Accountability Relations in Minipublics and Organizers

Abstract

This paper aims to understand accountability relations in minipublics. It shows that accountability might be weak for their participants, but not for their organizers. It discusses accountability in a descriptive fashion as a relational concept that can be weak or strong depending on the weight of sanctions. In addition, deliberative accountability has a separate section. While the deliberative accountability of deliberators is obvious, the deliberative accountability of organizers is not discussed much, yet it is an important expectation from organizers. This will be clearer when various accountability relations in the context of minipublics are fleshed out by asking who is accountable to whom and for what?. The final section will raise three points. Firstly, trust-based selection model of principal-agent accountability (Mansbridge 2009, 2014) will be discussed as it seems to offer us a different perspective on the weak accountability of participants and points at the importance of selection done by organizers. Secondly, it will be argued that the empowerment of minipublics is an important determinant of whether we want stronger accountability mechanisms in minipublics. Finally, it will be argued that organizers might be held accountable for the decisions made by an empowered minipublic.