User:Careen2000

I believe that over the years a number of governments have evolved drastically due to the instability in political and economic factors. Nowadays everyone has the right to freely express themselves and bring forth their opinions and views. Democratic republic of Namibia

Introduction[edit | edit source]
Unleash collaboration. Almost all people on earth are ruled by obsolete government systems that were developed centuries ago. For example, the constitution of the United States was ratified in 1788, a full 50 years before the first telegram was sent by Samuel Morse in 1838, 115 years before the Wright Brothers first powered airplane flight in 1903, and 140 years before Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928, the first antibiotic.

Contents

 * 1Introduction
 * 2Objectives
 * 3Evolution
 * 4Generating Variation
 * 5Selection Pressures
 * 6Selection Criteria
 * 7Selection Forces
 * 8Possibilities
 * 9Assignment
 * 10Further Reading
 * 11References

Today we have indoor plumbing, air travel, space exploration, electric automobiles, smartphones, and advanced medical procedures. Technology evolves quickly because many innovations are subjected to selection pressures that test fitness for use. Similarly, we can accelerate the evolvability of government systems by harnessing variability and subjecting government policies to effective selection pressures.

Objectives[edit | edit source]
The objective of this course is to accelerate the evolution of governments to better serve the needs of the people as we harness the wisdom of humanity.

This is a course in the possibilities curriculum, currently being developed as part of the Applied Wisdom Curriculum.

If you wish to contact the instructor, please click here to send me an email or leave a comment or question on the discussion page.

Evolution[edit | edit source]
Evolution occurs when variability is subjected to selection pressures.

In biological evolution living organisms are selected primarily based on reproductive success. In his book The Evolution of Everything, Matt Ridley describes the evolution of the universe, morality, life, genes, culture, the economy, technology, the mind, personality, education, population, leadership, government, religion, money, the internet and the future. Each of these systems evolves based on specialized generation, variation, and selection mechanisms.

Evolvability is the capacity of a system for adaptive evolution. Evolvability increases when more variation is generated and when selection pressures are enhanced.

While these ideas are well studied in biological systems, they are not often analyzed and applied to governance systems. This course applies these concepts to governance systems.

Generating Variation[edit | edit source]
Generating variation is the first component of evolvability. There are several existing and potential sources of variation in governments. These include 1) history, 2) comparisons, 3) leadership and policy changes, and 4) experimentation. These are discussed further below.

History[edit | edit source]
Historians, political philosophers, political scientists, and others have studied the structure and results of government systems throughout human history. Political historians study the political history of the world and the history of political thought. Much is known about the results of various government approaches. By applying criteria for evaluating government results, the effectiveness of various government structures is evaluated. As we discuss in the sections on democracy, various forms of democracy have provided the best results to date.

Comparisons[edit | edit source]
Businesses routinely use benchmarking to compare the results of various industry practices and identify best practices. Policy makers, government officials, and citizens have a similar opportunity to practice comparative politics and compare the results of various governments. These are forms of natural experiments. Examples of this work include:

Several specialized comparisons study the performance of various policies. Examples include:
 * The Freedom in the World report compiled by Freedom House,
 * The Democracy Index, compiled by the Economist Intelligence Unit.
 * The Democracy ranking compiled by the Association for Development and Advancement of the Democracy Award.
 * The Index of Freedom in the World, published by Canada’s Fraser Institute.
 * Indices published by the Varieties of Democracy institute,
 * The Worldwide Governance Indicators compiled by the World Bank.
 * World Report 2022, published by Human Rights Watch,
 * The Human Development Index compiled by the United Nations, and
 * others in this list of freedom indices.Comparison of average female and male life expectancy as defined by WHO for 2019. Open the original chart in a separate tab and hover over a bubble to highlight it. The size of bubbles are proportional to country population according to estimation of the UN for 2019.


 * the education index,
 * lists of countries by literacy rates,
 * the multidimensional poverty index,
 * the world happiness report,
 * the Human Capital Index,
 * the World Health Organization ranking of health systems in 2000,
 * the list of countries by quality of healthcare published by the OECD,
 * these lists of countries by life expectancy, and
 * this list of countries by intentional homicide rate.

