Overview
The Citizens Convention for Climate is a citizens' assembly held in 2019 and 2020 which discussed reducing France's carbon emissions by 40% from its 1990 levels in a spirit of social justice. It was initiated in response to the Yellow Vest protests to the fuel tax. The convention was assisted by a number of committees including the governance committee, a team of experts who provided organizational guidance and assistance, a guarantor college, which maintained the convention's independence, and a legal board. The members themselves divided into working groups on five issues within the topic of climate change: food, housing, employment, transportation, and consumption. The sessions were initially held every third weekend beginning the weekend of October 5, 2019.
The fourth session was delayed by the pension protests in December 2019 and January 2020 and the seventh session was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic. the second session focused on the biggest questions the convention would attempt to answer, the third session involved many meetings with outside experts, The members finalized their proposals during the fifth session, presented them during the sixth session, and voted on them in the seventh session. When parliament announced the bill written in response to the proposals of the convention, many members of the convention were outraged that it did not include many of their key provisions. During the unofficial eighth session, many members of the convention gave parliament a failing grade for its inability to enact their proposals.
The convention attracted significant attention from scholars, particularly scholars of deliberative and participatory democracy. There is a growing body of literature written by democratic theorists, many of whom observed the convention in person, on what the convention means for the future of democracy and evaluating the successes and failures of the convention.
Formation
On April 25, 2019, President Emmanuel Macron announced the creation of the Citizens Convention for Climate in a press conference. The stated purpose was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40% from their level in 1990 in accordance with social justice. This letter describes the organization of the convention and the independence of its governance committee. Philippe also stated that the proposals of the convention would be submitted to the President without filter.
Theory
The Citizens Convention for Climate is an example of a deliberative mini-public. Mini-publics are bodies chosen from the general public by random selection, also known as sortition. Juries, planning cells, consensus conferences, and deliberative polls are all examples of mini-publics. The Citizens Convention for Climate is a specific type of mini-public known as a citizens' assembly, a mini-public in which randomly selected members of the public are given legislative power as representatives of the general public, either formal or advisory, in a specific issue area or a group of issue areas. Citizens' assemblies are designed to be representative of the diversity of the entire population. The members of the convention had varying opinions on whether they believed themselves to be representatives of the public.
During the first session, 43 of the 123 members who answered a survey believed that they spoke only for themselves, 25 said they spoke for themselves and people like themselves, 24 said they spoke in the name of causes they cared about, and 3 in the name of other groups. At the same time as the French Citizens' Convention, the United Kingdom also held a citizens' assembly on climate change. Washington state is holding a citizens' assembly, which began in January 2021, and there have been proposals to solve a number of issues with help from citizens' assemblies such as COVID-19 and democratic reform. The citizens' convention was also, in part, inspired by consensus conventions on technology, featured most prominently in Denmark which has had 22 such conferences since 1998. These conferences also bring together a representative group of citizens to deliberate on an issue.
In these conferences, the citizens write a report on what issues unite the participants and where they were able to find consensus.
Sortition
The 150 members of the Citizens' Assembly on Climate were chosen randomly using sortition in order to produce a representative sample of the French population. Initially, the organizers randomly selected 250,000 phone numbers. They then texted each selected number to request permission to call about the convention. If granted permission, they called to collect demographic information. From this process, 190 citizens were selected, with 40 of them serving as substitutes. while the Irish Citizens' Assembly used four. Researchers have examined the sample of the population beyond the initial six categories covered by the quota sampling. There were many similarities between the French population and the members of the convention, notably among most cultural values, satisfaction with the media, satisfaction with life, and the desire for a high standard of living.
There were also some key differences. The members of the convention were generally more trusting of others and more confident in citizens' abilities to deliberate. They were more in favor of redistribution and associative action, but also stronger believers in diligence and hard work. They placed a lower value on individual expression and a stronger value on obedience while valuing the development of critical thinking more than discipline. Regarding the environment, they were more likely than the general public to say that climate change is principally caused by humans, but the general public was more likely to say that it was entirely caused by humans. The members were also more likely to value environmental protections and believe that environmental degradation was caused by climate change, but they were more likely to believe that there was a chance to limit it.
Members of the convention were more supportive of action against climate change and saw lobbies as the biggest threat against future action.
Demographics
The sortition and quota sampling produced the following demographic breakdown. The composition refers to the demographic breakdown reported at the start of the assembly, while the participants include the 159 and 160 people who participated in sessions 1 and 7, respectively, regardless of whether or not they were one of the 150 citizens selected. As a result, it includes the experts who advised on each session. The French population refers to the official demographic breakdown of the entire French population.
Thematic groups
On Sunday, October 6, 2019, the members of the Convention were divided into five thematic groups reflecting each of the policy areas they hoped the convention would address. These five groups were entitled, with their original French names in parentheses: Food and Agriculture (Se Nourrir), Housing (Se Loger), Employment and Industry (Travailler et Produire), Transportation (Se Déplacer), and Lifestyle and Consumption (Consommer).
