To Fix Tech, Democracy Needs to Grow Up:
There is growing recognition that rapid technology development is producing society-scale risks: state and private surveillance, widespread labor automation, ascending monopoly and oligopoly power, stagnant productivity growth, algorithmic discrimination, and the catastrophic risks posed by advances in fields like AI and biotechnology. Less often discussed, but in my view no less important, is the loss of potential advances that lack short-term or market-legible benefits. These include vaccine development for emerging diseases and open source platforms for basic digital affordances like identity and communication.
At the same time, as democracies falter in the face of complex global challenges, citizens (and increasingly, elected leaders) around the world are losing trust in democratic processes and are being swayed by autocratic alternatives. Nation-state democracies are, to varying degrees, beset by gridlock and hyper-partisanship, little accountability to the popular will, inefficiency, flagging state capacity, inability to keep up with emerging technologies, and corporate capture. While smaller-scale democratic experiments are growing, locally and globally, they remain far too fractured to handle consequential governance decisions at scale.
This puts us in a bind. Clearly, we could be doing a better job directing the development of technology towards collective human flourishing—in fact, this may be one of the greatest challenges of our time. If actually existing democracy is so riddled with flaws, it doesn't seem up to the task. This is what rings hollow in many calls to "democratize technology": Given the litany of complaints, why subject one seemingly broken system to governance by another?
At the same time, as we deal with everything from surveillance to space travel, we desperately need ways to collectively negotiate complex value trade-offs with global consequences, and ways to share in their benefits. This definitely seems like a job for democracy, albeit a much better iteration. So how can we radically update democracy so that we can successfully navigate toward long-term, shared positive outcomes?
The existing data economy (mirroring the digital economy as a whole) is a primary engine of shared growth and progress—and a leaky, power-concentrating, fractured mess. Data brokers sell and resell personal data with little oversight. Huge networks like Facebook and Google capture the information of billions of people and use it in the service of a few shareholders' narrow interests. It is only during brief moments of generosity during a crisis, like when Google provided mobility data to cities during the Covid pandemic, that the public can even see how vast these data stores are, and how helpful they might be in building shared safety and prosperity.
[...] From my vantage point within the tech governance ecosystem of the US, the situation often feels as polarized as our broader political system. Techno-solutionists eschew democracy while techno-pessimists eschew technology, resulting in a tech ecosystem increasingly divorced from the collective interest and a politics of technology increasingly against even the possibility of shared progress. But in reality, we are as far from the best democratic systems we could have as we are from the frontiers of technology-enabled flourishing. And we can't have one without the other—at least, not without embracing either a technocratic dystopia or a stagnant one.
This means we need to not only "fix democracy" and "fix technology," but find ways to leverage each toward the pursuit of the other. Getting there will require policymakers to initiate and finance positive alternatives, not just enact regulation to curb the harms of the current system. It will require political systems willing and able to raise and deploy funding into collective intelligence experimentation, via subsidies, sandboxes for fast innovation, and investment into basic research funding and digital public infrastructure. It will require technologists and researchers to develop metrics beyond artificial benchmarks or maximizing engagement; in turn, it will require funders and journals to reward research breakthroughs that augment collective intelligence and collaboration. It will require civil society organizations to expand beyond (necessary) criticism of existing technology ecosystems into convening communities to imagine and contribute to actionable, better futures. And it will require collective intelligence experiments of all kinds—from the local to the global, from the digital to the physical, from theory to practice. This isn't just a job for institutions; it's a job for all of us who are invested in both participation and progress.
For all its flaws, the early internet, the foundation of many Collective Inteilligence instances today, was built with public funding, research, civil society input, and private innovation. It has gone on to restructure our age. The almost insurmountable challenges of this century will require coordination on an even more massive scale. But the rewards are likely to be even greater. We should invest accordingly.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by HiThere on Tuesday August 16 2022, @04:28PM (21 children)
Democracy can't "grow up". That doesn't mean that autocracy is a better answer. What it means is that you need safeguards.
1) Anyone who has ever been part of a regulatory body must be prevented from ever accepting ANY emolument from those they once regulated. And that limit has to cover non-monetary payments.
2) Legislators must be prevented from accepting bribes. Also groups campaigning for their election must be prevented from accepting bribes on their behalf.
Those two steps would do a great deal to repair the process. They introduce problems, paying for a campaign is difficult. And they mean that the candidates would need to be wealthy. So some additional steps are needed. These involve government sponsored campaigns, which means the process would need to be SOLIDLY nailed down to be non-discriminatory. My current idea is anyone could be a candidate, but they would need petitions signed by a certain number of people to be a recognized candidate, at which point some government support would become available. Say franking privileges. They could use this to collect additional signatures. With some larger number of signatures sponsorship of a web page would be available. Etc. And that people would only be allowed to support one candidate for an office, but that they could change their minds. I.e. either withdraw their support for someone or to move their support to an alternate candidate. This requires a non-forgeable voter identification. Two factor identification should suffice. Say a driver's license/state id combined with some independent identifier. (I'm thinking the signature could happen in person, but the transfer would need to be done on-line, and thus need better validation.)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:17PM (8 children)
Oh, Democracy can grow up, and tech can help it along tremendously - starting with radical transparency.
Thing is, a significant element of our power structure doesn't want Democracy, they want a minority ruled Republic. They tend to shy away from transparency, but they're strong on psychology and other methods which keep them in power.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:52PM
Precisely. Authoritarians create problems, then assert that authoritarianism is the only way forward. Been there, done that thank you 20th Century.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @07:02PM (2 children)
Your partisanship is showing. The US is a Republic- representatives (and senators) supposedly represent us in making laws. Most of the more advanced countries in the world have some form of representative government, often called "parliamentary".
