From: Reason (reason@exratio.com)
Date: Fri Jul 20 2001 - 13:58:54 MDT
--->Brian D Williams
> I think it's a serious social problem that many citizens quite
> literally have nothing "invested" in this country.
I'd agree with this; it's back to basic human psychology again. People don't
care about something unless they built it or something that they own or
value is at stake. S'why council flats and communal property are such a
horrible failure in terms of maintenance and responsibility.
Not a new idea; Heinlein advocated creating this citizen investment through
military and government service. I think I like the money idea more; it
scales better to larger populations.
Anyone read that Spinrad novel about the Blue and Pink War? It has a very
interesting democratic model, as well as some thoughts on how democracies
get destablized by the media and mass stupidity. Specifically of interest
was the concept of a government actively breaking up monopolies by providing
seed money to 'govcorps' to compete in given spaces -- i.e. basically acting
as a VC.
Reason
http://www.exratio.com/
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