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This document gives an overview of the Fluid Democracy group decision-making structure and procedures. Fluid Democracy is defined by its bylaws, so this document can be thought of as an overview of those bylaws. The home page of Fluid Democracy is here.
Here are slides for a talk that roughly corresponds to this page. The slides will have to do for now, because the rest of this page isn't written yet. You may as well stop reading here and just look at those slides, for now.
Justification for many of the concepts in Fluid Democracy, and a comparison with current governmental systems, is given in Grab Bag of Governmental Reform Ideas.
the source of the slides is appended below. i will slowly convert this into prose.
Fluid Democracy is a system for group decision-making. It is designed to be scalable, that is, to work for groups with as few as 10 people, or as many as 100,000,000. It is generic enough to serve as a base for all sorts of groups. Some examples of types of groups are:
Let's take a look at other types of group decision-making systems. Fluid Democracy can be seen as an alternative to these.
Used in many non-profit projects. There is one person, the "dictator", often the founder of the project, who is seen by all to be in charge. This person essentially makes all the decisions, although sometimes s/he may consult others, or even put a decision to a vote, and sometimes a group of other project members may attempt to force the dictator to change hir mind about some issue.
Used in most corporations, both for-profit and non-profits. todo
There is a common basic structure used in most present-day democracies.
Out of all of these types of groups, the democracies are usually the biggest (some large corporations may have many shareholders, but these "members" are usually not very interested in being involved in the corporation's decisionmaking; whereas the corporation's employees might like to be involved, but (unless the corporation is employee-owned) are only given authority to the extent that management delegates it). The democracies are also usually the most concerned with consensus, and with checks and balances (since governments hold the power of violence, it is important to keep them from going wrong).
Regulation?
Many groups use voting, and well-defined sets of rules, but some prefer to use rough consensus and eschew strict rules?
All of the above components, plus oversight branch.
Chief executive ("CEO") appointed by boards
"Judges" and "Parliamentarians" appointed by boards
"Chairpeople" by direct election
\section{primary vs. external}
What is and isn't "external" is decided by primary.
(can have more parts: e.g. external, program activity, other)
\section{legislative}
Everyone
\includegraphics[scale=.75]{forum.eps}
\begin{itemize} \item[] Members collectively draft and amend proposals \item[] \item[] Transitive proxy voting (other names: liquid democracy, delegable proxy): \begin{itemize} \item[-] You can delegate your vote on any topical area, to any other voter \item[-] They can re-delegate \end{itemize} \end{itemize}
\includegraphics[scale=.75]{elects.eps}
Up to 7 boardmembers
Top layers of primary and external "delegate pyramids".
\includegraphics[scale=.75]{pyramid.eps}
Bottom layer of pyramid is voters.
To determine who is in the next layer up:
There are many cross-councils. Each one composed of 7 members (volunteers).
%% Sum of all cross-council votes have equal weight with all of the elect boardmembers' votes.
\includegraphics[scale=.5]{pyramidRedFaction.eps} $\quad \Rightarrow$ \includegraphics[scale=.5]{council.eps}
60% required to pass ordinary measures
Only one chamber needs to pass a measure, unless it is vetoed by another chamber
Each member submits their ideal budget, and these are combined in order to form the initial budget proposal. The initial proposal may then be amended.
\section{executive}
1 CEO (primary) and one EEO (external affairs)
Appoint and dismiss other executive team members
\includegraphics[scale=.75]{execs.eps}
\section{oversight}
Indivdual:
A majority of Chairpeople may pardon.
\includegraphics[scale=.75]{Chairpeople.eps}
\section{scaling down}
\includegraphics[scale=0.75]{structure_small_40.eps}
\section{extension: non-equal members}
\section{Summary}
\begin{center}
\includegraphics[scale=0.75]{structure1.eps} \end{center}
Efficient: optimistic concurrency, 17 reps vs. 536 in U.S..
So, each member has 5 ways to influence organization:
(compare to U.S.: vote for 2 senators, 1 rep, 1 president)
\section{The End}