Are you saying you want true democracy, where we each and all vote on each and every issue?
If so, do you trust your fellow countrymen and women (and its) to deeply study each issue, the backstory, and vote on these issues with the best of intentions for all?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday August 17 2022, @01:01AM (1 child)
There's a difference between a representative democracy, where the people elect representatives who serve their constituency, and a republic where the supposedly elected officials hold sway in the legislature, courts, police etc. by means other than representing the best interests of their constituencies.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 18 2022, @05:24PM
Wonderfully philosophical. Please explain how that applies here in the real world, and how our Republic is somehow different from what you're pondering.
If what you're alluding to was true, then no Democrat Senator or Rep. would ever be partisan. They would be fully open to ALL of their constituents, right? And I think we all know how that actually works.
I'm very neutral and independent, sitting on the hill observing the constant and escalating political battle. In fact, from where I sit and observe, the Democrats (like AOC) are far more partisan opinionated than the Republicans. Democrats are far louder, far more condescending, smug, arrogant, hateful, spiteful, rude, and boorish. I've always hoped they'd be much kinder, fully open to all constituents, D, R, I, C, G, whatever party.
(Score: 1) by Sjolfr on Tuesday August 16 2022, @08:10PM (3 children)
Define the "significant element" that you are referring to.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @08:26PM (1 child)
It's painfully obvious he's referring to Republicans. It's quite popular to bash them and lie about them, didn't you know that? They're all evil. Fascists, Nazis, racists, etc.
(Score: 1, Troll) by ilPapa on Wednesday August 17 2022, @03:05AM
The fact that it's "painfully obvious" tells you everything you need to know about Republicans.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 17 2022, @01:18AM
Big business that lives on government largess and doesn't want to see it disturbed
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Tuesday August 16 2022, @06:09PM (8 children)
The problem that your proposals don't address: The people who will be in a position to determine if somebody (either a regulator or politician) has accepted bribes can also be bribed to either find bribery where it doesn't exist (to eliminate a convenient opponent) or not see bribery where it does exist (to continue the gravy train at public expense). And any agency set up to see if the bribe-detectors were bribed can also be bribed. And that creates an infinite recursion of bribery and corruption.
In all my reading of history, I've yet to discover a political system that did not descend into a wretched hive of scum and villainy over time. Lots of attempts have been made, none have succeeded.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by RS3 on Tuesday August 16 2022, @07:06PM (7 children)
As most know, the US was supposed to have systems of checks and balances. Little by little the checks and balances have been eroded over the 246 years, exceptions are made, and we have a very complex and tangled legal and political mess.
I blame lobbying for much of the current mess.
That and corporations- the people who run them- are a bit too protected from prosecution.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Thexalon on Tuesday August 16 2022, @11:32PM (6 children)
It's been carefully replaced with "whoever writes the checks gets to decide the balance", yes. Which is precisely the point I was making here about corruption. I'm not even sure we have a clear winner for how long a form of government can avoid this fate.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday August 17 2022, @01:13AM (5 children)
Sadly that seems to be one of the biggest problematic factors. I'm not sure the Founding Fathers had to deal with this problem, nor anticipated it becoming the huge problem it has become. I guess they thought the "checks and balances" would fix any and all problems, but it seems money has influenced all branches of govt., perhaps Congress the most (worst).
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Reziac on Wednesday August 17 2022, @02:24AM (2 children)
"Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
-- John Adams
.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Saturday August 20 2022, @12:21AM (1 child)
That kind of goes for any form of government. It depends of course on how you define moral, and I tend to think those who place religion at the top of their list for importance should not be trusted with ruling anyone, but having a value system that requires providing for the benefit of all is necessary. If you could limit government to incorruptible, altruistic and intelligent, far sighted people, any form of government would work, even communism or a dictatorship. Such people however, have only rarely existed, and by their natures tend to be easily supplanted by more typical humans. That's a product of human nature. It is extremely difficult to fashion a government purposed to fairly take care of the needs of all its people, especially as any particular entity to be governed grows larger. Thus only a system with several sources of power, each with severe limits on that power, and a way to redress wrongs, can ultimately provide a fair and just government. If any of those are compromised, as they seem to be now in the US, government quickly starts to fail in its purpose.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday August 20 2022, @01:23AM
His point was that a government is only as solid as the people comprising it. Once infiltrated by the amoral, it becomes, as you say, compromised.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Wednesday August 17 2022, @12:36PM (1 child)
Nobody founding a government sets out to create a corrupt mess. The would-be monarchs think "Well, I'm the smartest person around, so of course everything will work best if I just make the decisions." The would-be republicans (note the small "r") think "Well, we're all decent people, so we'll get together and make a decent government from it." The would-be anarchists and democrats (again note the small "d") think "Well, we're on average good people in our society, so if we all spread out our decision-making as much as possible we'll do OK." And so forth.
And yet they all go wrong, sooner or later.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday August 18 2022, @07:57PM
Actually, royal lines often begin by all the worthies of the community deciding, "Olaf is the best of us; Olaf can be king." And so it stays until Olaf or his descendants fuck up, and out come the pitchforks and gibbets, and then the worthies vote in another king. But meanwhile, Olaf has a vested interest in the community. How many of our D.C. drones still have any connection to or vested interest in anywhere other than D.C. ??
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by loonycyborg on Tuesday August 16 2022, @09:38PM
Democracy existed only in ancient Greece. Modern governments tend to be mostly republics with various elective features. Word "democracy" shouldn't be used for any modern government as it's deceptive. If you want improvement, learn from opensource and implement meritocratic principles in governance too. Currently governments seem to be moving the opposite way making everything more clan-based.
