[EM] Parliamentary compromising strategy

[Michael Allan]

Thank you Abd,

Aside from you, and us at Votorola, the only others I know who
routinely go out of their way to emphasize the distinction between
normative guidance (continuous primaries, advice) and decisive power
are the folks at AG Meinungsfindungstool.  Unfortunately, I've had
difficulty communicating with them from the start owing to the
language barrier.  Lately too I think there's been a misunderstanding,
which I hope to clear up once I can pick up that thread again.

> Thus an advised person may use very sophisticated analysis, that
> includes such things as length of participation, whether or not a
> proxy is representing known persons, only only anonymous ones, and
> other measures that an advisee may freely choose.

Yes.  The voters themselves are advised too, and so everyone must be
free to filter, translate, recount, and generally do as they please
with the primary votes.  This is crucial.  Which reminds me that Mark
Murphy was thinking on similar lines when he wrote this:

   Mark Murphy.  2008.  The "killer app" of public participation.  In
   Rebooting America.  Edited by Allison Fine, Micah L. Sifrey, Andrew
   Rasiej and Joshua Levy.  Personal Democracy Press.
   http://rebooting.personaldemocracy.com/node/5499

   See also his later comments in the Metagov list.
   http://metagovernment.org/pipermail/start_metagovernment.org/2009-February/001195.html

> It is possible, as an example, for advisees to consider cash
> donations, or, say, labor and political activity, ascribed to
> proxies.  Whether that's a good idea or not depends on many details.

Conseo and I had a similar idea in 2011.  We sketched a design that's
since been partially implemented: http://zelea.com/w/Category:Account

> The *advisory system* does not need to and should abstain from
> drawing organizational conclusions from polls, except as needed only
> for its own process. ...

On that note, I notice a mistake here:
http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/power_structuring#In_a_parliamentary_system

  Each [open party] takes for its titular leader the root candidate
  who currently leads in the [open] primary.

That could easily be an abuse of the primary, depending on how we
implement it.  Probably Kristofer has already noticed this weakness
and will mention it, because it's similar to the one he mentioned in
connection with extracting the other open-party decision (candidate
list) from the other primary.  So maybe the same solution of random,
reviewed extractions is called for:

I said:
> Kristofer Munsterhjelm said:
> > ... It depends on how the lists are frozen before the
> > election. ...
>
> There's a potential weakness here.  Continuous primaries can't be
> bolted directly to decision systems, so the candidate list has to be
> extracted with care.  Ideally we have a separate secret ballot to
> extract the decision, like in single winner:
> http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/assembly_election/single-winner
> But the secret ballot is unavailable here (goes to waste).
> 
> So maybe a lottery every week.  It chooses a random time from the
> previous week.  The result snapshot at that time becomes the
> decision for the week.  It's reviewed by a panel who strike it
> (reverting to the previous week's decision) if they see any wild
> gyrations, or other fishy stuff.  So we have decisive candidtate
> lists at weekly intervals.  (Later we vote to amend the constitution
> and do all this by secret ballot instead.  That seems ideal, if we
> don't mind the added expense.)

Thanks again gents for taking the time to comment.

