Comment on this entry
How IEET Could Influence Governmental Policy
Recently there has been commenters’s discussion here at IEET about whether it should be moving from being essentially a website that provides reading material and a forum for public debate towards more of a genuine “think tank” model, clearly advocating a techno-progressive point of view and attempting to influence policy (both public and private) in a more direct, substantial and well-defined way.
...
Complete entry
COMMENTS
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/22 at 12:07 PM
Re “bureaucrats and politicians do a lot more good than harm.”:
This is true in a general sense. But today, watching the news in Europe, and taking due note of the preferences expressed by the voters in Greece, France, and Italy (yesterday), it seems to me that the European political and administrative system is a failure. The citizens are saying that bureaucrats and politicians do more harm than good.
And the reason is that too many civil servants and politicians are “venal narcissists and corrupt bureaucrats who seek only power and care not one jot for the interests of the people they have been elected or appointed to serve.”
Some civil servants and politicians are great persons, who really care for the interest of the people, but I am afraid most of them have no chance of getting to the top because the current system weeds them out.
This does not mean that I have given up on politics. If anything, I am even more persuaded that a good political and administrative system is urgently needed in our continent and the world.
As a citizen and a voter, I support parties that propose radical change. All parties propose change before the elections, and of course forget their promises after the elections, but I think there are some promising new political movements that have not been corrupted by the system yet.
In particular, Pirate Parties have scored spectacular results in Germany (and soon perhaps in the Netherlands), and seem (at least potentially) receptive of our techno-progressive ideas.
http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/4914
http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/prisco20111010
What can the IEET do?
A strategy that may be worth pursuing, here in Europe, is to try to get a consultative role in the formulation of the political programs of friendly parties.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/22 at 12:41 PM
More about Italian elections:
Comic Grillo shakes up Italian politics with shock win
And the new star of Italian politics is… Beppe Grillo !!
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/22 at 12:43 PM
It occurred to me this morning that we should make a list of ideas, and the consultative role idea is certainly a good one. I hope lots more follow!
I’m not sure how useful it is to describe the EU system as a failure, even if there are plenty of good reasons to do so. I was in Greece for the election, and to be honest the situation there really scares me. There’s a dangerous game of chicken going on between charismatic and not very responsible politicians and a Brussels- and Berlin-based elite that either don’t want to give up their privileges or are simply out of touch with people’s concerns.
Actually even that may be unfair. The fundamental problem in Europe is a lack of solidarity, and a perception that the costs of making the currency union work are just too high. I was reading today a newspaper article pointing out that (West) Germans don’t want to go through the same experience that they went through after reunification, which they perceive as having been very costly, and yet there seem to be good reasons to believe that the common currency can only survive if similarly he transfers are made. And this against a background where Germans and other central Europeans hate the idea of a weaker euro (which would otherwise help a lot), both for historical reasons and because they tend to be savers rather than investors (or, as many of them would out it, gamblers) in stocks. The current political class isn’t really to blame for this, and remember: we do have such things as voting booths, and the right to run for parliament.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/22 at 12:53 PM
Re “The fundamental problem in Europe is a lack of solidarity”
No, Peter, the fundamental problem in Europe is corruption. Most of the other problems follow. You know that.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/22 at 01:12 PM
In the book on strategy referenced in my article, the author makes the excellent point that a good diagnosis needs to address a well-defined challenge, and point towards a workable solution.
Let’s define the challenge as being that the EU system isn’t working, and needs to be made to work better than it currently does in serving the genuine aspirations of its citizens. My question then would be: how does framing the diagnosis in terms of corruption point towards a workable solution? What are the EU’s key strengths, which could then be brought to bear on the problem?
In a nutshell this is the approach I’ve tried to take with regard to the challenge of giving IEET a greater influence over governmental policy. We need to leverage its key strengths—the quality of its contributions, its awareness of future weirdness, the lively and mostly intelligent debates—to bring about the change we want.
