[governance] Re: SELF - Authority

Eric Dierker cogitoergosum at sbcglobal.net
Sun Oct 11 20:37:00 EDT 2009


Thank you Cosmin for this insightful piece that I am lucky enough to share. May we always remember and hold in thought those who cannot. There are three clear sets of chains that keep many from actively participating here, ignorance, poverty and tyranny. If all we do is partially loose the binds in any, we are rewarded tenfold.
 
First let me address a few "technical problems that I see".
 
Should we assume that insulation from the passions and needs of the governed is bad?
Pure Political Accountability is not always a good thing. Justices come to mind.
One person One vote does no such thing as assume delegation to an incumbant regime.
There is a huge gap between a "minority of billions" and the majority making arbitrary decisions.
 
Now to the crux of your issue. Direct democratic governance. I think I would reread Locke and More on Utopia and Anarchy then Marx's manifesto. Then I would begin some study of the Federalist Papers. Then I would spend some Socialogy and Anthropology time on the human condition and desire to constantly be making decisions of a technical nature regarding their governance. Probably start with the reality check that most people in the world do not spend more than 1 hour a year excercising their right to vote.
 
Here is your most glaring flaw. Your whole premise is that people must have full control of their government because other people are basically immoral and will not keep the good of the people in mind. See the problem?  If people are basically bad then giving more control to more people simply makes it badder.
 
All governance requires some trust. All choice assumes a free will to make choice. The best models we have are where people are free to chose who they will trust to govern them. What I trust is openness and transparency and accountability.  With this I can question. And in my questioning I can discern.  And in my discernment I can chose who to follow. So give me an option of processes to chose from, give me a choice of who to provide the process and then keep it open enough to evaluate. Then me and the other minority of voting people can decide. That model works, the world over. Do not force people to vote -- bad idea.


--- On Sun, 10/11/09, Cosmin L. Neagu <cosmin.neagu at rohost.com> wrote:


From: Cosmin L. Neagu <cosmin.neagu at rohost.com>
Subject: SELF - Authority
To: "governance" <governance at lists.cpsr.org>
Cc: "Paul Lehto" <lehto.paul at gmail.com>, "Eric Dierker" <cogitoergosum at sbcglobal.net>, toml at communisphere.com
Date: Sunday, October 11, 2009, 11:56 PM


I started this as a reply to a comment of Paul Lehto saying that the
only way to "guard against the guardians" is to dilute the ultimate
power as much as possible (one person one vote) and hope that in the
end it will all be OK or at least as good as could be expected.
It might be good enough for governing a few millions but as the
governing body "serves" more and more people it tends to develop ways
of insulating itself against it's subjects.
Even if it remains accountable it tends to be slow and inefficient
especially when it comes to conflict resolutions.

I say that this is not good enough, at least not when it comes to
governing the Internet of billions of people. I say we can do better,
at least regarding the ICANN / DNS issue.
The "one person one vote" assumes that everybody willing to delegate
his authority to the central body (let's say ICANN) using their vote.
The ones that do not vote have to accept the majority decision.
This is flawed in several ways:
- it produces potentially billions of people of "minority" while the
majority gets to make arbitrary decisions
- it assumes that the people that don't vote are OK with whatever result
- the process of election is expensive (time, money, fraud, manipulation, ...)

The alternative I proposed was to design a system that would not
delegate the power of the user to ICANN.
Every person could create for himself a asymmetrical key pair (PGP,
public/private encryption key) that he will need in order to make
decisions regarding his domains, his email, ...
ICANN would need to create and maintain the standard of a distributed
software (something similar to the current DNS software) and make sure
it's being run properly.
In short, a system like this would allow ICANN to make sure the
current principles of the Internet are not perverted and it would
allow the users to keep their authority to themselves (not to trust
ICANN or anybody else with their vote).

Even though the technical part might seem confusing it is quite strait
forward. I don't think that conventional methods will do.

Even more, I believe that a system that does not delegate the
authority of the user will eventually emerge... it doesn't actually
need permission from anybody. It only needs critical mass.
ICANN or IGF patronage might just make it happen better and quicker
but I cannot see a future without this happening at all.
It becomes easier and and easier and after all ... these days it only
takes a few good tweets to reach critical mass.


Cosmin
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