Governance committee
A Governance Committee, tasked with ensuring the efficiency and functionality of the convention, was established prior to selecting the members of the convention. It was organized by the Economic Social and Environmental Council (CESE).
The committee was entirely independent from the government, and was tasked with advocating for the protection of the will of the convention and its independence from outside threats. * Jean-Michel Fourniau, Professor at Université Gustave Eiffel, Research Director at the French Institute of Science and Technology for Transport, Development and Networks and President of "Democracy and Participation" a research interest group Social and Economic Experts: * Jean Grosset, Financial Administrator of the CESE and Director of the Observatory of Social Dialogue at the Jean Jaurès Foundation * Dominique Gillier, Vice-President of the CESE * Marie-Claire Martel, President of the Coordination of Federations and Associations of Culture (COFAC) and advisor of the CESE * Catherine Tissot-Colle, Communication and Sustainable Development Director of Eramet and advisor of the CESE Two members of the Ministry of the Ecological and Inclusive Transition: * Léo Cohen, Former Advisor to the Ministry of Ecological and Inclusive Transition * Ophélie Risler, Chief of the "Fight against the Greenhouse Effect" Department, Director of Energy and Climate in the Ministry of Ecological and Inclusive Transition.
Guarantor college
The guarantor college ensured the convention's independence. It was composed of three individuals named by the CESE's president, the president of the Senate, and the president of the National Assembly.
Activity
The convention was planned to consist of six two and a half day sessions, spanning October 2019 to February 2020 taking place every third week. Ultimately, the convention consisted of seven sessions, beginning on-schedule in October 2019, but ending in June 2020. The fourth session was initially delayed by the 2019-2020 Pension Reform Strike, which closed public transportation. Because of this delay, a seventh session was added at the request of the committee. It was then delayed again due to lockdowns for COVID-19 which began following the sixth session. The committee held two virtual sessions during lockdowns, before completing the seventh session in June 2020.
The official dates are as follows: *First session: October 4–6, 2019 * Second session: October 25–27, 2019 * Third session: November 15–17, 2019 * Fourth session: January 10–12, 2020 * Fifth session: February 7–9, 2020 * Sixth session: March 6–8, 2020 *Seventh session: June 19–21, 2020 There was an unofficial eighth session held from February 26 to February 28, 2021.
First session
The first meeting of the convention took place from Saturday October 5 to Sunday October 7, 2019. The session was primarily focused on defining and clarifying the mission of the assembly. First, the assembly spoke with paleoclimatologist Valérie Masson-Delmonte and Director General of the Institute for Climate Economics Benoit Leguet, then the governance committee presented and took questions. At the end of the session, the convention defined five thematic areas for individual groups to focus on: housing, labor and production, transportation, food, and consumption. The group also held meetings with important government officials, such as Prime Minister Édouard Philippe, Minister of the Ecological and Inclusive Transition Élisabeth Borne, and Member of the State Council Delphine Hédary.
It featured speeches from Vice President of the Economic, Social, and Environmental Council Michel Badré, research director emeritus of the National Center for Scientific Research Patrick Criqui, Energy Transition Manager for the Augustin de Romanet Climate Action Network Anne Bringault, legal lecturer Marine Fleury, and Secretary General of the French Democratic Confederation of Labor Laurent Berger, who spoke primarily on issues relating to political difficulties of climate action.
Second session
The second session of the convention, held from Friday October 25 to Sunday October 27, 2019, was characterized by a number of hearings focusing on the biggest questions that the convention hoped to answer. After summarizing their progress from the first session, the members debated greenhouse gas emissions reductions targets and how to achieve them. Much of the work during this session was held in the 5 working groups established in the first session. Many called for increased visibility and awareness, along with greater citizens' participation. Others commented on the unique nature of the convention, with most expressing support for its deliberative nature. Some at this point did worry that given the scale of the problems they would not have time to finish a proposal that they would be satisfied with. Several members also made statements in favor of social justice.
Third session
The third session met from November 15 to November 17, 2019, and was primarily spent either interviewing experts or meeting with the working groups. In total, over 60 experts spoke with the convention over the course of the weekend. Many of these meetings were contained in one working group, with each working group meeting a collection of experts simultaneously, but journalist and environmental activist Nicolas Hulot, at the request of the members, spoke individually to the whole group to describe his vision of the convention. The entire convention also heard from the team of impact assessors. Additionally, they did a "speed dating" event, where members of the convention spoke to a number of experts on the best ways to achieve the emissions target and debriefed with their working groups.
Fourth session
The fourth session was delayed from its initially scheduled time of December 6 through December 8, 2019, to January 10 through January 12, 2020, by a pension strike, which closed mass transportation. Each day of the convention opened with over three hours of work within each of the thematic groups, accompanied with parallel meetings of "the squad", which was supposed to resolve differences between proposals of different committees but was disbanded after this session. At the end of the session, the committee members began writing the final proposal based on the recommendations of the working groups. When asked by a sixteen year old member of the convention whether he thought the future of democracy was more deliberative like the convention, he responded "At the same time that we invent deliberative democracy, we need to restore representative democracy."
