bema
Vision

We Won the Vote. We Lost Our Voice.

2,500 years ago, any citizen of Athens could climb onto a stone, the bema, and speak before everyone. Today we vote every four years and, in between, we have almost nowhere to speak. This is the story of how we lost our voice, and how we can get it back.

Join the pilotHow it works

The vision in one minute

19 min read
  • Democracy was born in Athens with tools we have forgotten: the lottery, and every citizen's right to climb onto the bema, the stone from which people spoke to the assembly. That is where our name comes from.
  • Modern democracies chose representation: we vote every few years and, in between, have few channels to take part.
  • People are not tired of taking part; they are tired of taking part without seeing any result. When the process is visible and gets a response, they engage.
  • Switzerland, Ireland, Estonia, Taiwan, Barcelona and Porto Alegre show there are ways of taking part that work.
  • Bema brings those lessons to the scale of a town: considered proposals, limited support, nameless review and the whole process in plain sight.
Read the full founding paperThe whole story, from the Pnyx to the Cardedeu pilot · 49 min

Twenty-five centuries ago, on a rocky hill west of the Acropolis, ordinary citizens of Athens gathered to debate and decide the laws that governed their lives. They called it demokratia, the power of the people. It was radical, imperfect and transformative.

Today we live in systems we call democracies, yet the distance between citizens and decisions has become immense. We vote every few years and, in between, we watch. How did we get here? What can we learn from those who dared to experiment? And how can a platform help close that distance, without revolution, through careful, evidence-based design?

This is a story in four acts. It begins on a stone.

The steps of the bema carved into the rock of the Pnyx in Athens, with the Acropolis in the background
The bema on the Pnyx, Athens. In the background, the Acropolis.

Why We Are Called Bema

On the Pnyx, the hill where the Athenian assembly met, there is a platform carved into the rock. It was the bema. From there, any citizen could propose a law, defend a peace treaty or denounce an abuse before thousands of fellow citizens.

You needed no party's permission, and you did not have to be rich or famous. You only had to want to speak. And the system guaranteed something else: the right to be heard.

isegoriaἰσηγορία

From isos, equal, and agoreuein, to speak in public. Everyone's equal right to take the floor in the assembly.

Bema wants to be that stone: a place where any resident can make a proposal, and where the proposal is judged by what it says, not by who says it.

“Isegoria is an excellent thing, not in one respect only but in all.”

Act I. The Dream

Where Democracy Was Born

In 508 BC, Cleisthenes dismantled the old aristocratic order of Athens. From then on, any citizen, rich or poor, could speak in the assembly, propose laws and vote on war and peace. There were no parties and no elected representatives: citizens governed directly.

To spread power around, Athenians filled almost every office by lot. The kleroterion, a slotted stone still kept at the Agora Museum, picked each day's jurors at random. The Council of Five Hundred, also chosen by lot, set the agenda, and no one could serve on it more than twice in a lifetime. They even had a defence against anyone who gathered too much power: ostracism, a vote written on shards of pottery that could send that person away from the city for ten years.

But Athens is also a warning. Only free men born in the city could take part: at most three in ten adults. Women, enslaved people and foreigners were left out. Any system inspired by the tools of Athens has to correct its exclusions.

↳ How Bema addresses this

Bema takes two ideas from Athens: the lottery, to choose who reviews proposals, and isegoria, so that any verified resident can propose and every proposal is judged on its content. And it opens them to the whole community, without the exclusions of the original.

Kleroterion, the stone used for civic lotteries in ancient Athens

“Our constitution does not copy the laws of neighbouring states; we are rather a pattern to others than imitators ourselves.”

Who Ends Up Deciding?

Elect comes from the Latin eligere, to pick the best, the same root as elite. When we elect, we pick whoever stands out: the best speakers, the best known, those with the most time and means. A lottery looks at none of that. That is why the Athenians filled almost every office by lot.

