Can our party pick your brain?

[Rohan Jayasekera]

Michael, I suspect that the Transparency Party's plan is the same as
that of your "un-Party", even if not in theory then at least in
practice.  Here's my reasoning:

1. In any particular riding, as long as the party remains unelected it
doesn't really matter who the members are and what their opinions are
about what an elected representative should do.  The only thing that
matters is getting the party elected, and since that will be
determined not by the party membership but by all the voters in the
riding, the party will necessarily have to convince the voters that it
will serve them and not itself.

2. If the riding does indeed elect the Transparency Party's chosen
representative (and it doesn't matter who it is as long as s/he
doesn't renege on the promise to follow the orders of the people),
then every eligible voter who is not already a party member, and who
desires a voice in what that representative does, will join the
party.  And then that riding has direct democracy.

The hard part is winning the first riding, especially in countries/
regions that make it difficult for new parties to emerge, such as the
USA and Canada (the Canadian Green Party is still trying to elect its
first member).  If, however, this difficult goal is achieved, it
should get much easier afterward: once any riding has elected this
party, many voters in other ridings will want the same power and will
take the same path (as has been happening in a number of Arab
countries following the Tunisian revolution).  They may not even have
to wait to defeat their incumbent representatives, because some of
those will switch sides in order to avoid being thrown out (like some
members of Libya's ruling party have just done).  If all ridings
eventually go the same way, then the party system becomes irrelevant
and can be discarded.  I like Thomas's analogy of this party's being a
midwife, and your name "un-Party" captures it very nicely.

Rohan