[EM] Conceiving a Democratic Electoral Process

[Jameson Quinn]

I am enjoying this discussion and I thank Fred for starting it. However, I
have only a little to add:

1. Under plurality, parties are a necessary evil; primaries weed the field
and prevent vote-splitting. Of course, plurality itself is an entirely
unnecessary evil, mostly because it makes parties necessary.

2. Even without plurality, there would probably still be named, structured
groupings. Unstructured anarchy may be desirable, but it's not very stable.
That's not to say that there's no way to make the power dynamics inside the
party less pernicious, though.

3. As I envision PAL representation, the PR system I designed, parties
would simply be a label that any candidate could self-apply. To keep out
"wolves in sheeps clothing", any candidate would have the power to say,
among the other candidates who share their chosen party label, which ones
they do not consider to be allies. I think those dynamics – free to "join",
no guarantee you won't be shunned by the people who already have "joined",
but the binary shun-or-not choice should help prevent cliques of gradated
power – would be relatively healthy.

Jameson

2012/6/27 Juho Laatu <juho4880 at yahoo.co.uk>

> On 27.6.2012, at 18.03, Fred Gohlke wrote:
>
> > How, exactly, do we make our pseudo-democratic systems better?
>
> I have considered numerous options. At this very moment, maybe the
> sponsoring problem could be one easy (in theory) problem to solve. Just cut
> out party sponsoring and/or set some limits to the cost of personal
> campaigns.
>
> > re: "What I meant with "separate" is that sponsoring rules and
> >     practices may be very different in different countries, and
> >     that sponsoring rules can be changed without changing the
> >     other rules."
> >
> > In what way does the fact that different countries have different rules
> help us correct the evils of party-based systems?
>
> Maybe the separate nature of party sponsoring allows us to fix it as a
> stand alone problem. Maybe we could even follow pretty much the same rules
> in all countries although they may have quite different electoral systems.
>
> > How, exactly, can the people change the 'sponsoring rules' when the
> parties write the rules?
>
> That's an essential and difficult question. Any changes in the way power
> is distributed in any system are difficult since those people that are in
> power now, have been the winners in the current electoral system. If they
> make any changes in the system, they might just oust themselves.
>
> > re: "I agree that sponsoring can be very dangerous to a political
> >     system."
> >
> > I'm glad you agree.  Can you describe an electoral process that
> eliminates this danger?
>
> I briefly sketched an election method independent very simple approach
> above.
>
> > re: "We must work to make the practices better."
> >
> > That's true, although saying so does not constitute an effort to do so.
>  Can you suggest specific ways of improving the practices?
>
> Ok, I already generated two quick improvements, one for sponsoring and one
> raher radical approach that eliminated the influence of parties in
> nominating the candidates (assuming that this is what we need). The
> solutions may be different for different societies and different needs, so
> often we need to set the target before giving the solution. I'm happy to
> discuss different solutions for different needs.
>
> > re: "National Socialism grew within a democratic system. Better
> >     watch out that our countries will not degrade to that level."
> >
> > Stating the obvious does nothing to accomplish the goal.
>
> It is good to keep the warning sign visible all the time. It is so easy to
> slip to believing that one's own system is right and on the correct track.
> If people would have guessed where National Socialism might lead them to,
> they might have rejected it. This applies also to many later and smaller
> problems. Brutal practices have appeared also elsewhere.
>
> > re: "Multiple parties can be used to balance the madness of
> >     the other parties."
> >
> > Are you suggesting we take more of the poison that's killing us?
>
> Many medicines are in fact poison if used in too large quantities. Since
> politics is a difficult game to control, it may be that we have to cure the
> problems generated by one governmnet by using a poison that at least
> cancels the effects of the previous government (although probably that also
> generates new problems as a side effect).
>
> > re: "If there is only one solution, it will be officially right
> >     and it may deny eny need to improve the system (it may
> >     rather get corrupt and lock people to that now non-working
> >     structure).
> >
> > That's precisely the circumstances in which we find ourselves, right
> now.  Note that it doesn't stop us from trying to conceive improvements.
>  Our only difficulty is finding people with the intellect and the energy to
> work on finding a better way.
>
> In a democracy we need also voters that understand these good intentions
> well enough to accept and vote for such changes (unless we think that we
> need a revolution). In some sense I advertised parties as a method that
> makes peaceful "revolutions" possible, i.e. allows us to have different
> alternaties and therefore also oust one government and replace it with
> another one.
>
> Juho
>
>
>
>
>
> ----
> Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/attachments/20120627/64e987fc/attachment-0004.htm>