OpenGov - Open Government Brainstorm

Thumbs up. But that's too big for this format.

Maybe the UN could do something along those lines.

Global Governance is an issue of all of us.

Wait till google launched "wave" http://wave.google.com/

Then each one of us, will decide by his own on which wave he want to jump on.

And when the majority of us jump on the same wave of change, there will be kinda Tsunami rough down what we have done wrong last century. WE CAN redo the game of life on this planet in new roles and new boundary conditions we did not have before.

BTW: Do you think really in 21-century, we will still have all of these World Organizations from last century talking about the same thing using different labels?

Words like: "Lobby" and "Privilege" will be replaced with co-creation and collective participation ..

I do not know if there is already a reformation process "up-there". But I know, there is one in the bottom, which is tremendous :)

thanks for stepping by and commenting.

Hi Jafra,

I like the idea, for what it's worth - specific to this forum.

Just don't thinks that changing the world will change everything. There will always be lobbyists, and privilege, of some form or another. And always have been.

The practical issue is the extent to which their effects can be minimized through the united action of concerned and organized citizens.

What is important about this idea is that it will show the embeddedness of the US in Global Affairs.

but that's easy! just use the internet, or a cell-phone, or an airplane, or a communication satellite,...

What could be important about this idea is its ability to help organize effective measures in which the US plays an important role in growing peaceful coexistence in theh world.

U.N. calls U.S. human rights record "deplorable."

A new report suggests the U.S. may have committed war crimes -- and endorses the formation of a truth commission.

http://www.salon.com/news/primary_sources/2009/05/29/un_report/

(Every adult citizen of the US is guilty of conspiracy after the fact. Some of us for days, some for years... Willful ignorance doesn't cut it.)

Global governance is not the way to go. The liberty of the people will end if that happens.

We need to fight global government to our last breath.

We are already having global governance in a way, it's unbridled capitalism leading to financial crashes like the recent one. Global Governance as in this proposal doesn't END liberty but would guarantee real liberty - or do you prefer that multinational corporations run the world?

It is unbridled GOVERNMENT not capitalism that has led to this and more government will make the problem worse.

If a company doesn't meet up to your expectations you can use another company or start your own. When a government oppresses you, you are stuck.

Global governance was a bad idea from the start and nothing can make this pig into something usable.

the fact we are interconnected and we share building the reality is undebatable I think. But who is leading this process? Do we have equal chances and opportunistic for change? Is the effect of action/reaction the same on every one?

When I speak about enhanced Global Governance it is about providing each one of same existential balanced life-ecology on this planet.

The fact US politics has big influence on world politics, any positive change within will influence world politics in all

US has been part of most destructive mile-stones of our modern history. It can be leading to new constructive future with new culture of co-existence on this planet by considering every one, which this idea is actually promoting to.

The measure I am proposing within is easy to set-up, but could be with huge effect, when US ambassadors in developing countries ask media their to interact with. Imagine the huge dynamic and new space can be opened.

"US has been part of most destructive mile-stones of our modern history."

No Jafra, that is neither fair nor accurate. The US is providing the only model right now of a diverse, empire-scale Republic. This forum and others like it are examples of the kind of pluralism that was developed in the US, and not just technically.

Who has not made mistakes? Becasue the US is so big its mistakes are also big; but there is no Pol Pot, or Hitler, or Darfur, coming out of the US.

More like AIDS prevention and awareness in Africa, just for example. And more foreign aid than any other country, and more support for the UN (even if that is also a big mistake these days...)

I'm very much with you yigaldankahana.

If this is the "model," I'd hate to see the real thing.

tttahiti -

Your real problem is with human nature, not any specific system of governance. Deal with it.

jafra

Our "American arrogance" in Europe....in alphabetical order…

1. The American Cemetery at Aisne-Marne, France. A total of 2289 of our military dead. We Apologize.

2. The American Cemetery at Ardennes, Belgium. A total of 5329 of our dead.3. The American Cemetery at Brittany, France. A total of 4410 of our military dead. Excuse us.

