Chapter 14

Plurocracy

“You’re kidding?!” I was stunned. “Why not?”

“They aren’t needed. In fact, their rigid dogmatic thinking and formalised platforms would just obstruct plurocracy.”

I sighed, resigning myself to yet another unfathomable explanation. “Perhaps you’d better explain to me what plurocracy is.”

“Well,” she began, exhaling deeply, but continuing to cut asparagus. “The essential feature, I suppose, is its decentralised bottom-up structure. At its basis are small self-governing electorates called localities.”

“How small?”

“Most have around two hundred and fifty people – usually about three-quarters old enough to vote. Of course, numbers vary according to population densities, geography, and other factors. Our locality, Jibilee, spans all the houses bordering this garden, and those bordering the next two to the north – including the part of Balderstone Road where you live. Currently, a total of 188 voters.”

“And you’re their representative?”

“For the moment. But there’s another 187 people who could do the job if they wanted.”

It took me a moment to realise what that implied. “What about people outside the locality? Can they represent it?”

She snorted an abrupt but quiet laugh. “Of course not. How could anyone properly represent something they aren’t part of, familiar with? One of the main aims of plurocracy is to avoid distant and faceless representation. I know the majority of people in Jibilee by name and sight. And vice versa.”

“Jibilee?! What does that mean?”

“Nothing at all. Just the name chosen from those suggested by locality members when it formed.”

“But a meaningless name? I would have expected a famous Australian sportsperson’s. Bradman – Freeman – Cazaly.”

“They’re in use elsewhere, as are many others. But Aboriginal and old English names are more popular. Voters in Jibilee, though, and many other electorates, wanted to start afresh, with names lacking associations. Names we just liked the sound of.”

“But Jibilee?!”

“Better than ‘Orgasmia’. We should be grateful that was out-voted.”

Eyebrows raised, I nodded in agreement. “Anyway, about plurocracy…?”

“Yes, well, the localities – the base level electorates – are all arranged into larger associations. The town level usually consists of about twenty localities, that’s about five thousand people. You probably won’t like our town name either – Enote.”

I didn’t, but at least it was consistent – it sounded every bit as meaningless as Jibilee.

She stood, having cut all mature asparagus spears in sight – there must have been a couple hundred or more in her basket – and began walking back to the tool shed. I accompanied her. All the while, she continued her explanation. “Each town is represented by one of the representatives of its constituent localities. In some cases, like ours, the town rep is elected by town voters. In other towns, the locality representatives choose the town rep. And sometimes as compensation for their extra duties, an assistant or even replacement locality rep is elected. But these issues are entirely matters for each locality or town to decide.”

“Is that it? Localities and towns?”

“No. Towns form bigger electorates again, and those likewise, progressively upwards. The city level usually has about ten towns, say two hundred localities, fifty thousand people. In turn, cities combine to form regions. Chord, which is Enote’s city, and another forty-nine cities make up the region of Hillbeach.”

I belatedly realised that Enote wasn’t a meaningless name after all. Was Chord dissonant or consonant, I wondered.

“Hillbeach in turn combines with another nine regions to form the nation of Australia. Which in turn is linked with fifteen nearby nations to form the meta-nation of Oceania South, and there are nine other meta-nations across the world.”

“You mean every nation in the world has this system?”

“No, unfortunately there are still a few that maintain older forms of government. But a majority at least now use plurocracy. Australia was actually the very first to adopt it.”

That proved this was a dream. Australia leading the way? After generations of parroting Britain then the US? Usually we were a decade or two behind, not ahead!

Yet as surprised as I was to hear it, I must admit it appealed to my sense of national pride. My subconscious certainly knew which buttons to press.

“Ok,” I said, as we moved inside the tool shed, “so you have the various levels – apart from there being more of them, how is it different to what I’m used to with local, state and federal government?”

