Re: [ox-en] Re: Free administration
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2001 00:50:35 +0100
Hi Graham and all!
6 days ago Graham Seaman wrote:
On Sun, 16 Dec 2001, Stefan Merten wrote:
It is
power as a representative, since not all people involved in testing
water quality with him would have the same power.
Their opinion is at least to a considerable part reflected in the
Matt's decisions. Well, you may call this a representative - but the
word doesn't mean that type of representation usually, does it?
No, it's another case where the normal use of the word isn't helpful.
Ok. So we have at least this clear :-) .
But I think it's important that representation in some general sense is
involved.
Perhaps it's more of involvement in some general sense which is
involved. Perhaps it's something between representation and
involvement?
A lot of people have an idea of some future possible democracy
based on the internet being based on continual referenda, where everyone
can say 'yes' or 'no' to all sorts of questions traditionally handled
by governments. In appearance, this would be a direct democracy, without
representation.
Well, thinking a bit more about it, I think the separation between the
people who prepare decisions (i.e. government) and people who vote is
a big part of the problem. I'm not sure whether this is part of every
thinkable democracy but as more representative it is as more there is
a separation.
But you're outlining that already...
But in practice, it would be less democratic than a
representative system (representative in the sense of the water example).
Firstly, because if I don't have any knowledge or interest in water
quality, any vote I cast on it is meaningless;
Very important. You have to have knowledge to have the option of a
meaningful say in some field. This is reflected in Free Software very
well as far as I can say. Hmm...
secondly because most
questions are too complicated to formulate as a simple 'yes/no';
Very, very, very important. Formulating complicated things as a yes/no
decision mirrors the competition of capitalism, the choice between two
commodities for only one you have the money for, etc., etc.
Having some experience in working on a consensual basis, I learnt,
that voting destroys a decision making process. It interrupts it and
people who previously worked together to solve a problem in the best
way available, separate from each other to form factions, power comes
into play - it's awful. And the most awful thing is, that the *really*
good solutions are cut off by a vote.
thirdly,
because it gives the person who sets and chooses the questions too much
power.
This is the case when you have a real representative. Exactly. It's
easy to set an agenda if you're the only one who has knowledge enough
of a certain field.
The 'representative' way is not direct democracy in the traditional
(Athenian) sense; it doesn't necessarily involve any actual 'vote' at all;
if you don't call it 'representative', what do you call it?
Is there a German word already ? ;-)
At least none comes to mind :-( .
I think indeed we're experiencing something new here. There is no word
for that.
I think it's possible that there are differences, especially in cases that
effect
the lives of many people in areas where they can't all possibly have much
knowledge of technical details. For example, decisions about nuclear
power stations might be best taken not by nuclear physicists alone.
This is the point which wanders around in my head for months if not
years now. So how would this look like if we have that
between-representation-and-involvment process combined with
self-unfolding?
The nuclear physicist being a scientist is mainly interested in
physics. So s/he can tell us something about what is possible on a
physical level. For instance s/he can tell us how much energy gain is
available from which nuclear reaction. S/he also will tell us
something about the radioactivity.
In addition for a nuclear power station you need all kinds of
engineers. These people can tell us how the physical process may be
controlled. For this they have to cooperate with the physician.
Then there are people who want or may want to use that energy - and
who have to bear the consequences like radioactive wastes. This is
where the involvement of people comes into play which is at the moment
are excluded more or less from the decision. Today at this point some
politicians stand up and tell us what is good for us and how this is
done.
The anti-nuclear movement - at least in Germany - has (had?) tried to
gather knowledge from the physicians as well as from the engineers to
have a better base for their arguments. But this anti-movement was
already a consequence of the political process which took place
before. In a GPL society I think such an anti-movement is not
necessary because there are no politicians in the first place numbing
people.
So how could such a process look like in a GPL society? The physicians
and engineers clearly self-unfold in what they are doing - that's what
they like to do. I guess it would be wise to have "documenters" with
them who translate their work into a language understandable for the
potential users and consequence-bearers. This should be put to a web
site with each level of detail so it is at least accessible by
everyone who's interested enough.
But this doesn't suffice for nuclear power stations. What is missing?
Is it the discussion throughout society. We *know* that nuclear
technology has a big impact on many people - at least as a risk. So we
think that many of these people should have an educated say in this.
How is this organized? I don't know.
How does this happen in Free Software? For instance how is decided
which features go into the next version of KDE and which don't? I
mean, the design of KDE also has a big impact on many people.
That implies some mechanism of government not included within the
free software developer's type of structure.
Well, there is some involvement from the using-only users, isn't it?
The wishes and needs of these users are reflected in Free Software at
least to a certain degree. In that direction I thought if involvement
of some sort.
The point in Free Software is, that there are no clear boundaries
between people who're just using things and people creating things. I
for one am using tons of Free Software - most of it as is. But for
instance the `mh' mail system I'm using needs a little patch to suit
my needs - so I'm patching it. And even people who may not be able to
program may translate texts used in a program to other languages.
Mit Freien Grüßen
Stefan
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