Pirate Party Belgium - User contributions [en]

Pirate Democracy

2013-05-02T14:27:53Z

Paul Nollen:

= Basic definition =

'''Permanent direct democracy with proxy voting.'''

Permanent: 24/7, not restricted to once every 4 years

Direct: citizens have the possibility to propose new law proposals and vote on law proposals by themselves, without the need for an elected representative

Democracy: legislative power of the citizens (citizen sovereignty)

Proxy voting: any citizen may delegate her vote to whom she wishes, change delegate anytime, or vote herself whenever she wants to.

= Implementation =
== Proxy voting ==
* The scope of vote delegation should be kept as broad as possible initially, but voters should be given the opportunity to change the rules and limit their own voting possibilities later on. More concretely:
** No limitation on the number of delegated votes
** Transitive voting without limitation

= Outstanding questions =
== Principles ==
* How about the formation of a government? How about executive power?
* What would be the role of sortition ("tirage au sort") and deliberative democracy?
* Do we need other institutions than just the citizens voting on law proposals (e.g. a judicial committee to write law proposals in judicial language, an "expert" committee to provide advices and opinions on law proposals, etc...).
== Technical details ==
* Should delegation be transitive? i.e. I delegate my vote to X who delegates her vote to Y, who delegates her vote to Z, so I delegate my vote to Z.
** For: you trusted Y, whatever his decision, so you should trust his decision to delegate as well.
* Should delegates receive a compensation for their work?
** For: this will provide an incentive for people to invest time in studying law proposals
** Against: This will leave the door open to professional politician who can abuse the system
* Should there be a limit to the number of votes a delegate can gather?
** Against: people should have the freedom to vote whatever they want

== Axioms for a democratic decision making system ==
* Nobody has more decision-making power than anybody else
* The threshold to perform any action in the system needs to be as low as possible
* Everybody needs to be able to make and vote any proposal
* The freedom to do what you want with your vote needs to be as unlimited as possible.
* The final result needs to reflect the intentions of the voters as much as possible.
* Nobody can gain more influence on the final result through strategic proposals or voting.
* You have to be able to verify what happend to your vote.
* Every voting needs to be verifiable.
* Everybody has the right to remain anonymous.

== Presentations and documents ==
[http://www.e2d-i.net/Direct%20Democracy%20e20120627.ppt Direct Democracy ppt presentation]

[[File:Direct%20Democracy%20e20120627.pdf]]

[[File:Vrijheid_van_meningsuiting_Antrop._zomeruni_2012.doc]] Freedom of speech

[[File:Vrijheid_van_meningsuiting_Antrop._zomeruni_2012.doc]] Vrijheid van meningsuiting

== Discussions ==

[[File:Copy_van_piratepad_v7495_20120924.doc]]

[[File:Copy_van_de_mailing_onderwerp_meerderheid_v20120924.doc]]

= General information =

'''[http://pirateparty.be/democracy-squad]''' Objectives of the squad

Elections:2012/Debriefing

2012-12-09T20:52:16Z

Paul Nollen:

= Next Meeting =
*[[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Agenda01|Agenda of the next meeting]]
*WHEN :
*WHERE :
*[meeting on Mumble] ?
*[Google Hang-out] ?

= General Rules of a squad =
*All the things we do, every single thought and action should be documented on this page.
*This way, all the work done can be continued by the leaving squadmembers' successor.
*All position should be properly documented and commented.
= Objectives =
*To gather and compile every lesson we have learned from the communal and regional electoral campaign, so we won't waste time making the same mistakes in 2014.
= Members =
* [[User:Vincent.L|Vincent L.]] (Namur)

= Meeting Minutes =

{|border="1" cellpadding="4" width="400px" style="border-collapse: collapse; border-spacing: 0; border-width: 1px; border-style: solid; border-color: #000"
!Agenda & Date
!Meeting Minutes
|+
| [[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Agenda01|Agenda 1]]
| [[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Minutes01|Meeting Minutes 1]]
|-
| [[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Agenda02|Agenda 2]]
| [[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Minutes02|Meeting Minutes 2]]
|}

*''Templates'' : [[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Agenda_template|Agenda]] | [[Elections 2012 Debriefing/Minutes_template|Minutes]]

= Projects =
*
*
*
=Reference Documents =
* [http://crew-namur.piratepad.eu/4 Pad Namur]
*
*
= To Do =
*To collect reference documents from every crew/candidate
*
*
= External links =
* [http://www.democratie.nu/wiki/index.php/TOOLBOX Toolbox of Democratie.nu] Dutch and English. General information about actions, experiences and organisation.

