Why rule by the people is better than rule by the experts. In early 2017, Scientific American published a symposium on the threat that ‘big nudging’ poses to democracy.
Big Data is the phenomena whereby governments and corporations collect and analyse information provided by measuring sensors and internet searches. Nudging is the view that governments should build choice architectures that make it easier for people to pick, say, the more fuel-efficient car or the more sensible retirement plan. Big nudging is the combination of the two that enables public or private engineers to subtly influence the choices that people make, say, by autofilling internet searches in desirable ways.
Big nudging is a ‘digital sceptre that allows one to govern the masses efficiently, without having to involve citizens in democratic processes’. The symposium’s authors take for granted that democracy – the political regime in which the people collectively determine its common way of life – is better than epistocracy, or rule by experts. Sign up for Aeon’s Newsletter. The Meaning of Right. The Meaning Of "Right" NOTE: Below is a condensed version of an article by Stanley Benn in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy (vol. vii).
Rights. Since the seventeenth century, problems connected with rights have steadily engaged the attention of political and legal philosophers. Natural Rights. Thomas Jefferson, age 33, arrived in Philadelphia on June 20, 1775, as a Virginia delegate to the Second Continental Congress.
Fighting at Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill had already broken out between the colonists and British troops. Even so, most in Congress wanted to work out some mutual agreement with the mother country. For more than a year, the Americans had sent petitions to England proclaiming their grievances against the British government. Colonists even appealed to the British people, pleading with them to elect different members of Parliament who would be more open to compromise. But the "British brethren" refused to do this. Soon after Jefferson arrived in Philadelphia, Congress assigned him to draft a document explaining why the colonists had taken up arms against England. Neither Parliament nor King George, however, were interested in negotiations to prevent all-out war. Drafting Nature's Constitution: CELDF's Mari Margil on a new approach to environmental law.
Simply regulating pollution will never really stop it.
Mari Margil of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund discusses why we need a fundamental change in the way we use law to protect nature. posted Mar 02, 2010 Click here: Mari Margil discusses a new approach to environmental law The environmental movement, with its army of professional advocates, lawyers, grassroots campaigners, and dedicated funders, has been around for decades. Yet nearly every biological indicator shows a planet in crisis—and poised to unravel faster as climate change disrupts already-shaky ecosystem functions.
Mari Margil, associate director of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) believes it's time for different tactics. "Our system of environmental laws and regulations don't actually protect the environment," says CLEDF's Mari Margil. According to Margil, anemic environmental laws spring from the fact that nature has no constitutional rights. Part One Part Two Part Three. And about time for rights to nature? By Begonia Filgueira. It took until 1998 for the UK Parliament to incorporate human rights directly into the domestic legal system.
In light of the dangers posed by climate change, is it time to go one step further and grant rights to the Earth herself? Bolivia has done just that – the Mother Earth Rights Law (Ley 071(21 December 2010)) has now come into force. Congratulations to everyone involved in drafting and promoting this law. With Evo Morales’ Party (the Movement Towards Socialism) having a majority in Congress and the Senate, this law passed without much opposition.
Occupy the Law: A Bill of Rights for Your Community by Thomas Linzey and Jeff Reifman. A bill of rights that protects people and nature, but not corporations?
Your community could be next. posted Jan 03, 2012 When communities try to keep corporations from engaging in activities they don’t want, they often find they don’t have the legal power to say “no.” Why? Maine Town Declares Food Sovereignty. This is a tiny but welcome step.
However, this also has a very negative side. It more-or-less accepts the premise that any number of overt FICTIONs called “government” (federal, province, state, county, city, town, village, neighborhood, etc) have some kind of legitimate “right” to enslave us and bleed us dry (via fees and taxation). AND it presumes that the only way any one of us can escape such enslavement is on a one-by-one basis like the case described here. How a Community Bill of Rights Is Empowering People Against Corporations.
A law passed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, back in 2010 helped established a novel idea: if people have a Bill of Rights on the individual level, what about a set of rights bridging the individual to her or his community?
A right to water and clean air, a right to exist in a peaceful environment, a right to sustainable energy. After all, when thousands of people gather to protest something -- fracking, say, in New York state -- it is because they see that the law, which favors corporate interests rather than voting constituents, is broken. So, to clarify what belongs in the people's domain, the public interest law firm Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund coined the term “Community Bill of Rights,” which sets standards at the municipal and county levels that privilege environmental and health concerns over corporate profit.
And they've already scored some legislative victories. A Universal Declaration of Human Responsibilities. Chaired by Helmut Schmidt20-22 April 1997Vienna, Austria It is time to talk about human responsibilities.
