From: | "Pras Anand" <pras_anand(at)hotmail.com> |
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Date: | Sat, 11 Nov 2006 05:15:03 +0100 |
Subject: | Re: [WDDM] Thoughts about our democracy (and a general ramble) |
"Have any of you ever seen any other theories on
market place operation" Having just attended a particular highlevel event
about this I would say what many of us might know already and say that there are
numerous marketplace operations which are aimed at creating a DD. The industry
buzzword is e-democracy and if (for example) you search google for e-government
and european commission I'm sure you'd find many well placed ideas. These ideas
have now flourished into examples all over the world where cities and
municipalities have effectively created systems that people can access an
everyday democratic decision making vote system which directly affects the
government. In many people's eyes this may not be enough. True
much more needs to be done. My conclusion from watching many people present
their work, from the lead architect of the zurich e-voting system, to the mayor
of San Francisco's IT guy, - the conclusion was twofold, There are many people
out their attempting (for however shallow reasons) to say that this is the right
way to do it. This will filter through and in time, the good people will rise to
the top of a government. The actual issues that I thought were valuable were
that the majority don't really effectively use the internet nevermind directly
accessing the functions of a working government. How many people have thought
about what would happen if you replaced all the employees of the local council
and government with general internet-interested randoms. It would fall apart. If
everyone has a say then what would happen if we had an internet democracy? The
internet has a load of great content, but let's face it - much of it is
sarcastic rubbish. Like people's opinions much of the time are just
rubbish. In the sense that people don't even know what to
think often and just say what they read, heard or saw on the television. Why
would replacing existing governments with people from the general public
actually be a good thing? The other, and really crucial, point is this:
People are bastards. People are also great. The majority of people are pretty
open minded and nice individuals. These are the people we should have in our
governmental system. Democracy, voting, digital divide etc doesn't mean anything
if the people in charge of it are not nice people. Today there was a guy who was
talking on the stage about how young people should be involved in the process of
policy design. A notion I fully support. But the same guy didn't even
acknowledge me when I said hello to him - this was probably 2 out of about 100
people i said hello to. The point is - this is a fraud. A crook. These are the people in government that cause the
problems. They might be the majority at this time. But if we keep forwarding
positive notions of a governmental system (I mean the governmental industry, not
political activists) then different people will start to rise to the top of the
governmental bodies that we so love to hate. They can be transformed into more
effective, efficient organisations that are more focussed on improving the
quality of life. Look, I've just spent time in a top level
conference with leaders from around the world - from FBI to IBM - Mayors and IT
counsellors from at least 15 countries around the world. I've sat and watched
their presentations and come to the conclusion that none of them were really
saying anything new or concrete. There were around 60 speakers that I saw and
probably about 10 of them were superb presentations of quality change in our
society towards political constructs that we appreciate and need. So to close this ramble, I'm just saying that
although the older powerbase is a bunch of aristocrat wannabees living off our
tax money - it is starting to cite messages of DD. However genuine that is
depends on the example, most aren't genuine. Many are though and this is the
point that is so pointlessly over-expressed in this text. People in all communities tend to have similar
traits. Liars, arseholes, self-centered subjective people, open adaptive people
etc. I realised that even at the top of the chains in ICT and Government -
people are just people. If we hate each other then nothing will ever be solved.
But many people hate everyone different because of personal issues. IE "That
politician didn't do a good job because it affected me personally in a bad way"
or "that indian guy took my job, they should go back to their own
country". I'll actually finish with the point that people
from all walks of life do this - political activists, ict companies,
manufacture, energy, education, media, whatever. So, when you look at an
organisation from a political point of view, you discount the identity and
individual nature of each member within it. Which is a requirement of DD, for
example. Food for thought? or a bunch of crap. Who cares..
What are we going to do and why? Let's create events to bridge governmental
conferences with members of the politically active communities such as this one.
Bring people together in these scenarios and really talk about it in front of
your audience. Why not make a referendum out of the discussion so that the
audience actually makes a participatory decision. This would show people what DD
means and serve to illustrate the issues being discussed. Come on everyone, there are people working together
everywhere trying to create a DD. In fact they've gone quite a lot further in
conceptual terms. A personal estimate of annual global research funding into
this area - >$10Bn. Relatively minor in terms of research funding - but it's
enough to show that there is a concrete shift in terms of governmental
acceptence that something needs to change. They just don't want to give up their
lollipop just yet. I'll publish some PPT presentations from the Global
Forum 2006 when I get them, if anyone wants to see what is going on in the world
of e-government development. If any of you are actively creating systems and
solutions for the issues at hand, now's the time to really go for it. There is
plenty of opportunity for people with positive actions. As for those who like to
predict doom and criticise others without adequate knowledge - don't bother
reading any of it - you won't believe it anyway. Pras
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