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ASSEMBLY DIALOGUES
Exploring what makes democracy truly work for people
What makes a good democracy?
Across the UK, a new movement of grassroots democratic action is bubbling up — and Humanity Project is part of it. From neighbourhood initiatives to bold experiments in decision‑making, people are reimagining how politics can work for all of us.
To help strengthen this effort, between September and December 2024 we convened a series of critical round‑table dialogues on deliberative and participatory democracy. Our aim was simple: to ask — and start to answer — the big question:
"What makes a ‘good’ democracy?"
We believe one answer may lie in assemblies: spaces where everyday people gather — sometimes by choice, sometimes selected by democratic lottery — to learn about and deliberate on the issues that matter most in the places where we live.
Assemblies can bring us together across divides, give everyone a meaningful voice, and create decisions shaped by lived experience.
Quick actions
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Why these conversations matter
Pretty much everyone we know agrees that our current political system doesn’t work any more.
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Nearly 8 in 10 people in Britain believe our political system could be improved “quite a lot” or “a great deal” — up 18% since 2020.
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Most people want radical, but not reckless, change.\
If we can define what “good” democracy looks like — how it works, feels, and serves people — then we can start to change our political culture for the better.
What we’re after are ways to make politics a place where we can take back our power and agency to act on the things that matter to us, where we live.
No one believes business-as-usual is good enough any more. Everyone knows that a country in which the superrich keep getting richer while the rest of us suffer, is not a fair place to live, and it has to stop (even some millionaires say so!).
See the research and full dialogue recordings →
The Dialogues
With our partner Absurd Intelligence, we hosted five round‑tables bringing together experts in democratic innovation, artists, grassroots organisers, and movement leaders.
These plain-speaking dialogues with practitioners, organisers and experts, really got stuck into assemblies: how they work, what some of the key things to keep in mind are, and how they can make democracy a good, effective, respectful experience for people.
Key question‑holders included:
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Prof. Graham Smith – How can bottom‑up people’s assemblies and sortition assemblies work together productively?
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Claire Mellier – Is there truly such a thing as a neutral assembly or facilitator?
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Rich Wilson – Who sets the agenda, and how does framing shape outcomes?
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Lee Jasper – How can assemblies be more radically anti‑racist?
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Jon Alexander – How do we ensure national‑level assembly outputs are acted on?
"Magic happens when we convene a room full of people who aren’t usually together, but need to be. Bringing experts in democratic innovation, artists and makers, and grassroots organisers closer together is crucial to the work we need to do in making change happen."
What we learned – in brief
These dialogues helped surface both the tensions and the possibilities in the field of democratic innovation. They also helped connect different communities — from artists to academics, organisers to policy thinkers — who are all working toward a better way to do politics.
With regard to assemblies, the dialogues uncovered both inspiration and challenge:
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Assemblies work best when they feel owned by the community, not handed down from government.
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Neutrality is never simple — facilitators, agendas, and even the framing of questions shape the outcome.
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Assemblies can go deeper — tackling systemic issues like racism, inequality, and climate breakdown.
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Follow‑through is critical — without action, assemblies risk being dismissed as “talking shops”.
We’ve documented the key questions and takeaways from the Assembly Dialogues and are sharing them through the Assembly Dialogues website.
Find out more:
Thank you to all who took part
Thank you all participants:
Alex Lockwood, Anwar Akthar, Carne Ross, Claire Mellier , Clare Farrell, David Bent, Deborah Field-Pellew, Diane Beddoes, Dr Floyd Millen, Dr Rosa Zubizarreta, Ed Gillespie, Elena Moses, Eva Schonveld, Gospel Obeke, Granaz Baloch, Helen Goulden, James Robertson, Jamie Kelsey Fry, Janosch Pfeffer, Jenn Reid, Jeremy Till, Jessica Edwards, Jon Alexander, Josh Knowles, Josie Moon, Justin Kenrick, Kathie Conn, Lachlan Ayles, Lee Jasper, Liam Killeen, Liz Goold, Lucy Reid, Manfred Hellrigi, Mara Livermore, Marit Hammond, Martin Rausch, Martin Wroe, Mary Nassr, Michael DaCosta Babb. Mike Eccles. Mirian Levin, Molly May, Moussa Sylla, Myghal, Nick Anim, Professor Oliver Escobar, Patricia Garcia, Paul Ewen, Perry Walker, Pete Bryant, Phoebe Reith, Professor Graham Smith, Reema Patel, Rich Wilson, Robbie Stamp, Rossana Massuelo, Sarah Castell, Siddi Mujabah, Stephanie Draper, Stephen Bennett, Professor Stephen Elstub, Steve Conlon, Susan Richie, Timi Okuwa, Tom Lord, Yago Bermejo.
What comes next?
Humanity Project exists to bring assembly culture to life – across neighbourhoods, creative communities, and grassroots campaigns.
We know there are lots of nuanced challenges around deliberative democratic practices.
We want to be thorough in our interrogation of the field and ideas as we develop how we tell the story of assemblies through cultural activation, be they events such as The Fête of Britain, or in song, writing, art, theatre, football or faith.
Dialogues like this help us to understand what makes assemblies effective, inclusive, and genuinely transformative. These ideas are helping shape how we design assemblies, train organisers, and tell the story of assembly culture to the public.
We are excited by the bringing of truth, love and humanity into political organising and decision-making.
Learn about assembly culture in the UK
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Behind the dialogues
Humanity Project is a group of people who have had success in many fields, from social and environmental movements to politics, from anti-racism campaigning to grassroots community organising, and who know that we need to work together across our various fields and communities to be successful. Humanity Project is a movement that crosses political polarisations and centres on upgrading democracy itself. Humanity Project is not orientated in any party political way. Instead, it sees this shift in how decisions are made as a fundamental improvement for our nation and communities.
About Absurd Intelligence
Founded by the creative brains behind Extinction Rebellion, Absurd Intelligence occupies a crucial strategic position in the intersectional movement for change. Convening and catalysing an unrivalled network of world-class interdisciplinary experts, we are driving much-needed Narrative and Movement Leadership. Extinction Rebellion transformed the climate space, spreading to 100+ countries in 18 months (“The most successful start-up in history” — Yancey Strickler, Kickstarter). But we know that we cannot address the environmental crisis without also tackling the way our world makes decisions. What we did to disrupt and advance the narrative around climate, we now need to do for democracy.