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    21st Century Ideas: Is structure a form of governance?

    How do we design and select governance structures?

    Started by: john.ashton Raves:4

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    The structures for Americal and many other governments have been devised but then mostly left alone. This creates 3 issues... How do we design and investigate new structures? It seems to me that the only way to study a structure is to test it. But when this is at a political level then we are limited to studying what has gone before but have limited opportunities to study new ideas. How would new structures be adopted? Who decides and how that a governance structure should be used? This is effectively a chicken and egg situation. Do we allow the current governing strctures select a new one? Does this power have to be constrained, for example to prevent regression to dictatorship? If so does this limit the choice of possibly better options? Is democracy the answer? Are govenance structures effectively self supporting and therefore enduring, whether they are the best or not? If a change in governance structure has to put forward by the current government then this would seem unlikely for two reasons. People inside a system are less likely to see the flaws and the individuals have a vested self interest in preserving the status quo. Do we need to add protections to structural choices? For example in insisting that the current system + any proposed viable alternatives are put to the vote every x years?

    Over the last 20 years or so, we\\\'ve rediscovered experimental \\\"institution design\\\", mainly in online communities and massively multiplayer games. Although this isn\\\'t quite the same as the real thing we need to do now, to cope with the superthreats, we\\\'ve definitely got a wealth of new ideas to play with. (Ranging from open / collective decisionmaking / crowd design / free software through to various private virtual networks with their own specific codes and netiquettes.)

    I\\\'ve found that when it comes to writing speeches, it is often easier to edit an existing text than to stare at the blank page waiting for inspiration. I\\\'m going to guess that changing government would be similar. There are a lot of things that work with the systems we have, maybe some systems have more strengths than others, but there\\\'s always something good to build on. The key is to take the time to reach out and begin discussions with many disparate voices about the structures that could help us far down the road. Then, we need to set goals, timelines, check-in points, etc. This process can seem tiresome, even pointless at times, but the net effect will be real change in the long run.

    Testing new forms of government without actually risking the our lives and freedoms is definitely a hurdle to apply redesigning our government systems. Maybe some sort of game? Players are given a new governmental system and play as the various participants, trying to find any weaknesses and imbalances. Simulating new forms of governance won\\\'t tell us everything, but I bet it\\\'ll weed out some of the worst ideas.

    I agree with JJason. However I\\\'l also suggest that we blend it with an open source testing model. Lets say we can get a hundred towns to test out variations ideas. If they collaborate, they can test out different variations and still compare and contrast them. Take a Look at the ideas of Open Source Government.

    With the influence and power of multinational companies rivalling thath of national governments and state borders fading into irrelevance, it seems likely that such a multinational organisation would be responsible for implementing and testing a progressive form of post-Newtonian governance which stretched beyond the board room. Perhaps an ageing philanthropist like Richard Branson will establish a post-Newtonian experimental city-state / island / community, independent of exitising national government control from which to test a radical new model?

    Setting up a new political structure, such as a city-state / island / community is similar to some 18th century utopian communities. They worked well, for a while, but succumbed because of their isolation from the rest of society. Also there is no guarantee that a new kind of community that has done well in ideal situation would stand up to unforeseen threats. Could an alternative governance structure be one that allows parts of itself to become increasingly flexible and able to adapt to new circumstances. These parts could be special government departments, or new groups less dependent on bureaucracy and more on social participation?

    the problem with dictatorship is unending thirst for power that blinds those in it. And the problem with democracy is that the stupid choose who everybody else is governed by.

    Check out the SS Honor winning Quantum Goverance Struct for more ideas on new forms of govt!

    In reference to experimental states/communities and their similarities to Utopian communities: the is a major difference between the two. Paul stated that these Utopian societies collapsed because of their isolation from the rest of society, which is true. However, communication has drastically improved since the 18th and 19th centuries. Any experiemental city-state could theoretically be isolated in the conventional sense (meaning, a completely seperate entity from existing nations), yet it could still communicate freely with the rest of the world via the internet, etc. That way, those interested could keep abreast of these experimental communities and even provide feedback. With that in mind, I believe such experiments would be an effective way of exploring new forms of societal structure and governance. The idea of structure evolved, over time, from small communities before it was implemented on a larger scale. Perhaps this can be artificially replicated by Lord Samwise's proposed experiments.




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