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What is democracy to you?
Democracy is the exercise and experience of liberty of choice. It is the practice and experience of liberty of thoughts and the action of these thoughts. Democracy is the intention and action of liberty’s experience.

Why bother to vote?
I can understand why many people who are poor and out of jobs feel that it doesn’t matter whether they vote or not and that it will have no influence whatsoever on their own personal situations. It is understandable. But on the other hand voting is a way of saying that this my opinion, I want to have some influence on the development of my own life and of society, and that is one thing you can do. And if more poor people actually voted, that would have an influence, would change the world.

Can democracy solve climate change?
Yes, I think it can and I think it must. There is only one way that we can alter the patterns of peoples’ behaviour and that’s through consent. However, I think that you cannot tackle climate change without first tackling the democratic deficit; you’re not going to get people
to do things only because the centre says it’s a good thing. People have to feel they have some control over the decisions that are made and that they have a set of choices before them in shaping those decisions. So I think you can tackle it through democracy but not without some reform to the democratic system we see operating in most Western countries.