GOVERNANCE IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

by

Russell C. McGee

Copyright © 2007 by Russell C. McGee

                                     Last Updated 10/30/2007                                                 

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INTRODUCTION

During the first decade of the 21^st Century, we have seen the Internet make our “global village” smaller and enable humankind to communicate and cooperate on a scale never before imaginable.  This incredible reality has brought forth many examinations and proposals by some of the world’s most creative minds, all outlining the exceptionally positive potential for betterment of our planet. Inspired by a number of these treatises in books and other media, I have amalgamated these sundry proposals into a concept for reforming government on a global basis in a phased and practical way.  “Governance in the Twenty-First Century” outlines that vision, and distills these various proposals for revamping existing governments using modern technology. 

Throughout this paper I refer to this admirable gamut of ideas, and broadly credit them through quotes in the Appendices.  However, as I introduce my proposal, I cite just one of these many authors, Kenneth N. Waltz; who in Man, the State and War, cautions, “…demonstrating the need for an institution does not bring it into existence.  And were world government attempted, we might find ourselves dying in the attempt to unite, or uniting and living a life worse than death.”[1]  Notwithstanding Waltz’s well-intended advice, it is my considered opinion that the benefits of brave and visionary use of today’s information technology far outweigh the risks. 

In short, I propose a free-enterprise, capitalistic system of government which can bring greater peace and security to humankind, and better control of the environment than is now experienced anywhere.  Until a better name is found, it will be referred to as:  Gov21.  Principally, Gov21 makes full use of the Internet and includes a timely voting process involving all citizens of the earth.  The idea is to take advantage of the collective/group wisdom of all people, and place THEM in charge, instead of any single leader or oligarchy.  Achieving this will involve reforms which may take place over a long period of time and hence avoid major shocks to the population.

This is admittedly and unapologetically a Utopian proposal.  Some may recognize this and discontinue reading.  I believe that a Utopian plan with good characteristics and popular support can serve as a target for the evolution of existing governments.  Such directed influence can only be better than the random walk through which today’s political machinery leads us.  Therefore, the reader is urged to persevere and understand what is REALLY being proposed.

In order to avoid the main body of the text becoming too long, many of the details have been relegated to links that are accessible at the reader's option.  For those who are unaccustomed to the use of links, they exist on this website in two forms: those that lead to footnotes, which are blue numerals surrounded by square brackets and those that refer to detailed information, which are underlined words of text in blue.  In either case, one may display the contents of the link by left clicking on the blue entity of interest.  To return to the main text after following a link one simply clicks on the "Back Button" at the top of the browser.  The reader may wish to read the document twice: once to get the general drift of the proposal and a second time to pick up the details by following the links to get the full impact of what is being proposed.

You are welcome and encouraged to send appropriate questions, comments or criticisms, by email to rmcgee@gov21.org.  Whether you love it or hate it, tell everyone you can about it so that public exposure  may lead it to the future it deserves—either victory or defeat.

OVERVIEW

Gov21 is a structural and organizational concept.  It is a direct democracy that overcomes most if not all of the objections normally associated with this form of government.  Citizens of the world will enjoy many benefits when the system is fully implemented by employing the concept at all levels of government. An enumeration of these benefits, provided below, illustrates in broad overview the goals that Gov21 will achieve at the global level:

1. Control abuses of the global environment.
2. Disarm all nations.
3. Establish a well constrained global police, force with exclusive access to lethal weapons, to control international disputes, maintain order and enforce weapons prohibition.
4. Provide aid to victims of natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, famines and droughts.
5. Assist persons lost or endangered at sea or on land.
6. Assign ownership of natural resources to the citizens of the world and not to any nation, organization or person.
7. Make all government records accessible to the public--abolish the idea of classified government information.
8. Discontinue political parties.
9. Ratify all major decisions through the vote of all citizens.
10. Create an international information department to inform all citizens of outstanding issues and candidates for office upon which qualified voters will vote.
11. Enfranchise everyone over eighteen years of age and of sound mind for voting.
12. Provide Social Security, medical care and education (where qualified) to all citizens at no cost.
13. Eliminate taxes to defray the cost of operating the governments and their departments.
14. Enforce civil rights for every citizen such as those spelled out in the U. S. Bill of Rights.
15. Provide a 911-like number upon which persons or groups may report violations of their rights or instances of government misconduct or malfeasance.
16. Conduct the government in a free-enterprise, capitalistic manner within the constraints, incorporating the concepts and providing the services mentioned above to all citizens.

A SAMPLE AMERICAN GOVERNMENT

Application of the Gov21 structure and operation to a sample American government is provided.

MOTIVATION

My personal background led me to believe that the government of the United States was the next best thing after the Ancient Athenian Democracy but as time passed, I learned that in both cases, my perception was a myth.  After further reading and study, I concluded, especially in recent years, that our country is run by an aristocratic clique that is strongly influenced by corporate interests.

