12.2 The Concept of Digital Democracy
257
Note that, even in step four, the overall goal is not to “win against others”, but to
find a solution that works for everyone, or at least for many. The more people benefit
from a solution, the greater will be the chance that society benefits as well. Of course,
it is unlikely that everyone can benefit from every decision taken, but it is expected
that the resulting decisions would be better in the sense that more people would
benefit than when majority voting is applied. It would, moreover, be desirable to
ensure that it is not always the same group of people that benefits from the decisions
made, but that benefits are distributed over different interest groups in a fair way.
All in all, the above four-step process is expected to deliver solutions that will
benefit more people. When averaged over many decisions and fairness considerations
are taken into account, it might be even reached that everyone benefits (some from
one decision, others from other decisions). Hence, the resulting system is expected to
be superior to one that is based on classical majority voting or dictatorial decisions.
It could raise the quality of the outcome for everyone, thereby promoting prosperity
and peace.
Note that the above approach is kind of similar to the way the Swiss basic democracy
50 works, which is geared towards consensual decision-making and is using
rotation principles
51 to ensure that everyone can raise their most important issues.
Also, The People can interfere with the process at any time by means of referenda.
52
Digital technology would now allow us to implement these democratic principles
in a digital platform. Such a platform should be based on a “democracy by design”
approach.
53 It could increase the efficiency of democratic processes, and it would
allow to export this successful system to other countries—and to companies and
institutions, too. Finally, it might be possible to scale up the system in order to
solve some global problems as well. Hence, you can see that “Digital Democracy” is
not primarily about electronic voting
54 (which many people find pretty concerning,
because it may create possibilities to manipulate democratic elections electronically).
Instead, Digital Democracy is about unleashing “collective intelligence”, which can
be supported by digital means.
55
12.3 Participatory Resilience
When the world is in trouble, we would want to have a “resilient system”. This
means, whatever disaster, crisis, shock or surprise society experiences, it will be
able to flexibly adapt and recover, and in the best case even get to a better system
50 See “direct democracy”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy, https://www.eda.
admin.ch/aboutswitzerland/en/home/politik/uebersicht/direkte-demokratie.html.
51 See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotationsprinzip.
52 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referendum.
53 Metcalf [25], Thomas [26].
54 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_voting.
55 Mann and Helbing [21].
257
Note that, even in step four, the overall goal is not to “win against others”, but to
find a solution that works for everyone, or at least for many. The more people benefit
from a solution, the greater will be the chance that society benefits as well. Of course,
it is unlikely that everyone can benefit from every decision taken, but it is expected
that the resulting decisions would be better in the sense that more people would
benefit than when majority voting is applied. It would, moreover, be desirable to
ensure that it is not always the same group of people that benefits from the decisions
made, but that benefits are distributed over different interest groups in a fair way.
All in all, the above four-step process is expected to deliver solutions that will
benefit more people. When averaged over many decisions and fairness considerations
are taken into account, it might be even reached that everyone benefits (some from
one decision, others from other decisions). Hence, the resulting system is expected to
be superior to one that is based on classical majority voting or dictatorial decisions.
It could raise the quality of the outcome for everyone, thereby promoting prosperity
and peace.
Note that the above approach is kind of similar to the way the Swiss basic democracy
50 works, which is geared towards consensual decision-making and is using
rotation principles
51 to ensure that everyone can raise their most important issues.
Also, The People can interfere with the process at any time by means of referenda.
52
Digital technology would now allow us to implement these democratic principles
in a digital platform. Such a platform should be based on a “democracy by design”
approach.
53 It could increase the efficiency of democratic processes, and it would
allow to export this successful system to other countries—and to companies and
institutions, too. Finally, it might be possible to scale up the system in order to
solve some global problems as well. Hence, you can see that “Digital Democracy” is
not primarily about electronic voting
54 (which many people find pretty concerning,
because it may create possibilities to manipulate democratic elections electronically).
Instead, Digital Democracy is about unleashing “collective intelligence”, which can
be supported by digital means.
55
12.3 Participatory Resilience
When the world is in trouble, we would want to have a “resilient system”. This
means, whatever disaster, crisis, shock or surprise society experiences, it will be
able to flexibly adapt and recover, and in the best case even get to a better system
50 See “direct democracy”, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy, https://www.eda.
admin.ch/aboutswitzerland/en/home/politik/uebersicht/direkte-demokratie.html.
51 See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotationsprinzip.
52 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referendum.
53 Metcalf [25], Thomas [26].
54 See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_voting.
55 Mann and Helbing [21].