7 ms·

I think it would still be a problem, but a lesser one. A loud minority can still influence a majority. But it's harder. The thing with direct democracy is th

I think it would still be a problem, but a lesser one. A loud minority can still influence a majority. But it's harder. The thing with direct democracy is that we'd really need to implement like a 20 hour work week to make it work. Everyone would need to find the time to get up to date on all of the issues. Or you'd end up with a minority of people who happen to know and care about each issue controlling that issue... which maybe that's okay, actually. It would be really interesting to see how a true direct democracy behaved at the government level. I've seen it work at the level of a workplace or a housing cooperative. And it does work, it's effortful, but it works. But I dunno if it's ever really been tried at the level of a government.

mprovost 5y ago
An option that Kim Stanley Robinson explored is his novels is a kind of draft/jury service model where voters are randomly selected to serve in government. Sometimes for a whole term, but you can also imagine something like jury service where a group is brought together to decide a single issue. They would have the time to hear both sides of the arguments, make a decision, and then disband.
- bobthepanda 5y ago
  This is actually how Athenian democracy worked. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy#Selection_by_lot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy#Selection...
  - watwut 5y ago
    Yes, but the citizens were only subset of population and the city was smaller then current states. It is quite possible that it would not scale to larger population and general voting rights.
    - bobthepanda 5y ago
      Sure, I was just addressing my parent comment's proposal and providing more context. I don't really care for it, although I will have to say it would probably work better in the case of opaque public bodies very few people vote for elections in (e.g. a local American school board)
oftenwrong 5y ago
There is a candidate for mayor in NYC that is running on a direct democracy platform: https://www.seidmanformayor.com/ https://www.seidmanformayor.com/
rrrrrrrrrrrryan 5y ago
Liquid Democracy is a quirky concept that would probably resolve the problem you're describing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_democracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_democracy
mikem170 5y ago
Could be that a lesser amount of people negotiate on an issue, which then gets voted on by everybody? I agree that the voters would need more time to learn about the issues they are voting on, but not everyone needs to be involved preparing an issue for a vote. Switzerland has a lot more democracy than any other western government that I know of. Switzerland is a federation of cantons, each averaging 300k people, each with it's own constitution and parliament, collecting its own taxes, administering its own health care, even entering into certain treaties with other countries, etc. Each canton is subdivided into municipalities, some as small as a few thousand people, that decide more local issues including police, schools, etc. Divide and conquer, so that people can decide things for themselves. The magic seems to be that the people, via referendum, can add and/or delete laws they don't like [0]. So they have representatives but the people have ultimate direct power over them. Higher levels of government are involved only where necessary, for issues involving multiple lower levels of government. Seems to work well for them. Many people seem to believe that government needs to be big to be effective. The opposite may be the case, as Leopold Khor convincingly argues [1], that "bigness" is the cause of many problems. [0] https://wolf-linder.ch/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Swiss-political-system.pdf https://wolf-linder.ch/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Swiss-poli... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaszpQaNwAU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaszpQaNwAU
- thaumasiotes 5y ago
  > The magic seems to be that the people, via referendum, can add and/or delete laws they don't like. This is also true of California; that's not the magic. I'd say identifying bigness as the problem is much more on target.
  - mikem170 5y ago
    The document on Switzerland said that at a federal level the ability of the people to remove laws forces representatives to proactively compromise with possibly offended groups of people before passing a law, knowing that enough signatures could force a vote to stricke any given law (I believe that a double majority is required to keep any a federal law, something about a majority of people in a majority of cantons). Similar powers exist at the local levels, also. I would think that this would tend to force issues that are not agreed upon down to a more local level, which doesn't sound like a bad thing. However I do not disagree with you that the scale California often operates at may be too large.
DylanDmitri 5y ago
I've wondered if you can get a system where groups of 20-30 people (so extended family, maybe a group of friends, parents at a school) appoint one of their members to research issues and vote on their behalf. I already do this by default, deferring on most local decisions to my friend who's really into politics.
- johncearls 5y ago
  You've just invented the Republic. At least that's the way it is supposed to work. My opinion is that the House should be increased by a factor of 100. Hard to bribe that many people.

mprovost 5y ago

An option that Kim Stanley Robinson explored is his novels is a kind of draft/jury service model where voters are randomly selected to serve in government. Sometimes for a whole term, but you can also imagine something like jury service where a group is brought together to decide a single issue. They would have the time to hear both sides of the arguments, make a decision, and then disband.

bobthepanda 5y ago
This is actually how Athenian democracy worked. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy#Selection_by_lot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy#Selection...
- watwut 5y ago
  Yes, but the citizens were only subset of population and the city was smaller then current states. It is quite possible that it would not scale to larger population and general voting rights.
  - bobthepanda 5y ago
    Sure, I was just addressing my parent comment's proposal and providing more context. I don't really care for it, although I will have to say it would probably work better in the case of opaque public bodies very few people vote for elections in (e.g. a local American school board)

oftenwrong 5y ago

There is a candidate for mayor in NYC that is running on a direct democracy platform: https://www.seidmanformayor.com/ https://www.seidmanformayor.com/

rrrrrrrrrrrryan 5y ago

Liquid Democracy is a quirky concept that would probably resolve the problem you're describing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_democracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_democracy

mikem170 5y ago

Could be that a lesser amount of people negotiate on an issue, which then gets voted on by everybody? I agree that the voters would need more time to learn about the issues they are voting on, but not everyone needs to be involved preparing an issue for a vote. Switzerland has a lot more democracy than any other western government that I know of. Switzerland is a federation of cantons, each averaging 300k people, each with it's own constitution and parliament, collecting its own taxes, administering its own health care, even entering into certain treaties with other countries, etc. Each canton is subdivided into municipalities, some as small as a few thousand people, that decide more local issues including police, schools, etc. Divide and conquer, so that people can decide things for themselves. The magic seems to be that the people, via referendum, can add and/or delete laws they don't like [0]. So they have representatives but the people have ultimate direct power over them. Higher levels of government are involved only where necessary, for issues involving multiple lower levels of government. Seems to work well for them. Many people seem to believe that government needs to be big to be effective. The opposite may be the case, as Leopold Khor convincingly argues [1], that "bigness" is the cause of many problems. [0] https://wolf-linder.ch/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Swiss-political-system.pdf https://wolf-linder.ch/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Swiss-poli... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaszpQaNwAU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaszpQaNwAU

thaumasiotes 5y ago
> The magic seems to be that the people, via referendum, can add and/or delete laws they don't like. This is also true of California; that's not the magic. I'd say identifying bigness as the problem is much more on target.
- mikem170 5y ago
  The document on Switzerland said that at a federal level the ability of the people to remove laws forces representatives to proactively compromise with possibly offended groups of people before passing a law, knowing that enough signatures could force a vote to stricke any given law (I believe that a double majority is required to keep any a federal law, something about a majority of people in a majority of cantons). Similar powers exist at the local levels, also. I would think that this would tend to force issues that are not agreed upon down to a more local level, which doesn't sound like a bad thing. However I do not disagree with you that the scale California often operates at may be too large.

DylanDmitri 5y ago

I've wondered if you can get a system where groups of 20-30 people (so extended family, maybe a group of friends, parents at a school) appoint one of their members to research issues and vote on their behalf. I already do this by default, deferring on most local decisions to my friend who's really into politics.

johncearls 5y ago
You've just invented the Republic. At least that's the way it is supposed to work. My opinion is that the House should be increased by a factor of 100. Hard to bribe that many people.