On Wed, Oct 19, 2016 at 7:42 PM, Alexis Hunt <aler...@gmail.com <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','aler...@gmail.com');>> wrote:
> It has occurred to me that Agora is perhaps not the paragon of democracy > that it should strive to be. There are many examples of excellent > democracies out there, including the World's Greatest Democracy, with which > we are now all intimately familiar regardless of whether we'd like to be or > not. With that in mind, I'd like us to brainstorm some ideas that we could > have to improve our systems: > > - Elections should last 18 months, in case anything changes after the > first 17. > - Candidates should be able to run on tickets for different offices. In > the event of a tie, the tie should be resolved in such a way as to select > candidates from different tickets. > - One set of election rules is too much centralized power. We should > divide Agora into multiple segments, each with their own distinct rules for > election, which are all combined together at the end to pick the officers. > > Any others? > > Alexis > Yes. - People are not to be permitted to talk about themselves, only to say bad things about their opponent. Apologies are permissible so long as they are vague. I'll leave it to popular discretion whether this is to be a MUST or a SHOULD. - Bribery is of course to be banned. On the other hand, in the interests of free spech, campaign contributions are to be allowed, without limitation. This must of course include second-class persons, if we decide to bring them back. I don't see any way to make it anonymous, but if someone thinks of something... - In order to prevent fraud, we need stronger verification measures. Questionnaires, identity tests, everything. If some of our voters can't figure it out or pay the fees, that's too bad for them. On the other hand, if they can, the protections are too weak. Does anyone have a workable ID system we can borrow? I'm thinking public-key/private-key signatures on votes, but if someone can come up with something stronger... I'm sure there are more. Thoughts?
