Annabelle Lever

Sciences Po, Paris
  •  180
    This paper looks at Alexander Guerrero’s epistemic case for ‘lottocracy’, or government by randomly selected citizen assemblies. It argues that Guerrero fails to show that citizen expertise is more likely to be elicited and brought to bear on democratic politics if we replace elections with random selection. However, randomly selected citizen assemblies can be valuable deliberative and participative additions to elected and appointed institutions even when citizens are not bearers of special kno…Read more
  •  9
    Elections are generally considered the only way to create a democratic legislature where direct democracy is not an option. However, in recent years that assumption has been challenged by individuals who claim that lotteries are a democratic way of selecting people for office, elections are aristocratic or oligarchic, not democratic, and that elections as we know them are inadequate if true democracy is prioritized. In opposition to this wave, my paper argues that the assertions made to support …Read more
  •  19
    Democracy: Should We Replace Elections with Random Selection?
    Danish Yearbook of Philosophy 56 (2): 136-153. 2023.
    The aim of this paper is to explore the claim that lotteries are more democratic than elections. The paper starts by looking at the two main forms of equality that give lotteries their democratic appeal: an individually equal chance to be selected for office, and the proportionate representation of groups in the legislature. It shows that they cannot be jointly realized and argues that their egalitarian appeal is more apparent than real. Finally, the paper considers the democratic reasons to val…Read more
  •  26
    Random Selection, Democracy and Citizen Expertise
    Res Publica 30 (1): 145-157. 2024.
    This paper looks at Alexander Guerrero’s epistemic case for ‘lottocracy’, or government by randomly selected citizen assemblies. It argues that Guerrero fails to show that citizen expertise is more likely to be elicited and brought to bear on democratic politics if we replace elections with random selection. However, randomly selected citizen assemblies can be valuable deliberative and participative additions to elected and appointed institutions even when citizens are not bearers of special kno…Read more
  •  104
    Egalité démocratique et tirage au sort
    Raison Publique. forthcoming.
    La théorie démocratique contemporaine entretient une relation ambivalente avec les élections. Alors que les points de vue agrégatifs et minimalistes les considèrent comme une institution centrale de la démocratie représentative , les conceptions plus riches de la démocratie n’ont pas nécessairement de penchant pour elles. Les théories délibératives ont tendance à négliger les élections pour se concentrer sur la délibération publique, c’est-à-dire sur le processus continu de formation de l’opinio…Read more
  •  269
    La démocratie et la sélection: tirage au sort, élections et l'égalité
    In La démocratie; une idée force, Mare Et Martin. 2023.
    Devrions-nous remplacer les élections par des loteries ? Le célèbre livre de Bernard Manin sur le gouvernement représentatif a appris à beaucoup que les Grecs considéraient les élections comme un moyen aristocratique, et non démocratique, de sélectionner des personnes pour le pouvoir et l'autorité politique, en comparaison avec le tirage au sort, où chacun a une chance égale d'être sélectionné. (Manin 1997) Jusqu'à récemment, cependant, l'idée qu'un engagement envers la démocratie nécessite de r…Read more
  •  90
    Citizen assemblies hold out the promise of reviving democracy. However, the ways that they are currently conceptualised and organised limits their egalitarian appeal.
  •  1
    Must we vote for the common good?
    In Emily Crookston, David Killoren & Jonathan Trerise (eds.), Ethics in Politics: The Rights and Obligations of Individual Political Agents, Routledge. 2017.
  •  273
    Why Racial Profiling Is Hard to Justify: A Response to Risse and Zeckhauser
    Philosophy and Public Affairs 33 (1): 94-110. 2004.
    In their article, “Racial Profiling,” Risse and Zeckhauser offer a qualified defense of racial profiling in a racist society, such as the contemporary United States of America. It is a qualified defense, because they wish to distinguish racial profiling as it is, and as it might be, and to argue that while the former is not justified, the latter might be. Racial profiling as it is, they recognize, is marked by police abuse and the harassment of racial minorities, and by the disproportionate use …Read more
  •  46
    On Privacy
    Routledge. 2011.
    This book explores the Janus-faced features of privacy, and looks at their implications for the control of personal information, for sexual and reproductive freedom, and for democratic politics. It asks what, if anything, is wrong with asking women to get licenses in order to have children, given that pregnancy and childbirth can seriously damage your health. It considers whether employers should be able to monitor the friendships and financial affairs of employees, and whether we are entitled t…Read more
  •  112
    Democracy, Epistemology and the Problem of All‐White Juries
    Journal of Applied Philosophy 34 (4): 541-556. 2017.
    Does it matter that almost all juries in England and Wales are all-White? Does it matter even if this result is the unintended and undesired result of otherwise acceptable ways of choosing juries? Finally, does it matter that almost all juries are all-White if this has no adverse effect on the treatment of non-White defendants and victims of crime? According to Cheryl Thomas, there is no injustice in a system of jury selection which predictably results in juries with no minority members so long …Read more
  •  774
    Democracy and epistemology: a reply to Talisse
    Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 18 (1): 74-81. 2015.
    According to Robert Talisse, ‘we have sufficient epistemological reasons to be democrats’ and these reasons support democracy even when we are tempted to doubt the legitimacy of democratic government. As epistemic agents, we care about the truth of our beliefs, and have reasons to want to live in an environment conducive to forming and acting on true, rather than false, beliefs. Democracy, Talisse argues, is the best means to provide such an environment. Hence, he concludes that epistemic agenc…Read more
  •  4
    Ideas That Matter: Democracy, Justice, Rights (edited book)
    with Debra Satz
    Oup Usa. 2019.
