Delegative democracy

Liquid Democracy is a mixture of representative and direct democracy. The model can also be interpreted as a further development of the concept of e- democracy.

• 3.1 Trust as a non- transitive relationship
• 3.2 impossibility to conduct secret and at the same time can not be manipulated votes
• 3.3 Illusion greater participation of citizens in the decision-making process
• 3.4 risk of mood democracy
• 3.5 loss of seriousness by trivialization of the voting process
• 3.6 The digital divide
• 3.7 Under current law, only excitation character of the voting results

• 4.1 German law 4.1.1 inviolability of the "special branches of the legislature "
• 4.1.2 issue of voting machines
• 4.1.3 Bid secret ballot and the possibility of using secret voting

Features

The term Liquid Democracy called a "new form of democracy, are in various rigid ' boundaries, liquefied ' ". Liquid Democracy should enable the citizens to specifically decide on individual acts rather than only by the parties mediated " complete solutions", and give them the opportunity to participate in the formation of the texts.

In the " liquid democracy " is not a voter for four or five years ( in mayoral elections even for an even longer period of time) with his voice at the same time, the decision-making power from on matters of substance, but the citizens keeps his voice constantly "in the flow ", that is, he decides case by case when he wants to delegate his voice and when he would prefer to vote in person.

In the first case, the voice of the voters followed by an examination by selbigem setting for the specific case of the voice of the mandate selected carrier. In some variants of the Liquid Democracy is also a delegation to groups, such as a party, are provided. This process is called Delegated voting. In the second case, a modernized version of direct democracy is used in which the voter has to go to vote no local or deliver postal ballot paper, but tunes on the computer.

For the " liquefaction" the tuning various software solutions have been developed. From the German Pirate Party use " Liquid Feedback " is used to access over the Internet to internal party decisions. In addition, the program " adhocracy " is used for intra-party decision-making processes (eg of the SPD and the Left Party ). Representatives of the FDP value the finding that the development of these participatory tool " New Democracy" had nothing to do with the theory of Liquid Democracy, as the party's idea of ​​Delegated Voting generally rejected.

Representatives of the Pirate Party Berlin emphasize that the Liquid Democracy decisions should not even be liquid, but a decision must be clearly established at a particular time and be resilient.

Jennifer Paetsch, a board member of the association Liquid Democracy eV, however, denies that the above lectured vision of a complete liquefaction of the political system of Germany stands on the political agenda in the short term: "For us it 's not about to make representative democracy obsolete or replace. Our aim is to create interfaces in the existing parliaments and to supplement the existing methods. "

The concept of Liquid Democracy in the sense of a consistent bottom -up policy, losing by the party leaders and elected officials in power, implies far-reaching modifications to the organization of the institutions or authorities in which it should be applied. At the same time the new concept of political decision-making in a new theory of the state would have to be integrated. Simon Wolfer, a temporary employee at Liquid Democracy eV, admits that the theorists of the Liquid Democracy still " far away " are a " mature " than to present valid state concept. Moreover, you should democracy " not necessarily as head of state, but above all as an investment concept in all areas of society " are considered.

Developed in the context of the Liquid Democracy discourse tools to be used, according to representatives of established parties for a top-down policy, ie as tools for " real decision beneficiaries" (ie councilors, members of parliament, the State executive, local government, party, party executives, etc.) more effectively than in the past to know the opinion of the respective base and demand support from them. This possibility is foreseen in the project Liquid Friesland in the form of " administrative procedures ", but also in performances in the ranks of the Junge Union Hessen to implement policy field parliaments in their ranks. For this, it is to apply the restriction: "In order not to restrict the decision-making ability of the JU, therefore areas need to be defined, in which we get by living grassroots democracy means Adhocracy support for our policy work and new ideas. "

Liquid Democracy as a mixed form of democracy

Meanwhile, three directions of the Theory of Liquid Democracy have emerged that differ by the answer to the question of how "real existing " with the system of representative democracy is to be traversed.

Extensive waiver of MPs

One radical school of thought according to there should be no MPs who decide all pending issues in place of their voters for four or five years. The aversion to traditional MEP brings January Huwald, in 2007 CEO of the German Pirate Party, embodied in the fact that he rated as " selected on time oligarchs." In an accelerating world approval ratings changed "in the month clock ". The " bundle of choice " (ie the necessity to legitimize all the solutions to open-ended questions, which offers a party, by the choice of this party ), is considered unacceptable because parliamentarians are increasingly overwhelmed by the complex world and the " oversized bureaucracies " the actual authors of the texts, were inferior. Therefore, it makes sense to issue from time to time such persons for a limited time and with a right of withdrawal mandate held by the competent authority for sufficiently for the solution of those problems at issue in a particular case. According to this direction Liquid Democracy is a direct democratic system, which was supplemented by representative elements.

