salim Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Over the last days alot of Iraqi writers put alot of efforts on discussing a fake constitution draft that was created by some one and circulated through the media..Then Alsabah newspaper published the same non official draft which made alot of scholars feel so bad assuming that this is the real draft as the Alsabah is governemnt sponsored! To day on Aliraqia tv , the constitution members released the origal agreed on draft of the civil rights part which drove some attention for Islamic content in the fake one. There was no any reffrence to any Islamic laws!! This incedent brought to my attention some fact that our scholars are very sensative toward any such refrence, they even didn't wait until getting better understanding ..I think this is a very healthy , though bit unmatured! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldoctor Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 A primer on Democracy: I am a fan of democracy People today speak of democracy both in Iraq and in America. I am not just speaking about common folk. I am talking about many educated people. This is because in an effort to market democracy it has been 'bundled' with freedom, human rights and liberality. Bundling in marketing is to sell things together. In politics is to confuse to make the word equivalent to your goal equivalent to that of your listener. This is why I would like to clarify several points: Democracy: is the rule of the majority. Pros: Most people get what they want. Cons: The minority suffers the tyranny of the majority. Solution: Set rules so that the majority does not infringe on the basic rights of the minorities. The rules governing the mechanism of government are called the constitution. If a constitution protects the rights of minority in a democracy it is called a liberal democracy. Constitution: a set of rules regulating the mechanism of government. Constitution’s Pros: The constitution curbs the influence of government. It regulates the process of making future law. It protects minority. Constitution’s Cons: It may become old and new laws have to be made suitable for the times. Solutions: Make it possible to amend the constitution. Pros of amendments: The law is flexible. Cons of amendments: the liberality may eventually be taken out of the constitution. Liberal democracy: Is a democracy that protects the freedoms and rights of minorities. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldoctor Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Someone famous once said: Democracy is a system of govnemetn where people know what they want and they get long and hard. With that in mind, and I woud like people to know that I am not against democracy. I would like iraqi to know that we are not going to be dandy just because we have a democracy. Yes democracy has it problems here is a list: direct democracy(greek style) is not managable with large populations. Direct democracy equate the votes of 2 people totoaly ignorant about subject x to over a specialist in subject x. Representative democracy does not work if the representatives do not represent. Let me put it this way they might come steal money and leave.(sound familiar?) Voting procedures produce Chaotic outcomes Donald Saari a distingushed professor in mathematics proves that the outcome of elections is more influenced by voting procedures than by the voters' preferences. He also proves that the outcome is chaotic since chaotic systems are those determinstic sytems capeable of producing highly unpredictable responses to small changes. For example, pseudo random number generator in your computer is such system. This means that if you bring a bunch of monekys and you make them throw darts at choices, they will produce fundamentaly simliar outcomes to elections. Ironicaly, this is description is not far from the truth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
salim Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 This means that if you bring a bunch of monekys and you make them throw darts at choices, they will produce fundamentaly simliar outcomes to elections. Do have a better way to make them get their gases out? The question hear is not about if democracy the most perfect, the question if there is a better choice! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Moron99 Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Democracy does not succeed because of the leaders it chooses. It succeeds because of the leaders that it removes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldoctor Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 This means that if you bring a bunch of monekys and you make them throw darts at choices, they will produce fundamentaly simliar outcomes to elections. Do have a better way to make them get their gases out? The question hear is not about if democracy the most perfect, the question if there is a better choice! I would like people to know that I am not against democracy. I would like iraqis to know that we are not going to be dandy just because we have a democracy. PLEAS READ MY COMMENTS CAREFULY. From a decision theoretic perspective, I am hoping you can tell me if random assignments of candidates and outcome is the most perfect. I would also like to point out that the chaotic resutls comes from the method of voting and vote aggregation, not democracy in principle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldoctor Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 Democracy does not succeed because of the leaders it chooses. It succeeds because of the leaders that it removes. Dear Moron: Andrew Jackson was not removed and he killed Indians and exapnded the role of the presidency. There MANY examples of where democracy failed to remove presidents. They just left out of the tradition of the year term or the law that was later established. There are two presidents that were attacked by the public. One of them is Clinton. Enough said! I would like to point out that he founding fathers were concerned abotu this democracy turning intoa tyranny as much as we are about the Iraqi experiment today. I would also like to point out when you speak, you seem to assume that democracy works. Nations live longer than people so 300 years of democracy not so breifly interrupted by 100's of years of slavery, lack of women's rights, persecution of minority, and the suspension of liberites in the name of a state of emergency which happens to be prepetualy in existence qualifies for the fianl judegment of democracy working. In fact, whatever success we have had in this country is due to liberal principles established by the founding fathers. They can be considered the antidote to democracy. Please see my primer. thank you for you interest int he subject. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest moron99 Posted August 1, 2005 Report Share Posted August 1, 2005 aldoctor - There is no schoolyard without a bully. There is no religion without a cleric who seeks dominion over your life through the control of your soul. There is no government without a dictator plotting his ascension. It is just who we are. Humans. The greatest achievement of democracy is the ability to remove its own leaders without war or bloodshed. Every meglomaniac who successfully plots his rise to power knows in advance that he can not retain power without pleasing the people. The very thirst for power that drives him to ascend now drives him to become a servant of the people. I would only say - take care with your constitution. If you leave a loophole exposed there will inevitably be a dictator who finds it. Like I said - the greatest achievment of democracy is not how it selects new leaders but rather how it disposes of old ones. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest jillosophy Posted August 4, 2005 Report Share Posted August 4, 2005 moron99 - Very good post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldoctor Posted August 5, 2005 Report Share Posted August 5, 2005 Dear All: As fan of democracy I tried to contibute to the understanding of democracy, liberality, and constitutionalism. I have apprently failed to communicate what i wanted to communicate. I aplogies. I would like to leave this field after I share share the following references. The basic political writings of Jean Jacques Rosseau The constitution of the united states Donald Saari Chaotic election Arrow's impossibility Theorem Sen's Theorem and my humble contribution Evolutionary Game Theory Fixed Points in Power Dynamics in Political Systems You guys can google it. It might be worth while Thanks to Saffa for his comments. Thanks to Salim for his valuable contributions. Thank to all those who tried to understand my point. I hreally hope everyone will consider thaking five minutes per day to google these references. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
