Digital Collectivism

Up to date but included in other articles.

A call for an end to division

Causes of tension

As the information age reaches its climax, people around the world have become more and more divided. Exposure to political ideas, rather than leading to unity, has lead to conflict between those ideas.

Whether these ideas lean left, right, or center, our system of government which imposes ideas on those who agree and disagree, breeds resentment and alienation.

Half the population often feels governed by systems they don't consent to, leading to a state of tension.

Moreover, people feel increasingly frustrated by representative government as representatives themselves, once limited to one per 30,000 people, now represent millions of people, allowing us to judge people only by their promises and not their deeds back home.

People feel frustrated by a system that doesn't hold people to account for their promises, a system which too often incentivizes representatives who avoid real accountability. A system which constantly passes the bill to the next generation.

Not only that, government law moves at a snail's pace, with laws drafted hundreds of years ago governing how we relate in an increasingly digital age.

Cyber collectivism as an alternative.

But what if there was a way to end the tension and conflict?

It has become apparent that singular, geographically-bound systems of governance, while foundational to human progress, increasingly struggle to contain the diversity of human aspiration and conviction. When a significant portion of the populace feels its voice unheard, its values unrepresented, or its way of life unduly imposed upon by a monolithic structure, it is the right, it is the duty, of the people to explore new forms of association that foster harmony, reduce involuntary imposition, and allow for a flourishing of diverse communities.

The present age, marked by unprecedented digital connectivity, offers pathways previously unimaginable. We therefore declare our intent to establish a framework for Voluntary Digital Collectives, operating in parallel with and complementary to existing national and local governments, to manage aspects of civic and commercial life chosen by their members. This is not an act of secession from physical nations, but an act of Interdependence – a recognition that our digital lives transcend borders and that our associations can be as chosen and varied as our beliefs.

This model is increasingly inadequate for a hyper-pluralistic digital age.

Increasingly, people who share many values and spaces and ideas are conflicted over the things they don't share in common, amplified by social algorithms designed to amplify conflict.

Whereas we initially thought that exposure to more diverse viewpoints would lead to greater understanding, it's become clear

I want you to start by emphasizing the problem Not doing a cheap copy of the Declaration of Independence. We want to make something real here.

The problem at hand is twofold. One, we live in an abundant age of information and ideas. But ideas have left us more divided than ever. Two, we only have one concept of politics, which is to impose our ideas by force on other people, saying, you must conform to our ideas, whether they're left or right or whatever they are. You must conform to them. That's our thought concerning how government should function. And it's a thought that is no longer adequate for a digital age. Two, our representative system of democracy is broken. Basically, back when... Hey. It was invented. There was a requirement that we had a maximum of one per 30,000 people. One representative for 30,000 people. This way we could judge people by their deeds and not their promises. But now we find ourselves sending people into government based on their promises. Finding we can't hold them to account because even when we replace them with another person, we're only trusting their empty promises too.

Governments move incredibly slow and we need something. We need the ability to create government that works at the speed of change that we see in society.

So start by emphasizing all of the problems, how bad they are. Then, once we've emphasized the problem, we want to go into our solution. Our solution is, one, we organize in digital collectives. Two, we form in those voluntary digital collectives systems of law, justice, and welfare. All the systems of government that can be organized online. Three, we allow people to choose freely from working systems rather than just promises of ideas. And four, we advocate for recognition within nation states for this new form of government.

This has left us with a broken system where politicians are elected based on their empty promises. Politicians who avoid responsibility to take the actions that need to be taken and pass the bill to the next generation. It's a world which incentivizes promises rather than results.

As the information age reaches its climax, people around the world have become more and more divided. Exposure to a whole new set of political ideas, rather than leading to unity, has caused us to fight to see who can impose their ideas on all of us.

Rather than being united by our ideas, we are divided in seeking to impose our ideas on others.

We have then sent politicians on our behalf to increasingly detached legislative bodies to implement our ideas unimplemented.

What if, rather than relying on the empty promises of those incentivized to pass the bills to the next generation, we were able to choose between working systems of government?

Cyber Collectivism

In an increasingly divided world, Cyber Collectivism asks the question, what if, rather than fighting to impose ideas on one another, we organized working systems of government online and gave people a choice of systems.

In an increasingly divided world, cyber collectivism asks, what if, rather than trying to impose our ideas on one another, we organized working systems of government online and gave everyone a choice of systems?

Okay, this is a fascinating and ambitious idea. The challenge is to create something that feels both revolutionary and deeply rooted in the spirit of human liberty, much like the documents you mentioned, while addressing the unique complexities of a digital, globalized age.

Here's a draft, which I'll call "The Declaration of Digital Interdependence and Charter of Chosen Governance."

