Open Sourcing Democracy

The NY Times Magazine had an op-ed on open sourcing e-voting software this weekend.

Electronic voting has much to offer, but will we ever be able to trust these buggy machines? Yes, we will -- but only if we adopt the techniques of the "open source" geeks.

One reason it's difficult to trust the voting software of companies like Diebold is that the source code remains a trade secret. A few federally approved software experts are allowed to examine the code and verify that it works as intended, and in some cases, states are allowed to keep a copy in escrow. But the public has no access, and this is troublesome. When the Diebold source code was accidentally posted online last year, a computer-science professor looked at it and found it was dangerously hackable. Diebold may have fixed its bugs, but since the firm won't share the code publicly, there's no way of knowing. Just trust us, the company says.

(c/o boingboing)

I concur, I think that's a great idea for make voting machines more secure and the physical voting process more transparent. But what about the political process itself? Has representative democracy failed us?

My contention would be yes, it has. As Rutherford B. Hayes once said, "This is a government of the people, by the people and for the people no longer. It is a government of corporations, by corporations, and for corporations." For well over a century, our representatives have turned a blind eye to the public interest, and rather, placed their focus on "interests." With campaign financing and other forms of graft-as-lobbying (the political machinery of old) giving rise to plutocracy in this nation, we are hard-pressed to find politicians who, once elected, keep their promises to us, and keep engaging with us throughout their tenure to determine what decisions to make in our favor. Hell, they don't even want to hear what we have to say anymore. Thus, we can not honestly call these people our representatives.

Rushkoff wrote this great pamphlet for the British Labour party's think-tank Demos last year, called Open Source Democracy. The paper examines the way in which interactive technologies can play a role in increasing transparency and direct participation in our democracy. In contemplating Rushkoff's theories in both this document and Nothing Sacred (originally intended to be subtitled The Case for Open Source Judaism), I've begun to brainstorm such technologies and the way they might serve this purpose. Here's a concept I've come up with...

Create a website named YOURSTATE.ORG, or something to that effect. On the site, offer discussion forums with built in polling functions, as well as a Wiki for the creation/management of a platform, and "e-mail your representative" software like that offered on MoveOn, DRCNet, and other activist-oriented sites. The idea would be to float candidates willing to represent the majority (while including a nod to the concerns of the minority, or hell, it could just operate on consensus) participating in the discussion and voting taking place on the site within each particular district (or jurisdiction).

So for example, say I am willing to run for governor as a YOURSTATE.ORG candidate--#1. my campaign would be funded by contributions from participants using the site, as opposed to "other interests", similar to the way Howard Dean conducted his campaign; and #2. my policies and decisions would be based on either the consensus or majority decision of the website's participants within my district, again, as opposed to "other interests," such as corporate campaign contributors. Thus the idea is to eliminate parties and party platforms, eliminate political corruption in favor of corporate interests, and to engage the public directly in the decision making process, so that their representatives truly represent them.

It's not an entirely thoroughly worked out idea, but it's one that I feel has potential, so, in the true spirit of open source, I open it up to you for discussion. Maybe if we can hash it out and clarify it a bit more we can post it to RTMark and find some volunteers to code it...