Friday, May 29, 2015

Delegated Democracy

Delegated democracy is an idea for a new form of government that looks to realize the values and vision of past democratic models of government, yet failed in their aspirations due to the fact that there was simply no way to reasonably carry them out.

Democracy in America is a democratic republic and in such a republic career politicians are born, political parties become entrenched and gain enormous power, and corruption ensues as rich and powerful third party organization are able to hold sway over the elected officials that act not in accordance to the people’s wishes but instead against them. 

Delegated democracy can be enabled for the first time now via a new technology called blockchain technology; the blockchain is famously known use case Bitcoin, but actually has a wide range of applications, not just revolutionizing money.

The power of the blockchain is that its ledger can show with 100% clarity who has done what and when.  For moving money, knowing these things is very important and thus the growing popularity of Bitcoin, but when it comes to things like elections, it is also very important to know who has done what and when.  Elections right now are a cumbersome process that needs A LOT of oversight, planning, and maintenance in their execution.  But a blockchain can greatly reduce the burden of instituting elections as well as highly streamline the process; that basically a completely different kind of voting and therefore government can be formed, one run far more efficiently and more openly. 

If you were to combine the Senate, the House of Republicans, the US Constitution, and all the law books into one, that would be the blockchain in a delegated democracy.  No more corruption in any of those positions, no more administration costs, no more politicking at foundational levels.  Instead a platform can be made where the peoples will is recording in an ongoing continual basis, updated in real time and reflected in real time.  This can be done through delegated democracy.

People don’t want to vote in every election, and neither can they spend all the time researching each issue fully even if they wanted, and they definitely can’t take the time themselves to debate the crafting of each law word for word.  And so we live in an imperfect system where people watch TV commercials or maybe a couple of debates if that and then going off of that information elect officials that then make all the decisions for the country.  It is frustrating because very rarely do said officials actually do what they say, so at a fundamental level the system is not honest, but instead purposely misleads people time after time.

Delegated democracy can solve these problems by using a blockchain to allow each and every person to vote on each and every issue brought before their government.  In a republic these are issues that the elected officials would normally take care of.  A delegated democracy is real democracy because if a person does not want to vote on every single issue, they may instead transfer their voting power to another trusted person they believe in to vote for them. 

This allows for a completely new system to arise and that instead of being a two party system, a 10,000 party system arises.  Anybody can become a delegate and represent their own party.  And within a party there can be 10,000 divisions.  And in this way each voter can find a delegate that will vote exactly the way they would want them to vote on exactly each issue. 

Let us say a very population delegate arises to power in the year 2040 name Ryan Paul, the son of Rand Paul and the grandson of Ron Paul.  Ryan Paul has veered quite a bit from his father and grandfather’s position and in doing so as a delegate has become quite popular and not just “the other guy”.  And let’s say that I as a citizen really like his platform, except one thing.  I don’t like his stance on business taxes.  Within the Ryan Paul party it will be pretty easy to find a delegate that promises to always vote like Ryan Paul, except when it comes to business taxes.  And let’s say my wife really likes Ryan Paul but doesn’t like his stance on women’s issues, so instead within the Ryan Paul party she finds a delegate that will always vote with Ryan Paul except on issues involving women, and so it goes. 

In this system, Ryan Paul is not a President, or a Governor, or a Senator, but in some ways has taken over some of the most important duties of these people.  He would not get paid, but when laws are introduced or updated, he could vote on them, but as a delegate with a lot of supporters, his vote could hold considerable sway. This job of course would be one that pays $0 a year, but people that transfer their voting rights to him, could also make a small donation to help support him if they so choose too.

This makes the Democratic Party very quickly turn into a rainbow of sub-parties, as well as the Republican Party, and as well as the Independent Party.  And these rainbows start to strongly overlap so that it is now difficult to tell just exactly what the Democratic, Republican, or Independent Party is.  Instead we are left with delegates that express their party’s true values and stances on issues and vote in accordance with them.  And if any one delegate isn’t upholding their platform and doing exactly what they say, they can be voted out in real time at any time. 

In such a system delegates would get paid nothing, but would be voting in accordance with their love for country, city, or state.  Anyone citizen could become a delegate at any time.  In this way the people gain a much more powerful say in just exactly what will and will not be done on each issue.  And of course if a person wants to vote for themselves on each issue that is fine too.  Delegate power could be transferred out or kept private at the city, state, or national level depending on what a person’s interests are.    

All voting or transferring of voting power to delegates can be done very simply and easily at ones cell phone or home computer.  And all votes are 100% transparent.  They are all recorded on the blockchain and fully auditable by anyone at any time.  At no point in time before now could this every have been achieved but blockchain not only does this but does it easily. 

This allows for a revolution.  Once a person is in power they no longer have 2, 4, or 6 years to do as they like.  If they aren’t voting or doing work that the citizen likes, they can have their delegate power revoked at any time.  Competitors will be very quick to point out if a person voted congruently with their promises and if not alternative options will quickly arise and be only a 30 login and transfer away for the citizen. 

Furthermore, and very interestingly, not only can the block chain server as a giant ledger of who did what and when, but it actually has processing and execution power via a new technology called smart contracts.  Smart contracts allow for “if this then that” style of programming execution of value.  So if a vote is made to build a road and a contractor is selected, then the blockchain can release funds to that contractor and only that contractor.  Or if a new law is made banning a flying drones with HD x-technology cameras that essentially allow any one person to see clearly what is happening inside of another’s home at any time, then when a police officer finds a drone operator breaking this law, then when the person is cited, there will be a new citation with a set fine and punishment made in the blockchain that can be referenced that links the operator and the citation and explains how the operator must make amends. 


Via delegated democracy on the blockchain and smart contracts, a new kind of government can be formed and run much more efficiently and with transparency.  And when other blockchain technologies are added such as blockchain based citizen registry and/or land/property management, as well as handling the full process of collecting taxes, government budgets, and paying out this money for services and programs (again all via smart contracts with no overhead costs), then a new vision of government can be formalized, one that comes much closer to upholding the true realization of democracy, transparency, and efficiently run government. 

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home