(Score: 5, Informative) by captain normal on Tuesday August 16 2022, @10:33PM
"..Legislators must be prevented from accepting bribes. Also groups campaigning for their election must be prevented from accepting bribes on their behalf."
It kinda like used to be that way. Then the rich folk hacked the Senate and then the Supreme Court. Then they rammed through Citizens United and it's been by by democracy ever since.
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/citizens-united-explained [brennancenter.org]
"It is easier to fool someone than it is to convince them that they have been fooled" Mark Twain
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday August 17 2022, @02:52PM
Capitalism is more of the problem, not Democracy, and not tech either. Many of the possibilities for the future are grim, and much of the blame goes to Big Oil. 50 years ago they knew their business was bad for the environment, but instead of working on the problem, they opted to deny it because that was cheaper in the short term. Actually ran propaganda campaigns, when mere silence no longer sufficed. Incredibly, all the way back in 1965, LBJ was advised of this problem.
However, even Capitalism isn't entirely to blame. It's not only that the commies did their share of polluting. Capitalism is destruction neutral, really destruction amoral, and I'd say destructive competition is one of our biggest problems. The Soviet Union was especially hell bent on sacrificing the heck out of the environment, and why? Competition. They wanted that badly to keep up with the West. They were like the star athletes who are so desperate to win they take dangerous performance enhancing drugs that will cause them health issues that lead to death a decade later, and they know that but don't care.
Destructive competition is Why We Can't Have Nice Things. Bigots don't want anything done on any basis founded on equality or merit or need. They lie and obfuscate, to try to hide their bigotry, because they know it doesn't look good. But that's their game. I really fear some of those are so stupid that they think their greater familiarity with rough living will give them an edge should civilization collapse, and so, they are trying to bring that about. Let the fossil fuels burn! Drill, baby, drill! If technology and the rest of us hand them a way to reduce competition by murdering billions of others who could somehow be in competition with them some day if not today, they will use it.
As to the specific issues raise by TFA, how about some drastic reform of patent and copyright law? We could really use replacement systems, have them up and running well, so that trashing current IP law won't be disruptive. One of those items is digital notary systems. Such a system could quash plagiarism permanently. Another item is the USPS mandate is to provide communication that is not subject to private corporate control. They are extremely behind on the tech. In another generation, who the heck will hand write letters on paper? The only people I know who do that now are my older relatives. The USPS should get with it, and get into digital networking, become the ISP of last resort. Instead, they're arguing amongst themselves about how many of their next generation of delivery vehicles should be electric, rather than gas. Aarrgh!!
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @04:29PM (17 children)
If owners don't need the workers then the workers need to go away. It's simple economics.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MIRV888 on Tuesday August 16 2022, @08:53PM (16 children)
If we have humanoid robots to do all the leg work, what do you do with all the people? Because we are very close to that being the case. There simply won't be enough jobs for the population. So the economic model for earth will have to change or a whole lot of people will need to go away (die) in order to balance the work force size. In the past that always meant war. I don't have an answer, but the problem is almost here.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday August 17 2022, @01:30AM (15 children)
A few years ago I was doing some work where there was a very interesting plumber who was from Germany. Very good, efficient, etc., and major workaholic. Worked 18 hour days. Said he needed only 3 or 4 hours of sleep. (yikes!) We chatted a bit and he talked about how great Germany is (and I'm sure he was right). So I asked him: if Germany is so great, why are you here in the US? He said: because Germany limits how many hours he's allowed to work.
I've thought for a long time that as automation and robots do more and more manual labor, there are (obviously) fewer available hours of human labor needed. So, seems obvious, everyone can (and should) work fewer hours.
Trouble is, there are people who want to work longer hours, and I'm not sure what's right. The 40 hour work week has been a long accepted "standard", but people used to work a lot more hours, and many still do. I'd be in favor of a somewhat shorter "standard" work week. Of course, right now especially with inflation so high most people can't afford to work less. But maybe a very gradual change could work?
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Wednesday August 17 2022, @02:26AM (2 children)
We seem to have hit on a solution already -- in that government and HR departments have become jobs programs for the otherwise-unemployable. :/
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday August 17 2022, @04:06AM (1 child)
Why does it hurt so much when I laugh?
(Score: 3, Funny) by Reziac on Wednesday August 17 2022, @04:51AM
Because it's so expensive!!
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @12:22PM (10 children)
Needed for what? I find it remarkable how clueless people can be about how open-ended the "need" for human labor is. We're not even in Jevons paradox territory (where the demand for an efficiently used economic quantity like human labor goes up as you make it more efficient), we're just talking what you can use human labor for. The global economy, for example, has greatly expanded the need for human labor, contrary to narrative. For example, we're now able to bring everyone up to developed world standards of living. My take is that most of humanity will live in a developed world society by 2080, with that going up to perhaps 90% by 2100. That's going to require a lot of human labor.
Let people have what they want. That's what is right.
There's zero proof of harm here. And they create need for more work because when they're working longer hours, they're not doing mundane non-paying work like maintenance/cleaning, childcare, preparing entertainment, cooking, etc.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 17 2022, @02:09PM (1 child)
And I want your twelve-year-old daughter. How is that right?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @10:24PM
So is there zero proof of harm in you "wanting" that twelve year old?
Quoting stuff way out of context - how is that right?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Wednesday August 17 2022, @04:15PM (5 children)
So, a simple question: If you could live exactly as you do now, except that you worked 1 fewer days per week, would you be more or less happier than you are now?
