Our panel looks at the new ideas from around the world on how to renew democracy.

In the last in-person Festival of Ideas  event before the pandemic, Margaret Heffernan (author of Uncharted: How to Map the Future) said that one of the great tragedies of the last 50 years was our failure to defend and extend democracy. Renewing democracy, she added, is a 'cathedral project' – one that takes generations to complete.

Who has the new ideas and how can they be implemented? Claudia Chwalisz (The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD) looks at innovative citizen participation and deliberative, collaborative governance. Peter Geoghegan (author of the bestselling Democracy for Sale) examines how money, vested interests and digital skullduggery are eroding trust in democracy and what we can do to overcome this. Immy Kaur (Founder and Director of CIVIC SQUARE) looks at the role of citizens in radical systemic change, and how we can create a more democratic, distributed, open-source social and civic infrastructure.

It’s important to us that ideas and debate are affordable to everyone. It’s also important that our commentators, artists, writers, poets and thinkers are paid. This is a Pay What You Can event. You are invited to choose your own contribution to the event, from £0 to £8. All proceeds go towards supporting our speakers and sustaining Bristol Ideas. The option to attend for free is available for all online events.

Our Privacy Policy can be found on our website.

Festival of Ideas: Where's the New Thinking About Democracy?