[LINK] E-Democracy

[Stephen Loosley]

At 11:02 AM 27/11/2006, Tom Worthington wrote:

>At 04:57 PM 11/26/2006, stephen at melbpc.org.au wrote:
>>... why not enable Australian citizens to participate in our law-making process at a stage which still enables sensible amendments, based on public comment. ... these two sites could very easily include drafts of the bills
>>together with a simple form-page allowing for citizen comment. ...
>
>So why don't you suggest it to the members of Parliament?

Good grief .. what on earth makes you think I haven't? Responding to link replies, such as yours Tom, is just one small area of normal activity.

>Perhaps instead there could be a low cost on-line form of parliamentary inquiry. There would be no face-to-face hearings, but the details of each piece of legislation could be provided. The sort of non-partisan briefing papers the Parliamentary Library does a good job of providing could be presented. Submissions could be invited, made available and the arguments distilled. Citizens could then indicate which views they support. The parliamentarians could then see what is being supported.

It's a bit insulting to the public to suggest parliamentary librarians are across every issue better than say Linkers whom have shown they are expert in respective fields, and to suggest that we all need to have all the issues explained. But, certainly, library briefing papers may well be of assistance. E-democracy need not be rocket science, Tom, and one idea is to present different perspectives from that which the current sitting members can already receive ie, staff-produced briefing papers. 

Whatever, there's no doubt that a "public-discussion" format of e-democracy is unlikely to be accepted .. much too threatening to their power .. and that's why I suggest individual form-like, and hence essentially private, responses are much more likely to be introduced. If all the public responses are made public, it's fairly obvious that many responses will be much less candid, and hence helpful, than private submissions.

In regards to some junk-mail-responses .. well, so what?  If the value of Link was judged by such criteria, then Link might well not exist either :-)

I say again, e-democracy does NOT need to be rocket science. And I say, just like the Victorian government and e-voting .. hey, give it a go .. and then, if it needs refining .. well, ok .. so what .. few systems are perfect when initially introduced. And a private, easy and economical way to assist our governments in the making of better laws is certainly worth trying, even if experience then indicates that changes may make it better.

Cheers, people
Stephen Loosley
Victoria, Australia
.