[M]odern democracy was born of privilege and nurtured through class conflict. Conceived in partisan contest, initially as kings and barons, then as landed gentry in elections, the disenfranchised became chartists, then socialists, and the ultra-disenfranchised became communists. Even though the claims of the working class and the suffragettes have largely been resolved, the saga continues in a fossilised relic of divisiveness. Modern democracy rejected the Athenian ideal of equality, wherein the poor, as much as the rich, were automatically accorded a place in government.
An email I sent to the editors of The New Scientist:
To: “letters@newscientist.com”
Subject: Technology is not the missing ingredient for democracy
Dear Editors,
As you write (“A vote for change“, 25 April, 2015), people perceive that “the parties are all the same, the politicians are all the same, they are not like us”. This perception reflects the inherent elitist nature of the electoral process. Within the electoral process people and parties compete for power. Those who manage to win form a select group with those distinct characteristics that allowed them to win: better connections, more wealth, better organizational skills, more ambition, etc. Why would we expect those winners to represent the rest of us?
Since non-representativity is inherent to the electoral process, technology cannot change its nature. Technology may shift power within the system. Those groups that find out how to exploit new technology may be able to gain power at the expense of others who fail to do so. However, the elitist nature of elections will persist. Those new to power will again be a distinctive group with their own particular agenda and interests and will not represent the public at large.
Achieving a democratic system will require a radical change: moving away from our reliance on elections for selection people with power. Representative power can be created by relying on an established scientific method for obtaining representativity: random sampling. When parliament is selected as a random sample of the population then it would truly be “like us” and then it can then be expected to create policy that promotes the interests of the average citizen.
WASHINGTON—Saying that being confined in such a volatile environment was known to have devastating psychological repercussions, FBI officials reported Wednesday that Ohio man Patrick Kinsey had apparently become radicalized during his 18 years spent inside of the U.S. Congress. “We’ve uncovered evidence that leads us to believe this elected official became heavily influenced by hardline extremists and religious fanatics during his time serving in the country’s legislative branch,” said FBI spokesperson Irene Jessup, adding that the representative appeared to have fallen in with a powerful fundamentalist faction during his first days in the congressional chamber and quickly adopted their strict interpretation of a fringe ideology. Continue reading →
Update 2: If you are still having technical issues, please let me know by email.
Update: It seems the issue was associated with the blog’s theme. I have changed the theme and now the issue is resolved. Sorry if the new theme causes any disorientation. This is probably a temporary inconvenience.
There seems to be a problem with posting comments. This seems to affect only users who are logged in to the WordPress. If you are having this issue, log out of WordPress before you start commenting. You can then post the comment without logging in.
If you wish to post a comment while being logged in, that can be done by logging in after having started writing your comment using the little WordPress icon next to the comment box.
If this doesn’t get resolved soon, I’ll ask WordPress support for help.
Victoria Coren Mitchell writes about Ed Miliband’s proposal of having citizens ask the Prime Minister questions every week:
It’s Ed Miliband who is promising that, under his leadership, we would be allowed to go into the House of Commons and ask things. His wheeze is for prime minister’s questions to be extended, every Wednesday, to people who will be allowed to stand up and put whatever questions they like to the leader of the country, on behalf of the rest of us. I love this plan, save only my small confusion that this is what prime minister’s questions ALREADY IS.
I mean, tell me if I’ve missed the concept of our entire democracy; I speak as someone who could only manage grade C in GCSE chemistry (“Draw a picture of a test tube”, “A what?”); but I understood members of parliament to be people who go to Westminster and speak on behalf of the rest of us – specifically, when it comes to prime minister’s questions, in the form of putting questions to the prime minister.
It’s lovely to see politicians come out with clear ideas and policy, but Ed Miliband’s idea here is so massive that it is rather terrifying. Its implication is that our whole system has broken down. If “members of the public” are needed to go in on Wednesdays and ask questions on behalf of the nation, that can only mean members of parliament are not currently doing it. In which case, the entire constituency principle has fallen apart. Democracy has failed! We are being called in like relief firemen, like the Home Guard. Where will it stop? Will I get a phone call saying that, henceforward, I am to be home secretary every other Monday? Will you have to do the budget?
