What are non-local DSC?
Non*local DSCs are spontaneous collectives of DiEM25 members that are concerned about a specific topic and/but are not able to meet locally and thus resort to technology to discuss those topics and take action on them.
Why do we need Non-local Networked DSCs?
DiEM25’s goal is to democratize the European Union and to reform the European economic system.
The lack of a common public sphere is one of the main reasons for the current dysfunction of the EU. Political debate is still national, so persons and groups in different European countries cannot discuss common problems together and organize to solve them. In order to build a more democratic Europe, DiEM must be able to give a space for people and groups across Europe to deliberate on common matters together.
The current internal system of forum discussions is inadequate as can be seen from the low activity. We propose that DiEM members should be allowed to create online networking hubs / DSCs across Europe – so that they can discuss issues that matter to them but find no echo in local/surrounding realities.
The proposal for Non-local Network DSCs is also meant to strengthen grassroots democracy in DiEM by giving the grassroots more control over the policy processes.
The case for allowing non-local DSCs:
In DiEM’s organizing principles, there is no specific dispositions forbidding DSCs from organizing online. According to the OP DSCs are indeed thought as mostly local (“DSCs are best suited for people who live reasonably close to one another”) but there is nothing forbidding its online spontaneity. In fact, there is a mention to this possibility – DCS are supposed to think of ways for their meetings to “make participants leave the (physical or digital) room feeling enthused rather than alienated”
DSCs are also “self-governing, with no need to validate their actions from the CC”. and are expected to develop policy proposals to be submitted to the Forum or even to the CC.
Amendment to the OP: Non-local Network DSCS
DiEM25 should allow for Non-local Network DSCs.
Non-local Network DSCs offer DiEM members a forum for pan-European policy debate on their topics. The Non-Local Network DSCs are open for all DiEM members and usually deal with transversal topics, common to the entire membership (gender, transparency, internal democratic procedures, Human Rights and Immigration etc).
The CC member responsible for coordinating a specific policy area (e.g. Human Rights) shall be invited to become a member of the corresponding Non-Local Network DSC.
Non-local DSCs shall be allowed to
Non-Local DSCs should have the same rights as other DSCs, including the right to propose policies and sets of policy alternatives for a membership vote.
The CC and DiEM coordinators should support the work of the Non-Local Network DSCs in the same way they support the work of regular DSCs.
Support this proposal
If you would like to support this proposal you can sign below in a comment and sign this Change.org petition.
Democracy in Diem25 
I support this initiative. Pedrojuán (Dublin DSC)
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I also support this initiative. This brings about true cross-pollination of DiEM25 idea’s across Europe, through DSC’s that are not bound to a single country.
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I am not clear about the need for this petition. I have already received a message from Judith informing me that my initiative for a Pan-European Online Policy Discussion group may go ahead replacing the title “DSC” with “Task Force”. As far as I understand the situation, this matter has been settled.
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Task Force is not an existing figure in the OP. Hence theses groups cannot take part in the coordinators list. They do not exists beyond this exception. DSC are spontaneous and do not require permission to exist, just notification. I think if Task Force with an adequate definition appear in the OP, then it is OK. The question is to recognise officially the existence of working groups that are not local. I am happy with a different name.
The reason for this petition is that DiD was banned from the Coordinators List, before the group ever used the list, on the grounds that it was not local.
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I support this initiative. Eric (Leipzig DSC)
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The DSC Nottingham also supports this initiative
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I support this initative. Alex (Leipzig DSC)
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As someone who is yet without connection to a local DSC but with a great wish to actively join in I was really glad to hear from plans for non locals DSCs that are devoted to specific topics that are relevant & interesting to all of us. Despite my plans for creating a local DSC at my home town I’m absolutely convinced that the creation of non local DSCs is a consequent approach to the democratic exchange of thoughts in the spirit of DiEM25 that we all dream about & work for.
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I support the initiative. However I believe that it requires careful definition and an appropriate technological toolset in order to provide democratic safeguards. Otherwise (and I can understand any reticence on the part of the organisers) we are open to entryism and infiltration by other constituted groups with their own agenda.
I suggest that informal groups should be formed (and indeed, are forming), and that the formal modification of the OPs should await the availability of a toolset available to all (how do we contact each other? advertise the existence of a group to allow others to join? …) and of some sort of validation mechanism for the formation of network SCs.
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I support this initiative. Susett (Leipzig DSC)
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I support this initiative. (Anke DSC Leipzig )
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DSC Palermo 1 supports this initiative, Giovanni.
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I feel the limitations of the potential of DSC’s to be the driving force of Diem, resultant from the constraint of being physically local based is potentially a serious flaw in structure of Diem.
Colin DiEm Dublin
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Since non-local DSCs are not explicitly prohibited, coordination acted incorrectly in not admitting DiD to the List. However, there does seem to be an attempt to distinguish between location-based organization and topic-based organization – currently Pillars. Perhaps it would be better to reform the Pillar creation process so anyone could start a topic/expert collective as long as it didn’t duplicate an already existing grouping.
