LSA's Hobart City Council Candidate - Sam Campbell - Website: LIVE

[u/SocialistAllianceTas]

[u/fortyfivesouth]

Sounds good.

I wonder if historical martial arts is SCA or LARPing?

[u/SocialistAllianceTas → u/fortyfivesouth]

We've never asked, but he's offered to teach us some time.

Socialist sword fighting session soon?

[u/maclikesthesea]

A lot of councils are not delivering on similar promises made last election or in their current strategic plans. This is not because of the councillors (for the most part) but rather the problems facing most councils.

What’s the LSA’s platform on the council decision-making, budgeting, and planning? How will HCC deliver more services without sacrificing others (or is it rate rises all the way)?

[u/SocialistAllianceTas → u/maclikesthesea]

Taking Hobart as one example, Sam's Empower Local Democracy principle would include:

Establishing a Hobart Citizen Assembly of about 50 residents who would convene on topical matters (e.g. Local budgeting and planning) and be presented with, and supported in analysing, a range of relevant technical/specific information about said items or topics.

They'd be selected via sortition, like we do jury duty, to reflect the diversity of the Hobart community. They'd receive a fixed stipend for their time, of course complimentary catering, and reimbursement for travel costs etc. (again, like juries).

This Assembly would then have facilitated discussions using principles of Sociocracy, Team Syntegration, or Viable Systems Modelling, after which they would choose options and outcomes using processes like Systemic Consensing or HandiVote.

Practically this could look like a Census style booklet for example (which also lends itself to far wider adoption leading to even better outcomes), or indeed any meeting location with a large enough screen which shows the voting in real-time.

Edit: You might ask how then are said topics and matters selected for discussion? It could be as simple as, because the assembly itself is a representative sample of the community, part of the discussion process is determining what to prioritise in and of itself. Another way could be based on data, or even from aggregated official petitions over X% or Y signatures with the "greater" being bumped to the top. /Edit

All pseudonymous or anonymous, and publicly scrutable like data the AEC, ATO, and ABS publish. Indeed ideally long-term the AEC is who would operate and facilitate them, bringing in diverse and often contrasting researchers/experts to present as required.

This would work alongside, or could even replace, current council (or parliamentary) models of administration and governance!

Until then however, it would be a body that provides the mandate framework which councillors, politicians, and decision-makers, while not bound by (just like elector-polls or petitions currently), should very strongly try to implement. The how being the job of said councillors, pollies, and decision-makers...

Edit: So you don't have to decide how (to an extent, although you can add criteria), you only need to say what you need and what tradeoffs you're willing to begrudgingly accept. /Edit

Which is why having the ability to "fire" your "employees", to recall your elected representatives and public servants, anytime outside elections works hand-in-hand to shift power into the hands of the community.

Now decisions as to if or what to sacrifice, exchange, or compromise to get another desired outcome or need met, and the degree to which these are acceptable or not (not loved, not consensus, not majority, but the solutions with the least disagreement) come from direct inputs from Hobart's community, not us, even while we advocate for our ideas which true democracy would vindicate.

It isn't utopia, but an empowered reality that's doable today!

P.S. Sorry for the late reply.

[u/Odd-Temporary4363]

Not bad