Recent theories of democratic representation push beyond ‘minimalist’ notions that only rely on periodic elections to connect officials and constituents. For example, Jane Mansbridge (2019) calls for ‘recursive representation’, which seeks ongoing, two-way interaction between representatives and their constituents. Given the scale and complexity of modern representative democracies, how can such ambitious proposals be translated into practice? We analyze two Deliberative Town Halls (DTHs) convened with a Federal Member of Australian Parliament in 2020 to discuss a complex issue, mitochondrial donation, ahead of a parliamentary debate and conscience vote on this issue. Drawing on interviews with participants, we argue that democratic innovations such as DTHs can contribute to realizing recursive representation when three criteria are met: authenticity, inclusion, and impact. We discuss the significance of each criterion and the role of DTHs in advancing recursive representation in a parliamentary system.

Afrobarometer data collected three decades after Joel Barkan’s pioneering survey of rural Kenyans confirm his insights that voters stress MPs’ linkage roles in terms of representation (carrying views upward to the capital) and constituency service (bringing goods downward from national government) over their institutional roles (lawmaking and oversight). And, contrary to conventional wisdom, they prefer collective goods for the constituency over private goods. An African Legislatures Project survey of 822 MPs in seventeen countries revealed, however, that MPs misinterpret this as a demand for material goods and development and underappreciate the demand for representation, prompting—among other things—the adoption of controversial Constituency Development Funds.

During the past several decades, nearly symmetrical tidal appearances, both the time of high water elevation and the tidal range, were noted along the western coast of Taiwan. Research corresponding to anomalous amplifications of tidal range have been well studied by Lin, et al. [1,2], but the particular symmetrical tidal appearance of high water time has not yet been clarified. In this paper, we firstly apply a harmonic analysis to tidal data compiling. Based on the results, the important symmetric appearances of high water time and tidal range can be located. Emphasis is given on the investigation of symmetrical distribution of high water time by superposing two progressive waves that interfere on a topographic shelf with specific width. A conceptual configuration of co-oscillating standing tides is proposed to demonstrate the symmetrical tidal range distributing in the space domain and oscillating in the time domain.