Contrasting Views of Citizens’ Assemblies: Stakeholder Perceptions of Public Deliberation on Climate Change

Abstract

It has been argued that a ‘new climate politics’ has emerged in recent years, in the wake of global climate change protest movements. One part of the new climate politics entails experimentation with citizen-centric input into policy development, via mechanisms of deliberative democracy such as citizens’ assemblies. Yet relatively little is known about the motivations and aspirations of those commissioning climate assemblies or about general public perceptions of these institutions. Addressing these issues is important for increasing understanding of what these deliberative mechanisms represent in the context of climate change, how legitimate, credible and useful they are perceived to be by those involved, and whether they represent a radical way of doing politics differently or a more incremental change. This article addresses these gaps by presenting findings from mixed method research on prior expectations of the Devon Climate Assembly, proposed following the declaration of a climate emergency in 2019. The research compares and contrasts the views of those commissioning and administering the citizens’ assembly, with those of the wider public. Findings indicate widespread support, yet also considerable risk and uncertainty associated with holding the assembly. Enabling input into policy of a broad array of public voices was seen as necessary for effective climate response, yet there was scepticism about the practical challenges involved in ensuring citizen representation, and about whether politicians, and society more generally, would embrace the ‘hard choices’ required. The assembly was diversely represented as a means to unlock structural change, and as an instrumental tool to achieve behaviour change at scale. The Devon Climate Assembly appears to indicate ‘cautious experimentation’ where democratic innovation is widely embraced yet carefully constrained, offering only a modest example of a ‘new climate politics,’ with minimal challenges to the authority of existing institutions.

Full text

Politics and Governance (ISSN: 2183–2463)
2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X
DOI: 10.17645/pag.v9i2.4019
Article
Contrasting Views of Citizens’ Assemblies: Stakeholder Perceptions of
Public Deliberation on Climate Change
Rebecca Sandover 1,*, Alice Moseley 2and Patrick Devine-Wright 1
1Department of Geography, University of Exeter, Exeter, EX4 4PY, UK; E-Mails: r.sandover@exeter.ac.uk (R.S.),
p.g.devine-wright@exeter.ac.uk (P.D.-W.)
2Department of Politics, University of Exeter, Exeter, EX4 4PY, UK; E-Mail: a.moseley@exeter.ac.uk
* Corresponding author
Submitted: 17 January 2021 | Accepted: 18 March 2021 | Published: in press
Abstract
It has been argued that a ‘new climate politics’ has emerged in recent years, in the wake of global climate change protest
movements. One part of the new climate politics entails experimentation with citizen-centric input into policy develop-
ment, via mechanisms of deliberative democracy such as citizens’ assemblies. Yet relatively little is known about the moti-
vations and aspirations of those commissioning climate assemblies or about general public perceptions of these institu-
tions. Addressing these issues is important for increasing understanding of what these deliberative mechanisms represent
in the context of climate change, how legitimate, credible and useful they are perceived to be by those involved, and
whether they represent a radical way of doing politics differently or a more incremental change. This article addresses
these gaps by presenting findings from mixed method research on prior expectations of the Devon Climate Assembly, pro-
posed following the declaration of a climate emergency in 2019. The research compares and contrasts the views of those
commissioning and administering the citizens’ assembly, with those of the wider public. Findings indicate widespread sup-
port, yet also considerable risk and uncertainty associated with holding the assembly. Enabling input into policy of a broad
array of public voices was seen as necessary for effective climate response, yet there was scepticism about the practical
challenges involved in ensuring citizen representation, and about whether politicians, and society more generally, would
embrace the ‘hard choices’ required. The assembly was diversely represented as a means to unlock structural change, and
as an instrumental tool to achieve behaviour change at scale. The Devon Climate Assembly appears to indicate ‘cautious
experimentation’ where democratic innovation is widely embraced yet carefully constrained, offering only a modest exam-
ple of a ‘new climate politics,’ with minimal challenges to the authority of existing institutions.
Keywords
citizens’ assemblies; climate assembly; climate change; climate emergency; climate politics; deliberation; democratic
innovations
Issue
This article is part of the issue “Is There a New Climate Politics? Emergency, Engagement and Justice” edited by Anna R.
Davies (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland), Stephan Hügel (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland) and Vanesa Castán Broto (University
of Sheffield, UK).
© 2021 by the authors; licensee Cogitatio (Lisbon, Portugal). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribu-
tion 4.0 International License (CC BY).
1. Introduction
The necessity to rapidly and extensively respond to cli-
mate change has been repeatedly emphasised by scien-
tific experts (e.g., Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, 2018). A narrative of Climate Emergency has
emerged over recent years, driven by social movements
such as Fridays for Future. Policy makers at different
scales have responded through declarations of Climate
Emergency and setting target dates to reach net zero
emissions. At the time of writing, 74% of local author-
ities in the UK have declared a Climate Emergency, as
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 1

has the UK national government (Climate Emergency UK,
2021). Civil society groups, notably Extinction Rebellion
in the UK, have demanded greater public participation
in climate policy making through the use of deliberative
mechanisms such as citizens’ assemblies with the abil-
ity to produce recommendations that are binding and
not just advisory (Extinction Rebellion, 2019). Bryant and
Stone (2020) identify six UK local authorities—all based
in cities—that have implemented public deliberations on
climate change. However, judging the extent to which
these new narratives, declarations and deliberations are
indicators of a ‘new climate politics’ is uncertain. In the
case of public deliberations, it requires analysis of the
motivations and rationales underlying why these new
mechanisms are being introduced by policy makers—is
the aim to re-configure power relations between citi-
zens and elected representatives? Or to address partic-
ular challenges with representative politics (e.g., lack of
trust, lack of citizen engagement, short-term interests),
which may need addressing to respond to the climate cri-
sis? Upon what criteria are the legitimacy and credibility
of citizens’ assemblies based? And what happens next:
Do they lead to substantively new policies and actions on
climate adaptation and mitigation? Are citizens’ climate
assemblies a one-off, or do they represent a more endur-
ing shift towards public deliberation in policy making?
