The Rise of Open-Source Politics

Incognitius writes "There's a great article in this week's The Nation about the rise of open-source politics. Never before has the top-down world of presidential campaigning been opened to a bottom-up, networked community of ordinary voters. Applied to political organizing, open source means opening up participation in planning and implementation to the community, letting competing actors evaluate the value of your plans and actions, being able to shift resources away from bad plans and bad planners and toward better ones, and expecting more of participants in return. What do you guys think, is open source a good model for politics?"

Re:What I'm wondering is...

[taylortbb]

Although its not a forefront issue is one that is brought up. Generally the left parties support open-source, a good example (though possibly co-incidence) is that the George W Bush website ran IIS but Kerry's ran Apache/Linux.

Though, to the average voter it doesn't matter, many think Microsoft is the best thing since sliced bread and really wont be told otherwise. (These are the same people that say Firefox is auwful before even trying it). And those that don't like Microsoft generally still consider many other political items to be much more important, and to an extent they are correct. If I was American (not Canadian) I would have voted Kerry, but if Kerry liked Microsoft and George W liked Linux I still would have voted for Kerry. I really think nuclear war is a bigger deal than Microsoft vs. OSS; and many would agree with me.

The Canadian Green Party (http://www.greenparty.ca/) is an example of a party that support OSS, if you look at their technology policies (http://www.greenparty.ca/platform2004/en/policies .php?p=16#pt14 , Open Source section) they very specifically say that they will ban proprietary software in government unless there is no OSS alternative, they will say that everything must be done in open, standard formats, they say that anything developed by the government will be open source. They are one of the few parties that makes a big deal of it, and although they have 7% of the popular vote they don't have concentrated enough support to win seats in the House of Commons. They are one of the small parties, I don't see any big parties (Liberal, Conservative, Bloc Québécois, NDP) doing this, and that might be because they have realized that this doesn't win votes.

Memeset propagation, not campaigns, most important

[Cryofan]

The campaigns are not what is important. Before you can get a good populist candidate, one who favors egalitarian change, you need to get the right set of ideas (memeset) out into the political "air". The rightwing wealthy and the mega corporations have already done that over the last 30 years using their think tanks and foundations. See here:

http://www.hnn.us/articles/1244.html
http://www .opednews.com/kall%20starting_a_progress ive_counterpa.htm

So before you can get a "candidate of the people" you need to have the voters already aware of a set of ideas that reflect his politics. What you need is a Leftwing Meme Propagation Machine which needs to be up and running YEARS before the campaign.

If you want to get a real liberal (as opposed to faux liberals like Kerry, Dean, Edwards, et al., you need to sell the idea of progressive politics to the public.

Rightwingers here on /. will no doubt tell me that CBS, NBC, PBS, et al are the leftwing meme propagation machine. I used to think so, too. But I was wrong, and so are you. Economically Leftism and social leftism are two different things. One feeds the bulldog, and the other does not.

The Cathedral and the Bazaar

[pherris]

From "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" [firstmonday.dk]

The fact that this bazaar style seemed to work, and work well, came as a distinct shock. As I learned my way around, I worked hard not just at individual projects, but also at trying to understand why the Linux world not only didn't fly apart in confusion but seemed to go from strength to strength at a speed barely imaginable to cathedral-builders.

Politics up until recently has been an insider's only game. Any information about a candidate was only available through a few select news outlets and many times it was "polished" so said outlet wouldn't have their access shut off. Discussions were limited to the local coffee shop with a few people. It was the cathedral.

Now the news and editorials come from everywhere. We can discuss the same issue with hundreds of people in a day. Opinions can be formed with the help of a diverse and eclectic group of people. While this system scares traditional news outlets like daily papers, local tv and radio stations, it works very well. It is the bazaar.

Even though I don't think when Eric wrote his landmark article about the history of GNU/Linux it could or would be applied to politics, I think parts of it fit this issue quite well.

The Internet and FOSS have truly changed the way we live. Is it any surprise that it's also changing politics too? BTW, if you haven't read "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" read it soon. It's great stuff.

Fuck your tribe.

[otis wildflower]

Here's what I hope.. The internet helps folks bypass the party tribe system, and that history is used as a lesson on which to base improvements of the future. That people can argue ideas on their merits, not on the tribal associations of those fielding the ideas.