I'm not going to accept, without proof, the assumptions that appear to be baked into your comment, namely that maximizing labor hours is the same as maximizing production is the same as maximizing the fulfillment of human needs and desires.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @05:29PM (4 children)
Further I would prefer working my current amount of time and getting a quarter more. Funny how you didn't include that as an option.
I'm not going to accept that straw man either just like I don't accept that it's wrong to work hard because you're stealing work from someone else.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday August 17 2022, @06:09PM (3 children)
Is it, though?
Some useful numbers here: The amount of money needed to ensure that nobody in America lives in poverty is about $4-5 trillion. The US GDP is over 4 times that, $21 trillion. I think there's likely a lot wiggle room as to how productive that economy might actually need to be before every gain is indeed "dearly" purchased. And I could make similar kinds of calculations for the world economy if I really wanted to sit down and crunch poverty rates, population, and GDP numbers.
There's also a difference between demanding that people bust their butts to make money that's critical for people being able to eat, and demanding that people bust their butts for money that's going to go towards increasing the average bid for a Rembrandt at Sotheby's.
I get that you've probably hustled a lot over your life, and have gotten to the point where you're used to doing that and expect to keep doing that until you either are rich enough or old enough to retire. I can also understand why you might feel better about doing that if you believed it was necessary or some kind of moral good that you were doing, rather than a choice that you made. But that doesn't automatically mean that it is necessary, useful, or even possible for everybody to do what you did.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @10:23PM (2 children)
Most which is already earned present or past by the people in question. And poverty is a vague thing. I could see that price tag going up, for example, if someone decides that everyone needs a pile of electronics or more heroic health care, for example.
You ever learn what that difference is, you tell me. I can't help but notice that nobody demands the Rembrandt. That means it's a crypto demand. For all I know, I could be demanding a Rembrandt right now and just haven't realized it yet.
I have learned that it's better in the long run to say "fuck you" to a parasite with a list of things they want, than to given them what they want. If they really want that list, they'll figure some arrangement that suits me - like inventing labor saving devices or providing a service I value and which doesn't put them out that much. If they don't, then they didn't really want it enough.
A lot of this stuff just seems some misguided effort to reenact an Ayn Rand novel, like Atlas Shrugged or Anthem in the real world - especially the caricature villains and their looter behavior and speech. I think that's a terrible idea. I don't care how much you need shit. A growing majority of people in the world have the ability to get it and I'm fine with them working to get what they want and need.
Dirty secret - I didn't try that hard. I get that not everyone has above average intelligence, interests that parlay themselves into decent paying jobs, or the ability to work harder to compensate for that relative advantage such as it is, but I think at least 90% can do something similar or better.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday August 18 2022, @10:34AM (1 child)
For the record, since you seem to think net worth is a measure of somebody's contribution to society, I'm worth about half a million right now, make well into 6 figures annually, and my main financial question is how long I'll want to keep working before retiring early, probably in my mid-40's. I've "succeeded" under the rules of our current way of living by a lot of measurements. And I know a few millionaires, so I have some idea of what that can and can't do for you.
The difference between you and I is that I don't think only about what's good for me, but also about what's good for other people, and I'm not going to assume that what I did is something everybody can do.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday August 18 2022, @05:53PM
Here's my take. First, there's a significant gap between expecting 90% of people to reach my level of success and yours. Second, it remains a reasonable expectation on my part. Second, I notice the usual lack of problem here. There's all this vague talk about how people should be spending their money better, but no serious examples. And somehow money is not very valuable because it's not informing us how spend our money better.
Even if we ignore the fluffiness of this concern, we're left with obvious problems, such as a profound inability of society to do what supposedly is good for society.
It reminds me of the people who scold us that taxes pay for civilization while ignoring that taxes also pay for the destruction of civilization. There's a stony indifference to what we're doing rather than what we're paying. I see no point to caring about the optimality of peoples' purchases when we already don't care much about tens of trillions of dollars per year of such transactions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 18 2022, @10:31AM (1 child)
> And they create need for more work because when they're working longer hours, they're not doing mundane non-paying work like maintenance/cleaning, childcare, preparing entertainment, cooking, etc.
Personally, I enjoy some amount of maintenance/cleaning--preventative maintenance means some smaller chance that there will be failures at inconvenient times (house, car, etc) and cleaning isn't terrible either--when the choice is living in (possibly unhealthy) squalor.
I suggest that if childcare is "mundane work" then those parents will get mundane kids--perhaps not the outcome that we as a society desire?
Some of the most fun times I remember as a kid were prepping in advance for the annual Halloween party our family hosted for kids on the block--piling up trimmings all summer to make the bonfire pile in the extra lot, then on the day setting up hoses to control that fire, cutting sticks for marshmallow roasting, etc. Lots of anticipation combined with that prep work.
If you find cooking mundane perhaps you need to get a copy of "Joy of Cooking"(grin).
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday August 19 2022, @12:03AM
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday August 17 2022, @03:03PM
I think the answer is that the fruits of labor, whether of people or robots, must be distributed fairly. We can come up with ways to do that. I am not worried about a robot apocalypse. That can be managed, and it will free us all from all kinds of drudgery.
Perhaps a fair exchange is that to receive these fruits, people must consent to not have too many children. Another issue is that we don't want everyone stuck with nothing to do but make babies. Keeping active can be so much better than wage slavery, without it being only about baby making.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Barenflimski on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:00PM (5 children)
I'm not so sure that Democracy is the problem.
I think its the two party system that has us so tied up in regulations and laws that nothing can get done.
When I can't get anything done without multiple bureaucrats telling me everything I need to do, when I did it "right" or "wrong", and then fining me, or destroying me financially, while threatening jail terms, all the while saying, "If I don't like it, then get the laws changed", I'm not sure its Democracy that is the problem.
