[pp.int.general] Reflections on the PP GA

[seykron]

Nice summary, thank you!

I would like to make a little comment on some points.

> 4. There is still the problem of what to do in case of a malicious
> attack on the GA. It is not that difficult to disrupt the
> communication link and then what should we do? Would the GA be valid
> if the remote participants were cut off from it? What if they were cut
> off not constantly - but often enough to make the GA again
> frustratingly inefficient?

Starhawk wrote a lot of articles about how to unlock issues and reach
consensus on a direct democracy-driven organization based on her own
experiencies as an activist from the 70s. IMHO this is the best one:

http://www.starhawk.org/activism/trainer-resources/consensus.html

However, all articles in that directory are brilliant.

> 6. I hope that much of the information exchange can actually happen
> outside of GAs. We can use the mailing lists for this. Maybe we could
> set up a new one that would be open to all pirate party members - but
> still have some rules that would fix the troll problem. Or
> alternatively we can also use the new Liquid Feedback system for this.
> In areas where we manage to reach consensus on-line - there the GA
> will be only a formality and it will proceed smoothly.

It's not a coincidence that you misunderstand "voting" as "consensus".
liquid democracy (as LiquidFeedback home page says) is not about
consensus, it is about vote delegation. Voting make losers. From
Starhawk's article:

"Voting is a means by which we choose one alternative from several.
Consensus, on the other hand, is a process of synthesizing many diverse
elements together. Voting assumes that people are always competitive
and that agreement can only be reached through compromise. Consensus
assumes that people are willing to agree with each other, and that in
such an atmosphere, conflict and differences can result in creative and
intelligent decisions"

It would be nice if you can consider this kind of practice instead of
classical voting variations. It is possible, in the PPAr we're writing
a paper about direct democracy practice implemented as a political
party (with a lot of historical references to understand the context
we're living on). This is the first revision on Github (in spanish, no
translations available yet):

http://is.gd/wO6g2d

Otherwise, I really look forward to see the results of this GA. You're
doing a great effort to build a common project :)

Regards,

Matías


On Mon, 14 Apr 2014 08:57:21 +0200
Zbigniew Łukasiak <zzbbyy at gmail.com> wrote:

> 1. Overall I have positive impressions. I think with the new board we
> have a chance to overcome at least some of the problems from the past.
> Unfortunately I don't see how the Court of Arbitration could  rule the
> GA announcement correct and that means we'll be back with the old
> board.  Maybe the Netherlands would just remove their complaint?
> 
> 2. The statutes say "The General Assembly shall meet at least once a
> year" - so there is no problem with having another GA with a correct
> announcement soon.
> 
> 3. The proceedings where efficient (at least at the part that I was
> present) - that was a surprise for me after reading reports on all the
> past GAs. Maybe the procedure was improved? I would like for the
> remote delegates to confirm my impressions - but  for me it looked
> that when the on-site delegates worked with no more than one remote
> participant they had enough time to make sure that the communication
> worked and could efficiently represent them.
> 
> 4. There is still the problem of what to do in case of a malicious
> attack on the GA. It is not that difficult to disrupt the
> communication link and then what should we do? Would the GA be valid
> if the remote participants were cut off from it? What if they were cut
> off not constantly - but often enough to make the GA again
> frustratingly inefficient?
> 
> 
> 5. PPI Headquaters - I have started this in another thread already -
> but I'll repeate. We need to know what is that organization. I don't
> quite buy the 'automagic' that was talked about at the GA - it is well
> known that all the 'small script' in contracts are the most important
> part of them.
> 
> 6. I hope that much of the information exchange can actually happen
> outside of GAs. We can use the mailing lists for this. Maybe we could
> set up a new one that would be open to all pirate party members - but
> still have some rules that would fix the troll problem. Or
> alternatively we can also use the new Liquid Feedback system for this.
> In areas where we manage to reach consensus on-line - there the GA
> will be only a formality and it will proceed smoothly.
> 
> 7. I liked the open space sessions - big thumbs up for Gregory for
> organizing this. I hope that the outcome papers will be published by
> the GA organizers - that will enable more people to join in the
> projects. There is much that can be done - and it will be very
> interesting to see which projects get along their plans and which just
> get stuck at the starting point. In a half a year this will be an
> interesting learning opportunity. Personally I have the feeling that
> there was a little bit too much talk about great outcomes and too
> little about the practical detail how to reach them. Maybe we should
> start thinking about 'the minimum viable product' as is popular among
> entrepreneurs.
> 
> 

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