The Declaration of Digital Interdependence and Charter of Chosen Governance

Preamble: A New Compact for a Divided Age

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for peoples to evolve the political bands which have connected them with one another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and co-equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of humankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to such evolution.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all individuals are created with inherent dignity and an unalienable yearning for self-determination; that they are endowed with certain rights, among these are Life, Liberty, the Pursuit of Happiness, and the Freedom of Association; that to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Peoples, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed – a consent that, in a connected world, can be more diverse, fluid, and granular than ever before.

We, the Peoples of the Digital Age, therefore solemnly publish and declare:

That it is the right of individuals to freely associate and form or join Digital Collectives based on shared principles, values, or goals, for the purpose of governing agreed-upon aspects of their interactions, commerce, and communal life.

The Charter of Chosen Governance

Article I: The Principle of Voluntary Association and Digital Self-Determination

Every individual possesses the inherent right to choose, form, or join a Digital Collective, or to abstain from such association, without coercion or penalty from any physical or digital authority.
Digital Collectives shall be self-governing entities, established by the mutual consent of their members, operating under transparent charters and by-laws.
Membership in a Digital Collective is voluntary. Individuals shall have the right to enter and exit Collectives freely, subject to the agreed-upon terms of association within that Collective.

Article II: Scope and Authority of Digital Collectives

Digital Collectives may establish rules, norms, and systems for governing interactions, contracts, commerce, dispute resolution, resource management, and other civic functions among their consenting members.
The authority of a Digital Collective extends only to those aspects of life and commerce explicitly delegated to it by its members and defined in its founding charter.
Digital Collectives shall primarily operate within the digital realm but may establish protocols for interactions that have physical manifestations, provided these do not contravene the fundamental public safety and order of the physical jurisdictions involved.
Physical governments retain ultimate sovereignty over their territories, physical infrastructure, criminal law pertaining to physical harm and safety, national defense, and the protection of fundamental human rights that supersede any Collective's rules.

Article III: Precedence and Harmonization

In matters of civil or commercial dispute arising solely between members of the same Digital Collective, where both parties have explicitly consented to the Collective's jurisdiction for such matters, the laws, regulations, and dispute resolution mechanisms of that Digital Collective shall take precedence.
Physical governments are encouraged to recognize the legitimacy of Digital Collective judgments in such intra-collective disputes, provided these Collectives operate transparently, ensure due process, and do not violate universal human rights or the core public policy of the physical jurisdiction.
Mechanisms for dialogue, mutual recognition, and harmonization shall be established between Digital Collectives and physical governments to ensure clarity, prevent conflict of laws, and foster a cooperative ecosystem.
Transactions or interactions involving a member of a Digital Collective and a non-member (or a member of a different, un-federated Collective) shall, by default, be governed by the laws of the relevant physical jurisdiction(s), unless all parties explicitly agree otherwise through a pre-determined inter-collective or bridging agreement.

Article IV: The Digital Bill of Rights within Collectives

To ensure that liberty flourishes within these new forms of association, the following rights are recognized as fundamental within and between Digital Collectives:

Freedom of Digital Association: The right to join, create, or leave Collectives without undue burden.
Freedom of Expression and Information: The right to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas within the Collective, subject to rules agreed upon by its members to foster constructive discourse and prevent harm as defined by the Collective.
Right to Digital Privacy and Data Sovereignty: Individuals control their personal data and how it is used by the Collective, with clear consent mechanisms.
Right to Due Process and Fair Adjudication: Disputes within a Collective must be resolved through transparent, impartial, and timely processes defined in its charter.
Right to Transparency in Governance: The rules, decision-making processes, and financial dealings of a Digital Collective shall be accessible to its members.
Right to Participate in Governance: Members shall have a voice in the governance of their Collective, as outlined in its charter.
Freedom from Arbitrary Digital Exile or Sanction: Removal or sanction from a Collective must follow due process as established by the Collective.
Right to Portability: Where feasible, individuals should be able to take their reputational or transactional history with them when moving between compatible Collectives.
Non-Discrimination: Collectives, while formed around shared values, shall not arbitrarily discriminate in membership or treatment based on immutable characteristics irrelevant to the Collective's stated purpose, unless such distinction is a core, explicitly stated tenet of the Collective's formation and agreed to by all members (e.g., a Collective for women entrepreneurs).
Primacy of Universal Human Rights: No rule or action of a Digital Collective may infringe upon the universally recognized human rights that are considered foundational by the broader community of nations.

A Call to Collaboration and Experimentation

Let this Declaration not be an endpoint, but a starting point. We call upon technologists, legal scholars, ethicists, community organizers, and citizens of all nations to explore, design, and build these Digital Collectives with wisdom, foresight, and a profound respect for human dignity and freedom.

The path ahead will require innovation, patience, and a willingness to learn from both successes and failures. But the promise is a world where diverse communities can flourish side-by-side, governed by consent rather than by reluctant acquiescence, and where the immense power of digital connectivity is harnessed not for division, but for a richer, more harmonious, and freely chosen human experience.

Let us, therefore, mutually pledge to each other our digital fortunes, our shared intellect, and our sacred honor, to bring forth this new era of chosen governance and digital interdependence.