The way I see it, every party gets into power. They make more laws, claiming life will be better. No one removes laws.
This entire country (United States) is so tied up in knots that we can't build a basement, pave our roads, or even choose the schools we want anymore, without incredible hurdles to climb.
This doesn't feel like freedom to me, and changing it through voting only seems to tie it in more knots.
That is the crux of the problem, as I see it. I don't see that its helpful to blame a philosophical model.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:54PM
WouLdn'T iT bE So mUcH sImPler if One ruLEr deCideD eveRyThiNg??! AmiRite?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday August 16 2022, @09:51PM (2 children)
I wish do many regulations were not necessary. Bad behavior of businesses (or individuals) creates the need for regulations. So I have a difficult time having much sympathy.
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 17 2022, @04:09AM (1 child)
Some people do not have the knowledge of right and wrong.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Wednesday August 17 2022, @02:16PM
That would be corporations. Corporations are psychopathic.
And remember the famous Republican (Mitt Romney) words . . . corporations are people too!
How often should I have my memory checked? I used to know but...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @12:30PM
Given that there's plenty of non-two party systems that are or were also tied up in regulation (like the entire EU bloc or the former USSR), I think we might need to look elsewhere for that.
My take is that the dynamics of a political system encourage adding rules rather than taking away rules.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Gaaark on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:19PM (3 children)
Make corporations pay more taxes and have government agencies do the research, and have it open for all to use.
It worked with medical research in the past.
Now, corporations do the research and keep the results for themselves and charge through the nose for pills that can do more harm than good at times: they do the research, they do the testing and when the tests show harm is being done, cover up the results and push the pill out hoping that the lawsuits cost less than they made but who cares as long as the execs get their bonuses and avoid jail time.
Take corporate profit out of the equation and you'll have results that are for the people.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:57PM (1 child)
Well, profit motive is pretty clean. Doing things "for the people" tends to end up with mass slaughter, historically. Genuine competition is hard to fake - if people are free to choose which widget they spend their money on then they will pick the best one they can afford. Crap ones die out, like crap animals (looking at you, dodo).
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Tuesday August 16 2022, @06:55PM
See: Snake oil, Radium water, etc.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2, Interesting) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @01:42AM
What benefits would government agencies bring? Due to public funding of science, we're already in a perverse world of staggering levels of research, but most of it crap. At least corporations pursue research that does something.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Thexalon on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:38PM (7 children)
Money is a not-great abstraction. When it was invented, the idea seems to have roughly been "this person produced something useful for somebody else, which entitles them to get something else useful from somebody else". But that starts to break down when $50K worth of treating cancer patients is treated the same as $50K worth of heroin sales is treated the same as $50K from investments your financial manager made for you because you inherited a large family fortune.
This means that important information about what is actually happening concretely is lost. Which is really handy for those who want to hide what's happening concretely, whether it's spying on people, enslaving people, poisoning people, or endangering all life on Earth. And that sets up all the incentives to be not ideal. And you can try using government to prevent it, but the problem with that is that $50K in bribe receipts looks the same to the economic system as any of the other $50K stacks of cash I described earlier.
I'm not entirely sure what the solution to this problem is, but I'm quite sure that as long as it's not solved we'll continue to have lots of criminality and corruption, including in technological fields.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @12:03AM (6 children)
Sounds to me like you just made a powerful case for money. It's a $50k transaction. We don't have to give a shit whether it's curing cancer, making someone high, or supporting some rich kid.
Ignore it and the nonproblem stays a nonproblem. People make bad choices. That's just one of the things they do. My take is that if we create some system of moral infrastructure to police peoples' $50k transactions, we just create more powerful avenues for peoples' bad decisions to screw us all. How soon we forget the perils of conflict of interest and incompetence when we get a taste of power!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 17 2022, @02:18PM (1 child)
Your khallousness aside, you're no dummy but you don't seem to be able to see beyond the end of your nose. Case in point: that 50k can be invested such that it helps improve society, or can be totally and foolishly wasted.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @10:26PM
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday August 17 2022, @04:34PM (3 children)
Really, we don't? So it really makes no difference at all to you how many drug dealers and their customers (and the shootings, medical emergencies, and thefts that go with them) are on the block where you live and/or have a business? And you really think that some rich kid spending their time partying on daddy's yacht is an equally good use of time and resources as nursing?
People are of course always capable of making bad choices, but well-designed social systems push most people to make good choices most of the time. As for how to prevent a person's bad decision from screwing over a lot of other people, you generally take steps to limit how much damage a bad decision can have (e.g. laws and public messaging campaigns against drunk driving to reduce the number of people who do that and kill random bystanders in the process), or you force the person making that decision to answer to the people who are going to be affected by that decision in some way (e.g. elections).
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 17 2022, @10:33PM
I don't lose sleep over the tobacco and alcohol pushers. The War on Drugs is not a money problem, but rather a pathology of society.
Similarly, it doesn't matter to me if rich kid is partying on daddy's yacht. At least, they're not spending my money and mostly staying out of trouble.
My take is that if we somehow build infrastructure for this more moral spending, it'll be run by drug addicts and rich kids who like to party. The same people who make societally suboptimal decisions will be making those decisions with everyone's money. I'm sure it'll work out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 20 2022, @12:31AM (1 child)
Well, it's Khallow. He appears to live by the holy rule that if someone is making money doing something they should be able to forever make money doing that. There are no such things as external costs.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday August 23 2022, @03:09AM
That's just so stupid. Nobody with reading comprehension skills would have gotten that from reading my posts in this thread. I suppose if you have some sort of intent to make a serious argument I can link to where I've argued against things like corporate welfare, agricultural subsidies, life styles, or the various existing social safety nets that some claim we need.
