The Assembly Movement can’t carry on as it did before the death of George Floyd – if we want a politics fit for the 21st century, how can assemblies be more radically anti-racist than they have been so far?

Held by Lee Jasper and Clare Farrell, facilitated by Nick Anim and David Bent.

• You can watch the summary video:

• You can watch Lee and Claire define the problem for this round-table, here:

• And you can watch the full round-table here:

Context

The movement for systemic change and a democratic reset needs everyone: the broadest critical mass of people. At the heart of this movement for democratic systems change are the tools of assemblies – self-built, bottom up people’s assemblies, as well as sorition- or lottery-based assemblies that are designed to be demographically the same as the public they represent.

But do these ‘representative’ models work for marginalised communities and their lived experience? Or does the participatory democracy community need to upgrade what it has always done in terms of improving its relevance for multicultural Britain? This dialogue explores what assemblies must do, and how much harder they may need to work to counter the racial gaslighting, the media hype around race and immigration, around Muslim communities and other discriminations, including narratives such as “all immigrants are illegal”, or “all black people are violent”, etc.

Does the assembly movement need to distinguish itself from the history and traditions of the mainstream White Left in terms of its relationship with African, Caribbean and Asian communities? After the death of George Floyd, people all round the world hit the streets to demand a more radical form of antiracist work demanding justice and equality. How is the participatory democracy movement changing its practice after George Floyd? Can it abandon the shibboleths of the 20th century to create a politics fit for the 21st century?

This dialogue aims to improve on representation as a limited approach to inclusion where substantial prejudice and division is present in society. It will also include questions around sortition, oversampling, trusted proxies, etc. The thinking that comes out of this dialogue can be used to foster discussions about approaches to youth, women, disabled community, LGBTQ+ and other often marginalised groups, and will draw on practical examples and recent topics looked at by assemblies: e.g. on policing in Waltham Forest.