Direct Democracy

excerpt from 500 Ways To Make America Better

“Citizens should be able to shape the policies that affect their families and their communities. We have the information and the technology to make this possible.

This nation has assembled an immense record of successes and failures in nearly every field. We know what works, and we know what doesn’t. This is the kind of information that can be brought together in a user-friendly way to empower citizens as policymakers in their own communities.

Moreover, the technology of the Internet can bring this information into every home, and allow us to communicate as directly as the town meetings of two hundred years ago. Why can’t the information superhighway enable us to make informed decisions for ourselves? Why can’t each of us access the best thinking on issue after issue, from health care to public safety to education?

Beginning with John and Robert Kennedy, there have been efforts to restore neighborhood-level democracy, particularly in our most impoverished communities. However, it is only now, at the end of the century, that we have all the tools to make this vision real.

It has been done. The Ellen Wilson community on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC sat down for a year to take stock and plan for the future. This ‘people’s congress’ made far-reaching decisions about local policy, and managed to rebuild a fragmented community. The legacy of the information age should be thousands of stories like this one; stories of how citizens came together to shape a common destiny.”