Deliberative democracy models - think of a v large jury - are really interesting. The pioneering theorist was James Fishkin now at Stanford. I decided not to do post-grad but if I had I likely would have studied under him.
Didn’t such a jury recommend a soft Brexit (staying in the single market), perhaps as part of NAFTA?
We should be looking at in these kinds of models very closely. Democracy in the social media world needs rejuvenation.
Representative democracy is a hill I am prepared to die on (almost literally).
But I have toyed with the thought experiment of replacing the Lords with online public voting, and then retaining the Parliament Act or even supercharging it. The public gains the right to ask the elected chamber to “think again” but we don’t get a “people’s assembly” imposing the death penalty.
I'm not the biggest fan of representative democracy - if you're going to have states and parliaments and such, I kinda like the idea of treating it like jury duty; have a lottery, everyone can be in it, pick a name out of the hat and go. It makes career politics impossible, and I think would make politics head towards a form that is based more on the philosophical notion of a veil of ignorance: because whilst the people in government at any time will be in positions of power, they later won't be and therefore know that the decisions they make have to still be beneficial to them when they lose that powerful position. I understand that is logistically difficult in the modern era with geopolitics and it would also rely on a highly technocratic civil service (although that's not much different to now), but I think outcomes would be clearer. Give each "jury government" around 5-6 years, with the expectation that the first 6 months may require them to figure out exactly how they are gonna govern - will factions of similarly minded people emerge and form "parties" and "governments" or will everything have to be a policy brought to them for an up down vote of the entire jury, will they have a committee system where different people with different specialisations will go away and create policy which will get voted on. It could be very interesting. Laborious, yes, but interesting.
However you carve it up - your way or via constant referendums - direct democracy would mean the death penalty, much slower advances in things like gay rights, a highly unbalanced budget, and even less long term planning.
THE eco-zealot who dumped glitter on Sir Keir Starmer at the Labour Party conference while demanding “democracy” is a privileged globe-trotting rich kid.
Jobless XR moaner Yaz Ashmawi, 28, studied at a private school in the oil-rich UAE and enjoys a £750,000 second home in Devon.
As much as he as an individual will annoy me - so what? Like, 13 flights in ten years is not that much and if he has realised that the privileges of his upbringing give him some ability to make the world a better place - good? That's exactly what people with power and money should do. I understand why poor and precarious people don't protest - they have little option but to do what they must.
You're right. It's not that much. However if you are a protestor for XR or JSO then for your message to be effective you have got to practice what you preach. Otherwise you are just a hypocrite.
I suggest it's actually quite a lot. Given his wealth it may also be business class:
He has jetted to 13 countries on four continents in ten years
I would say that if he is serious about what he alleges are his beliefs, he should be aiming not to fly at all and substantially achieving it.
It reminds of the attention-seeking XR convict featured in the media from my area, who when I followed up turned out to live in a valuable farmhouse renting out holiday barn conversions for a living, and neither the farmhouse nor the barn conversions had even half-decent energy efficiency.
In my book hypocrites don't deserve a hearing, particularly hypocrites who are not modelling whatever they seek to impose on everyone else.
But I know that's not a popular view on PB.
He's 28 - 13 years mean some of these flights he would have been 15? So family holidays where he may not have had a choice? Also - like maybe he got a better understanding of climate change in his early 20s (like me)
Was the Yazmeister protesting about climate change in this instance? He shouted something about democracy iirc.
His position as an XR member was likely the idea of a people's assembly as a true democracy. I don't necessarily agree with that, but that is likely his position.
If the people's assembly looked at all the options and decided that we should use more North Sea fossil fuels, would he respect its decision?
I assume so
We have a people's assembly that says we should use more North Sea fossil fuels, its the House of Commons.
Direct democracy and representative democracy are two different things. You can argue that one is more efficient or moral than the other, but to ignore the distinction is not particularly useful.
By direct democracy you mean referenda like the Brexit Referendum? Or something else?
So the idea of a peoples' assembly, from my understanding, is:
Everyone gets to see all the evidence and gets to interrogate the experts directly - not mediated through media and politics. In a logistical form the easiest way to do this would be to have local assemblies that work on a consensus model (only taking decisions which all individuals agree to) and building further consensus with other localised assemblies. It has many things in common with democratic confederalism - apart from the consensus stuff which I typically hate... Is it a logistical nightmare? Yes. Would it produce positive policy? Almost certainly not. Is it philosophically distinct from representative democracy or even a direct referenda - yes.
The problem with what I think you're suggesting is that it's self-selecting, and three consensus model means that the minority who can afford to attend indefinitely win out.
Where citizens assemblies have actually been used effectively, eg in Ireland, the membership is determined using a similar method to the jury system, so members are chosen at random, and the assembly votes on proposals after hearing evidence, so the time commitment is not unlimited.
