Swedish national citizens’ assembly on climate kicks off

Tim Daw at the press conference for the national citizens’ assembly. Photo: Johannes Ernstberger

For the assembly, 60 participants were chosen through a “democratic lottery” to reflect Swedish society. During the spring they will meet several times to deliberate and arrive at well-reasoned and well-informed suggestions for how Sweden can take responsibility for living up to the Paris Agreement. The ambition is that the citizens’ assembly will enrich and nuance the public and political debate on climate issues in Sweden.

The citizens’ assembly is a part of the research programme Fairtrans, which is a collaboration between Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University, University of Gävle, Uppsala University, Lund University and IVL Svenska Miljöinstitutet.

Participants chosen using a “democratic lottery

The participants of the citizens’ assembly have been chosen using a “democratic lottery”. An invitation was first sent to 7 000 randomly selected people registered in the Swedish state personal address register, SPAR. Nearly 500 recipients indicated their interest to partake. Of these, 60 were chosen with the help of an algorithm to reflect Swedish society.

“I’m very happy that so many were interested in joining the citizens’ assembly. That is a sign of great engagement which should make for valuable discussions in which different experiences and perspectives meet,” says Tim Daw, researcher at Stockholm Resilience Centre and project leader for the citizens’ assembly.

The participants will discuss, learn from each other, and take into consideration different arguments. They will be supported by some of Sweden’s leading researchers and experts who will share insights from their respective areas of knowledge. The citizens’ assembly will vote for suggestions and present these at the end of May.

Read more about the citizens' assembly on the Fairtrans webpage (in Swedish)
Watch short film about the national citizens´assembly on Youtube