Wikilaws replaces third US state’s legislature
Today, Wisconsin became the third state after New Hampshire and Oregon to ratify an amendment to its state constitution to adopt a radical form of tech-enabled, continuous direct democracy. In spite of the snafu in which the historically libertarian New Hampshire briefly erased all of its laws from the Wikilaws system, voters have reacted with enthusiasm and surprising levels of participation.
Wisconsin’s last state assembly speaker Kealy Marsch had this to say:
Wisconsin has always been an innovator in public engagement and democracy – from La Follette’s progressivism to the state university system’s Wisconsin idea extending the ‘campus’ concept to our borders. Today represents our renewed commitment to democracy and ensures the will of the people is directly echoed in our laws.
Nov. 1 press conference, former assembly chamber (to become a museum & public meeting space)
The Wikilaws system is only the latest crowd wisdom application released by the Wikimedia Foundation. The organization already powers the bottom-up shareholder and employee governance & accountability systems at 62% of US public companies and some commentators are exuberant about the imminent extinction of corporate boards. Wikilaws relies on over 60 years of experience managing the often-rambunctious Wikipedia community, as the world’s most accurate and comprehensive encyclopedia remains completely volunteer-run.
Some of the flash points already leading to rancor as Wisconsinites log into and start contributing to the public legislative project are between animal rights activists and hunters, coastal migrants and longtime residents, and questions surrounding corporate water rights. If Oregon’s experience sunsetting representative democracy is any indication however, higher levels of transparency and public debate will lead to lower levels of strife.
Analysts do not expect the same dismantling of government seen in New Hampshire. The unraveling of political parties is expected to accelerate in the face of entirely custom policy choices now facing citizens. Interest groups and associations have already seen their memberships skyrocket as people orient around the issues that matter most and ignore others. According to political analyst Joffrei Alsop,
“Voters have always had an uneasy relationship with political parties. You rarely saw a ‘complete’ Republican or Democrat in perfect harmony with policy platforms, as viscerally demonstrated by the chaos of the Twenty-Teens. Now that people don’t have to choose a party to choose a representative to get their most important policy preferences met, we may end up with a more citizen-centric system on our hands.”
The experiment has rattled both lobbyists and voter influence watchdogs. Without the ability to curry favor with key politicians, some lobbying firms have already adjusted their business models to become more like ad agencies. However, funding for political advertising is under more scrutiny than ever as new foreign influence campaigns are uncovered weekly and outside of traditional election cycles. Perhaps the Oregonian solution will be adopted widely, though campaigns to fight further political ad bans proliferate.
Ultimately, so-called “hyper-direct” democracy will test the founding fathers’ fears of the masses. Widespread disillusionment with the electoral college’s increasingly faithless electors started the conversation decades ago and Wikilaws is the next evolutionary step in reinforcing democracy against the winds of Churchillian skepticism.
Roman Ryan 