We all know that Westminster’s makeup is not precisely representative: it’s almost entirely white, overwhelmingly male, and filled increasingly with people who have spent their entire lives in politics. But I thought we were still, broadly, trusting them to operate on behalf of their constituencies and ask the questions that we would ourselves.
In her opinion article Creating a better community plan, Rachel Magnusson extols the virtues of a citizens assembly that is in the process of recruiting participation by residents of Vancouver’s East Vancouver neighbourhood known as Grandview-Woodland, anchored by Commercial Drive.
Authorized by Vancouver city council, this assembly is in response to a community urban plan process that raised howls of protest in 2013 when, after months of supposed listening, residents heard that multiple towers were to be raised in their neighbourhood, some as high as 32 stories.
With the citizens assembly, Vancouver city council is again embarked on a road heavy on process and light on listening. Magnusson and her fellow consultants, who are being paid $150,000 or more out of a total civic allotment of $275,000, are very enamoured by their credentials. Potent terms such as democracy, insight and community are rhetorically utilized to instil trust in the process. Trust is the main issue. Trust between the city’s planning department and the citizens of Grandview-Woodland is sorely lacking.
Our Community Our Plan, a citizens group based in the neighbourhood, has tried repeatedly to advise Magnusson, members of the planning department and city council of the pitfalls in this process, but to no avail, so in this space let us try again. Continue reading →
What did democracy really mean in Athens? – Melissa Schwartzberg
Hey, congratulations! You just won the lottery. Only the prize isn’t cash or a luxury cruise. It’s a position in your country’s national legislature. And you aren’t the only lucky winner. All of your fellow lawmakers were chosen in the same way.
This might strike you as a strange way to run a government, let alone a democracy. Elections are the epitome of democracy, right? Well, the ancient Athenians, who coined the word, had another view. In fact elections only played a small role in Athenian democracy, with most offices filled by random lottery from a pool of citizen volunteers. Continue reading →
There are three crucial ingredients for a high quality democracy: a very large hat, a pen and lots of small bits of paper. Write the name of each citizen in the land on a bit of paper, put all the bits of paper in the hat, close your eyes and pluck out 500 names from the hat. Write to each of the 500 saying:
“Congratulations, you have been picked as one of the 500 people who will run the country for the next five years. Please come along to our Random Parliament and start making decisions about things like welfare reform, flag display and corporation tax rates (maybe). We’ll put you up in a swanky hotel, pay you loads of expenses and square it with your boss. Look forward to seeing you…”
To readers of this blog the idea that random selection should play a central role in government may seem like common sense, but clearly it’s not. 341 followers (344 at last count!) represent a statistically invisible group on a planet of 7 billion. We aren’t a minority and we aren’t a fringe group (not even a lunatic fringe); from the perspective of politics we simply don’t exist (at least not in the U.S.). Our sense of things is anything but common, it is exceedingly rare. If we ever hope to see this thinking converted into action that will have to change. Somehow we must convince enough people to put our movement on the map. For this, we will need a highly effective argument, because the people we wish to persuade are living under the thrall of a myth.
The average citizen of our globe believes fervently in something which they call “The Democratic Process”. Voting is its central tenet. No matter how often it fails them they rarely waver in their devotion. And like true believers, fundamentalists even, each further obstacle is taken as a sign; the path is righteous but rocky, we must purify our faith and trudge ever onward. When we are finally worthy, the Democratic Process will at last deliver us. The road to true reverence has been long. Following the rise of the Third Estate there came the fall of property qualifications; then the secret ballot; voting by freed slaves; direct election of Senators; the ballot initiative and finally women were included. None of this brought deliverance and so today’s mantra is “corporate cash”. If only we can somehow stay the floodgates of corporate influence which pervert the process of “True” Democracy, then at long long last we will finally enter the promised land. Continue reading →
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Equality by lot 