I noticed that in your welcome letter you refer to your 'narrow focus' - jurisprudence, and more specifically UK. But while systems as well as national proclivities change from one country to another, and therefore require specific and tailored solutions and changes, it seems to me that much of what you write about on T'reasonable Man is more universal - for instance the idea of involving juries in removing people from power, which I guess could in principle be done anywhere. This seems to me important - there is a hunger for 'new ways of doing things' all over the world now (reflecting that the time for change has come, globally - or to say it another way, the old ways of doing things are 'past their sell-by date, and are causing a lot of problems). Seems to me there are a lot more people saying 'we need new ways of doing things' than there are people offering serious thoughts on what those new ways are. That's part of what my World in Transition is about - as you know with a generally 'three-fold' perspective. But I think the more universal elements of T'Reasonable Man have much to offer to that debate too, beyond the UK.
Probalby some of your thinking will be very compatible with my three-fold perspective and perhaps some won't. But as you said in your 'Edge of Reason', we don't have to stay in our silos - goes for me too! Any serious new view for the future has to be worked out through the confluence of many ideas!
Yes, I'm trying to get down to the fundamentals so I think the principles I'm exploring apply much more widely than just the UK. But I find that essays about principles need to be grounded through a connection to real circumstances.
I think we're definitely both heading towards the same goal – I'm looking forward to reading your next piece.
But I question why we "need" representatives at all. The signal from the noise, the "wisdom of the crowd" emerges from large numbers of people with diverse viewpoints. So, in that sense, we should be striving to bypass representatives and go straight to direct democracy.
Now, it's not feasible to bring everyone into Parliament, but we could use sortition to select thousands of individuals at random. Much cheaper and cleaner than elections, gathering diverse viewpoints from a broad range of people.
I'll be discussing sortition in my next piece which I'll be posting in a few days time.
One of my aims is to propose reforms which might be acceptable to a clear majority at this point in time. I think there would be huge resistance to the idea of 'taking away people's right to vote' in order to implement a theoretically better system, especially when the theory behind it has not yet passed the test of time. The 'wisdom of the crowd' is a relatively new concept and, while it might well lead to better decisions than we get, currently, from [insert adjective] politicians, or [insert adjective] experts, that doesn't mean it would be better than the wisdom of the wise.
And, from my perspective, that phrase 'with diverse viewpoints' hides quite a lot of complexity!
Hi Malcolm,
I noticed that in your welcome letter you refer to your 'narrow focus' - jurisprudence, and more specifically UK. But while systems as well as national proclivities change from one country to another, and therefore require specific and tailored solutions and changes, it seems to me that much of what you write about on T'reasonable Man is more universal - for instance the idea of involving juries in removing people from power, which I guess could in principle be done anywhere. This seems to me important - there is a hunger for 'new ways of doing things' all over the world now (reflecting that the time for change has come, globally - or to say it another way, the old ways of doing things are 'past their sell-by date, and are causing a lot of problems). Seems to me there are a lot more people saying 'we need new ways of doing things' than there are people offering serious thoughts on what those new ways are. That's part of what my World in Transition is about - as you know with a generally 'three-fold' perspective. But I think the more universal elements of T'Reasonable Man have much to offer to that debate too, beyond the UK.
Probalby some of your thinking will be very compatible with my three-fold perspective and perhaps some won't. But as you said in your 'Edge of Reason', we don't have to stay in our silos - goes for me too! Any serious new view for the future has to be worked out through the confluence of many ideas!
Thanks Michael.
Yes, I'm trying to get down to the fundamentals so I think the principles I'm exploring apply much more widely than just the UK. But I find that essays about principles need to be grounded through a connection to real circumstances.
I think we're definitely both heading towards the same goal – I'm looking forward to reading your next piece.
I salute your commitment to grounding through connection to real circumstances. The world would benefit from a lot more of that!
This is a reasonable take.
But I question why we "need" representatives at all. The signal from the noise, the "wisdom of the crowd" emerges from large numbers of people with diverse viewpoints. So, in that sense, we should be striving to bypass representatives and go straight to direct democracy.
Now, it's not feasible to bring everyone into Parliament, but we could use sortition to select thousands of individuals at random. Much cheaper and cleaner than elections, gathering diverse viewpoints from a broad range of people.
Thanks JK
I'll be discussing sortition in my next piece which I'll be posting in a few days time.
One of my aims is to propose reforms which might be acceptable to a clear majority at this point in time. I think there would be huge resistance to the idea of 'taking away people's right to vote' in order to implement a theoretically better system, especially when the theory behind it has not yet passed the test of time. The 'wisdom of the crowd' is a relatively new concept and, while it might well lead to better decisions than we get, currently, from [insert adjective] politicians, or [insert adjective] experts, that doesn't mean it would be better than the wisdom of the wise.
And, from my perspective, that phrase 'with diverse viewpoints' hides quite a lot of complexity!