At 2/14/2002, Jim Devine wrote:
>how about delegatory democracy, in which these neighborhood assemblies elect >delegates, not representatives. Delegates are subject to easy recall. This >is one aspect of the Paris Commune-style democracy that Marx admired. > >(Of course, the issue of popular representation is a different one from that >of how to organize a leftist organization, though many of the same points >apply.) This issue is already being discussed in the context of the relationship between neighborhood assemblies and the Sunday afternoon city-wide assembly (interbarrial) where supposedly all assemblies are represented (even though this is the forum where left parties participate the most and there are yet no formal mechanisms of representation/delegation). Many neighborhood assemblies feel that the "interbarrial" assembly should not make decisions but should only act as a space for coordination of activities, and perhaps generation of proposals that the individual assemblies would then vote on. However, left political parties want to keep decision-making in the "interbarrial" because they can easily stack the vote in favour of their proposals. Of course, this whole movement is quite new, at most a month and a half old ,though activity has indeed been feverish. It will be very interesting to see what happens with the delegation/representation issue, though at this moment the feeling is very strong that the power is in the local assembly and should stay there. It will aslo be very interesting to see what happens when discussions about how/if to institutionalize this movement arise, if/how to participate in elections, if/how to create a politcal party, etc. etc. There are already hints of all this with very strong opinions voiced and many sides of these issues. Alan _________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