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Tuesday August 16 2022, @06:06PM
And stop being for sale.
(Score: 2) by oumuamua on Tuesday August 16 2022, @06:13PM
The Democracy solution he was describing: https://www.forwardparty.com/ [forwardparty.com]
And the key to reform is ranked choice voting; which basically lets you vote for your first choice, without fear of 'wasting' your vote. If your first choice doesn't win, you specify a 2nd choice who gets your vote instead.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Immerman on Tuesday August 16 2022, @07:39PM (9 children)
Seems to me the biggest failure of democracy is that, thanks to the way elections are handled, our Representatives rarely actually represent our interests. Party politics has taken over, and elections tend to amount to voting between political parties, with the individuals elected having little incentive to do anything but toe the party line. I mean, what are you going to do, vote for a Democrat rather than a corrupt Republican (or vice versa)?
Meanwhile direct democracy suffers from the fact that very few people have any interest in taking part in the day to day details of legislation, much less have the background or resources to do so in a well informed manner.
Which is why I've been an advocate of Direct Representation for a while now. The core premise is simple:
Each citizen chooses a Representative to support, and when Reps. vote, rather than one vote each they (effectively) cast one vote per supporter.
One of the conceptually simplest implementations would be to simply have a single nationwide instant runoff election, where every citizen's support get credited to their favorite winning candidate. Whether you prefer Mitch McConnell or Bernie Sanders, your vote for them *directly* gives them more power - even compared to their mostly-similar allies.
Another implementation would be to continue to elect Representatives as normal, but have a "confidence vote" before they take power, in which everyone can vote for their favorite amongst all the sitting Reps. You might even do such a thing more frequently than elections are held.
Regardless of implementation, you create the situation where every citizen's vote actually matters, *nobody* is stuck being "represented" by a Rep they voted against (or voted for only to keep a worse lizard from winning), and every Rep is most directly in competition for personal power with the other members of their own party, and so have great incentive to stand out from their party in some way to attract more supporters. That should both promote ideological diversity within the party, and encourage all Reps to support policies that are popular among their supporters.
Not to mention greatly discouraging corruption - why would I support a corrupt tool when they have less corrupt colleagues spouting similar rhetoric?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @07:57PM (1 child)
I see a couple of problems with this.
It complicates an already complex system.
Presumably this information would have to be public, so the concept of a "secret ballot" would disappear. This would open the door to harassing people who support someone who isn't supported by their boss/coworkers/family/friends.
I can't think of a single politician with whom I agree on everything. Therefore, I will always be represented by someone who doesn't reflect my position on some issues.
If you're going to move in this direction, why not go whole hog and make every decision, no matter how mundane or obscure, a referendum vote? Of course, most people are totally uninformed on most issues, so their votes will either be random guesses or whatever their favorite talking head on TV tells them to believe.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday August 16 2022, @10:08PM
>Presumably this information would have to be public,
Well,m the voting totals would, but that's already true.
Beyond that, why? It needs be no different than any other instant-runoff election. It's just that instead of the number of votes being irrelevant beyond the "you won a seat" threshold, they actually matter.
>I will always be represented by someone who doesn't reflect my position on some issues.
True, nothing is perfect. But that's a lot better than the current situation where your Rep probably doesn't represent you on *any* issues. Not even the ones where you agree with their rhetoric, because they only spew that shit to get elected, it rarely influences their actions.
>If you're going to move in this direction...
I think you answered that one quite well yourself. In pretty much the same way I did when mentioning the big problems with Direct Democracy
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @08:02PM (1 child)
So according to your plan, everyone who gets even one vote will be elected to the House/Senate??? Imagine the chaos of having thousands (millions?) of representatives, each voting the will of a handful of people. The logical result of this is that everyone will vote for themselves. Who's going to do all the things a civilization needs done, if we're all arguing in the Capital Building all day?
And what about the Presidency? Does each presidential candidate who gets even one vote share in the presidency? The White House is going to get awfully crowded!
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Tuesday August 16 2022, @09:11PM
Easy fix for that is to decide how many reps you want in the house/senate and just start counting them off the top until you have that many. Anyone who got votes, but not enough to get into the house/senate, gets to proxy their votes to anyone who did get in.
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Sjolfr on Tuesday August 16 2022, @08:53PM (4 children)
Re: Direct Representation
Who chooses the names of people that are on the list of candidates for citizens to support? What are the thresholds for being an elected official vs not? If I get one person to agree with me and vote for me can I be an elected official? Who can be an elected official?
The process you describe sounds a lot like our primary process where lots of candidates compete for the direct support of delegates. Delegates are chosen per district from among its residents that are interested in participating in the process directly. Local delegates choose from amongst themselves, via voting, to determine which of them will move up to the state delegate level. Rinse and repeat. A districts population determines how many delegates they can have. If individual citizens are interested they can follow the entire process and cast votes/make their wishes heard. This last year my district was allowed 15 delegates. We chose those from the 15 people who attended the meetings that everyone is invited to. Yup, we were all delegates.
I believe that your description of Direct Representation would result in pretty much what we have now. Candidates would fudge the truth just as much as they do now and constituents would band together and collaboratively vote for the same candidate in order to gain leverage. Eventually these voting blocks, or factions, would eventually dissolve in to 2 major groups. That's a classic single/double elimination grid like we use in sports to determine what 2 teams go to the final game.