Unfortunately, there's something in the limbic system that makes people want to conform and seek the approval of others in their social groupings, something hardwired in the primate brain.

The one thing about opensource that I would want to see in politics is the concept of meritocracy. People earn respect and legitimacy on how correct their code or arguments are. That's pretty unique in the world of human endeavor. There's rarely an 'old boy's network' in opensource, there's rarely arguments about technology that last longer than a few testable patches. How much of that is applicable to things like socialized medicine, foreign policy, the environment, etc. I don't know, but I'd hope it's more than what we have now :p

Re:Not with our voting system...

[lnoble]

Instan Runoff Voting roughtly accomplishes this. Though electoral reform must go much farther through increased campaign finance reform, a new system of proprtional representation or some form of alternative districting that does not give the economic and political power holders control over how our vote is counted. Not to mention bringing the Federal Reserve into public oversight, and a plethora of other things neccessary to fight the current economic class system, and neoliberal policies of our country.

Washington State currently has an IRV legislative initiative that desperatly needs your help to get on the table, so if you live there please visit irvwa.org [irvwa.org] and learn more. Also their example software is all open source.

Re:zerg

[mattkime]

If all you heard was "he's not Bush", I'm not sure you educated yourself. (Then again, there's the whole conversation on whether the voter should have to educate themselves.)

Kerry would repeal tax breaks for the rich, work to build international alliances, provide stem cell funding, seek gas alternatives, protect a woman's right to abortion, select supreme court justices that feel similarly, work to expand health care cover, and more.

Also, people who typically cite Kerry for not providing a reason to vote for him often do not fault Bush for what the Democrats see as his many faults. (poor economy, no bin laden, no WMDs and therefore no justification for war in Iraq, cheney's haliburton connections, silly stem cell stance, heavy handed foreign policy, prisoner abuse problems, tax cuts for the rich)

I believe we had plenty of reason to speak out against the actions of our president over the past four years.

I hope I'm not annoying you with this, but I believe in what is currently the Democrats cause. I don't think they need to change their goals, just educate people such as I am attempting to do here.

I do think Bush was more effective in communicating with people - his message is painfully simple. Kerry needed to take more of a stand and leave the nuance for later.

Re:What I'm wondering is...

[C10H14N2]

More like if more people _in_general_ voted. Voter turnout in the US is woefully pathetic. It rarely even comes close to what would otherwise be considered a necessary quorum.

No amount of change in the behavior of the existing electorate will really heal much so long as turnout remains so pitifully low.

Re:Here in Australia

[darnok]

You're right - maybe I should have reworded it to "The Labour Party has traditionally been a bottom-up party". The unions and left-leaning factions have been marginalised to a large extent over the past several years...

However, the point still stands; the two parties have been run on a totally separate basis, and maybe the incidents in the Labor Party that you've highlighted have been an attempt to change that model. I could see how a Labor politician could be driven crazy by having to ensure that they're covering the requirements of every element in the party that has a public face; maybe it's just become "too hard" or the way forward has become "too obvious" to require that consensus in some peoples' eyes.

I still say the Labour Party has more brawls in public than the Libs, regardless of who's in power. It's obvious that some high-ranking Liberal Party people have very different views on e.g. the republic than the boss does, but the whole issue is kept tightly under wraps and dissenting views are very rarely expressed in the open. Whether that's a good or bad thing is another matter, but the two parties operate very differently in this respect.

Re:My turn to by cynical...

[nelsonal]

AFAI could tell they were both officially in favor of civil unions (Bush hesitantly Kerry more promenantly). Neither came out with anything harsher than abortion is wrong, but that it should be legal. So there are semantical differences (which probably did count for a few hundred thousand votes in Ohio).

Re:What I'm wondering is...

[C10H14N2]

South Africa: 89%
Iceland: 85%
Brazil: 79%
Italy: 81%
Germany: 79%
Sweden: 80%
Norway: 75% ...bear in mind, the United States in 1964 had 96% turnout.

