[pp.int.general] what are the minimum true core Pirates principles? -Attempt to get a workable consensus-

[Jens Seipenbusch]

Hi there,

Let me try to add the view of a contemporary wittness.
You should ask yourself, which point in time you are investigating.
pre-2009 its a true fact, that we didnt have total direct democracy (or
the usage of liquid democracy as a mix of direct and representative
democracy or the use of a specific piece of web application software) as
value (!) of the pirate movement anywhere. What we developed around then
in germany were the possibilities to have more (not total) participation
(germany has some backlog demand with plebiscites) - of course in
connection with a special interest in modern technology (also for
internal organisation). Nevertheless we were and still are against
voting machines (i still own the domain
'wirvertrauenwahlcomputernnicht.de') and defending privacy as one of our
most important basic values.
Most of the german pirates see LQFB as a tool for accomplishing certain
tasks, e.g. developing and improving a draft text and then voting on it
with the option of delegation (which is its main strength). I'd say that
most of the german pirates know that a piece of software will not solve
all our political problems, not even those related to online
participation. Only a few pirates are fanatic with LQFB - thats a fact -
and even some of them wouldnt recommend it as a large scale leading
instrument for the german government with 80 million users.

Dario has some really good points here (see below).
I think the crucial point is to weigh participation against results and
take reality into account:
If you had 'perfect' participation on a decision, that still is no
guarantee for a good result, because the result depends on all the other
things BESIDES participation on voting, like knowledge, discussion,
education, involvement, time (!) and many other things.
Therefore i'd still today prefer a conventional referendum to an online
one. This is also one of the reasons why the results of our current
systems are not satisfactory.
'mob' is what we make of it, its all a question of parameters and
implementation and the above mentioned 'surrounding'.
Voting on complex decisions in a daily rhythm with 10 minutes to think
about it WILL produce bad (populistic) results.

For the minimum core pirate principles i'd list:
substance:
- information society needs new rules (preserve openness, change
copyright laws on digital data, internet as public space/good,...patents
and ipr etc)
- preserve privacy against authorities and against modern companies (to
avoid heteronomy etc.)

methods:
- occams razor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor)
- K.I.S.S. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K.I.S.S.)
- traceability (how could this happen)
- accountability (who is responsible for this decision)
- transparency (what http://www.transparency.org/ demands, not beyond)
- rationality (facts, not beliefs)
- freedom (as in: restrictions need rationale justification, no
restricting of behaviour which doesnt harm anyone)
- tolerance (as in: no lawmaking on the basis of ideological, religious
or otherwise irrelevant thoughts or feelings)

regards,
Jens
---
Jens Seipenbusch
former chairman and one of the founders of the german pirate party
co-author of uppsala-declaration ^^
international relations 2006-2010
comissioned coordinator for the eu-election 2014


(deliberate TOFU/full quote)

Am 24.09.2012 18:51, schrieb Dario:
> 2012/9/24 Andrew Norton <ktetch at ktetch.co.uk>
>
>> Mob rule (aka 'direct democracy') hasn't even been around or
>> considered for more than 1-2 years (3 at most) less than half the age
>> of the pirate movement. It's not been a 'core part of the pirate
>> philosophy'. Might be the case in one or two parties, but others just
>> started flirting with it.
>>
>>
> No, no :) To properly argue against something, nobody should call names
> like 'snout-counting' or 'mob rule' to the opposite ideas.
>
> I see no reason to keep "direct/liquid democracy" as a emotional decision
> tool. It must be used with facts from a prior discussion. Voting without
> facts or prior discussion is "mob ruling", not "direct/liquid
> democracy". As understood
> by those who are in favor of DD/LD.
>
> Probably we should name it "deliberative democracy" [0]. Or "liquid
> deliberative democracy". Facts + Discussion + LD = well-informed
> participants taking decisions on their own or delegating them. It sounds
> right to me.
>
>
>> Fact-based leadership should be the way forward, and while 'liquid
>> democracy' may not be mutually exclusive with it, it's certainly
>> diametrically opposite. In fact, every time I think about LD, a term
>> from a Harry Turtledove novel pops into my head - 'snout-counting'.
>>
>>
> I don't know in other countries but here Spaniards are tired of messianic
> leaders with "facts". Anyway, I think there is a big misconception of LD
> because of its current implementation: discuss a bit and vote, vote, vote.
> And of course LD supporters are not against facts, we are against leaders
> and not harnessing collective intelligence.
>
> [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deliberative_democracy
>