I like your idea of trying to get a consultative role the formation of political programs, but it might also help if we were a bit more precise about the change we actually do want. And come to think of it, a good way to unlock that kind of idea is to ask what pisses us off.
So maybe the question I should be asking you is: to what extent is corruption a technoprogressive issue? And to the extent that it is, are there specific policy changes that we would like to see in this context, and which are realistically feasible over a short timescale. Define that, and probably the rest (consultative roles etc) will follow.
Posted by André on 05/22 at 01:24 PM
If I may add my 2 cents - I think that the biggest mistake that the IEET could do is to stick to one specific political orientation, or worse, to one particular party.
Over-specialized symbiosis is a bad evolutionary strategy. The topics we discuss here are already marginal, and at times create strong averse reactions. So, I think, the Institute should not be picky about the places where to disperse its seeds, otherwise we might marginalize even more the policies we would like to propose. Imagine to see some controversial political figure adding controversial transhumanis ideas to his unpopular routine.
I think it is better to behave like rats, or indiscriminate parasites (both very successful lifeforms). Anything goes. Any political party, especially those with large audiences, can be a candidate for our proposals. Paradoxically, it would be more productive to smuggle techno-progressive memes inside populist political formations, where people are more vociferous - and therefore would better replicate our discussions. And I frankly do not think this is going to be an impossible task
In a way we should translate our ideas, make them somehow palatable for a generic electoral base - and only then stimulate the political machine from above. At that point ideas would sound more interesting, also for a decision maker.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/22 at 01:45 PM
@André
Yes, your ideas fit well with my instinct that, unless you are Monsanto or something, policy is most effectively influenced indirectly, at least at first, via a bottom-up process.
That said, I don’t necessarily see a contradiction with Giulio’s idea. I suppose it depends what one means by “consultative role”, and to what extent it would rule out relationships with parties or organisations (including other think tanks?) of different political colour.
In any case I don’t think IEET should be jumping into action without first defining its strategy. I still think we already have an excellent platform on which to build, and we need to make sure we build on it rather than undermining it. Just we need to be clearer about what we want to see happen in the short term, and perhaps more creative in forming alliances. One thing I haven’t touched on, of course, is financial considerations, but if money permits then relationships with marketing consultants should be considered.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/22 at 01:53 PM
Re “how does framing the diagnosis in terms of corruption point towards a workable solution”
Because it address the real problem. They say that Europe is “inefficient” or “wasteful”, but I have a theory well tested and confirmed by a lot of evidence: we are not inefficient and wasteful because we are stupid, but because the wasteful inefficiencies help the admins to make more money (both cash and “political capital”). I could write a thick book on this.
Sometimes you need to cut the root.
Posted by iPan on 05/22 at 02:06 PM
Obsolete the government.
Social networks are the government now.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/23 at 02:00 AM
@iPan
Well obviously we’re not going to get government buy-in around that idea, so I take it your suggestion is basically to ignore the and wait for them to die a natural?
Or?
Posted by Travis James Leland on 05/23 at 03:13 AM
Although I’m still pretty new here as a commentator, I’ve been reading this site for a few years now, so I think I am able to put forth an opinion on this one.
I’m not as familiar with the workings of the EU as I am with American politics, so my comments should be taken for what they are worth.
It seems we are forgetting the importance of lobbyists in the government. Here in America, whenever someone tries to pass a law or guide the administration toward new ideas or changes to the status quo, someone who represents an entire industry comes in, waving lots of money, influence and power, and stopping that person cold. I’m not saying that the politicians are crooked, but the lobbyists seem quite able to have their way with the politicians.
