As a senior-level software engineer, I work with political systems every day. When I design a software system, relationships between people drive system requirements - the needs of the stakeholders need to be balanced so that the company can create value. The right system can improve how people work together and reduce infighting. This may include by coordinating user activities or surfacing new analytical information. Usually the kinds of systems I work with and am most interested in involve business activities like extracting data from websites, publishing news articles, selling products or tracking resource allocations.
I don't normally blog about government politics. The occasion for this post is the reopening of the federal government after over two weeks of shutdown and the last-minute aversion of a default on US sovereign debt. On the one hand the crisis was created by a populist movement with some important ideas - but on the other hand the current political system wasn't adequately designed to handle politicians so intent on dismantling the government from within. Having read extensively on the revolutionary war, the constitutional convention and historic US presidents, I cannot imagine this is how the greats of our nation's past envisioned our political future.
The gridlocked national government is unlikely to allow a structural change through constitutional amendments or self-regulation. Special interests, career politicians and the codification of congressional inertia make it difficult for even obvious improvements to happen (consider infrastructure improvements, health care reform and campaign finance reform).
I have been contemplating whether approaches like proxy voting have the potential to change the way politicians and the public interact. Proxy voting allows people to flexibly delegate decisions based on trust relationships. For example, I often ask voting advice from my friend Kevin. He is a licensed social worker, NYU graduate student, director of a shelter for LGTB youth and a close family friend whom I trust implicitly. Kevin sometimes circulates suggestions about upcoming NYC-area elections, and a number of people I know follow these recommendations when voting. Proxy voting takes this a step further by allowing me to designate a person to actually vote on my behalf, called a "proxy". I could have Kevin be my voting proxy on social policy issues. In turn, Kevin could allow some or all of his policy decisions to be delegated to others. I might delegate different policy areas or decisions to different people: I could use Matthew Green and Neil deGrasse Tyson as voting proxies on technology policy. I can always choose to vote directly instead of delegating, and I can employ a combination of delegation and direct voting. I can change the way I delegate at any time - it's not on a multi-year cycle like electing government officials.
One way of using a proxy voting system is to have each legislative vote be determined by proxy voting - elected officials backed by the proxy network would vote as a block based on the decisions of the voting network. In this mode, the representative is simply a facilitator, and all real political power resides in her proxy network. The result may be a "transparty"system, one in which political party affiliation itself is fluid and can vary across different policy areas.
The Pirate Party is the most visible party that uses this voting system; their voting system is LiquidFeedback, an MIT-licensed open source tool written in Lua and PL/SQL. Unfortunately, the Pirate Party does not appear to hold any meaningful seats in my jurisdiction. Without representation, there's not much point to having a proxy system. From my preliminary reading I think it will be a long time before the US mainstream accepts proxy voting, and I believe there needs to be an incremental bridge to build public awareness and trust for such a change. This bridge must work within the confines of the current two party system.
Perhaps proxy voting concepts could be applied to the conventional way we vote for elected officials or referenda. There is no obvious hook for delegated voting: each voter has to vote individually. Yet the proxy voting model could be inverted as a tool to help voters decide how to vote at the polls. In this inversion, I tell the proxy system whom I trust and the system tells me how to vote. I simply take my tablet or a printout with me to the polling place and select the candidates or referenda recommended by my network of experts. The system might also suggest political activities for me to do between elections using a similar model; this could include rallies, speeches, conventions, fundraisers and other forums for political discourse.
I'm really just starting to learn about proxy voting systems and consider how the concept can be applied. If you have an interest in this topic or know of people who would be, please get in touch.
I don't normally blog about government politics. The occasion for this post is the reopening of the federal government after over two weeks of shutdown and the last-minute aversion of a default on US sovereign debt. On the one hand the crisis was created by a populist movement with some important ideas - but on the other hand the current political system wasn't adequately designed to handle politicians so intent on dismantling the government from within. Having read extensively on the revolutionary war, the constitutional convention and historic US presidents, I cannot imagine this is how the greats of our nation's past envisioned our political future.
The gridlocked national government is unlikely to allow a structural change through constitutional amendments or self-regulation. Special interests, career politicians and the codification of congressional inertia make it difficult for even obvious improvements to happen (consider infrastructure improvements, health care reform and campaign finance reform).
I have been contemplating whether approaches like proxy voting have the potential to change the way politicians and the public interact. Proxy voting allows people to flexibly delegate decisions based on trust relationships. For example, I often ask voting advice from my friend Kevin. He is a licensed social worker, NYU graduate student, director of a shelter for LGTB youth and a close family friend whom I trust implicitly. Kevin sometimes circulates suggestions about upcoming NYC-area elections, and a number of people I know follow these recommendations when voting. Proxy voting takes this a step further by allowing me to designate a person to actually vote on my behalf, called a "proxy". I could have Kevin be my voting proxy on social policy issues. In turn, Kevin could allow some or all of his policy decisions to be delegated to others. I might delegate different policy areas or decisions to different people: I could use Matthew Green and Neil deGrasse Tyson as voting proxies on technology policy. I can always choose to vote directly instead of delegating, and I can employ a combination of delegation and direct voting. I can change the way I delegate at any time - it's not on a multi-year cycle like electing government officials.
One way of using a proxy voting system is to have each legislative vote be determined by proxy voting - elected officials backed by the proxy network would vote as a block based on the decisions of the voting network. In this mode, the representative is simply a facilitator, and all real political power resides in her proxy network. The result may be a "transparty"system, one in which political party affiliation itself is fluid and can vary across different policy areas.
The Pirate Party is the most visible party that uses this voting system; their voting system is LiquidFeedback, an MIT-licensed open source tool written in Lua and PL/SQL. Unfortunately, the Pirate Party does not appear to hold any meaningful seats in my jurisdiction. Without representation, there's not much point to having a proxy system. From my preliminary reading I think it will be a long time before the US mainstream accepts proxy voting, and I believe there needs to be an incremental bridge to build public awareness and trust for such a change. This bridge must work within the confines of the current two party system.
Perhaps proxy voting concepts could be applied to the conventional way we vote for elected officials or referenda. There is no obvious hook for delegated voting: each voter has to vote individually. Yet the proxy voting model could be inverted as a tool to help voters decide how to vote at the polls. In this inversion, I tell the proxy system whom I trust and the system tells me how to vote. I simply take my tablet or a printout with me to the polling place and select the candidates or referenda recommended by my network of experts. The system might also suggest political activities for me to do between elections using a similar model; this could include rallies, speeches, conventions, fundraisers and other forums for political discourse.
I'm really just starting to learn about proxy voting systems and consider how the concept can be applied. If you have an interest in this topic or know of people who would be, please get in touch.
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