The problem with any governmental system is not really the system itself ... it's the people. If people weren't power hungry, money grubbing, self centered dictators at heart then just about any system would work. But they doesn't. In fact no system is perfect for us because most people are happy to believe lies that fit their own agendas. Just take a close look at the major issues in American politics; abortion, guns, education, you name it. I'm willing to bet there are more lies being talked about as fact, amongst the general populace, than anything else.
Any sort of government fails because the people become complacent and vote, or takes sides, based on their own faulty views of reality. This is represented in America by the war of words and narrative that we see all over the place; news, twitter, facebook, anywhere. Most of what you read are nonsense opinions based on political agenda ... yet tons of people count them and fact.
Eventually all of the people involved, regardless of political structure, become the target for lies and violence from the "ruling class" or "wanna-be ruling class". Most of the people pick a side and advocate for aggression/violence against "the other side" based on misconceptions about reality, bias, bigotry, etc. Eventually this turns in to revolution.
As soon as the people become complacent then it becomes easier and easier for the shittiest of people to get in to positions of power. That complacency happens at the local level ... which is why my district had only 15 people show up for the preliminary meetings.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday August 16 2022, @10:29PM (2 children)
>Who chooses the names of people that are on the list of candidates for citizens to support?
The list is the candidates that were elected. If you want to combine the election and support voting into a single process...
Personally I'd say let anyone who wants to throw their hat in the ring.
- If you assume an instant runoff to elect N Reps, anyone who doesn't make the cut doesn't matter.
- If anyone can be a Rep, even with only one supporter, then you probably want a cuttoff between "seated" Reps who get can participate in the procedural aspects (speaking, making motions, etc), and "everyone else" whose only official power is voting, and everything else is done via unofficial conversations and alliances.
> Candidates would fudge the truth just as much as they do now and constituents would band together and collaboratively vote for the same candidate in order to gain leverage
Why would they band together behind a candidate with a track record of fudging the truth or ignoring their constituents wishes, rather than a similar candidate with a better track record of upholding their promises?
One thing you may be misunderstanding - yes, such a system would likely be very similar if you can only support the candidate from your district. The point is to allow you to support ANY Rep, regardless of where they're from. If your district elected someone corrupt, or from the wrong party, or just not the absolute best your party has to offer, you can throw your support behind any other Rep from anywhere in the country. (Obviously this works better for institutions that are supposed to represent the people, like the House, rather than those like the Senate that are supposed to represent regional interests)
It's easy to get people to divide up into tribal lines to vote for the "right" party. However, if we take the current U.S. House, both parties have hundreds of members, and it's a lot harder to convince people to vote for the corrupt local member of "their" tribe, rather than the honest (or just more aligned with their values) member from another district.
That's the important part - give people a real voice in which aspects (and actors) in their party should rise to prominence - right now that's handled completely within the party's internal power structure - something in which citizens have no voice.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Sjolfr on Wednesday August 17 2022, @12:48AM (1 child)
> Why would they band together
The very premise of consolidating representation is a form of banding together. People do this to gain power, leverage, and authority. It's the reason unions exist; worker representation within the workplace. Humans are a hierarchical animal. We are hardwired for hierarchies. Look our current political parties for an example, and not just the major two. Look at all of them and how the candidates get chosen. We implement hierarchies in everything we do all the way down to the household level. Authority itself is, by its very nature, hierarchical.
Very few of us fit 100% perfectly in to the beliefs of the candidates or parties. In fact, the majority of people actually alter their own beliefs to match those of the political party with which they most closely align. All of that despite the fact that our politicians lie all the time, not always about everything, but about some things. It's called managing the narrative and that level of management exists in all forms of government because they are all made up of people.
> The point is to allow you to support ANY Rep, regardless of where they're from.
This is the way our current system works for the most part. There will always be physical/geographical boundaries. You, myself, anyone can vote for anyone. It's called a write-in. You could even cast your vote for a Chinese national despite the fact they they are not eligible for office in America. One of the spots where there are unfair control mechanisms in the US is who is allowed on the ballot. What most people don't understand is that the ballot is not a comprehensive list of all the candidates. Plus, for a candidate to run for office in a state all they have to do live there for 2 weeks and declare residency.
If you are suggesting that we remove geographical boundaries it would likely become very difficult to manage it. There is a reason why Americans can't vote for a UK Prime Minister ... it's not our business. Identifying a country as a boundary for voting rights establishes the idea that geographical boundaries are a reasonable boundaries on who one votes for. In that sense 'anyone voting for anyone' really is just anarchy. At the extreme we could see millions of representatives. Order would have to be introduced in the form of qualifications (language, age, citizenship), minimum popularity, criminal background checks, etc.. No one would want Charles Manson in office because 2 people voted for him. If you just take the top one who got the most votes, for each office, you're likely disenfranchising a lot of people.
250,000,000 people vote:
Candidate 1:21% votes
Candidate 2:20% votes
Candidate 3:20% votes
Candidate 4:20% votes
Candidate 5:19% votes
Candidate #1 wins and 79% of the population is dictated to by the will of 21% of the population. This is exactly what the American system is designed to prevent. The electoral college is a large part of those checks and balances. This also demonstrates why groups band together with a common agenda. If Candidates #3 and #4 are close-enough politically they could win if they combine their voting blocks.
The way the US was designed was to give the majority of power to the states. The state happens to be one of the basic boundary lines between representation. Local elections are run locally; governor, mayor, etc. Nobody wants a hick from the middle of nowhere in Texas to run San Francisco. No one wants a person from the hood in Chicago making decisions on how rural Minnesota prioritizes tax revenue. National elections are run nationally; president. No one really wants Vladimir Putin to be eligible for US president. Representatives and members of Congress are chosen to represent the state so the entire state gets to vote on them. Anyone in the state can run for any of the state offices. Anyone in the country can run for president.
