The expansion of democratic innovations has always been analysed from the point of view of the quality of the instruments, as well as their internal functioning. In this paper, using as an example the expansion of democratic innovations in Spain, we propose to understand this process from the sociological concept of ‘field’. Thus, we will be able to analyse the changes that have taken place in this new field of institutional participation. The results give us relevant information about the existing conflicts, as well as necessary keys to understand the crisis of some instruments or the arrival of new ones.

The global rise of deliberative democratic innovations, particularly minipublics such as citizens’ assemblies and deliberative polls, has been marked by uneven adoption across advanced democracies. While some countries have integrated these mechanisms into their democratic frameworks, others remain hesitant, raising questions about the institutional conditions that facilitate or hinder their adoption. This study employs qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) to examine how configurations of three key institutional dimensions – consensus democracy, federalism, and direct democracy – shape the adoption of minipublics. Our findings reveal that minipublics are more likely to be adopted in majoritarian systems with strong federalism and limited direct democracy, where they address participatory gaps. Conversely, systems combining high consensus democracy and extensive direct democratic mechanisms, such as Switzerland, often exhibit lower adoption rates, as existing power-sharing structures fulfil similar deliberative functions.

This article compares the historical trajectories of democratic innovations across space and time in the UK by analysing the development and impact of collaborative governance, participatory budgeting, referendums, and mini-publics. This is an interesting country for longer-term analysis. First, the UK has been considered an inhospitable environment for democratic innovation. Second, it has experienced asymmetrical decentralisation of legislative and executive powers from national to subnational institutions. Third, these changes have taken place during a period of democratic backsliding. We analyse how these dynamics are interrelated by charting the trajectory of four types of democratic innovations in four different countries of the UK (space) from the 1970s to the present (time). We find that, after years of limited democratic innovation there has been rapid, although geographically asymmetrical, development in recent decades. We argue that the importance of these differences should not be overstated in relation to democratic deepening. We conclude that, to advance democratic innovations in the UK, a constitutional convention is required.

Conclusions of the Special Issue ‘Trajectories of Democratic Innovations’.