How to reform the electoral system

[TomG]

The problems of modern mass nation state democratic republics were expressed above. It’s easy enough to conclude that representative democracy doesn’t work in mass anonymous societies. Perhaps democracy doesn’t work. I certainly share doubts about the effectiveness of electors, as individuals, to express a coherent popular will and the ability of a system of representatives to implement a popular will. I abhor elitism and privilege and I also resent a need to spend a major part of my life organizing to protect my interests.

Perhaps some remedy is available through electoral reform, but some political theorists think that representative democracy does not describe how modern society actually works. A theory of pluralism, or some other model, may better describe social behaviour. The links below are about pluralism. I haven’t read such subjects in depth in a long time. Perhaps there are better ideas.

One basic idea in pluralism is that the ‘basic good’ isn’t given a priori. The basic good is determined by negotiation, An implication is that individuals as electors can’t negotiate, so organized interest groups perform the task. If such thinking is realistic then elections seem largely irrelevant except perhaps as a kind of reality check. And then, electoral reform would seem beside the point. The military coup is a reality check enjoyed in much of the world, and I’d just as soon avoid that enjoyment myself. Perhaps the task is more to figure out how to make a pluralistic model work to provide acceptable protection for the interests of all members of society. I don’t feel such protection is now present.

One idea that is almost axiomatic in political studies is that a people who want to live together will find a way to do so almost without regard to any system of governance. And, also the converse that no system of voluntary governance will enable people to live together who do not want to do so. The implication of these ideas is that a nation-state must start with a people who want to live together (overwhelmingly share a set of values). If that prerequisite is present, then institutional forms and constitutional forms are not very important, and tinkering with these forms will not produce fundamental reform.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluralism_%28political_theory%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluralism_%28political_philosophy%29

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perfectionism-moral/

 

[jimmoyer]

As another sidebar to this ongoing analysis of structure and organization,
I'd like to contribute another idea concerning our abhorrence of elitism and privilege
and crony-ism.

It's a simple fact of life that we are all hypocrites abhoring what others do and
not seeing the same in ourselves.

It's a simple fact that we will all help our friends first and strangers get low priority.

It's a simple fact that we will help those similar to our own culture and station as well.

Also it's a simple fact that there are no experts or elite specialists that are impartial
to an issue, that all those most knowledgeable also are liable to conflict of interest and
have some personal gain to be had. I wonder if the ignorant outsider less experienced
and knowledgeable will do any better for the public interest ???

Let's dispense with this boring righteous indignation.

Let's look a little closer at these matters.

 

[L Gilbert]

Hmmmm. Thought this was about what would be a better electoral system.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

In theory perhaps. Being 'answerable' implies being under some authority. However in practice the PMO has authority to dictate to Parliament.

Being answerable means being answerable. There is no fuzzy line here, when Parliment votes non-confidence in the government the PMO is gone. The PMO only exists to serve a leader established by Parliment. We don't elect a PMO we elect a Parliment, it's our democracy. Like I said you're not suggesting reform, you're advocating revolution.

Nobody is proposing that. Check the thread.

Yes you are, your exact words were a "small group of elites" being in power. That's a hell of a lot less democractic than what we have now. And considering the Prime Ministers(Harper) Office that you keep harping on is one of the most right-wing in our history, what you're talking about is fascism. I'm sure there's people who would like to have old Harpo as the Supreme Leader of New Canada, but I'm not one of them.

 

[jimmoyer]

LOL !!

It's still germane. Because isn't the electoral system all about trying to get
better people in office ?

What ensures that ?

 

[L Gilbert]

Apparently nothing we have in NorthAm, unfortunately.

 

[Cobalt_Kid]

This is just the NEW RISE of FASCISM as far as I'm concerned. This is the same debate many countries went through in the 1920s and 30s.

The simpleminded among us at that time decided that democracies were just too messy and disorderly and needed to be replaced with nice neat dictatorships where the trains ran on time and people thought the things they were supposed to think. Oh, and let's get rid of the religions we don't like and trade organizations and political parties because they keep us from having our nice neat perfect little world.

