Fixing Bugs in Democracy

Democracy, data, and science

This is Sam’s Newsletter, covering democracy, data, and science.

I’m a working scientist with an interest in using my craft to understand how and why our democracy has gone off track. Data analytics can help in many ways: understanding where we are politically, how we got here - and use those insights to help find a way out of this mess.

In the last few years I’ve focused on redistricting, and led a group at Princeton dedicated to this topic (the Princeton Gerrymandering Project). Before that, I’ve written during campaign season in election years (the Princeton Election Consortium). I am also on Twitter. In all cases, a central theme is empowerment: finding ways to give citizens more leverage, and make democracy more responsive to their wishes. Sometimes that means drawing fairer districts. Sometimes it means finding just the right races to volunteer for.

For those of you who came from one of the lists associated with the sites above: this Substack is free too! Eventually I may have some posts that require payment. But my main goal is to create a route for wide dissemination of ideas and analysis, and the majority of posts will remain free.

In the weeks and months ahead I’ll pursue the theme of how we can use science and data to repair our ailing democracy. I hope you’ll join me!