Politics and Technology: Leveling the Playing Field and Making Democracy (Little "D") democratic

I'd first like to thank those who have begun commenting on my posts concerning the need for an emergent Third Party movement. I think JD's perspective from Argentina is extremely useful to the debate. The reality is that the multi-party system, as he described, opens up opportunities for many people who would otherwise be disenfranchised. When there are only two parties, there emerges a "check and balance" system that turns a blind eye to some of the more egregious practices in government, such as pork barrel spending ("earmarking"). While the parties will call each other out on the issues that are necessary to motivate their respective political bases, they will not do so on much of the substantive policy that passes without much dissent every day in Congress.

The primary subject of today's post is to examine in greater depth the first point of yesterday's post, which was concerning the pragmatics of a Third Party movement, what it would do in order to break through the Two Party Juggernaut, etc. I will start with my first point from yesterday. A successful Third Party will possess an understanding of technology and how to use it in a post-modern political context.

Before I delve too deeply into the specific political applications of technology, I'd like to make a couple of introductory remarks about where the world is with respect to technology. The world is a vastly different place than it was even 10 years ago. Today, unlike any other period in human history, the masses in the industrialized world (and increasingly in emerging nations) have access, at nominal cost, to the tools of publication. Any high school or college student with access to $800 bucks can get an Apple MacBook with his student discount and immediately have the capability of publishing to the world their thoughts and opinions in the form of a Blog, or on YouTube as a Video Blog while sitting at a local coffee shop with free WiFi. He can syndicate his blog to his Facebook "Notes" or copy it to his MySpace profile, and through all of these mechanisms reach most of his personal social network. The power of this is truly incalculable, and this brings me to a logical segue into the meat of today's post.

Political parties are organized in order to bring together people of similar ideas to act in concert with one another to achieve certain political ends. Prior to the digital revolution, the traditional two party system was essentially the only way for people to collectively pursue common political goals. They joined up with whichever party most closely fit their political philosophy and then started "paying dues" to move up the ranks and eventually run for political office. This is a terribly inefficient way of figuring out who is best qualified to hold public office. The kinds of lackeys, sycophants, and otherwise smarmy individuals who occupy "party politics" would make used car salesmen feel like clean, upstanding individuals (I wanted to use "insurance salesmen" as my example, but considering that one of my best friends sells insurance as part of his "financial planning" practice, I figured I ought to refrain).

The two party system prior to the advent of technology also required that one be able to raise a lot of money in order to run effective media campaigns. Candidates can win without television advertising (I've worked on some of those campaigns), but few candidates are capable of raising up the kind of volunteer support needed to run an effective ground campaign. Technology is changing all of that. Grassroots politics no longer requires door-to-door campaigning, but can now harness and leverage the openness and vastness of the web to achieve the same sort of results. It also costs virtually nothing, and doesn't require nearly as many "foot soldiers."

An emergent Third Party (or, preferably, SEVERAL "third" parties) would harness this nascent technology to communicate its message to people in their online communities and social networks. Blogging and video blogging are essential strategies to making this work. Creating a presence in online communities like Facebook and MySpace would help to drive traffic to such blogs, create a relationship with citizens who identify with the message of the party, and so on. They would use online communities to help them get the signatures they need to gain ballot access, they would use online communities to push direct democracy legislation (initiative and referenda) consistent with their platforms in order to advance such agendas without needing governing majorities in legislatures. This will help increase their credibility with the voters, and lend a level of trust that presently causes risk averse citizens from casting their vote for "fringe" third party candidates.

A successful Third Party candidate would understand that people's disenfranchisement with the political process in post-modern culture stems from the lack of authenticity from the politicians themselves. Consequently, in their use of blogs and video blogs, social networking presences, etc., they will have a distinctive motivation to just be themselves and to build genuine relationships with voters and constituents. They will not have polished speechwriters prepping their video blogs; they will not have ghost writers penning their blog content. That is the part of my original statement that the technology must be applied in a post-modern cultural context.

It is insufficient to merely take the tools of the Web and become successful. That must be accompanied by an adoption of the cultureand philosophy of the Web as well. This means reaching people where they are in an authentic and, if possible, slightly entertaining way.

Candidates who embrace technology fully will be the only ones who are able to maintain their authenticity, since their fund raising requirements will be substantially less, and their "Beholden" quotient will be so much lower.

The country is waiting for people who are willing to make this leap and to lead the way into a new democracy. The Web is the fastest, easiest, and cheapest way to make this happen, if done properly (read: authentically).

Tomorrow: The necessity of COMPLETE transparency in a successful Third Party movement.