4. Brookwood, England American Cemetery. A total of 468 of our dead.

5. Cambridge, England. 3812 of our military dead.

6. Epinal, France American Cemetery. A total of 5525 of our Military dead.

7. Flanders Field, Belgium. A total of 368 of our military.

8. Florence, Italy. A total of 4402 of our military dead.

9. Henri-Chapelle, Belgium. A total of 7992 of our military dead.

10. Lorraine, France. A total of 10,489 of our military dead.

11. Luxembourg, Luxembourg. A total of 5076 of our military dead.

12. Meuse-Argonne. A total of 14246 of our military dead.

13. Netherlands, Netherlands. A total of 8301 of our military dead.

14. Normandy, France. A total of 9387 of our military dead.

15. Oise-Aisne, France. A total of 6012 of our military dead.

16. Rhone, France. A total of 861 of our military dead.

17. Sicily, Italy. A total of 7861 of our military dead.

18. Somme, France. A total of 1844 of our military dead.

19. St. Mihiel, France. A total of 4153 of our military dead.

20. Suresnes, France. a total of 1541 of our military dead.

I apologize to no one. I remind those of our sacrifice and don't confuse arrogance with leadership.

If I added correctly the count is 104,366 dead and now we have to watch the occupant of 1600 Penn. Ave. apologize to Europe and the Middle East for "American arrogance"!

Just because the guy living in the White House says something stupid, that does not give anyone the right to call us arrogant when we were the ones who stepped in and saved Europe from being called Greater Germany.

Living in Berlin I'm very much aware how the Allied Forces, chief among them the US kept this city free until the Wall came down. We are indebted to you.

Nevertheless it is quite in order to criticize your friends when you feel they are doing 'stupid' things. We could name Vietnam as an example. Or more recently Iraq.

Just because the US (not you, cashman) have sacrificed so many lives more than 60 years ago doesn't mean that the US is innocent of imperialistic politics and (unasked for and badly executed) World-policing.

Global governance, by the way, is different from a Global Government which, I think, is what you (prob. rightly)oppose. The proposal at hand looks like something that is about Governace... not government.

Ok Yigal, It was not a good shot. Thanks for the point ..

Critisim is a true gift from co-selves mirrors .. each mirror has its own individual consiousness filter. Denial is consiousness killer ~

In my region people do not have positive image of US. I think we people should re-do the we used to know each other and we will discover new facts and correct many views.

Most of us has certain experience history, repeats of same thoughts in same way in own mind, which grave certain picture about things which are not real ..

Hi, what you said here is essential.

--

Just because the US (not you, cashman) have sacrificed so many lives more than 60 years ago doesn't mean that the US is innocent of imperialistic politics and (unasked for and badly executed) World-policing.

--

It the same with Israel and Holocaust. People suffered or sacrificed do not become holly.

One major advantage of global governance, which is actually more democracy for all, is that we will learn to deal with each other as individuals developing living meanings of Global Mind and thinking about common future in times many of us try to estimate whole group behavior and judge the group, "state" "nation" "ethnic" "religion" ..

hi- the people of America have allowed the government to act in ways the Constitution does not allow for, that's true.

On the grand scale of things, whenever anyplace in the world is in trouble the first place they look is to us.Flood,famine,fights,and tsunami have all been answered and answered quickly by America. Americans are always ready to help.

The current occupant of the White House does not speak for me and the arrogance he's talking about is his own and his derision was shown at a recent press conference when the White House spokesman laughed instead of answering why it is we cannot have the real birth certificate shown to us.

So if you ask me, yes, the White House is filled to the brim with arrogance, divisiveness and derision.

There are NO advantages to global governance.

Other than the fact that every time someone rules the world it comes crumbling down around them there's no advantage to giving up your soveriegnty to some pompous bureaucrat.It does not matter if you give it up at the local, state , federal, or global level.

America is the land of the free and global governance will end freedom.

yigaldankahana said, "Your real problem is with human nature, not any specific system of governance." Now we're getting somewhere.

Yep, humans are born savages and some of them grow up and become civilized. That's the point of government. We're trying to rise above the level of Sapolsky's baboons. At least, the authors of the Constitution were aiming for it. What the current powers are aiming for is worse than no government at all.

The US Constitution, plus the Bill of Rights and the Civil Rights amendments, are a formula.

That formula, more or less, could be applied in other places as well, and would also lead to coexistence in them.

Why not on a global scale?

The key is to keep the focus all the while on individual rights; not allegedly corporate rights that just become a pretext for private depradations.

Just as it can be abused in the US, it could be abused globally.