Woman, 78 years oldMan, 27 years oldWoman, 23 years old, low incomeWoman, 75 years old, low incomeWoman, 60 years oldMan, 31 years old, low incomeMan, 22 years oldMan, 68 years oldMan, 67 years oldMan, 19 years oldWoman, 55 years oldMan, 32 years old, low incomeWoman, 29 years oldMan, 41 years oldMan, 50 years oldMan, 60 years oldMan, 29 years old, low incomeMan, 27 years oldWoman, 56 years oldWoman, 43 years oldWoman, 83 years oldWoman, 43 years oldMan, 25 years oldMan, 63 years oldWoman, 32 years oldWoman, 51 years oldMan, 60 years oldWoman, 46 years oldMan, 28 years oldMan, 23 years old, low incomeMan, 44 years oldMan, 51 years oldWoman, 62 years old, low incomeMan, 72 years oldMan, 22 years oldWoman, 50 years old, low incomeWoman, 18 years old, low incomeMan, 68 years oldMan, 81 years oldWoman, 54 years oldWoman, 83 years oldWoman, 52 years oldWoman, 63 years oldWoman, 46 years oldWoman, 23 years oldMan, 71 years oldWoman, 63 years old, low incomeMan, 43 years oldWoman, 47 years oldMan, 66 years oldMan, 77 years old, low incomeWoman, 53 years oldMan, 31 years oldMan, 28 years oldWoman, 36 years oldMan, 43 years oldWoman, 73 years oldMan, 65 years oldWoman, 45 years old, low incomeWoman, 40 years old, low incomeWoman, 84 years oldWoman, 47 years oldWoman, 29 years old, low incomeWoman, 45 years oldMan, 60 years old, low incomeWoman, 73 years oldMan, 50 years oldWoman, 31 years old, low incomeMan, 46 years old, low incomeWoman, 74 years oldWoman, 59 years oldWoman, 64 years old, low incomeMan, 51 years old, low incomeWoman, 78 years oldWoman, 60 years oldWoman, 54 years old, low incomeMan, 78 years old, low incomeWoman, 21 years old, low incomeWoman, 79 years oldWoman, 82 years oldWoman, 44 years oldMan, 66 years oldMan, 77 years oldMan, 26 years old, low incomeWoman, 72 years oldMan, 26 years oldMan, 34 years old, low incomeMan, 72 years old, low incomeMan, 25 years oldMan, 29 years old, low incomeMan, 39 years old, low incomeMan, 75 years oldMan, 61 years old, low incomeMan, 69 years old, low incomeWoman, 24 years oldWoman, 77 years oldWoman, 59 years oldWoman, 48 years old, low incomeWoman, 72 years oldMan, 61 years old
A simulated town of 100 people, with illustrative data. Hover over a dot to see who it is.

1 election. The most visible people are far more likely to win. Elect again: the panel looks little like the town.

Women
2 of 7 on the panel · 51% in town
Under 35
0 of 7 on the panel · 27% in town
Low income
0 of 7 on the panel · 30% in town
↳ How Bema addresses this

On Bema, nobody runs to review proposals and nobody appoints the reviewers: they come out of a lottery among verified residents. The algorithm is public, and anyone can check that the draw was fair.

“It is thought to be democratic for the offices to be assigned by lot, and oligarchic for them to be elected.”

When Representation Became a Filter

After the fall of Athens, direct democracy disappeared for centuries. Rome had assemblies, but real power lay with the Senate and elected magistrates. Medieval parliaments represented estates and nobles, not the people.

The American (1776) and French (1789) revolutions did not bring back Athens: they chose Rome. James Madison wanted representatives who would “refine and enlarge the public views”. Sieyès declared that France must be “a representative government, not a democracy”. And when Alexander Hamilton spoke of “representative democracy” in 1777, he joined two words that to the Greeks contradicted each other, like a square circle.

Over time, representation went from practical necessity to filter. Citizens won the power to choose who governs, but not the power to govern. Between elections there are hardly any channels left to decide anything, and parties act as gatekeepers.

↳ How Bema addresses this

Bema does not aim to replace elected institutions. It adds a permanent layer of participation, where citizens can propose, debate and build consensus between elections.

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, 1789

“The English people believes itself to be free; it is gravely mistaken; it is free only during the election of members of parliament. As soon as they are elected, it is enslaved; it is nothing.”

Act II. The Crisis

People Aren't Tired of Taking Part. They're Tired of Taking Part Without Impact.

Across Europe, the great majority of citizens support democracy as an idea, yet nearly half are not satisfied with how it works in their own country. Trust in parliaments and parties is at a low.