However, even if our leaders have continued to promote a myth, there is no reason for despair.  I believe that, through a series of well planned steps, it will be possible to reform our existing government structure into one that will be as good as or better than the mythological one that we have been told of; to bring to reality the myth of the Athenian Democracy at all levels of government including global.  This objective and the means of achieving it are the subjects of this paper.

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

I have followed a few basic ideas in creating this new model of government:

1.     A government should exist to satisfy the needs and wants of its citizens.

2.     The relationships between the functions of government and their benefits to the citizens must be as nearly as possible simple, direct and easy to understand.

3.     Human abuse of the environment of our planet must be brought under control.

4.      War is a losing proposition and should be abolished.

5.    Weapons more powerful than a minimal weapon set should be outlawed for anyone other than legitimate police and defense forces.

6.  The wisdom of an accurately informed citizenry will always exceed that of a group of representatives, especially if the representatives are swayed in their opinions by special interests.

7.    Natural resources do not belong to any person, company or municipality but to the people of the earth.

8.    The many good features of our existing government must be preserved in any reformed government.

NEEDS AND WANTS

If the government is going to be responsive to the needs and wants of its citizens, then an agreed-upon description of these needs and wants will be a good starting point for designing a system that satisfies them or, at least, has the focus to address them intelligently.   The list of needs and wants that I have come up with is as follows:

  Need/Want                                       Comment                                          

  Food                                     Each person is responsible for providing his/her food and that of his/her family, but the government shall facilitate the availability of a continuing supply.

Water                                     Same comment as for food.

Disaster Relief                        Each person shall provide his/her own shelter but the government shall provide assistance in case of disasters.

Social Security                      A means shall be provided such that each citizen may receive an income after retirement.

  Medical Care                         High quality care for all.

  Environmental Protection       Assurance that the health and safely of each person and his or her grandchildren are not harmed directly or indirectly by their environment.

Personal Safety                     A person and his/her property are protected from criminals and miscreants.

Fire Protection                       Fire abatement and fighting service shall strive to protect every citizen’s personal property.  Building standards shall be developed such as to diminish the likelihood of fire damage.

Energy                                   Every person shall acquire his/her own energy but the government shall facilitate an adequate supply at reasonable prices and without direct or indirect damage to the environment.

 Transportation                         Economical means of moving people and cargo from one location

                                                to another shall be provided.

Financial Stability                  Accumulation of wealth shall be protected from the ravages of inflation.

Investment Security                Investments shall be protected from unscrupulous market practices.

Fair Business                         Unfair business practices shall continue to be unlawful and prosecuted.

Land Rescue                          A government-supplied service.

Sea Rescue                            A government-supplied service.

Education                               Every citizen shall be able to obtain the education for which he/she is qualified at a reasonable cost.

Criminal Detection                  Provides assurance that criminals shall be apprehended.

Criminal Prosecution               Provides assurance that criminals shall be prosecuted.

Prisons                                   Provides assurance that criminals shall be removed from society for appropriate periods.

Personal 911                          A hotline that can be called by any citizen to report evidence of fraud, malfeasance and/or civil-rights violations with assurance of personal protection if the perpetrator(s) is(are) brought to justice.

Tax Relief                               Taxes are to be reduced or eliminated.

Legacy                                   All of the other needs and wants that are satisfied by our existing governments but we would not wish to abandon.

It is likely that this list is incomplete and/or may have the wrong granularity.  An attempt to reconcile some of these overlaps shall be undertaken in the text below.

GENERAL PLAN

 The approach that I am suggesting for our new government structure is acephalous.  The entity in charge will be THE PEOPLE.  A staff and a management team—referred to collectively as a department—shall exist for each of the needs and wants listed above (and appropriately refined).  Each management team shall be responsible for one department and shall remain in charge until removed on the initiative and by the vote of the people.  At the time that a management team is terminated at the behest of an election, a replacement team shall be simultaneously placed in control.  Members of the staff shall remain in their jobs until retirement, voluntary termination or for cause at the behest of their management at which time their management will replace them.

The connection between performance and responsibility will be simple and direct, so if some department is performing poorly, it will be easy and simple for the voters to cause the management of that department to be replaced.  Similarly, if a department seems to be doing its job well but is limited by lack of funds, the voters will be able to vote to increase the funds of that department.  But, assuming a constant total budget, it will be necessary to decrease the budget of some other department(s) if a worthy one is to have its budget increased.  The voters will also have an opportunity to take part in the selection of which department will contribute to this offset.  In short, the voters will be in charge at the highest level; they will make all of the final decisions.

But how is this all going to be made to work?  The answer is: by the addition of several other departments the responsibilities and names of which are given in the following table:

Each of these is described below in greater detail.

