Could modern tech bring back direct democracy?

[AqD]

Imagine a government where every laws, rules and agreements are subject to your vote and all the impacts of choices are calculated by math models and presented to you, or leave to AI voting in your preferences.

No more politicians, campaigns, protests, debates or misinformation.

Everyone can purpose a law and everyone who purpose a law would need to construct a model for prediction of impacts, from publicly available data and algorithms - you could, for example, know that by voting yes to join a conflict, +10% chance of your city would be hit by terrorist attack and some military manufacturer would get 400% income next year, or that raising tax on a certain product would increase your household cost by 2%.

Most of the top government positions can be fired or replaced by data analysts who do real jobs helping the society, improving and verifying the prediction models or help construct them.

Ex politicians can hide in their basements, browse Internet all day and try to raise awareness, like SJWs.

Wouldn't that be very nice?

[Muizer]

If you consider, as I would, democracy to be a system that balances expert analysis of problems (including feasibility and impact studies) and popular support for their solutions, then your proposals does not deliver. The missing ingredient is meaningful accountability. For whoever is making the proposal, there's no incentive to do an a priori expert analysis that goes beyond the knowledge at the disposal of the voters ; beyond what is necessary to secure popular support. It could be argued this accountability is failing in representative democracies as well, but that's not a failing of the political system but of the direction we all, as voters, have allowed it to go in. Until democratic leaders abuse their power to rig society in their favour (Hungary, Poland, Russia, Turkey, to name a few) blaming it on the system is in fact primarily lazy and defeatist. People who shift the blame for their own inaction also won't be the ones who would approach direct democracy with the diligence of a law-maker, which it requires. It is, up to a point, a good thing their influence remains limited, because you can't build any kind of democracy on apathy.

[Basileos Leandros I]

Such a system in theory sounds amazing, in reality not so much.

My focus will be on the tech side of things but I do want to point out that if you take this place as a microcosm, direct democracy wasn't a perfect solution. I can propose more or less what I like as a project / award for the forum, but keep in mind that in a direct democracy, with millions of people, the system could be very easily overwhelmed particularly with troll proposals. Also, you can lie very well with statistics and projection models.

Furthermore, neither does Switzerland (the last place with direct democracy in reality) have a very sound political system either.

On the tech side of things, implementing a direct vote will require a monumental security effort which as things stand governments are not willing to shell out on. And even with the most secure systems, extremely talented hackers can find a way to get inside it.

[DaVinci]

bring back direct democracy?

There never was actual direct democracy anywhere. 'Direct democracy' as such, what the word says in its very sense, is an illusion, and impossible. So unfortunately, the title is already a misinformer, sotospeak. No offence, just saying, or informing.

And what you describe in 1st post is a kind of representative democracy. What is the existing form in democracies, with diverse various degrees of representation.

Btw., "SJW" is a buzzword term of the alt-right.

[AqD]

If you consider, as I would, democracy to be a system that balances expert analysis of problems (including feasibility and impact studies) and popular support for their solutions, then your proposals does not deliver. The missing ingredient is meaningful accountability. For whoever is making the proposal, there's no incentive to do an a priori expert analysis that goes beyond the knowledge at the disposal of the voters ; beyond what is necessary to secure popular support.

But there would be incentives for citizens to request better analysis or perform it themselves, since they would have to make the decisions.

Wouldn't this compel citizens to take far more responsibilities and be more knowledgeable, than relying on their representatives which has become a new class of hereditary elites who do things solely for their own benefits?

[Sar1n]

Btw., "SJW" is a buzzword term of the alt-right.

Nope, it's a term used by anyone with at least a bit of brain to describe certain kind of vocal, toxic self-righteous leftists.

There are two problems with this. First is technical-such system would be centralized, automated and due to sheer amount of information going through in both ways, impossible to be temporarily suspended and replaced by something simpler without totally losing functionality. That means it would be vulnerable to either subversion to manipulate outcome or simpler brute force attacks to disable it in critical time.
Second is simple. It emphasizes the biggest weakness of democracy. You need educated, engaged public capable of civil discourse to function properly.