In this study, we begin to address these important
questions through a case study of the first citizens’ cli-
mate assembly to take place in a rural county of the UK,
in Devon, South West of England (hereafter referred to
as ‘the Devon Climate Assembly’). Addressing gaps in the
literature on citizens’ assemblies, we focus on the views
of stakeholders, including public officers (administrators
and managers of local authorities and other public organ-
isations), as well as members of the wider public who
contributed to a public call for evidence as part of the
wider process leading up to the assembly. With regards
to temporality, we address the gap that little research
has explored stakeholder perceptions of public delib-
eration before an assembly takes place. This is useful
to reveal the expectations and anticipations associated
with democratic innovations when citizens’ assemblies
are held in places for the first time: How are they justi-
fied by policy makers as a necessary departure from con-
ventional politics? Upon what criteria are their legitimacy
and credibility argued to lie?
Devon represents a suitable context to address
these questions. In 2019, local councils across the
county declared a Climate Emergency. Devon County
Council convened a partnership of 27 organisations—the
Devon Climate Emergency Response Group (hereafter
DCERG)—to coordinate responses. A Net Zero Task Force
made up of 15 experts was set up to write the Carbon
Plan, informed by a citizens’ assembly to ensure pub-
lic participation. ‘Mini-public’ deliberation on climate
change has not taken place in Devon to date. Conducting
research in advance of the Devon Climate Assembly, we
use a risk analytical framework to investigate the per-
ceived opportunities, drawbacks and uncertainties asso-
ciated with the assembly by stakeholders and ‘engaged’
publics. We also attend to how perceptions of legitimacy
and credibility play out across different geographies of
urbanity and rurality, noting the lack of research on
rurally based climate assemblies to date. We pose the
following research questions:
RQ1: How do local stakeholders—specifically those
commissioning the assembly and members of the
wider public—perceive the opportunities and draw-
backs of holding a Net Zero Citizens’ Assembly
in Devon?
RQ2: In terms of process and outcomes, what aspects
of mini-public deliberation are considered crucial to
its legitimacy and credibility?
Drawing on analysis of data from interviews with local
stakeholders and from surveys with ‘engaged’ publics,
the research addresses these research questions and
contributes to debates concerning public trust in politi-
cal institutions, and the institutionalisation and broader
purposes of public deliberation (e.g., Dryzek et al., 2019;
Farrell et al., 2019). The remainder of the article is struc-
tured as follows. In Section 2, we begin by setting out
reasons behind the growing interest in deliberative pub-
lic engagement on climate change, before discussing the
benefits and challenges of mini publics such as citizens’
assemblies (Section 2.1). We next show how our research
builds on, and addresses gaps in the current literature
(Section 2.2), before describing the context of our own
study (Section 2.3). Section 3 sets out our methodology,
and Section 4 outlines our key research findings. We dis-
cuss these findings more fully in Section 5 before present-
ing our conclusion.
2. Public Deliberation and the Governance of Climate
Change
With many governments reluctant to divest from fossil-
fuels or risk reductions in economic growth, there has
been a burgeoning interest at sub-national levels (e.g.,
cities and regions) in the role that mini-public delibera-
tion might play in building a social mandate for action
on climate change (Howarth et al., 2020). The interest
in deliberative public engagement has also grown in
the context of increasing disenchantment with ‘formal’
politics and elected politicians (Flinders & Curry, 2008;
Smith, 2009; Stoker, 2006), as well as political polari-
sation and the spread of misinformation (Farrell et al.,
2019). Deliberation by mini-publics is contended to over-
come many of the difficulties associated with political
engagement through social media (Dryzek et al., 2019),
notably an emphasis upon argumentative complexity,
civility, listening, mutual respect and openness to persua-
sion. Given these developments, increasing interest at
regional and local levels in applying public deliberation to
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 2

the challenge of climate change is unsurprising. However,
democratic innovation via mini-public deliberation on cli-
mate change at the local level also raises many challeng-
ing questions regarding risk and uncertainty in proposing,
justifying and implementing mechanisms hitherto unfa-
miliar to local stakeholders and publics.
2.1. Citizens’ Assemblies as Mini-Public Deliberation
Citizens’ assemblies are a type of ‘mini-public,’ which
involve bringing together a group of citizens—selected
randomly to be representative of a wider population—
to ‘deliberate’ on a specific topic on which they are
provided with information (by experts, and other stake-
holders) to inform a decision making process or public
opinion (Dahl, 1989). They are just one variety of mini-
public, amongst others such as citizens’ juries, deliber-
ative polls, consensus conferences and planning cells
(Smith, 2009; Smith & Setälä, 2018). These institutions
bring together a random selection of citizens to deliber-
ate on issues of public concern and to provide a collec-
tive recommendation, although the types of topics con-
sidered vary, as well as their size, and specific objectives.
