[EM] proxy representation with "dissenting votes"

[Jiri Räsänen]

My last writing was too ambiguous, so I try to offer some adjustment.

1. At this point I will not try to make any case for or agains any 
system. I just want to clarify what is meant for certain concepts, for 
myself and hopefully in the process, to some other too.

There are a few possible terminology choises. I tried to formulate that 
"direct representation" would be a general attribute and "proxy 
representation" being a sub set. If that doesn't feel right, I'm OK 
with that too.

In my mind the most simple system is the D2000's direct representation, 
that's why I pointed it as a starting place. Delegated Proxy offers one 
layer more.


2. FCP'S MODEL AND THE EXPERIENCE PROMOTING IT

I have been active in the FCP (Finnish Citizens' Power) since its 
beginning at 1988. As far as I have understood right the proper use of 
"proxy representation", our proposed system was (is) not that, yet 
close to it.

FCP's Synthesis Democracy model:
1. The parliament functions via direct representation. Rep A has 5000 
votes and B 9000 votes etc.
2. There is a constant election, so that any voter can change his/her 
representative at any given day.
(2.1 Changes would appear next morning, not minute-to-minute.)
3. A citizen can reserve a vote that the parliament is holding for 
him/herself. The citizen's representative will remain, but in the 
reserved issue will not use his/her vote.
4. There is imperative mandate. Meaning that after the representative 
has voted, a citizen can take back the mandate in that single issue and 
vote him/herself.
(4.1. Imperative mandate may take place only if for example 1/10 of the 
representatives or 1/100 of the electorate so addresses.)
(5. Two possible treshold models for getting elected to the parliament 
and dropping in the constant election)

Our argument was (is) quite like what Mr. Lomax presented.
Some favour representative democracy, some favour direct democracy. We 
proposed that the decision between direct and representative democracy 
was not necessarily a monolithic system-level decision. We propose a 
system that allows each citizen decide wheter he/she wants direct or 
representative democracy. Also offering the flexibility to use DD in 
issues close to me while letting RD handle the rest of the stuff. Both 
alienation and the tyranny of the active could so be bypassed.

We printed our platform and hit the streets. Our platform was 
all-in-one program to transform the political system of Finland. 
Initially, most thought we were crazy. Newspapers concentrated our 
proposal of electronic voting.

We did this campaigning for some 5 years hard. After that we went on 
concentrating more conservative reforms that would still enhance 
pluralism. So we went to STV and such.
It refreshes my vains to see other people really thinking much the same 
lines we have been thinking!

3. As far as I know, Demoex is still running. As far as I know, they 
haven't used Nordfors's technology.

4. Using cryptography, digital signature, it is possible to have both 
secret ballot and a communication between a representative (=proxy) and 
a voter so that the representative knows that the person who contacts 
him/her has voted for him/her.
     - There are of course several critical issues in electronic voting!

5. To me, there is a problem of delegable proxy having more than one 
level of voting / delegating. Quite amusingly, the cycle may occure: A 
wants to give his vote to B. B wants to give his vote to C and C wants 
to give his vote to A. Of course it is possible just to prohibit cyclic 
delegating, but this does not make the problem disappear, it merely 
transforms it. There is more to it but I will not go deeper on the 
issue at the moment.

6. Funny that you mentioned the Chinese society. I remember that 
Nordfors was thinking that perhaps the communist party could use the 
system for internal discussion. I tried to sell the system to a major 
party in Finland, their key person in the internal forums (now the 
prime minister of Finland, BTW) was interested but they had already 
invested into a different web discussion system.

7. To my mind the most proponent places to start the silent revolution 
of Delegable proxies could be mis-sized parties and unions, where there 
is both formal and informal discussion, both paid and non-paid people. 
You see, if you have a discussion + delegative system out in the wild, 
there is no real reason for people to join it, since there is nothing 
close to decide, it's just talk. Political systems coded in law are, on 
the other hand, way too resistant to change to be a starting point. In 
small units it may be the easiest to begin such a system, but it takes 
at least a mid-sized party before the delegated discussion / voting 
will begin to have distinctive emergent properties that aside of 
discussion list type organization.

8.1 The smallest step towards the Delegated proxy democracy in present 
western democracies:
When there is a referendum and let's say 60% of the people vote, let 
the parliament use the remaining 40% of the total voting power.
This way there is no fear that too little people would vote in a 
referendum for it to be meaningful, since the representatives would 
always fill the remaining political vacuum.
Meaning that you could have much more referendums.
This could be an easy step for present Switzerland.

8.2 Step two:
(This needs electronic voting.)
When there is a referendum, for those citizens not voting, their vote 
would be used by a) the parlamentarian they voted for in the last 
elections.  If there is no such parlamentarian, then b) the _closest_ 
parlamentarian(s). (With preferential voting, more accuracy.)

OR:

8.3 _Before_ each referendum, the parliament would have a semi-advisory 
vote. If I have a representative in the parliament and he/she votes the 
way I either think myself, or I _trust_ his/her opinion, I don't bother 
to vote for myself.
This model would stress the politician / parlamentarian as and advisor.

NOTE: In 8.1 and in 8.3 the representation system remains the old one 
representative / one vote. In model 8.2 within the referendums, the 
representatives would use as many votes that there would be left to 
them. So to the present political dogma, the 8.2 is more radical. Hence 
8.1 or 8.3 as the first step.
NOTE 2: There could be also the variation to 8.2, having the 
parlamentarians voting before the citizens, this now approaching the 
FCP model described above.

So, to summarize: There could be at least two meaningful routes to 
delegated proxy. One being the small and mid-scale parties and 
associations. The other could be to adjust referendums close to proxy 
logic and step by step having more referendums.

9. Too bad what happened with Approval voting group.   :-(


All the best,

Jiri Räsänen
Finland


28.2.2006 kello 22:07, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:

  (continuation of earlier response)
>
> Democracy2000.org went up in 1998, proposing
> proxy representation. There is no mention of
> delegable proxy, which is a crucial innovation,
> there. Standard proxy representation, as proposed
> by Democracy2000, would be a vast improvement
> over existing methods of forming assemblies in
> the political arena, but we can see from the
> experience with proxy representation in large
...