Citizens Convention for Climate

Yellow Vest protesters

On April 25, 2019, President Emmanuel Macron announced the creation of the Citizens Convention for Climate in a press conference.[15] The stated purpose was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40% from their level in 1990 in accordance with social justice.[1] The convention was a response to the wider Yellow Vest protest movement and as an extension of the French "Grand Débat National", organized in response to it. In particular, the convention was a response to the protests against the fuel tax and the decreased speed limit, which the Yellow Vest protesters viewed as unfair to the poor, and it was hoped that the convention would be able to resolve the tensions around the tax or propose alternative measures.[1]

On July 2, 2019, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe addressed a "letter of mission" that formally announced the convention to the president of the Economical, Social and Environmental Council (CESE), the organization tasked with organizing the convention.[16] This letter describes the organization of the convention and the independence of its governance committee.[16] Philippe also stated that the proposals of the convention would be submitted to the President without filter.[16]

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.[17] 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.[18]

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.[14] Individual members of the convention gave more specific accounts. When asked, a 30-year-old man said that he was "trying" to be a representative while a 17-year-old high school student said "It's a little arrogant to say that [I'm representing the youth] but I'm trying to represent them. Not everybody has the chance to be selected."[14] Another member of the convention said to Hélène Landemore, a democratic theorist and observer of the convention, "When I say I represent the youth, I mean me, the others [other young members of the convention], ... saying what they [the French youth] think, being their loudspeaker, acting for them."[14]

Mini-publics have been growing in popularity in recent years, particularly in order to solve climate change. In 2004, British Columbia held a citizens' assembly, called the British Columbia Citizens' Assembly, in order to decide how to amend voting rules in the province.[18] Ireland has held several citizens assemblies since 2010 to address questions such as the legalization of abortion, same-sex marriage, and climate change.[19] 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,[20] 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[21] and democratic reform.[22] 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.[23] 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.[23]

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.[1] 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.[7]

The official dates are as follows:

• First session: October 4–6, 2019[1]
• Second session: October 25–27, 2019[1]
• Third session: November 15–17, 2019[1]
• Fourth session: January 10–12, 2020[1]
• Fifth session: February 7–9, 2020[1]
• Sixth session: March 6–8, 2020[1]
• Seventh session: June 19–21, 2020[1]

There was an unofficial eighth session held from February 26 to February 28, 2021.

The Convention ultimately approved 149 proposals, many of them with near universal support.[1] The policies that passed with the lowest level of support were a proposal to reduce the speed limit to 110 km/h, passing with 59.7% support, a constitutional amendment prioritizing environmental concerns with individual rights with 58% support, a referendum on whether to criminalize ecocide with 63.4% support, and giving more power to the CESE with 59% support.[39] The only proposal to be rejected reduced the work week from 35 hours to 28 hours without salary loss.[1] 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.[25]

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.[39] 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.[39] The housing group passed provisions to require the renovation and retrofitting of buildings by 2040 and effective land resource management to prevent urban expansion.[39] 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.[39] 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.[39]

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.[1] During the convention, the members decided to submit their proposals directly to the legislature rather than putting them to a referendum with the expectation that the legislature would pass a law to codify each proposal. Of the 149 proposals, Macron committed to enacting 146, choosing to play what he termed a "trump card" or a "joker" on three provisions: a change to the preamble of the constitution, a 4% tax on corporate dividends to fund climate initiatives, and a reduction in the speed limit. He argued that the change to the preamble would place environmental interests above all other liberties, that the tax on corporate dividends would reduce French competitiveness, and that he did not want to initiate more protests with the reduction in the speed limit, which was an impetus for the Yellow Vest movement.[1]

Over the course of the drafting of the bill, a growing rift emerged between the members and supporters of the convention and the government. Members of the convention believed that the government was failing to fully enact its proposals, while some in the government believed it was going too far. Emmanuel Macron said in response to the growing rift between the convention and the government, "They helped me at the start, now they want everything."[40] He also said "you can't say that just because 150 citizens wrote something, it's the Bible or the Koran."[13] In response to frustrations with the government's response to the proposals of the convention, some members founded an organization called "Les 150", an advocacy group dedicated to passing the provisions put forward by the members of the citizens' assembly.[41] 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.[12] At the end of this debate, Macron committed himself to putting the constitutional amendment to a referendum.[12]

In January 2021, parliament unveiled the law drafted in response to the Citizens Convention, and it drew immediate backlash for weakening the proposals of the convention, particularly from the members of the convention itself. It also drew criticism from climate advocacy organizations such as Friends of the Earth and Climate Action Network France.[41] Parliament was accused of watering down several key provisions. For example, the convention proposed ending all domestic flights when a rail alternative was available for less than four hours, but parliament lowered this threshold to 2.5 hours.[41] The tax on aviation would also only take effect if the emissions return to pre-pandemic levels and the European Union takes no action. The law was also accused of weakening the ban on new airports.[41] Ultimately, it is estimated that the bill proposed by parliament contains 40% of the proposals by the convention.[13] Parliament began debating the bill on March 29, 2021.[42] It passed in the National Assembly on May 4, 2021.[43]