And hey, when it comes time to face down those messy democracies who didn't follow our divine lead we're going to kick their ass.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but very few of those nice orderly efficient dictatorships survived their collisions with democracies. I think what we have is the best there is, even if some infantile minds fail to understand it's true power.

 

[jimmoyer]

All this tedious tinkering of THE SYSTEM usually begets more unintended loopholes
down the road.

Some of you want your politicians to be "more answerable".

Hmmm...

Do we want that ?

Answerable to what segment of the voters ?

Perhaps the age old dilemna that defies any tinkering with any democratic system
is the choice our politicians must make : To lead ? OR to represent their constituency ?

Which is it?

Either could be bad or good.

And do you tie the politicians hands by NOT allowing them to LEAD YOU, by forcing
them to follow YOU and your wishes ?

 

[atlanticaparty]

This is just the NEW RISE of FASCISM as far as I'm concerned. This is the same debate many countries went through in the 1920s and 30s.

The simpleminded among us at that time decided that democracies were just too messy and disorderly and needed to be replaced with nice neat dictatorships where the trains ran on time and people thought the things they were supposed to think. Oh, and let's get rid of the religions we don't like and trade organizations and political parties because they keep us from having our nice neat perfect little world.

And hey, when it comes time to face down those messy democracies who didn't follow our divine lead we're going to kick their ass.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but very few of those nice orderly efficient dictatorships survived their collisions with democracies. I think what we have is the best there is, even if some infantile minds fail to understand it's true power.

Any luck with the website?

 

[TomG]

Morning all:

Since republics require governance based on popular consent and hold electors to be the supreme authority, political leadership in a republic would seem to require an overwhelming supply of willing followers. Such a supply of willing followers would seem to require a very high degree of shared values among most members of a society. Leadership in a republic seems inherently messy. If leadership requires more than a low level of coercion, why bother with the messy structures of representative democracy at all. Many of the world’s truly repressive dictatorships call themselves democratic republics (elections are held). Window dressing abounds in modern times.

If a society really can’t function without coersive leadership, why not just adopt a form of governance found in ancient Greece. Citizens couldn’t manage their own affairs so they accepted the rule of those who were called tyrants. Some tyrants delivered some of the best government known in the history of western civilization. Some delivered terrible government. Luck of the draw I guess.

The problem of leadership under republican governance might be cast in terms of I. Berlin’s two freedoms (I know I’m obscure as usual but I just build rough ideas here. I do chose to work some at ideas though. Nobody has to read). Berlin’s two freedoms are negative (the freedom from things) and positive (the freedom to become things). The implications of Berlin’s freedoms here are that if I perceive my personal freedom as negative freedoms I don’t need leadership. I want to be governed by a set of principles implemented as law. The law restricts my behaviour but also may protect me from the behaviour of others that I do not wish to experience. I need only the law and some system of representation to maintain the law on accordance with perhaps constitutional provisions.

However, if I want to become something I’m not at present--famous, prosperous, a brain surgeon, rocket scientist, or member of some utopia in fashion then I’d likely find that other people’s negative freedoms get in the way of my positive ones. I’d need a system to bulldoze my path to some positive freedom goal. To achieve my positive freedom, I’d need leadership, and possibly coercive leadership. NB that some later writers consider Berlin’s distinction artificial and conclude that there is only one basis for freedom.

My ramble is obscure ill formed and arcane. It might be interesting though to consider if the war on terrorism is supposed to prevent terrorist behaviour (negative freedom) or deliver a society to lives that are free from terror (positive freedom). It is perhaps obvious that excessive emphasis on negative freedoms leads to bureaucracy while excessive emphasis on positive freedom may lead to totalitarianism.

For electoral reform I might favour an aggressive form of proportional representation. Such systems are supposed to promote unstable coalition governments and frequent elections. Sounds like a good deal to me.

 

[jimmoyer]

Since republics require governance based on popular consent and hold electors to be the supreme authority, political leadership in a republic would seem to require an overwhelming supply of willing followers.

