DISCUSSION: Models of democracy?

Ois varmaan hyvä, jos ihmiset sais keskustella näin merkittävästä aiheesta omalla äidinkielellään ja ns. luottamuksellisesti ilman, että vastauksia kopioitais didin slackiin, ellei ajatuksensa jakanut erikseen sano, että se on ok. Hyvä aihe sinänsä. :)

Greetings from Argentina. Some of you may know that I am here because of participation in groups following the teachings of an Argentine thinker known by the pen name Silo. Among other things, 24 years ago he wrote a document titled “The Statement of the Humanist Movement”. In it, he outlines societal ideas, including ideas about democracy. The Humanist Movement that he talks of, includes everyone who agrees on the ideas expressed in that document; the movement has no organisational form. There are organizations that have been formed to put in practice those ideas, but “the Humanist Movement” as a whole is simply all those who aspire to the ideas expressed in the Statement.

The entire Statement can be found in the sixth letter of the book Letters To My Friends: http://www.silo.net/en/collected_works/letters_to_my_friends

The relevant chapter of the Statement in relation to the issue of democracy reads:
“II. Real Democracy Versus Formal Democracy
The edifice of democracy has fallen into ruin as its foundations—the separation of powers, representative government, and respect for minorities—have been eroded.
The theoretical separation of powers has become nonsense. Even a cursory examination of the practices surrounding the origin and composition of the different powers reveals the intimate relationships that link them to each other. And things could hardly be otherwise, for they all form part of one same system. In nation after nation we see one branch gaining supremacy over the others, functions being usurped, corruption and irregularities surfacing—all corresponding to the changing global economic and political situation of each country.
As for representative government, since the extension of universal suffrage people have believed that only a single act is involved when they elect their representative and their representative carries out the mandate received. But as time has passed, people have come to see clearly that there are in fact two acts: a first in which the many elect the few, and a second in which those few betray the many, representing interests foreign to the mandate they received. And this corruption is fed within the political parties, now reduced to little more than a handful of leaders who are totally out of touch with the needs of the people. Through the party machinery, powerful interests finance candidates and then dictate the policies they must follow. This state of affairs reveals a profound crisis in the contemporary conception and implementation of representative democracy.
Humanists struggle to transform the practice of representative government, giving the highest priority to consulting the people directly through referenda, plebiscites, and direct election of candidates. However, in many countries there are still laws that subordinate independent candidates to political parties, or rather to political maneuvering and financial restrictions that prevent them from even reaching the ballot and the free expression of the will of the people.
Every constitution or law that prevents the full possibility of every citizen to elect and to be elected makes a mockery of real democracy, which is above all such legal restrictions. And in order for there to be true equality of opportunity, during elections the news media must be placed at the service of the people, providing all candidates with exactly the same opportunities to communicate with the people.
To address the problem that elected officials regularly fail to carry out their campaign promises, there is also a need to enact laws of political responsibility that will subject such officials to censure, revocation of powers, recall from office, and loss of immunity. The current alternative, under which parties or individuals who do not fulfill their campaign promises risk defeat in future elections, in practice does not hinder in the least the politicians’ second act—betraying the people they represent.
As for directly consulting the people on the most urgent issues, every day the possibilities to do so increase through the use of technology. This does not mean simply giving greater importance to easily manipulated opinion polls and surveys. What it does mean is to facilitate real participation and direct voting by means of today’s advanced computational and communications technologies.
In real democracy, all minorities must be provided with the protections that correspond to their right to representation, as well as all measures needed to advance in practice their full inclusion, participation, and development.
Today, minorities the world over who are the targets of xenophobia and discrimination make anguished pleas for recognition. It is the responsibility of humanists everywhere to bring this issue to the fore, leading the struggle to overcome such neo-fascism, whether overt or covert. In short, to struggle for the rights of minorities is to struggle for the rights of all human beings.
Under the coercion of centralized states—today no more than the unfeeling instruments of big capital—many countries with diverse populations subject entire provinces, regions, or autonomous groups to this same kind of discrimination. This must end through the adoption of federal forms of organization, through which real political power will return to the hands of these historical and cultural entities.
In sum, to give highest priority to the issues of capital and labor, real democracy, and decentralization of the apparatus of the State, is to set the political struggle on the path toward creating a new kind of society—a flexible society constantly changing in harmony with the changing needs of the people, who are now suffocated more each day by their dependence on an inhuman system. “

My interpretation of the answers that this proposal would appear to give to the concerns expressed in the debate on DiD:

Centralism: Problems:
-Does the concentration of power in the executive lead to authoritarianism?
-Is the model of an indivisible general will viable in a pluralistic and globalized society?
Answer: Laws of political responsibility are a necessity to prevent authoritarianism. All minorities must be provided with protections.

