Technology Will Change Politics From Top Down To Bottom Up
from the but-it-won't-be-pleasant-in-the-meantime dept
Sometimes people wonder why so many people in the tech industry tend to fall into more of a "libertarian" viewpoint on things. Perhaps it's because they realize the empowering nature of technology to do away with the need for many more centralized top down structures. The reason that we often have big top down structures is because there was no efficient way to spread the control outwards, so you consolidate power at the top allowing someone else to make decisions for a large group of people as their "representative." However, technology erodes some of that, by creating more efficient means of communication, breaking down the need for such top down control. We see it many different aspects. Companies today are more fluid, with a much more bottom up approach. Products and services that involve a bottom up approach are becoming more popular (and more useful) every day. So it's only a matter of time until the same thing happens to the government.It's almost surprising to find out that there's a high ranking politician who recognizes this. Apparently the UK's Tory leader David Cameron made exactly that point, noting that politicians need to let go, and let the technology distribute tasks out to citizens, rather than trying to control everything centrally. Of course, it's one thing to say it and another thing altogether to do it. Those who came up through the "old" way, which grants more power and control at the top freak out at the idea of giving up that control. You see it today with the way Microsoft reacts to open source, the way the RIAA reacts to Napster, to the way newspapers react to citizen journalism. They close up, circle the wagons and talk about how important that control is -- though, not in those terms exactly. Instead, they trash the quality of the more chaotic bottom up system, missing the point that it's not about the average quality, but the the abundance of options that make quality more personalized. The same thing will happen in politics as well. Many people get into politics (or get hooked on politics) because of the power that comes with it. Getting them to give up that power won't be easy by any means. But it will happen. It'll just mean a period of rather painful adjustment.
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Filed Under: bottom up, politics, technology, top down
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The New Centralism
http://blog.livedoor.jp/tonchamon/archives/51666125.html
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Does anyone want to live in a world where there are a million incompatible OS's, where each computer requires a completely different set of instructions? The internet is the ultimate centralized system where all computers have to follow an America-centric IP protocol. As for music, any idiot can bang out music on the sidewalk or upload it to youtube, but people prefer quality control -- that points to a centralized system of judgement. As for patriotism, that has and will remain people-driven. If people of a given nation perceive an external threat, they will band together and persecute the foreign threats. The internet gives armchair fascists a new way to harm minority opinions. If millions of armchair fascists all make death threats and verbally tear people to shreds, it goes beyond the powers of law enforcement to track down all of them. So in that sense, the powers that be are losing control over law and order -- if that is the world we want to live in.
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I mean, just take, for example, the story about the guy who wanted a memorial flag sent to his Grandfather with a special message. However, the message (only to his grandfather) was censored by the govermentment because it contained the word, God. Just one example out of many of the minority (trust me, if you don't believe in God in some form or another, you're the minority) restricting the freedoms of the majority.
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Exactly
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Just like scientists choose to do research instead of becoming richer, if educated correctly, you can brainwash people out of the perception of monetary reward system, but brainwashing has to start early, and any kind of corruption should be punishable by death. Eventually, over 100 years, you will probably get a good society.
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> of monetary reward system, but brainwashing
> has to start early
Any system that holds as one of its central tenets that it's necessary to "brainwash" people is by definition evil.
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Woah...um...
The idea isn't that theres no control or no common protocol, it's that power is distributed more through everyone instead of just a single control point.
As to you Shohat, I'm not sure if you'd want to call that a social-communism. Yes, thats what it was called, but thats not what it was, ask someone whose chinese. China is a great example of a very critical government who wants to control everything, look up "the great firewall of china" in Wikipedia.
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This sounds very good...and very very bad.
On the other hand, it's truly frightening to me. As George Carlin once said, "Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that." Do you really want someone like that calling the shots? More direct participation in democracy could easily lead to a "mob rule" mentatlity, which I really don't think that anyone wants. The issues and the legislation that the government deals with tends to be very complex, and even the "experts" frequently run afoul of unforseen side effects of their actions. Even intelligent people are rarely well-educated on anything beyond a few major issues.
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Alternatively...
If I remember correctly, those powers not specifically allocated to the Federal Government by the Constitution, were left to the STATES and to the PEOPLE. So, if the States and People simply stand up and ask for what is rightfully theirs, and don't take "No" for an answer, then we'll be well on our way to a more Libertarian style of government.
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I think the technology will enable us to move government to a more local level - then if Big Brother wants to watch us, they'll have to take it out of their war budget. Because that's all this "control" really is, a war against the citizens of our country, by those who wish to remain fully vested in their "power".
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http://www.ronpaul2008.com
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A Mentality Change is needed even for us ( to Kevi
Just to remember that there are indian tribes composed by a few thousands of people who lived in an organized and harmonic way without the need of police, judges and politics.
I think that the average people may be democratically stupid as a consequence because there were other people taking the decisions for them.
As soon as the society get used to participating to democratic decisions its habits will change and they will be more interested in be part of the process.
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#10
I did find this rather disturbing though "any kind of corruption should be punishable by death. Eventually, over 100 years, you will probably get a good society."
I would think "any kind of corruption" might be taking it a bit far. After 100 years of murdering anyone who is "different" you would have a society of robots - no freedoms, no unique thoughts. The definition of "corruption" would be far too easy to exploit and soon you would see people being executed for anything seen by the majority as wrong; different religions, sexual orientation, ethnic background. Suddenly the authorities would have a means to kill off anyone who disagrees with them in the name of "corruption."
Not a world I would want to live in.
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Soon we'll all be implanted with chips and they'll have VASTLY more power.
I'd hope the people would flat out refuse. But too many people are sheep and that won't happen.
One chip, one government, one religion.
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Power to the people? Where in America is govt. most accountable to the people? Our local govt. You want to talk about corruption? You have to look no farther than New Jersey (with over 100 local politicians arrested for corruption, including school board members) to see that power to the people will not change anything.
You want the people voting on bills? That would be interesting. GWB vetoed a child healthcare bill, doesn't that seem very bad? Who would vote against child healthcare insurance? Of course, that ignores the fact that some states (New Jersey for one) isn't covering the low income kids and want to raise the benefit to people with incomes up to $100,000.
You want power to the people? You better accept a ban on abortion, no immigration, reduced innovation (think the poor and middle class would support business) and much more.
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For the People BY the People
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Goveremntment in the hands of the United Sates int
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Democracy vrs. Freedom
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