How can nations be well governed without the need for politicians?

Question

True statesmen are rare. What we have now everywhere are two-bit politicians who do not have the interests of citizens in heart. Most of them are autocratic, corrupt and self-serving. They are the cause of all ills within nations and without. What we need now is a system of government run by citizens without the need for politicians. A government by the people, for the people and of the people -- minus the politicians. Surely, the technological advances we have today can be used to create such a system, if only we take the time to explore this seriously.

Answer 1

I keep thinking that governments could be ruled by the people for the people virtually. Let everybody have their say and then let the majority rule. Maybe you could create a government out of a jury type system. You would have a judge that would follow basic rules of good government, you could have "lawyers" present different sides and the the 12 person jury could make decisions. I trust the average person especially if grouped together much more than our politicians. What would be neat if if we could pilot or prototype the idea. Maybe it could be something like Yahoo Answers. People could suggest ideas and then people could vote. It would have to be much different but maybe it could be the Genesis of a new world order!! :)

Answer 2

I think the best way is to revert the Office of the Presidency BACK to a PUBLIC SERVANT position, with their pay being equivilent to the minimum wage. This should also be applied to ALL government positions. That way perhaps it would be LESS likely that greed would be the motivating factor for election and the desire to SERVE the people of the United States IN thier best interest would be a more motivating factor. Make them as accountable to the laws of the United States as the Citizens are, not ABOVE the law as so many seem to be. Make "Who's working hardest FOR America and Americans " the focus of elections, not who is sleeping with who (as Clinton wasn't the first president who had a mistress while in office, more like the 7th or 8th, I don't quite recall) Re-establish the ORIGINAL Constitution as our forfathers intended, not so heavily amended that the original no longer exists. Social security was set up to insure that no President would die penniless, take away the TOTALLY unreasonable "retirement packages" and put THAT money into the Social Security fund. I do believe every president had a job BEFORE he went into office, depending on how well he did his job, he shouldn't have a problem getting a job afterwards, yeah, go back to actually WORKING for a living instead of continuing to live off taxpayers. It's like welfare for the rich to keep them rich. Sorry America, but if you get fired from your job due to incompetence (which is basically what happens when a president isn't re-elected) do YOU get to keep your retirement and all the perks of the job?? NO -- so why should the president?? Make a new law...all corrupt government officials go to jail or face a firing squad, thier choice. (Because either way you know they're dead meat) Put any nominee's voting history on the front page of every newspaper so the American citizens aren't as susceptable to believe the lies, and any candidate caught lying is instantly disqualified from the race. That would be a good start, removing the lobbyist, another solution.

Answer 3

A direct democracy? These have problems as well. The obvious first few:
1. They're time-consuming for their citizens, and most aren't willing to spend that much time.
2. The typical citizen is not politically aware and is incapable of managing the country even as well as a corrupt politician.
3. Direct democracies don't scale well, working best for 5-and-fewer-digit places.
4. Even well-governed, thoughtful, motivated, and well-educated direct democracies have problems:
http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/apology.html

In general I think the best solution is one which minimizes the amount of hard (presumably-)corrupt politicians can do, with checks and balances and wide use of press reporting.

Answer 4

Less than half the possible people vote for president of the US. Even less vote in congressional elections. A system of on line referendum would garner even less votes and be subject to hacks, cheats and vote sales. Not quite ready for it yet...

so the republic still stands

Answer 5

How the other countries are governed