Citizens’ assemblies have been described as “potentially
the most radical and democratically robust” type of mini-
public (Escobar & Elstub, 2017, p. 3), partly because of
their size, the length of time that can be involved com-
pared to other mini-publics, i.e., usually over several
weekends (Smith & Setälä, 2018), the informed nature
of the deliberations, and their potential for influenc-
ing public policy. Although citizens’ assemblies are rel-
atively rare, experimentation with their use is growing,
and they have been utilised by national governments
to garner public input into topics like electoral reform
(the Netherlands, British Columbia, Ontario), abortion
(Ireland), long term care (UK) and climate change (e.g., in
France, UK and Ireland). There has been some, although
more limited, use by local public authorities, for instance
Vancouver’s assembly on municipal planning (Beauvais,
2018), as well as by teams involving academics and civil
society organisations on constitutional and multi-level
governance issues (Flinders et al., 2016; Renwick et al.,
2018). Thus citizens’ assemblies are not novel, but their
application to the challenge of climate change is a more
recent phenomenon.
A central aspect of any mini-public is citizen delib-
eration involves “engaging with alternative arguments
with an open mind” (Niemeyer, 2013, p. 435). Mini-
publics are part of a family of institutions designed to
enhance citizen involvement in political decision making,
sometimes described as ‘democratic innovations.’ Other
democratic innovations include direction legislation, par-
ticipatory budgeting and town hall meetings, and various
forms of e-democracy (Smith, 2009). Mini-publics are
used to complement rather than replace systems of rep-
resentative democracy, and aim to improve the relations
between citizens and decision-makers (Hendriks, 2006),
and deepen citizenship, re-casting the role of citizens
as co-producers and problem solvers (Elstub & Escobar,
2019). They tend to be used in policy areas of high polit-
ical salience, of constitutional importance, or which are
politically sensitive or divisive, and are often employed
to consider issues where decisions have to be made but
where different policy options involve difficult trade-offs
(Parkinson, 2004; Renwick et al., 2018).
One of the main benefits of citizens’ assemblies,
according to their advocates, is that their recommen-
dations can command high public legitimacy (Elstub
& Escobar, 2019). Legitimacy claims stem from the
rigour with which participants are selected, the informed
nature of deliberations, the inclusion of expertise from
credible and impartial witnesses, the variety of per-
spectives considered, and the richness of the debates.
There is emphasis on creating institutional conditions
that allow free and equal participation between citizens
in a context of mutual respect and understanding (John,
Smith, & Stoker, 2009). From this perspective, incorpo-
rating elements of citizen deliberation into policy devel-
opment can be said to enhance democratic legitimacy.
However, the quality and legitimacy of citizens’ assem-
blies themselves is contingent upon requirements includ-
ing an open and transparent process, impartiality of
witnesses, lack of interest group or political party dom-
inance, and wider public engagement in the process
(Devaney, Torney, Brereton, & Coleman, 2020; Farrell
et al., 2019). These can be regarded as issues of ‘input
legitimacy’ which are focused around the participation
and inclusion of relevant actors, and ‘throughout legiti-
macy’ concerned with the quality of processes and inter-
actions involved (Devaney et al., 2020; Schmidt, 2013).
Despite the possible benefits of citizens’ assemblies
for addressing topics such as climate change, there are
also limitations. These mechanisms only involve one
small part of a population, albeit a statistically represen-
tative and randomly selected component. Participation is
voluntary since those invited can decline the invitation,
creating a potential self-selection bias (Smith & Setälä,
2018). Those who do not take part (the majority of cit-
izens) are left ‘untouched’ by the process (Parkinson,
2003). Lafont (2015) points out that the views of partic-
ipating citizens are not representative of public opinion,
since their opinions are likely to shift during the deliber-
ation. She also questions the accountability of citizens’
assemblies, as unelected bodies which other citizens
may feel do not represent them. Others have noted that
deliberative mini publics often lack real decision mak-
ing power. Parkinson (2004, p. 385), discussing citizens’
juries, notes that they sometimes make “recommenda-
tions that are within quite narrow boundaries that are
determined by levels of power to which [the partici-
pants] do not have access.” This underscores the impor-
tance of ensuring that where deliberative mini-publics
are used, the agreed follow-up and implementation pro-
cedures following their recommendations are commu-
nicated clearly to participants, thus enhancing ‘output
legitimacy’ (Devaney et al., 2020).
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 3

Existing literature has not considered whether citi-
zens’ assemblies are perceived as a radical departure
from politics as usual by the different groups involved
in them, nor what these different groups consider to be
their main purpose, risks and benefits. Research is lack-
ing on whether social movements, the wider public and
political/administrative actors hold different, and poten-
tially competing, views about the purpose of citizens’
assemblies on climate change, with the risk that the find-
ings and recommendations of an assembly may be called
into question and lack legitimacy. This is an important
issue when local areas are experimenting with forms of
democratic innovation and a key focus of this research.
2.2. When a Local Area Engages with a Mini-Public for
the First Time: Aspirations and Uncertainties
Within the literature on citizens’ assemblies specifically,
there has been considerable emphasis on the experiences
and views of participants themselves (Beauvais, 2018;
Niemeyer, 2013; Renwick et al., 2018). Other research
explores the views of the professional participation prac-
titioners who conduct deliberative mini-publics (Cooper
&Smith,2012).However,thereisrelativelylittleresearch
on the views of either the public officers or political office
holders who commission and organise citizens’ assem-
blies, and even less examining wider public perceptions.
