Direct Democracy

The corporate reference is interesting.

This isn't the place to get into the pros/cons of the corporation as a 'person' however, it can be used to illustrate a point.

Lets say that tomorrow 85% of Canadians believe that the corporation as a 'person' doesn't align with the long-term best interests of their society. So, what happens?

Well, today nothing because they have no power beyond bitching and moaning. A political party needs to take up their cause.

Is a so-called right wing or centrist party going to do this? Well probably not, just can't see old Steve or Paul being too interested in pursuing the matter. The best Canadians could hope for is a vague generalisation in the party platform as to 'looking into this matter that is of concern to many Canadians'. Of course, nothing would ever end up being done.

So, let's say a so-called left wing party makes this a plank in their platform. Well, then you've got the problem of choosing whether that plank is enough to make you vote for a party that may have nine other planks you see as 'pie in the sky', whatever. So, we probably don't have a lot of hope from that direction.

But, say this becomes a real issue across Canada. At some point the politicos will piously state it's a matter for the courts, after which it will get tied up there for ten or twenty years while high paid lawyers argue precedents from Roman law forward that support the notion as the corporation as a 'person' in front of politically appointed judges who will probably see the exercise as an annoying nuisance that just reduces the time they can spend caring for their (shareholder) investment portfolios.

While this is happening, corporations will, among other strategies, relentlessly bombard the public with propaganda showing the 'good' they are doing for one and all, intermixed with dire warnings concerning the destruction of our economy and all that is good in the world and potential veiled threats from a southerly direction.

So, I'd guess the chance of any change in this regard within our current structure to be slim to none.

In a DD society, the 85% would get to vote on an initiative raised by Reverend Blair, and corporations would no longer be 'people' in Canada.

But will anybody with an issue be able to raise it all willy-nilly like that? Wouldn't I more likely have to start a campaign to get people on board? Wouldn't I most likely try to recruit special interest groups with the organisation and infrastructure to produce results? Wouldn't my opposition do the same?

See what I mean? Without a mechanism to prevent it, we end up back in the same place. I know there has to be way around that, but to just assume that it will happen automatically would be a mistake.

I was mainly trying to demonstrate a situation where DD might offer a light at the end of the tunnel that not, realistically speaking, present in the current structure.

We know that a mechanism citizens can use to raise initiatives is required. The nuts and bolts, e.g., number of signatories, etc., involved in raising an initiative are of course open to discussion.

Objective third parties, e.g., public servants, can analyse the initiative, gather the facts and present these, the options, pro/cons and source of the initiative to citizens. Citizens will make their decisions based on the information they receive.

The initiative process is not always going to be simple yes/no questions. Getting back to global warming, for example, you might first need to present the facts re: global warming to Canadian and elicit their opinion as to whether based on known facts an issue exists that Canada sould be acting on. For Canadians who believe action is required, options of what that action should be could also be included.

Given the above, is the type of campaign often seen south of the border from pro/con sides, e.g., 'vote yes for proposition 55', 'vote no to proposition 55', necessary or desirable, given that one or both sides may not be presenting the fully story or an objective version thereof.

I wouldn't necessarily see the DD citizen initiative process as involving, or allowing, the type of massive advertising campaigns that arise in respect of some US propositions. Basically, you have the question, you have the facts, you don't need anyone trying to 'sell' you on either side.

Again, the above are just very high level suggestions of how things potentially could work. A lot of blanks remain to be filled in.

I don't assume anything will occur automatically. Again, significant thought, discussion and planning is required to create the DD structure. It won't happen overnight.