Just as I was thinking about the future of democracy in the context of information superhighway, Futurist arrived with the "Democracy On-Line" article. Also relevant was a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation TV report on the experience of direct democracy with referenda in Rossland (British Columbia) CANADA. Here are my thoughts on on-line democracy beyond electronic town meetings and home voting.
Back in 1985, I wrote a piece of software called CM4POLL System (on the IBM mainframe computer) and experimented with electronic democracy, primarily to gather the readers's reaction as to whether I should continue or resign from the editorship of CM4NEWS on-line hypertext newsletter and information archive. It had an audience of around 50 engineers, scientists and technologists in a project at the Research and Development subsidiary of a major telecommunications equipment manufacturer. It demonstrated to me that it is quite possible to take an electronic vote, have the system verify the identity of the voter (to avoid multiple voting), then immediately publish the results with anonymous comments in free-text format. Although lacking a post-voting comment-analysis capability, I felt that it was consistent with all democratic principles.
So, the advent of the information superhighway with computing power and communication links will make it possible to provide the electorate with an on-line hypertext ballot where some people would continue to vote for a candidate, while others could choose to represent himself/herself in what I call "individual democracy" option. The system would have to be consistent with the fundamental principle of 1 person 1 vote, but it opens a door for permanent referenda on every issue for those who so wish, while preserving the present political representation for those who trust politician's judgement and don't want to be bothered. I would even like to see a society in which citizens have an option to be tried in either civil code or common law. It is a quest for complete individualism to achieve maximum satisfaction for maximum number of people rather than relying on majority-minority relationship and being controlled by the establishment.
Fuzzy logic allows the addition of multi-dimensional degrees to a question. Thus, one would answer that he/she agrees with a certain issue 80%. Flexible fuzzy decision algorithm would allow just and fair calculation of final results. One example would be Canada's constitutional reform in 1992. Rather than asking whether to agree Yes or No on a deal reached by 10 politicians in closed-door meetings, I would have answered "100% to establish common economic union", "80% to reform the senate", "0% for the distinct society". Other people may have just said "Yes" or "No" to the entire package, but the algorithm could process the weighting and come up with a final result most reflecting the voters's wishes.
