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?160 residents aged 16+, drawn by public lottery, set priorities and adopted recommendations by more than 50% of votes, then ranked them.Sortition / citizens' assemblyA 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?Content-neutral moderation, a party-nominated scientific board and a stakeholder hearing; rival proposals were put to separate votes.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?Bundestag-funded with allowances of €100 per in-person day; recommendations carry fiscal implications such as free school lunches and an animal-welfare levy.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 AI role.No AI role.None; a medieval legal order.
What are the main risks?Association with one parliamentary majority; non-binding status; follow-up interrupted by the end of the electoral term.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.