Just as it can work in the US, it can work globally.

As Tom Paine wrote: "The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind."

And speaking of Sapolsky's baboons, they have the answer to everything. (Just get rid of the jerks at the top so the nice guys can take over.)

http://books.google.com/books?id=oy52m6kgQQMC&pg=PA177&lpg=PA177&dq=Sapolsky+nice+guy&source=bl&ots=2Rzrx9foCZ&sig=oIFznBpZsgnHFnVh_pegus70c8w&hl=en&ei=Ib4kStu-KYGktge73LTkBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1

This whole discussion shows the difficulties of public debate, and how and why global governance will maybe fail. Some of the participants in this do not want to communicate but just espouse their values which have nothing to do with the proposal at hand.

Actually, this is the reason why many of us in "the rest of the world" would rather NOT have the US as strong as it (still) is. The arrogance of cashman57 makes it clear where he says, "Flood,famine,fights,and tsunami have all been answered and answered quickly by America", simply ignoring how many states in the rest of the world have been helping each other in dire circumstances. He is also trying hard to push his political agenda which I find rather below any standard that allows for fair discussion.

If you would decide to actually listen to arguments, as people do who are interested in a common dialog, and get out of the adolescent mood of arrogantly "knowing it all" it might make sense to go on. Otherwise, yes, it doesn't seem like this particular proposal on what could be an "Open Government Dialogue" about things that matter, is worth pursuing.

hi -

Just by helping think this through we're accomplishing a purpose here.

We are capable of ignoring peanut galleries where and when they may arise.

The thing is I'd like for Wael to better understand how to pursue his dream,

which is essentially pluralistic and positive and benign,

without having to reinvent the wheel,

and which paths are really dead ends that only look like shortcuts.

I didn't see cashman's defensiveness as arrogance, and anyways,

there is a valid point in his argument.

If you think it's a tangent, you can ignore it and keep the focus where you think it should be

instead of making it an even bigger distraction by responding to it!

The challenge is that human rights exist and the UN exists and the world court exists; all related to the idea of international law. These things imply a substantially objective standard. A substantially objective standard implies the possibility of governance in accordance with substantially objective standards everywhere.

The process of getting there will obviously require global collaboration, and standards of governance.

The way I see it, the US is uniquely positioned by experience and constitution to positively inform the development of that process - or to screw it up.

By being clear about what the US system - despite our flaws - does offer, in many ways we take for granted and don't consciously recognize, we make it more likely that our own stupidity will not prevent the transmission of valuable elements of our culture to future generations and societies.

I, for one, am very interested in exploring how WAel

hi- I am sorry that you are unable to comprehend the values America was founded on. You seem to have a problem with recognition of values and instead try to paint me as political and arrogant.

No, I don't know it all but I do know that global governance is a bad idea and that people who try to prop up a bad idea with namecalling instead of an argument probably lack the ability to form an argument that makes sense.

The people who died in the Revolutionary war died for the soveriegnty of all of the people in the united States.

To turn that on its head and demand we bow to global governance is an affront to the very values blood was shed for.

Maybe the day will come when you can actually formulate an idea to back global governance but I doubt it.

Until then just parrot what you find on the DNC website.

Thank you yigaldankahana for calling my attention to "ignoring peanut galleries". I will.

I think it may be worthwhile pursuing the idea of "objective standards for governance". At this moment I wouldn't know how we would get towards this, but I guess Wael's proposal of making Global Governance a topic would allow us to pursue that further.

also, everyone, I am NOT in favor of one world government.

Only some standard that can be applied substantially objectively everywhere.

In the past they called it natural law. It is the basis for human rights concepts.

It is also the basis of the US system, and what made it so unique.

Maybe the distinction between government and governance is too subtle,

and this is really about global standards, more than governance per se.

There are too many differences in culture and heritage to make the rest of the world accept the rights we see as unalienable.

Global governance does not insure the rights of all the people, it is something that is imposed on people.

We have enough imposition as it is and creating another layer of control and bureaucracy will not advance the contidion of anyone.

If the rest of the world wants to accept all of our rights, let them do so as a matter of their own political machines, not an imposition.

Imagine the resistance you would get in muslim controlled countries if you demanded that all are created equal and that applies to women as well as men.

You try to float that idea and you are likely to be chased out of there faster that 0bama spends a billion dollars.