[Common Soldier]

Imagine a government where every laws, rules and agreements are subject to your vote and all the impacts of choices are calculated by math models and presented to you, or leave to AI voting in your preferences.

No more politicians, campaigns, protests, debates or misinformation.

Everyone can purpose a law and everyone who purpose a law would need to construct a model for prediction of impacts, from publicly available data and algorithms - you could, for example, know that by voting yes to join a conflict, +10% chance of your city would be hit by terrorist attack and some military manufacturer would get 400% income next year, or that raising tax on a certain product would increase your household cost by 2%.

Most of the top government positions can be fired or replaced by data analysts who do real jobs helping the society, improving and verifying the prediction models or help construct them.

Ex politicians can hide in their basements, browse Internet all day and try to raise awareness, like SJWs.

Wouldn't that be very nice?

I don't think the average citizen would want to have to make the all the kind of decissions that their elective representives have routinely make. The time it would.take to get themselves properly informed would take too time.out of their daily lives. I think that most people would prefer delegate most of the more mundane decission making to their representatives. Heck, many Americans can't even bother to vote once in every.2 years, so.why would.thwy want to.be involved in the daily running of the government?

[Genava]

I don't think the average citizen would want to have to make the all the kind of decissions that their elective representives have routinely make. The time it would.take to get themselves properly informed would take too time.out of their daily lives. I think that most people would prefer delegate most of the more mundane decission making to their representatives. Heck, many Americans can't even bother to vote once in every.2 years, so.why would.thwy want to.be involved in the daily running of the government?

Personally I think citizen are like child. They need to get responsibilities at some point to grown up and to learn how to be mature.

Obviously, not all population are ready to have a system close to the one we have in Switzerland. But it is only by trying and by learning from their mistakes that they would be ready for that.

https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/the-swi...ountry/8483932
https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/yes-no-...-vote/41963568

[Common Soldier]

Personally I think citizen are like child. They need to get responsibilities at some point to grown up and to learn how to be mature.

Obviously, not all population are ready to have a system close to the one we have in Switzerland. But it is only by trying and by learning from their mistakes that they would be ready for that.

https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/the-swi...ountry/8483932
https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/yes-no-...-vote/41963568

The US has a population of 350 million and apans an entire continent, while Switzerland has only 8.6 million ans occupies one small.region of thr world's smallest continent. Governing the US is orders of magnitude more complex than Switzerland. Even governing thr larger US states would be more complex. Switzerland has no.standing navy to worry about, no mulitary.commitments and responsibiliies to worry about.

What would be practical for Switzerland might work on thr state level, but not.national. having to deal.with the complexities of a population 40 times greater would demand a lot.more of the citizens time than what is required of the Swiss citizen.


Note, on the state level US citizens often vote on laws.and admenments to state laws, so US citizens do currenrly practice some direct democracy, just not on the national level. Some expansion could be included to have US citizens to vote on certain things, like approving treaties or health care bills, but often those can be complex, and it wouls take a person some timr to.properly investigate a treaty or.a major.health care bill to do it justice. Often compromises have ro be reached to meet thr demands of various different competing interest, and how could such negotiations and compromises be done with a direct democracy system as proposed?

[Muizer]

Nope, it's a term used by anyone with at least a bit of brain to describe certain kind of vocal, toxic self-righteous leftists.

That's what an alt-right person would say

[Genava]

Note, on the state level US citizens often vote on laws.and admenments to state laws, so US citizens do currenrly practice some direct democracy, just not on the national level. Some expansion could be included to have US citizens to vote on certain things, like approving treaties or health care bills, but often those can be complex, and it wouls take a person some timr to.properly investigate a treaty or.a major.health care bill to do it justice. Often compromises have ro be reached to meet thr demands of various different competing interest, and how could such negotiations and compromises be done with a direct democracy system as proposed?

Do you really think we vote on everything? That's not the case.
We vote any changes to the federal constitution.
We vote any law that got a referendum with enough support (from the citizens).
We vote any proposal that got enough support (from the citizens).

Most of the time, the federal assembly do its own thing without needing the opinion of the people directly. They are elected by the people so it is alright.

