Sébastien Treyer, as member of the support group of 14 experts who accompanied the 150 citizens throughout the process, and Nicolas Berghmans, who observed the French Citizens' Climate Convention, participate in this session, organised by Sciences Po, as part of the interdisciplinary environmental research workshop (AIRE).
In the wake of the Yellow Vests crisis, of which the carbon tax challenge was one of the triggers, the Citizens' Climate Convention organised between October 2019 and June 2020 was an unprecedented experiment in deliberative democracy. Aimed at unblocking the slow pace of climate action in France, it questioned how to carry out the ecological transition in a spirit of social justice. During this process, 150 citizens drawn at random had to deal with complex issues on the expertise of actors coming from different backgrounds in a process and formats of interaction that built up over the course of the convention. How did citizens gain access to this expertise? What is the balance and sequence between proposals for expertise and demand for expertise by citizens? What lessons can be drawn for climate expertise from this unique experience? How should we view the 150 proposals for measures resulting from the work of citizens with regard to climate action?
More information [in French]