People talk about “participation fatigue”, but the evidence says otherwise. When participation is decorative, when people are asked and their answers vanish into a drawer, engagement drops. When it has a visible path and a clear response, people engage, and deeply. Ireland's Citizens' Assembly (2016–2018) showed that randomly selected citizens, given time and information, could handle abortion or climate change with more nuance than politicians who had avoided those topics for decades.

The problem is not that people are incapable. It is that the loop between effort and result is broken. People disconnect because the system disconnected them first.

↳ How Bema addresses this

Bema makes the whole path visible: from idea to support, from escalation to the council's response. It cannot force anyone to say yes, but it makes silence visible. If a public body wants to commit resources or delivery, it must declare that explicitly, publicly and traceably.

A polling station in Begur during the 2015 elections

“The cure for the ailments of democracy is more democracy.”

Todaythe proposal gets lost

I make aproposalIt vanishesinto a drawerI don't knowwhat happenedI stoptaking partI send itsilenceletdownI don't return
The loop breaks on the way back: with no visible response, the next proposal never comes.

With Bemaevery step is visible

I make aproposalI can see whereit is, alwaysI see whatcame of itI feelpart of ittrackingresponsetrustI want more
Taking part builds the habit of taking part, and the habit asks for more.

From a Single Act to a Living Practice

The philosopher Benjamin Barber contrasted thin democracy, where citizens merely vote now and then, with strong democracy, which we call thick here: citizens take part continuously in debate and decisions. Carole Pateman added that participation educates: the more people decide on what affects them, the better they get at it.

Thick democracy does not ask everyone to take part all the time. It asks that anyone who wants to can do so, with clear rules and a visible result.

The internet was supposed to make it possible. Instead, social media turned conversation into an endless stream of reactions that rewards whatever goes viral. We can comment forever, but the noise rarely becomes useful knowledge. We don't need another platform to talk: we need infrastructure that distils what a community knows.

↳ How Bema addresses this

Bema works as a collective intelligence aggregator: the monthly quota curbs impulsive proposals, similar-idea detection makes them converge, nameless review reduces bias and conviction support rewards sustained backing. Escalation carries that refined signal to decision-makers, without pretending the platform can bind them.

Landsgemeinde in Glarus, Switzerland: an open-air citizens' assembly

“Strong democracy is the politics of amateurs, where every man is compelled to encounter every other man without the intermediary of expertise.”

Four Years of Democracy, in Two Lines

Thin democracywhat we have now

I vote

Thick democracyan example: any resident, over four years

I vote
I propose
I give support
I review, if drawn
I get a response

1 moment

to make yourself heard in 1,461 days

36 moments

in the same time, all voluntary

Each mark is a moment when a resident uses their voice. The grey ticks under “I propose” are monthly quotas they did not use: having them obliges you to nothing. And the vote does not go away.

Cardboard Walls

In recent decades, hostility towards the other side has grown much faster than attachment to our own. We don't love our ideas more: we hate theirs more. And the incentives help, because conflict brings in more votes and more audience than agreement.

Often the label weighs more than the content. In a classic experiment, the psychologist Geoffrey Cohen showed that people support or reject the same policy depending on which party they are told proposed it. Take the label away, and many walls turn out to be cardboard painted in party colours.

Parties still do a job nobody has managed to replace: organising disagreement peacefully. But they also decide what gets talked about, and that may be their most invisible power.

↳ How Bema addresses this

That is why, on Bema, whoever reviews a proposal does not know who wrote it. And when an idea gathers enough support, it reaches decision-makers without any party having to put it on the agenda.

Geoffrey L. Cohen, “Party over policy”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2003

Act III. The Renaissance

The Thinkers Who Saw Another Way

In the late twentieth century, a wave of philosophers began to sketch alternatives. Jürgen Habermas argued that a political decision is legitimate when it comes from public deliberation among free and equal people, not just from counting the preferences we already held before we talked.

James Fishkin invented the deliberative poll: bring together randomly selected citizens, give them balanced information and time to talk, and measure how their views change. People did not become more polarised: they became more nuanced. Hélène Landemore went further: a diverse group of ordinary citizens often decides better than a small group of experts, because it sees more angles.

These ideas did not stay in universities. They took root in citizens' assemblies, participatory budgets and deliberation platforms on four continents.

↳ How Bema addresses this

Bema's review by lottery applies Fishkin's idea: randomly selected panels assess proposals without knowing who wrote them. Before voting, you have to read the whole proposal. And later, before challenging an argument, you will have to show you understood it by summarising it in your own words.