Previous work has explored perceptions of these insti-
tutions among ‘opinion leaders,’ e.g., in a proposed citi-
zens’ climate assembly in Australia which did not come to
pass, owing to opposition (Boswell, Niemeyer, & Hendriks,
2013). Parkinson (2004) explored the motivations of
health managers using citizens’ juries, and found they
were used as a means of testing out arguments. By bring-
ing together witnesses, managers, professionals and lay
people, the issues were thoroughly debated, giving clar-
ity at the end of the process and a stronger sense of
the legitimacy of competing arguments. Managers also
viewed the juries as a means of rationalising polarised
debates between competing interest groups, giving public
managers the opportunity to make decisions that would
be perceived as free of interest group domination. With
regards to temporality, while much previous research
focuses on experiences and reflections of participants
during or after citizens’ assemblies (e.g., Devine-Wright
&Cotton,2017),lessresearchhasexploredtheperiod
before the assembly has taken place.
The implication of these gaps is a lack of research
upon the expectations and anticipations of democratic
innovations when mini-publics such as citizens’ assem-
blies are held in places for the first time. For political
leaders, the decision to hold a mini-public climate delib-
eration is likely to require justification and legitimisation
as to why a departure from ‘business as usual’ politics
is required. Moreover, such innovation might be associ-
ated with considerable uncertainty and a range of poten-
tial risks and opportunities regarding what is involved,
how it should be undertaken and what outcomes might
arise. Accordingly, we apply a risk analytical framework
(Pidgeon, Hood, Jones, Turner, & Gibson, 1992; Slovic,
2010) to explore stakeholder and public perceptions of
the Devon Climate Assembly, with a focus upon percep-
tions of its potential benefits and drawbacks for tackling
climate change, as well as positive and negative affec-
tive responses. As part of this analysis we explore the
extent to which a citizens’ assembly is seen as a radi-
cal break and new way of doing climate politics, a man-
date for more radical action, or whether there are other,
more instrumental reasons for pursuing this type of
deliberative mini-public, such as those alluded to above
(Parkinson, 2004).
There are important spatial dimensions to demo-
cratic innovation. Local authority-led mini-publics on cli-
mate change, in the UK at least, have taken place in
urban areas to date. Holding mini-public deliberations
on climate change in rural areas is likely to raise partic-
ular challenges, not least in ensuring the representative-
ness of participants. Farrell et al. (2019) underscore the
importance of random selection in the design of mini
publics. Yet recruitment requires voluntary participation
by citizens. Ensuring representative participation from
scarcely populated or historically disadvantaged rural
areas is likely to pose a challenge to the legitimacy of
democratic innovation (Smith, 2009). Rurally facing cli-
mate assemblies also have to engage with a range of
critical issues not faced by urban areas, notably the sit-
ing of large and controversial energy infrastructure such
as wind turbines, provision of low carbon mobility to
remote areas, and alterations to historical patterns of
farming and land management.
2.3. The Devon Carbon Plan and Climate Assembly
Our research is conducted in Devon, the third largest
County in the South West of England with a total pop-
ulation in 2019 of 1,2 million people and an average
age of 43.7 years, above the national average (Devon
Population Statistics, 2019). Rural areas account for 90%
of Devon’s land area, and the county is internationally
recognised for landscapes of national importance; 35%
of Devon’s land area is within Dartmoor and Exmoor
National Parks together with five Areas of Outstanding
Natural Beauty. Yet Devon also has major urban centres,
three largest of which—Plymouth, Torbay and Exeter—
account for almost half of its population. There are signif-
icant wealth and life expectation gaps between areas in
the north and south and between more remote rural and
coastal populations that contrast to better-resourced
urban and suburban based populations (Devon Health
and Wellbeing Board, 2019). Recent government statis-
tics highlight these income and lifestyle disparities with
indices of multiple deprivation categorising parts of
North Devon and Torridge as some of the most deprived
places in England (Devon County Council, 2020).
In 2019, following Devon councils’ declaration of
a Climate Emergency, Devon County Council convened
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 4

DCERG—a partnership to coordinate responses across
Devon, with the aim of producing a Carbon Plan to reach
net zero emissions. DCERG includes local councils and
national parks (n 14), health trusts (n 3), private
sector interests (e.g., utilities and farming organisations,
n4), environmental organisations (n 3) and aca-
demic institutions (n 3). DCERG, in turn, set up a
Devon Climate Emergency (‘Net Zero’) Task Force made
up of 15 experts to write the Carbon Plan, and a Climate
Impacts Group to create a regional Adaptation Plan.
DCERG devised a process to create the Carbon
Plan that combined three steps. First, Expert Thematic
Hearings were convened by the Task Force across
November-December 2019, calling witnesses on
Transport, Energy and Waste, Food, Land and Sea, Built
Environment and Cross-cutting themes (Devon Climate
Emergency [DCE], 2020a). Second, DCERG issued a Public
Call for Evidence, with submissions reviewed by the Task
Force for inclusion in the Carbon Plan. Third, DCERG com-
mitted to holding a Citizens’ Assembly in order “to enable
views of the general public to play an important role in
the production of the Devon Carbon Plan” (DCE, 2020b).
DCERG and Devon County Council have collaborated
with researchers from the University of Exeter to inform
how the Devon Climate Assembly will be undertaken
(see Positionality). University researchers were com-
missioned to conduct evidence reviews about citizens’
assembly design and delivery, with the aim of ensur-
ing adherence to best practice, and by association the
legitimacy and credibility of the assembly. The Covid-19
pandemic severely disrupted the Carbon Plan process,
pushing it back to mid-2021, necessitating the assembly
to be held online. Instead of deliberating on the entire
Plan, DCERG decided that the assembly would focus on
a small number of particularly challenging and controver-
sial issues. These include disincentives on private car use,
changes to land management associated with reduced
meat production and consumption, and use of onshore
wind energy to generate low carbon electricity. Within
this evolving local context, we address research gaps con-
cerning the expectations and anticipations of democratic
innovations when citizens’ assemblies are held in places
for the first time.