Democracy

2012-11-28T16:19:32Z

Paul Nollen: /* Contact */

{{SquadSidebarEN|place=None|street=|number=|postalcode=|city=|captain=Undefined|navigator=Undefined|treasurekeeper=None|squadname=Democracy}}
== Objectives of the squad ==

The purposes of this squad are to

# help define what a '''[[Pirate Democracy]]''' could be '''(working documents and presentations are listed there)'''
# interact with other Pirates to try to reach a consensus on this question
# help publicize our view on democracy (provided point 2 is achieved)
# work on the tools that will be needed to implement this new type of democracy

== Current Projects ==
=== Proposition for Pirate Party's Statutes: The Charter Party ===
The objective of the Charter Party of the Pirate Party is to provide, within a single document, a complete guide to the Belgian Pirate Party. Instead of formal statutes organized as a series of articles, it introduces the entities of the party, describes a few guiding rules and proposes a series of good practices. Thus the Charter Party should be considered as a basis for guiding the Crews, but it can be modified internally in order to test and select new good practices. During each General Assembly, each Crew can propose these empirically tested amendments to the Charter Party.

[https://docs.google.com/document/d/1exek1lCSreUia8nHtKRdfOd6P3qkr5Q0Cr_rxCDuqZg/edit Charter Party]

== Meetings ==
[[November 12th 2012]]

== Contact ==
For questions, comments, etc... please write to Alex at zenon.alex@gmail.com (F,E) or Paul at paul.nollen@gmail.com (N,E),we have a mailing list but only recently. Please subscribe the list on the bottom of this page.

== Content ==
The important concepts that need to be discussed include:

*[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy direct democracy]
*[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_voting#Delegated_voting liquid democracy]
*[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deliberative_democracy deliberative democracy]
*[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-democracy E-democracy]
*General overview:
*[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy#Forms Forms of Democracy]

== References ==
*[http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~matsusak/Papers/Matsusaka_DD_PC_Encyclopedia.pdf Direct Democracy] :
Definitions, literature and references - John G. Matsusaka, University of Southern California

*[http://www.democracy-international.org/book-direct-democracy.html book direct democracy]

facts, arguments and experiences on the introduction of initiative and referendum
This book is a must for anyone who has an interest in the current changes in society. It is available for free in eight languages.

*[http://www.iri-europe.org/publications/guidebooks/ IRI Guidebooks to Direct Democracy]

It is the goal of the Initiative and Referendum Institute, Europe's first think-tank on modern direct democracy founded in 2001, to make a significant contribution to improving the knowledge of the history and practice of direct democracy – in the world in general, and especially in Europe.

That is why the IRI "Guidebook to Direct Democracy" (published in English, French, Spanish, German, Korean, Italian, Finnish and Chinese) focuses on the place where the tools which allow citizens to take part in political decision-making are the most extensive and have been used for the longest period of time – Switzerland. Over the past 150 years, citizens' rights have been continually extended and now cover all the levels of political life (national, cantonal and local) and all areas of politics (including foreign policy).
IRI also developed, in collaboration with [http://www.democracy-international.org/ Democracy International], the [http://direct-democracy-navigator.org/ direct-democracy-navigator] – a unique global information and collaboration platform on modern participative democracy.

*[http://liqd.net/en/schwerpunkte/theoretische-grundlagen/liquid-democracy/ Liquid democracy]

The idea of “Liquid Democracy” has already been circulating on the web for a couple of years, however without any suggestions for a specific execution. The core of the idea is delegated voting, which removes the previous separation between representative democratic and direct democratic decisions. The principle of delegated voting is the base for all Liquid Democracy concepts, however the idea itself is not sufficient when it comes to the description of complex political processes. Since the end of 2008 people associated with the current Liquid Democracy e.V. deal with the theme of liquid democracy and try to advance it ever since.

The term “Liquid Democracy”, LD stands for a new form of democracy in which various “rigid“ barriers are being “fluidised“.

*[http://books.google.be/books/about/The_Athenian_Democracy_in_the_Age_of_Dem.html?id=o2mgjqbFGp4C&redir_esc=y Athenian Democracy in the Age of Demosthenes: Structure, Principles & Ideology] by Mogens Herman Hansen (ISBN-10: 0806131438 | ISBN-13: 978-0806131436)

This book summarize 30 years of research on Athenian society and focus on the second era of Athenian democracy (403-322 BC). As the Athenian democracy is probably the most nearly perfect example of (direct) democracy, it is a very important inspiration for any person who want to understand how a democracy can work. This book is also translated in French.

*[http://participedia.net/ Participedia] is an open global knowledge community for researchers and practitioners in the field of democratic innovation and public engagement.

