Government

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Government- The Current Situation

            Government should be by the people for the people, since the French revolution in 1789 every government in the world has had to acknowledge that the people have power. Since that time governments have tried to keep as much power for themselves as possible while making sure the people don’t get rid of them. In “Western” nations this is often done by having periodic elections in which the people choose between two or more political parties who once elected run the nation until the people get a chance to either stay the course or pick a different party to rule them, despite this they are still being ruled from above, this is government justified by the people, not actually by the people, at best this system encourages but does not even ensure despotism in a nation’s government. In nations that don’t qualify as democracies there is not even an attempt by the government to justify its power based on the will of the people with the possible exception of some propagandist claims, such as those who claim to represent the will of the people because the people once brought them to power in a revolution.

Why is government by the people better than government justified by the people, or the alternative? If government is by the people, not merely justified by them, the government must be accountable to the people, that is, it must be accountable to itself in everything it does. As well if government is by the people then it is not separate from the people and is therefore better able to understand and meet the needs of the people.

            How can government by the people be achieved realistically? Well that’s what we’re going to discuss.

Government- The Councils

            Everyone has a right to self and elective representation in government, the easiest theoretical way of doing this is having everyone decide what to do in every legislative and executive decision a society faces, in practice however this is impractical. To account for this everyone should be given the right to meet at whatever location governing is done at and cast a vote according to their personal desires if they so choose, however this may be difficult for them to do if they cannot somehow bodily arrive at the place of governance, so they may elect an official to cast their vote for them on their behalf, someone with whom they generally share opinions, much like voting for the parties whose platform is closest to your own beliefs about government, however unlike a party you can take away your vote from the person you elected to use it at anytime if you feel that you disagree with them on issues or legislation currently going through the system of government.

            Let’s look at an example: there is a small island nation in the Caribbean where a recent rash of coat factories have sprung up working on artisan wages and power distribution. This islands government is also based on Artisanism but all of the decisions are made between the hours of 9:00 and 17:00 (5:00 pm), which means that everyone who works at one of the coat factories during the day shift can’t participate and most people on the evening shift would rather be asleep than go to tedious government meetings. Of course there are other businesses on the island but the coat factories dominate the island. Now everyone who wants to take the time to go to meetings gets to vote on issues as they come up, and those who can’t must find someone to give there vote to at least for the time being if they want their voices heard. This can be done in a simple contract.

            Now, some enterprising islander is sure to realize that people will pay for a representative in government to advocate their interests as it would be very difficult to be in the government full time and keep a job. This enterprising individual would of course have to set their own prices for their services and therefore would be making a profit and qualify to manage themselves, and if they were to get an organized party of advocates together, they could manage themselves just the same way as any other business. Of course this doesn’t give this person any more power in government than anyone else because at anytime the people who gave them their votes can take them away or show up themselves and oppose the entrepreneur’s political decisions.

            This form of government prevents the shortcomings of government justified by the people; it even avoids costly and wasteful elections while giving the people even more power.

Government- Legislation

            What does the government do? That should be simple the government exists to protect the rights of its people, as well as make sure that those rights are in the interest of the people, which is much easier when the government is controlled and made by the people. To do this the government must be able to uphold the rights of the people, and agree on what those rights should be. How each right of an Artisanist society can be upheld will be dealt with in the explanations of what they are, right now, we will deal with how rights should be agreed on.

            The councils of a society should exist as legislative bodies which can make additions and changes to the rights they uphold. To do this legislation should be proposed, debated, and voted on, at which point if it is not passed the person who proposed it may well make changes and propose it again, and if it is passed it can be upheld.

            How exactly does this process work? Well let’s go to the example of the small Island in the Caribbean. On Tuesday Mr. Hugh Beris finishes writing a proposal to make Marijuana consumption, sale, possession, and production legal on the island, basing his proposal on the existing right to religious and intellectual freedoms, as well as the impracticalities of enforcing unpopular anti-marijuana laws. That morning he goes to the council and when it’s his turn on the floor he makes his proposal briefly and puts the document in the file of proposed legislation, a superficial yay, nay, vote is held, from that point each side nominates and elects an advocate who is then given a standard period of time, let’s say a week, to research the issue at hand. A week later on Tuesday again after a morning of proposals and a break for lunch debates are held in the afternoon on the proposals made last week, each sides advocates are given as much time as possible based on the number of proposals to be debated that day, one side makes the same points about legalizing marijuana’s relation to the right to religious and intellectual freedoms and the practical implications, while the other side points out the bills relation to the right to safety as it is detrimental to an individuals health. At the end of the debating time the actual vote is held and the proposal becomes legislation or is blocked, and Mr. Hugh Beris goes back to the drawing board.

Government- Taxation

            Regardless of what one might like, for a government to have power and uphold the peoples rights it must have finances this has been done for hundreds of years by taxation, if there can be a fair wage then there should be a method of fair taxation, unfortunately tax is inherently unfair as it is forcing people to pay for things they might not want. However it is also unfair if people do not have their rights upheld, so a balance must be struck, luckily when government is by the people, it doesn’t fall to the same corporate or corrupt personal interests, and so the people can agree on how much tax they should be paying and they all take part, in deciding where that money goes. It’s like pooling some money with friends and family members so you can afford the lease on a building downtown so that you can all open and help run a café there. How taxation is structured should be decided by the people, but hopefully the people understand that the less they pay in taxes the fewer services will be freely accessible.

Government- Regions

         How big an area should a single government have power over? The best size for a governmental region should be based on the idea that the farther away geographically the place of government is from the extent of the area it affects, the less able it is to allow self representation to those living far away. So, smaller is better, having a big region with a powerful centralized government isn’t good. It is better to have many smaller self governing regions, the other reason for this is that in a democracy majority rules and in a big region if an issue is very sensitive and almost split down the middle in terms of support for one side or the other than the rule of majority may leave a very large amount of the population dissatisfied, and chances are that they will not be spread evenly across the population, chances are that there will be small regions which, if they were self governing would not have to live under the heel of the majority.

            On the other hand regions must be big enough to financially support themselves and provide for themselves, so ideally the size of regions is a balance between those two factors, and that would be different in every situation.