As democracy evolves, the design of its spaces must evolve too

In their new paper, Spaces for Deliberation: Eight Spatial Qualities for Designing Deliberative Assemblies, DemocracyNext Cities Programme Lead, James MacDonald-Nelson and DemocracyNext Fellow Gustav Kjær Vad Nielsen, explore how the built environment shapes what’s possible in citizens’ assemblies. Drawing from interviews with leading practitioners across six countries, they bring attention to a surprisingly overlooked factor in democratic innovation: space.

A citizens’ assembly is a lottery-selected group that reflects the broader community. Through guided deliberation, they develop shared recommendations for policymakers. For example, in Ireland, four major referendums (abortion, same-sex marriage, divorce, and blasphemy) followed such assemblies and all led to votes for change.

As the number of these assemblies grows worldwide - over 700 according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) - and more are established as permanent institutions, DemocracyNext has identified a key issue: the spaces where they are held are often ill-suited for meaningful deliberation.

MacDonald-Nelson and Nielson’s paper reveals three key findings:

1. Spatial qualities are often carefully considered by conveners;
2. Practical requirements typically take priority over atmosphere and symbolic value when both cannot be achieved;
3. Common challenges include high costs, inaccessibility, and limited availability of suitable spaces.

The authors also explore how citizens’ assemblies often walk a line between imitating traditional parliamentary spaces and intentionally breaking from them to create more inclusive, innovative formats.

To help guide future design, the authors propose eight critical spatial qualities that support meaningful participation and deliberation:

1. Lighting (combining natural and artificial sources);
2. Acoustics (incorporating specific materials and appropriate room configurations);
3. Connectivity (ensuring proximity between spaces);
4. Symbolic value (considering the socio-cultural context and identity of a space);
5. Flexibility (allowing for rearrangement of furniture and equipment);
6. Atmosphere (creating environments both formal yet welcoming);
7. Accessibility (ensuring physical accessibility);
8. Technology (making technology visible and approachable).

As democracy evolves, the design of its spaces must evolve too. DemocracyNext invites urban designers, architects, public officials, and civic practitioners to rethink how the built environment supports participation - by design.

Read the full paper here.

Watch the recording from the launch webinar here.

Learn more about the Cities Programme here.

If you’d like to interview the authors, please contact Ruba Asfahani, Communications Lead.

DemocracyNext

DemocracyNext is an international research & action institute focused on scaling high quality, empowered, and permanent citizens’ assemblies. We believe in a more just, joyful, and collaborative future, where everyone has meaningful power to shape their societies.

For a step-by-step guide on how to design, run, and act on the results of a Citizens’ Assembly, read our Assembling the Assembly Guide.

About the co-authors

Gustav Kjær Vad Nielsen is an architect, artist, and researcher from Denmark. He is currently pursuing a PhD in architecture and geography as a doctoral researcher with Cultures of Assembly and the Chair of Urban Regeneration at the University of Luxembourg. Through art-based feminist and decolonial approaches he explores questions of political ontology, democracy, commons, and pluriversal designing towards socio-ecologically just spatial transformation. Gustav graduated with a Master of Architecture degree from Yale University in 2022 and received a Master of Philosophy in Architecture and Urban Studies degree from the University of Cambridge in 2024 for his dissertation “Assembly Matter(ing)s”. He is a founding member of the Community Design Research Group at the University of Cambridge, co-edited the experimental anthology I, Like Many Things (2023) and has previously worked with architecture offices in Denmark, the Netherlands, and USA.).

James MacDonald-Nelson is the Cities Programme Lead at DemocracyNext. James is a designer with degrees in landscape architecture, urbanism, and global development studies. Having studied and worked in spatial practice for 10 years in Canada and Europe, James has a deep knowledge of how the built environment is transformed and managed - and how often citizens are left out of these processes. At DemocracyNext, James is responsible for all things city-related. This includes managing collaborations with cities around the world who have partnered with DemNext to broaden and deepen citizen participation and deliberation in urban planning decision-making processes - with citizens’ assemblies playing a central role.