The U.S. is particularly bad when you take into account registration versus eligibility. Most other comparable countries differ by just a couple percent between the two metrics, whereas the United States generally differs by 20-30%. So, while the U.K. may have 60% turnout--that actually represents roughly 60% of eligibles, whereas in the United States a 60% turnout is really only 40% of eligibles. In 2000, for instance, we had 63% turnout, but it was only 46% of eligibles, which oddly enough is almost exactly the same as experienced in Burkina Faso, which is not exactly something to cheer over.

Go to www.idea.int for more info on this. Participation in the U.S. is in fact quite painfully pathetic, like it or not.

We're #140 in the world.. YAY!

[C10H14N2]

http://www.idea.int/vt/survey/voter_turnout_pop1.c fm

US Voter turnout on average during the 1990s fell between that of Chad and Botswana.

GO AMERICA!

Pfffft... We are so pathetic.

Democrats and Republican need better candidates

[MarkusQ]

You want some rational arguments against Bush?

• He spends money with more abandon than any liberal in history
• He lies to the American public
• He lauches unprovoked attacks into third world countries
• He can't figure out how to win them once he's started them
• He shows no respect for the constitution
• He shows no respect for civil liberties
• He uses legal loopholes and questionable logic to rationalize going against pretty much every American Ideal, from "innocent until proven guilty" and "seperation of church and state" to "the right to a fair and speedy trial"
• He routinely places the good of corporations over the good of individuals
• etc., etc.

Before any Democrats reading this get to smug, ask yourself: was Kerry the best you could come up with? "I have a plan" and "Wrong, Wrong, Wrong"? Both parties have any number of sensible, credible people they could have run...and the real problem is they ran Bush and Kerry. The race was so close for so long mostly because neither one of them was worth voting for, except as a way to keep the other from winning.

-- MarkusQ

Re:PR people with Che Guevara on their wall

[mattkime]

I think you're forgetting about the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth - hell, and anyone else who spoke about against Kerry's stellar war record. They're the same people that tore into McCain in the 2000 primary.

I'll admit that Fahrenheit 9/11 isn't unbiased. But it does expose the ugly connections that currently exist at the highest levels of our government. Is it okay to have a president with family ties to the Saudi Royal family, ruling over the people who made 9/11? Is it okay for the VP's former country to get such huge government handouts - and even get caught over billing only to be told to give it back! Is it okay for the present to make a case for war which is untrue? You might not like Moore's editing, but the points I've made in this paragraph are all very true.

I'm really not even sure who you're refering to as a rabid democratic zealot, besides Micheal Moore. I don't even agree with you on Micheal Moore, because he can and does speak out against Democrats as well.

Maybe I'm a zealot. I believe its wrong that the president sold the country on a justification for war that simply wasn't true. I believe it is wrong that the president tells scientists that they can't study embryonic stem cells. I believe the prisoner abuse that occurred was a result of values expressed at the highest levels of government about the treatment of our enemy.

Re:Open Source?

[evvk]

"Anarcho-capitalism" is not anarchism. It is an oxymoron. Anti-capitalism has been central to anarchism alwaysds since its conception in the 19th century.

Re:Open-source decisions

[Keitopsis]

While a open-referendum system would supply fast, and copius ideas, I question a few aspects of the process.

1) Who of all the public has the time to spend to review all bills before this legislature without being a professional "statesman"? Does this create a neccisary bias towards the rich?

2) If government was quick (instant). How do the people become educated on an issue? Do we expect to "follow the advice of an enlightened leader"?

3) How does this system provide for consistancy? The populous wont be able to jerk back and forth as something is illegal or unfunded and times that it is legal or funded. How would one find out if something is illegal or not? This seems to deny freedom, given that it seems to support the concept of "All things not explicitly stated are illegal" rather than vice-versa.

4) How can a government of this magnitude educate the populous on what it is doing? While I personally am not a big fan of the secrecy of a govenment, there are things that a government needs to keep to itself in order to protect the public good. Do we have "special committees" to oversee defence? How is that chosen?

5) Who is, and who isnt allowed to participate in government? To answer this question is aristocracy. If you dont answer it, 5-year olds and forign nationals will be helping you make decisions.

I admit that I am playing devils advocate here. I am not wholy opposed to true "open-source" democracy. The last question I have is where do you blur the lines between republic, aristocracy, and democracy to make a realistic government possible in the current time frame.

--Kei