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Status: activeType: 🔬 researchCountry: Australia Website: www.lateraleconomics.com.au
Status active
Type 🔬 research
Country Australia
Website www.lateraleconomics.com.au
Contact mail@lateraleconomics.com.au
+61 403 077 732
Concepts Isegoria Deliberative Democracy Cognitive Division Of Labour Prediction Markets Citizens Assembly Tribal Epistemology
Last activity 2026-07-16 dod
Website loaded directly and describes current services/team under Nicholas Gruen (CEO); page itself undated so corroborated via web search showing Gruen's Substack/Club Troppo commentary continuing into 2026

Lateral Economics

Lateral Economics is a policy consultancy founded and led by Nicholas Gruen, a widely published Australian economist and commentator. The firm works with government clients on economic reform, productivity, and innovation policy — but Gruen is perhaps best known publicly for his advocacy of democratic reform, particularly citizens' juries and sortition as mechanisms for improving the quality of collective decision-making.

Gruen's democracy-relevant argument (developed extensively in talks, articles, and podcasts including a 2020 DOD episode) centres on the concept of isegoria: elections structurally degrade the quality of democratic deliberation by rewarding emotional salience and tribal loyalty over considered reasoning, while randomly selected citizens' juries restore equal standing and produce more considered outcomes.

He has advocated for a philanthropically funded standing citizens' jury that would shadow parliament — operating without formal power initially, but providing an evidence base for the model.

Key people

  • Nicholas Gruen — founder and principal. Australian economist, commentator, and one of the most consistent Australian voices for sortition and citizens' juries as mechanisms for improving democratic deliberation. Has presented to DOD multiple times. 2020 DOD episode

See also

History

  • 2000-01-01 Founded by economist Nicholas Gruen as an economic consultancyFounding of the organisation
    Sourcing: High
    In 2000 he founded economic consultancy Lateral Economics
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  • 2011-12-01 Published the Herald/Age–Lateral Economics (HALE) Index, correcting GDP for wellbeingFlagship national wellbeing index
    Sourcing: High
    Lateral Economics has developed the Herald/Age – Lateral Economics(HALE) Index of wellbeing which builds a measure of wellbeing by correcting GDP for the numerous ways in which it fails to reflect wellbeing.

    Month-only date estimate — the outputs listing page itself carries no publish date; per earlier web-search corroboration, the Final Report was published December 2011. A quarterly-updated national wellbeing index commissioned with Fairfax/Herald and The Age, adjusting GDP for inequality, human capital, natural capital, and health.

    ↗ View source