“It’s vastly different – because of the way the levels interact.” As she continued, Dianne placed the asparagus one or two at a time onto a long low bench, sorting it eventually into a score or more of equally sized piles. “Firstly, just so I don’t confuse you, an electorate at any level is often called a plurocracy. Now whatever the level, for a plurocracy to pass a proposal, approval is required not only from a majority of its voters but also from a majority of its constituent plurocracies. Enote, for example, can only pass a proposal if more than half of its localities and more than half of all its voters agree. Likewise at the city level and above.”

I suddenly recognised what she was describing: a system mentioned in an episode of the classic TV satire, ‘Yes, Minister’. Extended and expanded, but basically the same. I hadn’t seen the series for years, yet here it was being re-presented to me as part of a grander scheme. Not for the first time, I was stunned by my dream’s level of detail. I’d never had one nearly so involved.

“Mind you,” continued Dianne, “in some plurocracies – Jibilee for one – a majority is defined not as a half but two-thirds. Though in some situations, not even that suffices: many localities, again Jibilee included, sometimes require full consensus for proposals to be adopted – we continuously modify them until they satisfy everyone. For other decisions, especially about issues of land use, many plurocracies weight votes, so people most affected have the greatest say. Some votes have a zero to ten scale and must reach a pre-agreed total for decisions to be passed. But I digress. Whatever the details, the point is, every plurocratic electorate at every level functions semi-autonomously. So, while each locality, for example, has to heed the plurocratic decisions of its town, these apply only to issues that affect two or more localities – for purely internal affairs, each locality makes its own rulings. So, for example, a decision to build a new shop within Jibilee would be made by Jibilee’s voters; but the shop’s location would be restricted by Enote’s planning scheme, and the height it could reach would be limited by another agreement settled on by the whole of Chord. This way, people most directly affected by proposals have the major say and decisions are made from the bottom up.”

Whereas the approach of most governments I knew could more aptly be described as up-(your-)bottom. “But then what is the point of having representatives? In your system, they’d surely be superfluous. You might as well not bother even having elections.”

“We don’t,” replied Dianne, to what must have been my obvious astonishment. “Each person’s vote is stored on the Net, and anyone can change their vote at any time. This saves the waste and tedium of semi-periodic elections, as well as motivating more diligent representation.” She shrugged. “Personally I think the title should be coordinator, not representative, because mostly what we do is provide options and proposals to our electorates, and try to ensure they have all available and necessary information to make properly considered decisions themselves. All of which is facilitated by the Net. It’s usually an efficient way to make proposals, to seek and obtain ‘expert’ advice, and to bring any issue to the attention of those it affects. Like an electronic communal noticeboard.”

Having now emptied the basket of asparagus, Dianne put it and the knife back on the shelves, then opened one door of a tall, wide, two-door refrigerator at the end of the bench. Inside were vegetable crispers, one atop another on shelves, all marked with a different surname each. One, I noticed, was ‘Knight’.

“But if you can change your vote at any time,” I asked, “doesn’t it lead to instability?”

“Not at all,” she replied, taking one pile of asparagus and putting it in the top crisper. As she continued her reply, she repeated the process for the remainder of the asparagus and crispers (though she skipped her own family’s). “Without political parties, a change of representation corresponds merely to the people changing their mind, not a potentially destabilising power shift. With plurocracy, power always remains with the people. Even if our voting habits did prove destabilising, we could vote to change them. The choices available are limited only by our imaginations.”

Choices. What would people choose with such an arrangement, I wondered. How would they manage to find agreement? “What if a locality or town disagrees with a majority of others?” I asked. “Are they supposed to just cop it on the chin? Grin and bear it?”

“Not necessarily. Each plurocracy has the right to secede. If Jibilee ever finds itself consistently voting against decisions plurocratically passed by Enote, we could choose to secede from it and become independent. Or join other more-like-minded localities – not necessarily with common borders.”

A useful feature, I thought, but hardly a panacea. “Even with the right to secede, how would plurocracy prevent discrimination against minorities? How does it avoid persecution? I can see how it would just lead to rule by majority ignorance. Legislated racism with all the different ethnic groups huddling together in their own electorates, making up their own rules.”

