Political Equality

Abstract This article uses Arash Abizadeh to illustrate the appeal and difficulties of the claim that random selection is a more democratic way to select a legislature than election. It agrees with Abizadeh that representative democracy cannot be reduced to the right of voters to choose their legislators. However, it challenges his view that elections are inherently inegalitarian because they enable voters to discriminate unfairly among electoral candidates and his assimilation of gyroscopic to descriptive representation. Finally, the article highlights the difficulties of justifying random selection while rejecting election on egalitarian grounds. It therefore concludes that democratic equality requires more, not less, attention to the ethics of voting and to the conceptual, moral, and political dimensions of citizens’ claims on elected office.