[EM] Idea Proposal: Listening Democracy

[Duane Johnson]

This sounds quite interesting, Abd ul-Rahman.  Where can I learn about  
your FA/DP idea?  Your discussion here is helpful, but I feel like I  
am missing out the important prerequisite pieces in order to make  
sense of it.  (I know about delegable proxy, but haven't heard about  
FA/DP specifically).

Thanks,
Duane Johnson

On Apr 21, 2010, at 9:57 AM, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:

> At 04:42 PM 4/19/2010, Duane Johnson wrote:
>> Hi Everyone,
>>
>> I am new to this forum, thanks to James Green-Armytage who sent me  
>> the address.  I am a software engineer in Chicago who also happens  
>> to be interested in voting methods.
>>
>> I'd like to propose a voting method that may be of interest here.   
>> It has also been cross-posted to the ideas group at forums.e- 
>> democracy.org.  This system seems almost too simple when you  
>> understand it, but the implications are deep and, I believe,  
>> profound.  I am interested in your feedback.
>
> I'm glad to see more people thinking about process and voting as  
> involving communication. Which leads to considering communication as  
> the foundation of democracy, not voting per se. Functional democracy  
> is deliberative democracy; democracy without communication is easily  
> manipulated and if power is directly exercised, there is a tendency  
> to mob rule, where the intelligence of crowds is dumbed down instead  
> of amplified. Wikipedia, for those who study it, is a great example  
> of how not to do it.
>
> However, I strongly urge people who attempt to analyze the situation  
> and to propose reforms to:
>
> 1. Keep it simple. An extraordinarily powerful system for fully  
> proportional representation consisting of a seemingly-simple tweak  
> on Single Transferable Vote was proposed in 1883 or so by Charles  
> Dodgson (Lewis Carroll). If a simple system that is *obviously* far  
> more democratic doesn't attract notice for more than a hundred  
> years, what chance does something more complicated and dodgier  
> (i.e., involving lots of unknowns) have?
>
> 2. Don't propose chickens without eggs or vice versa. Imagine that  
> there is some ideal political system, that allows good ideas to be  
> efficiently considered, with the necessary depth. If such a system  
> existed, it would be easy to suggest and propose and agree upon it,  
> and if people agree on just about anything, they can do it, as long  
> as the actual already-existing system is reasonably democratic. I  
> invented FA/DP (Free Associations with Delegable Proxy) as a method  
> for considering and forming consensus on ideas like FA/DP.
>
> 3. FA/DP is terminally simple, but, in reality, it's like pulling  
> teeth to even get people to consider it. Sure, lots of people will  
> say, "What a great idea," if they don't get stuck in the knee-jerk  
> objections, like, "*They* will corrupt anything." or, more  
> sophisticated, "Iron law of oligarchy (see the Wikipedia article),"  
> etc.
>
> 4. Notice: the method by which one would develop consensus and  
> implement better political systems is a political system.  
> Revolutions tend to empower the revolutionaries, or those who  
> inherit power from them. If we want a true democratic revolution, we  
> must want something different from the norm of revolution, which  
> tends to follow the same traditional power structures, thus, in  
> effect, simply changing faces. Traditional power structures boil  
> down to two kinds: oligarchical and distributed. Oligarchical power  
> developed and prospered because it was more efficient when the scale  
> became large -- even though it is, from an ideal perspective, very  
> inefficient -- due to the involvement in process normally required  
> for distributed power to function, which expands exponentially with  
> the number of active participants.
>
> 5. FA principles are natural for humans, most peer organizations, in  
> their infancy, are roughly FAs. But if the FA principles aren't  
> understood and solidly maintained, and as organizations grow, they  
> naturally develop oligarchical structure, it is what people know how  
> to do, and they are not aware that there are alternatives. When the  
> organization is small, implementing something like DP seems too  
> complicated. Can't we just discuss things like we always have? When  
> the scale becomes large enough that DP is truly needed, it's too  
> late. De-facto oligarchies have already developed, and the Iron Law  
> of Oligarchy begins to function and resist change back to  
> distributed power. The oligarchy believes that it knows best, and,  
> indeed, it often does. It's the exceptions that are killers, that  
> reduce long-term efficiency and support, that allow originally  
> wonderful nonprofit organizations, for example, to become divided  
> and weakened, to be co-opted by corruption, to become no longer  
> truly representative of the aspirations of their members, but  