Such a supply of willing followers would seem to require a very high degree of shared values among most members of a society.
------------------------------------------------TomG--------------------------------------

Excellent post.

Keep up the musings and ramblings.

Those beginning statements of your post were worth repeating.

For all the angry emotions that attend differences of opinion in the North American
societies, we do have what you call a very high degree of shared values --- and a unity
in consent despite the arguments.

That's the big picture.

And that should be the backdrop and perspective to all these suggested changes
and tweaking of THE SYSTEM.

It leads again to the idea that CULTURE is the determiner, not the structure of government,
not the leaders, that move major changes.

 

[darkbeaver]

atlantica: must be understood and contested

Proponents of Atlantica assert that the region is held back by “policy distress” factors: our minimum wages are too high, we have too many unionized workers and too many social programs and public services.

​

​

>by John Jacobs
March 1, 2007
It is likely that few Atlantic Canadians would argue against the potential benefits of improving trade ties with our New England neighbours. So the controversy surrounding proposals for an “Atlantica” trade zone spanning Atlantic Canada and northern New England may come as a surprise.
A study released last week by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA), however, argues that concerns about Atlantica are justified. Atlantica: Myths and Reality concludes that the economic initiative would damage the region's social and economic prospects.
The report by lead author Scott Sinclair and me, finds that the Atlantica initiative is not primarily about enhancing trade between the New England states and the Atlantic provinces. Our study examines the two main themes that are stressed repeatedly by Atlantica proponents: a proposed Atlantica transport corridor and a parallel energy export corridor.
According to the transportation corridor plan, container ships too large to pass through the Panama Canal would sail to Halifax via the Suez Canal and the Asian goods would then be trucked across the region to markets in the U.S. Midwest.
Our report shows that the development of this corridor for “truck-trains” (huge transport trucks with two or more trailers) would have few economic benefits for the rest of the Atlantic region. The corridor highways would absorb public spending that could otherwise be used to support more diversified infrastructure throughout the region. Increased heavy-truck traffic would make the region's roads less safe and harm the environment. Action to curb global warming through more sustainable transportation networks could turn investments in the planned corridor into a white elephant.
The Atlantica corridor agenda also faces serious practical obstacles, such as the U.S.'s national security concerns, plans to expand the Panama Canal that would diminish the attractiveness of Halifax as a port for Asian cargo, and a sky-high U.S. trade deficit that could also curtail its appetite for foreign goods.
Our study argues that Atlantica's emphasis on energy exports to the U.S. doesn't pay enough attention to Atlantic Canada's own energy security, whether the public is getting a fair share of revenues from these publicly owned resources, or negative environmental effects. It also takes issue with Atlantica's deregulation agenda that targets minimum wage legislation, the “high” level of unionization, and the region's public services.
In response to these criticisms, Atlantica's main promoter, the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS) appeared to back-pedal. It argued that the controversial transportation corridor was only “one tiny piece of a very large puzzle,” and downplayed its importance to the overall Atlantica strategy.
Perhaps some clarification is in order: What exactly is Atlantica?
That can be hard to tell. When confronted with serious critiques of controversial Atlantica proposals, such as the truck-train corridor, proponents shift to their fall-back position: Atlantica is just about neighbours trying to get along and improve trade opportunities. Recent media responses to our paper by Charles Cirtwill, acting president of AIMS provide an example of this.
Cirtwill claims that “Atlantica … is actually an exercise in mental geography that ties together the American northeast with most of the Atlantic region and a portion of Quebec.” This sounds, well, interesting, albeit somewhat vague. Cirtwill's comment that the Atlantica “region has a lot of things in common and by really working together we can take advantage of a wide range of opportunities,” doesn't really clarify matters, but it works as a public relations exercise — who is going to argue with the basic sentiment of neighbourly co-operation and trade?
Perhaps it's best to go to the source, the AIMS website and the provocative arguments for the Atlantica agenda put forward by its president Brian Lee Crowley. The AIMS president laid out the Atlantica “action plan” in his address to the Atlantic Provinces Chambers of Commerce conference last summer. He focused on the need to develop the transportation corridor. While noting that the corridor may provide some opportunities for export of locally produced goods, Crowley dismissed the importance of trade within the region.
According to the AIMS website, Crowley stresses that Atlantica is “not about the trade between New Brunswick and the northeastern United States, it's about Asia and the North American heartland.” Moving Asian goods on transports trucks via Halifax through Atlantic Canada to the central U.S. is an often repeated theme in various AIMS reports and submissions to governments.
It is difficult to separate out the ideological baggage of AIMS from the overall general Atlantica agenda being promoted by various business interests. The Atlantica website hosted by AIMS has no hesitation regarding its market fundamentalist views. It asserts that the region is held back by “policy distress” factors: our minimum wages are too high, we have too many unionized workers and too many social programs and public services.
Cirtwill claims that “You can't cherry-pick which part [of Atlantica] you want to have, you have to have all of it.” This seems to be saying that to enhance trade, we have no choice but to accept truck-trains on our highways, the draining of the region's energy resources, the environmental costs, the decreased public services, more unprotected workers, and lower minimum wages. These are serious issues that will affect citizens on both sides of the border.
According to our paper, “without a frank and open public debate, the Atlantica scheme could do serious harm. As a policy concept, therefore, it must be understood and contested.”
My hope is that our study helps open up a public debate that has to-date been confined to the likes of $600 Chamber of Commerce conferences.
John Jacobs is director of the Nova Scotia office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. He co-authored with Scott Sinclair of Atlantica: Myths and Reality. A version of this commentary was originally published in The Chronicle Herald.

