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WORLDWIDE DIRECT DEMOCRACY Newsletter (funded, and written by Jiri Polak) Vol. 4 (No.2) June 2002
The Rights and Wrongs of Marxism (by Jiri Polak) At the beginning of the twenty first century, in practice, except in the minds of some small groups of fanatics and the official ideology of the last surviving totalitarian oligarchies, Marxism is dead. Yet the fact remains that, for several decades of the post-war era, about one third of mankind lived under the sway of political systems based on the Marxist (or pseudo-Marxist) ideology. This must mean that, at least in some respect, Marxism has not been completely wrong. I believe that the DD movement can learn a lot from the development of movements based on Marxism. To some extent, we can learn from Marxist mistakes and even from its limited success. Let us try to sort out the rights from the wrongs. The Wrongs 1.Philosophy. Marx believed that reality is purely material. Spiritual phenomena are, according to him, manifestations of "highly organized matter", i.e. the brains. This concept has been refuted by modern physics which has wiped out the distinction between mind and matter and put forward mind as the source of all observations (i.e. reality). 2.Political economy. a) According to Marxism, the source of all values inherent in goods is manual work. The workers produce all values but are robbed of most of them by the capitalists who leave to the workers only what is needed for their subsistence. Even if we disregard the competing "bourgeois" theory of marginal value, other theorists (among them e.g. late Eng.Jaroslav Koci) have shown that even factors other than manual work are the source of value. This is confirmed by empirical observation: The share of manual work in the production of goods keeps diminishing, while the sum total of values produced keeps increasing. b) Marx believed that the trend he observed, i.e. the impoverishment of the workers, would progress on and on and finally drive them to stage a big revolution which would put the capitalists out of business and transfer the means of production into the hands of the "working class". This belief was surely inspired by Marx´s life experience. The late eighteenth and most of the nineteenth century was a time of revolutions (1789, 1830, 1848 and 1871). But the trend did not last. Successively, the living standards of the workers improved, so that they became "bourgeois" themselves and lost any desire to make revolution, if they ever did nourish such desire in the first place.c) Socialization of the means of production was expected by Marx to result in a better performance of the economic system. The opposite has turned out to be the truth. If, for a few years after WW2, the communist economies were growing faster than the western ones, this was due to the extremely low starting point. Since the early 1960s, western capitalism was incessantly outstripping the socialized economies behind the Iron Curtain and at the end of the eighties, it drove these economies to bankruptcy. 3.Sociology and politics. a) The basic concept in Marxism is the class - the class of the proletarians against the class of the capitalists. Both experience and sociological analyses show that no class, as a collective entity, is capable of any rational action or long-term activity. Such actions and activities can only be performed by small groups of leaders who pretend to act on behalf of the class. After they have seized power, no matter on what pretence, the leaders themselves are transformed into a new ruling class, sometimes prone to produce a sole dictator. The dictatorship of the proletariat, expected by Marx to ultimately emerge from the process, can, in practice, only be the dictatorship of the party, its leadership or its supreme leader. This is the Iron Law of Oligarchy from which there is no escape. b) Marx expected the proletarian revolution to start in the most developed countries. Instead, the first revolution claiming to have been inspired by Marx took place in the most backward European country - Lenin´s Russia. Undoubtedly, the Leninist-Stalinist regime would have remained limited to Russia (and some neighbouring areas) alone, if it were not for WW2 which brought even Eastern Europé under Soviet rule. The secession of Tito´s Yugoslavia in 1948 was compensated by the communist coup in Czechoslovkia which took place in the same year. A seemingly monolithic communist bloc was established. In 1949, this bloc appeared to be immensely enlarged by the victory of Mao in continental China. But, although inspired by Marxism and the success of Leninism in Russia, Maoism was not Marxism. Mao discerned 5 classes (contrary to the two classes in Marxism) of which only comprador bourgeoisie was considered overtly hostile, while national bourgeoisie was considered to be a possible cooperation partner. The main revolutionary force were the peasants (not the workers, like in Marxism). Interestingly, Stalin had supported Chiang Kai Shek against Mao until