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.[14] She describes how the broad support for the social movements was able to pressure elected officials to give more autonomy to the Convention on Climate. While the social movements endorsed the creation of the convention, they believed that elected officials were using it to signal their support for social movements without making real changes.[14] She also describes how the members of the convention became defensive of their proposals against attempts to influence them, whether these attempts came from formal governmental institutions or from experts. She believes that the empowerment of the citizens through the citizens' assembly also empowers them to protect their ideas and proposals.[14] She also believes that in a large enough citizens' assembly, there will statistically be several strong personalities to defend the more timid members of the convention. Landemore notes this in the way that citizens discussed the carbon tax, as she believes the members often felt like political pawns to garner support for the carbon tax causing them to be less open with experts proposing it. She cites an anecdote when an expert was describing the benefits of a carbon tax, a member of the convention shouted "stop treating us like children" as evidence.[14] She notes two other confrontations as illustrations of the convention's strength against attempts to influence by experts. First, when a representative from the Bouygues corporation called for a complete renovation of all French homes with cheaper labor, members accused him of a conflict of interest.[14] Second, when an expert questioned the housing group about their proposals and how they would be financed, the members of the convention rose to each others' defense. In contrast to the occasionally adversarial tone with parliament, Landemore notices the congenial tone amongst the members, which she believes is indicative of good intragroup relationships in this type of citizens' assemblies.[14]

A team of French observers led by Louis-Gaëtan Giraudet also wrote a report describing and analyzing the convention in which they questioned the extent of the expert involvement. They acknowledged that experts played a substantial role in designing the convention's activities, but were unsure about whether the experts hampered the participants creativity. They noted that throughout the convention, experts often attempted to sway citizens towards a particular policy that he or she may not have initially supported.[1] This contributed to a tension they noted among several citizens who felt obligated to create measures that were both bold and practical. Further commenting on expert involvement and training, they suggest that the citizens should have been trained in deliberation.[1] They also cast doubt on what they describe as a prevailing notion that the overwhelming consensus achieved by the convention on their proposals as evidence that the citizens were extremely well informed.[1] They believe that because provisions were passed in blocks rather than as individual proposals, some may have been unable to express their dissent for one specific proposal within a group of proposals.[1] They also believe that the citizens' active involvement in creating each proposal makes them predisposed to support them and that they would already be broadly popular and consensual with the convention by the time to vote on the proposals.[1]

The convention has drawn comparisons to other deliberative mini-publics, most notably the Citizens Assembly of the United Kingdom (CAUK), which overlapped with the Citizens' Convention for Climate. Claire Miller and Rich Wilson have noted several similarities between the two citizens' assemblies. As they note, both were created in response to widespread protest. In France, this was the Yellow Vest protest movement, while in the United Kingdom, this was the protests by the Extinction Rebellion movement.[25] They also noted that both citizens' assemblies followed the traditional format of a learning phase, followed by deliberation, followed by voting. In both groups, the members were split into several working groups, although the French Convention had five groups while the Citizens' Assembly of the United Kingdom had three.[25] They also note that both groups created proposals that were, in their view, bolder than proposals previously made by politicians. In addition to these three similarities, they note several key differences.[25] The French convention was given a larger budget, it was given a more formal role in comparison to the CAUK's more advisory role, citizens and interest groups were given more authority to define the role of the convention, members were encouraged to be more active in politics, and members had more agency to redefine the role and rules of the convention.[25] Additionally, the French Citizen's Convention was created in order to design new policy while the CAUK was created to evaluate existing policy.[25] They also observed that the French convention sparked a greater national debate than the CAUK.[25]

The French government has been criticized for its handling of the proposals of the convention. This has led some to question whether the convention was truly a success considering parliament's proposed bill did not incorporate all of the resolutions of the convention. Over the course of the legislative process, news agencies reported the growing tensions between members of the convention and parliament. While this process was underway, Hélène Landemore expressed uncertainty in her book about whether the convention would have any real impact on the fight against climate change.[14] When the bill in response to the convention was released in January 2021 and did not contain many proposals of the convention, one news agency questioned whether the Citizens Convention on Climate was a failed experiment, concluding that the true future and result of the convention remained to be seen and expressed a belief in the strong possibility that the deliberative model would be repeated.[13] The citizens themselves, when polled in a special eighth session, gave the government an average rating of a 3.3/10 for its consideration of the proposals of the convention and an average rating of 2.5/10 about their confidence that France would reach its emissions reduction target of 40% reduction from 1990 by 2030 in a spirit of social justice. They did, however, give an average rating of a 6/10 for how much they influenced the French debate on climate change and a rating of a 7.7/10 for their impressions of how they improved democracy.[44]

• Official website of the Citizen's Convention for Climate