3. Methodology
A single case study research design (Yin, 1981) was
employed, with the aim of providing an intensive,
in-depth investigation (Sayer, 1992) of local stakeholder
perceptions of the Devon Climate Assembly. Interviews
with commissioning and independent expert stakehold-
ers enabled deep insights into the perspectives of those
commissioning the assembly process, with a specific
focus on understanding the perceptions of local author-
ities and other local decision makers. A survey with
engaged publics enabled us to gauge perceptions of pub-
lic stakeholders who had declared an interest in the
assembly process.
16 in-depth interviews were conducted between
June and September 2020. Interviews were conducted
with DCERG members from local authorities (n 10),
membership organisations such as land based, business
and environmental organisations (n 3) and a Devon
County Council representative (n 1) as well as mem-
bers of the Devon Climate Emergency Task Force (n 5).
In the rest of the article when referring to DCERG stake-
holders in general, we use the term ‘commissioning
stakeholders.’ Elsewhere we use the term ‘council stake-
holders’ to distinguish issues common to local authority
interviewees. Interview questions focused on stakehold-
ers’ expectations of the Devon Climate Assembly and
their perceptions of its value, challenges, risks, oppor-
tunities and uncertainties in the context of the wider
Carbon Plan process (see the Supplementary File for
interview schedule).
A questionnaire was used to capture the perceptions
of engaged public stakeholders. Recruitment was under-
taken in collaboration with Devon County Council, who
identified and facilitated introductions to 100 individuals
who had submitted evidence in the 2019 public consul-
tation. Of the 31 people who completed the survey, only
seven stated that they represented a voluntary organisa-
tion or activist group such as a local Green Party group
and a Community Renewable Energy group. The majority
(89%) were aged 50 years or over. Geographically, pub-
lic participants were more likely to reside in rural areas
or the more populous areas of South and East Devon,
with relatively few from urban areas. The survey ques-
tions focused on perceptions of, and confidence in, the
public consultation process, expectations of the citizens’
assembly, and perceptions of the risks and opportunities
of using a citizens’ assembly to address climate change
(see the Supplementary File for survey instrument).
Interview data analysis was conducted using Nvivo
led by the first author. Thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke,
2006) was used to identify issues of risk and benefit, legit-
imacy and credibility that were important to participants,
linked to the main research questions. Analysis of survey
data combined descriptive analysis from multiple choice
questions and manual thematic coding of open ended
answers. Both sets of analyses were integrated to form
an over-arching narrative using a form of triangulation
(Baxter & Eyles, 1997). In reporting the findings below,
we use thematic headings which emerged as part of our
predominantly inductive analytical approach.
In terms of positionality, this study was conducted in
collaboration with Devon County Council—the lead insti-
gator of DCERG—who co-designed and co-funded the
research. Although acting as expert advisors within the
process, through the production of two rapid evidence
reviews on mini-public deliberation for DCERG and the
Task Fo rc e, t he res earc he rs s ou ght to m ai nt ai n a se lf-
reflexive position throughout when they engaged with
the participating stakeholders, to retain a critical indepen-
dence with regard to the aims of the research, methodol-
ogy, and how the findings were interpreted and used.
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 5

4. Key Findings: Democratic Innovation, Climate
Governance, Risk and Representation
Our findings indicate that stakeholders across all groups
believe that citizens’ assemblies hold potential as sites
of democratic innovation on climate change. However,
a spectrum of opinions on the purpose of the Devon
Climate Assembly were apparent, ranging from per-
ceiving the need for innovative forms of democracy,
to perceiving a need for intensive public education
and behaviour change. Democratic innovation was per-
ceived by all stakeholders as fraught with risk, albeit
with distinct stakeholders being concerned about dif-
fering risks. These risks relate to the processes and
outcomes of the assembly, focusing on issues of legit-
imacy, representation and the spatial context of the
process. Commissioning stakeholders in particular made
evident their fundamental concern to demonstrate that
the assembly is a legitimate and transparent process.
This section will present the differing narratives
of democratic innovation expressed via stakeholders’
perspectives on the Devon Climate Assembly, whilst
also interrogating perceptions around the risks of legit-
imacy, representativeness and the spatial context of
the process.
4.1. Democratic Innovation and the Challenge of
Climate Emergency Governance
For some council stakeholders, the value of the citi-
zens’ assembly was in “challenging the position of politi-
cians…in order to make changes” (DCERG Interview June
2020). There was recognition that politicians and local
authorities are unable to act alone to tackle climate
change, resulting in a narrative of ‘bringing the public on
board.’ Extending democracy to the people of Devon was
seen as essential so that the public could “own it [the
Carbon Plan] and feel that they can shape it. This is vital
for a do-able, active plan” (DCERG Interview July 2020).
Stakeholders recognised that multiple complexities
are inherent in the process of addressing pathways to
Net Zero. For instance, they acknowledged the com-
plexity of knowledge and information regarding climate
change and the wide range of knowledges relating to dif-
ferent critical policy areas. In addition there was acknowl-
edgment of the multiple scales of governance, notably
the importance of central government for themes such
as energy and transport, which further compound the
context of making controversial policy decisions.
For council stakeholders, democratic innovation was
viewed as creating a welcome pathway through these
complexities, providing leadership and political cover for
local authorities. A collective approach was welcomed
within this narrative of ‘hard decision making.’ However
ultimately interviewees feared that politicians may still
make decisions with an eye toward winning elections.