the latter´s victory because he thought, on ideological grounds, that a nationalist "bourgeois" revolution had to always precede any communist revolution. Facing the accomplished fact, he had to put up with Mao and between 1949 and 1960, the seemingly monolithic communist bloc stretched from Prague to Peking. All this was no "historical necessity", it was one of the consequences of the two world wars. In 1960, the Sino-Soviet rift became visible and since then, the bloc began to crumble. In the next issue, I´ll try to sum up the rights of Marxism, if any, and to find out why, during some forty years or so, in the eyes of so many people, Marxism seemed to be a correct theory and a political and economic success. website - National Initiative for Democracy www.p2dd.org, home of the National Initiative For Democracy, has moved to www.nidd.org
At the University of Auburn, an interesting and important project led by Prof. Ted Becker is in progress (information is available att www.auburn.edu/tann): Welcome to 21st Century Democracy One of America´s greatest contributions to Western political philosophy and practice has been the Constitutional Convention where new forms of government are invented or transformed. Although there has been only 1 such event at the national level in American history (1787), there have been many at the state level. SIMCONCON IS AN EXPERIMENTAL CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION USING THE ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) of the 21st century to better inform the designers of state constitutions and the citizens who must call them and ratify their product. You are invited to participate in this experiment in 21st century democracy, at Auburn University, in the state of Alabama, USA, being held in the Spring of 2002 - either as a political scientist, political leader or official, political acitivist or concerned citizen. So, what can you do? First, nearly 30 Auburn University students - from undergrads to doctoral - from liberal arts, business and engineering - are now "delegates" to the Simulated "Constitutional Convention" (SimConCon) being held at the business school. For this "course", they will be doing research, organizing and holding hearings, debating, discussing and negotiating. Then, at the end of this 16 week process, they will propose some major reforms for the Alabama Constitution (or any constitution that seeks to provide its citizens with good government). All of their work product, and the work of many highly qualified experts, will be posted on this website for one and all to see. Every citizen interested in potential constitutional reform for their state - country - or even the EU - can benefit from the information and opinions that will be displayed here. If however, you´d like to INTERACT with the SimConCon from your computer - in other words PARTICIPATE in this with us - YOU CAN DO SO!
Information from Mr.M. Dane Waters: March 05/02: "80% of Minnesota voters favor establishing the I&R process." Switzerland: The Swiss have voted to join the United Nations. The Montana State Supreme Court upheld a term limits initiative passed by voters in 1992. The California State Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Proposition 21, a juvenile crime initiative, passed by voters in 2000. The Washington State Senate approved two new regulations on the initiative process. The Wyoming House voted down two bills that would have made the initiative process easier in the state. March 13/02: No state has adopted the initiative process since Mississippi readopted it in 1992. "On Tuesday of this week I spoke at a press conference in Albany where the Governor announced the details of his I&R legislation" (see: http://www.iandrinstitute.org/PatakiRelease.pdf: March 22/02: Minnesota, along with New York, represent the greatest chances for the expansion of the I&R process. … the MN House passed the I&R amendment by a 76-57 margin. … The next big hurdle is the Senate … (which is) openly hostile to the idea. April 19/02: A federal judge in Washington yesterday overturned a law prohibiting D.C. residents form circulating or voting on a ballot initiative to legalize marihuana for medical purposes. Oregon: A federal judge Wednesday rejected an attempt by U.S.Attorney General John Ashcroft to punish Oregon Physicians who help terminally ill patients end their lives … (In this letter, Mr.Waters brings additional interesting information from Oklahoma, Massachusetts, Oregon (Part two), Virginia, Florida, Colorado, and California; for details please see the I&R Institute´s website, http://www.iandrinstitute.org ) New Book- "Voices of Europé: Citizens, Referendums, and European Integration", by Simon Hug. April 29/02: Today the New York Senate passed Governor Pataki´s constitutional amendment establishing the initiative and referendum process with an overwhelming majority. Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno was instrumental in getting the amendment passed. … The hurdle now becomes the State Assembly.
