“As we're increasingly realising, social connectedness and a shared political discourse which honours the common good are all fundamental to a functioning society and economy. Yet there's pervasive foreboding that these things are falling away in our society. Faith in our major institutions, including our democracy continues its steady decline both here and in other Western Democracies. This talk will explore the ways in which inequality is more than a simple material phenomenon. It will argue that politics as currently practices is losing its capacity to address these concerns, and explore an alternative from which our political system could borrow - in which people are represented by citizens juries or councils - selected by lot as they were in ancient Athens. It will also explore the ways in which such a system might be more hospitable to solving our social problems."