issue the at most, several thousand participated. The population of Belgium at 2011, was about 11 million. That means that the percentage that participated was less than 0.1%. The characteristics of the participants could be heavily skewed. They can be more young, liberals or people with a lot of leisure time., whereas most of the population usually tend to have less time of leisure, and thus their issues may be different from those that was selected. We suggest that for inclusiveness, a random sample would have been much more inclusive.
Phase 2: Suggesting Ideas
In the second phase, a random sample of 1000 participants were selected. The sample was tested for representedness and was found to represent the population. The mangers did change the level of representedness in favor of defense from majority roll. The Belgium Population is composed of 61% Flemish and 39% Walloons. To defend the minority form the sheer power of the majority, the organizers set the representatives to be 50% Flemish and 50% Walloons.