Raphael's The School of Athens, an allegory of philosophical dialogue

“The many, of whom each individual is not a good man, when they meet together may be better than the few good, if regarded not individually but collectively.”

Living Laboratories of Democracy

The ideas of the deliberative turn are not just theory. Countries and cities around the world have run bold democratic experiments, and each one holds lessons for a civic platform.

  • Switzerland

    Since 1848, Swiss citizens have voted in federal, cantonal and municipal referendums, on up to four voting days a year. Any group that gathers enough signatures can put a proposal to the vote. Far from creating chaos, the system sits alongside one of the most stable societies in the world. Two cantons still hold the Landsgemeinde, an open-air assembly where people vote by show of hands.

    Read more

  • Estonia

    After regaining independence in 1991, Estonia built a pioneering digital administration: with a single digital identity, citizens can vote, file taxes or start a company online. In 2023, for the first time, more than half of the votes in the parliamentary election were cast online. Estonia shows that public, transparent digital infrastructure can make participation easier without sacrificing security.

    Read more

  • Ireland

    Ireland has made citizens' assemblies a regular tool. A convention of 66 randomly selected citizens and 33 politicians (2012–2014) recommended marriage equality, approved by referendum in 2015 with 62% of the vote. Then the Citizens' Assembly (2016–2018), with 99 citizens chosen by lot, opened the way to the 2018 abortion referendum, approved with 66%. The lottery unlocked debates that politics had dodged for decades.

    Read more

  • Taiwan

    After the 2014 Sunflower Movement, the civic tech community g0v, with Audrey Tang, launched vTaiwan: a platform that combines Pol.is, a tool that clusters opinions, with online deliberation and in-person meetings. It produced agreements on contested issues such as regulating ride-hailing. Years later, Tang was appointed digital minister. Taiwan shows that technology built for consensus, rather than for holding attention, can reduce polarisation.

    Read more

  • Barcelona

    In 2016, Barcelona City Council created Decidim, an open-source participation platform. Today hundreds of institutions and organisations around the world use it for proposals, participatory budgets and assemblies. Decidim shows that digital participation can be public, auditable and owned by everyone.

    Read more

  • Porto Alegre

    In 1989, Porto Alegre in Brazil began deciding part of its municipal budget in neighbourhood assemblies open to all. For years, thousands of residents took part, and investment shifted towards the neighbourhoods that needed it most. Participatory budgeting has since spread to thousands of cities.

    Read more
↳ The Bema synthesis

Bema copies no single model. It takes lessons from all of them: Switzerland's rhythm of participation, Estonia's digital infrastructure, Ireland's lotteries, Taiwan's consensus technology, Barcelona's open source and Porto Alegre's closeness to residents.

A Brief Timeline of Democratic Innovation

Act IV. The Platform

Bema's Synthesis: Ancient Wisdom, Modern Design

Bema is neither a social network nor a complaints box. It is a collective intelligence aggregator: it gathers scattered contributions, filters out the noise and brings forward the ideas with the most merit and the broadest consensus.

The design rests on five pillars, each answering a specific failure of existing participation tools:

Scarcity as Value

The resources for taking part, proposals and support, are limited on purpose. That forces reflection, curbs spam and gives every contribution weight. Athenian courts already timed each speaker with a water clock.

Structural Depolarisation

Whoever reviews a proposal does not know who wrote it. That tackles ideological bias at the root, and ideas are judged by what they say.

Democracy by Lot

Review is done by panels of residents chosen by lot: not the usual volunteers, not self-appointed experts, not platform staff. Public duties belong to everyone.

Honest Institutional Impact

Bema documents consensus and brings it to the competent institution, but the pilot is non-binding. Commitments to respond, fund or deliver exist only when the public body explicitly takes them on and they can be tracked.

Simple Outside, Robust Inside

For participants, everything is simple: write an idea, give support and follow its path. Inside, every step leaves a trace: the lottery can be audited and every status change is recorded.

The Stoa of Attalos in the Athenian Agora, rebuilt as a civic space

The Path of a Proposal

Three rules sum up the design: low friction to get in, high quality to move up and full transparency to build trust. Proposing is easy, going far means passing filters, and the whole process can be followed.

To get in

Low friction

  1. 1

    Write the idea

    A guided form helps you explain what the problem is, what you propose and who it helps.