Operations

Certain companies shall be identified as “key corporations”.  Key corporations are those contained in an arbitrarily defined list and have one or more of the following attributes:

·        They exploit a resource that is the property of the people, e. g. petroleum or mining companies.

·        Their existence has a profound influence upon the lives of the citizens, e. g. pharmaceutical companies.

·        Their existence provides a service that is vital to the citizens, e. g. transportation companies.

·        Their existence and/or methods of operation pose a significant danger to the environment, e. g. chemical companies.

·     They engage in unfair labor or business practices. e. g. textile companies using sweatshops.

The government shall purchase enough shares in the stock of each listed key corporation to permit domination of voting during annual Board of Directors’ Meetings.  The purchases shall accomplish two purposes: to create income to defray the cost of running the government and to ensure that the key corporations are run in a manner that conforms to the wishes and standards approved by the citizens.  The exact number of shares to be purchased will vary from company to company and to some extent on the issue under consideration, but it will be much less than the 51% needed to achieve complete dominance.  Placement of a company on the key corporations list shall occur only with just cause, with ratification of the voters and availability of funds for stock purchases.

The Operations Department in cooperation with the Finance Department shall determine which shares shall be purchased when, based upon the availability of funds and the need to keep the income stream and control of listed key corporations in balance.  It shall also determine, in cooperation with the Information Department, which companies are not conforming to their goals and, hence are in need of change in their company policies and/or executive management.  It shall submit proposals to errant companies and cast votes during their annual Board of Directors’ Meetings to achieve necessary changes.

In addition to outright stock purchases, the government shall acquire stocks of companies that opt to pay a portion of their corporate tax in the form of stock shares.

Elections

 Every citizen of sound mind and over 18 years of age and not officially excused (for example, for medical reasons) shall vote in every election.  Failure to do so shall result in a fine.  Voters will be encouraged to vote via the Internet, though that will not be a requirement.  Use of the Internet will facilitate the act of voting and the dissemination of information needed by voters to intelligently carry out this obligation.  The important objective is for EVERYONE who is eligible to vote to do so.

To facilitate this process, all eligible voters shall be registered and given a voter’s identification. Voters who choose to use the Internet shall choose a voting password.  Several cases must be considered as follows:

• Voters who choose to use the Internet
  1. And have personal access to the Internet shall vote and receive information according to normal Internet procedures.
  2. But do not have personal access to the Internet and are within a reasonable distance of a voting kiosk shall utilize a terminal at that location.
  3. But do not have personal access to the Internet and are not within a reasonable distance of a voting kiosk will use a traveling voting booth that will traverse remote locations according to a well publicized schedule.
• Voters who choose not to use the Internet

1.      And are within a reasonable distance of an Election Department office shall cast their votes there according to whatever offline method is available.

2.      But are not within a reasonable distance of an Election Department office shall cast their votes by postal ballots.

The voting method of Gov21 is a variant of the one described by Rothenberger (and perhaps others).[2]  It permits eligible voters to vote at any time they wish from any location at which they can gain access to an appropriate terminal or by hard copy if they prefer.  Although they may vote at any time, a distinction in the method of processing the vote is made between voting on an issue and voting on a candidate. 

In the case of an issue, a cut-off date for voting shall be announced when the issue is made available for voting.  The voter may vote on the issue at any time between its announcement and the cut-off date.  At the cut-off date, the issue shall be closed, the votes shall be tallied, the decision announced and promulgated.

A list of qualified candidates shall be perpetually available and updated for each department head and legislative and judicial post.  Each voter shall cast a single vote for each department head, his/her top two selections for the two legislative posts for his state and his top twelve selections for judicial posts (assuming there are twelve justices).  When the time comes to make a selection for a department head, the person at the top of the list shall have won; for all 100 legislative posts, the top two persons from all fifty states shall be chosen; for the twelve judicial posts, the top twelve persons shall be chosen.  Each of these persons shall remain in office until retirement (voluntary of statutory) or if replaced for non-confidence (as described below).    

The Elections Department shall coordinate with the Information Department to ensure that all voters are informed of the issues and the candidates prior to election cut-off days.

To avoid confusion, election cut-offs shall be batched together and at rather frequent intervals, probably quarterly.  Because there will be many issues and candidates to be voted on and much information to acquire to prepare for intelligent voting, voting templates will be available that provide a recommended slate for voters to use.  These templates will be created by persons that have studied the issues and candidates in depth and are motivated to encourage people to vote according to their selections.  Such people will develop a reputation over time and a voter will be able to simplify his/her voting task by following the template author that he/she characteristically agrees with.  On the other hand, if a particular template represents a particular voter’s position with the exception of some particular issues and/or candidates, he/she will be permitted to vote the template with specifically indicated exceptions or, of course, he/she may vote for each issue and/or candidate separately.