Citizens have a very powerful voice in the political power structure. It just so happens that very few people really care enough to engage with it. In fact a lot of people think they don't have a say because they really don't understand how it all works. This is where political action committees (PACs) come in and wield a lot of power; controlling the narrative and the money.
The only qualifications there are for running for office are usually residency, age, and citizenship.
The bottom line is that it takes an engaged, voting, population to elect good representatives regardless of the system within you want to work. Plus, in the end, if you want to vote for California style politics ... move there. If you don't want to subject your daughter to abortion bans, move. If it's important enough people can, and do, move. It's a free country.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Wednesday August 17 2022, @01:43AM
Way to ignore the important part of that sentence. Obviously there's motive to band together - but why would you do so behind a corrupt tool when there's 200 other duly elected Reps from your party to choose from, and they're not a homogeneous block. If everyone picks the Rep they like best then the ones who espouse the most popular ideals are going to get more personal power, while the ones supporting fringe ideals will lack power, which means they will lack campaign funding (because who is going to funnel money to a candidate whose vote is so small it makes no difference), and will likely be replaced by a candidate with broader appeal the next time.
Even if the entire party still votes as a block, the ideals of that party will inevitably drift closer to the ideals of their supporters.
>This is the way our current system works for the most part.
No, it really doesn't. You can *only* vote for the Rep. from your district - almost certainly a choice between a mediocre (at best) candidate from "your" team, and an evil candidate from the other team. And if you vote for the losing candidate your vote is wasted and you may as well have stayed home that day. Yeah, you can do a write in, but unless there's massive support for them, that's just another way to waste your vote. Your vote only really matters if it was a close election, and you voted for the winning candidate.
Lets compare a couple scenarios for the 435 Representatives in the House:
Today:
- each is elected in one of 435 completely separate district-level elections. Virtually all of which are between a mediocre candidate from "your team" versus the "evil other".
- most elections are fairly close, meaning almost half the population wasted their vote on a losing candidate and get NO representation
- many/most people who voted for the winner did so because they were less bad than the alternative, so they're still not getting bad representation
- every Representative has exactly the same voting power, regardless of how (un)popular they are
Under Instant Runoff Direct Represenation
- you have ONE election with 435 winners.
- if your favorite candidate doesn't win, then your vote goes to your second favorite, or your third, or however far down your list you have to go before finding someone who won. Make sure to put one of the really popular "guaranteed to win" candidates from "your" team down at the bottom of your list, just in case no one better wins.
- *every* voter gives their support to the winning representative that they like best
- every Representative has voting power directly proportional to how popular they are
That last bit is important. Heck, you could let anyone who got at least one vote "win", and who cares if Charles Manson is in office with 2 votes? He only casts two votes out of ~300 million, he doesn't matter. The seat only has as much power as it's supporters give it (to avoid chaos you probably want only the few hundred most popular candidates to have procedural power, everyone else just votes)
And yes, that eliminates some of the regionality on a per-candidate level, which is why I said it's not well suited to institutions like the Senate that are supposed to represent regions. But for representing people - do you really think a California rancher will be better represented by someone with vast urban support whose district happened to include that ranch , rather than a Texan or Floridian whose platform is targeted at ranchers in their state? Or maybe even by a candidate specifically targeting *all* Californian ranchers, rather than the current situation where they have to target one districts ranchers, plus enough city folk to sway the election away.
Where pork is concerned, perhaps. But how about where making federal law is concerned? You know, a Reps primary job? And how popular will pork projects be when the Reps pus
hing them know it will likely cost them the voting power they're getting from out-of-state supporters?
(Score: 2) by ilPapa on Wednesday August 17 2022, @03:14AM
Same way we do now: signatures on a petition. If you can get enough people to sign a piece of paper saying they want you to be a candidate, you get to be a candidate.
The problem with direct representation is that it's a Republican nightmare. We've only had like one Republican presidential candidate get a majority of the votes in his first term since the 1980s or 90s. We are an overwhelmingly liberal country and it's only through locking down gerrymandered districts can Republicans ever hope to win an election outside of say, Wyoming.
We have one party that supports our system of being a democratic republic and one who does not. One party that supports getting the consent of the governed and one that does not. One party that craves compromise and one that craves a white christian nationalist authoritarian regime.
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by tizan on Tuesday August 16 2022, @10:34PM (2 children)
For democracy to grow...you need people to have time to be kept informed and educated and not kept poor and uneducated.
Let's take an example away from the US. Remember the Arab spring and Egypt specifically....Educated middle class lead a revolution...but could not sustain it
as the uneducated majority voted for a religious bigot who promptly removed an impartial judiciary etc....
Giving people the possibility to make a choice does not mean they won't put somebody that promptly remove that right.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday August 17 2022, @12:38AM (1 child)
Are you referring to Mohammed Morsi, or the US-backed general who took over in a coup and put Morsi in prison and immediately removed any semblance of democracy? The US and its allies were very clear all along that they did not want democracy in Egypt, and don't seem too keen on it in Libya, Syria, or Tunisia either.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by tizan on Friday August 19 2022, @08:52PM
Morsi promptly changed the constitution to make himself unremovable by any other means than a coup and disallow anything that is not islamists.
So if Morsi and company kept a democracy that could elect somebody in the future that is not an islamist government then may be the educated middle class (you those that control the news paper, the universities etc) would not have welcomed Sisi ...
This is no longer the days of Patrice Lumumba where the CIA removed a locally popular leader among the intelligensia
Remember places like South Africa has managed a sustain a democracy...just because the one elected however vile to some still respect the law that say they can be replaced in the next election