Interesting perspective....

[Artur F. Silva]

Hello Doc:

At 08:36 15-11-2000 -0800, Richard Charles Holloway wrote:
>An interesting analogy.  There are some substantial differences though that
>the Zimbabwe politician may have not been astute enough to have identified.
>One significant difference is that "self-declaring" is not sufficient to
>decide the election like it is in many third world countries.

That is true. But please consider the following:


>7.  Imagine that six million people voted in the disputed province and
>that  the self-declared winner's 'lead' was only 327 votes.  Fewer,
>certainly, than the vote counting machines' margin of error.
>
>8.  Imagine that the self-declared winner and his political party
>opposed a  more careful by-hand inspection and re-counting of the
>ballots in the disputed province or in its most hotly disputed district.

Now, the "self-declared winner" has not opposed by force, but went to
court (in the state ruled by his brother). Now imagine that the court
decides that recount must be stoped (that's only a possibility,
I know). Would that be better? or worse? Now imagine that Federal
Suprem Court decides its incompetence, because it' is a matter of
state law (another possibility only). Is it better or worse?

Now, add the following:

>4.  Imagine that the poorly drafted ballots of one district, a district
>heavily favoring the self-declared winner's opponent, led thousands of
>voters to vote for the wrong candidate.

This means that recount is not enough... And add also the following
(I never heard that before and do not know if it is clamed, is it?
This would be really third world...)

>6.  Imagine that hundreds of members of that most-despised caste were
>intercepted on their way to the polls by state police operating under
>the  authority of the self-declared winner's brother.

In conclusion: the situation created by a two century old (and at that
time precursor) regulation is at least bizarre. And can it be solved with a
Counstitutional revision, that needs the agrement of I don not know how
many states?

Add to all this the percentage of the population that have not participaded
in the pools, applying the law of two feet. Churchill said many years ago
that "Democracy is a bad regime; the only thing that can be said in favour
is that it is better than any other known regime" (freely quoted).

So the central question is: isn't  it the moment to discover new
democracy rules, a more profound (participative?) democracy?
A democracy that would mean to the old and descredited political
system the same that Open Space means to comunities and
organizations?

[The first reason that I liked OS was that it can be the way to
facilitate implement the learning organizations, others "talk about",
and "discipline about". The way to go back to deGues findings,
and less to the "teaching" and "discussion" of disciplines. And
I think, Doc, you know better than others what I am talking about.

But the reason that ultimately  was decisive is that I can see OS
aplyed to almost everything - from the family level (where something
most be done urgently) to the Government level (where I doubt
that the borders of today will stand...).

>The good news...that the rest of the world can see how it all
>works out.  A bit like open space?

It is "open", for sure. But is it "Open Space"?

Only to think about...

Regards

Artur

*
*
==========================================================
OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu
Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html

===========================================================
OSLIST at EGROUPS.COM
To subscribe,
1.  Visit: http://www.egroups.com/group/oslist
2.  Sign up -- provide an email address,
    and choose a login ID and password
3.  Click on "Subscribe" and follow the instructions

To unsubscribe, change your options,
view the archives of oslist at egroups.com:
1.  Visit: http://www.egroups.com/group/oslist
2.  Sign in and Proceed