 Information

The members of the Information Department shall be the watchdogs of the government.  They shall be constantly on the lookout for corruption and malfeasance in office throughout the government structure and report such findings to the citizens.  They shall be particularly zealous in revealing such transgressions to Legal and Criminal Prosecution Departments for appropriate action.

To the maximum extent possible, the data gathered by the Information Department shall be objective and not the results of the opinions of the Information Department employees.  Rather they shall be based upon national standards in relation to environmental protection, executive compensation, equal employment opportunity, and the annual goals set by each department and listed key corporations.  By contrast to the public information media, who are free to editorialize, give personal opinions or biased judgments, the Information Department is limited to reporting measurable data.  These shall generally be reporting the performance of departments against their previously planned goals.  The measures shall be “goal met” or “goal missed” and, to the extent possible, the degree to which the goal was been exceeded or fallen behind.  Excuses and rationalizations shall be left to the public media to provide. 

In addition to these measurements, the Information Department shall conduct opinion polls as needed to maintain an accurate knowledge of the attitudes of the citizens toward their government.  It shall be the Information Department’s responsibility to assure that ALL voting members of society are adequately informed of issues and qualifications of candidates in elections.  They shall be required to exercise great skill so that the information they convey shall be accurate and understandable to the broad spectrum of the voting public.

Special incentives shall be available to members of this department who reveal cases of corruption or malfeasance or correction of previously reported incorrect data.  These incentives may include such items as cash bonuses, promotions, special public recognition and medals.  On the contrary, instances of incorrect reporting or misleading descriptions of reported data shall result in demotion and discredit.  Inviolable standards shall be put in place to guide the awards of incentives and penalties.

At the same time that great care is taken to assure that the Information Department will deliver objective information, it is necessary that the public media not be controlled by special interests that could sway the opinions of voters in inappropriate directions.  A method of controlling such damaging influence is proposed.

Finance

The government shall have several sources of income such as:

• Dividends from stock owned by the government (as described above)
• Interest and dividends paid to the government’s employee pension fund
• Fees paid by purchasers of licenses or resulting from payment of fines
• Sale of bonds on the global market

All of these and perhaps others, shall be payable to the Finance Department, which shall be responsible for their management and disbursal. 

It shall be a goal, expressed in the national constitution, that after a start-up period, the government shall be funded entirely by its own income sources excluding income from the employee pension fund.  In this way, it will be unnecessary for lower level governments to pay fees to keep the highest level of government in operation and the tax burden of citizens shall be reduced or eliminated.  Income from the employee pension fund shall, in general, be returned to that fund; however, these funds might be used to cover budget overruns and under runs upon occasion.

Other than its fairly mechanical responsibility to collect and disburse funds, the Finance Department shall be responsible for managing the following balancing acts:

• Determining the correct amounts of stock to purchase in each of the listed key corporations.
• Determining the amounts and denominations of bonds to be issued so as not to destabilize the bond market.
• Determining the amount of funds to be borrowed from or repaid to the employee pension fund so that it is not penalized for use of its funds.
• Managing the employee pension fund.
• Adjusting license fees as needed and endorsed by the voters.
• In cooperation with the Information and Legal Departments, preparing an annual budget that shall fit as nearly as possible within available revenues and shall be ratified by the voters.

Legal

The members of the Legal Department shall consist of two persons per state selected by vote of the citizens of the states.  (I would have said one per state except there must be a way to represent the views of the minority.)  Their primary purpose shall be the proposal of new laws or amendments to existing laws.  They shall have no authority to make laws as does the U. S. Congress and President, but only to propose them to be voted upon by the people.  It shall be their responsibility to obtain knowledge—with or without the assistance of the Information Department—of issues that are pending within the national populace and are in need of resolution.  They shall propose resolutions to such issues and inform the public of their proposals via the Information Department and submit them to the Election Department for ratification in the next election.  Members of the Legal Department shall be selected by vote of the citizens.

Judicial

This shall be similar to the existing U. S. Supreme Court; however, it shall screen all legislation and proposals prior to them being submitted to the populous for ratification.  Hence, it shall preempt the introduction of unconstitutional laws rather than rejecting them after passage.  It shall also be the final court of appeal in criminal and civil cases. It shall differ from the U. S. Supreme Court in that its members, including the Chief Justice shall be selected by national election.

Presidency

The emphasis in Gov21 is to place the responsibility for ratifying the budgets, plans, schedules and leadership of all departments of government upon the people.  This is the right thing to do, but there is a danger that overemphasis by the voters on short-term goals will place some important government activities in jeopardy.  I am thinking of the futures of organizations like NASA, NIH, NOAA and the national laboratories.  None of these is oriented toward the achievement of clearly defined products and/or services on a fixed time schedule, but are rather dedicated to increasing the knowledge of our world and its processes.  They produce much of the knowledge upon which future progress is based.