The particularity is that we, Swiss citizens, have the possibility to ask the government to execute a popular vote on a specific change of laws.

For more details:
https://www.ch.ch/en/demokratie/poli...ts/referendum/
https://www.ch.ch/en/demokratie/poli...ar-initiative/

[Common Soldier]

Do you really think we vote on everything? That's not the case.
We vote any changes to the federal constitution.
We vote any law that got a referendum with enough support (from the citizens).
We vote any proposal that got enough support (from the citizens).

Most of the time, the federal assembly does its own thing without needing the opinion of the people directly. They are elected by the people so it is alright.

The particularity is that we, Swiss citizens, have the possibility to ask the government to execute a popular vote on a specific change of laws.

For more details:
https://www.ch.ch/en/demokratie/poli...ts/referendum/
https://www.ch.ch/en/demokratie/poli...ar-initiative/

That is pretty much what we do in the US, only just on the state level, and some US states have a far bigger population and cover more land area, for.example California, than Switzerland. States citizens oftrn vote on state amendments and other laws. State citizens can even remove elected state officials from office with a direct vote, as long those doing the recall csn get enough voter signatures to put thr recall on the ballot.


What works for a country of 8.6 million is not practical for a nation of 350 million.

[antaeus]

Wouldn't that be very nice?

To add to the pile on...

I can't think of anything worse than a dictatorship by majority. Replacing a flaming torch or pitch fork with a keyboard doesn't make it any less a nasty place. Democracy works because of the built in checks and balances. Remove those and you have mob justice. You would, in essence, be giving up your society to those whom have the loudest voice and broadest reach amongst the media. You would be giving up society to talk back radio hosts and editorial news commentators.

Nope, it's a term used by anyone with at least a bit of brain to describe certain kind of vocal, toxic self-righteous leftists..

The use of throw-away dehumanising catch phrases such as SJW (or alt-right for that matter) to describe large diverse groups of people amongst whom there usually massive and often contradictory differences of opinion, just because you might disagree with some of their opinions is a sure sign of someone who is either too lazy, incapable or unwilling to engage in nuanced thought, or is deliberately dehumanising to push an agenda. It's trendy versions of fob or pinko or any of the plethora of dehumanising or racist or bigoted or whatever terms history can lend to us.

[DaVinci]

That's what an alt-right person would say

No surprise. But see below about "alt-right".

snip



The use of throw-away dehumanising catch phrases such as SJW (or alt-right for that matter) to describe large diverse groups of people amongst whom there usually massive and often contradictory differences of opinion, just because you might disagree with some of their opinions is a sure sign of someone who is either too lazy, incapable or unwilling to engage in nuanced thought, or is deliberately dehumanising to push an agenda. It's trendy versions of fob or pinko or any of the plethora of dehumanising or racist or bigoted or whatever terms history can lend to us.

Yes. But somewhat normal in social media, and also long "established" in the political fight between left and right. And in the actual violent fight anyway, dehuminisation is firm application in the military for ages, as preparation to kill the enemy.

And, except "alt-right" is an abreviation, that comes from alternative right. It is in fact a term-invention by R. B. Spencer, an american far right activist.

So "alt-right for that matter" does not work in comparison as buzzword.

As you can read with the link, it became truly a kind of pool-term for online activists and supporters of the extreme right in the US. And one of those guys invented the buzzword SJW, from where it spead out.

"Alt-right" nowadays, got and gets also wrong used, ie. for all far right'ers in the world, partially in social media at least. Whereas it is originally a pure US-American term*.

In proper view, the term is nonsense. It was chosen by Spencer with intention to make the far right more harmless in the public view, aiming to giving them a salon-able taste. And it worked.

* and actual experts have diverse politological valid terms for right extremists.

[Sir Adrian]

Imho such as system would be horrible and self-defeating. You may give everyone's voice and equal weight, but that does not mean that everyone knows what they're talking about. The people are easily tricked and misled and direct democracy would quickly devolve into populism and economic ruin.

