Tim Shirley wrote:I am always puzzled by the advocates of direct election though. Seems to me that the one guaranteed result of voting is that you will elect a politician, regardless of how you go about it. Further, the more "popular" you make the election process, the more likely you are to elect someone who is a politician first and whose other skills come a distant second. Also, being directly elected will mean that they are tempted to make populist, short-sighted decisions, rather than ones which may be in the long term interest of the sport.This is not an "evidence" issue - and your attempt to suggest that it should be is, frankly, ridiculous; I could as easily make the same claim to those who support the current system and there would be the same dearth of "evidence". Neither the current system nor direct elections are about ensuring that the best candidates are elected. The current systems is specifically designed to perpetuate the status quo - at least according to those in the system who designed it. Neither will direct elections guarantee the best candidate is elected - but they will get you a system that readily allows you to toss people out if they do less than adequately. And that, Tim is the key difference. Under the current system, the membership cannot get rid of people who are doing less than well. W. S. Churchill famously describes democracy not as the best form of government, but as the least worst. It works in our clubs (and at least in the GFA Queensland region) - and it works in the public sphere. It is far from faultless but it is infinitely better than anything else we humans have dreamed up over the 6,000 years or so of recorded history. If the GFA leadership believe they are doing what the membership wants them to do, then they will be elected once we change the system. If not there will be new faces and new directions. Finally - just whose organisation is this? The GFA is an organisation of its members and it is they who 'own' the organisation. Accordingly, it should be the members who control it. -- Robert Hart [EMAIL PROTECTED] +61 (0)438 385 533 http://www.hart.wattle.id.au |
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