The Presidency in Gov 21 shall be the foremost futurist of the nation.  The President shall provide a vision of the future to which citizens may refer when considering how many government resources are to be spent on future scientific and technological development versus the immediate needs of the day.  He/she may also make recommendations to the Legal Department on changes in organizational structure, which may in turn be passed on to the people for ratification.  In addition, the President shall be the official presenter of the nation’s most coveted awards for accomplishments in all fields of endeavor and he shall continue to make an annual State of the Union address.

MERGING WITH THE PAST

At this point, I have enumerated 21 departments (not counting Legacy) responsive to the needs and wants of citizens and 7 departments needed to make the government operate.  The functions of these 28 departments must be merged with the functions of many independent agencies, legislative organizations; quasi-official organizations and a plethora of Boards, Commissions, Committees and Judicial Agencies that exist in today’s government.  I have performed a structural analysis of today's U. S. Government to determine which existing functions should be carried forward to Gov21. 

GOV21

With the foregoing first approximation to the structure of the legacy government, it is possible to sketch the list of departments that shall form Gov21 at the U. S. level.  It shall consist of the array of autonomous departments listed below.  The following table identifies each department with its source and an associated comment where appropriate.  Where the sources are legacy organizations, they are keyed to their designations in the structural analysis with links to the corresponding text for brevity.

This is the general plan of the government that I am recommending.  It is not liberal or conservative, Democratic or Republican, communistic or fascist; it puts the power where it belongs: in the hands of the citizens.  Instead of having the government run by a single executive who delegates responsibility to a group of department heads, the new government shall have an executive at the head of each of the departments listed above that constitute the government. Each department shall consist of an executive management team and (if appropriate) a staff.   Each of the departments shall carry out a single governmental function and shall be responsible directly to the voters who shall control the budget of the department and shall have the authority to replace the executive management leadership periodically or if non-confidence is demonstrated.    The staffs shall conduct the day-to-day operation of the departments and shall not be replaced with changes in the executive management teams; however, members of the staffs may be replaced for cause during the administration of any management team.

In the fully implemented system, political parties as we know them shall be nonexistent.  In the existing system, a change in the party of the President introduces a huge shock to the national government because the change in party causes the replacement of hosts of government officials and often modification of guiding philosophies of governance.  In the Gov21 system, changes in executive management shall be made a department at a time so that the shock of change shall be significantly reduced and hopefully in a generally positive direction.

DYNAMICS

Budget

1. By the end of the first quarter of each year, the Finance Department shall deliver to the Operations Department an estimate of the funds to be available in the coming year.
2. By the end of the second quarter of each year, the Information Department shall deliver a consensus of public opinion to the Operations Department describing changes desired by the electorate to major department budgets.  That is, which departments should get more and which should get fewer funds.
3. Based upon information obtained in steps 1 and 2, the Operations Department shall prepare three alternative budgets.
4. The Elections Department shall conduct an election by the end of the second quarter of each year in which every voter shall choose between the three alternative budgets for each department offered to the public for choice.  The law will require each of the alternatives presented to the voters to conform to the wishes of the people as provided in step 2 and be within the estimated revenues provided by step 1 and conform to existing legal requirements and agreements.  The winners of this election shall be the official budget for all departments for the coming year.

Department Plans and Schedules

1. By the middle of the third quarter of each year, each department may submit modified plans and schedules to the Information Department for endorsement for each of the following years to match their ratified budget for those years.  The purpose of the endorsement is to ensure that the plans and schedules are measurable; that they are not “blowing smoke” and that they conform to legal requirements and agreements.
2. By the end of the third quarter of each year, endorsed Plans and Schedules will be submitted to the voters for ratification.
3. At any time at all a person who is qualified and wishes to replace an existing manager and his/her team may submit a bid to be placed on a list of candidates.  In addition, every four years or following a vote of non-confidence, bids will be solicited by the Operations Department for replacement of the management of each department except Judicial and Legal.   The bids shall consist of a description of the management team he/she represents and the Information-Department-endorsed budget, plans and schedules he/she would follow if elected and the name of a replacement leader who would take charge in the event of the submitter’s death, incapacitation or retirement.  In the case of the Legal and Judicial Departments, a similar process shall be followed except the entity to potentially be replaced will be a representative or a justice and not a management team.
4. Hence, national leaders shall be those persons that are selected in the manner described above by the PEOPLE and each shall be of equal rank.