The Devon Climate Emergency Task Force interviewees
focused on fears that the general public would reject
an opportunity to make hard choices that would impact
on their lifestyles and consumption practices. A smaller
number of interviewees, representing membership bod-
ies, feared that the citizens’ assembly would produce out-
comes that were too radical for their membership and/or
are not implementable.
The citizens’ assembly was, therefore, seen by stake-
holders in multiple and overlapping ways—as a novel
way to engage in climate policy making, and as an instru-
mental tool for public education, a theme expressed by
a range of stakeholders who saw it as a process that
“touches on people’s lifestyles” and “instigates behaviour
change” (DCERG Interview July 2020). Interviewees saw
the potential for the assembly to enable policy and
behaviour change, providing a sound evidence base for
politicians and assembly members whilst also educating
the wider public on why these issues matter and why
hard decisions are required.
4.2. Democratic Innovation and Risk
There was awareness of great risk in implementing demo-
cratic innovation but also risk in remaining with politics
as usual and not addressing the urgent issues of climate
change. Mass climate change protests in 2019 were seen
to have changed public perceptions of climate change
and created a need for political action at all levels:
It was one of Extinction Rebellion’s…national demands
and we thought locally it made a lot of sense…there
are things that we can do at a Devon level but there are
things that need to be done at a national level….And
there are things that can be done at a very local level
that don’t need any kind…of large organisational sup-
port for, and we wanted to try and find a way of
expressing that. (DCERG Interview July 2020)
Our analysis highlights that commissioners of the Climate
Assembly were aware of potential positive impacts of a
citizens’ assembly and wider Carbon Plan process. They
emphasised the importance of a wider public engage-
ment and a communication plan that would run along-
side the citizens’ assembly to enable the public to both
follow the steps of the process, i.e., observe its legiti-
macy, and to be informed along with assembly members
about the complexities of the issues under deliberation.
However commissioning stakeholders were also highly
aware of the risks of the assembly. Issues of legiti-
macy overarch the concerns commissioning stakeholder
expressed about the assembly, which was seen to be of
fundamental importance to the success of the project.
Engaged publics also expressed concerns regarding
the legitimacy of the citizens’ assembly process, with
concerns about the procedures for running the assem-
bly that focused on issues of representation, knowl-
edge sharing and facilitation. Their concerns can be
summarised as relating to issues of power and authority
in decision making, i.e., whose voice and whose knowl-
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 6

edge are listened to? “Legitimacy in my eyes would
involve excellent leadership allowing full consideration
of information & proposals from bona fide scientists and
climate experts….Who appoints the expert witnesses?
Lack of transparency or bias in how people are invited
to take part” (extracts from open ended questions from
the engaged publics survey September 2020).
4.3. Democratic Innovation and Representation
Issues of representation were central to commission-
ing stakeholders’ concerns and can be summarised as
being primarily centred on achieving fair representation
of Devon residents by taking into account perspectives
from less populous, less economically resilient areas.
This was seen as essential to achieve public buy-in for
the outcomes of the Carbon Plan process. Secondly,
issues of representation focused on bringing in wider
perspectives into decision making, linking matters of rep-
resentation with issues of power and authority in demo-
cratic innovation.
4.3.1. The Rural Context to Climate Change Decision
Making
For council stakeholders, there were significant concerns
how a public panel could represent the diversity of lived
experiences across Devon. Concerns focused on those liv-
ing in rural areas that experience a lack of services, less
employment opportunities and areas of significant depri-
vation. There was concern that decisions taken in a citi-
zens’ assembly would not reflect the lived experiences of
those living in less economically resilient rural localities.
Council stakeholders projected anxiety that the more
densely populated areas would attract more represen-
tation in the assembly process. They believed that city
regions and densely populated areas would be priori-
tised in the recruitment process, side-lining and weaken-
ing rural voices:
I think you could be disenfranchising a large portion
of…the Devon decision makers and…and the public as
well, because it’s not seen as being truly representa-
tive, and it’s going to be the usual Exeter, Plymouth,
Torbay focus….So it’s not northern and it’s not rural.
(DCERG Council Interview June 2020)
Concerns about a lack of rural representation arose in
part from where the 2019 expert hearings were held.
Despite proposing several northern locations, hearings
were conducted in the south and east of the county. Poor
transport links and unreliable digital infrastructures were
reasons, stakeholders believed, underpinning the deci-
sion not to hold hearings in North Devon. This fuelled
concerns that spatial bias may be replicated in the rep-
resentation of the Devon Climate Assembly itself.
Concerns relating to the lived experiences of rural
areas were not limited to the operation of the assem-
bly, but also linked to apprehensions about potential out-
comes. Different types of stakeholders, including com-
missioning stakeholders and engaged publics, expressed
concern that recommendations from the assembly relat-
ing to land use, the rural economy and farming may fail to
account for the needs and heritage of rural and farming
communities:
Devon has a real challenge in those rural areas hav-
ing more reliance…on less sustainable travel or less
sustainable energy…it’s going to be very difficult for
the carbon plan to come up with a one size fits
all approach…not just the urban area…but the rural
area…where it’s a bit more difficult…those areas could
be left behind….So I think that taking the views of
the rural areas on board…will help us to ensure more
of a just transition across the whole county. (Devon
Climate Emergency Task Force Interview July 2020)
This articulates awareness of the challenges of finding
implementable climate outcomes that work across the
varied geographies and lived experiences of Devon com-
munities. Engaged publics also emphasised the impor-
tance of agriculture to the local economy of rural Devon;
reinforcing stakeholders’ agreement that representation
of the rural voice on the assembly was imperative to
perceptions of its effectiveness and legitimacy. That the
Climate Assembly could unlock the complexity of devis-
ing climate change policies and strategies that are oper-
able across the sub-region was a hope all stakeholders
agreed with.
