Saturday, August 20, 2011

25 Ordinary Citizens Write Iceland’s New Constitution With Help From Social Media


How neat!

http://singularityhub.com/2011/08/03/25-ordinary-citizens-write-icelands-new-constitution-with-help-from-social-media/

by Aaron Saenz August 3rd, 2011

The newest government in the world was designed with help from comments on the internet. God help us all. After Iceland’s economic collapse in 2008, the island nation decided it was time to write a new constitution, this one not based on its parent country of Denmark but rather made from the original ideas of its citizens. Iceland’s small population of 320,000 elected 25 assembly members from 522 ordinary candidates (including lawyers, political science professors, journalists, and many other professions), who in turn opened their process up to the public in an unprecedented fashion. The Constitutional Council was highly active on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Flickr, where they solicited comments and suggestions for the new government. On Friday July 29th, 2011, the Iceland parliament officially received the new constitution, comprised of 114 articles divided into 9 chapters. Set to be reviewed, and then put before vote for ratification by October 1st, the internet-assisted document marks a possible paradigm shift in governing. In the 21st Century, we’re writing our constitutions with social media. The future is a crazy place.

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Yet the enthusiasm from the public hasn’t exactly been stellar (maybe they didn’t like the singing?). Despite the historic nature of the constitutional elections, little more than a third of Iceland actually voted (83,531 or 35.95% of the ~230,000 eligible voters). [Ie., voted for the 25 who wrote the proposed new constitution.]

[Actually, I can understand the low turnout. Unless you know someone personally, or they have some kind of public voting record, how do you know they will vote the way you think they will?]

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