Votes of Non-confidence

Immediately after the completion of each voting cycle, the Information Department shall examine the vote rankings of all office holders and their potential replacements.  These rankings shall be made available to the public.  All those incumbents whose present vote total is 30% or more below the leading potential replacement's vote total and has remained in this inferior position for over one election cycle shall be identified.  This list shall be forwarded to the Legal Department, which shall prepare a ratification of non-confidence issue at the next election cycle for each person on the list.  In each case, the issue shall be “shall this office holder be replaced by the person of highest vote ranking for this post following this election?"  In the case of Legal and Judicial Department posts, the comparisons shall be made based upon the position in the ranking held by the person when he initially held the post.  For example, if a Justice was ranked sixth in the voting when he was appointed to the bench, then he would be placed on the non-confidence list if his vote count dropped 30% below that of the potential-replacement justice with the present sixth rank total and he remained there for over one voting cycle.

Measurements

Each department and listed key corporation shall be required to provide a progress report by the end of the third quarter of each year.  These reports shall describe progress made toward the completion of the latest plans and schedules.  The Information Department shall prepare a public report summarizing the performance of each department and key corporation to be used as a basis for judging the acceptability of each corresponding management team to continue to hold its current responsibilities.

Structural Change

The initial government structure may from time to time need modification for various reasons.  Whenever such a need arises, an alternative structure may be proposed either by an Electoral Initiative of the PEOPLE or by the Legal Department.  Such changes shall become effective after ratification by the vote of the citizens.

IMPLEMENTATION

The preceding section describes the top level in a national government; this section provides a bottom-up description of town, city, county, state and global governments and their relationship to one another and the national government during and after implementation.

BASICS

To the extent possible, all levels of government shall be patterned after the sample government described above.  Of course, one could posit implementation by way of global revolution.  Revolution is an alternative that inevitably results in human suffering but also is probably more difficult to achieve than a phased approach.  I shall adhere to the ground rule: REVOLUTION IS NOT AN OPTION. Hence, a phased approach is probably the best one, though not the quickest.  In fact, a slow implementation is probably beneficial because changes that are as sweeping as those suggested will cause many changes in social organization and in the means of employment of some individuals.  Time will be needed to absorb such shocks.  I have chosen the word “reform’ to describe the process that must be gone through.

Perhaps the most important objective, global disarmament, cannot be achieved initially, but only after some of the other features such as leadership via vote of the citizens has been implemented.  However, steps toward global disarmament hopefully will be undertaken concurrently with other early stages of implementation.  It turns out that, because of the disarmament issue, implementation at the national level must be postponed until after global implementation for some nations.  The only way that disarmament is possible is if there is a global police force to suppress violence throughout the world.  Otherwise, no nation or its citizens would be willing to give up the protection of its Defense Department. Furthermore, the chief executives of the various militarily-dominant nation-states will need to be involved in (if not in charge of) the negotiations leading to disarmament and with supplying troops and weapons to an interim global police force while disarmament is proceeding.  Hence, the implementation that I envision will have the global and low-level governments and militarily-non-dominant nations converting to Gov21 before militarily-dominant nations.

REFORM

Implementation shall proceed in the following steps:

1. Specification of a well-thought-out version of this government structure.
2. Dissemination of concepts.
3. Organization of a movement to promote the concepts.
4. Global implementation.
5. Low-level implementation.
6. National implementation

Each of these steps shall be discussed below in terms of commonly used U S governmental entities:

    1. Concept Specification

This paper is the beginning of concept specification.  The plan is to refine it within a small group of family and friends.  After that, it shall be published on a website to make it available to the public.  Then a public discussion group shall be created to solicit comments, criticisms and support.  The process of refinement shall continue through use of the discussion group until a stable and desirable specification has been obtained.  At that point, step 2 may commence.

    2. Dissemination of Concepts

Various media, NGOs and other organizations will be informed of the website and the discussion group and opportunities will be sought in which to publicize the effort.

    3. Organization of a Movement

Gov21 parties shall be organized wherever there is sufficient support to allow it.  This step can be done concurrent with step 2, which can continue indefinitely.  The parties will spread the ideas of the Gov21 system and influence ongoing legislation in the Gov21 direction.  Participants in the blog will be natural candidates for initial party memberships.  As parties are formed, they will be encouraged to contact additional potential members. Persons who do not have access to the blog can be contacted via snail-mail distributions or any other form of communication that can be worked out.  (In addition to possibly gaining new members, this might also serve as practice for dealing with voters who do not have personal access to the Internet after implementation.)

The possibility of forming a Gov21 NGO (non-government organization) to promote Gov21 ideas, especially those concerning global disarmament and the environment shall be studied.  In this connection, it may be possible or preferable to join forces with other NGOs with whom Gov21 shares common goals and objectives. (See Appendix A)

In addition, the parties will begin the formation of documents and plans that will be needed in the implementation steps to follow.  Detailed and definitive structural analysis including merging of legacy organizations shall be carried out at each level of government.  Draft charters shall be created for use at the town, city and county levels; draft constitutions for the state and national levels.  Plans for converting typical existing governments at each level to the Gov21 form will also be prepared.