“You’re right. That’s what it’s capable of. And the only way to avoid it is to be vigilant. People must understand the responsibilities associated with self-determination. Which requires education. It’s an ongoing task. Though there’s a simple guideline designed to foster the best from people, one that is accepted as a condition – as a guiding rule – by each and every plurocracy: any practice of one’s own choice is a right, as long as it fulfils the duty not to harm others in the process.”

“That’s vague enough to be misinterpreted. Hardly foolproof.”

“True,” she said, closing the refrigerator door, and picking up the last pile of asparagus from the bench. She continued to talk as we made our way out of the tool shed and back to her house, her fingers fluttering more than ever now that they were not involved in more deliberate actions. “Care must always be taken to distinguish the truly harmful from the merely disagreeable – to avoid misinterpreting due to shocked sensibilities or outraged morality. Or laziness. Even a majority definition of ‘harm’ could open the door to just the sort of rule by weight of numbers that persecution depends on. Which is why many localities pursue consensus rather than majority approval – for certain proposals at least.”

“Which proposals?”

“Whichever ones are deemed appropriate to deal with that way”

“But how do you determine which ones are appropriate?”

“We vote on it.”

“So you vote to determine if you need to find consensus instead of voting?”

“I know, it sounds contradictory. In the early years, there were several attempts to set up simple criteria for determining when to seek majority approval and when to seek consensus, but they failed badly. Most other plurocracies had similar experiences. You can’t always use simple generalised criteria – such as a party platform – to tackle complex issues. Usually the first thing we do, any time a proposal is made that requires a decision, is discuss the reasons for and against methods of making the decision, then we vote as to which method to use.”

“So presumably you end up with a majority approval in favour of reaching consensus.”

“Yes, a two-thirds majority – that’s what we decided. We can change it, but the possibility hasn’t been raised for more than two decades.”

I shook my head. “I find it hard to believe people are so politically involved. I’m used to most being apathetic even about voting once every few years. And you’re telling me now they vote all the time on all sorts of issues! However well you might ‘coordinate’ your electorate, I hate to think what poor decisions they make.”

“Ah yes,” said Dianne, smiling grimly, “the old fear that if people are actually given power, they will be irresponsible with it. Preserved, no doubt, because it justified the restriction of power to a few leaders who usually acted so irresponsibly as to make the fear seem warranted. But people aren’t sheep to be led, even if tradition long treated us so. And, just like children, we can’t become responsible if we aren’t given responsibilities.”

“Voting at elections is a heavy responsibility.”

“Choosing every few years which party hack should take control? That just transfers responsibility – abandons it. It has to be taken over personally, through involvement, not abdication. Fortunately, as might have been predicted if fear, prejudice and lazy thinking hadn’t ruled, once people were given responsibilities by plurocracy, most rose to the occasion.”

She hadn’t convinced me – perhaps the fear she spoke of was too entrenched in me – yet I couldn’t think how to reply. Instead, as we entered her back yard, I suddenly became aware of the potential ponderousness of the system she’d been describing. “All this careful involved decision-making must take a lot of time. Doesn’t it slow the wheel of progress? Or grind it to a halt?”

“Progress at times is less rapid under plurocracy, but it’s a type and rate of progress that people truly want. With only one needay a week, we have enough time to deliberate over decisions, to seek information, and to use our plurocratic abilities for change responsibly. Perhaps we don’t make so fast a wheel, but for most it’s a better wheel. In any case, your concern is just the common old argument that true democracy isn’t practical because it would take too long to get anything done, that what’s really needed is a benevolent dictator to make decisions on everyone’s behalf. Of course, dictators rarely stay benevolent for long, nor are any as omniscient as they need to be to make all those decisions. But it was always a ridiculous argument as long as true democracy was never actually attempted. A bit like a virgin claiming sex is unpleasant.”

A lengthy silence followed, as we entered the house and moved into her kitchen. I wanted to raise objections, to point out flaws, but at the time none came to me. After she transferred the asparagus to the refrigerator, she gestured to me to sit down, then moved behind the kitchen bench.

