Reflecting the citizens versus reflecting individuals: When do non-participants support minipublics?

Research on citizens’ support of minipublic is mounting over the past few years, with studies indicating moderate support across different country contexts. But why do citizens support minipublics? The common narrative is that minipublics are appealing for they offer a citizen-oriented alternative to more conventional forms of political decision-making. In that regard, minipublics are more likely to reflect the preferences, information, and perspectives of the general public (e.g., Landemore, 2020). Thus, citizens tend to identify with participants in a minipublic rather than with elected representatives. Reasons include not only a general suspicion of political actors and alienation from conventional decision-making, but also trust in fellow citizens and trust in minipubics in general. The second narrative, however, presents a reverse story: citizens would have no reason to trust minipublics precisely because they cannot know who the participants are (e.g., Lafont, 2020). In that regard, lottocratic approaches tend to be individualistic and fail to reflect societal lines of conflict. Depending on the context, however, minipublics could still serve some additional functions. Yet, we know little about how perceptions of political and social trust affect support among non-participants. Drawing on conjoint experiments in Finland, Ireland, and the USA we examine support for various types of minipublics in different contexts and argue that support depends both on general political trust versus general social trust and on experience with minipublics.