Liberal republicanism: Problems:
-Liberal politics rests on rules (“an empire of laws, not of men”.) Is a normative political order exclusionary in itself? (One could claim that e.g. property rights exclude the poor, reasoned deliberation favors the educated or one person, one vote benefits the working class.)
-Is a constitutional order too rigid to be inclusive or to prevent political deadlock? Alternatively, how to prevent tampering with the political system, if changing the constitution is easy?
Answer: A rigid empire of laws will be made flexible through federal forms of organization.

Anarchism: Problems:
-Does the lack of common power make common actions impossible?
-Does a lack of common decisions lead to prisoners’ dilemma-type situations? (It is in the individual interest to cheat or buy weapons, even if everybody could be better off by being honest or living in peace.)
-Does a lack of common power lead to collective action problems? (E.g. Why pay for public services, if somebody else will produce them?)
-Is the lack of a common government sufficient to stop tyranny, if there are power imbalances between individuals and groups? (Feudal barons, big corporations, power politics…)
Answer: To me, anarchism doesn’t mean the absence of common decisions or common power, but rather that common power grows out of real democracy instead of a formal democracy. Real democracy is an ideal of continuous dialogue and discovery. The Humanist Statement proposes a revolutionary process that leads towards real democracy.

Best wishes,
Juha

Meitsi on hämmentynyt idealisti. Seuraavissa lyriikoissa on mielestäni jotain oleellista ajattelumaailmastani (jos et ole kiinnostunut näin proosallisesta vastauksesta, hyppää lopun analyyttiseen binäärilistaan). Ois kiva, jos maailma ois kuten John Lennonin laulussa "Imagine" (kliseistä joo!):

"Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today... Aha-ah...

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace... You...

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world... You..."

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Mutta olen tietoinen, että maailma on täynnä julmia sotia, kuten Serj Tankian laulaa laulussaan "Occupied Tears":

"I forgot to bring you roses
When you hit the floor
You knew the poses
Asking for war
Have you forgot the wall?
I've foreseen it all
We've foreseen it all

Holocaust, you taste the great fear
How can you just occupy another child's tear?

Don't you all know?
Don't you all care?
Don't you all see how this isn't fair?
Are we all blind? Do we not see?
Do we not bleed?

The faint cries of lost limbs.
Mimes surrounded by mines.
Without warning signs of the great sacrifice."

---

Serj Tankian laulaa myös pelosta nationalismin lähteenä kappaleessa "Borders are".

"Borders are, the gallows
Of our collective national egos
Subjective, lines in sand
In the water separating everything
Fear is the cause of separation
Backed with illicit conversations
Procured by constant condemnations
National blood-painted persuasions
Here's my song, for the free
No, it's not about praise and publicity
Corprotocracy, what a hypocrisy
Aristocracy versus democracy"

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Lyhyesti sanottuna:

• olen pysyvää hiearkiaa vastaan (vastuun jako rotaatiolla ok)
• olen tasa-arvon puolesta
• olen teknokratiaa vastaan
• olen tavallisten ihmisten voimautumisen puolesta
• olen kabinettipolitiikkaa vastaan
• olen avoimuuden puolesta
• olen ekskluusiota vastaan
• olen inkluusion puolesta

Jos nuo määreet löytyy mallista, nimi on melko yhdentekevä.

@laurisnellman
kirjoitin omia ajatuksiani tästä aiheesta jo kesällä. Piti linkata tämä tänne heti kun näin, että aloitit keskustelun. En kuitenkaan löytänyt alkuperäistä ketjua.

Nyt löysin vihdoin sen - olin aloittanut sen tuolla Carpe Diem 25-alaryhmässä. Ketjun aloituksessa vertaillaan lyhyesti Heldin developmental vs protective jaottelua demokratiakäsityksissä:
Keskustelua erilaisista demokratiakäsityksistä ja demokratian tulevaisuudesta