In a previous post (https://dmv.community/@cobber2005/115436853437091550), when suggesting that small direct-democracies could be self-created by people playing a nomic (a game where it's a turn to change a rule of the game) in the fashion of a table-top game (where conventionally each player gets a turn), I mentioned that the equality offered by turn-taking was not perfect.

Even with turn-taking, inequalities can come from players' different abilities as well as from how the game's mechanics change over time. About the latter, one particular mechanic that is sometime found in tabletop games is the 'skip', where a player is denied a turn in the current round. This mechanic is often used in an adversarial way, to reduce a competitor's ability to act. It seem unlikely that such a mechanic would be democratically voted into a nomic's rule set, since democrats would probably view any formal rule denying a group participant the chance to participate as anti-democratic.

However some groups might create rules where a 'skip' is used as a counterweight for gaining some other ability, like (for example) making a rule where a player can have their vote count twice on the present rule proposal if they forfeit their next turn to make a proposal. Note that, in this example, being skipped is an optional tradeoff being chosen by the participant, not imposed on them.

Also, while everyone should have a chance to participate in a nomic, it's possible some players may feel the nomic offers them excessive opportunities to participate, and choose to not always participate at the highest level available (e.g., they might sometimes choose to abstain from a vote or 'pass' their turn to make a proposal). And yet some groups may feel it is an important obligation for each member to weigh in on each proposal with their vote (which could be an open- or secret-ballot). It is up to the group to decide if and how they wish to regulate these possibilities and details.
#nomic
#democracy
#directdemocracy

Quote 2 from Yavor Tarinski's new book "Horizons of Direct Democracy":

"""
It can be suggested that by reconfiguring the architecture of power, direct democracy strives at the greatest possible justice. In this sense it seeks to allow for everyone to participate in deciding on matters up to the point where our choice impinge on others, but from there on, others should have their own self-managing say. This comes to ensure a universal opportunity for every person to take equal responsibility and active part in crafting the path their community is going to take. In short, it seeks to integrate political participation with everyday life.
"""

Book available at https://on-our-own-authority-publishing.square.site/product/tarinski-horizons-of-direct-democracy/JPILP5RW2LT2LQ25AUXYRMPO

#Democracy #DirectDemocracy #SelfGovernance #Tarinski

Quote 1 from Yavor Tarinski's new book "Horizons of Direct Democracy":

"""
It is well known that citizenship in Ancient Athens (508-322 BCE) - where the concept is said to have initially emerged - meant something radically different from what we have today. Although the Athenian society of that time was plagued by slavery and patriarchy, with slaves and women being excluded from political life, it nonetheless underwent a revolution that saw the establishment of democracy, or self-management by the citizenry. For the Ancient Athenians such as Aristotle, there was a clear distinction between a democratic system and elections for representatives - the former was based on popular assemblies and sortition, while the latter was viewed as the building block of oligarchy. Although critical of democracy, Aristotle underlines its grassroots character:

"A democracy exists whenever those who are free and are not well off, being in a majority, are in sovereign control of the government, an oligarchy lies in the hands of the rich and better born, those being few."

This understanding of democratic politics as popular self-management continues throughout the ages. Eighteenth-century thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau were well aware of the difference between democracy and representation: for Rousseau, when a government lays in the hands of the whole people, or of a majority of them, then we have a democratic society, while aristocracy or oligarchy is when the government is restructured to a small number of citizens (i.e. representatives). Similar was the stance on the issue of other prominent figures of the period. Thomas Paine, too, made a distinction between representation and democracy, understanding that in its original form the latter stood for a "society governing itself without the aid of secondary means."
"""

#Democracy #DirectDemocracy #SelfGovernance #Tarinski

* **The Target:** Heath suggests the rebellion is less about economic inequality and more about the power of **cognitive elites**—those whose analytical expertise drives policy that appears counter-intuitive to the average person. The rise of populism is seen as a rejection of the cognitive burden and constant self-correction demanded by a modern, highly rationalized world.

***

## The Role of Modern Communication

The article suggests that **social media** and the rapid-fire pace of modern communication accelerate this problem. The digital environment favors fast, reactive, intuitive responses (System 1) while actively discouraging the slow, reflective effort required for analytical thinking (System 2). This environment removes traditional media gatekeepers, allowing populist messages to directly appeal to and amplify popular intuitions.