Global governance and global government are both bad ideas.

Chashman, you want the whole world to listen to America, but not pursuing mutual listening? The core idea in my proposal is to add new links to improve new relationships in our human sphere, ading new values and meanings with building the future. What is possible today was not possible 10 years ago. So why not to re-do with new game roles?

You may change the title in any other fits the original proposal, which I hope you have read it.

But that's the point. This discussion was posted by a Palestinian.

It's not being imposed on anyone.

The same forces of human nature that led to women's rights and human rights in general

in the Christian world, which was not too long ago completely paternalistic,

will sooner or later express themselves in the Muslim world too.

That is Progress.

We don't have to float the idea. Enlightened Muslims will do it as an internal matter, and our discussing it with them first is an integral part of the process.

there are tones of interpretation about women role in Islam. Why to look on the on you "might" dis-like??

What about this one:

~ The smell of the rose dose not have any gender ~

A palestinian should already know the detrimental effects of global governance. In 1947 the global government imposed its global governance upon the people of the Middle East and created what is now called Israel.

To now think somehow that some more global interferance will solve a problem is what could be defined as insanity, and that is repeatedly doing the same thing and expecting a different result every time.

Oh sure, the lofty idea was floated and has been repeated but what we have discovered is the global solutions imposed on a people will result in more palestines and more people stripped of their rights.

In the muslim controlled countries they see a different idea of freedom than we do in the united States. We are not subjects of a kingdom.

Yet whenever someone wants change in the world they want the united States to step up while in their land they burn Old Glory and shout for our death.

So, world government created the very thing that is keeping us from peace and that is an imposed solution.

Creating world governence should not be sought, but justice and freedom of all of the people in all of the countries should be the goal.

Whether it is the role of a woman in Saudi society or the role of a woman in a Coptic Christian group we have seen double standards.

The United Nations was created, they said, to resolve these problems and make peace happen.

When someone says "global government" run as fast as you can from them for they will create another palestine.And YOU will be stuck in it.

"In the muslim controlled countries they see a different idea of freedom than we do in the united States."

That is just wrong. Freedom is freedom, anywhere and everywhere.

Most people seem to understand that concept on a gut level.

I know quite a lot of Muslims who understand freedom the same way you and I do.

Of course there are also plenty - especially who benefit from the status quo, and those brainwashed by their media - who do not.

My experience is that there is a significant and growing body of opinion within the world Muslim society that is not only ready to take up the fight for human rights and substantially universal standards, but also to criticize us for the reverse-ethnocentrism of low expectations and excuse-making for the 'benighted primitives.'

We can take that attitude and give it up as a lost cause,

or be more proactive and positive, and try to help make a difference.

I think the key is substantially objective standards,

and that they can be fairly transmitted and expressed and expounded upon Islamically

and in Islamic terms,

without losing the essential qualities that led us to value them in the first place.

Quote re: Obama's trip to Cairo from an Egyptian journalist:

"If he comes to say, 'We respect Islam, America is not against you,' then it's just rhetoric," says Hala Mustafa, editor of the Arabic journal Democracy, published in Cairo. "To bridge the gap, you need to change some policies and play a more active role in solving Middle East problems. He will be brave if he stresses the real challenges facing us today, like the need for freedom, tolerance, respect for individual rights, women's rights and diversity."

So the guy who lost his birth certificate is a significant force for change in the middle East?

What about the United Nations? I thought they were the example of global governance you want us to adopt, right?we have the operations of the world body to go by, and that body created the palestinian crisis.

Are you sure global governance is what you want?

The UN is a travesty. And the last thing I want is any kind of global government.

I've read Animal Farm and 1984....

I think Wael is talking about standards of governance that we already really have in the US,

not the UN.

Again, this is related to the line between supporting dictators in the name of respecting the people they subjugate, or really doing what it takes to respect the people. That may require the unpopular step of opposing the autocrats and dictators and theocrats - whom the Obama admin. seems to think it needs to win over (!) in order to achieve some short-term objective.

In fact, it will prevent the achievement of our long-term goals of growing democracy and peaceful coexistence in the region.

International 'order' is really anarchic; the guys with the biggest military budget and the greatest economic clout can do as they please.

International politics, so far, has little to do with any kind of ideology or conviction and everything with what a nation determines to be it's own best interest, and how much they can realize depends, again on its military and economic power.