“Well…,” I said, finally. “It’s… it’s unprecedented.”

“Actually it isn’t,” she replied, stopping in her tracks, blinking rapidly. “It has much in common with Switzerland’s old system of government, although it’s more elaborate, systematic and consistent. And naturally enough, modern information technology streamlines it – enough to decentralise most government departments into towns and cities.”

I had a fleeting vision of a local ‘Dad’s Army’ defence force, but she continued before I could voice my thoughts.

“It makes sense. Towns are pretty much the perfect size to most efficiently satisfy most social needs and many cultural ones, as well as to maintain eco-energy systems and other services like much health-care. But some things work better with more than five thousand people, and are most efficiently managed at the city level: police, for example, libraries, information, fire protection. As well as education, housing, sanitation, street maintenance, entertainment, recreation. And of course there are some concerns for which cities don’t suffice. A few can produce high standard orchestras and sports teams, universities and specialist research groups, and other ensembles of note, but more often – for the best standard possible – the talents and skills of a region or even a nation need to be pooled. The advantages of being part of a larger group manifest most during hard times: when industrial shortfalls, for example, or crop failures occur in one city, they can usually be compensated for by other cities in the region – and regional failures, by the nation.” She moved to a cupboard and opened it. “Care for a tea?”

“A coffee please,” I replied, to her surprise. Another silence followed as she prepared the drinks. I found myself lost in my own thoughts, trying to digest – as well as recall – all she had said, and to figure out how this system might actually work. Not surprisingly, given her ability to talk at length, Dianne broke the silence. It was as if she was aware what I was thinking.

“As it happens, the monthly locality meeting is scheduled for tonight. Not only would it be a good chance for you to see plurocracy in practice, but since we have to reach consensus on one issue, your attendance is more or less essential.” She smiled. “Not that you usually miss the meetings.”

Running footsteps interrupted us, and I turned to see a young girl, perhaps eight years old, rush into the room, speaking simultaneously. “Can I have something to eat please Mum?”

“It’s a bit early for lunch, Victoria,” said Dianne.

“Awww,” she whined, “but I’m really hungry.”

“How about an apple?”

“Ok.” She turned to me and said “Hi Ernest,” then immediately moved to a fruit bowl on one of the benches and hovered over it, lost in the decision of which apple to select. You could see at a glance she was her mother’s daughter.

“Hello,” I said to her. I turned to Dianne. “No school today? Do children have a one-day week too, like adults?”

“Most have three school days a week,” Dianne answered, the start of a broad explanation of the nature of modern education. Schools still existed at least, and they served much the same function as ever, but they were augmented by on-line education at home and various other audiovisual aids used almost from birth. Children also had frequent ‘community days’, time spent accompanying and assisting adults as they performed their work – a sort of work-experience meant to provide opportunities to meet many people in many walks of life, and to understand the type of labour the community performed and how it functioned. This, Dianne claimed, helped develop social skills and supplied a wide choice of role-models. It also helped children decide – sooner or later – what they themselves did best and what they might most want to do when they grew up.

“And do you like community days?” I asked Victoria as she chomped on her apple.

“O yes,” she replied, her mouth full. “I told you once before. Community work is the best part of school.”

“Really?”

“Yes, I like seeing how we grow food and produce energy, and how factories run.”

“You sure it isn’t just slave labour?” I asked Dianne, after Victoria returned to her room.

“Hardly,” she said. “It isn’t hard work, not at Victoria’s age. In fact, half the time, the kids don’t do any work, they just observe and keep the adults company. When they actually do some work, as often as not it just slows the adults down. So there’s very little motivation for using them as slaves.”

I had many more questions, as we sat outside with our drinks, and Dianne was very informative with her answers. Children were still taught the three r’s, but an at least equal focus was given to the art of living with other people. As soon as they were able to understand the concepts, children were taught the rights due to and from each other, how to trust, co-operate, tolerate differences, how to resolve conflicts, control anger, and manage stress.