Assignment[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Find your country on one of the reports or indices listed above, or on some other reliable ranked evaluation.
 * 2) If your country is ranked at the top, congratulations; enjoy your country’s success, and consider sharing successful ideas and policies with others.
 * 3) Otherwise, study the policy in place at the highest-ranking countries and work to have them enacted appropriately in your country.
 * 4) Perform a gap analysis by identifying the gaps existing between your performance and the best performances.
 * 5) Work to close those gaps.

Leadership and Policy Changes[edit | edit source]
Leadership changes occur because of term limits, elections, succession, coups, or revolution. This provides citizens and researchers with an opportunity to evaluate the results obtained by one leader compared to others. This comparison is often difficult because of the complexity of government and the need to distinguish between local and global effects and short term and long-term effects. Access to reliable information regarding the effectiveness of various policies is often difficult to obtain and evaluate due to propaganda, unreliable reporting, media bias, limited data availability, and the effort required to collect, analyze, and interpret the data. In addition, each of us is constrained by our bounded rationality—the limited capacity of people to direct attention to these issues and make optimal decisions.

Policy changes also take place and provide opportunities and difficulties like those in evaluating leadership changes.

Experimentation[edit | edit source]
An experiment is a procedure carried out to determine the effectiveness of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs when a particular factor is manipulated. Experiments vary greatly in goal and scale but always rely on a repeatable procedure and logical analysis of the results.

In a laboratory experiment condition are controlled, one factor to be studied is manipulated and the results are recorded, analyzed, studied, and reported. It is rarely feasible to carry out such experiments in social settings because of the difficulties and ethical concerns of manipulating groups of people. Natural experimental studies are used in these cases.

A randomized controlled trial (RCT) or Randomized Field Trial (RFT) is a form of scientific experiment used to control factors not under direct experimental control. Examples of RCTs are clinical trials that compare the effects of drugs, surgical techniques, medical devices, diagnostic procedures, or other medical treatments.

Participants who enroll in RCTs differ from one another in known and unknown ways that can influence study outcomes, and yet cannot be directly controlled. By randomly allocating participants among compared treatments, an RCT enables statistical control over these influences. Provided it is designed well, conducted properly, and enrolls enough participants, an RCT may achieve sufficient control over these confounding factors to deliver a useful comparison of the treatments studied.

Randomly controlled trials can be used to conduct social experiments, as the following examples show.

The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) is an excellent example of using experimentation to inform policy decisions. The lab is a global research center working to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence. J-PAL conducts randomized impact evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty, and builds partnerships with governments, NGOs, donors, and others to generate new research, share knowledge, and scale up effective programs.

Other organizations conducting actionable research using social experiments include the EdRedesign Lab, and the work of John A. List in performing field experiments in economics.

Experiments in government are carried out in various national and local settings. Ongoing experiments include:


 * Rank choice voting, also known as instant-runoff voting, is a type of ranked preferential voting. It uses a majority voting rule in single-winner elections where there are more than two candidates. It has a significant and growing history of use around the world, including within the United States where it is advocated by the FairVote organization.
 * The FairVote organization advocates within the United States for:
 * Fair Representation Voting,
 * Ranked Choice Voting,
 * the Constitutional Right to Vote, and
 * the National Popular Vote.
 * The Institute for Political Innovation advocates for:
 * Final-Five Voting which is a variation of a Top-four primary soon to be used in Alaska, and
 * Zero-Based Rule Making which promises to eliminate constraints on thinking and open new possibilities for solving problems. This proposal is modeled on zero-based budgeting practices often used in business settings.
 * Liquid democracy is a form of delegative democracy, whereby an electorate engages in collective decision-making through direct participation and dynamic representation. This democratic system utilizes elements of both direct and representative democracy. Voters in a liquid democracy have the right to vote directly on all policy issues as in a direct democracy; voters also have the option to delegate their votes to someone who will vote on their behalf as in representative democracy. Any individual may be delegated votes (those delegated votes are termed "proxies") and these proxies may in turn delegate their vote as well as any votes they have been delegated by others resulting in "metadelegation". Several implementations are being used.
 * The GovLab is relying on reproducible experiments and metrics to better understand what works (and what doesn’t) and to translate theory and hypotheses into actionable insights. They collaborate and connect with experts and practitioners across sectors and disciplines, levels of government, and geographies to learn how to govern more effectively and legitimately.
 * Several pilot programs are underway to experiment with various forms of Universal Basic Income.
 * The Forward Party is a political action committee (PAC) that seeks to form a new centrist political party in the United States.