Are we looking at an all-out Middle East war? We haven’t had one for AGES
EXCITING
Israel have been bombing Syria in the last few weeks so it is probably to do with that.
Nice to see some Israeli intelligence can do its job after the clusterfuck that was the weekend. Probably had Frank Spencer in charge the day the intel on Hamas came through.
Deliberative democracy models - think of a v large jury - are really interesting. The pioneering theorist was James Fishkin now at Stanford. I decided not to do post-grad but if I had I likely would have studied under him.
Didn’t such a jury recommend a soft Brexit (staying in the single market), perhaps as part of NAFTA?
We should be looking at in these kinds of models very closely. Democracy in the social media world needs rejuvenation.
Representative democracy is a hill I am prepared to die on (almost literally).
But I have toyed with the thought experiment of replacing the Lords with online public voting, and then retaining the Parliament Act or even supercharging it. The public gains the right to ask the elected chamber to “think again” but we don’t get a “people’s assembly” imposing the death penalty.
I'm not the biggest fan of representative democracy - if you're going to have states and parliaments and such, I kinda like the idea of treating it like jury duty; have a lottery, everyone can be in it, pick a name out of the hat and go. It makes career politics impossible, and I think would make politics head towards a form that is based more on the philosophical notion of a veil of ignorance: because whilst the people in government at any time will be in positions of power, they later won't be and therefore know that the decisions they make have to still be beneficial to them when they lose that powerful position. I understand that is logistically difficult in the modern era with geopolitics and it would also rely on a highly technocratic civil service (although that's not much different to now), but I think outcomes would be clearer. Give each "jury government" around 5-6 years, with the expectation that the first 6 months may require them to figure out exactly how they are gonna govern - will factions of similarly minded people emerge and form "parties" and "governments" or will everything have to be a policy brought to them for an up down vote of the entire jury, will they have a committee system where different people with different specialisations will go away and create policy which will get voted on. It could be very interesting. Laborious, yes, but interesting.
That would lead to government by the unelected bureaucracy of the civil service, even more than we have already.
That is a downside possibility, certainly. But again, it's currently a big bureaucracy that people complain actually runs the shot. Representative democracy doesn't stop that.
Sunak seems doomed, but one thing he should try, in my opinion, is to contrast his ‘Eat out to help out’ optimism with Sir Keir’s “we better all stay in for a few more months this summer, even though the worst was way behind us” strategy,
“Johnson Variant”, Jesus Christ. He must have been secretly hoping for more cases when we opened up against his advice
"Guys, remember that time I used your money to pay people to go out for pizza and a load of them caught Cofid and died" doesn't sound like a vote winner to me, but I'm happy for the Tories to give it a go.
Obviously I am aware that it’s a risky strategy, but I think it’s worth it to show Sir Keir up as a doom monger that wanted to lock us all indoors (while he was ok with booze ups for himself & friends)
You might regret invoking the memory of Sir Beer Korma – Big-G-Wales will be bothering you every five minutes
It’s quite something that people see Boris letting people who were working together indoors all day have a drink after work as 100 on the outrage index, whilst Sir Keir having one himself is a zero, when the difference is just a technicality
More like 52-48 really, which as we know is not all or nothing
It's not a technicality when it was a year apart and very different regulations in force.
Which is why Johnson got a police caution, why he lied to the Commons and why he resigned in disgrace, while Starmer was cleared by the police.
It's obvious that you don't like Starmer and think the sun shines out of Johnsons fundament, but facts actually matter.
The fact is that Boris got a police caution along with the current Prime Minister and no one is saying it’s a reason for Sunak to resign.
Sir Keir got away with the same thing on a technicality. He was advocating knocking us down for longer, banning us from meeting friends for a drink, ostensibly because it would have risked spreading a terrible disease, but was happy to share a drink inside with friends himself. Maybe the disease knew not to spread around Party political types. Either that or he was being disingenuous all along
It’s currygate all over again, with added batshit whataboutery.
The ways people fail to understand the British amaze me. British plugs are great.
I can see a deal forming here. We get mixer taps, they get safe plugs.
Hard no to German “shelf loos”
But we should adopt their practise of a tiny little biscuit or chocolate with a coffee. Civilised
Where do you go, and where have you been for the last few years, where they don’t give you a tiny biscuit or chocolate with your coffee unless it’s a takeout?
Everywhere? Honestly I’ve never been served an automatic tiny biscuit or choc with my coffee in the UK. Not in bijou cafes, high street chains or anywhere
I assume it's the Trans thing. SLab were an even more enthusiastic supporter of the GRR bill at Holyrood than the SNP, though who knows what position they've triangulated themselves into now.
Comments
This would appear appropriate here.
Where citizens assemblies have actually been used effectively, eg in Ireland, the membership is determined using a similar method to the jury system, so members are chosen at random, and the assembly votes on proposals after hearing evidence, so the time commitment is not unlimited.
Israel.must have known something........