I second Hans, it is essential that we start our thinking by asking the right question, questions with a critical edge and without presumptions.
Eric On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 8:22 AM Klein, Hans K <[email protected]> wrote: > Well, I would propose a softer version of the posting below. > > As currently practiced, liberation technology and its policy partner, > democracy promotion, build on an implicit and overly-simple model of > democracy. It involves catalyzing large public protests that destabilize > governments. > > The model supposes that destabilization is followed by "democracy", but in > fact destabilization is more often followed by chaos, civil war, and > foreign intervention. > > Libya had a brief democratic moment, but now it has a civil war; so far > the list of interveners includes France, Italy, US, Turkey, and Russia. > Syria had its moment, but then came foreign intervention in the form of > various radical mercenaries backed by Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and even the > US. Ukraine had its big demonstrations, but the people in the Maidan were > then given a government hand-picked by foreign powers (See: BBC [ > https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26079957 ], Consortium News [ > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGq_Xvzn_3I ] .) In every case, the > people (the "demos") of the country came out as the loser. > > What is a more effective model of democracy promotion? I think it is one > based on organic growth in the society. Political development takes time; > the clock speed may be measured in human generations. The successful model > requires patient nurturing and no threatening or attacking. The terrible > democracy recession that we have seen in the last 10 years is in large part > a reaction to outsiders seeing democracy as an act of "liberation", i.e. as > a rapid and kinetic process that can deliver immediate results. > > In each case, we can ask what is worse: the problem or the cure? > Syria: Assad or the civil war > Libya: Ghaddafi or the civil war > Ukraine: Yanukovych or the civil war > (You can pose the same question of Iraq and Afghanistan...) > > A useful question would be: given the learning that (hopefully) has taken > place, what could we at LiberationTech do to *effectively* promote > democracy? > > Hans Klein > School of Public Policy > Georgia Tech > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: LT [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of > grarpamp > Sent: Tuesday, May 26, 2020 6:32 AM > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [liberationtech] What could we at Liberationtech do to help > pro-democracy HK activists protest China's new security law? > > > What could we ... do to help pro-democracy ... activists ... > > do things that have not been done in the past. > > Stop teaching them that they can somehow break free from whatever shithole > government they're under now by claiming democracy is some magical font of > freedom worth aspiring to. It's not, at all. It's just another form of same > slavery, force, murder, trickery, theft, war, false authority... > Spread out, infused, diluted, harder to see and kill than their average > dictator, by design... a ruse, a ploy, a trap for confusing the sheeple. > And it worked. > "B-ah-ah-ah" they all said, "oh please give us that" they begged, while > scrambling over each other in queues hundreds deep to cast discard their > own fates down some worthless memehole in a box... a final act of spiritual > suicide transformed into one of joy by the programming of the wolves that > still rule over all of them. > > Regarding "government", there is only one thing that hasn't been done in > the past. > > -- > Liberationtech is public & archives are searchable from any major > commercial search engine. Violations of list guidelines will get you > moderated: https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/lt. Unsubscribe, > change to digest mode, or change password by emailing > [email protected]. > -- > Liberationtech is public & archives are searchable from any major > commercial search engine. Violations of list guidelines will get you > moderated: https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/lt. Unsubscribe, > change to digest mode, or change password by emailing > [email protected].
-- Liberationtech is public & archives are searchable from any major commercial search engine. Violations of list guidelines will get you moderated: https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/lt. Unsubscribe, change to digest mode, or change password by emailing [email protected].