Dianne claimed at one point that learning was no longer a chore or a contest, but an engagement. “We aren’t trained exclusively for employment but rather for life. So, too, our identities aren’t defined by careers, but by how we spend all our time – work and leisure.”

“It sounds to me,” I replied, “a bit like brain-washing. However well intentioned, isn’t it just organised propaganda? Indoctrination? A sort of supposedly enlightened version of the Hitler Youth?”

Dianne looked shocked – enough for her fidgeting to cease, but only for a few moments. “That’s a very inappropriate comparison. I can understand how it might seem like indoctrination, but the fact is that every culture indoctrinates, if not wilfully then unintentionally. Each generation passes onto the next their unstated assumptions and expectations about life and society. We do the same, no doubt, but at least we are aware of it. That is why behavioural studies are a significant part of education, why we are taught to understand where and who we are, the nature of our thinking, our culture, and the assumptions and philosophy of our institutions and systems. And we are also taught to think critically, to question accepted wisdom, to be vigilant and creative. I may be wrong, but I don’t think the Hitler Youth were taught that.”

“Point taken. So what’s the result? Does everyone have an IQ of 200?”

My scepticism sounded unduly harsh even to my ears, but Dianne brushed it aside without comment. “The result is, generally speaking, a more open-minded and understanding society. It isn’t perfect. It can’t be, of course, not ever – people are too fallible, but most are happy and fulfilled. And when they are not, when life throws some spanner in the works and happiness and fulfilment fly out the window, the cohesiveness and caring of the community help people move on.”

She was clearly convinced of the truth of what she was saying, and on the surface I had to admit she had made some persuasive arguments, but I still had nagging doubts about it all. There was a certain cerebral quality to this society, a dispassionate detachment that I found unnerving and not entirely human. I could not see happiness and fulfilment flowing from it for me. “It all sounds very fine and civilised,” I said, “but I can’t help feeling it must also be a bit boring.”

“O, anything but,” she replied. “For me there is never enough time in the day to become bored.”

“Even with a one-day working week? Surely with all that time on your hands…”

She smiled knowingly and gently shook her head. “When enufism was first introduced,” she said, “some feared that the economic problem would just be replaced by a problem of boredom. Critics claimed a shorter working week was likely to generate an uncontrollable level of hedonism and self-indulgence. And there certainly was plenty of that at first, although it was hardly out of control. But you can’t do anything for long before it begins to bore, even hedonism. Then you either seek newer activities, or rot. And one of the best activities to revive the terminally bored is education. When you have something interesting to learn, you are rarely bored. Of course, what interests each person differs, but that just means education has to involve efforts to determine what interests each person. Which is what we do. Not just for children. Education doesn’t stop at the end of secondary school, or tertiary. It continues voluntarily through to old age – whenever people want it, on whatever subject interests them, from the driest academic esoterica to advanced knitting or skateboarding, anything that can be taught.”

“Including gun-running?” I said with cynical aplomb. “Terrorism 101?”

“Naturally.”

I stared at her expressionless face in disbelief.

She stared back, oddly motionless for seconds. Then a sudden wide smile. “You actually believed me, didn’t you?”

I was too startled – and relieved – to respond.

“Of course those things aren’t taught,” she continued. “I meant anything that fulfils the duty not to harm others. That concept has become so second nature to most of us now, I forgot you would need to be reminded. Sorry.”

Rather obviously, Dianne changed the topic to me. Ernest, that is. Presumably she was hoping she’d mention something that would jog my memory back into full bloom. At first, I was glad for the reprieve from further new disarming ideas. But however sure Dianne was about me being Ernest, I knew she was wrong. So after hearing a few things about ‘myself’, I politely declined to hear any more. She then told me a little about Mattie and – whenever my censoring skills weren’t quick enough – ‘our’ marriage, as well as some neighbourhood gossip. Most of it went in one ear and out the other. What I did pay attention to only made me aware of how much I did not know the people of whom she spoke.