[Cookiegod]

Electronic voting is a idea.
https://youtu.be/w3_0x6oaDmI
https://youtu.be/LkH2r-sNjQs

[Heathen Hammer]

That's what an alt-right person would say

"Alt-right" is just a buzzword term of SJWs.

As per the notion of direct democracy, we have to look at current situation. Looking at general corruption and decay of demographic institutions into de-facto oligarchy, it seems that representative democracy may not be the best thing - at least it certainly is easily subverted by rich elites as well as foreign influences. The far-left's Soviet-funded crawl into academia and entertainment industries of the West certainly proves that, while 2020 itself certainly proves to us that the current representative democracy model is flawed, to say the least.
So a degree of direct democracy is certainly needed to undermine the influence of the over-represented elites. How should it be done? There are a variety of ways, from online polling linked to your citizenship, to referendums, both may be logistically difficult, but in the long term could bring better results. The question is, who would bring such changes? Elites are certainly happy with their dominant position with representative model and would fight any changes tooth and nail, while the mainstream media will do its thing of misinforming the public and smearing any opposition. So at least we know the Gord's knot here, the question is how to untie it.

[antaeus]

"Alt-right" is just a buzzword term of SJWs.

As per the notion of direct democracy, we have to look at current situation. Looking at general corruption and decay of demographic institutions into de-facto oligarchy, it seems that representative democracy may not be the best thing - at least it certainly is easily subverted by rich elites as well as foreign influences. The far-left's Soviet-funded crawl into academia and entertainment industries of the West certainly proves that, while 2020 itself certainly proves to us that the current representative democracy model is flawed, to say the least.

How does 2020 prove that representative democracy is flawed? There has been a number of successful elections in representative democracies, and there will be a number more over the next few months. Representative systems are not free from influence of powerful elites, but that's what the 'representative' part seeks to balance. In a direct democracy, the only opinion that matters is the one with the largest advertising budget - the one that can have it's message heard most widely. In most developed democracies, that would mean handing over your country to Rupert Murdoch, your new direct democracy world leader. I have never understood how people can think that direct democracy could end up as anything other than a tyranny of the masses popularity contest between the biggest media owners.

Certainly representative democracies can function better than some do. Democracies with in-built two party biases that are less proportional seem to struggle with containing influence, whereas democracies with more more proportional systems which allow for the inclusion of more smaller parties seem to do better thanks to the need to work within coalitions. But that speaks to the need to reform, rather than the need to do-away-with.

[Heathen Hammer]

How does 2020 prove that representative democracy is flawed? There has been a number of successful elections in representative democracies, and there will be a number more over the next few months. Representative systems are not free from influence of powerful elites, but that's what the 'representative' part seeks to balance. In a direct democracy, the only opinion that matters is the one with the largest advertising budget - the one that can have it's message heard most widely. In most developed democracies, that would mean handing over your country to Rupert Murdoch, your new direct democracy world leader. I have never understood how people can think that direct democracy could end up as anything other than a tyranny of the masses popularity contest between the biggest media owners.

Certainly representative democracies can function better than some do. Democracies with in-built two party biases that are less proportional seem to struggle with containing influence, whereas democracies with more more proportional systems which allow for the inclusion of more smaller parties seem to do better thanks to the need to work within coalitions. But that speaks to the need to reform, rather than the need to do-away-with.

2020 proves that representative democracy almost always leads to oligarchy - your excellent point about media can be applied here to a much bigger extent.
Excellent point about media. The problem with representative democracy is that it stops being a democracy when elections become symbolic, as financial elites control every prominent candidate, thus rendering whole process useless. At the end of the day, being able to chose which servants of the elites gets to represent them this time isn't a real choice.

[brave_warrior]

I do think most people would be overwhelmed by being able to vote for anything and everything. The complexity of our society has grown considerably compared to Ancient Greece where 'real' democracy was still feasible. The point is most people do not care about every singe law nor understand all kinds of mechanisms provided by law and how one decision can affect another although you might have not thought about it in the first place. Politicians have so many people working for them - and most people are not aware of how politics work. It would overcomplicate everything. Let alone technology and misinformation would become a bigger threat to society and a hacker attack might disrupt everything and cause wars.