One of the basic principles of sociocracy is that people have roles. These are elected with open elections.
We use roles to divide a group's tasks. A role has a set of tasks, for example "secretary." Each role must have a clear definition of what that role means. For a secretary, it is taking minutes during meetings.
Each group can choose which roles they need. These roles are most common:
In this extensive list of role descriptions you can read which other roles are available.
Open elections are a way to decide as a group who is suitable for a particular role. In general, people who are most active often get the most important roles. Within Extinction Rebellion, we prevent that with open elections.
Roles are ususally elected for a short time, for example 3 or 6 months. After this period the elections will be held again.
The elections consist of six steps:
Determining the role and term: The group discusses what role is needed, what exactly this role entails and for how long they want to elect the role.
Create nominations: Everyone in the group writes down who they think is most suitable for the role. You can also choose yourself. We write down the names so that no one can change their nomination in between rounds.
Share nominations: One by one everyone shares who they nominated and why. We only give positive reasons for nominating someone. So no reasons to not nominate someone else.
Amendment round: After everyone has heard eachothers nominations and reasonings, they get the chance to change their nomination. We then repeat steps 2 and 3.
Proposal by facilitator: Based on the nominations, reasons and reactions from the group, the facilitator proposes a candidate for the role.
Consent round: The members of the group consent to the proposal or object. In the last case the objections are discussed and the groups will look for a solution together.
With this process everyone has a fair chance to get a role and the group decides together who does what.
If you want to know more about roles and open elections, read more on sociocracyforall.org