> because the organization has been "successful," and comes to  
> dominate its field, it is very difficult to start anew and such  
> efforts will be considered "divisive" and "disruptive."
>
> 6. So: consider delegable proxy, how simple it can be when applied  
> within a Free Association, which does not concentrate power *at  
> all*. In the Montesqueuian sense, it is pure judgment, which I think  
> of as advice. In theory, if the executive and judicial power are  
> fully separated, the judicial system has no direct power, it only  
> advises but cannot coerce the executive system. A wise executive,  
> though, wants good advice! In an FA/DP system, the system functions  
> solely to advise its members as well as anyone else interested. The  
> only coercive power it might have is the distributed power of the  
> members, if they act in a coordinated manner, and it cannot, without  
> blatant abandonment of FA principles, coerce them. The FA itself  
> does not collect power except for the power to communicate, and it  
> cannot control that, for the communication structure is easily  
> replicable, if a central structure is corrupted in some way, the  
> delegable proxy structure can re-establish it, network by network,  
> reconnecting outside the original structure, because most of the  
> communication in an FA/DP structure is not through the central  
> structure, it's under the control of the proxies themselves, who  
> cannot compel any client to participate, who do not "own" their  
> clients, nor do the clients own them.
>
> 7. Often overlooked, because of the habits of thinking only in terms  
> of hierarchies that concentrate power or representation, is that, if  
> everyone names a proxy, all paths in the directed graph produce form  
> loops. There is nobody at the "top," or, more accurately, there must  
> be at least two. I.e., if there is what I call a superproxy, someone  
> who, if nobody else participates in some "discussion," would  
> represent every member, there must be at least two, because the  
> proxy named by this superproxy would have the same representative  
> power.
>
> 8. Lots of people, thinking about this stuff, try to eliminate  
> loops, because a loop can mean that some are not represented in some  
> high-level process. However, when that "defect" happens, it's  
> visible. It's easy to notify those who are "absent," and to do so  
> efficiently, through identification of unrepresented loops and the  
> "proxy rank" of those involved. ("Proxy rank" looks at each member  
> and considers how many clients are represented if the member  
> participates and nobody else does, it's a bit complicated because it  
> involves recursion to avoid the appearance of equal representation  
> due to a superproxy of some natural caucus naming a proxy within the  
> caucus.) Loops represent natural caucuses, and they only cause loss  
> of representation if no member of the caucus, in the loop,  
> participates in a process. Attempting to avoid loops involves  
> restricting the rights of members to name people in their own  
> trusted group, forcing the naming of someone outside that group.  
> That's coercive, in the name of "more democratic." Bad idea.  
> Instead, let people decide if they want to be represented or not. If  
> they do, and if it is not practical for them to be represented  
> directly through a loop member, all it takes is one member of a loop  
> naming a proxy outside the loop to break it.
>
> 9. Alternate proxies are another solution to the loop issue. An  
> "alternate proxy" is a backup proxy, considered to represent a  
> member if the primary proxy is not present or represented. But,  
> remember, every complication represents risk. Single-proxy DP  
> encourages members to think about whom they most trust, from among  
> those who are available to them. A single proxy has a clear (and  
> accepted, I encourage not recognizing, or deprecating, unaccepted  
> proxy designations) responsibility to communicate information coming  
> from the "center" to the client (or to *not* communicate information  
> that the proxy deems to be "noise" for the client). Does an  
> alternate proxy have this responsibility? The core of DP, to me, is  
> the proxy-client relationship and how it will function.
>
> 10. FA/DP is necessarily informal, it creates organizational  
> structure only in the loosest sense. The relevant Alcoholics  
> Anonymous tradition (AA is the model FA) says, "AA as such ought  
> never be organized, but we may create service boards or committees  
> directly responsible to those they serve." Notice: a "service board"  
> is a corporation, and it is, in this "exception," not creating a  
> board -- which will own property as a corporation and thus develop  
> centralized power -- that is AA or controls any part of AA, and that  
> is "responsible" to those it serves, which means, in practice, those  
> who actually form it. They do not obtain the endorsement of AA  
> itself, they are only quasi-AA, perhaps broadly supported, or  
