Recent theories of democratic representation push beyond ‘minimalist’ notions that only rely on periodic elections to connect officials and constituents. For example, Jane Mansbridge (2019) calls for ‘recursive representation’, which seeks ongoing, two-way interaction between representatives and their constituents. Given the scale and complexity of modern representative democracies, how can such ambitious proposals be translated into practice? We analyze two Deliberative Town Halls (DTHs) convened with a Federal Member of Australian Parliament in 2020 to discuss a complex issue, mitochondrial donation, ahead of a parliamentary debate and conscience vote on this issue. Drawing on interviews with participants, we argue that democratic innovations such as DTHs can contribute to realizing recursive representation when three criteria are met: authenticity, inclusion, and impact. We discuss the significance of each criterion and the role of DTHs in advancing recursive representation in a parliamentary system.

In this essay, we place Black women's electoral challenges and opportunities in context. We situate this year of “Black Women Candidates” as an anomaly, but one that has been a long in the making. We also point to the appeal of Black women lawmakers among voters to mirror Alberder Gillespie's claims in this epigraph. We note that Black women have long been the backbone of the Democratic Party and are willing to use their clout for their own political means. Furthermore, given the unique ways that Black women represent their constituents, an influx of Black women into governing bodies may have a substantial, lasting impact on policy-making. We conclude with insights from our own research and that of other scholars on Black women to demonstrate future avenues of scholarly research.

While concerns about the public's receptivity to factual information are widespread, much less attention has been paid to the factual receptivity, or lack thereof, of elected officials. Recent survey research has made clear that US legislators and legislative staff systematically misperceive their constituents' opinions on salient public policies. This study reports the results from two field experiments designed to correct misperceptions of sitting US legislators. The legislators (n = 2,346) were invited to access a dashboard of constituent opinion generated using the 2016 Cooperative Congressional Election Study. Despite extensive outreach efforts, only 11 per cent accessed the information in Study 1 and only 2.3 per cent did so in Study 2. More troubling for democratic norms, legislators who accessed constituent opinion data were no more accurate at perceiving their constituents' opinions. The findings underscore the challenges confronting efforts to improve the accuracy of elected officials' perceptions and suggest that elected officials may indeed resist factual information.