Polity Atlas

How each model solves the same problems

Instead of “democracy versus anarchism”, compare the concrete ways collective problems get solved.

Question✕✕✕
How are decisions made?Inatsisartut (31 members, proportional representation) forms the government, Naalakkersuisut. Fields are taken over from Denmark when Greenland decides.A stratified random sample of 523 voters deliberated in moderated groups and plenaries and answered questionnaires before and after; no decisions were taken.Sortition / citizens' assemblyKings of small kingdoms (túatha) under over-kings; assemblies (óenach); customary law expounded by hereditary jurists rather than legislated.
How are conflicts resolved?Negotiation between Naalakkersuisut and the Danish government; disputes over competence go to a board under the Act; independence requires agreement, a referendum and both parliaments' consent.Balanced briefing materials, trained neutral moderators and competing experts structured disagreement.Brehon judges; sureties (naidm, ráth, aitire); distraint of livestock; ritual fasting against higher-ranking defendants; body-fines and honour-price compensation.Arbitration
How are public goods funded?Health, education, social services, fisheries and mineral resources run by Greenland, financed by local taxes, fisheries and a Danish block grant.Privately funded; produced published results, media coverage and a peer-reviewed study.Rules on shared grazing, co-operative ploughing, mills and fencing; obligatory hospitality; churches and monasteries; few public works.
How is AI used?No specific role for AI in the self-government arrangement.No AI role.None; a medieval legal order.
What are the main risks?Fiscal dependence on the block grant; small administrative capacity; pressure from great powers over minerals and security; social problems inherited from colonial policy.Self-selection into attendance; artificial setting; analysis by the method's designers; no institutional uptake.Status-graded and unequal protection, unfree labour, endemic raiding and dynastic war, and vulnerability to a centralising conqueror.CLM-0385

This illustrates differences in design; it is not a universal claim about outcomes. Each cell links to mechanisms and the claims behind them.