You are invited to have a look at the updated website http://democracy.mkolar.org/pdda/index.html set up by Mr.Miroslav Kolar, originally in co-operation with Mr.George Sagi, one of the founding fathers of the Worldwide DD Movement and author of the book Direct Democracy, and an abbreviated version Studies Leading to the Theory of Direct Democracy. (Information originally at www.pangea.ca). Undoubtedly, the above website is one of the best and most comprehensive in the field. On 2 April, we received this letter form Mr.Lorenzo Bouchard: A little info from British Columbia, Canada. Our provincial gov't is activating a referendum on the process of Native Land Claims. It's being done through the mail. http://mypage.direct.ca/l/lbouchar http://www.universityinvictoria.com
Lyn Carson: Australia´s first combined televote and citizens´ jury: Information or informed discussion? Australia is no more advanced than other Western countries when it comes to innovative methods for citizen participation in decision making but there are some signs for optimism. Australia has an impressive history of referenda (nearly fifty referenda have been put to the population so far) but few succeed. In 1999 a referendum was held to decide whether Australia should become a republic but, alas, the model was rejected by a majority of citizens. Prior to this referendum a deliberative poll was convened and this showed how much our preferences can change if we have the chance to engage in informed deliberation. Sadly the wider population did not have an opportunity to do so (see Worldwide Direct Democracy Newsletter, vol 2, no 2, 2000). Recently an interesting project took place in Sydney. Dr Stuart White from the Institute for Sustainable Futures was commissioned to undertake an independent review of container deposit legislation for the Minister for Environment in New South Wales (NSW is Australia´s largest state). Container deposit legislation or CDL is legislation to require a mandatory deposit on containers - eg soft drink bottles- to encourage their return by consumers. It was obvious that the beverage and retail industries opposed CDL and local government and environmental groups supported it. This issue was complex and opinions were polarized. What did citizens think? There had been considerable quantitative research on this topic. A number of opinion polls had been completed by industry and government in Australian states without CDL and all polls showed overwhelming support for the idea (a beverage industry poll showed 77% support). One survey completed in the only Australian state that has CDL also showed strong satisfaction (95% support). Therefore, it seemed that citizens who did not understand the complexity of enacting CDL supported the idea but so did people who were living with the legislation. What further information could be derived from social research? Well, Dr White wanted to know not only what citizens thought about the idea of paying a deposit on beverage containers but also how they thought this deposit should be refunded (eg at shops, depots, reverse-vending machines). The findings were instructive for those with an interest in deliberative democracy. The televote involved 400 citizens who had been randomly selected. They were surveyed about their opinions, then asked if they would participate further. At that stage 71% supported CDL (consistent with earlier opinion polls). The televote participants were sent information that had been agreed to by all parties in the debate (achieving this consensus was no mean feat!). Then televote participants were surveyed again. The level of support dropped to 59%. One could speculate that support dropped away once people understood the complexity of the issue and the difficulty of living with CDL but this is inconsistent with the poll that showed 95% support from those who are already dealing with the complexity and inconvenience of CDL. And the televote response is in sharp contrast to the citizens´ jury result. We speculate that the reduced support occurred because of the complexity of the issue and the difficulty of resolving that complexity by talking to friends and answering a survey. More deliberation was needed for people to deal with their unanswered concerns. In contrast 2000 people were randomly selected and invited to respond if they wanted to be part of a citizens´ jury. Of those that responded 12 were chosen (and 11 participated) Prior to knowing anything about CDL 7 supported it and 4 were unsure. After reading the same printed information as the televoters, 6 supported CDL, 4 were unsure and one was opposed. Subsequent to this, the eleven participants had an opportunity to question experts about CDL. They listened, argued and perplexed and sought more information and discussed and argued some more. Eventually the group produced a written report that sought to satisfy the needs of all stakeholders. The eleven participants were unanimous in their support for CDL, but importantly, had been able to apply conditions to that support. Their concerns had been satisfied. The jury´s recommendations were incorporated in full into the Final Report. By the end of this project, like the jury members, we had learnt a lot. Those of us who were involved in the design and implementation of both participatory methods felt certain that good information and a willingness to discuss this information had not been enough. Yes, information is essential for democratic practice but so, too, is informed discussion amongst equals, that is, discussion beyond a sharing of printed information and mutual confusion and biases. Sustainable democracy needs opportunities for citizens to directly decide about issues of importance but these opportunities should be supported by discursive spaces in which reasoned and considerate debate can occur. Of course, the big question is: did the decision makers take the citizens´ views into account? CDL is so contentious that politicians want to bury it. Already they have claimed that there are national impediments to implementing CDL in NSW and this attitude will definitely stall any legislative change. Interestingly, the Minister for Environment has printed copies of the Review´s first two volumes only. The third volume which covers the social research described above was not included. Thankfully, it is available electronically. Dr.L. Carson is a senior lecturer in applied politics at The University of Sydney, Australia. You´ll find Volume 3 of the Final Report on Container Deposit Legislation via Links @ Carson´s website www.hydra.org.au/activedemocracy/
On 7 April 2002, an interesting article was published in Le Monde: La France est-elle un pays corrompu? During the latest 20 years or so, it has been more and more difficult for the politicians to hide their financial and other machinations. The judges have become more independent and able to prosecute even higly placed persons, including, recently, President Chirac himself. In the latest Transparency report, France has receded from the 21st to the 23rd position. Among western states, only Belgium, Portugal, Italy and Greece are considered more corrupt.