http://www.rabble.ca/news.shtml

 

[TomG]

Electoral reform: how is it that I am represented?

Tuesday morning I drove a short distance from where we live and walked a bush road to a place I know where I could snowshoe into a large marsh, go across the marsh and up a small unnamed stream to what somebody I know calls the pagosphone. It’s an overhanging rock-face that the stream runs over to form a curtain of ice-sickles from top to ground. The ice-sickles are in varying lengths and diameters. They make a tone when tapped. Something vaguely like melodies can be played.

I didn’t make it all the way to the pagosphone since I was solo and there was nobody to spell me in breaking the trail. The trail was of course easier on the way back. After I was out of the marsh I stopped in the middle of a trans-continental gas pipeline the bush road crosses to check if I had cell phone contact yet (it’s a bargain I make with my wife who isn’t too fond of my solo trips in the bush). As I glanced up from the phone, I saw a wolf standing 20-30 yards from me. The wolf looked at me and I at the wolf. I could see its eyes and the detail and shag of its coat. Neither of us moved. I say idiotic things aloud like ‘Hi wolf, how you doing ya little charmer.’ I held a magic moment for myself for maybe 30 seconds as the wolf and I witnessed each other as equals. Finally the wolf turned and moved away a few yards before again giving me a profile and checking out what I was doing. It finally moved over a hill in the lope that I know it could keep up all day.

The wolf and I met as equals in the bush and we parted as equals—neither the wolf nor I seemed to experience fear, propriety or aggression. It was the sort of experience that can be had occasionally l where I live. To me these occasional experiences are the wealth that is available to me--riches beyond value, greater than any price that could be set. Such experiences are riches that are available to me or anybody who makes the effort to find them.

I have other tales to tell, but the wolf was particularly important to me since it took place over a gas pipe line and beside post-logged bush. The setting is the very symbol of how value is exported from the land where I experience my riches. As the wolf and I had our moment, countless cubic feet of gas rushed beneath us on its way to market. Exported for the benefit of persons who have no relationship with the land other than its economic value, and value that is exported that never returns to where it was taken. My experiences do not detract from the land, but the land that is experienced for its economic value eventually disappears.

