XPost: soc.culture.jewish   
   From: Josjoha@market.socialism.nl   
      
    (In the below I will up to the first * explain what a Council   
     Government is, and up to the ** what was already proposed many times   
     before, the system of sub-councils to defeat bribery.)   
      
   A Council Government is a form of Government and elections, where people   
   form groups small enough to convene and debate. Each of these groups may   
   elect a representative, and these representatives can then also form   
   Councils.   
      
   This form of Government is (or seems) natural. You group together and   
   you talk. When you have reached some conclusion on some topic, you rest   
   and start to wonder: what do all the other people think, who are not   
   part of this group. If you see other people also having formed groups to   
   talk, it is evident that you will try to find out what they are   
   thinking, talking about and deciding. An obvious way to do that is to   
   send a messenger.   
      
   This form of Government has been attempted in 1917 during the Socialist   
   / Communist Revolutions, because it had become apparent how Capitalism   
   and Parliament (massive election pools for each candidate, creating a   
   great gap between voters and politicians) was not functioning as hoped.   
   Parliament was notoriously corrupt. The benefit the Council Government   
   form promises, is that you can immediately repeal your messenger, your   
   representative, once they have been bribed by the rich and start lying.   
   Mechanisms for immediate recall and replacement may have been invented   
   for massive election pools, but they can not be effective. It is too   
   much work to do a re-election.   
      
    *   
      
   Here I assume a voter group of 50 or a few more people, and also the   
   higher Councils will typically have that size.   
      
   The fundamental question this whole system tries to solve: how can we   
   reduce the power of evil people. People who are bribed or who are lying   
   or skewing things becausue the sense wealth opportunities for   
   themselves, are these evil entities. You cannot just detect them,   
   although you can replace them.   
      
   There are also more sophisticated attacks possible on the representative   
   system, which do not rely on a single corruptible person. For example a   
   wealthy person may bribe several people, let's say 4 persons out of 50   
   in a Provincial Council. While this does not sound much, they can have a   
   disproportionate influence, especially if they keep their co-operation   
   and funding a secret. We will assume to deal with experts at these   
   crafts, because soon they will be. If there is enough money in it,   
   some people will do almost anything. Criminal conspiracy is not rare. It   
   may seem fairly benign if some people have a friendly get together with   
   their wealthy friend. Who can make a law against it ? It might all be   
   innocent.   
      
   It is dangerous to start pointing fingers and demonize people.  Moreover,   
   it is indeed part of a democracy that wealthy persons also have the vote,   
   and being wealthy does not necessarily mean evil either.  People should   
   talk about politics, they should get together. The risk of creating a   
   witch hunt in the Councils, is potentially a greater danger than even   
   any conspiracies (criminal or less so) might pose.   
      
   One mechanism to help with this (see book, already in there), is to   
   divide the Council up into smaller councils of about 10 persons. 10   
   persons is a handy size for a debate. If you have 4 people conspiring,   
   their ability to influence is shattered. If they want to play as a team   
   and start lying because they expect to be paid for lying, they are down   
   to 2 persons in 2 of these sub-councils, or just one person in 4 of the   
   5 subcouncils. The rich man now needs to bribe more of the Council,   
   which gets increasingly costly and risky. You can also argue that if the   
   majority can be bribed, so that literally the majority of that nation   
   can be bribed and not just a few politicians who have made this into   
   their carreer, you get what you deserve. You are just a bad people in   
   general.   
      
   You can of course keep reducing the size of these sub-councils, to make   
   bribery increasingly difficult. The ultimate in this is just 2 persons.   
      
   Let's assume a Council of 50, and subcouncils of 10. This also goes for   
   the voter group at population level. They too are a Council, can debate   
   and influence their Representative. They don't have to, but they can.   
      
   The idea is that the sub-councils pre-cook any topic with themselves, so   
   that later in a grand meeting of the whole Council the proceedings are   
   faster and less prone to demagoguery. A lot of people will not feel well   
   talking to 50 persons, you can already have an effect of people who are   
   adept to manipulating crowds, and using social bickering, hatred and   
   atmosphere poisening around topics and opinions to get their way. In a   
   smaller council, people generally feel more confident. If you don't   
   understand some small thing, you won't easily raise your hand in a group   
   of 50. In a group of 10, many more people will. Some still will not.   
      
   The idea is also that the sub-councils can talk to each other directly,   
   especially if they reached some conclusion. The ideas then go from   
   subcouncil to subcouncil, and can there be discussed. If you think the   
   whole process is going to be long, perhaps longwinded and take many   
   sessions for every topic, many days or weeks: exactly ! That is what we   
   want. Slow and careful decision making, rather than rushed demagoguery   
   and rolling over people. If the topic is law, then the aim is to make   
   law for forever. You look at it extremely carefully, and make a wise   
   decision.   
      
    **   
      
   What you could do when convening in a subcouncil, is to have a session   
   where you have everyone talk to one other person. You could put two   
   chairs accross each other, for 5 pairs total. People can talk at the   
   same time, which of course saves on the total time. If you keep it   
   fairly short, you might get through the whole thing in an hour or two.   
   It might be good to keep it short, because you could always do it again,   
   and those who find out they have a lot to talk about, can continue on   
   their own time. If people talk 5 minutes to each other, and there is two   
   minutes to change chairs, 7 * 10 = 70 minutes. With a break half way of   
   15 minutes, the whole thing takes 1.5 hours. It is a bit long, but you   
   can also do one half one day, and the other half another.   
      
   To coin a term "carrousel" ? Makes sense I guess. You could then have a   
   sub-council vote to do a carrousel on some topic ...   
      
   To make it even more structured, you could flip a coin on each meeting   
   between 2 persons start, and the winner gets to choose if they go first   
   or second. Each could first talk for one minute, leaving maybe 2 minutes   
   for some questions and answers between the two.   
      
   Under these conditions, everyone should be able to talk and express   
   their opinions, and listen to that one person accross from them. It will   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)