*[http://www.ftu-namur.org/fichiers/TIC_participation_citoyenne.pdf Les outils numériques au service d’une participation citoyenne et démocratique augmentée] : Initiatives in francophone Belgium and good foreign practices to enhance the expression citizenship and participatory democracy.

== Mailing list ==
{{#widget:Mailinglist|value=cHAuYmUuZGVtb2NyYXRpZUBwaXJhdGVwYXJ0eS5iZQ==}} pp.be.democratie@pirateparty.be

2012-11-14T11:40:32Z

Paul Nollen:

Talk:Democracy/Meeting/12 11 2012

2012-11-14T08:47:53Z

Paul Nollen: Created page with ""Another topic of discussion was the rules governing the behaviour of elected representatives. It was said that they should sign some contract with the party, ensuring they will ..."

Democracy

2012-11-14T08:32:41Z

Paul Nollen: /* References */

Pirate Democracy

2012-11-14T08:11:38Z

Paul Nollen: /* General information */

Pirate Democracy

2012-11-14T08:11:24Z

Paul Nollen: /* General information */

Talk:Pirate Democracy

2012-11-14T08:10:05Z

Paul Nollen:

--[[User:NingúnOtro|NingúnOtro]] I strongly oppose the fact that a direct entry in the Pirate Party Wiki without any sign of approval of its content by the wider Assembly can be made representative of the thoughts of the Pirate Party as a whole on any subject.

"Pirate Democracy" is too important a subject to have Paul Nollen take on it be what any circumstancial visitors to our Wiki get to believe that what he writes is what the whole Party takes for granted.

If there is one thing more wrong than any other about it... it is the fact that he may think that he is entitled to try to get away with it simply by having the guts to write it down and publish it in the Wiki.

One of the biggest dangers of direct democracy... everyone thinks his take on things is authoritative enough, and he lacks the reflex to ask others for their opinion on the matter. Instead of a community, we become an opportunistic gathering of mere individuals each trying to retrieve more than what we input, all chaotically improvised and geared towards the survival of the fittest...

----

It is impossible to start any discussion or come to any conclusion without giving some content. I don't try to impose anything. I just wanted to offer the possibility to study and discuss the subject of "democracy". For a lot of people "direct democracy" like it exists in Switzerland and half of the US states is simply unknown. The very basic discussions on the mailing lists prove this.
Our squad just had his first meeting in order to try to organise open workshops about the democracy item. I hope that we can provide some information about these workshops in the next week or so.
Maybe this can reassure you that we don't intend to impose anything. At due time we may reach a conclusion in the Squad and even then that conclusion has to be approved by the general assemblee. Apart from direct democracy there are other forms of democracy worth talking about. I am a member (amongst other organisations) of participedia who offers very interesting examples http://participedia.net/
--[[User:Paul Nollen|Paul Nollen]] 20:40, 13 November 2012 (CET)

----

My comment was not that much about the presented content, but about the way that no care was taken to showcase it as something being proposed or under discussion. For any casual visitor... whatever you have written down there showcases as the PP-BE take on Pirate Democracy. With most of the Pirates not even knowing something about it had been written down in the wiki for everyone to read.

Just imagine how the Pirate Party of Belgium could work if every member did more or less the same. Wait!... ain't that exactly the experience we have had for the provincial and local elections ;( .
--[[User:NingúnOtro|NingúnOtro]] 00:23, 14 November 2012 (CET)

----

Always welcome to improve our objectives, we did our best to explain them on the squad page:
http://www.pirateparty.be/wiki/index.php/DemocracySquad

Objectives of the squad

The purposes of this squad are to

1. help define what a Pirate Democracy could be (working documents and presentations are listed there)

2. interact with other Pirates to try to reach a consensus on this question

3. help publicize our view on democracy (provided point 2 is achieved)

4. work on the tools that will be needed to implement this new type of democracy

--[[User:Paul Nollen|Paul Nollen]] 09:10, 14 November 2012 (CET)

Democracy

2012-11-14T08:04:56Z

Paul Nollen: /* References */

Talk:Pirate Democracy

2012-11-13T19:40:48Z

Paul Nollen:

Paul Nollen: /* Mailinglist */

== Objectives of the squad ==
The purposes of this squad are to

1. help define what a [[Pirate Democracy]] could be

2. interact with other Pirates to try to reach a consensus on this question

3. help publicize our view on democracy (provided point 2 is achieved)

4. work on the tools that will be needed to implement this new type of democracy

== Meetings ==
We will try to meet every month but a time and place still needs to be defined.
Meetings will be held in Brussels.