salim Posted August 5, 2005 Report Share Posted August 5, 2005 Aldoctor Please have alook to my comment under "Why moslims are not free" in this forum Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aldoctor Posted August 5, 2005 Report Share Posted August 5, 2005 This is an amazing article http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20021102/bob8.asp Safaa Salim, and anyone who is interested in democracy. This is the simplest boil down of the last fifty years of specialists research in democracy. The reader of this article will know more than .9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999 999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999 percent of the population Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Alaa Posted August 8, 2005 Report Share Posted August 8, 2005 I have been watching Al Iraqia for some days and have seen the the ways members of The national assembly from various sects interact. The interactions and debate is mainly between the Shia and the Kurds. The general conclusion of the public, in their debate on a TV program discussing the constitution, is that there is a deep sense of distrust between these two major national and religious groups. The consenses is that a legacy of distrust between them is what hinders any progress toward a productive discussion. Spending hours watching them it appears to me that it is not the distrust that hampers positive progress but it is the fierce competetiveness of the very limited resources of Iraq (resources are limited because of the current situation and not the actual lack of resources). The main problem is that everybody thinks and believes it is distrust. The Shia think that they are as much entitled to the resources as the Kurds and the Kurds think the same and both haven't move their attention to the fact that they are competing to grap as much of Iraq resources as they can as if all the resources are about to vanish. This shortsightedness (i.e. distrust) is getting them nowhere. Both parties need to focus their attention on how to organise their acts to develop ways to compete fairly and leginmatily and not to develop ways to prevent each other from competition. At this stage of Iraq history competition is quite healthy but has to be legitimised and it is the way forward to create competing models for further development of the whole of Iraq. I think the Kurds must be given the opportunity to develop their model of social development so that the Shia may be in a position to learn from them. I say the Shia must learn from the Kurds because the Kurds have a clear model in mind which they believe could be good for their scular autonomous social infrastructure. On the other hand, the Shia have little idea of how to develop theirs apart from a vague idea of a religious state where Sharia is a dominant part of their model. The Shia know very well that the Kurds are ahead of them of what exactly they want,therefor they are a bit worried that the Kurds may develop their model and leave the Shia behind regressing due their focus on implementing the Sharia. During the same debate of the public and figures from the national assembley, the Shia seems to focus on implicitly demolishing the Kurds' arguement and avoid a big question of separating religion from state; at the same time the Kurds are not stressing the separation of religion and the state because they think it can be done in their own autonomous model. This is a typical lose of focus due to defensivness...sorry for the misspelling since the spell checker wasn't avaible in this German cafe' browser....salam....Ala Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Safaa Posted August 8, 2005 Report Share Posted August 8, 2005 Ala, I also did over the last couple weeks.. I got different impressions than yours.. Will grape some chance to comment thoroughly later.. As I always put it , in Iraq there is no group competition, there is cross group fears.. Iraqi resources "both material and social" are so huge to compete.. What this assembly and other free Iraq institutions and civil debates are doing is to expose these fear in order to cure them.. That is in my opinion part of the strategic plan for building a strong united Iraq. I might be optimist here.. But future will tell if I am right.. To day all Iraqis are looking toward the current critical meetings by head of groups representatives, let all pray that Iraqis can pass this very very critical mile stone of the political process.. It is our Iraq and we need to build together.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ala Posted August 9, 2005 Report Share Posted August 9, 2005 I acknowledge the legacy of fear, but would like to say more regarding my interpretation of "The Fear" and make it more of an open competition among models. Trying to create passive hamony or not competing effectively are not good options for us, on the contrary we need a paradigm shift in political competition: What I was trying to elicit from all those, though hampering but still relatively healthy, discussions is the underlining defensive attitudes that may lead to loss of focus of Iraqi parties. Defensiveness can be seen either in an eye of distrust or in an eye of not knowing the rules and protocols of competition. On the surface it may seem distrust but if one digs a little deeper to get to the essence of such interactions, it may mean a lack of understanding of the rules of competition. Culturally speaking our children are not trained to compete without elimination, since wining in our culture has an elimination dimension only. Keeping such culture in mind, any competition appears in a facade of distrust. Now...let me make it a little bit clearer; what appears to be a cross groups fear (as Safaa suggested) is fear of failure (fear of failure is not just a fear, it is not knowing how to compete effectively) before others which may mean simply competiting ineffectively. Otherwise the element of fear of the Kurds dominating the political arena in Iraq is virtually impossible, therefore the Shia may feel a bit behind in terms of having a clearer political model apart from the vague religious one. Therefore, one may ask what the Shia are frightened of? on the other hand, the Kurds are frightened of not having enough resources to construct their own political model which they aspire for. The Kurds are not just obsessed with nationalistic pride, but without enough resources they can't reach their secular, nonreligious model. As we can see I use the term "fear" with an underlining sense of competition and not just fear of annihilation. Finally we Iraqis shouldn't be just suspicious of the Kurds' intention of separating from Iraq, we should compete with them to establish more humane model regardless whether the Kurds will separate or not, and accept the fact that groups competition exists in its ineffective and ineffecient sense and should be developed further in a ligitimate context....salam....Ala Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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