Case in point… With the rise of childhood obesity, childhood-onset diabetes and other food-related illnesses, concerned lawmakers tried to pass legislation that would hold school districts accountable for the content of the meals they serve in their cafeterias. There was a call to reduce the amount of saturated fats in school lunches, and to increase the number of fresh fruits and vegetables that could be served. Long story short - representatives for the food industry (read: the people who had been supplying the current food to the government for the school lunches, or the fast-food industry) made their intentions to Congress quite clear and soon after, pizza was officially recognized as being a serving of vegetable. The argument is that the amount of tomato paste (read: a vaguely tomato-inspired concoction of chemicals high in sodium and refined sugars) counts as a serving of vegetable and the crust is the required “grain” serving, although it is pretty much enriched white bread and not whole grain. For more details, here is an article about it… http://articles.latimes.com/2011/nov/28/health/la-he-school-lunch-nutrition-20111128
The point I am trying to make is that politicians, as far as I can see, have the best intentions and want to do well by us. But once they reach office, they are besieged by people from all sides, offering deals that can not be refused in exchange for getting what they want. If you call our pizza a vegetable, we will cut a deal that makes the food we supply for government-subsidized school lunches even cheaper than it was before, and we will throw all our support behind your re-election campaign next year.
So how does this fit in with this article and the subsequent conversation?
IEET is, and should be, a think tank. Some of the most brilliant minds in the world have contributed to it, or are advocates of similar groups. In the last week or so, there have been contributions by Stephen Hawking, Michio Kaku and yours truly (I kid). I believe that in order for IEET to be heard by the government of the United States (and elsewhere) is to throw our support behind certain issues, much like lobbyists.
Having read the comments under a recent article (you know which one), it’s pretty clear that we are not all going to agree on everything. Nor SHOULD we. But I think that in this election year, we can run polls on the IEET main page on major hot button issues. Depending on the results of the polls, we can throw our support in the appropriate direction or to the appropriate candidate.
It’s late and I am pretty tired, so I hope this made some sense. To sum up - we have smart people here. We think a lot about issues that will affect the future of our country and our world. Instead of a manifesto that we should all blindly adhere to, I think we should all vote here, and then use the majority opinion to say that the IEET supports this cause or this issue or this candidate. We could also have spokespersons who could make public statements or write letters to government officials on behalf of the IEET, based on the results of our internal voting. It might be slow going at first, but I think it has the potential to make IEET into a respected voice to goverment officials AND the public.
Does any of this sound feasible?
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/23 at 06:29 AM
Welcome Travis. Re “Having read the comments under a recent article (you know which one), it’s pretty clear that we are not all going to agree on everything. Nor SHOULD we.”
Another good example is the just published article on prostitution. My position is known (if there is no victim, there is no crime) but I expect others to vehemently disagree.
I mostly agree that we should not agree on everything, and that different opinions can and should be expressed here. But then the IEET is just an online discussion group. One of the best discussion groups, but just a discussion group.
In order to be/come an influential think tank, I think the IEET should formulate positions on the important issues of our times. This does not mean that those who don’t agree on IEET’s official positions should be kicked out, but it does mean that the official positions should be clearly stated.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/23 at 08:44 AM
I agree that we should make more proactive use of our polls. This is a tradition we already have, so we might as well use it.
More generally I very much like the way Travis is thinking. You are right: we have brilliant minds that are contributing, and (I assume) a highly literate, intelligent and informed readership. The polls are an obvious way to listen to their voice, and ideas like spokespersons, public statements, and other kind of campaigns would ensure that this voice is heard more widely. Many IEETers are doubtless doing this already, but there needs to be some mechanism for us to do this in a coordinated way, and more clearly under IEET’s auspices.
I also agree that we should not focus only on government: there’s the public, and also of course corporations. Like bureaucrats and politicians, corporations are not actually evil (at least not all of them), and while we may deplore the extent to which public policy tends to get captured by special interests, since we aim to operate in the real world and not an imaginary one we might as well try to influence what see lobbyists are lobbying for. This is also the kind of things I mean by influencing policy indirectly.
All this could be very exciting if we get it right. Of course there should be no talk of “kicking anyone out”, as either a contributor or commentator, because they disagree with positions taken by IEET. We have to remain a broad church (if you’ll forgive the metaphor in view of the still raging discussion on religion!). Actually I think IEET is already much more than “just a discussion group”, even “one of the best”, but there is a potential for influence that we are not currently realising. And paradoxically, I think this might take some of the heat out of our disagreements, or at least help them to move along a bit quicker. I think part of our frustration stems from the sense that our discussions are ultimately a bit pointless, or at least not having the impact they could. And that makes us bitter and bickery.
