Global People Power’s Constitution requires your input. To help create the constitution, please join our Constitution Forum.
In order to provide direction to the organisation, we have created a constitutional preamble (beneath “management structure”).
Management Structure
Rather than being hierarchical in nature, Global People Power’s management structure functions along the lines of Network/Collaborative/Holonic Governance.
People participating in the management of Global People Power will co-create an Accountability Contract with those with whom they will be working alongside and according to their specific role. The contract will set out their commitment to the team, workload, deadlines, sub-strategies, strategies, and mission according to the core aims and values of Global People Power.
Constitutional Preamble
50-50 gender equity and power redistribution
Global People Power is all about participation and representation. It is fundamental to our vision of success that we overcome thousands of years of male-dominated hierarchical power structures. Global decision making must become re-balanced and redistributed. Anything less is undemocratic and unworkable.
That is why we are determined that our democratic process will initially lack gender equity. We will be taking steps to ensure that there are more women, or people who identify as women, participating. This will equal out over time but bold steps are necessary to guarantee that the power and wisdom of women is no longer wasted.
To achieve this, we are strongly encouraging Earth Citizens to prioritise asking women who are taking action on the front line of global challenges to be the first to propose global policies.
We will regularly review, report on, and if necessary improve on Global People Power’s gender equity and geographical representation balance.
Global Empire or Global People Power?
We do not want to live in a world where every day the balance of power tips more steeply in favour of multi-national corporations owned by a tiny minority of globally mobile elites [i]. Nor do we want to live in a world of immense and rising inequality, where almost half of the world’s wealth is owned by 1% of the population – a world full of fearful and compliant debt slaves [ii] – a world where caring energetic people who demonstrate for a better life for everyone are brutally mistreated by nation states – [iii] a world devoid of nature – [iv] a world that is taking on the shape of an undemocratic global empire [v].
Global growing up
Humanity learns like children learn, through trial and error. Each era of human history points towards the next. This is the age of excessive and unbridled individualism, short-term self-interest and profit at all costs. It’s time we embraced some long-term intelligent self-interest and cooperation. We are not advocating that everybody becomes the same, nor that we replace a tyranny of the minority (what we have now) with a tyranny of the majority. Far from it! Well-balanced societies must facilitate the healthy expression of all values, and that includes the desire for competitive entrepreneurialism. With Global People Power in action, competition can still occur, if it is still needed as a motivator, but as long as it is balanced by a system of fair global regulation.
Through the internet and modern communications [vi] we can mobilise local to global grassroots support and participation. As Jimmy Wales, the Founder of Wikipedia says, “Most people are pretty sensible.” We are highly empathic [vii] intelligent beings. A great many of us are desperate to find new ways to take responsibility for the world’s problems [viii]. Let’s help each other find each other.
Evolving democracy
Many new forms of local, national, and global direct, open and participatory web-based governance have emerged in recent years [ix]. Global People Power aims to complement this movement by encouraging local to global unity in diversity. We will follow the principle of “the power of subsidiary.” This is where local decisions are made locally and global decisions are made globally all functioning for the benefit of the whole in the understanding that ultimately, everyone and everything is interconnected as whole-systems within whole-systems. It is not a question of either-or campaigning, but both-and.
Reform or revolution?
Global People Power may not satisfy that part in us which still desires to “crush the system” by brutalising those who preside over it. Our purpose however, is to provide what most people want, the power to directly influence their world and in a way that is transparent, open and free from undue influence and to not be surreptitiously undermined. Global People Power could help to upgrade, reform and legitimise existing national and local forms of governance around the world. It would be hard to consider the achievement of this ambitious mission, the goal of local to global suffrage as anything other than a revolutionary paradigm shift.
The challenge of new ideas
New ideas challenge us. They contradict what we have known to be true (research Cognitive Dissonance). New ideas usually demand a lot of soul-searching prior to a huge leap of faith. Most of the time we would rather feel safe with what we already believe to be true, even when life conditions around us compel us to try out a different viewpoint and to experiment in adapting our behaviour. But as Albert Einstein said “You can’t solve a problem with the same thinking that got you into the problem in the first place.” So instead of trying harder and harder the old way and getting nowhere, which Einstein also said was “the definition of madness,” let’s try something new. Let’s try thinking and acting on a whole new planetary scale to tackle planetary problems.
[i] Oxfam. 20/01/2014. Working For the Few. Political capture and economic inequality[ii] Hudson, Michael. Counter Punch. Debt Slavery – Why It Destroyed Rome, Why It Will Destroy Us Unless It’s Stopped. 02/04/2011
[iii] Oppenheim, Maya. New Statesman. 22/11/2014. Why are Occupy Democracy Protesters staging another occupation in London?
[iv] Carey, Bjorn. Stanford University. Science Daily. 24/07/2014. Biologist warn of early stages of Earth’s sixth mass extinction event
[v] Hudson, Michael. (Book) 20/01/2003. Super Imperialism. The economic strategy of American empire.
[vi] Worldwide Web Foundation. Recognise the Internet as a human right, says Sir Tim Berners-Lee as he launches annual Web Index
[vii] Rifkin, Jeremy. RSA Animate. The Empathic Society.
[vii] Hall-Jones, Peter. Global Policy Forum. May 2006. Tne Rise of NGOs.
[ix] Liquid Democracy.