Delegation systems are considered as a necessary evil: it they had to be because ever stand a variety of legislative changes on the agenda and it was the citizens alone for reasons of time impossible to find out about all the projects. Therefore a stay voters when he recognized his lack of expertise, no other choice but to delegate his vote to a person of his confidence. Such persons would but. Because of the always-on withdrawal mandate even if they united many votes, not nearly the power that possesses a deputy

Sebastian Jabbusch, former chairman of the Pirate Party of Mecklenburg- Vorpommern, for example, provides seriously -meant question: " [W ] he should look a Liquid Democracy society? If in Parliament only a great Liquid Democracy computer stand, announces the results of voting every few hours? "

From the ranks of those who reject integration of instruments of Liquid Democracy in the existing constitution, strong criticism of the model experiment Liquid Friesland was practiced against direct democracy can be no question, if the results of public participation on Liquid Feedback as mere " suggestions " in the meaning of § 34 of the Lower Saxony municipal constitutional law would be assessed.

Basic acceptance of the existence of parliaments

The association Liquid Democracy eV accepted in the context of the theory of direct parliamentary system, in principle, the existing representative, normalized by German law, in particular by the German party system of mandatory law decisions by MPs, especially in state parliaments and the Bundestag. Therefore, the association expressly declares: "We do not want to replace the general election. " The " government representatives " should, however be regularly involved in discourses that currently take place in society, and be based on their results. Of particular importance for any kind are subject policy field parliaments that deal exclusively with the issue in question.

Such a process put also represent a modernization of the traditional direct democracy in which citizens are given the opportunity to make binding decisions on matters of substance. In the case of civil and referendum but find a discourse on the draft legislation to be agreed in advance rather than just between the initiators and competent representatives. Citizens had during direct parliamentary bring good chance their own ideas for improvement and alternative proposals in this discourse, especially when they would a member of a policy field Parliament, which is easily possible. Participation is easily possible for each through the use of information technology today.

Leonhard Dobusch doubts that it ever go in the model of Liquid Democracy primarily to grassroots democracy. The key is, rather, that by collecting votes in the context of Delegated Voting arises a new interpretation of the nature of representation.

Liquid Democracy as an intra -partisan organization principle

The clubs Public Software Group eV and Interactive Democracy eV see the realistic path to greater participation in the fundamental renewal of decision making in political parties. Liquid Democracy can members gain immediate impact and thereby make parties more attractive for citizens. Consequently, the software LiquidFeedback for roll-call votes in parties and clubs has been developed. A commitment to citizen participation is advocated as an additional channel to elected representatives, if (as in Liquid Friesland) only authorized users can log exactly once, the participants can identify with each other and made ​​a realistic statement about the political consequences of the investment. By contrast, they preclude any binding commitment in the legislature.

Criticism

Trust as a non- transitive relationship

A first criticism refers to the ability of delegates to pass entrusted to them under Delegated Voting voice. This results in the ability to " chain delegations " and the accumulation of votes at each voting results by pre-determined by users, automatic voting. As a " super delegates " apply for a definition of the Pirate Party such delegates who have received a power of attorney to vote at least ten percent of the voters. While it is for each participant at any time to see how his voice was used, but surprising votes cast by the delegates may not be subsequently reversed. However, each time very quickly changed the delegation chain or delegate the power of attorney be revoked for voting so that everyone still just before the vote is given the opportunity, but tune itself.

To form on the way to " chain delegations ," is criticized, among other things, that people delegate their vote because a personal relationship of trust between them and the delegates there. However, this process is not transitive if he was mostly emotional reasons. Thus it follows from the sentences: " Fritz Love Lisa " and " Lisa loves John" is not the phrase: " Fritz loves Hans ". A "Transit" (transition ) of love does not exist. If a relationship of trust based on popularity and not on rational grounds, then is the conclusion: " A trusts B and B trusts C; So familiar A C " inadmissible. Therefore chain delegations were problematic. On the second national congress of the Pirate Party of Bavaria in 2012 why the request was made, " dampen " the weight of transitive delegations.