Posted by hankpellissier on 05/23 at 09:47 AM
I agree that IEET should conduct surveys on important questions, and then lobby the viewpoint that the surveys suggests we agree upon.
What are good survey topics? Please let me know. Thanks.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/23 at 09:59 AM
We should also bear in mind the point I tried to stres in my article: we are likely to get most traction if our policy positions are concrete and realisable (but not inevitable) on a relatively short time frame. This shouldn’t be a straitjacket, though.
Would it be good to harvest the results of some of the polls we’ve done over the past few months and draw inspiration from that? Just an idea.
Posted by Travis James Leland on 05/23 at 11:11 AM
This discussion is very similar to a series of articles I am working on. A “secret project” if you will. I don’t want to give anything away yet, but I just emailed Hank with the specifics. After he gives me the go-ahead I can start on the project. I think you will all like it. It has the potential to address a lot of the points brought up here.
Posted by Pastor_Alex on 05/23 at 12:37 PM
I think you are correct in your thinking about how to influence bureaucracy, wherever it exists. What I see in Guilio’s and your discussion is about how to label the failure of the existing system. I think the discussion about naming the source of the failure does not have to be directly linked to suggestions of how to fix it.
Corruption for instance is a real problem in any system. Unfortunately attacking corruption directly by creating anti-corruption policy is short circuited when the people who run the anti-corruption policy become corrupt or are replaced by corrupt people. The solution then isn’t just more policy which enables new forms of corruption. What the solution might be is creating new systems that are inherently more difficult to corrupt. That’s where your new technology might come in, though I’m not talking primarily about technological systems.
One simple example, there was a recent scandal about how some British MP’s were abusing the personal expense part of their remuneration. Once the expenses were made public the behaviour of many of them changed. The logical extension would be to make the expenses charged to the public purse by either politician or bureaucrat public and searchable automatically. This action would meet the criteria you set out for influencing government change.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/23 at 01:12 PM
@Alex
Thanks. I think it does help to make a link between how we name the problem and what we might want to do about it. But to be honest I doubt that IEET should be focusing primarily on “how to fix the broken political and administrative system”. We’re supposed to be pursuing a technoprogressive agenda, right? So what we might want to do is to think about why our political and administrative systems are failing to effectively counter reactionary, anti-technology forces. Or more generally what is preventing societies from developing and getting public buy-in around positive visions about how emerging technologies can make our lives better (while responsibly managing the risks, of course).
Come to think of it, that could be an article topic in itself. Which might point towards better targeted policy positions. Food for thought. I can feel a “part 2” coming on…
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/23 at 01:19 PM
@Alex re “Unfortunately attacking corruption directly by creating anti-corruption policy is short circuited when the people who run the anti-corruption policy become corrupt or are replaced by corrupt people.”
At the beginning the people in anti-corruption movements are good. These movements have a period of grace of 2/3 years, and then of course they become corrupted themselves. At that point, they must be replaced by new watchdogs, and so forth. It is important that we keep watching for corruption in administrations, because there is always some. Here, spontaneous whistle-blowing groups (local wikileaks) can do a lot of good.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/24 at 01:34 AM
@Hank re “IEET should conduct surveys on important questions, and then lobby the viewpoint that the surveys suggests we agree upon.”
Suppose we do a survey on racism, and a racist group notices it and instruct its members to participate en-masse. The results would then suggest that we are racists, but we don’t want to lobby that viewpoint.
We should think of some kind of vetting system. We should do surveys, but they should be restricted to persons who agree on our core principles.
Posted by Travis James Leland on 05/24 at 02:21 AM
Giulio,
“We should do surveys, but they should be restricted to persons who agree on our core principles.”
I think that completely defeats the purpose of voting in the first place, doesn’t it?
