Ian O'Flynn

Every political call for a public inquiry is an admission that the political mechanisms of accountability failed in real time.

The issue of accountability is crucial -- how exactly would that work? -- but to the best of my knowledge none of the lottocrats has ever provided a compelling answer. I doubt they're actually serious about this stuff, tbh. But the worry all along is that it gives people false hope.

Politics Without Politicians by Hélène Landemore review – could we get rid of Farage, Truss and Trump? A Yale lecturer’s radical proposal to replace elected leaders with ordinary people, chosen by lottery

www.theguardian.com/books/2026/f...

Accountability really is the cornerstone of representative democracy. We must be able to see and appreciate the chains of reasoning on which governmental decisions (broadly understood to include cases of this sort) rest.

In Gorsuch’s Homage to Legislative Power, a Subtle Reproach of a Neutered Congress

What comes across here is how far away Congress is from the ideal of a deliberative democracy. Can that ideal be revived? Can it regain some of its hold or power?

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/21/u...

Pity about its source, but a clear statement all the same of the notion of deliberative democracy.

Epstein files are where the grammar of wealth meets the vocabulary of the brothel Jeffrey Epstein and his friends were culture warriors – the war they waged was against women

This is phenomenal read. The opening paragraphs in particular are about as arresting (no pun intended) as you could imagine.

www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2026...

Anyone interested in deliberative democracy should probably be following this story (a great example of deliberative journalism in its own right). Freedom of the press is a cornerstone of DD. What's particularly interesting here is where the attack was coming from.

For and Against a United Ireland In For and Against a United Ireland, renowned journalists Fintan O’Toole and Sam McBride provide an accessible and measured approach to the polarized debat...

An interesting approach to stimulating public deliberation: have each author write two essays, one setting out the pros, the other, the cons. undpress.nd.edu/978026821118...

If you want to know what Reform would be like in power, look at how it threatened Bangor University | Gaby Hinsliff A debating society didn’t want to invite two figures connected to the party to speak. Cue an authoritarian response, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff

"What the Bangor affair underlines ... is that the right to free speech isn’t the same as the right to a free audience whenever you happen to be campaigning in the neighbourhood; and that whatever you have to say, you can’t actively make people want to listen." www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Football must reject Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s cynical, self-serving electioneering | Barney Ronay Tax exile has already proven himself a terrible club owner; now his ill-informed diatribe about immigration has poured fuel on wider flames

This is very good. Follow the money, and the cynicism, the self-serving opportunism, and you may learn why people speak as they do. www.theguardian.com/football/202...

Trump revokes landmark ruling that greenhouse gases endanger public health The White House calls it the largest deregulation in US history, but environmentalists say it will prove costly for Americans.

This is one of the worst pieces of writing I've seen in a long time. Its "he said, she said" approach is both puerile and misplaced. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Day after Alex Pretti killing I complained to BBC about presentation of White House statements and evidence as equivalent. Duty of balance doesn’t extend to complicity with clear lies, I said. BBC could and should report WH making false statements as a *fact of the story*. Today I got response …

PM tells Sir Jim Ratcliffe to apologise for saying UK 'colonised by immigrants' Sir Keir Starmer says comments by the businessman and Manchester United co-owner are

Following in from my last post about the poisoning of public discourse ... www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... Demented.

The rise of vice-signalling: how hatred poisoned politics Over the last 10 years, the terms of political debate have changed completely – and week by week they seem to get worse

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Can't say I follow all of this (especially Elliott's comments) but, for what it's worth, I've always thought of deliberative democracy as (to adapt a phrase from Brian Barry) a fighting creed.

Peter Thiel warns the Antichrist and apocalypse are linked to the ‘end of modernity’ currently happening—and cites Greta Thunberg as a driving example | Fortune The Gen Z Swedish climate activist is a legionnaire of the Antichrist, Thiel claims, a “Luddite” who wants to halt technological progress in its tracks.

"Commentators note that by casting Thunberg and other critics of Big Tech as quasi‑religious enemies, he turns policy debates over emissions, data, and algorithms into a cosmic showdown between salvation through innovation and a deceptive, authoritarian environmentalism."
fortune.com/2026/02/04/p...

Pentagon ends academic ties with Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said the Pentagon will end all graduate-level military training, fellowships and certificate programs at the school.

The mild voice of reason this is not. Closer to demented. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

MLK on 'racism'.

Welsh language signs spotted in Helston Tesco in Cornwall One councillor hopes this is an opportunity for supermarkets to support Cornish more directly.

Make of this what you will.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Models of Deliberative Democracy | Antonino Palumbo | Taylor & Francis This collection of landmark essays explains how deliberation is contributing to the democratization of policy making and policy implementation, fields which in

New edited collection (well, a new collection of some classics): Models of Deliberative Democracy, edited by Antonino Palumbo: www.taylorfrancis.com/books/edit/1....

‘It’s an absolute bloodbath’: Washington Post lays off hundreds of workers Former Post executive editor blasts owner Jeff Bezos’s ‘sickening efforts to curry favor’ with Trump The Washington Post laid off hundreds of employees on Wednesday, which its former executive editor said “ranks among the darkest days” in the newspaper’s history. Approximately one-third of employees were affected. Staffers at the Post have been on edge for weeks about the rumored cuts, which the publication would not confirm or deny. “It’s an absolute bloodbath,” said one employee, not authorized to speak publicly. Continue reading...

‘It’s an absolute bloodbath’: Washington Post lays off hundreds of workers

“Without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed — and no republic can survive...And that is why our press was protected by the First Amendment, the only business in America specifically protected by the Constitution." #JFK #FirstAmendment #PrayForAmerica

Maija and I had the usual struggles with our paper, so it's great to be shortlisted.

Implications for public deliberation?

Some years ago, Shapiro argued against deliberative democracy on the grounds that actual politics is about power and private interests. He wasn't wrong. But what have we done about it since? Mainly, conducted a bunch of mini-publics. Groan.

Towards an Innovative Democracy: Institutionalizing Participation in Challenging Times Thematic Issue, Vol 14 (2026)

New from Politics and Governance: Towards an Innovative Democracy: Institutionalizing Participation in Challenging Times (2026, Volume 14).
Edited by Irena Fiket, Gazela Drasko and Giovanni Allegretti
Complete issue: www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/issue/view/479

Opinion | How Trump Has Used the Presidency to Make at Least $1.4 Billion The president took an oath to serve the American people. Instead, he’s focused his second term on enriching himself and his family.

A clear statement of the essential relationship between representative democracy, political trust and pursuit of the public interest. Though it tends to be forgotten nowadays, this relationship was a key driver of the emergence of deliberative democracy in the 1980s. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Ah, yes, those pesky elections.

Does Donald Trump's 'Board of Peace' undermine the UN? The UN has had its fair share of knocks over its 80 years, but the latest move by US President Donald Trump to set up a rival organisation under his personal stewardship could prove its biggest challe...

"[T]he board of peace would invest considerable power in one man--Donald Trump." Sure, the current Security Council is a mess. But "'it's a space where...countries talk and discuss their policies, cooperation and, very importantly, their red lines on particular issues'."
www.rte.ie/news/analysi...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

How about this for an essay title?: "Donald Trump and the Limits of Deliberative Democracy."

Might be a good time to flag this one again: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....