That’s the question I ponder in a new essay published in Zócalo Public Square, an online magazine that circulates ideas around the globe. The gist of my argument is that had there been a CIR-style Review held in Britain in advance of the vote, and had the Review’s one-page analysis been widely circulated, it probably would have reduced the misconceptions about the EU and the benefits of leaving it. It’s impossible to know what...

A new article on the CIR process appeared in the second issue of the new journal, Communication and the Public. This is the first article to draw on the findings of “usability testing” done on the CIR in 2014. That data first appeared in a 2015 report, Empowering Voters through Better Information: Analysis of the Citizens’ Initiative Review, 2010-2014. The new article shows that voters found the CIR Statements to be a useful...