Mike


Abd ul-Rahman Lomax said:
> At 01:03 AM 3/18/2013, Michael Allan wrote:
> >I still want to salvage Kristofer's liquid democracy approach to the
> >problem.  My last post didn't properly describe the executive primary,
> >however, and it seems to be crucial.
> 
> I'm totally pleased to see that Michael Allen has grasped the concept 
> of using Liquid Democracy for an advisory function. That's exactly 
> what I see and predict.
> 
> I will add that how to analyze delegable proxy polls is *up to the 
> one who wants to be advised.* That's why I want the nuts and bolts of 
> the canvassing process to be completely visible (excepting only a 
> possible Asset Voting front-end, that establishes raw proxy 
> representative power.)
> 
> Thus an advised person may use very sophisticated analysis, that 
> includes such things as length of participation, whether or not a 
> proxy is representing known persons, only only anonymous ones, and 
> other measures that an advisee may freely choose.
> 
> It is possible, as an example, for advisees to consider cash 
> donations, or, say, labor and political activity, ascribed to 
> proxies. Whether that's a good idea or not depends on many details.
> 
> The *advisory system* does not need to and should abstain from 
> drawing organizational conclusions from polls, except as needed only 
> for its own process. I.e., is there an official web site? Who are 
> trustees? Or are there multiple sites which ordinarily cooperate and 
> identify as being organizational sites. Are there restrictions on 
> such identification, etc. Free Associations avoid property, but still 
> do support property-holding organizations that are "directly 
> responsible to those they serve." They avoid centralization of power, 
> except over very narrow issues (like the usage of the organizational 
> name in any controversy.)
> 
> If Asset is used, while ordinary members may comment and participate 
> in certain discussions, as allowed, the only *voting* power is from 
> those who have received votes in the Asset election, which would be 
> repeated periodically, say once a year. That would be a secret ballot 
> election. Anyone consenting to be an elector, then, is voluntarily 
> taking on the responsibilities -- and risks -- of public action.
> 
> It *is* possible to imagine control systems that use Asset 
> techniques, and it *is* possible for electors to designate proxies, 
> but this either must be public, or have high security over what is 
> not public. What I recommend is to first implement advisory systems, 
> because they are fail-safe.
> 
> Thanks again to Michael Allen for all his work, I've been watching for years.
> 
> 
> > > I'm not entirely sure what you mean here. Is it parliamentary, in
> > > that the primary decides upon the composition of the legislature,
> > > and the legislature decides upon the composition of the executive?
> > > Or is it presidential, where there are two separate primaries, both
> > > decided by the voters through a liquid method?
> >
> >I describe both parliamentary and presidential systems in this new
> >document: http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/power_structuring
> >Looking at the parliamentary system, there are two continuous, open
> >primaries.  One nominates the legislature (still as described in my
> >last post) and the other nominates the executive.  If the technical
> >parties that run the primaries (parties like Pirates and Partido de
> >Internet, which we can also call "open parties") do well enough in the
> >election, then the head of state invites the winning primary executive
> >to form the government.  Why?  Because the open parties take for their
> >titular leader the current leader of the executive primary.
> >
> >So although there is no executive election (no constitutional change,
> >just a primary), neither does the new parliament decide the executive,
> >as it did before, at least not where the open parties are concerned.
> >They instead defer the decision to the executive primary.  So your
> >next question still needs to be answered.
> >
> > > It seems to me that you're saying it is "presidential" (separate
> > > executive elections), but the assembly has to give confidence to the
> > > government. What, then, happens if the assembly doesn't? Is there
> > > another executive election? Or does the assembly just watch the
> > > candidate executive until the voters rearrange their voters to
> > > produce an executive they approve of, and then they pick that
> > > executive?
> >
> >If parliament brings down the government on a motion of confidence,
> >then probably parliament is dismissed for an election.  That much is
> >the same as now.  The difference is that parliament no longer decides
> >the government.  But it can still bring the government down, and this
> >raises (again) a question of stability.
> >
> >Suppose the bone of contention (budget or whatever) is itself open to
> >a continuous primary.  If a budget that's unpopular in the budget
> >primary is pushed by the government, which therefore begins to suffer
> >in the *executive* primary, then the assembly has a clear licence to
> >bring down the government.  Otherwise it does not and might itself be
> >punished in the resulting election.  I'm thinking this will solve the
> >stability problem by increasing (once again) the level of information.
> >It puts a lot onto the citizens, but presumeably also gives them the
> >tools and experience to deal with it.
> >
> > > As for parties adopting the list, I don't think they would. Consider
> > > it in systems terms. Then the party is a system that responds to
> > > influence from the outside in such a way as to retain its
> > > integrity. The party thus desires to push the political environment
> > > in a direction that supports its existence. Traditionally, that can
> > > be done by gaining influence. Increased influence means greater
> > > capacity to change the environment - and thus a greater ability to
> > > head off changes that would be a problem to the party's own
> > > integrity. Here, a problem to integrity would be something that
> > > either weakens the party or requires it to change enough that it's
> > > no longer that party.
> > >
> > > Adopting a consensus list might give the party greater
> > > influence. But this influence is given at the cost of destroying
> > > integrity. In your own simpler words, it's political suicide. What
> > > good does it do the party to gain greater control, if the thing
> > > which gains control is not the party any longer? Control and
> > > influence are tools to keep integrity, but if there's no integrity
> > > to keep, it loses its point.
> >
> >True.
> >
> > > The party would have to redefine its identity so that it is not
> > > based on any political position before it could adopt the list. I
> > > don't think any usual parties would do that. They have not defined
> > > themselves as organizations that encourage democracy whatever its
> > > shape, but as organizations that politically represent a certain
> > > general position.
> >
> >I was wrong about the fate of the political parties.  I couldn't find
> >a role for them, so I thought they'd just vanish.  But I found a role
