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All political reforms must be considered in context. I only know the USA, so am unqualified to comment about the Welsh proposals. One folk (mis)understanding i

All political reforms must be considered in context. I only know the USA, so am unqualified to comment about the Welsh proposals. One folk (mis)understanding in the USA is that journalism will hold politicians to account. If that ever was the case, it's certainly not happening now. We need something to counterbalance misinformation. Lest we succumb to mob rule and thereby forfeit our democracy to tyranny. h/t Aristotle I'm completely fine with banning all political advertising. It serves zero purpose, is a net negative for society. Instead, candidates and parties would publish their agenda, platforms, proposed legislation, accomplishments, and misc critiques. They'd also have to focus on "the ground game", like doorbelling and townhalls. Most campaign spending is on advertising. So next we eliminate most fund raising. Just publicly finance campaigns. It's cheaper (for society) overall. Since > 2/3rds of a politician's time is spent fund raising, we just freed them up to do some actual legislating and governing. Woot. I also want to establish trusts (or equiv) for investigative reporting. Just give journalists money (stipends) and see what they come up with. Like todays bloggers and podcasters, but without the patreon links. Publishers, editors, and other journalists will then pick up and boost worthy reporting. And the larger trusts (for research and publishing) can underwrite expenses as needed. I'm bullish on innovations like Citizen Assemblies https://participedia.net/search?selectedCategory=all&query=citizen%20assembly https://participedia.net/search?selectedCategory=all&query=c... and Citizen Juries. They're slow, deliberative democracy. Antithical to today's public discourse. PS- At the end of the day, I support whatever reforms get our society to a multi-racial majoritarian democracy.

xyzzy_plugh 2y ago
While I agree with you, Citizen Assemblies and Citizen Juries have a big problem, which you mention, in that they can take substantial time to build sufficient momentum to take action and have impact. These things don't work if the coup has already transpired. Conversely endowing these bodies with the ability to act swiftly also brings significant risk. I'm not sure what to believe in here.
- specialist 2y ago
  Me neither. That said, policy work is already slow. A politic friend lobbys on behalf of working families. His org's very first legislative win was enacting modest praternity leave (IIRC). The smallest sliver of their agenda (basically a Nordic style safety net). It took EIGHTEEN YEARS. Similarly, in The Waxman Report, former Rep Henry Waxman relates the yeoman work of policy. Some of the reforms he worked on took THIRTY YEARS. In comparison, maybe Citizen Assemblies aren't so bad. It could be one of those counterintuitive "slow down to speed up" things. Back when I managed teams, I flipped most of our workflows to front load everything. Hash all the major stuff at a project's launch. Everyone HATED it. Absolutely HATED all the DISCUSSION. Let's just get to work. After ramming all my process crap down everyone's throat, my teams mostly ran themselves, always hit their deadlines, and made money. (And of course no one remembered all the initial strive.) Alas, the major downside of "continuous process improvement" is the apparent requirement of having a benevolent dictactor, enforcing empowerment and delegation. (Oh, the irony.) Backsliding is so, so easy. The impulse to gatekeep and concern troll must always be clamped down. Alas. To finish off, I'm with you. Seems like even if "more democracy" is the best answer, we've probably run out of time. Or maybe we need these ideas fleshed out, to have a plan ready, for the power vacuum resulting from tyranny's inevitable failure. I just don't know.

xyzzy_plugh 2y ago

While I agree with you, Citizen Assemblies and Citizen Juries have a big problem, which you mention, in that they can take substantial time to build sufficient momentum to take action and have impact. These things don't work if the coup has already transpired. Conversely endowing these bodies with the ability to act swiftly also brings significant risk. I'm not sure what to believe in here.

specialist 2y ago
Me neither. That said, policy work is already slow. A politic friend lobbys on behalf of working families. His org's very first legislative win was enacting modest praternity leave (IIRC). The smallest sliver of their agenda (basically a Nordic style safety net). It took EIGHTEEN YEARS. Similarly, in The Waxman Report, former Rep Henry Waxman relates the yeoman work of policy. Some of the reforms he worked on took THIRTY YEARS. In comparison, maybe Citizen Assemblies aren't so bad. It could be one of those counterintuitive "slow down to speed up" things. Back when I managed teams, I flipped most of our workflows to front load everything. Hash all the major stuff at a project's launch. Everyone HATED it. Absolutely HATED all the DISCUSSION. Let's just get to work. After ramming all my process crap down everyone's throat, my teams mostly ran themselves, always hit their deadlines, and made money. (And of course no one remembered all the initial strive.) Alas, the major downside of "continuous process improvement" is the apparent requirement of having a benevolent dictactor, enforcing empowerment and delegation. (Oh, the irony.) Backsliding is so, so easy. The impulse to gatekeep and concern troll must always be clamped down. Alas. To finish off, I'm with you. Seems like even if "more democracy" is the best answer, we've probably run out of time. Or maybe we need these ideas fleshed out, to have a plan ready, for the power vacuum resulting from tyranny's inevitable failure. I just don't know.