== Contact ==
For questions, comments, etc... please write to Alex at zenon.alex@gmail.com (we have a mailing list but only recently. Please subscribe the list on the bottom of this page).

== Content ==
The important concepts that need to be discussed include:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy direct democracy]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_voting#Delegated_voting liquid democracy]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deliberative_democracy deliberative democracy]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-democracy E-democracy]

General overview:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy#Forms Forms of Democracy]

== References ==

[http://www.democracy-international.org/book-direct-democracy.html book direct democracy]

facts, arguments and experiences on the introduction of initiative and referendum

This book is a must for anyone who has an interest in the current changes in society. It is available for free in eight languages.

[http://www.iri-europe.org/publications/guidebooks/ IRI Guidebooks to Direct Democracy]

It is the goal of the Initiative and Referendum Institute, Europe's first think-tank on modern direct democracy founded in 2001, to make a significant contribution to improving the knowledge of the history and practice of direct democracy – in the world in general, and especially in Europe.

That is why the IRI "Guidebook to Direct Democracy" (published in English, French, Spanish, German, Korean, Italian, Finnish and Chinese) focuses on the place where the tools which allow citizens to take part in political decision-making are the most extensive and have been used for the longest period of time – Switzerland. Over the past 150 years, citizens' rights have been continually extended and now cover all the levels of political life (national, cantonal and local) and all areas of politics (including foreign policy).

[http://liqd.net/en/schwerpunkte/theoretische-grundlagen/liquid-democracy/ Liquid democracy]

The idea of “Liquid Democracy” has already been circulating on the web for a couple of years, however without any suggestions for a specific execution. The core of the idea is delegated voting, which removes the previous separation between representative democratic and direct democratic decisions. The principle of delegated voting is the base for all Liquid Democracy concepts, however the idea itself is not sufficient when it comes to the describtion of complex political processes. Since the end of 2008 people associated with the current Liquid Democracy e.V. deal with the theme of liquid democracy and try to advance it ever since.

The term “Liquid Democracy”, LD stands for a new form of democracy in which various “rigid“ barriers are being “fluidised“.

== Mailinglist == pp.be.democratie@pirateparty.be
{{#widget:Mailinglist|value=cHAuYmUuZGVtb2NyYXRpZUBwaXJhdGVwYXJ0eS5iZQ==}}

2012-06-26T11:40:08Z

Paul Nollen:

== Objectives of the squad ==
The purposes of this squad are to

1. help define what a Pirate Democracy could be

2. interact with other Pirates to try to reach a consensus on this question

3. help publicize our view on democracy (provided point 2 is achieved)

4. work on the tools that will be needed to implement this new type of democracy

== Meetings ==
We will try to meet every month but a time and place still needs to be defined.
Meetings will be held in Brussels and in English (to allow all communities to participate), unless another solution seems preferable.

== Content ==
The important concepts that need to be discussed include:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy direct democracy]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_voting#Delegated_voting liquid democracy]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deliberative_democracy deliberative democracy]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-democracy E-democracy]

== References ==

[http://www.democracy-international.org/book-direct-democracy.html book direct democracy]

facts, arguments and experiences on the introduction of initiative and referendum

This book is a must for anyone who has an interest in the current changes in society. It is available for free in eight languages.

[http://www.iri-europe.org/publications/guidebooks/ IRI Guidebooks to Direct Democracy]

It is the goal of the Initiative and Referendum Institute, Europe's first think-tank on modern direct democracy founded in 2001, to make a significant contribution to improving the knowledge of the history and practice of direct democracy – in the world in general, and especially in Europe.

That is why the IRI "Guidebook to Direct Democracy" (published in English, French, Spanish, German, Korean, Italian, Finnish and Chinese) focuses on the place where the tools which allow citizens to take part in political decision-making are the most extensive and have been used for the longest period of time – Switzerland. Over the past 150 years, citizens' rights have been continually extended and now cover all the levels of political life (national, cantonal and local) and all areas of politics (including foreign policy).

[http://liqd.net/en/schwerpunkte/theoretische-grundlagen/liquid-democracy/ Liquid democracy]

The idea of “Liquid Democracy” has already been circulating on the web for a couple of years, however without any suggestions for a specific execution. The core of the idea is delegated voting, which removes the previous separation between representative democratic and direct democratic decisions. The principle of delegated voting is the base for all Liquid Democracy concepts, however the idea itself is not sufficient when it comes to the describtion of complex political processes. Since the end of 2008 people associated with the current Liquid Democracy e.V. deal with the theme of liquid democracy and try to advance it ever since.

The term “Liquid Democracy”, LD stands for a new form of democracy in which various “rigid“ barriers are being “fluidised“.

== To do ==
Create a mailing list.