> perhaps not. Local Alcoholism Councils are often formed by AA  
> members to represent the interests of alcoholics and alcoholism  
> treatment before local governments. These Councils are often created  
> and dominated by AA members and other interested persons, but they  
> do not speak for AA, they speak for their members.
>
> 11. In the same way, the natural caucuses formed by proxies and  
> their clients, cooperating, can form, say, Political Action  
> Committees that exercise real power, collecting donations, or,  
> because of campaign finance laws, they can easily recommend  
> individual donations to their members. FA/DP doesn't collect power,  
> in itself, these PACs are outside the FA itself, it does not endorse  
> them, though they are free to endorse it. FAs do not take positions  
> on controversial issues, and this is crucial, if FAs are to be able  
> to form broad consensus, for to do this, every side on an issue  
> should ideally be represented. FAs will certainly form with "initial  
> bias," a bias created solely by the natural bias of its members, and  
> the power exercised initially through PACs may reflect this bias.  
> If, as I expect, FA/DP social technology is as efficient as I  
> expect, these PACs will be successful, and will attract imitation.  
> If the FA is open to participation by "the other side," it then  
> becomes a mechanism whereby broader consensus might be found. Each  
> caucus remains free, if it chooses, to organize its own PACs, but  
> two PACs opposing each other in the sphere of real power weaken each  
> other. That's good, when consensus hasn't been found! But  
> cooperation and consensus are powerful. If agreement can be found,  
> it will prevail. In order for this to work, joining the FA must not  
> have any appearance of supporting one side of a controversy. FAs can  
> report the results of polls of its members, those are just facts.  
> However, these polls do not establish an "organizational position,"  
> except in one very narrow sphere, the organization of the FA itself.  
> Strictly speaking, the non-endorsement of controversial position  
> practice of FAs is with regard to "outside issues." Within the FA,  
> there are traditions which maintain the autonomy of all "meetings"  
> and which prevent coercive power from arising. There is still the  
> Iron Law of Oligarchy, it is not cancelled by FA/DP, but the leaders  
> that develop are as they are in AA. "Our leaders are but trusted  
> servants, they do not govern." Strictly speaking, these "leaders" do  
> govern, but they only govern their own "meetings," i.e., they govern  
> their own communication group, their own natural caucus, and because  
> they cannot compel participation, the collected power is highly  
> restricted. In AA, the saying is, "The only requirement to start a  
> meeting is a resentment and a coffee pot." AA turns natural division  
> and disagreement into fuel for expansion, for the more meetings  
> there are, the more options there are for members, the more  
> communication power exists.
>
> 12. I imagine FA/DP using all forms of communication technology,  
> but, it is important to remember, it doesn't depend on any form of  
> communication in particular, beyond the central idea of two people  
> communicating directly. DP is established if there is a member list  
> and a list of assigned proxies (preferably with acceptances, that's  
> often overlooked by those who are trying to set up a "voting  
> system.") For voting applications, I recommend, instead of DP, Asset  
> Voting, with DP as a voluntary and optional method for electors  
> holding votes to cooperate and coordinate to create representation.  
> Asset Voting is compatible with existing traditions regarding  
> deliberative assemblies, creating a default assembly where every  
> member has the same voting power as every other member. That can be  
> modified to reduce the voting power of a member whenever an elector  
> who has transferred votes to that member votes directly, but that is  
> a tweak, an improvement, I believe, and would establish true and  
> complete representation in all decisions of an Assembly, which is  
> important, but it is also possible that such "outside voting" would  
> be only advisory. Early implementations of Asset Voting should keep  
> it simple, establishing the principle of full representation by  
> chosen representative, instead of representatives being chosen in  
> "contests," for such contests represent not only winners and losers  
> among candidates, but winners and losers among voters. Are the  
> losers represented? How can we say that a voter is represented in a  
> legislature when the voter opposed the choice of a majority, not to  
> mention the mere plurality that is often the real case? This is the  
> elephant in the living room of "representative democracy." It isn't.  
> The people, the "demos" are not represented, jurisdictions are,  
> districts.
>

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