On 9 March, Mr.Steven Clift (http://www.publicus.net) sent round the following information: *** Democracies Online Newswire - http://www.e-democracy.org/do *** * Future of E-Democracy - http://publicus.net/articles/future.html * "While I understand that a number of political parties in the Nordic countries have hosted online discussions for sometime, as does the Democratic National Committee http://freedem.com in the U.S., this may be as the Liberal Democrats http://www.makeitpolicy.org.uk/ suggest "one of the first national policy consultations conducted by a political party over the internet anywhere in the world." "Are others aware of other examples or research on the use of online consultation/information exchange/discussion by political parties in the development of party policy? I am also interested in examples where parties have used online discussion tools internally for party efforts and policy development." Steven Clift, Democracies Online Newswire. On 30 May, Mr.Miroslav Kolar , using the cicdd discussion channel, wrote: New submission to http://democracy.mkolar.org/newURL.html LINK: http://www.planet-thanet.fsnet.co.uk/nps/index.htm - The NEW political system - A proposal how to achieve better democracy, closer to the ideal, where the power is retained, and directly exercised by the people. Emphasis is on local democracy.
Recently, a simulated parliamentary election was organized among pupils of the Swedish medium level schools. Only 30% of those qualified bothered to participate. About 5% cast blank votes. One can wonder: How long can a political system survive without any radical reform if it is considered meaningful by no more than some 25% of the young generation? Almost at the same time, a well-known journalist, Anders Isaksson, published a book called The Political Aristocracy. He pointed out that the Swedish political power-holders are mostly one another´s relatives or personal friends. They consider politics as a well paid life-long profession. Typically, they begin by joining a youth organization, then a political party or trade union and stay in the system until retirement or even longer. They get structurally preferential treatment when applying for a flat, when they need medical attention, and other unjustified privileges assuring that they can enjoy living standards much higher than average citizens. Sweden is surely not exceptional in this respect. But mental barriers might be stronger here than in comparable countries. The words direct democracy are banned from public debate. If referendum is mentioned, it means plebiscite organized by the authorities. It hardly occurs to anybody that citizens might take their own initiative to demand a referendum. It is true that the media quite often speak about the crisis of the system. But to overcome it, they only ask questions like "What should we do to strengthen confidence in the parties? To make more people involved in (party) politics? To make the young more interested?" etc. They never ask whether party politics is democracy in the first place and whether the whole system is not in need of a remake.
Open Initiative On 6 March 2001, the citizen movement Open Initiative was registered at the Ministry of Interior. Its Program contains the following statements: "We demand that the social system be improved and the legal system be properly adjusted. We demand that we all get better opportunities to participate in decisions concerning our common life. We want that every citizen of our country may express his/her opinion. We demand that people invested with decision-making power be responsible for their decisions. We demand that people be not toys at the hands of politicians. We demand priority for citizen activities in building associations, working in the field of culture and sport, education and protection of the young, promotion of small- and medium-scale enterprise, etc." As all similar organizations in Czech Republic, Open Initiative survives on small private means of its members and on occasional small gifts from the public. For the campaign, they cannot afford more than one second-hand table and chair. Nevertheless, they have already been able to collect many thousands of signatures in support of the right to citizen initiative and referendum. Additional demands are being prepared for presentation. A law concerning Referendum has been passed by Parliament. It is now being discussed in the Senate. Nevertheless, the law is very diluted. It's the same story as everywhere. The politicians will give up only as much power as they have to under the pressure of public opinion. Hopefully, opinion will be more and more frustrated and angry.
