Abstract
The increased interest in citizens’ assemblies has generated a heated debate about precisely which decision-making authorities they should be able to exercise. A key question in this debate is whether it is democratically legitimate to confer decision- making authority upon citizens’ assemblies. To help answer this question, I distinguish between two ways in which citizens’ assemblies can be institutionalized: a vertical or “top-down” approach versus a horizontal or “bottom-up” approach. Whereas the first approach seeks to empower citizens’ assemblies to do the deliberating and deciding for the rest of the citizenry, the second approach seeks to institutionalize citizens’ assemblies with the aim of empowering the entire citizenry to influence policymaking, set the political agenda, and have the final say on certain political decisions. After analysing various proposals, I conclude that conferring decision-making authority upon citizens assemblies can be democratically legitimate only insofar as it empowers the entire citizenry.