Author Jim Manzi advocates institutionalized social experimentation. Decentralized experimentation would be encouraged and would be subjected to standardized experimental evaluation and reporting to Congress. He suggests conducting as many social policy randomized controlled trials as we do clinical trials, about 10,000 each year.

Assignment[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Choose some local setting where you can run an experiment. This may be a student council election, a committee appointment, a local election, or some other arena.
 * 2) Choose an innovation from the above list, or some other source.
 * 3) Run a trial of the chosen innovation in the chosen setting. For example, use rank choice voting to select the student class president at a local school.
 * 4) Reflect on what was learned from that experiment.
 * 5) Consider how larger experiments can be carried out.
 * 6) Engage with at least one of the organizations mentioned above.
 * 7) Work with them to evolve government.

Selection Pressures[edit | edit source]
The evolution of government will depend on the selection pressures each government system is subjected to. Selection pressures have two parts 1) selection criteria—identifying what we want—and 2) selection forces—making changes that progress toward the selection criteria. These are the system feedback mechanisms. Each is described below.

Selection Criteria[edit | edit source]
Selection criteria form the basis for choosing the best alternative from several available choices. Evolution is accelerated when useful selection criteria are coupled with effective selection forces. In this section we develop useful criteria for selecting the best government options.

Selecting Leaders[edit | edit source]
It may be easier to select wise leaders than it is to understand, evaluate, and select various policy options.

Assignment[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Assess the intellectual honesty of the candidates. Eliminate any candidate that is not intellectually honest.
 * 2) Assess the moral reasoning of the candidates. Eliminate any candidate that does not consistently demonstrate well developed moral reasoning.
 * 3) Complete the Assessing Wisdom section of the Wikiversity course on Wisdom.
 * 4) Follow the instructions and complete the wisdom assessment form to evaluate the viable candidates. Establish a rank ordering of the most attractive candidates.
 * 5) Consider supporting, campaigning, and voting for the candidate that scores best. Act to place wise leaders in office.
 * 6) Make these important decisions wisely.

Policy-based Selections[edit | edit source]
In addition to choosing wise leaders, it is helpful to advocate for policy positions that lead to good government and good governance.

The United Nations is playing an increasing role in promoting good governance. According to former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, "Good governance is ensuring respect for human rights and the rule of law; strengthening democracy; promoting transparency and capacity in public administration." To implement this, the UN follows eight principles:


 * Participation – People can voice their own opinions through legitimate intermediate organizations or representatives.
 * Rule of Law – Legal frameworks are enforced impartially, especially on human right laws.
 * Consensus Orientation– Differing interests are mediated to meet the broad consensus on the best interests of a community.
 * Equity and Inclusiveness – People have opportunities to improve or maintain their well-being.
 * Effectiveness and Efficiency – Processes and institutions produce results that meet the needs of their community while making the best of their resources.
 * Accountability – Governmental institutions, private sectors, and civil society organizations are held accountable to the public and institutional stakeholders.
 * Transparency – Information is accessible to the public and is understandable and monitored.
 * Responsiveness – Institutions and processes serve all stakeholders.

Going beyond these general principles, good government is most likely to mean supporting policies that strengthen the democratic processes.

Defining Democracy[edit | edit source]
Although not necessarily the best possible governance system, democracy is widely acknowledged as the most effective governance system in wide use today. For example, Derek Bok states “In this regard, it is noteworthy that almost all the countries in the world that rank highest in overall satisfaction with life have been successful democracies for more than 80 years.”

Although democracy is generally understood to be defined by voting, no consensus exists on a precise definition of democracy. Karl Popper says that the "classical" view of democracy is "in brief, the theory that democracy is the rule of the people, and that the people have a right to rule." Kofi Annan states that "there are as many different forms of democracy as there are democratic nations in the world." One study identified 2,234 adjectives used in the English language to describe democracy.

