At 05:43 PM 3/25/2007, Juho wrote: >I don't believe there would be one single method and >formal procedures that would be best for all environments.
Right. It is not being proposed that FA/DP is for every organizational type, merely that it is an interesting tool that could rapidly transform society. Maybe. If tried. As noted, a government *can't* be a Free Association, as we use the term. It is an oxymoron. FAs don't exercise sovereignty. A government *can*, theoretically, use Delegable Proxy, and we are quite interested in that, but consider it foolish to promote it at this time because of the utter lack of experience with DP, the Demoex situation being too short of duration and too problematic for other reasons. But there is no reason to wait for experience for trying FA/DP. All it takes is an organizational opportunity. At this point, I'm mostly publicizing the concept, so that somewhere, someplace, someone will have the understanding to try it when the opportunity presents. In addition, we have started a number of pilot projects, but none of them have attracted sufficient support to even test the concept, beyond a few indications. I know personally the value of assigning a proxy, because I've done it and it works for me in many ways, and I've only begun to rely on it, just a little. > (This >applies also to many other discussions on this mailing list on the >relative merits of different voting methods and discussions on "which >one is best".) To me it seems obvious that FAs and legislative >processes need different parameters, the expected behaviour of voters/ >members is different etc. Often concrete examples of the intended >environment help me in understanding what cases the discussed >theoretical concept are expected to cover. Proxies can be used in >many different ways, as this stream of discussion proves. Sure. I do suggest that we keep in mind a basic concept of the proxy, which is someone who exercises a right that the principal could exercise if present (and competent), having been freely assigned that responsibility by the principal, and subject to the continued consent of the principal. As described, Trees by Proxy so constrains the citizens that some of this is lost, though it is unclear to me that these constraints are essentials of the system, but rather seem to me to be artifacts of the theoretician's additional opinions. For example, if we imagine Trees by Proxy as proposed by Ketchum, and then we add to it the following provisions: (1) Voters may vote directly at any assembly by showing up and voting, technical constraints permitting. This presence does not, in itself, give them other participation rights. (2) Proxy assignments can be revoked at any time by notice to the affected bodies by the principal. These changes would bring the proxies into conformance with the basic concept I've described, and it is not clear to me that they would alter the basic function of Trees by Proxy, except to make it more democratic and free. In considering these matters, one thing has become clear to me, that there are two sources of power and function. Voting rights come from the citizen and depend totally upon the continued consent of the citizen, who can substitute his own vote as desired (where practical, and generally it could be made practical), but "floor rights" are granted by a deliberative body, according to its rules. Floor rights might depend, provisionally, on, say, the number of proxies held, but they need not be restricted to this, and, in particular, an assembly could continue the floor rights of a member for a time even if the member loses proxies to fall below an established threshold. There is no harm in this; the *voting power* of the member is reduced. Similarly, an assembly might delay the admission of a new member based on number of proxies held having reached the threshold. It's all about what the *assembly* decides. And with proxy voting as the norm and direct voting allowed, it would seem that we would have the best aspects of direct democracy and representative democracy combined. ---- election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