4.3.2. Process of Participation: Bringing Wider Voices
into Decision Making
Public participation was viewed by commissioning and
the Devon Climate Emergency Task Force stakeholders
as an essential way of determining public perspectives
on climate policy change, and as a method of generating
public ‘ownership’ of those policy changes. The Climate
Assembly was seen as a way to bring in wider perspec-
tives to decision making, including usually disengaged
voices. It was seen as a public engagement tool that
would go beyond commonly used methods such as pub-
lic consultations or information campaigns. For this rea-
son and considering the inherent complexity of tackling
climate change, stakeholders were predominately posi-
tive about the potential for the Climate Assembly to pro-
duce insights into public perspectives and as a vehicle
to gain ‘social permission from people’ for policy out-
comes (Devon Climate Emergency Task Force Interview
September 2020):
You tend to get a certain demographic of peo-
ple who respond…you don’t really have an inkling
of how representative it is of people who particu-
larly don’t tend to get involved. Particularly lower
socio-economic groups, ethnic minority backgrounds,
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 7

young people particularly. (DCERG Council Interview
October 2020)
This reflects widely held views from stakeholders that
question the legitimacy of conventional public engage-
ment processes (and the demographic details of public
respondents in our research partially supports this find-
ing as the majority of respondents were aged over 50—
other demographic details such as education and ethnic-
ity were not collected). The perception was that for more
radical policy changes to be publicly acceptable, input
from a more diverse demographic (that is perceived to be
representative) is needed to ensure that policies that are
approved will have the potential for wide public buy in.
Citizens’ assemblies were seen as making public engage-
ment meaningful and having the potential to extend
democracy to a wider demographic of citizens than those
who usually vote.
Many stakeholders discussed the importance of
having an extensive communication campaign running
alongside the assembly. The objective of this would be to
enable a Devon-wide audience to digest material shared
to the assembly with the result that the public are edu-
cated about the imperatives and potential pathways for
policy change. Some stakeholders offered suggestions
for best practices for a successful communication cam-
paign which focused on issues of who the public would
listen to and engage with:
So the outcome of the citizens’ assembly is presented
in a language that will come across well on Spotlight
[local area TV program], or Radio Devon…then ide-
ally…there will be some leaders that emerge from the
citizens’ assembly…if they are people who the aver-
age viewer of Spotlight will relate to then that’s going
to be the way in which it’s going to really land. (DCERG
Council Interview July 2020)
Concerns about how to communicate to a wider audi-
ence to gain public buy-in on climate change policies links
closely to wider themes of representation and questions
relating to who has the authority to determine climate
change policies.
Commissioning stakeholders expressed concerns
about the impacts of Covid-19 on public perceptions
of the urgency of climate action. Another impact
of Covid-19 is the requirement to redesign public
engagement to run online. Commissioning stakehold-
ers perceived an online citizens’ assembly to potentially
overcome challenges of access, removing the neces-
sity to transport assembly members and expert wit-
nesses around the sub-region. However, all stakeholders
expressed concern that a digital divide would impact on
representation in an online assembly, which was seen as
being a particular issue for rural and northern communi-
ties with poor access to digital infrastructures.
Taken together, the analysis indicates widespread
support, yet also considerable risk and uncertainty asso-
ciated with holding the assembly. Broadening the range
of public voices inputting into policy was deemed nec-
essary for effective climate response, although scepti-
cism existed about the practical challenges of ensuring
citizen representation, and about whether politicians,
and society, would embrace the ‘hard choices’ required.
Nonetheless there were aspirations that the assembly
could serve as a tool for education and behaviour change,
as well as providing a mandate for change. In summary,
the research suggests an approach of ‘cautious exper-
imentation,’ rather than a radical attempt to reconfig-
ure power relations between citizens and politicians,
with a commitment to democratic innovation widely
embraced yet carefully constrained to minimise risk
and uncertainty.
5. Discussion and Conclusion
Our research considers whether a ‘new climate politics’
is emerging across different societies, founded upon calls
for urgent change from civil society groups and social
movements, new narratives and declarations of Climate
Emergency, the setting of target dates to achieve cli-
mate neutrality and the innovation of democratic mech-
anisms with an emphasis upon mini-public deliberation.
Recent events in Devon, England present a suitable case
study to begin to address this question of an emergent
‘new climate politics,’ given Emergency declarations by
local councils, the establishment of a new stakeholder
coalition and expert task force, and the commitment
to hold a citizens’ assembly on climate change. It also
enables several research gaps to be addressed, notably
concerning a priori risk perceptions held by stakehold-
ers and non-participant publics concerning the bene-
fits, drawbacks and uncertainties associated with a cit-
izens’ climate assembly, as well as important spatial
dimensions of perceptions of legitimacy and credibil-
ity across rural and urban geographies. As such, the
research contributes to debates concerning public trust
in political institutions, and the institutionalisation and
broader purposes of public deliberation (Devaney et al.,
2020; Devine-Wright, 2017; Dryzek et al., 2019; Farrell
et al., 2019). Such research knowledge also provides
practical value to those wishing to embed delibera-
tive public engagement alongside traditional representa-
tive democracy.
Addressing our first research question, we found
that local stakeholders—specifically those commission-
ing the assembly and members of the wider public—
perceived representative politics as unlikely to effectively
tackle climate change due to its focus on time bounded,
party political election cycles. A citizens’ assembly and
its wider governance processes, which entailed multi-
agency and multi-sectoral partnership of local organisa-
tions operating at different levels of governance, was
seen as providing an opportunity to address the inher-
ent complexity of climate change whilst also provid-
ing politicians with a process that would provide legiti-
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 8

macy for the bold policy changes that might be required.