The struggle for a more humane international politics has led to the Geneva Convention (which the former US administration apparently didn't care much about), the International Red Cross, the United Nations, the International Court of Justice in The Hague, the International Monetary Fund and so on. All of this is part of our struggle to come to some form of universal agreement on a minimum of rules that every nation will respect. This will turn out to be the hardest struggles of all, and we're very far from reaching any kind of agreement that could possibly be called something like "Global Governance" - so Global Government is not only extremely unlikely, we're not speaking about it in the first place.

Waels proposal, which seems to get more and more opposition, and this comment section illustrates the kind of difficulty we're facing in coming to agreement on (any kind of) universal rules.

To, again, use the Geneva Convention as an example: If one state (in this case the US) decides to use torture (which is forbidden by the Geneva Convention to which the US is party) by whatever pretext, it shows others what really rules: the power to do what you want, never mind already agreed upon conventions. In ordinary life we say, "He broke his word."

If you sign a treaty and then do not uphold it when the going gets a little tougher than normal, everybody is going to doubt that you're in the game for the greater good of all; we all believe you will just follow a rule that you agreed upon if it suits you.

Abu Graib, water-boarding, starting a war on fabricated evidence.... these matters may be forgotten by US-Americans fast but not by people outside the "American Empire". Global governance as proposed here would also be a means to re-achieve the good reputation the US used to have before the Bush administration.

yigaldankahana said, "The way I see it, the US is uniquely positioned by experience and constitution to positively inform the development of that process - or to screw it up." That pretty much says it all. I would rather see someone else -- just about anyone else -- monitor such a dialogue. The "values America was founded on" are pretty much gone with the wind.

I think that "the distinction between government and governance is too subtle" and would prefer to throw them away entirely. I would rather use a word like "dialogue" while setting up and phrases like "objective standard" as we go along. Not to impose a value that makes no sense in a given region, but to acknowledge values we already share and insisting that they apply to everyone, not just to people who look like you.

Is a hungry child in a foreign, war-torn country more or less important than a hungry kitten in my back yard?

(By the way, Afganistan had some freedoms for a while. They had educated women working as doctors and lawyers, who were suddenly forced to go home and wear their veils. It's not the majority who want to be oppressed.)

What do you think about changing the title to "taking with each other about each other" ?

I see the whole discussion went far a way from the real meaning of the proposal.

Wael

Talking with each other about each other is funny (I knew you had it in you).

But also a bit too vague to be helpful.

Please elaborate on the "real meaning of the proposal"

so we know exactly what you'd like our opinion on?

sorry, it should "taking WITH each other instead talking ABOUT each other"

the meaning goes deep to how "perception" in our mind is build. To the rule of media and politics within building any perception. Perception feed our picture of (naive) reality. Why naive? because to 99% each one of us is far a way from the facts to know what IS real. Political manipulation, media-manipulation through emotional marketing, etc. mass up facts into naive reality ..

this is one aspect.

The other aspect, each one of us has limited observation sensing-function, meanwhile it has high potential. the vantage we look through , the angle can systematically enhanced, so that we share bigger spot of common observation and EXCHANGE of SAME INFORMATION almost in real time. So it is a matter how we set-up our information flow ..

Back to the proposal:

We see how US politics influence lives of many people on this planet.

When ordinary people communicate directly their reading of US politics in countries through an interactive like "ideascale" offers here, both sides will improve prediction and common sense affect. This kind of direct dialog would be new in our global community. Western will recognize that thy can not talk ABOUT collective "Muslim world", when they are able to talk WITH Muslim person directly and find out generalization is totally missing the point and vis versa .. new way of building relationships between people will emerge, without waiting for Leaders or Media to feed up us with their products.

In my opinion this is definitely a postive measure. It help each one of us to govern better about topics we want to be involved with and open the space for mutual collaboration. As it is has global dimension I link the relation to global governance.

So what you're getting at is something that focuses on individuals in networking and learning, and expressing themselves.

The phrase "global governance" doesn't fit that well.

I remember one time you using the phrase 'radical democratic.'

I liked that, as it is vague enough to mean anything to anyone,

but also has a mysterious promise for maybe some improvements in Democracy,

namely a justly-run cyber-'Republic' built around radically new technology.