[p2p-research] 10 days to go...

Sat Nov 20 03:40:31 CET 2010

Thanks Smari, definitely understandable that the focus is
Iceland/Icelandic. I'll post to smartmobs tomorrow if that is not too
late...

2010/11/19 Smári McCarthy <smari at anarchism.is>:
> I'm sorry it's taken so long to hammer this together; most of my
> material regarding the constitutional assembly is (understandably I
> hope) in Icelandic and the emphasis has been there, but I took a bit of
> time today to hack together a basic overview of the most important points...
>
> It's nowhere near comprehensive, but I hope it gives people at least a
> feel of what it is I'm trying to do. Please forgive shoddy formatting
> and typos. :-)
>
> http://www.smarimccarthy.com/issues_english.pdf
>
>  - Smári
>
>
> On 11/18/2010 04:30 PM, Samuel Rose wrote:
>> I started with this on p2p foundation blog (a combo of what I posted
>> to my facebook wall, plus Smari's text
>>
>> http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/11763/2010/11/18
>>
>> We can edit or refine it if necessary
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 9:19 AM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Smari, I started by inviting facebook friends to like your page ...
>>>
>>> Chris, I hope you have some time for this, i.e. to publish the text below,
>>> with the bio info of smari at http://p2pfoundation.net/Sm%C3%A1ri_McCarthy,
>>> and an intro paragraph, first on Ning,
>>>
>>> With this short intro text,
>>>
>>> At the P2P Foundation, we want to fully support Smári McCarthy 's candidate
>>> for the Icelandic Constitutional Assembly. I consider him, after the more
>>> single issue oriented Pirate Party (whose efforts we also appreciate), to be
>>> the first 'full P2P-free cultural candidate", so this is a historic
>>> occasion.
>>>
>>> Suggested title: Smari McCarthy, P2P Candidate for Icelandic Constitutional
>>> Assembly.
>>>
>>> (smari, now is a good time to change anything on your bio page).
>>>
>>> Smari, please also write, for future use, something on your policy approach,
>>> and why people should support it, in english,
>>>
>>> Once we have something more 'together', we can use the regular blog, which
>>> has a much larger audience,
>>>
>>> Smari, use our list to ask for support from other people, please DO NOT
>>> HESITATE,
>>>
>>> Michel
>>>
>>> 2010/11/17 Smári McCarthy <smari at immi.is>
>>>>
>>>> Hi Michel, Simona,
>>>>
>>>>  In reference to our conversation in Barcelona about my candidacy for
>>>> the Icelandic Constitutional Assembly, I'm thinking that it's about time
>>>> to invoke the P2P culture and try and rally some external awareness and
>>>> support.
>>>>
>>>>  What I'd suggest is if we can draft some kind of letter of endorsement
>>>> from the P2P community and get a bunch of signatures, then I could wave
>>>> that around here.
>>>>
>>>>  A slightly more involved but potentially useful thing would be some
>>>> kind of video clip, just a talking heads thing, with somebody speaking
>>>> about the importance of understanding of networked societies and that
>>>> this understanding be incorporated into modern state structure.
>>>>
>>>>  And then of course there's the easiest thing to do, which is to click
>>>> the "like" button on my Facebook page. 97% of Icelandic adults use
>>>> Facebook and various sites are using Facebook ranking as a measure of
>>>> popularity, despite it being an incredibly skewed estimate.
>>>>
>>>> https://www.facebook.com/pages/Smari-McCarthy-a-stjornlagabing/161452417212255?ref=ts
>>>>
>>>>  Michel, could I request that you take initiative on this on the list?
>>>> I can provide you with background information but I do feel very awkward
>>>> about asking people to support me. :P
>>>>
>>>>  Here's some initial background [sharable]:
>>>>
>>>> ----------------------
>>>>
>>>>  In 1874 Iceland received its first constitution from the Danish king
>>>> as a result of popular demand for increased home-rule. In 1918 the
>>>> country became sovereign under the Danish crown, and in 1920 a new
>>>> constitution to this effect was enacted.
>>>>
>>>>  In 1944, after being disconnected with Denmark for over a year,
>>>> Iceland proclaimed independence. A temporary constitution, mostly based
>>>> on the constitution of 1920, was accepted, with an article stating that
>>>> it should be renewed within the year.
>>>>
>>>>  Now 66 years have passed without the constitution being reevaluated.
>>>>
>>>>  After the financial crash of 2008 the Icelandic people, understanding
>>>> the need for democratic reform as well as economic reform, started to
>>>> make demands for a constitutional assembly. After the government
>>>> collapsed in early 2009 the new government coalition of the Social
>>>> Democrat Party and the Left-Green Party agreed to organize a
>>>> constitutional assembly, although for many months this idea looked like
>>>> it would be buried.
>>>>
>>>>  In late October 2009 a national assembly was held in Iceland, where
>>>> 1500 people were randomly selected from the census to work over the
>>>> course of a day to create a new set of guiding principles for Iceland.
>>>> In the aftermath it was decided in parliament that the popular demand
>>>> for a constitutional assembly was so great that the issue could no
>>>> longer be ignored.
>>>>
>>>>  On June 25th 2010 law 90/2010 was enacted creating a mandate for
>>>> general elections for a constitutional assembly consisting of 25-31
>>>> nonpartisan individuals, based on single transferable vote in addition
>>>> to a gender quota rule. The elections for this assembly are to be held
>>>> on November 27th 2010, 10 days from now.
>>>>
>>>>  The electorate is the roughly 228000 voters in Iceland, and there are
>>>> 523 individual candidates running in the election, all as individuals
>>>> although some have known connections with special interest groups,
>>>> political parties, and such. These relationships have been mapped by
>>>> various websites. Various other websites provide filtering mechanisms of
>>>> various sorts in order to help people weed out the best 25 candidates to
>>>> vote for.
>>>>
>>>>  After the elections the assembly will convene in February 2011 and
>>>> operate for 2-4 months during that year to draft a new constitution and
>>>> propose it to parliament, along with suggested adoption mechanisms and
>>>> protocols. If parliament accepts the new constitution it will be put to
>>>> a referendum.
>>>>
>>>>  There has been an alarming amount of P2P activity in relation to this
>>>> election. Campaigns are primarily being operated through social
>>>> networking sites, with a lot of pressure on candidates not to advertise
>>>> in traditional media. A lot of individuals and organizations have been
>>>> in direct contact with the various candidates in order to provide their
>>>> own arbitrary filters, and in general there is a lot of buzz, but also a
>>>> lot of uncertainty, as the number of candidates and the equidistribution
>>>> of the attention is the source of great confusion.
>>>>
>>>>  To reduce this confusion somewhat and to promote the elections as an
>>>> important step towards more direct democracy, a broad coalition of
>>>> candidates from various political leanings has joined forces to raise
>>>> awareness about the forthcoming elections, operating on amicable
>>>> grounds, and further, there are discussions about creating a "shadow
>>>> assembly" using the Shadow Parliament Project's software and
>>>> organizational mechanisms, in order to facilitate broad discussions
>>>> amongst the general public during the operation time of the assembly.
>>>>
>>>>  In short, it looks like the opportunity for Iceland is great, but
>>>> there are still a number of hurdles. It will be interesting to see the
>>>> results, and hopefully this will lead to a great democratic upheaval,
>>>> promoting and protecting networked societies in the future.
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------
>>>>
>>>>  Hope you can use some of that in some meaningful way.
>>>>
>>>>     - Smári
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
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>>>
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>>>
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>>>
>>> Think tank: http://www.asianforesightinstitute.org/index.php/eng/The-AFI
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
>>
>>
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