Last year, a headline in The Guardian asked a provocative question: “Citizens’ assemblies: Are they the future of democracy?” It’s a reflection of just how popular this approach to democracy has become in many parts of the (mostly Western) world. Citizens’ assemblies are random collections of people, selected by lottery from the general population, usually convened to deliberate on a specific policy question. There are currently hundreds of citizens assemblies running at the national, state or local level, from Paris’ permanent Citizens Council, to Germany’s many regional assemblies, to the increasing number of deliberative bodies forming across Latin America. Yet, the vast majority of innovation around deliberative democracy is in Europe and Canada, with comparatively little in the United States, the world’s second largest democracy. Why is that? It’s certainly not because people in the United States are satisfied with the voice they have in decision-making. Two years ago, a survey found that 83% of voters believe there isn’t “an adequate system in place for the voice of the American people to be heard in Congress.” And when presented with the prospect of a politician who says they will consult with a representative sample of constituents to decide their stance, more than 4 in 10 said they would cross party lines to vote for such a person. So, what’s going on? Why haven’t citizens’ assemblies taken root in the United States in the same way as participatory budgeting?