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This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ; Background Opportunities for community members to actively participate in policy development are increasing. Community/citizen's juries (CJs) are a deliberative democratic process aimed to illicit informed community perspectives on difficult topics. But how comprehensive these processes are reported in peer-reviewed literature is unknown. Adequate reporting of methodology enables others to judge process quality, compare outcomes, facilitate critical reflection and potentially repeat a process. We aimed to identify important elements for reporting CJs, to develop an initial checklist and to review published health and health policy CJs to examine reporting standards. Design Using the literature and expertise from CJ researchers and policy advisors, a list of important CJ reporting items was suggested and further refined. We then reviewed published CJs within the health literature and used the checklist to assess the comprehensiveness of reporting. Results CJCheck was developed and examined reporting of CJ planning, juror information, procedures and scheduling. We screened 1711 studies and extracted data from 38. No studies fully reported the checklist items. The item most consistently reported was juror numbers (92%, 35/38), while least reported was the availability of expert presentations (5%, 2/38). Recruitment strategies were described in 66% of studies (25/38); however, the frequency and timing of deliberations was inadequately described (29%, 11/38). Conclusions Currently CJ publications in health and health policy literature are inadequately reported, hampering their use in policy making. We propose broadening the CJCheck by creating a reporting standards template in collaboration with international CJ researchers, policy advisors and consumer representatives to ensure standardized, systematic and transparent reporting.

BACKGROUND: Opportunities for community members to actively participate in policy development are increasing. Community/citizen's juries (CJs) are a deliberative democratic process aimed to illicit informed community perspectives on difficult topics. But how comprehensive these processes are reported in peer-reviewed literature is unknown. Adequate reporting of methodology enables others to judge process quality, compare outcomes, facilitate critical reflection and potentially repeat a process. We aimed to identify important elements for reporting CJs, to develop an initial checklist and to review published health and health policy CJs to examine reporting standards. DESIGN: Using the literature and expertise from CJ researchers and policy advisors, a list of important CJ reporting items was suggested and further refined. We then reviewed published CJs within the health literature and used the checklist to assess the comprehensiveness of reporting. RESULTS: CJCheck was developed and examined reporting of CJ planning, juror information, procedures and scheduling. We screened 1711 studies and extracted data from 38. No studies fully reported the checklist items. The item most consistently reported was juror numbers (92%, 35/38), while least reported was the availability of expert presentations (5%, 2/38). Recruitment strategies were described in 66% of studies (25/38); however, the frequency and timing of deliberations was inadequately described (29%, 11/38). CONCLUSIONS: Currently CJ publications in health and health policy literature are inadequately reported, hampering their use in policy making. We propose broadening the CJCheck by creating a reporting standards template in collaboration with international CJ researchers, policy advisors and consumer representatives to ensure standardized, systematic and transparent reporting.

Background: Opportunities for community members to actively participate in policy development is increasing. Community/Citizen's Juries (CJs) are a deliberative democratic process aimed to illicit informed community perspectives on difficult topics. But how comprehensive these processes are reported in peer-reviewed literature is unknown. Adequate reporting of methodology enables others to judge process quality, compare outcomes, facilitate critical reflection, and potentially repeat a process. We aimed to identify important elements for reporting CJs and develop an initial checklist, and to review published health and health policy CJs to examine reporting standards. Design: Using literature and expertise from CJ researchers and policy-advisors, a list of important CJ reporting items was suggested and further refined. We then reviewed published CJs within the health literature and used the checklist to assess the comprehensiveness of reporting. Results: CJCheck was developed and examined reporting of CJ planning, juror information, procedures and scheduling. We screened 1711 studies and extracted data from 38. No studies fully reported the checklist items. The item most consistently reported was juror numbers (92%, 35/38) while least reported was availability of expert presentations (5%, 2/38). Recruitment strategies were described in 66% of studies (25/38) however, the frequency and timing of deliberations was inadequately described (29%, 11/38). Conclusions: Currently CJ publications in health and health policy literature are inadequately reported, hampering their use in policy-making. We propose broadening the CJCheck by creating a reporting standards template in collaboration with international CJ researchers, policy-advisors and consumer representatives to ensure standardised, systematic and transparent reporting.