Impossibility to perform, secret, and at the same time can not be manipulated votes

Secret and also tamper-resistant elections are not possible digitally. The secret ballot is, however, with the concept of Liquid Democracy anyway is in stark contradiction, so very doubtful that it was ever intended. Liquid Democracy is characterized by the possibility of one's own tuning behavior of another ( automatically if desired and in any case at any time revocable) to be able to adapt to. This possibility would be absurd, if not trust formed through visibility of voting and control would allow. That secret yet abuse resistant elections are not possible digitally, is currently undisputed. This is a correct statement, but in terms of Liquid Democracy is inappropriate because it fails to recognize the nature of the Liquid Democracy. Even if a secret digital voting would be possible, it would be inconsistent with the concept of Liquid Democracy, as the above essentials of Liquid Democracy would be undermined by the. In other words, a program for secret voting could not be called more than Liquid Democracy.

About digital Elections: A " digital ballot box " has not yet been developed, and it will probably never exist. This means that on the one hand (before the vote ) would have to be checked the identity of the vocal willing, in the case of voting rights, his vote would have to be registered and it registered original documents have to be handed over, he should be able to mark unobserved. While observing these documents would have to be thrown through the ballot box slot, which would make them anonymous. Still, should be able to be controlled by a certain time interval, who participated in the vote if the number of voters matches the number of ballots and whether they were counted correctly. Even with postal voting original election papers with initially undetectable cross -setting unique to specific individuals can be assigned. Their identity and entitlement to vote can thereby be clearly established. For the enumeration, however, can the fact that in this case they have passed an anonymizing urn slit the documents not be reconstructed, who did the voice. Both voting procedure can not be completely replicated digitally.

If you want to so perform verifiable electronic voting, they must be held as an open vote with identities that are linked to other participants sufficiently with the voting people. In this way would be determined at each vote, if all voters were eligible to vote and only so many voices have given, as they were allowed to leave. Lockable would also, if anyone has participated in the vote and ( if so ) how he voted. Fear of social pressure could (as with traditional open Voters ) induce voting, group Compliant vote. That interpretation can be partially explained by the ability to speak out for a secret ballot, encounter. Low Zustimmungsquoren to refer a matter to the secret ballot on an offline tuning to address this problem partially.

The use of Liquid Feedback for " secret" votes will be rejected by the developers of the software mainly because of the manipulation associated risks. Nevertheless, it can be stated that there is still no known case in the Liquid feedback from operators and was referred to the secret ballot suitable. The contrary is clearly seen that the voting behavior can be observed.

The Friedrich -Ebert- Foundation criticized the approach of the Liquid Democracy as " inconsistent": The three core values ​​of the Pirate Party, namely, political transparency, political participation and Privacy did not want to put together in this triad. Although one could think together political transparency and Privacy thoroughly. The precondition for this is that there is a clear boundary between " politicians " and " citizens." As could be expected from the politicians that he transparently make his actions because he is ex officio and power for the second category, the "citizen", responsible draw, could be the contrary granted to the citizens the opacity of his action because his work and his power was limited. That interpretation can be argued that the citizen has always been always will be a politician when he runs policy. In this respect the boundary between citizens and politicians from registration can be drawn in such a system.

Illusion of greater participation of citizens in the decision-making process

The partially embraced hope, by Liquid Democracy would be a greater citizen participation as accessible by citizens or petition is not covered by the reality: September 19, 2012, the German Pirate Party had claims to 34 043 members. When voting platform " Liquid Feedback " were registered at that time only 10,807 members. It was found in Liquid Feedback no vote, in which more than 800 members had participated. Most of them were less than 300, less than one percent of all members. The Pirate Party of Austria, in which a largely identical voting platform is used, the percentage of Pirate Party members who are active also in coordination platform Liquid Feedback, however, is significantly higher. This may be due to the fact that at the Pirate Party of Austria, in contrast to its German sister party digital voting results directly result in a change of the program, the Rules or the statutes.

In the initial phase of the Liquid Friesland project have applied for an access code to Liquid feedback from the approximately 100,000 inhabitants of the district of Friesland 450 citizens. Her voice have given vote per case between 20 and 50 Fries countries. County politicians hinted that they only appear a continuation of the project as useful if some would take regularly at least 100 to 200 Fries countries in a vote.