Why vote on something if you know that everyone voting will already agree with you? What incentive would people have to place a dissenting vote, if it will ostracize them from future voting?
My whole idea about using the polls to vote IS to adopt a set of core values for the IEET Contributors AND the readers. In terms of vetting, perhaps contributor votes count more than readers? You know, some way of tipping the scales toward the Contributors.
Hypothetical case…
Universal Health Care/Obamacare. A contributor writes a well-researched piece that lays all the facts out and describes why it fits or does not fit the technoprogressive thinking that the IEET is concerned with. Or perhaps two people who disagree write an article each. Then Hank (or whomever) puts up a poll for readers to vote on. Meanwhile, IEET Contributors vote via email or something. The Contributors make up 50% of the voting and the readers make up the other 50%. Say 20 Contributors vote, and 15 of them say that IEET should be in favor of Obamacare. 100 readers vote, and 65 of them are in favor. The motion passes and the IEET releases an official statement to the press that says that the Technoprogressive movement has decided to back Obamacare and will take steps to raise public awareness of the benefits of it, etc.
This way every voice in the community gets heard, democratically. IEET gets to adopt a core set of values that will focus our efforts to become a true think tank, and we will slowly work our way into the public forum while hopefully catching the attention of some lawmakers.
Does this seem like a fair system to all of you?
Posted by hankpellissier on 05/24 at 06:45 AM
I agree with Giulio’s contention that a general open-to-the-public survey will not accurately reflect the beliefs of core IEET members.
Travis’s idea is headed in the right direction… perhaps.
This is perhaps a decision for the Board of Directors to make - how IEET represents itself and the policies it promotes is ultimately, I think, their responsibility.
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 05/24 at 07:06 AM
@Travis re “I think that [restricted surveys] completely defeats the purpose of voting in the first place, doesn’t it?”
I don’t think so, because we know what our core principles are, and we want to promote policies that are consistent with our core principles. This is not a parliament, but one party among many.
Re “Why vote on something if you know that everyone voting will already agree with you?”
Not so. Frequent posters and commenter share similar core values, but disagree on weights and priorities. See the endless debates on religion, affirmative action, prostitution, drugs…
Posted by Intomorrow on 05/25 at 11:26 PM
“So what we might want to do is to think about why our political and administrative systems are failing to effectively counter reactionary, anti-technology forces. Or more generally what is preventing societies from developing and getting public buy-in around positive visions about how emerging technologies can make our lives better (while responsibly managing the risks, of course).”
@Pete,
Travis provides a partial answer:
“Here in America, whenever someone tries to pass a law or guide the administration toward new ideas or changes to the status quo, someone who represents an entire industry comes in, waving lots of money, influence and power, and stopping that person cold.”
A spoiler.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/26 at 01:38 AM
@Intomorrow
Indeed, but there are also more fundamental issues. If we were to boil it down into one word I think it would have to be fear. I think I might write an article on Technology and Fear.
Posted by Intomorrow on 05/26 at 05:07 PM
You get right to the point like no other:
fear.
What I fear more and more is talking—aside from online—to other people. Not fear of them, not any more, but rather, fear of their anachronisms; fear that what they say mocks all futurist pretensions; fear that I am a fool, a troubador.
They probably know, the educated ones, that humans will not colonize space; advanced beings will, beings having as little in common with us as we have with our pets.
Educated yokels probably know, deep inside, that the future will be good.. yet only for those who survive, and to survive one must play games which negate a sense of integrity.
The above doesn’t get to the point as well as you do—but it will do for a start.
Posted by Peter Wicks on 05/26 at 11:16 PM
I completely agree, Intomorrow. Merely to survive, let alone thrive, without lying and cheating one has to live in an unusually high trust culture (in the creation of which religion has generally played a major role), have a privileged status within that culture and be rather unambitious in other respects. Most people don’t have that luxury, although many avoid doing it consciously by deluding themselves in various ways (religious faith being one of them, of course).
Add your comment here:
| 
IEET Blog