  2. 2

    Check if it already exists

    We show you similar proposals. If you join one instead of repeating it, you get your quota back.

  3. 3

    One proposal a month

    Because you only have one, you think it through. And if a neighbour has a better idea, you can give them your quota.

To move up

High quality

  1. 4

    Blind review by lottery

    Seven residents chosen at random read it in full, without knowing who wrote it, and decide whether it can go to debate.

  2. 5

    Conviction support

    You have a few supports each month. The longer you keep one, the more it weighs, and last-minute campaigns count for little.

  3. 6

    Support threshold

    When a proposal reaches enough support, for example 50 residents, it moves up a level.

To build trust

Full transparency

  1. 7

    It reaches decision-makers

    With its full review and support history. The council decides: escalating is not obliging.

  2. 8

    Everyone sees its status

    From publication to response, every status change is public.

How far it can go

  1. Town council

    when it reaches the town's support threshold

  2. County

    when the same idea appears in several towns

  3. Catalonia

    through formal channels with other public bodies

The statuses everyone sees

  1. Published
  2. In review
  3. Gathering support
  4. At the council
  5. Answered
  6. Done
  7. or discarded, and why

Ideas we are exploring

Pieces from the founding document that we are still working through.

  • Two-week rotating panels

    The review panel is renewed in turns: there are always experienced residents and new ones.

  • Blind party proposals

    Read parties' proposals without logo, colour or name, and say whether you agree based on content alone.

  • Hidden reputation

    The platform remembers how many of each resident's proposals succeeded, but reviewers never see it.

  • Consensus map

    As in vTaiwan: cluster many opinions and show where most people agree, even if they vote differently.

How each step works, in detail

Starting Where Change Is Tangible

Lasting democratic innovation rarely starts at national scale. It starts in neighbourhoods and towns, where the path from taking part to seeing a result is shortest. Porto Alegre did it with its municipal budget; Tolosa, in the Basque Country, with an assembly of 32 residents chosen by lot and supported by the OECD (2022). When someone sees that their proposal improved a square or changed a service, they don't forget it.

That is why the pilot starts in Cardedeu, with the Fòrum Obert de Cardedeu: the conclusions of its in-person tables are already on the platform, and residents can prioritise them. First we have to show it works in one town; then grow on solid foundations.

Starting small is not a limitation: it is a strategy. Elinor Ostrom showed through decades of fieldwork that local self-government often works better than top-down design, because the people closest to a problem know it best.

↳ How Bema addresses this

The pilot starts with the core: diagnoses, proposals with a monthly quota, similar-idea detection and conviction support. Review by lottery and escalation to the council will come in later phases. Any delivery commitment will exist only if a competent public body expressly takes it on.

Seedlings growing, a metaphor for local democratic innovation

“A core goal of public policy should be to facilitate the development of institutions that bring out the best in humans.”

Real Risks, No Utopias

A serious democratic reform cannot pretend that good intentions are enough. These are the risks we see, and what Bema does about them.

Tyranny of the majority
Bema works within the law and fundamental rights. A proposal that violates them does not pass review, however much support it has.
Disinformation
Review by lottery and conviction support make it hard to inflate an idea overnight. But no platform replaces civic education or critical thinking.
The digital divide
Technology must add, not subtract. That is why the pilot builds on the in-person tables of the Fòrum Obert de Cardedeu.
Tech solutionism
An app does not create democratic culture. Bema is infrastructure; people create the culture, through debate, meetings and time.
Resistance from the system
Those who hold power rarely give it up. That is why Bema starts small, shows results and grows: it is harder to stop than a law that can be blocked.

Technology alone is never enough. Culture, institutions and human judgement must stay at the centre.

The Roman Forum, a reminder that republics can fall when institutions weaken

This is not a manifesto. It is an invitation.

Perhaps It Is Time to Climb Back onto That Stone.

Democracy is not a finished product. It is an experiment each generation has to renew. Bema does not have all the answers, but it believes the questions matter: how do we judge ideas on their merit? How do we make taking part worthwhile? How do we turn consensus into action?

The tools exist. The evidence is there. What is missing is the will to try: starting small, learning honestly and building together.

Join the pilotBack to home
Or read the full founding paper

Image credits

Photographs from Wikimedia Commons, under the licence shown for each.