Democratic principles require all eligible citizens being equal before the law and having equal access to legislative processes. For example, in a representative democracy, every vote has equal weight, no unreasonable restrictions can apply to anyone seeking to become a representative, and the freedom of its eligible citizens is secured by legitimized rights and liberties which are typically protected by a constitution.

Freedom House provides this characterization of democracy:"“Democracy means more than just majority rule, however. In its ideal form, it is a governing system based on the will and consent of the governed, institutions that are accountable to all citizens, adherence to the rule of law, and respect for human rights. It is a network of mutually reinforcing structures in which those exercising power are subject to checks both within and outside the state, for example, from independent courts, an independent press, and civil society. It requires an openness to alternations in power, with rival candidates or parties competing fairly to govern for the good of the public as a whole, not just themselves or those who voted for them. It creates a level playing field so that all people, no matter the circumstances of their birth or background, can enjoy the universal human rights to which they are entitled and participate in politics and governance.”"

Characteristics of Democracy[edit | edit source]
Women practice voting in Dayton Oct. 27, 1920 Freedom House has established detailed criteria for evaluating various forms of democracy. These criteria are summarized below:

Electoral process.[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Was the current head of government or other chief national authority elected through free and fair elections? Considerations include independent election monitoring, adequate time for candidates to enter and campaign, accurate registration of voters, inclusion of women and minority candidates, opportunities for candidates to address voters, make speeches, hold public meetings, and obtain media access, use of secret ballot, lack of pressure or voter intimidation, transparent vote counting, access to voting places, and the peaceful transfer of power.
 * 2) Were the current national legislative representatives elected through free and fair elections? The considerations are like the above.
 * 3) Are the electoral laws and framework fair, and are they implemented impartially by the relevant election management bodies? Considerations include use of a fair legislative framework for conducting elections, an independent election commission, universal suffrage, fair election districts, and fair procedures for electoral reform.

Political Pluralism and Participation[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Do the people have the right to organize in different political parties or other competitive political groupings of their choice, and is the system free of undue obstacles to the rise and fall of these competing parties or groupings? Considerations include opportunities to form political parties, freedom to hold meetings, rallies, and obtain media access, fair and equitable rules for party financing, freedom of peaceful assembly, and opportunities for independent candidates.
 * 2) Is there a realistic opportunity for the opposition to increase its support or gain power through elections? Considerations include freedom of opposition parties to increase their support base and compete in elections, are opposition parties in positions of authority, and is there a significant opposition vote?
 * 3) Are the people’s political choices free from domination by forces that are external to the political sphere, or by political forces that employ extrapolitical means? Considerations include lack of intimidation by military, foreign powers, oligarchies, criminal organizations, or other powerful groups, absence of bribery, corruption, improper quid pro quo, or other improper influences, lack of dominant political donors, transparent campaign financing, and accountability to the voters.
 * 4) Do various segments of the population (including ethnic, racial, religious, gender, LGBT+, and other relevant groups) have full political rights and electoral opportunities? Considerations include addressing minority issues, participation of minority groups in political life, full inclusion of women, and citizenship opportunities for minorities.

Functioning of government[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Do the freely elected head of government and national legislative representatives determine the policies of the government? Considerations include installation of the elected officials into office, ability to form a functioning government, non-interference by nonstate actors, lack of military influence on government operations, independence of the executive and legislative branches, and frequency of bipartisan actions.
 * 2) Are safeguards against official corruption strong and effective? Considerations include effectiveness of anticorruption laws and programs, independent oversight and auditing, investigation of alleged corruption, and whistleblower protections.
 * 3) Does the government operate with openness and transparency? Considerations include ability of citizens to obtain accurate information about state operations, ability to petition government agencies for information, publication of state information, ability to access and comment on pending legislations, public review of budget processes, transparency in awarding contracts, and public scrutiny of government officials’ financial disclosure.

Additional discretionary political rights question[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Is the government or occupying power deliberately changing the ethnic composition of a country or territory so as to destroy a culture or tip the political balance in favor of another group? Considerations include providing incentives to change the ethnic composition of a region, forcibly moving people into or out of certain regions, and arresting or killing members of certain ethnic groups.