How am I represented in this lazy sort of democracy called pluralism (representation by interest groups--if that is what we have). Pluralism as we know it tends to reduce interests to a common denominator of economic value. The importance of everything represented by the system is measured by its economic value. How is it that people are represented at all if we actors in our system are reduced to cardboard cutout profiles that can be called economic value? What is the relevance of electoral reform when we electors must be only production units and hide our humanity from the system if we wish to be represented—if that is a fair assessment?

Eventually I know that I must fight in some way more than I do now for both myself and the wolf. I will do so even though I no doubt retained the wolf’s interest only until it figured out that I wasn’t old, sick and about to fall down. I must fight because neither of us is represented in a system that requires us to have a price tag affixed to our foreheads. The wolf and I parted as equals, but there is no equality to be had in price tags. Too much value sticks to the fingers of those who apply the tags. I already know that electoral reform will not be my fight. I will fight for the wolf though because my life without it is diminished.

The pagosphone too has value in its own right. I played it last year. It will retain its value only if the people who know it don’t tell anybody where it is. Things of genuine value must be hidden least they be fed to the maws of global capitalism to the benefit of only those who apply price tags. How will the system of representation survive if things of value must be hidden—if culture must be priced?

 

[jimmoyer]

Great story on that pagosphone, TomG.

I'd like to respond more on that later.

But

For now ?

You want to know how you're represented ???

I don't necessarily want our politicians to "represent" us.

I want them to figure things out the best way --- the greatest good for the greatest number of
people.

We voters, we electors are too parochial, too narrow minded, self-centered or we are
too self righteous, too ignorant.

This is division of labor, man.

We hired them to do a job.

A job we don't do.

 

[TomG]

How then am I represented?

My question is a little hard to dismiss while remaining within the fabric of Western Culture. We’ve accumulating common experience for a long time now starting from the days when the people were rules by gods and existed only for the amusement of gods. We collected experience through the times when individuals were cogs in the Chain of Being and ruled by the divine right of monarchs--to serve the greater glory of god. Individuals gained status and finally emerged full bloom in the philosophy of individualism formed during the Renaissance and Age of Enlightenment. The individual emerged in their own right, possessing inherent worth, and governance by and for themselves or by their representatives. Individuals and their worth were the sole rationale for the existence of governments that posses coercive power to enforce approved behaviour. It was an astounding idea that produced a tidal wave that swept old-style monarchies aside.

The social contract of JS Mill defined the arrangement and various national constitutions codified it. Governments serve the greater good of individuals collectively and monopolize the legitimate use of coercive force to achieve the greater good. Individuals agree to government’s monopoly and the implied limits to their behaviours provided they are able to act to govern themselves or are adequately represented. Under the contract, I cannot be denied my question ‘How am I represented?’ without leaving the social contract in tatters. Since government monopolizes governance, who else is there to ask?

I am aware that representation might be contracted out and I did mention what I called the lazy democracy of pluralism (where I would be reduced to a undefined set of interests and might as well be known as consumer man). I am aware that some variation of the electorate as employers of politicians metaphor might serve as a contracting out of representation. However, I think the idea deserves careful thought. If politicians do not represent us, then how would their job descriptions be written; how would a collective electorate manage their employee politicians; how would performance and evaluation be defined let alone assessed? If their jobs can’t be specified, then how can it be known if the jobs are done adequately? I think there are more than a few problems with the idea of politician as employee.

Well then there was the example of happings before the toxic waste of several empires ago was cleaned up. Free peasants in Gaul came to be harassed by Gothic raiders during the interminable collapse of Roman authority. Eventually there was no central authority, which left stranded Roman Legion units in Gaul without pay cheques. Local Roman commanders contracted with peasants to provide protection for a share of their crops. It didn’t take long for the arrangement to become feudal, and the formerly free peasants became bound to the land. There shouldn’t any doubt who become the hereditary aristocracy and where the divine right came from. We’ve been collecting common experience for awhile in the West. Much of that experience should create considerable mistrust of employees that possess coercive power when their employers do not. That in fact is what Hrothgar discovered in Beowulf. You can’t hire power that you lack without loosing all that you love best.