2/2

Excellent article explaining Populism (https://josephheath.substack.com/p/populism-fast-and-slow) Gemini summary:

The article "Populism: Fast and Slow" by Joseph Heath proposes a definition of populism through the lens of **dual-process cognitive theory**, drawing from Daniel Kahneman's distinction between "fast" and "slow" thinking.

## Core Argument: Intuition vs. Analysis

Heath argues that populism is fundamentally an **epistemic strategy** that exploits the tension between two modes of thought:

1. **System 1 (Fast, Intuitive Thinking):** This is the **"common sense"** approach—quick, effortless, and driven by heuristics, biases, and gut feelings. Populism champions this mode of thought, identifying it with **"the people."**
2. **System 2 (Slow, Analytical Thinking):** This is the **"elite"** approach—effortful, analytical, and requiring specialized knowledge, expertise, and cognitive control.

The populist political strategy is to constantly privilege the intuitive views of the people over the analytical views of the elites.

***

## The Cognitive Divide and Resentment

The conflict arises when the consensus views of analytical elites clash with the strong intuitions of the public. Populists capitalize on the resentment this disconnect creates.

* **Policy Clashes:** Populists emphasize issues where **popular intuition** and **elite consensus** diverge. Examples include:
* **Crime:** Intuition favors harsh punishment, while expert analysis often points to more complex, long-term, or systemic causes and solutions.
* **Economics:** Intuitive understandings of trade, immigration, and collective action often contradict the conclusions of analytical economic models.
* **Illiberalism:** Populism resists abstract liberal principles (like due process or freedom of speech) because adhering to them requires cognitive decoupling and inhibition, which is cognitively taxing and runs counter to immediate intuitive reactions.

1/2

#Democracy #Populism

Are tabletop games small democracies? Probably not most. But the idea of taking turns has a democratic flavor. It offers a kind of equality, in that every player gets a chance to influence the game-world. Sure, many games have times when a player might get skipped or get to take an extra turn, or their ability to act is different from other players. But plenty of games require all players to take an equal number of turns, and to have the same possible actions available.

When the game-world is the real-world, the turn mechanism is an easy and intuitive way for organizations to build democratic processes. Imagine a group deliberation composed of rounds where everyone takes a turn either speaking for 30 seconds, or choosing another person to possibly speak for 30 seconds. Or a worker cooperative restaurant where, at the beginning of each week and in a randomized order, the workers take turns choosing their role for the week from the roles remaining (i.e. cook, host, waiter, dishwasher, cleaner, cashier, ...). Power is shared when each player has the opportunity to exercise that same power, in turn. Order matters, but there are ways to even out the advantages of order (such as randomizing it each round, as in the restaurant example).

@jlou

I had not heard of Glen Weyl or "quadratic voting" before. It seems like a very useful social technology.

Gemini's summary was helpful in understanding it as, quote:

- a novel voting system designed to better reflect the intensity of voters' preferences rather than just their direction of choice.

- Voters are given a fixed budget of "vote credits". ... To cast N votes on an issue, it costs N^2 credits. For example, 1 vote costs 1 credit, 2 votes cost 4 credits, 3 votes cost 9 credits, and so on.

- mitigate the "tyranny of the majority" that can occur in "one-person-one-vote" systems. In traditional majority rule, a large group that only slightly prefers an outcome can overrule a smaller group that cares intensely about the opposite outcome. QV addresses this by allowing the intense minority to buy more votes and increase their influence on the issues that matter most to them.

So each person is given the same number of credits. A person can express the intensity of their preference by putting more votes on a single issue, but each additional vote on that single issue costs more credits. Meaning they have less vote credits to spend placing votes on other issues. Or they can put just a few votes on many issues. They can choose their balance of intensity vs. breadth.

Seems like some gaming could happen by whoever gets to choose the group of votable issues given to voters (i.e. putting many issues known to be important to the minority to force them to dilute their ability to register their intensity on any one issue). But still seems like a net positive compared to majority rule.

Thanks for sharing this.

In 1982, the philosopher Peter Suber created a game called Nomic where it's a move to change a rule of the game. It's a game of self-amendment. If the players change the rules so that they share the game's decision-making power, they can turn a nomic into a small participatory democracy. And if they're able to agree on a goal, they could try to reach that goal in a democratic way, using the nomic to make decisions about how to coordinate towards the goal.

Democracy + Nomic = Democranomic.

See more at democranomic.neocities.org

#nomic #democracy #cooperatives