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Shoaib
Who is for EDD (Electronic Direct Democracy) in Pakistan?
This is a discussion stemming out of http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Idea-open-source-project-that-2500624%2ES%2E60505200.
Please share your thoughts, criticism as well as suggestions on what needs to be part of the infrastructure needed to make that happen.
To summarize:
Talking about the political situation in Pakistan, the roots of our crisis are 1) Bad form of democracy (representative) where practically few dozen make decisions for millions 2) Corrupt people making their way into the select dozen.
One way to overcome this is to gradually move away towards "Direct democracy," the best example of which in modern times in Switzerland. It is a form of democracy where everyone's opinion counts. Switzerland didn't become member of UN till 2002, because more than 50% always voted against http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2002/09/10/swissun0209010.html
Electronic Direct Democracy is the name given to form of governance that relies on technology to make sure everyone's heard and counts. Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-democracy
Coming back to Pakistan, if we can come up with the required technological infrastructure to support EDD in even one large city such as Islamabad, we can inspire a left wing political movement to implement it.
Imagine you run for a constituency by making us all a promise that you will only act according to the what the EDD system tells you - the people want. It would be a political break-through we all need, and it sounds plausible. Again, all we need is the required infrastructure.
Kashif K., Shoaib A. like this
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5 comments
Hasan
Hasan K. • Also E-Democracy doesn't necessarily mean that only people having a computer and internet can participate. It means that technology is used to gather mass participation from people for deciding national matters. Cell phone for example is with large variety of people as opposed to having computer and internet. People should participate in E-Democracy via phones, booths even ATM machines.
I'm posting this to avoid trolls against the topic and 'can not be done' posts.
Shoaib
Shoaib A. • Recommended browsing: http://www.metagovernment.org/wiki/Active_projects
Kashif
Kashif K. • I like what Hasan said, we've got a infrastructure in place (Mobile), Telenor already into social engineering with campaigns like "Karo Mumkin and "Khamooshi Ka Bycot", Maybe they can be inspired to participate.
Shoaib
Shoaib A. • A rough view (so far) of how the infrastructure would look like:
- Action Planner
Used by social groups, NGOs, political parties, semi-gov to coordinate local actions, the kind of actions that are municipal. For example, missing manhole cover should activate some bodies/volunteers to go ahead and do what it takes to resolve.
- Community Desk
A community front end system where society member can discuss civic issues, demand propose solutions. The desk would integrate tightly with Action planner and based on popular demand people's wants can be escalated to either campaign (in campaign manager) or civic actions in action planner.
- Events and Ticketing
Fairly easy to see how that compliments by tracking progress as well as notifications, like SMS notifications CDA/PTCL uses to confirm/report fulfillment of complaints.
- e-Office
A system usable by public outlets to provide online versions of forms. Forms can be filled, authenticated and submitted to external service providers or made available for printing.
- Volunteer Manager
Society members can volunteer to be responsible for civic actions (action planner). For example, someone who knows how to submit an application for suo-moto notice could volunteer to be notified when an issue has reached a certain level of critical, so that he/she can followup.
- Campaign Planner
This is for subjective issues/enhancements like wanting to build a mosque, parking lot, schools - etc. issues that are more like political campaigns.
- Consensus Builder
The backbone of democracy, a tool whereby a certain group of people selectable through criteria (like an opinion vote by college going women in Rwp) can vote on an open item of consensus. It shouldn't be difficult to see how that integrates with the rest of the tools.
- Wiki
A wiki that details legal procedures as well as general how to topic of specific interest to members of the society. It would also include forms for download and printing as well as contact/complaint information. For example, how to obtain a domicile certificate.
- Identity and Profile Management
A system that manages identities and integrates with state controlled identity providers like NADRA. Also holds profile (personal attributes) that are used by other systems.
Shoaib
Shoaib A. • - Fund Raiser
The name says it all. It would compliment works of social bodies and even groups of society members by providing a centralized way to raise funds and the like.