Pyramidal deliberative democracy

This dissertation has two main objectives. First, to outline an ICT-facilitated model of democracy called ‘pyramidal democracy’ that reconciles deliberative democracy with mass engagement. Second, to suggest how this model of democracy might engender the democratisation of the global economy and thus the provision of a basic level of economic security for all global citizens. At the core of the model is the pyramidal deliberative network, a means of organising citizens into small online deliberative groups and linking these groups together by means of an iterative process of delegate-selection and group-formation. The pyramidal network enables citizens to aggregate their preferences in a deliberative manner, and then project social power by authorizing the delegates at the top-tier of the pyramidal network to communicate their social demands to elected officials or to other points of authority. The envisioned outcome is the democratisation of the public sphere by means of the proliferation of deliberative networks in the government, market, and civil society spheres. Transnational pyramidal networks may make it feasible to instantiate a new citizen-based schema of global governance and, thereby, facilitate the reform of the United Nations and enable a transition towards global peace, sustainability, and distributive justice. Distributive justice might be achieved by means of implementing the six components of a democratised economy: participatory budgeting, fee-and-dividend taxes, a basic income, monetary reform, workplace democracy, and the sharing economy. Taken together, these components might enable the universal provision of a social minimum – a universal basic income sufficient for basic security and real freedom. Taken to its logical conclusion, a democratised economy may also enable a transition towards a post-scarcity economic order characterised by a maximal stock of humanmade and natural capital that would not exceed the sustainable carrying capacity of the earth

Fiscal and monetary contraction in Chile : a rational-expectations approach

For the past two decades, Chile has consistently pursued a course of macroeconomic stabilization and deep economic reform. But in recent years, real exchange rate appreciation and persistent moderate inflation have become key concerns for Chilean policymakers, suggesting the need for further fiscal and monetary retrenchment. Using an open-economy, dynamic rational-expectations macroeconomic model applied to Chile, the authors analyze and quantify the macroeconomic impact of fiscal and monetary retrenchment. Several features of the model are essential for a realistic assessment of the effects of fiscal and monetary policy shifts in Chile: backward indexation of wages, consolidation of the central bank and the general government, and the coexistence of (1) liquidity-constrained consumers and firms with (2) unconstrained agents whose consumption and investment decisions reflect intertemporal optimization with perfect foresight. This framework makes it possible to distinguish meaningfully betweenpermanent and transitory policy changes, as well as between changes that are or are not anticipated. Simulations show that a balanced-budget fiscal contraction leads to a modest real depreciation, which is sharper in the short term (especially if the contraction is temporary). At the same time, this type of fiscal retrenchment causes a temporary deterioration of the current account. An orthodox money-based disinflation implemented by halving the growth rate of base money leads to a sharp real appreciation in the near term, with steep output and employment costs in the short run, but it also causes a transitory improvement in the current account.Environmental Economics&Policies,International Terrorism&Counterterrorism,Fiscal&Monetary Policy,Economic Theory&Research,Payment Systems&Infrastructure,Macroeconomic Management,Banks&Banking Reform,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies,Economic Stabilization

The impact of civilian control on contemporary defense planning systems challenges for South East Europe

Defense planning has always been one of the most sensitive issues in promoting civilian control of the armed forces. Ensuring democratic control of defense policy is a challenging task, and Southeastern Europe's (SEE) experience to date has inevitably been mixed. At this phase of the reform process, some countries from the region do not possess the necessary civilian knowledge to replace the dominance of the armed forces in the defense planning process. This thesis provides a comparative analysis of efforts to establish civilian democratic control over defense planning in three SEE countries. Its purpose is to contribute to a better understanding of the importance and the role of civilians, especially elected leaders in defense planning, and search for models of defense planning systems that are most appropriate for countries with very limited defense capabilities. This thesis argues that the use of a defense planning system with the necessary civilian control may result in the establishment of a modern, effective military. Focus is mainly on the experience of three countries: Romania, Bulgaria and Republic of Moldova. It looks at achievements and major challenges these countries still face to establish greater professional civil-military cooperation and effective civilian control over defense planning.http://archive.org/details/theimpactofcivil109455769Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited

Incentives and Perceptions of Information Security Risks

Technologies and procedures for effectively securing cyberspace exist, but are largely underdeployed. One reason for this is that organizational - reward systems lack the proper incentives for decision-maker allocation of resources. We identify characteristics of differing stakeholder perceptions of security and privacy risks and integrate them in a decision making framework. We significantly revise the Fischhoff and Slovic model of risk perceptions --- introducing ordinal scales to the identified characteristics of risk perceptions, and incorporating the dynamics of perception by including the important and neglected time element. Over twelve months, we reviewed and verified the model with thirty five senior information security executives from industrial and governmental organizations. We present a methodology for identification of perverse incentives---situations where the interests of a manager or employee are not aligned with those of the organization; and how the policies and reward system may be modified to correct the mis-alignment

An Empty Promise? Digital Democracy in the Smart City

The digital transformation affects every part of our societies and everyday lives, including the processes and structures of our democracies. On the one hand, information and communication technologies have the potential to lower the threshold for political communication and participation. On the other hand, they can be used for large-scale data collection and surveillance, posing a risk to the public sphere. This thesis investigates the impact of digitization on the legitimacy of democracy. It first develops a novel framework based on the theories of participatory and deliberative democracy, drawing on recent work on deliberative systems. On this basis, digital democracy is examined as a system, consisting of different engagement spaces and actors within the smart city. The smart city is a particularly fruitful testbed for digital democracy as it is based on the promise of applying a high density of digital technologies to facilitate civic participation as well as better service delivery and governance. Through an in-depth case study of the smart city of Amsterdam, this thesis not only reveals the legitimacy dilemmas of digital democracy in the smart city, but also illustrates the limits of applying participatorydeliberative systems theory on a digital democracy ecosystem. The analysis demonstrates design conflicts between different online engagement platforms within the digital democracy system, as well as conflicting objectives among the actors behind them. The findings do not support the claim that digitization negatively impacts democracy’s legitimacy in the smart city of Amsterdam through marketization, large-scale data collection, and surveillance, as some authors warn. However, a significant positive impact of digitization on democratic legitimacy, through higher levels of inclusiveness, empowerment, or civic influence, is also not confirmed. The findings show that digital technologies’ promise of facilitating large-scale citizen participation and deliberation in the smart city does not live up to the normative ideal. The results from Amsterdam are exposed to smart city and digital democracy experts across the globe to test their generalizability, demonstrating that, despite its shortcomings, Amsterdam’s extensive digital democracy system is far advanced in international comparison. What may appear a contradiction in fact illustrates that we are still in the early stages of development, with potential to enhance the legitimacy of digital democracy, both in the smart city of Amsterdam and beyond