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I believe there should be no regulation on the amount of groups that are formed to talk about the same topic as long as they all conform to the Manifesto and spirit of DiEM25. There are two basic reasons for this.
The practical group size is limited to (some say) 30 people ( I do not want to go in the scientifical debate here, but my experience tells me the number is even smaller) Far too small for a FUTURE multimillion member grassroots party capable of making a change in Europe. Hence the same topic must be discussed over and over in many NSC’s, and those should link through further NSC’s in a redundant network that makes ideas flow freely with the help of pubic communication channels such as the Mastodon server which has been set up by Aral Balkan and I encourage everyone to join. (http://d25.community)
Furthermore, there are many people in small villages and towns where there is not enough traction to found a local DSC. They are being left out by an unnecesary restriction. What I would ask is why to limit the reach of DSC’s to local, if they were inititally conveived as local and non local.
It is not so bad that DiD was left out of the coordinators list, just a glitch. It is just positive that this fact has sprung the debate about the internal structure of DiEM25.
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The limit for real-time conversation is about 20, but 30 might work in a highly skilled group.
Non-synchronous interaction without support is limited to about 150 (the Dunbar Number).
However, non-sync interaction with reputation support is not population limited.
My proposal:
http://cosmism.blogspot.dk/2015/06/direct-democracy-computer-network-based.html
has not been implemented, but there are several sites which maintain over 50,000 active participants.
Therefore, our suggestion would best be for one group/site for each topic area.
This avoids what could be a complicated conflict resolution and integration process.
Implementation of the reputation support I proposed would be relatively straight forward and could be completed within Loomio or some other package already being used by DiEM25 DSCs before the simpler system breaks down. This assumes we get a developer for a few months full-time.
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In this “false news” era, it is vital that we have subject-matter collectives within DiEM25. Their job would be solely to establish facts. For example: What are the costs of producing electricity with different technologies? Are GMOs a health risk? Does chiropractic treatment have a physical basis?
Each of these could have an Advisory Panel member as a trustee and connection to DiEM25 central actors.
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I think your (David) position is in no means in contradiction with the existence of NSC. An asynchronous subject-matter collective will encompass members from many DSC’s and NSC. Some of these discussion groups will deal exclusively with that subject matter, others may take that subject matter for specific meetings or part of them. The physical presence of the collective results from the results of its activity. Documents and decisions. The question is through which debate process these emerge.
NSC are a proposal to solve two problems. The first one being to make synchronous interaction more powerful and hence the contributions to the debate more interesting. To produce better content for the subject-matter collectives.
The second is precisely to identify, by word of mouth, which subjects should be addressed at each point in time. If there is a top down design of the subject-matter groups there will be a top down control of the agenda. If subject-matter collectives are a result of spontaneous discussions that repeat themselves all over, and our common awareness of this repetitions, then we will be sure that the agenda is controlled bottom up. Networking collectives will help to connect DSC’s, but also other NSC’s. If many NSC deal with the same subject matter, the this subject matter collective must be created and given the required infrastructure.
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I have made two entirely separate proposals. One concerns the NSCs, which will inevitably generate conflicts when different groups come to different conclusions. The other is subject-matter collectives. For clarity, please respond to each proposal separately. This second topic could have its own main post, but I don’t see a way to create one.
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DSC Dublin supports this initiative.
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Most of the objectives stated can be achieved by setting up the right online infrastructure:
: A single forum for discussion, which can be accessed by both email and web.
: Every administrative action will be logged to ensure accountability (automatically when possible).
: Three persons will be assigned to any administrative role in order to ensure full transparency and to ensure appeal options
: An external (independent of forum administration) person from the CC or AP will be the ultimate responsible for seeing that Admins follow the OPs. This person will also be responsible for ensuring that funding is available for system operation.
: Supervisory parties will have their contact information clearly posted in the forum. Any emails to such parties must be responded to within 3 days. A member failing to get a timely response can directly (to the CC, for example) request that administrative action be taken to correct the problem.
: Standards of administration will ensure that no official action can be taken without timely announcement, following procedural rules, etc. For example, an Announcements sub-forum must provide full information about coming official meetings. Any funding decision must satisfy procedures.
: Any member will be able to create a sub-forum, which will be announced in the Announcements sub-forum.
: Current lists, forums, etc. will be placed in archive mode after timely requests to participants to subscribe the new forum. Or, get the addresses and auto-subscribe all active participants
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[…] concept of Networking Spontaneous Collectives or Non-local DSC’s is developed further in this article and a more general analysis of topologies for grassroots democracy can be found in the article […]
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[…] One last remark before I jump into the details: Tools can be used in many ways and, not surprisingly, I will describe how to use Mastodon in order to give support to the grassroots, self organising topology that was previously described in previous posts: here, here and here. […]
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