RevolucioN NoW
7th February 2004, 03:48
The dubious legacy of 20th century communism and its guiding light “democratic” centralism are leading a new generation of activists to question how the major Leninist parties operate, to possibly even consider alternatives to this dark hellhole of bureaucratic rule and petty careerism.
But what are the alternatives to this “self evident” truth, surely we cannot believe that the proletariat is able to make decisions without the oversight of a hard core Leninist party? Well, it can and I have been considering ways to avoid the cesspool of democratic centralism, one of the most interesting appears to be the ideas of Athenian democracy, a short period of the classical Greek period.
While it was by no means perfect, Athenian democracy allowed for ordinary people to become involved in the process of government. At the lowest level, all male citizens could attend the Ecclesia, a large gathering of citizens which met at least 40 times a year and made many important decisions including those relating to the budget and laws.
The next highest assembly was the council of 500, with all its members selected by lot (drawn from a hat) from the lower ecclesia assembly. This assembly allowed for members to only serve once in their lives and was rotated frequently (once every year).
The Prytanes the highest assembly in the land, its membership was drawn from the council of 500 at random, and one member was selected as president for a period of 24 hours. One could only serve once as president.
The court system was also rather democratic with a popular law court composed of 6000 random people having authority to rule on all cases other than murder. Cases of murder were left to a council of nobles known as the Areopagus.
Basic tenants of this system such as drawing representatives at random from lower bodies and laws stopping people serving multiple terms could be beneficial to leftists in the 21st century. This method creates an essence of decentralization without doing away with the horizontal method of organization. As representatives are cycled out every year, the threat of entrenched people in power is non-existent.
There were of course many flaws to this system, namely the fact that it was really only radical politically, not economically thus leaving nobles with control over much of the land. The fact that women were not allowed to become representatives was a severely crippling factor.
What are comrade’s opinions on this method of organization?
But what are the alternatives to this “self evident” truth, surely we cannot believe that the proletariat is able to make decisions without the oversight of a hard core Leninist party? Well, it can and I have been considering ways to avoid the cesspool of democratic centralism, one of the most interesting appears to be the ideas of Athenian democracy, a short period of the classical Greek period.
While it was by no means perfect, Athenian democracy allowed for ordinary people to become involved in the process of government. At the lowest level, all male citizens could attend the Ecclesia, a large gathering of citizens which met at least 40 times a year and made many important decisions including those relating to the budget and laws.
The next highest assembly was the council of 500, with all its members selected by lot (drawn from a hat) from the lower ecclesia assembly. This assembly allowed for members to only serve once in their lives and was rotated frequently (once every year).
The Prytanes the highest assembly in the land, its membership was drawn from the council of 500 at random, and one member was selected as president for a period of 24 hours. One could only serve once as president.
The court system was also rather democratic with a popular law court composed of 6000 random people having authority to rule on all cases other than murder. Cases of murder were left to a council of nobles known as the Areopagus.
Basic tenants of this system such as drawing representatives at random from lower bodies and laws stopping people serving multiple terms could be beneficial to leftists in the 21st century. This method creates an essence of decentralization without doing away with the horizontal method of organization. As representatives are cycled out every year, the threat of entrenched people in power is non-existent.
There were of course many flaws to this system, namely the fact that it was really only radical politically, not economically thus leaving nobles with control over much of the land. The fact that women were not allowed to become representatives was a severely crippling factor.
What are comrade’s opinions on this method of organization?