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In my naive opinion, the least shitty modern political theory I've found so far is Murray Bookchin's scheme for municipalism, where it's an Athenian style, dece

In my naive opinion, the least shitty modern political theory I've found so far is Murray Bookchin's scheme for municipalism, where it's an Athenian style, decentralized democracy with horizontal instead of vertical power structures. The best part of this scheme is it can implemented within a state like Pakistan so these peasants can organize their own affairs with each other on a community basis for things like clean water or agriculture trading. People are hesitant to usher in a global power because nobody in the elite circles of such a power would bother listening to the concerns of the far removed people affected by their laws, it's more likely they would just implement ideology they think is best and become a prince ruling over a colony. If anybody knows of any universities with an active political theorist department or journal that isn't recycling 20th century ideology I'd be interested.

campground 9y ago
The thing is there is a global power structure now, it's just not accountable. This is always my problem with anarchism. There's never not a power structure. The difference is whether or not the power structure has been designed with people's individual rights as a core principle.
- nine_k 9y ago
  The idea is to build a power structure that resists turning into an absolutist pyramid. The classic liberal three branches of power is such a scheme, for instance. But it can be decentralized even more, see Switzerland.
StavrosK 9y ago
I've had an idea for a while, where you basically build a government as a service. The way you do it is this: 1) You create a non-profit organization and hire a few people. 2) You create a website where every law proposal that goes through parliament/congress/whatever is displayed on the website, and you give each citizen one vote on this website on each proposal. 3) Your people run for members of parliament in the next election. 4) Here's the kicker: You promise that all of your elected members of parliament will unanimously vote on each decision whatever the vote on the website was. If a majority of citizens voted yes on a law, your people will also all vote yes and (hopefully) pass it. 5) Citizens are incentivized to elect your MPs because they are basically direct democracy, transparent and accountable. 6) You explain each proposal in layman's terms, and how it will affect people, so they're more informed on how they vote. The good thing about this is that it's backwards-compatible with democracy and it's in the people's best interests to vote for your people. They do need to trust that you'll do what you say, but standard checks and balances apply there (you won't be elected next term if you don't). You also need to solve the electronic voting problem, which is hard, but this protocol is probably better than the one we have now where MPs vote based on lobbyists.
- zdragnar 9y ago
  We tried this with Pokemon on twitch and it didn't go so well.
  - StavrosK 9y ago
    Viewers there had more to gain by messing things up than by running them properly, though. Democracy works in the real world, just not very well. It mostly doesn't work on Twitch.
    - zdragnar 9y ago
      The groups who enjoy chaos on the internet frequently bleed over into the real world... there are no shortages of voting examples. A super quick google search brings up this[1] as a first result. Where I am, a very vocal minority are involved in politics. A small majority are dispassionately interested in the workings of the government, and only vote on things of particular interest to those individuals. The rest couldn't care less, because they assume their one lone voice won't make a difference. The internet (aka people) is why we can't have nice things, and will most certainly ruin this idea. 1: http://mentalfloss.com/article/52524/15-polls-hijacked-internet http://mentalfloss.com/article/52524/15-polls-hijacked-inter...
    - StavrosK 9y ago
      You would verify people's voting credentials and distribute secure keys, it wouldn't just allow anyone to sign up.
- rectang 9y ago
  My proposal: Our shiny new aircraft carrier shall be christened "Boaty McBoatface".
  - StavrosK 9y ago
    And our president shall be Donald Trump!

campground 9y ago

The thing is there is a global power structure now, it's just not accountable. This is always my problem with anarchism. There's never not a power structure. The difference is whether or not the power structure has been designed with people's individual rights as a core principle.

nine_k 9y ago
The idea is to build a power structure that resists turning into an absolutist pyramid. The classic liberal three branches of power is such a scheme, for instance. But it can be decentralized even more, see Switzerland.

StavrosK 9y ago

I've had an idea for a while, where you basically build a government as a service. The way you do it is this: 1) You create a non-profit organization and hire a few people. 2) You create a website where every law proposal that goes through parliament/congress/whatever is displayed on the website, and you give each citizen one vote on this website on each proposal. 3) Your people run for members of parliament in the next election. 4) Here's the kicker: You promise that all of your elected members of parliament will unanimously vote on each decision whatever the vote on the website was. If a majority of citizens voted yes on a law, your people will also all vote yes and (hopefully) pass it. 5) Citizens are incentivized to elect your MPs because they are basically direct democracy, transparent and accountable. 6) You explain each proposal in layman's terms, and how it will affect people, so they're more informed on how they vote. The good thing about this is that it's backwards-compatible with democracy and it's in the people's best interests to vote for your people. They do need to trust that you'll do what you say, but standard checks and balances apply there (you won't be elected next term if you don't). You also need to solve the electronic voting problem, which is hard, but this protocol is probably better than the one we have now where MPs vote based on lobbyists.

zdragnar 9y ago
We tried this with Pokemon on twitch and it didn't go so well.
- StavrosK 9y ago
  Viewers there had more to gain by messing things up than by running them properly, though. Democracy works in the real world, just not very well. It mostly doesn't work on Twitch.
  - zdragnar 9y ago
    The groups who enjoy chaos on the internet frequently bleed over into the real world... there are no shortages of voting examples. A super quick google search brings up this[1] as a first result. Where I am, a very vocal minority are involved in politics. A small majority are dispassionately interested in the workings of the government, and only vote on things of particular interest to those individuals. The rest couldn't care less, because they assume their one lone voice won't make a difference. The internet (aka people) is why we can't have nice things, and will most certainly ruin this idea. 1: http://mentalfloss.com/article/52524/15-polls-hijacked-internet http://mentalfloss.com/article/52524/15-polls-hijacked-inter...
  - StavrosK 9y ago
    You would verify people's voting credentials and distribute secure keys, it wouldn't just allow anyone to sign up.
rectang 9y ago
My proposal: Our shiny new aircraft carrier shall be christened "Boaty McBoatface".
- StavrosK 9y ago
  And our president shall be Donald Trump!