Foundations Build to last

To put the title quote in perspective:

now we're busy making all our busy plans

on foundations built to last

but nothing fades as fast as the future

and nothing clings like the past

Peter Gabriel, lyrics of More than this

The thought that started this manifesto had to do with legislation. I had read a bit about demarchy and I was active on kuro5hin.org which used a rating system to rate user contributions (and at some point users). I added the two together added some madness and had the basics of the legislative process proposed here. The requirements for the rating system that would make the legislature work did not seem to be feasible if used for legislature alone. Thus I expanded the concepts and added ideas to hypothetically solve many things I perceived as contemporary major problems. You are reading the result now - (in fall 2008) six years after I had the first legislature process worked out.

The three main problems I saw with western democratic legislation were the selection process for our leaders, their motivation and the behemoth law systems created by the democratic apparatus.

The selected rulers are people who tend to be more aggressive than the average, simply because they have fought their way to the top against many competitors. I'm utterly amazed how sane and capable many politicians are after 40 years in that rat race. This is indeed a major argument in favor of democracy: it selects strong, sane competitive people. It has however been empirically demonstrated, that the narcissists who commonly seek power are not better suited to make decisions than the average person. I believe that selecting more peaceful less competitive people as our leaders would make the world a less aggressive, less competitive place, which I would appreciate.

Once the narcissists are in power the only motivation that the system imposes on them is staying in power, i.e. winning the next election. Therefore the decision making processes are slowed during communal, state, and federal elections. At any time real public debates are rare among politicians: any member of the ruling party always defends even the greatest bullshit while any member of the opposition reflexively tramples on even the most marvelous of political achievements. The party is everything, individual democrats are not supposed to have individual opinions. This apparently inhumane behavior makes it hard for the public to identify with their rulers.

Perceived power is for a good part proportional to the number of subordinates a functionary has. This counteracts lean administration. It is always harder to let go some long established advantage then to make some new restriction, or provide advantages to others. This leads to ever more laws. Both effects combined lead to bureaucracies that are more complex, expensive, and restrictive than they have to be.

So I set out to design a process that may result in a lean government that twists few but strong levers and has competent rulers that are only motivated to server the common good. And while I was at it I tried to solve all other problems of society that came to my mind as well. And somewhere in between I must have lost my mind. I swear I saw it just then. Where is the damn thing?