Fifth session
Convention members focused on finalizing their proposals during the fifth session which ran from Friday, February 7 to Saturday, February 9, 2020. After finalizing the proposals and creating the presentations, the committee questioned experts on the specific proposals of each working group. The convention then split into groups which they called "îlots" (small islands), composed of members of each working group. In the îlots, members debated and improved upon the proposals of each working group. The committee also debated whether they wanted to consider amending the constitution prior to working in îlots and volunteering members made a final judgement at the end of the Saturday session, which they presented to the group on Sunday. On Sunday, the members finalized their work in the session by deciding what their messages to the French government and French public should be.
They also discussed financing their proposals, using advice provided in a video by economists Agnès Benassy-Queré and Christian Chavagneux.
Sixth session
The sixth session was held from March 6 to March 8, 2020. They then discussed a number of issues including legislative, regulatory, and referendum-based implementation methods, constitutional amendments, and financing. They also read an official statement to be delivered to the French public. Each working group also gave a presentation about their proposals then took questions and discussed the work of the group as a whole. Then they presented and discussed each individual "family of objectives" within each working group's domain. This process began Friday night with the consumption group, continued throughout the day with the transportation, food, and housing group on Saturday, and finished with the employment and industry group on Sunday. After completing the presentations, the group created the final report and selected by lot members to serve on the editorial board.
They then finalized the official statement.
Seventh session
The seventh session was delayed due to lockdowns from COVID-19 and was ultimately held from June 19 to June 21, 2020, and was devoted to voting on the proposals of each working group. On Saturday morning, the convention debated and voted on the food group's proposal. After agreeing to 149 provisions, the committee voted and debated on finance. The convention also considered whether to send their work to a referendum or submit it directly to parliament. After debating and completing a tentative vote on Saturday, the convention ultimately decided to bypass the referendum on Sunday. The convention ended with the submission of the final report, after several sessions of review, to Emmanuel Macron.
Eighth session
From February 26 to February 28, 2021, the members of the convention reconvened for a special eighth session to evaluate how well parliament had carried out their proposals. Those in attendance voted on how they viewed the government's handling of each of the provisions that they passed, giving a rating from 1 to 10 for each. They also answered whether they thought the convention as a whole would achieve its goal of a 40% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions since 1990 by 2030 in a spirit of social justice and whether they thought that they had a significant impact on the climate debate. They also evaluated their impact on the democratic process as a whole. Following the session, the facilitation team from the convention wrote a report on the day.
Proposals
The Convention ultimately approved 149 proposals, many of them with near universal support. The only proposal to be rejected reduced the work week from 35 hours to 28 hours without salary loss. The criminalization of ecocide was considered especially significant as it emerged from the citizens and was not originally a part of the convention's expert-defined agenda. The proposals of each working group passed with very strong support, typically above 90% for each bundle of proposals and almost always above 80%. The transportation working group passed proposals to promote alternatives to cars and improve public roads, increase the use of high-speed rail, reduce the carbon footprint of long-distance travel and air-travel, and to create a government website with all transportation options.
The consumption group passed provisions mandating that companies disclose products' carbon footprint, limiting advertising for high-carbon products, restricting single-use plastic, and creating educational programs about low-carbon consumption. The housing group passed provisions to require the renovation and retrofitting of buildings by 2040 and effective land resource management to prevent urban expansion. The employment group created programs to finance the transition to a lower carbon economy, require companies to track their carbon footprints, and monitor changes in digital technology as it relates to the environment. Finally the food sector working group passed regulations on restaurants and farmers and provisions promoting local food production, limiting food waste, fostering agro-ecology, improving consumer information, increasing agricultural education, and reforming fisheries.
The food group also promoted an ambitious target in the Common Agricultural Practice (CAP) negotiations.
Government reception
At the outset of the convention, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe declared that the proposals of the convention would be submitted without filter, although the exact meaning of this statement was unclear. He also said "you can't say that just because 150 citizens wrote something, it's the Bible or the Koran." In December 2020, the members of the convention and Macron met to discuss progress on the bill and news agencies reported division between the two parties over issues such as an amendment to the constitution to include environmental protection, automobile regulations, and a proposed moratorium on 5G development. It passed in the National Assembly on May 4, 2021.
Outside analysis and criticism
The Citizens Convention for Climate has attracted considerable attention from democratic scholars, many of whom studied the convention by observing its deliberations, monitoring its progress, and interviewing its members. One such scholar is Hélène Landemore, a political theorist, who wrote some of her observations in her book Open Democracy: Reinventing Popular Rule for the Twenty-First Century. She observed a three-way struggle for power and legitimacy between the members of the convention, traditional formal institutions like parliament, and civic organizations and social movements like the Citizen Vests, a major proponent of the convention.