Selection algorithms

When we say we will “run a selection” using OpenDLP we mean that we will use a computer algorithm to randomly select 50 people from our pool of respondents , in such a way that all targets are satisfied.

The algorithm used by Sortition Foundation was developed in association with academics from Harvard and Carnegie Mellon Universities and was written up in a peer-reviewed article in Nature. The algorithm was proven to be “as fair as possible”.

If you are interested in learning about how this, and other, selection algorithms work you can:

1. Read the Nature article.
2. Follow this animated explainer – it goes through the algorithm mentioned above, as well as other similar algorithms. This is recommended for people who are less technically minded.
3. Check out the sortition-algorithms code walkthrough on the sortition-algorithms documentation site. This explains how you can check out the code for yourself – it is all open source and free to use – and run a selection on your own machine.