These plans will be adjusted as a function of level that will adapt the general model to fit the needs and resources of each level in turn.  For example, most towns, cities and counties will not need departments of State, Defense, Medical Care, Social Security and possibly Education.  Also, it will be appropriate where funds are limited to merge certain functions, such as Police and Criminal Detection—these are to be governments OF THE PEOPLE, so they should be formed in a way that THE PEOPLE can afford.

    4.  Global Implementation

Elise Boulding explains, “The UN system consists of six major operating organs, 15 associated agencies, two universities, well over twenty research institutes, divisions, and special programs, and five regional commissions,  These bodies operate 50 worldwide information systems, 160 UN centers (one in each member state), and innumerable regional and local offices to administer the programs with which they are charged.”  Restructuring this will be a significant challenge and any attempt to describe how it might be done is far beyond the scope of this paper; however, a path to disarmament is possible to imagine and will be described.

Except for Defense and Environment, the need for this level of government would be greatly diminished.  However, lack of proper conduct in either or both of these areas could lead to the destruction of life on our planet or at least the demise of the human race.  Hence, it seems prudent to press on and see how the Gov21 approach can be applied to global problems.  The global approach is frequently alluded to in the literature as it has been revealed by my research. 

Hopefully, the people in power at the United Nations will support the idea of creating a reformed global government and will be willing to proceed with a rational plan. The pressure to implement such change shall be provided by Gov21 parties at all levels and perhaps national and international NGOs.  (See Appendix A).

The first changes at the UN level shall be initiated by nations that have strong Gov21 parties and whose people and government support the goals of immediate disarmament and enhanced environmental protection.  The UN representatives of these nations shall be instructed to aggressively support all measures leading to disarmament and improvements in the health of the environment.  To help create a world situation that will be conducive to disarmament, the UN will be encouraged to form a permanent global police force to put down violence.  The police force shall consist initially of troops and weapons supplied by member nations and shall be rotated periodically to spread the burden and avoid creation of an ingrained military mentality.    It is hoped that these measures might exert significant pressure on militarily dominant nations to accelerate their disarmament and environmental efforts. As the militarily dominant nations disarm, the strength of the global police will be diminished but never below a point where it will be capable of putting down any international incident.

Creation of a global police force brings with it the risk that the police might get out of control and become more of a problem than a solution.  To guard against this risk, the police force will not normally have access to fuel and ammunition.  A separate supply organization shall be created to provide supplies to them only as directed by specific UN orders that shall specify the mission for which the supplies are to be used, the quantities of each and the delivery location of each.  A team of observers shall oversee the delivery of such supplies and the amounts of each supply actually delivered and the retrieval of any remaining supplies after completion of the mission.

If the Gov21 support in any or all of the participating non-military nations is sufficiently strong that they convert to the Gov21 structure, they may initiate national elections to determine the positions their UN Ambassadors are to take on all issues upon which they will vote at the UN.  The UN could remain in this situation for a considerable time period until disarmament is achieved.  At that time, the complete reformation of the UN to the Gov21 structure and the reform of the final demilitarized nations will be possible.  The resulting UN will be referred to as Gov21UN.

When the UN is ready for conversion, the Legal, Judicial, Finance, State, Elections and Information Departments shall be formed first, so that control of Gov21UN shall be in the hands of the voters of the participating nation-states.  Among their first duties, the voters shall approve an initial list of global key companies.  Then the Operations Department shall be formed at the global level and shall assume oversight of the listed key companies and the Finance Department shall be formed to invest in their stock and accept their income.  Global industries are those that conduct their business beyond the borders of a single nation-state.

At about the same time, the global police shall be diminished to its minimum size and strength and made a permanent part of the UN.  However, this change will be delayed until two conditions have been met:

·         Gov21UN has existed long enough to have the financial resources to maintain the global police, and

·         The rest of the planet has been cleansed of all other weapons more powerful than those belonging to the minimal weapon set.

As globalization proceeds, a point will be reached when Gov21UN shall be able to reduce assessments from participating nation-states.  At this point, the participating nation-states shall be able to accomplish some or all of three things:

·         Reduce taxes

·         Implement additional departments not yet Gov21ized

·         Buy up small arms from citizens for destruction.

This reduction in assessments shall not be made to non-participating nation-states.  It is hoped that this will give them an incentive to convert to the Gov21 approach.  Similarly, reductions may be withheld from participating nation-states that are “dragging their feet” in their arms-reduction efforts.

As funds become available at the global level, Land Rescue, Sea Rescue and Environment Departments shall be implemented; however, their implementation shall have a lower priority than completion of global disarmament and implementation of Gov21UN Police.  As implementation of departments proceeds at the global level, whether or not to eliminate their counterparts at the national level will be left up to the nation-states to decide.  In some cases, the nation-states may wish to provide more support than is offered by the Gov21UN and this will be perfectly acceptable.  In the case of the Social Security, Medical Care and Education Departments, it may be better to leave the actual management in control of the nation-states and merely provide some supplemental funding from the global level to those nations that are in need..