As such, our research concurs with other work which
has noted the role of deliberative mini-publics in tack-
ling difficult and contentious issues (Parkinson, 2004;
Renwick et al., 2018), and shows how the institutional
apparatus surrounding an assembly can provide politi-
cal decision makers and public managers with the legit-
imacy for decisions in these contentious areas. In terms
of perceived risks and opportunities, the process of a cit-
izens’ assembly was seen as a tool for extending demo-
cratic processes beyond ‘politics as usual,’ engaging a
wider set of voices than ‘conventional’ public partici-
pation processes. That said, there remained scepticism
about the potential of an assembly to overcome politi-
cal priorities connected to winning elections. A climate
assembly was also viewed as an opportunity for public
education and behavioural change, grounded in scepti-
cism that publics would accept ‘hard choices’ embed-
ded in everyday lifestylesand consumption habits. In this
regard, the assembly can be seen, to some degree, as
an instrumental tool to foster behavioural change, as
much as the re-configuring of power relations between
citizens and elected politicians (Elstub & Escobar, 2019;
Hendriks, 2006).
The assembly was also perceived by stakeholders as
an opportunity to understand and involve diverse pub-
lic perspectives, including those less likely to vote. From
a policy maker’s perspective, the assembly was seen as
providing ‘political cover’ for local authorities to tackle
complex controversies that have multiple scales of gov-
ernance and geographies of citizens. Yet there was con-
siderable uncertainty about the likely outcomes of an
assembly, with some worried that its recommendations
may be too radical, and others that they may not be rad-
ical enough. Worries were expressed that the outcomes
and recommendations may disadvantage populations in
the more rural and economically disadvantaged parts of
the County, further contributing to longstanding geogra-
phies of social and economic vulnerability.
Addressing the second research question, concerns
relating to legitimacy focused on diverse issues, bound
up with the perceived necessity for inclusion of a wide
range of perspectives including those from rural and
farming areas, and the need for a process which was
transparent and seen to be so, including transparency
over the selection of witnesses. Taking account of the
varied geographies of the county was seen as part of
delivering a just transition to Net Zero. Process issues
like good facilitation were mentioned as well as issues
of design, formatting, quality of deliberation, what infor-
mation is shared and by whom, the numbers of peo-
ple involved, and how representative the assembly was
perceived to be (issues of input and throughout legiti-
macy), as well as whether the findings were listened to
and implemented, reinforcing the need for ‘output legit-
imacy’ (Devaney et al., 2020). Transparency and a robust
process were therefore seen as critical to navigating the
potential risks of the project.
Themes raised by research participants resonate
with existing literature on democratic innovations. Key
issues of representativeness/inclusiveness and trans-
parency raised by our research are connected to the
need for input and throughout legitimacy in citizens’
assemblies articulated elsewhere (Devaney et al., 2020).
Furthermore, mini-publics are conventionally seen as
providing opportunities for engaging wider groups of par-
ticipants than in other public engagement processes due
to the processes of randomisation involved (Escobar &
Elstub, 2017; Smith, 2009; Smith & Setälä, 2018). In our
study concerns were expressed over whether this would
be achieved, particularly in relation to the rural and less
economically advantaged population, and digital divides
that may emerge in an online assembly.
In conclusion, the case study provides an example
of ‘cautious experimentation’ where a commitment to
democratic innovation is widely embraced yet carefully
constrained to minimise risk and uncertainty. Citizen
input will be enabled by the assembly, but within a
broader multi-stakeholder, multi-stage process where
power remains vested in experts (in the Task Force) and
incumbent institutions (in the DCERG) rather than youth,
civil society groups or social movements. Moreover, the
Devon Climate Assembly recommendations will only
inform policy, not make decisions. In these ways, it can
be said to offer a modest example of a ‘new climate
politics,’ with minimal challenges, at least at this stage
in the process, to the power and authority of exist-
ing institutions.
Acknowledgments
We would like to acknowledge grant funding from an
ESRC Impact Acceleration Project Co-Creation Award
(Grant Ref 113124R) and from Devon County Council
on behalf of the Devon Climate Emergency partnership.
We also thank our anonymous referees for their helpful
comments and all our research participants.
Conflict of Interests
The authors declare no conflict of interests.
Supplementary Material
Supplementary material for this article is available online
in the format provided by the author (unedited).
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About the Authors
Rebecca Sandover is Lecturer in Geography at the University of Exeter. She is a Social Scientist with
research interests in sustainable food networks, food policy partnerships and public participation in
climate change policy making. Her recent work includes investigating action toward the formation of
sustainable food networks in the South West UK, and stakeholders’ perceptions of the Devon Climate
Emergency’s Net Zero Citizen Assembly.
Alice Moseley is Senior Lecturer in Politics, University of Exeter. She is a Political Scientist with research
interests in civic participation, including deliberative engagement in public policy, and in behavioural
public policy and administration. Her recent work connects these topics with issues relating to climate
change mitigation and adaptation.
Patrick Devine-Wright is Professor of Geography at the University of Exeter. He is an Environmental
Social Scientist with a primary interest in social acceptance of energy transitions, community engage-
ment and place attachment. With expertise spanning human geography and environmental psychol-
ogy, he was cited in the top 1% of social science scholars globally by Web of Science in 2019 and 2020.
He is an IPCC Lead Author on social aspects of climate change mitigation and Chair of the Devon Net
Zero Task Force.
Politics and Governance, 2021, Volume 9, Issue 2, Pages X–X 11