We are now trying to regain it since
about 150 years. But it is hard to reinstall democratic habits of low-tech,
small communities with hardly any specialization other than between men and
women. We now have to deal with large-scale society, advanced technologies
and a wide specter of labor specialization. The village has become the global
village, with potential similarities but also with huge differences.
With increased levels of information
and education, many have come to doubt the functioning of the democratic
project. They notice that voting is rather pointless as long as elections omit high
officials, journalists, lobbyists and the hidden powers represented by those lobbyists.
ILLUSION
We can hope for improvement through
next elections, but elections are part of the very same political system that
we try to modify through elections. The last thing we should expect is that
those we bring into power will try to change it. They are the ones who benefit
from that political system and will not want risking the benefits of their
personal investments.
To my mind, the core problem is that
our elections delegate power to persons. It is ‘representative’ democracy. We
have come to suppose that ruling a country is a specialized job: “It has to be
done by people such as politicians and their advisors.” The consequence is that
more than 99% of the citizens are to meekly implement what the experts decide.
Schools and mass-production have turned us into the standard citizens who make
the wheels turn.
Therefore, we as citizens cannot
improve society through elections and hoping for politicians to do the job for
us. If elections and politicians do bring improvements it is because the wider
society has arrived at a point where a majority want something, for instance,
more equality for women.
But the desire of more equality for
women does not come from elections. It evolves in society, whereas elections
are just an instrument. Neither does the desire of more equality for women come
from politicians as opinion makers. They follow the trend, put that desire on
their agenda.
So, instead of mostly focusing on
elections, we may at least also focus on society, or perhaps even more. Change
has to come bottom-up, through creative thought and by inspired action.
Elections reinforce routine thinking and are therefore, next to their benefits,
a dangerous instrument in the hands of those who want our conformity.
STONE AGE
What can we, in our attempts to
improve politics, learn from our stone-age ancestors? And what have qe
unlearned in farm society? What might we recover from the community
organization used by democratic stone-age tribals and perhaps set free of what
is still waiting in our genes?
Our stone-age ancestors show that
democracy does not have a government. It is government, a certain type of
government. All people are involved in managing the community. They notice a
problem, discuss it, use earlier knowledge provided by elders, decide, test,
re-decide and implement again, as an ongoing, joint process.
It is not a separate segment of
society, like we at present see as politics, next to economics, education,
health care, religion, sports, arts, and other such segments. No, tribals apply
politics as an integral part of everybody’s daily life.
RE-ENACT
Now, do we have any chance of
re-enact parts of this stone-age life in our high-tech, globalized and
specialized lives? Well, here is the garden where we can experiment, discuss,
use available knowledge, decide, test, re-decide and implement again, as an
ongoing, joint process. What can we re-enact from the long gone past that,
however, may still be slumbering in our genes waiting to be used again?
Which differences are simply too
large to bridge? How can involve more citizens in ongoing management? How will
citizens acquire and use sensible information? How to clarify, just to mention
one immense challenge, the integration of issues ranging from the local to the
global level? Can we hope for proper use of Internet and social media? Other
media. Civil society? School education? More and better personal meetings, at
various levels of scale?
In shaping the behaviors of future
adults, mothers have most of the influence. In wider society we may use the
power of collective consumer actions. Improve legal support to employees so
that they become more vocal. Start more economic and ecological initiatives
from below and keep those initiatives running. Teach constructive initiatives
and their consolidation. Improve and safeguard information such as in the
social media. Maintain communication between initiatives to learn and support
each other.
In the visible domain, school
education, established media and social media may need our critical and
creative attention. In the hidden domain, the enormous power of large companies
can be counterpoised, not by trade unions, but by consumers. The power of banks
may be undermined by bottom-up financial initiatives that bring rivaling
influence.
It’s all very difficult. But is
difficulty a reason to give up? Let’s start with small steps. I can give a few
ideas and welcome positive responses.
VOTE MATCH
Have you heard of Vote Match,
‘Stemwijzer’ in Dutch? It is an Internet tool, developed to help voters prepare
for elections by testing their political preferences. “The user enters his/her
opinion in response to some thirty propositions, and the program calculates which
party most closely matches the user’s points of view. This is an attractive
means to provide voters with information on political parties’ stances on an
extremely wide range of issues.”
It is used by millions of people in
the run-up to Dutch and European parliamentary elections, but also for
municipal and provincial governments and the water boards. Furthermore, it has
been developed for the French presidential and parliamentary elections. German,
English, American, Swiss and Bulgarian version coming up.
It is produced by the Dutch company
Prodemos.
https://prodemos.nl/english/activities/international-activities/vote-match/
Part Two, about referendums, will
follow due.
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