Pirate Democracy

From Pirate Party Belgium
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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.

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.
  • 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?