[governance] Reconciling Democracy & Multistakeholderism: Having a Voice vs. Having a Vote

[Jeanette Hofmann]

Hi all,

for once I fully agree with Parminder. While the fight for 
multi-stakeholder arrangements is good and justified, we should not 
ignore their downsides. All studies I know of on the participation in 
referendum, open source projects, wikipedia and the likes confirm the 
non-egalitarian effect of participatory movements: they tend to increase 
the voice of resourceful groups and marginalize those without education, 
money, time etc. Multi-stakeholder participation is not the answer to 
everything. On the contrary, I think we need to assess and be wary of 
all forms of voice and vote.

Whether or not they meet democratic standards, there is a categorial 
difference between voice and vote. One is binding for third parties, the 
other is not. Decision making procedures need to reflect that difference 
in terms of accountability, transparency, representativeness etc.

jeanette



> And yes, non human entities ( businesses as well as NGOs) cannot have
> votes. They should have voice though.
>
> Positing what should be channels of voice (multi-stakeholder systems) as
> those of votes have mostly meant that those with the greatest resources
> have exclusive or additional votes, and the less resourced are sought to
> be pacified by giving nominal space and opportunity for voice (that they
> are mostly not able to exercise in competition with well resourced
> voices) *instead* of giving votes - or actual participation in decision
> making....
>
> Which does not mean that current (or any) systems of representation are
> perfect (or even good enough). They need to be constantly improved
> through processes of deepening democracy. But it is counter productive
> to impose non democratic forms over them.
>
> Paul's exposition is also instructive for showing the contradiction
> involved in standing for 'human' rights and also advocating
> multistakeholderism as a political decision making system. Only actual
> humans have the human right of participation in making the political
> decisions that effect them, not businesses or NGOs. Agreed that humans
> need to effectively organise to exercise political choice. That is what
> the project of democracy is about. But a private business can hardly be
> seen as a system for organising humans for exercising choice. At
> present, only elected democratic governments are such a system,
> especially those who listen to and respect all voices.
>
> parminder
>
>
>
> On Monday 31 October 2011 09:30 PM, Paul Lehto wrote:
>>
>> It seems that in the longstanding debates about the merits and
>> demerits of multi-stakeholderism, there is a perspective that may
>> possibly help reconcile the views of some major positions on this
>> issue, or perhaps even reconcile all of them: The question perhaps
>> ought to be framed in terms of having a voice versus having a vote.
>>
>> Under human rights and democracy laws, only human beings (or their
>> elected representatives) have votes. But businesses, NGOs, and others
>> often have relevant if not important expertise, and thus have relevant
>> if not important "voices" that are either useful or even necessary to
>> intelligent process, and thus to good outcomes.
>>
>> Garbage in, garbage out. For good process, we need good "voices" or
>> good information. One big source of this good information are all the
>> folks we think of as invitees or participants in a "multi-stakeholder"
>> process.
>>
>> The issues arise when the voices are also the only votes or the main
>> votes. This confuses good, democratic process of furthering the
>> important cause of an INFORMED decision-making electorate or process,
>> with the issue of WHO HAS A VOTE. Under democracy and fundamental
>> humans rights laws, only human beings have votes, and it is one a one
>> person/one vote basis.
>>
>> For the moment, let's put aside the issue of building robust electoral
>> systems on a global scale allowing all the humans to vote who are
>> interested in doing so and effected by what's proposed (i.e. "the
>> governed.") There may be challenges there to be sure, but if this is
>> considered a worthy objection ultimately, then it is a worthy
>> objection for a dictator to object to democracy because polling
>> places, precincts, ballots and other infrastructure simply does not
>> exist. That's a bad joke, or an excuse for authoritarianism, not a
>> valid objection to working towards and implementing democracy.
>>
>> The call of freedom and democracy movements worldwide has nearly
>> always been essentially the same thing: let's make democracy REAL. And
>> then we will eternally have to keep it real, of course.
>>
>> We ought to have multi-stakeholderism in terms of Voice Process, but
>> not in terms of Vote Process. It's very important to hear all the
>> different perspectives including business perspectives
>> (Multi-stakeholderism), but that should not translate into non-elected
>> OR non-human persons or entities voting and determining the laws and
>> policies that structure and define the freedom of the internet (or the
>> necessary protections against fraud and abuse).
>>
>> Paul Lehto, J.D.
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Paul R Lehto, J.D.
>> P.O. Box 1
>> Ishpeming, MI 49849
>> lehto.paul at gmail.com <mailto:lehto.paul at gmail.com>
>> 906-204-4026 (cell)
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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