Background: Opportunities for community members to actively participate in policy development are increasing. Community/citizen's juries (CJs) are a deliberative democratic process aimed to illicit informed community perspectives on difficult topics. But how comprehensive these processes are reported in peer-reviewed literature is unknown. Adequate reporting of methodology enables others to judge process quality, compare outcomes, facilitate critical reflection and potentially repeat a process. We aimed to identify important elements for reporting CJs, to develop an initial checklist and to review published health and health policy CJs to examine reporting standards. Design: Using the literature and expertise from CJ researchers and policy advisors, a list of important CJ reporting items was suggested and further refined. We then reviewed published CJs within the health literature and used the checklist to assess the comprehensiveness of reporting. Results: CJCheck was developed and examined reporting of CJ planning, juror information, procedures and scheduling. We screened 1711 studies and extracted data from 38. No studies fully reported the checklist items. The item most consistently reported was juror numbers (92%, 35/38), while least reported was the availability of expert presentations (5%, 2/38). Recruitment strategies were described in 66% of studies (25/38); however, the frequency and timing of deliberations was inadequately described (29%, 11/38). Conclusions: Currently CJ publications in health and health policy literature are inadequately reported, hampering their use in policy making. We propose broadening the CJCheck by creating a reporting standards template in collaboration with international CJ researchers, policy advisors and consumer representatives to ensure standardized, systematic and transparent reporting. ; Rae Thomas, Rebecca Sims, Chris Degeling, Jackie M. Street, Stacy M. Carter, Lucie Rychetnik, Jennifer A. Whitty, Andrew Wilson, Paul Ward, Paul Glasziou

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the search of for effective tools for public participation in general and public deliberation in specific in strategic environmental assessment (SEA) through an experiment with citizens' juries in municipal energy planning. The experiment with a deliberative democratic tool is thought to lead to more legitimate public policy decisions. The experiment combines design principles of citizens' juries with scenario methodologies (Shell/GBN). The evaluation of the experiment is structured around a framework of analysis derived from Jürgen Habermas's notion of discourse as an ideal democratic procedure. The results show that the citizens' jury enabled a constructive exchange of information and arguments and co-operation between ordinary citizens and experts. This indicates that citizens' juries is a participatory tool that can be used to represent a means for reforming SEA in a more deliberative democratic direction. But the analysis also revealed a number of distortions in the communicative process. These distortions indicate how the deliberative democratic potential can be further increased through revisions of the institutional arrangements of the decision-making process. Furthermore, regarding effects of deliberation, it is clear that the participatory process generated new and fruitful ideas and that the citizens increased their knowledge through participating in the process.

Survey techniques such as contingent valuation have been used extensively by environmental economists to develop an understanding of consumer preferences for environmental goods. On the basis of such techniques, recommendations have been formulated in relation to environmental policy. However, the exposure of weaknesses in this method has led economists to look to other information-gathering approaches which might enhance, and/or complement, environmental valuation. One such approach is that of 'citizens' juries' (CJs). A CJ consists of a small group of people, selected to represent the general public rather than any interest group or sector, which meets to deliberate upon a policy question. This approach may complement traditional approaches to data gathering on public preferences for environmental goods and services by addressing some of the concerns that have been voiced regarding existing methods. First, CJs may be useful in tackling the problem of information provision, and concerns relating to the level of understanding of the respondent. Second, CJs may be a means of addressing the 'citizen value versus consumer value' argument in environmental valuation. Third, CJs may help researchers understand how participants construct their values. Fourth, this approach allows sustainability issues to be addressed explicitly. The authors also discuss a number of problems associated with CJs and conclude with examples from two recent juries on environmental issues which were held in Scotland, and make recommendations on how environmental economists might utilise this tool.

Court reformers continue to debate over efforts to select juries more diverse than are typically achieved through existing procedures. Controversial proposals advocate race-conscious methods for selecting diverse juries. Such efforts, however well-intentioned, face constitutional difficulties under the Equal Protection Clause, which appears to preclude any use of race in selecting juries. The challenge thus presented by the Court's equal protection jurisprudence is whether jury selection procedures can be designed that effectively enhance the representative character of juries without violating constitutional norms. Professor Forde-Mazrui offers a novel insight for resolving this challenge. Analogizing juries to legislatures, he applies electoral districting principles to jury selection. Striking parallels between legislatures and juries justify comparing the selection of jurors to the election of legislators. Both legislatures and juries are fundamental institutions that best serve their function when their membership is representative of their respective jurisdiction. The electoral process enhances the representative character of legislatures through single-member districting. Although limiting the use of race in drawing electoral districts, the Court has endorsed designing districts around "communities of interest," communities with shared political interests identified geographically by demographic characteristics such as residential proximity, socioeconomic class, occupation, religion, and political affiliation. Curiously, the Court even permits some use of race in drawing districts provided it is only one among many factors. Drawing on electoral districting experience and doctrine, Professor Forde-Mazrui proposes a jury selection procedure he terms 'Yural districting." An implementing jurisdiction would divide a jury district into twelve sub-districts, designed around "communities of interest," and would require juries to contain jurors from every sub-district. Such a procedure should satisfy ...

The government has launched a sustained attack upon the concept of society, championing the individual. However, in certain arenas they are now providing contradictory messages. For example, health service restructuring is calling for greater citizen involvement, appealing to a simplistic mixture of individualistic and communitarian identities. Located within that arena, this article explores the discourses of 'everyday citizens'. It is demonstrated that there is a greater diversity of citizen and community identities than is recognized in government rhetoric, and it is suggested that this diversity needs to be addressed if citizenship and community are to be useful tools upon which to base policy.