    The essays in this volume take off from themes in the work of eminent philosopher and political scientist Joshua Cohen. They center around three central ideas: democracy, confronting injustice, and formulating political principles and values in an interdependent world.
  •  1591
    Should Voting Be Compulsory? Democracy and the Ethics of Voting
    with Annabelle Lever and Alexandru Volacu
    In Andrei Poama & Annabelle Lever (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Ethics and Public Policy, Routledge. pp. 242-254. 2019.
    The ethics of voting is a new field of academic research, uniting debates in ethics and public policy, democratic theory and more empirical studies of politics. A central question in this emerging field is whether or not voters should be legally required to vote. This chapter examines different arguments on behalf of compulsory voting, arguing that these do not generally succeed, although compulsory voting might be justified in certain special cases. However, adequately specifying the forms of …Read more
  •  385
    'Taxation, Conscientious Objection and Religious Freedom'
    Ethical Perspectives 20 (1): 144-153. 2013.
    This is part of a symposium on conscientious objection and religious freedom inspired by the US Catholic Church's claim that being forced to pay for health insurance that covers abortions (the effect of 'Obamacare')is the equivalent of forcing pacifists to fight. This article takes issue with this claim, and shows that while it would be unjust on democratic principles to force pacifists to fight, given their willingness to serve their country in other ways, there is no democratic objection to fo…Read more
  •  330
    Privacy: Restrictions and Decisions
    In Steven Scalet and Christopher Griffin (ed.), APA Newsletter on Philosophy and Law, . pp. 1-6. 2013.
    This article forms part of a tribute to Anita L. Allen by the APA newletter on Philosophy and Law. It celebrates Allen's work, but also explains why her conception of privacy is philosophically inadequate. It then uses basic democratic principles and the example of the secret ballot to suggest how we might develop a more philosophically persuasive version of Allen's ideas.
  •  587
    'Privacy, Private Property and Collective Property'
    The Good Society 21 (1): 47-60. 2012.
    This article is part of a symposium on property-owning democracy. In A Theory of Justice John Rawls argued that people in a just society would have rights to some forms of personal property, whatever the best way to organise the economy. Without being explicit about it, he also seems to have believed that protection for at least some forms of privacy are included in the Basic Liberties, to which all are entitled. Thus, Rawls assumes that people are entitled to form families, as well as person…Read more
  •  1534
    Privacy, democracy and freedom of expression
    In Beate Rossler & Dorota Mokrosinska (eds.), The Social Dimensions of Privacy, Cambridge University Press. 2015.
    this paper argues that people are entitled to keep some true facts about themselves to themselves, should they so wish, as a sign of respect for their moral and political status, and in order to protect themselves from being used as a public example in order to educate or to entertain other people. The “outing” - or non-consensual public disclosure - of people’s health records or status, or their sexual behaviour or orientation is usually unjustified, even when its consequences seem to be benefi…Read more
  •  827
    The new frontiers in the philosophy of intellectual property lie squarely in territories belonging to moral and political philosophy, as well as legal philosophy and philosophy of economics – or so this collection suggests. Those who wish to understand the nature and justification of intellectual property may now find themselves immersed in philosophical debates on the structure and relative merits of consequentialist and deontological moral theories, or disputes about the nature and value of p…Read more
  •  147
    Is public policy ethics possible and, if so, is it desirable? This twofold question can – and sometimes does — elicit a smile or a frown. The smile implies that ethical theorizing rests on a naïve idea of policy-making; the frown implies that there is something tasteless or incongruous in expecting philosophy to engage with problems of policy and with the political bargaining and compromise that policy-making often involves. These reactions – familiar to many working in this academic discipline…Read more
  •  238
    Le mot 'race': un débat français?
    Analyse, Opinion, Critique 32 (31.5.19). 2019.
    Les deux articles d’Eric Fassin, et la réponse de mon collègue Alain Policar, apportent intelligence et lucidité sur un sujet difficile, et un débat pénible que l’on peine à voir dans la polémique de Marianne (n° 1152,2-18 avril), ni malheureusement dans quelques articles sur ces sujets parus dans l’Obs. Pour une non-française, il n’est pas toujours facile de comprendre une lutte, plutôt qu’un ‘débat’, autour du mot ‘race’, qui semble spécifiquement française, mais où néanmoins les idées et text…Read more
  • Ideas That Matter: Justice, Democracy, Rights (edited book)
    with Debra Satz
    Oxford University Press. 2019.
  •  462
    'Democracy and Voting: A Response to Lisa Hill'
    British Journal of Political Science 40 925-929. 2010.
    Lisa Hill’s response to my critique of compulsory voting, like similar responses in print or in discussion, remind me how much a child of the ‘70s I am, and how far my beliefs and intuitions about politics have been shaped by the electoral conflicts, social movements and violence of that period. But my perceptions of politics have also been profoundly shaped by my teachers, and fellow graduate students, at MIT. Theda Skocpol famously urged political scientists to ‘bring the state back in’ to…Read more
  •  382
    Democracy and Lay Participation: The Case of NICE
    In Henry Kipppin Gerry Stoker (ed.), The Future of Public Service Reform, Bloomsbury Academic Press. 2013.
    What is the role of lay deliberation – if any – in health-care rationing, and administration more generally? Two potential answers are suggested by recent debates on the subject. The one, which I will call the technocratic answer, suggests that there is no distinctive role for lay participation once ordinary democratic politics have set the goals and priorities which reform should implement. Determining how best to achieve those ends, and then actually achieving them, this view suggests, is a…Read more