> >when I was drawing the diagrams.  You can see it here in figure SN:
> >http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/power_structuring#SN
> >
> >The two massive trees (Cx and Dx) are a lot like political parties.
> >They're certainly political in the sense of being concerned with
> >power.  They seem likely to have integrity too, as you say.  Two key
> >differences though: (1) even in a parliamentary system, they have
> >nothing to do with the legislature, such as party lists.  They're
> >purely executive parties; one in power, the other in waiting.
> >
> >(2) They are recursively structured *as* political parties.  At least
> >I imagine that each sub-office would have it's own specialized
> >sub-parties.  So if O is the ministry of finance, then Co and Zo are
> >sub-parties that specialize and diverge in issues of "left finance",
> >and Do and its peers in "right finance".  One of these sub-parties
> >will ordinarily be in power, it's leader sitting as minister, while
> >the others are in waiting.  Presumeably the large number of parties in
> >PR systems would be swallowed up by 2 or 3 of these hyper-parties,
> >where they'd rise or descend through the semi-fluid hierarchy.
> >
> >(I guess it's an evolutionary system.  At first I thought it might be
> >genetic because the formal offices look like genes, and the variant
> >parties that fill them look like alleles.  But it's not clear that
> >these party-alleles can replicate in the population (population of
> >what?), so I doubt it.  Still, the better sub-parties are likely to
> >sink vertically to greater power.  So it might be seen as a kind of
> >evolutionary breeder, or developmental nursery of parties.)
> >
> > > New parties could define themselves differently. If the party's
> > > considering itself "an organization to introduce liquid democracy",
> > > for instance (as the Internet Party is, to my knowledge), it would
> > > have no difficulty moving to a consensus list.
> >
> >Yes, I think the technical parties are better equipped to become "open
> >parties".  They'll cooperate in a loose network to provide the crucial
> >open primaries.  They'll be formal parties in the eyes of the state;
> >but each will take its candidate list from the assembly primary and
> >its leader from the executive primary, meaning they aren't really
> >parties, just technical platforms clothed to fit the parliamentary
> >system.  http://havoc.zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/glossary#open_party
> >The real political parties are in the executive, where they focus
> >exclusively on issues of power.
> >
> > > But would it get rid of the parliamentary compromising strategy that
> > > I mentioned? ...
> >
> >It seems instead to move it into the executive primary.  Looking again
> >at figure SN: http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/power_structuring#SN
> >Suppose an election is approaching.  I'm voting for Ds on the right,
> >but it's looking like the left will win.  The nominee for the finance
> >minister is a spend-thrift too, and I'm a fiscal conservative.  So I
> >shift my vote to Zs, thus supporting Zo for finance minister.  Maybe
> >we conservatives can unseat the spend-thrift Co.
> >
> >This seems benign now.  The accuracy of the executive primary cannot
> >really be questioned, because it's as accurate as the electors want it
> >to be.  So this is no longer the problem:
> >
> > > > > But if enough people vote this way, then the [left-wing] wins,
> > > > > even if the polls were inaccurate and it would not have won if
> > > > > people had voted honestly.
> >
> >If there's any instability centered on the nomination for the finance
> >ministry, then it's Cx's fault.  He decides the nomination.  Either
> >he's open to renaming the finance minister, or he's not, and he should
> >communicate that decision clearly.  Probably he has.  Probably it's
> >too late for vote shifts from the right to have any influence.  It's
> >all crystallized.  Better to stand one's ground and wait for the left
> >to enter office.  Let them get bashed around a little by reality.
> >Then maybe the primary will become fluid again, at least in places.
> >The minister has to pass a budget.
> >
> > > ... It depends on how the lists are frozen before the election. ...
> >
> >There's a potential weakness here.  Continuous primaries can't be
> >bolted directly to decision systems, so the candidate list has to be
> >extracted with care.  Ideally we have a separate secret ballot to
> >extract the decision, like in single winner:
> >http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/assembly_election/single-winner
> >But the secret ballot is unavailable here (goes to waste).
> >
> >So maybe a lottery every week.  It chooses a random time from the
> >previous week.  The result snapshot at that time becomes the decision
> >for the week.  It's reviewed by a panel who strike it (reverting to
> >the previous week's decision) if they see any wild gyrations, or other
> >fishy stuff.  So we have decisive candidtate lists at weekly
> >intervals.  (Later we vote to amend the constitution and do all this
> >by secret ballot instead.  That seems ideal, if we don't mind the
> >added expense.)
> >
> > > If there's a negotiation step between the candidates on the list,
> > > then it could [rid strategy]. Say a voter votes for a liberal. This
> > > liberal notices that according to predictions of support for the
> > > non-technical list, more conservatives than liberals will be
> > > elected. Thus he gives his support to the more liberal
> > > conservatives, pushing them above the less liberal ones on the final
> > > list.  If there is no negotiation, then the voters have to do the
> > > negotiation step, and that could lead to the kind of instability I
> > > mentioned. It might be less serious than the case with a continuous
> > > election, though.  The voters know they have to make up their minds
> > > before the time the lists will be frozen (for the elections). The
> > > pressure is akin to that in Simmons's consensus method: "reach an
> > > agreement or we'll pick at random". One might still want to have
> > > tools that could be used to escape local attractors, however. In the
> > > case where the right splits off the center to not be diluted, it
> > > would be nice to have some mechanism that could predicate the vote
> > > transfers on keeping the center, so the right can see that splitting
> > > off the center will never work. But I don't know what those tools
> > > would look like. I think a liquid system would be more free to
> > > develop these than a traditional party system would, since the tools
> > > and mechanisms would only inform the voters, not alter how they
> > > delegate.
> >
> >Does it still look problematic?  It seems the right/left boundary in
> >parliament is now so fuzzified, there's no longer any fulcrum to
> >teeter on.  It's so hemmed in by primaries too, that (as a whole) it
> >hasn't much wiggle room either.  The energetic elector might save his
> >powder for legislative primaries, for instance, in which bills are
> >prepared: http://zelea.com/w/Stuff:Votorola/p/legislative_action
> >
> >Mike