The negative Benthamite approach to collective decision making has a number of definite implications. Let me cite some representative examples from earlier chapters:

• Screening jurors and voters from bribes and threats

• Screening constitution-makers from soldiers and crowds

• Separating the constituent and legislative powers

• Combining ex ante secrecy and ex post publicity of voting in juries and assemblies

• Publishing the names of abstainers in national elections

• Enforcing a ban on the sale and serving of liquor to jurors and voters

• Enforcing a delay between the last public debates and opinion polls on the one hand and election day on the other

• Putting the assets of public officials into blind trusts

• Adopting a ban on cumul des mandats by representatives

• Adopting a cap on aggregate campaign contributions

• Adopting the constructive vote of no confidence

• Seating deputies on benches rather than at desks

• Seating jurors in unadorned rooms

• Selecting jury forepersons by secret ballot

• Offering jurors information in ways that minimize cognitive bias, for example, in terms of natural frequencies rather than probabilities

• Disallowing knowledge of a defendant’s previous criminal record

• Delaying jury trials in highly publicized cases

I shall not belabor the virtues of the general Benthamite framework, but take up the issues I mentioned in the Introduction: the costs of decision making, the value of diversity, the need for institutional overrides, the question of whether the negative approach might be indeterminate, and the need for a political will.

Costs

For Bentham, reducing the cost of political decision making was a crucial desideratum. As I noted in Chapter 3, he thought, somewhat incoherently, that the measures that would maximize the aptitude of deputies and officials would also minimize expenses. In reality, there is often a trade-off. We may not be able, however, to determine its shape.