Eventually, Dianne’s husband, David – my supposed old school friend – left his workshop long enough to share lunch with us. And Victoria’s older brother, James, appeared briefly before heading off to a friend’s place. David – an oddly hesitant type who, somewhat like his wife, apparently could not say a word without an accompanying hand or facial gesture – was shocked by my purported amnesia, but James, on the cusp of adolescence, was too much in a world of his own to give any indication that he even noticed (though he could not be said to lack manners).

After lunch, David returned to his workshop, but Dianne spent the rest of the day with me, showing no overt signs of annoyance or impatience, or even of getting on with her own life. I was surprised by this, given the nervous energy so apparent in her; I wondered if she had things to do but was being prevented from doing – by me. Even when she was seated, she shifted every few seconds, as if unable to become comfortable. Her fingers only ceased their fidgeting movements when they were otherwise occupied, or for a few moments when she was taken by surprise or discomfort. Likewise her less frequent blinking. At first I thought it was me making her nervous, but at one stage, after lunch, when I was seated outside, I observed her through the kitchen window when she was briefly alone inside with David, and she was as much assailed by her fidgeting then as before. A bundle of nervous energy, it seemed.

“Perhaps I should head home now,” I said soon after lunch, before realising that I was not able to go home – at best, I could only return to Ernest’s home. “You must have things to do.”

“Nothing urgent,” she said. “I’m up to date with my work, and prepared for tonight’s meeting. But what about you? How are you feeling? Is anything coming back yet?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Nor will it. I know you and Wilbur and everyone else here are sure I’m someone else, but I’m telling you I am Steven Stone.”

She said nothing, beyond the eloquence of her expression of compassionate concern.

Soon after, she suggested a game of tennis, which initially struck me as a good idea, but then I remembered my injury. Despite their bruised appearance, however, my toes seemed to be completely recovered thanks to Toby’s injection, so I decided they probably wouldn’t trouble me. My chest pains were another concern. I was not keen on doing anything to make them return. Then I began to reconsider – if this was a dream, why should I fear chest pains? Perhaps they were not going to be part of the dream. They hadn’t been since I first met Wilbur in the storm. Perhaps their absence was my subconscious’s way of telling me I did not have heart trouble after all. Wishful thinking, maybe, but I was feeling restless and trapped. Apart from the walking, this dream had been fairly inactive, physically if not intellectually.

“I haven’t played in years,” I said to Dianne.

“What about last week’s game?” she replied.

I smiled and just shook my head. She shrugged and said, “Well, are you interested or not? I promise I’ll take it easy on you.”

She probably did, but still she thrashed me. I made a half-hearted attempt at blaming it on my foot injury, but the truth was it did not impair me at all, as Dianne pointed out in reply.

I enjoyed the game thoroughly. Though tired and muscle-sore by the end of it, still no chest pain eventuated. More evidence for a dream. I had almost hoped a pain would strike – a small one – so Toby’s device would do its stuff. It was still stuck to my chest, yet it didn’t impede my movements even while playing tennis.

On the walk back, the tennis courts being barely further away than Ernest’s house, Dianne informed me that I’d performed up to my usual standard. Which made Ernest, if he existed, a fairly inept tennis player.

After our return, over a late afternoon tea on her verandah, the information overload I was trying to keep at the back of my mind hit breaking point. David was with us again, and I’d just belatedly made the usual, casual, polite remarks to the effect of ‘what a nice place you have’, before asking how long they’d been living there.

“Fifteen years,” said David. “Or is it sixteen? Umm. No, fifteen.”

“Paid off your mortgage?” I asked innocently.

“Mortgage?” they said in unison, looking at me, then each other, in surprise. At least I was not the only one at risk of turning into a parrot.

I misinterpreted. “You have paid it off then?” When their puzzled looks mounted, I tried again. “Or were you cashed up enough to avoid a mortgage altogether?”

“Um…,” began David, his body rigid, his expression concerned. “You really have forgotten everything.”

“There was nothing to pay,” said Dianne, blinking more rapidly than normal.

“You mean you rent?” I said, grappling.

“No,” said Dianne, “no one rents any more. No one buys houses either. Housing is free.”