However, some critics doubt anyway that there is a desire for more opportunities to participate ( via the Internet ) existed in the majority of the population: 50 percent of the population interested in very little for politics. You would see at most TV news and went to the polls. Not even the triumph of the Internet have not changed in the slightest. The "passive mainstreamers " neither speak with friends about politics yet they would read the policy section of the newspaper. You also never contributed to a political blog and never signed an online petition. Bildungsferne layers not also participated in the network hardly the political dialogue, even when they were young and Youtube - tested. Much of mainly older politically aware of the digital divide is concerned ( see below). The policy should not make the mistake to keep the results of online discussions for a representative opinion average. In a compilation of different models of citizen participation, the Leadership Academy Baden- Württemberg are the following Judgment of the model from Liquid Democracy: "His great weakness is [ ... ] the adoption of politicized citizens as a rule. In fact finds policy on the internet but only in a small niche rather than production, with at most a new playground for the outside of the Internet politically interested and active. " The here postulated " assumption of the politicized citizens as a rule, " however, is also a blank adoption. On the contrary: At a meeting of the SPD - affiliated Friedrich Ebert Foundation in November 2011, the thesis was represented, every conceivable variant of democracy would lead in practice to a " dictatorship of the assets ." This could not be otherwise in the case of Liquid Democracy.

Risk of mood democracy

As with any form of democracy, the fear of ochlocracy ( mob rule ) can also lead to the meeting, as Aristotle put it.

Accordingly, fundamental exercises Laszlo Trankovits criticism of the concept of Liquid Democracy: "It's a fluke of history that we have the solid framework of representative democracy in Germany. The system of checks and balances should allow carefully weighed policy-making, reduce the rush of modern life, perspective can allow or 'sustainable' concepts. Who decides must be at least politically can be held responsible - that would be a blur possible in a direct democracy. The more the citizens influenced, the more the system threatens to degenerate into a future- blind mood democracy. [ ... ] The pirates must prove that they are more than the institutionalized expression of the claim to power of the ignorant still. "

Burkhard Schröder brings this criticism by saying to the point: "Direct participation of all always gives [ ... ] not necessarily mean better results but can only feel good all over. " Problem here is the Dunning - Kruger effect, ie the fact that often their incompetence were in reality Incompetent unaware and therefore not delegated their vote, even though they could not properly assess a complex issue at hand.

Jürgen Manemann subjects the underlying understanding of rationality of a review: " The model of liquid democracy is a particular notion of rationality based on the based on the concept of collective intelligence, which is based on the assumption that better solutions are found when many take few involved in decisions. Collective Intelligence contains great potential in fact to come to right decisions. it is, however, geared primarily to solutions which are based on public information -based knowledge and / or common everyday experiences, which allow the behavior of other. foresee the basis of collective intelligence are initially independently decisive people. from the sum of individual interests, an average is taken, then the best solution. collective intelligence can in this respect very well come to relatively unanimous and the matter appropriate solutions. In this sense, nothing is also object to the concept. But behind the collective intelligence is not plugged an aligned on a common good general will. The concept of collective intelligence is not able to preserve the common good from being undermined by vested interests. In politics it comes to questions that can not be solved with the help of collective intelligence, because there is not the solution to these questions. ".

Loss of seriousness by trivialization of the voting process

Bernd Guggenheimer finally can not imagine that in a fun society in which the judgments of citizens often more aesthetic ("Like " ) follow as rational criteria, " someone who is very fast times between the first self- draft beer and a straight up early eve - game Show latches, might have something to bring Groundbreaking and Bestandverbürgendes " in the process of policy formulation.

Digital Divide

At most, one-fifth of people living in Germany German people fourteen years was internetaffin in the sense that they use the Internet not only as a retrieval medium, but as a space for different activities in the sense of a social network.

The biggest hurdle for the rapid introduction of software-based online democracy a la Liquid Democracy is the associated preference of those sectors of the population, who possessed a greater competence or affinity to digital technologies and the Internet. They also state that the principle desirable ability to actively intervene with the help of Liquid Democracy in discourses that these problems exacerbate, if not only the decision but also the decision accompanying discourse largely expire taught online, the disadvantage of those groups potenziere the were particularly affected by digital divide.

On the other hand, it is certainly state that any form of democracy has preconditions for participation. For example, children, young people and foreigners have no right to participate in parliamentary elections. The traditional party democracy sets for the participation of individuals ahead regularly, that this (r) is physically present, often at a disadvantage working people compared to non- professionals. Likewise, for example, sick people, or financially disadvantaged de facto less opportunity to assert their ideas in the political process, as healthy or wealthy people.

Markus Schlegel, a proponent of Liquid Democracy in the ranks of the SPD, recommends: "With all the enthusiasm for electronic debates on the Internet, the traditional local associations must continue to be a forum for discussion, because all members - even those without Internet access - must have equal opportunities, their opinion a hearing to be. "

Under current law, only excitation character of the voting results

Currently the application of Liquid Democracy may be due to lack of legal bases, the traditional direct democracy does not modernize, as binding decisions can be made only with the help of citizens and referenda, while voting with the help of Liquid feedback and other tools in the areas in which the Basic Law, a state constitution, a municipal constitution or the Political Parties Act are applicable, only the status of " suggestions " have.

