Hi everybody. Welcome to your local network for direct democracy. On this site we will be starting a new approach to politics where you determine the course of events which affect your life, not the people you elect, or some shadowy industrial force behind the scenes. Here, we will discuss our best approaches to managing our affairs together, and we will decide how we will conduct our campaign to regain control of the factors which make the difference to our prosperity, opportunity and the character of our lives.
Direct democracy is not a new idea. There have been countless attempts to try this, and it is not as straight forward as we might think. I'm concerned immediately at how I will avoid 'leading'! After all, we may all have access to the site, but I'm still the moderator. I can do plenty of things to make sure every voice is heard, but in the end, it will be my responsibility to see this is done, and what is to stop me from influencing the course of events?
I have 3 ideas on this:
BlocVote. I am partnering up with BlocVote who have more than 20 candidate or Councillor, or MP members, and the consensus of our input will curtail my instinct to set the agenda.
Polis - I am going to contact Polis who have conducted successful surveys for things like Uber and Air BNB to resolve conflict between these and traditional businesses which they threatened. Their style of consultancy seems appropriate to our needs, because they've figured out a method of gathering data in a way which does not prejudice it from the outset.
Forums. Any of us can begin a forum post. Getting debate started about anything from anybody at any time, ought to ensure that we remain an open platform.
I encourage you all to go and check out the partnerships I'm proposing and also to make suggestions on other initiatives we might try to keep us on the right course. When we've figured out the appropriate methods of working together and come to a consensus on these, we will be closer to writing ourselves a proper constitution. This can then be refined as we proceed.
A further suggestion I would make is that we appoint people from the community to oversee our work. The best way to ensure that I don't become a dictator is to put others in charge from the outset. So let's start a forum right here and let's call it 'Management'. The purpose of the management forum is to ensure that that there is never any management of any of the forums!
I hope that you will all participate on this site as fully as you are able. If I have to work alone, this will fail. If only a small group take an interest, this will fail. If a large group adopt it but we do not have a majority - it's pointless. realize that we will never have universal adoption of any political method, particularly if it involves work, but there are decisions which should never be taken without everybody. The more this becomes inclusive, the greater it's potential.
I'm just scratching the surface of what can be done on a site like this. It's important that I don't begin things too fast. I may have dozens of political ideas which I want to share but the first is the most important - all of us having equal control, not just over decisions, but of our focus of attention. Please join in, and be creative!
Speak soon.
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