On 9 April, Volume 1 No 2 of IRI EUROPE WATCH was released. It can be looked up at www.iri-europé.org Quote: "The Initiative & Referendum process is on the move in Europé. In many countries national Parliaments are debating new forms of Direct Democracy, including Germany, Austria and Sweden. In important ballots the Irish and Swiss voters have had a say on moral and international issues. Finally, the Constitutional Convention of the European Union is about to include I&R in its agenda. Here, IRI Europé will play a direct role as an advisor and facilitator of these first cautious steps towards transnational direct democracy. Keep reading and get the facts and comments from our team of correspondents and experts throughout Europé." European Referendum Campaign (abbreviated) "Idea: To organize a Convention on the Future of Europé. In the context of a European-wide campaign, organizations for the idea of a European-wide referendum are to be won as signers of an appeal. The aim would be an order of magnitude of "1000 plus" organizations from all European Union and applicant states. Public-effective actions which are locally executed by the organizations, follow the signing. The objective is to attain a public pressure regarding our demands which - in our sense - shall positively influence the work of the convention and the subsequent treatment of its working results. "Strategy: The appeal is formulated in such a way that the broadest possible alliance develops: from "the right" to "the left", from "federalists" to "EU critics". All organizations are welcome as signers. Excluded: Organizations with racistic targets. Different special events and actions are connected with the signing of the appeal, e.g. sending postcards to the address of the national parliaments and/or convention members. The whole campaign must be executed in the context of a professional marketing strategy and be coordinated by a central office." Organizers: Agora Europé (Mr.Arjen Nijeboer); Mehr Demokratie-Welt (Mr.Thomas Rupp and Mr.Franz Isemann); NDDIE (Mr.Heiko Dittmer and Mr.Thomas Rupp); IRI Europé (Mr.Bruno Kaufmann); WIT Belgium (Mr.Heiko Dittmer) The Convention will presumably present its results to the public in June 2003. Coordinator: Mr.Hans Born, Managing Director, Pro NGO! (www.pro-ngo.org) Conference Following up on the c2d Budapest Conference (March 2000), a public conference on e-voting was held on May 10 and 11 at the European University Institute. See: http://www.iue.it/RSC/e-vote/Welcome.html
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HOW SAFE IS INTERNET VOTING? (continued from March issue) 14 April 01, Mr.Aki Orr: Dear Bernard, First of all let me assure you I take your criticism of manipulation of E-voting seriously. I used to be a Lecturer in Computer Science, and worked in UCL as a Scientific Applications Programmer from ´69 to ´74, so I am aware of the problems. You write: "Assuming you can identify there has been interference, what do you do about it? Is the vote declared null? How many times does the system have to be ´interfered´ with to negate the vote? How do you check how many valid votes there are?" I would suggest the following. Suppose every vote is recorded in 6 independent computer networks. If, when totals are compared, 5 show the same number and 1 does not, I'd accept the number shown by the 5. Also if 4 show the same number. However, if only 3 show the same number I'd suggest a re-vote. I believe that by the time DD becomes a political reality there will be new ways of tackling any interference with electronically transmitted information, and DD supporters - taking your criticism into account - will decide whether E-vote is safe or not. The question is: Is there any absolute insecurity built into any transmission of E-data or can this insecurity be reduced by hardware and software measures making it ever smaller. I believe it can be continuously reduced so as to render it irrelevant for the particular issue. Am I too hopeful?" Mr.Bernard Clayson: "I would say yes, you are too hopeful. By the very nature of the ´beast´, ´virus´ protection has to be running behind the ones creating the ´virus´, ask the companies providing the protection, they are chasing their butt's trying to cover what has been found, so how do you protect against what has not been dreamed up in the connivers mind? Chicken & Egg, or Catch-22?" Mr.Aki Orr: "Dear Mirek and Bernard, consider the following idea: Let us imagine a government with 32 departments (most governments have less), and in each department 128 options to vote on (in most cases the number is much lower). This means that any political decision requires five binary digits to identify the government department, and seven binary digits to identify the particular decision. Altogether 12 binary digits. Let us add a header label of three binary digits to identify the message as a political decision and a final digit for the decision itself 0 for NO, 1 for YES. The whole message is sixteen binary digits long. At the receiving end a program checks every incoming message as a political decision and deletes all those exceeding sixteen bits. NO HACKER EVER WROTE A VIRUS 16 BITS LONG. WHY NOT? BECAUSE IT SIMPLY CANNOT BE DONE. ANY virus is a machine code program. Machine code instructions are 8 bits long. So 16 bits mean TWO machine code instructions. No virus can be written in two machine code instructions. Banking instructions and e-mail are a lot longer than 16 bits and have variable length. If DD decisions are all just 16 bits long and anything longer gets deleted, no harmful interference is possible. I don´t insist on this particular scheme. I just want to give an example that elementary software measures can eliminate a lot of interference with E-data transmissions." Mr.Jack Curtis: "(BC) This would show numbers, but of what? how many ´yes´ votes? Or total votes? … As I've pointed out before, e-voting ´may´ become feasible once the system (go´) is under people control, until that point it is rash to give the people hope when it could end in disaster. One major bog up and the public would lose all faith in