What would you think of the following radically altered voting scenario?
Once a year on the same day we hold a vote for the local assembly, with a blank ballot with nine or more lines (as per the Assembly's agreement prior to the election, but with nine being the minimum) on the ballot sheet. All persons eligible to vote would be classified as voter-candidates (i.e. every voter is a candidate by default). To vote, you write the nine (or more, according to the local assembly's agreement for that year) names on your ballot along with their voter number next to it (each person would be given a voter card with a distinct number on each, which he keeps for life). To find out the voter number of the person you intend to vote for, you could just look it up on-line. After all, it wouldn't be like a credidt card number, and would have no other use.
Unless you write the specific number of names, the ballot will be spoilt. Once everyone has voted, we add up all the names, and the nine (or more, according to local agreement) names that appear most frequently would form the membership of the new local assembly. No politiking either. That would be prohibited. So no campaign in other words. Also, to encourage minority representation, we could say that a tie goes to the visible minority candidate if their is one, otherwise we must vote again to break the tie. But with such large numbers of people, a tie would be highly unlikely.
To make it efficient, it could even all be done on a computer; you type in the names, so the counting is done automatically.
Then, nine days later, also every year, the members of the local assemblies would vote for the provincial government in the same way. And so on up the line to the federal government.
To pass a law, either five members of the assembly, or a majority, depending on which is the larger number of the two, must vote in favour of it. And any new law must be unanimously supported by all members publicly. If we end up with fewer than five members at some point in the year, owing to death, etc., then we must have a bi-election to refill the empty seats.
This would eliminate partisanship, politicking and campaings, ensure efficiency by reducing the number of legislators to nine or more at each level of government, encourage decentralization owing to the fact that local assembly members would vote for provincial governmenents that would be more responsive to their needs, and so on up the line, eliminate conflict between levels of government sinse one votes for the other anyway, bring representation down to the grassroots, and increase the chances of minorities being represented (after all, though there would be more caucasian voters, there would also be more caucasian candidates splitting the racial vote. Likewise, though there would be fewer non-caucasian voters, there would also be fewer non-caucasian candidates to split the vote).
What would you think of such a system?
Once a year on the same day we hold a vote for the local assembly, with a blank ballot with nine or more lines (as per the Assembly's agreement prior to the election, but with nine being the minimum) on the ballot sheet. All persons eligible to vote would be classified as voter-candidates (i.e. every voter is a candidate by default). To vote, you write the nine (or more, according to the local assembly's agreement for that year) names on your ballot along with their voter number next to it (each person would be given a voter card with a distinct number on each, which he keeps for life). To find out the voter number of the person you intend to vote for, you could just look it up on-line. After all, it wouldn't be like a credidt card number, and would have no other use.
Unless you write the specific number of names, the ballot will be spoilt. Once everyone has voted, we add up all the names, and the nine (or more, according to local agreement) names that appear most frequently would form the membership of the new local assembly. No politiking either. That would be prohibited. So no campaign in other words. Also, to encourage minority representation, we could say that a tie goes to the visible minority candidate if their is one, otherwise we must vote again to break the tie. But with such large numbers of people, a tie would be highly unlikely.
To make it efficient, it could even all be done on a computer; you type in the names, so the counting is done automatically.
Then, nine days later, also every year, the members of the local assemblies would vote for the provincial government in the same way. And so on up the line to the federal government.
To pass a law, either five members of the assembly, or a majority, depending on which is the larger number of the two, must vote in favour of it. And any new law must be unanimously supported by all members publicly. If we end up with fewer than five members at some point in the year, owing to death, etc., then we must have a bi-election to refill the empty seats.
This would eliminate partisanship, politicking and campaings, ensure efficiency by reducing the number of legislators to nine or more at each level of government, encourage decentralization owing to the fact that local assembly members would vote for provincial governmenents that would be more responsive to their needs, and so on up the line, eliminate conflict between levels of government sinse one votes for the other anyway, bring representation down to the grassroots, and increase the chances of minorities being represented (after all, though there would be more caucasian voters, there would also be more caucasian candidates splitting the racial vote. Likewise, though there would be fewer non-caucasian voters, there would also be fewer non-caucasian candidates to split the vote).
What would you think of such a system?