Freedom of Expression and belief[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Are there free and independent media? Considerations include media censorship, pressure or surveillance, punishment of journalists, freedom of speech regarding criticism of government officials, government control of media, editorial independence, nonpartisan coverage, government influence of media coverage, involvement of women and minorities, free expression in works of literature, and other cultural expressions.
 * 2) Are individuals free to practice and express their religious faith or nonbelief in public and private? Considerations include freedom of religious institutions to function, freedom from harassment of minority faith members, lack of government involvement in appointing religious leaders, freedom to distribute religious writings, freedom to construct and occupy religious buildings, lack of government involvement in religious education, and freedom to eschew religious beliefs and practices.
 * 3) Is there academic freedom, and is the educational system free from extensive political indoctrination? Considerations include freedom of educators to pursue political activities, non-interference in school curriculums, fair allocation of funding, freedom of student associations to pursue political activities, and freedom of students to support candidates of their choice.
 * 4) Are individuals free to express their personal views on political or other sensitive topics without fear of surveillance or retribution? Considerations include the ability to engage in discussions, including political discussions, in public, or private places, including online communications, and lack of surveillance of antigovernment conversations.

Associational and organizational rights[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Is there freedom of assembly? Considerations include freedom to protest peacefully, lack of intimidation or harassment of peaceful protesters, censorship of peaceful protester’s communications, and freedom to petition the public,
 * 2) Is there freedom for nongovernmental organizations, particularly those that are engaged in human rights– and governance-related work? Considerations include ease of creating nongovernment organizations, fair rules for financing the work, and freedom from government intimidation or harassment.
 * 3) Is there freedom for trade unions and similar professional or labor organizations? Considerations include unfettered formation and operation of trade unions, lack of pressure to join or not join certain trade unions, ability to strike without reprisals, collective bargaining, and free operation of professional organizations.

Rule of Law[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Is there an independent judiciary? Considerations include noninterference by the executive branch or other influences, fair appointment of judges, impartial rulings by judges, compliance with judicial decisions, and the absence of powerful influences over judicial decisions.
 * 2) Does due process prevail in civil and criminal matters? Considerations include presumption of innocence, access to effective counsel, fair trial, fair access to the court system, independent prosecutors, fair and effective law enforcement, and upholding of due process without interference.
 * 3) Is there protection from the illegitimate use of physical force and freedom from war and insurgencies? Considerations include absence of excessive force during arrest and detainment, humane conditions in pretrial detention facilities and prisons, effective redress of abuse, absence of corporal punishment, minimal application of capital punishment, lack of violent crime, and safety for the population.
 * 4) Do laws, policies, and practices guarantee equal treatment of various segments of the population? Considerations include the ability of distinctive or minority groups to exercise their human rights, lack of violence against such groups, lack of discrimination against such groups, granting of asylum, and protection of human rights.

Personal autonomy and individual rights[edit | edit source]

 * 1) Do individuals enjoy freedom of movement, including the ability to change their place of residence, employment, or education? Considerations include freedom of foreign travel, freedom of movement within the country, lack of bribery and other corruption, safe travel, and equal rights for women.
 * 2) Are individuals able to exercise the right to own property and establish private businesses without undue interference from state or nonstate actors? Considerations include the ability to purchase or sell land and other property, equal rights for women, lack of favoritism, cronyism, bribery, extortion, and other forms of corruption, and ease of doing business,
 * 3) Do individuals enjoy personal social freedoms, including choice of marriage partner and size of family, protection from domestic violence, and control over appearance? Considerations include lack of personal and domestic violence, freedom to marry your chosen partner, fair divorce and child custody decisions, and free choice of dress and appearance.
 * 4) Do individuals enjoy equality of opportunity and freedom from economic exploitation? Considerations include lack of worker exploitation, economic opportunity, fair competition, and absence of human trafficking.

While the Freedom House characteristics of democracy criteria are extensive, a more extensive set of criteria is used by the V-Dem institute to evaluate democracies around the world. Their document “V-Dem Methodology v11.1” describes their methodology in detail. Interested students can study that document for more detail.

Other authors advocate for additional characteristics including increasing human capital through more effective and relevant education, improving our shared knowledge base, increasing emotional intelligence, and increasing our collective intelligence.,

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