As regards the Food, Water and Disaster Relief Departments, it seems prudent to leave these to the nations in which the needs may exist.  In nations in which lack of these needs is a problem, plants and equipment will be provided, which may in turn enable them to become self-sufficient.  This is the primary means of helping the people of such nations, but in extreme cases of famine, drought or natural disasters Gov21UN would muster deliveries of food, water and other necessities of life on an accelerated and emergency basis.

With respect to the implementation sequence, it will be left to the voters to decide which of the remaining departments after Gov21UN Police shall be implemented in turn as funds are available.

    5.  Low-level Implementation

Cities, towns and counties shall be sought in which there is a high level of support.  In any of these where there is enough interest and backing, initial implementation of parts of the concept shall proceed.  The first goal of each shall be reorganization of the local government according to the charters created in 3 above and modified to meet the specific circumstances of each particular government.  This will place the citizens in charge through their exercise of the vote.  That is, instead of a mayor and town council or city council or county board of supervisors, the votes of the people will make decisions.  In order to accomplish this, low-level versions of the Information, Elections and Legal Departments will need to be implemented (or created by reorganization of existing departments).

It is possible that several changes to the charter will need to be made to achieve the complete Gov21 reform.  As this process proceeds, each charter shall incorporate changes and improvements that have been learned by other cities, towns and counties in their implementations and operation.

At the state level, many of the same changes shall take place except a constitution instead of a charter shall be created.  As with lower levels of government, several changes to the constitution may be needed before the complete transition has been made, but in all cases, the first change shall be that which gives executive control to the citizens.  Implementation shall also involve creation of some distinct departments such as Police, Criminal Detection, Criminal Prosecution and Education, which shall not differ greatly from their pre-Gov21 predecessors.  However, in all cases decisions shall be made by vote of the people instead of governor and legislature.

At all levels (including national), the Operations and Finance Departments (or their functions) shall be implemented and they shall begin the purchase of stock in certain key, national industries as described in 6C below.

    6. National Implementation

As explained above, the conversion of a militarily-non-dominant nation and a militarily-dominant nation may proceed along slightly different lines.  These are described separately below:

Militarily-Non-dominant Nations

Once a sufficient number of states have converted and there is enough interest and support, the nation may be converted.  This will proceed in a number of steps as described below:

      A.  The initial step in the conversion of a nation will begin concurrently with step 3 above by the national Gov21 Party.  When the Gov21 Party wins a national election, the start-up leadership for the Legal, Information, Elections and Judicial Departments (who will have been waiting in the wings) will be selected so that control by the vote of the citizens can take place.  Also a draft constitution will have been prepared by completing in detail the type of legacy merge illustrated above.  As soon as possible an election shall be conducted to obtain ratification of the constitution and the initial department leadership by the vote of the citizens.  These ratifications will be accomplished on a “straw-vote” basis within the Gov21 Party before supremacy of Gov21 has been achieved so that it will be ready to begin operation as soon as supremacy has been reached.  The ratification shall then be repeated, if necessary, in a general election when adoption of the Gov21 Constitution has taken place.

     B.  When the Gov21 Party achieves supremacy, political parties will be discontinued; they will no longer have any meaning. The Information Department shall conduct opinion polls of the citizenry periodically to determine if adjustments are needed either to the constitution or to the initial departmental leadership.  If such are needed, they will be implemented as described above.

     C.  As soon as the initial Gov21 has been formed and ratified in a national election, it shall put maximum effort on achieving global disarmament and environmental protection, which would hopefully already be underway.  This will include instructing its Ambassador to the UN to vote according to the results of elections of the people of the nation.  In addition, it shall start taking steps to achieve internal disarmament.  At this point, the Operations and Finance Departments shall be implemented at the national level and the Operations Department shall begin the purchase of stock in listed, national key companies.    National companies are those that conduct business within (but not limited to) the nation.  These purchases will be made for the purposes of generating revenue for the national government and to exert control over these companies if that is required.  This is the period of maximum financial burden on the nation-states.  They will be paying for all of their usual expenses and will need additional funds for the purchase of stocks in key corporations. 

     D.   As disarmament and purchase of interests in nationally-listed key industries proceed, the Information Department shall poll the citizens to determine the priorities desired for implementing the remaining government departments.  Many of the new departments shall be very similar to their pre-Gov21 counterparts; the conversions shall consist simply of a renaming and possible replacement of the management teams.  If a pre-Gov21 counterpart did not exist, each new department shall be implemented whenever it can be afforded.

Militarily-Dominant Nations