DD. You prepared to risk that? Because I'm not." Mr.Jack Curtis: "You confuse e-democracy with e-voting. I'm more interested in Democracy as a means of improving people, than as a means of improving governmental decision-making, & electronically is the best, if not only possible, means of trying to implement Democracy on a large scale, thanks to the reduced inertia in electrical systems. If you wait for people to gain control of the system BEFORE you attempt to implement Edemocracy, you may be waiting a long time. I think it´s best to simply get a commitment to TRY EDD on however limited a scale, & see if it CAN be made to work then, if so, gradually extend it´s perview later. This has to be done at the national level because (at least in the U.S.) most power is vested in the national government these days, the system must ultimately be scaleable to the national level, & a big commitment is required to develop such a system. … most computers are still limping along pretty well, viruses & all." (to be continued)
John Bunzl: WDD and the Simultaneous Policy (SP) When we think or talk about "democracy", (i.e. the power of the people), I suggest we commonly overlook the very foundation stone upon which it depends. For "the people" to have power, they must first agree that they are members of the same social unit, the unit upon which their power is to be exercised. And for their voices to be given expression they must co-operate in establishing a commonly agreed framework through which that can happen. The essential foundation stone of democracy is therefore: co-operation. Without pre-existing co-operation, there can be no democracy. And if we are talking about world democracy, it follows that co-operation between all the world's peoples and nations must first exist. But what now exists is not constructive co-operation but, rather, its opposite: destructive competition. In particular, that means destructive competition between nation states. Global de-regulated capital flows and corporations know no national boundaries and by their ability or threat to move elsewhere, force nations to compete with one another for capital, jobs (and therefore votes) and ever scarcer natural resources. With increased government reliance on capital markets to finance public deficits and on corporations to maintain employment, internationally mobile capital effectively precludes the implementation of any national policy that might incur market or corporate displeasure. The markets have consequently engineered strong leverage over the economic, social and environmental policies adopted by any country ensuring that only market-friendly, neo-liberal policies are pursued - regardless of the party in power. The result is the strangle-hold of pseudo-democracy in which, whatever party we elect, the policies delivered remain substantially the same. Since virtually all nations are part of increasingly integrated global economy, they are all subject to the same strangle-hold. So what we are dealing with here is a ´dictatorship of competition´; a vicious circle. It is a dictatorship because no nation can exit from this predicament by seeking to re-regulate financial markets since such action would cause capital flight, devaluation and inflation if not outright economic collapse. Similarly, policies seeking to address environmental or societal problems requiring higher public spending or higher costs for industry are precluded on the grounds of undercompetitiveness, adverse market reaction and the threat of job losses. In de-regulating capital markets, nations have therefore unleashed a force they can no longer unilaterally control - a global competitive merry-go-round now spinning so fast that no nation can get off (unless, like Argentina, it is forcibly ejected by the market itself). So this is the vicious circle of destructive competition which must be broken. And whatever our views are about the kind of world democracy we would like to see, since the principle agents of governance in the world today are nation states, it is nation states that we must focus upon if we are to move from competition to co-operation. Against this background, the International Simultaneous Policy Organization (ISPO) sets out feasible means not only of regaining control of global financial markets and corporations, but of going much further towards creating the conditions for a global society and economy more compatible with Nature and the needs of human nature. It requires all or virtually all nations to act simultaneously by implementing the Simultaneous Policy (SP); a range of citizen-designed measures to re-regulate global markets and corporations in order to restore genuine democracy, environmental protection, peace and co-operation around the world. SP thus calls upon peoples all over the world to recognise the futility of conventional party politics and to unite both by taking policy out of the hands of politicians and, by force of their numbers and their votes, by bringing political parties into competition with one another to adopt SP. By separating the adoption of SP from its implementation, SP transcends party-political differences and allows voters, NGOs, politicians and governments to adopt it without risking their respective personal or national interests. It therefore represents political action of a kind not yet seen: a New Politics of cooperation and community which transcends both the divisions of conventional party politics and the dilemmas of maintaining international competitiveness. Citizens the world over, can thus use SP as a first step towards world direct democracy; a way of creating the cooperative foundation stone upon which world democracy can develop and flourish. It is therefore ISPO´s hope that it can work together with all groups who share this aim in a synthesis of unity and diversity; a way which preserves the integrity and diversity of each organisation and yet unites us behind a common objective. John Bunzl, Founder - International Simultaneous Policy Organisation (ISPO) P.O.Box 26547, London SE3 7YT, UK Email: info@simpol.org Web: www.simpol.org Fax: +44(0)20-8460 2035 |
