The Experts the People Want. A Survey Experiment Examining the Legitimacy Effect of Who Selects Experts in Climate Assemblies

Climate assemblies are an increasingly popular way to involve citizens in climate policy. While climate change is a complex topic, about which there is rampant misinformation, climate assemblies may offer a way forward as they involve an important component of information by different types of experts. While this may indeed foster enlightened judgement and better deliberation and policy advice, it remains to be seen how the maxi-public reacts to different . On the one hand they may view the inclusion of experts selected by the organisers a means of steering the process and be less trusting of the information provided. On the other hand it may be that the maxi-public is more trusting of that information when they are selected by the assembly members themselves. We test this by using an innovative survey-experiment in a real-life setting. The survey experiment was developed in the context of The Netherlands' Citizens' Assembly on Climate. This citizens’ assembly was organized between January and September 2025. During the process, participants were informed by experts. The participants of the citizens’ assembly decided, as much as possible, which knowledge and information they wanted to receive and use, and which experts and stakeholders they invited. In this real-life case, participants thus had agency over the information they received. In this study, we test whether (awareness of) participants’ influence over expert selection positively affects the broader public’s trust expert information in the CA. In order to do so, we randomly assign half of the respondents to read a description indicating that citizens decided which information they received and which experts were invited. The other half of the respondents read a description stating only that the participants were informed by experts during the meetings.