People collectively thinking, discussing, and deciding what they think about an issue is an important aspect of quasidemocratic polities. Ideally, deliberation enables peaceful synthesis of conflicting preferences and needs. Local assemblies are a simple yet dangerous tool to do this. They are simple because it's just people gathering; they are dangerous because unless there is appropriate structure to them, chaos is likely.

Items to research online:

1. Polis by The Computational Democracy Project
2. Community Notes by Twitter
3. vTaiwan's open consultation platform

Books:

1. Open Democracy, Hélène Landemore, 2020

1. When the People Speak, James S. Fishkin, 2011
2. Against Elections, David Van Reybrouck, 2016

Books from a different point of view:

1. Against Democracy, Jason Brennan, 2016
2. The Myth of the Rational Voter, Bryan Caplan, 2007

Finally, there are a number of organisations in the UK (and outside / global) that work in the field of citizen assemblies and participatory democracy:

1. Involve
2. Shared Future
3. Sortition Foundation / 858.org.uk
4. House of the People / timetoassemble.org