In a motion of the regional association Rhein- Main as well as the district associations Frankfurt, Offenbach, Maingau, Main -Kinzig and the Urban Community of Neu-Isenburg the Junge Union, to implement policy field parliaments in the Hessian JU, the Board will veto directly democratically adopted resolutions of policy field parliaments authority. Reason: " [ W] ecause he represents all JU members, the decision of the Board is effective and not voting recommendation [ of the policy field Parliament ], the Management Board has therefore vote against the recommendation of veto. "

Legal standards

German law

Inviolability of the "special branches of the legislature "

Article 79, paragraph 3 of the German Basic Law shall designate the pillars of the free democratic basic order, which should itself are not modified by a unanimous decision. Among the features of this basic order belongs to a ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court in 1952 the principle of popular sovereignty. The principle of popular sovereignty is regulated in Article 20, paragraph 2 of the Basic Law (GG). The provision reads as follows:

Moreover, it was on a " political camp", which was held in Berlin in September 2012, made ​​clear that " [ ...] [ t] he addition of the decision-making and the control of the executive legislative [ ... ] " incumbent. Accordingly, the abolition of parliaments would constitute a violation of article 79, paragraph 3 also by GG of change protected principle of separation of powers.

A complete elimination of the "special branches of the legislature ," especially of the Bundestag and the Bundesrat as constitutional bodies in the course of a radical interpretation of the principle of Liquid Democracy would be unconstitutional.

Problem of voting machines

On 3 March 2009 the Federal Constitutional Court issued a ruling on the use of voting machines in federal elections: The Second Senate decided that the use of electronic voting machines requires that the essential steps of the voting and results analysis can be checked by the civil reliably and without special expertise. Here, the control of the voting and the counting of votes is of particular importance. While in the conventional ballot vote manipulation or electoral fraud under the framework of the existing rules only with considerable effort and with a preventive acting very high risk of detection are certainly possible programming errors in the software or targeted electoral fraud by manipulating the software with electronic voting machines are difficult to see. The large width effect of possible errors in the voting machines or targeted electoral fraud commands special precautions to preserve the public nature of elections. If the election results determined by computer-controlled processing of data stored in an electronic memory voices, it is not sufficient when using a summary paper printout or an electronic display only the result of the carried out in the voting machine calculation process can be noted.

The Chaos Computer Club is quoted by the Constitutional Court with the following assessment:

The stringent requirements of the Federal Constitutional Court for the conduct of federal elections are, in principle, analogous to all applicable elections, which must be secret according to § 15 paragraph 2 of the Law on Political Parties. The same goes for secret ballots on request, which also provides the Political Parties Act; this should only be carried out in general meetings. Note also the order of the inner-party democracy under Article 21 paragraph 1 GG, which is elaborated by the Political Parties Act.

Bid secret ballot and the possibility of using secret voting

The controversial question of whether there is an opposite change in ways protected, derivable from the right to informational self- determination fundamental right of citizens to be able to choose secret and vote, or be whether the bids secret ballot and the ability to carry out secret ballots, overridden allowed.

The Federal Arbitration Court of the Pirate Party holds open voting then for harmless if the voting data is only accessible internally party, as demanded by § 28 Section 9, Clause 4 of the Federal Data Protection Act. Patrizia also seal and Alexandra Tsesis doubt that the five principles of electoral law of Article Article 38 paragraph 1 shall be taken on the decision-making within parties unchanged: It is beyond dispute that the requirement for immediacy should not be applied to parties - the right to conduct meetings of delegates, is guaranteed by the Political Parties Act. This suggests that other principles of electoral law must be modified when applied to the decision-making within parties.

The Berlin Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information, however, states: " [A ] us the democratic self-determination right of a party does not follow that absolutely any kind of electronic internal party decision-making must be permitted. Rather interprets Article 21 paragraph 1 sentence 3 GG even suggest that a verfassungslegitimes interest of individual party members, especially those of the intra-party minority, in the confidentiality of information about their political opinions may be. "

International Law

The Switzerland had in connection with the requirement of confidentiality of electoral processes a reservation to article 25Vorlage. Kind / Maintenance / ch- search of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to avoid the further in some cantons elections under the open sky with open hand picked ( rural community ) may be performed. This is an indication that the complex "secret elections and voting " is also governed by international law.