The two-party system has failed America. Both the Democrats and Republicans have failed to serve the people, catering instead to well-funded special interests. The Iraq war, huge budget and trade deficits, environmental neglect, rampant lobbying, public subsidies to big business, personal scandals involving top government officials, and a general lack of leadership have weakened public confidence in government. Third-party politics, while untainted with those failures, suffers from a persisting lack of credibility that its candidates can win. At most, say establishment critics, such candidates play the role of a spoiler.

So what’s to be done? This web site is dedicated to the proposition that a new political party can lift our country, the United States of America, out of its quagmire. Indeed, that party can help to move our society into the next phase of civilization. For, the forces of world history have advanced to a point of fundamental change. Unseen by most people, our destiny is to experience the transformation of major institutions in the direction of democracy. It is to experience globalization in positive ways. We ourselves, if we decide to embrace this future, will be transforming the institution of government in ways scarcely imaginable.

This new political party is named "Gold Party". (If members later want to change the name, that’s OK. Having a name is the first step in making something a reality.) Would Gold Party be a “third party” like the others? Yes and no. Yes, it would have an organization separate from those of other political parties. No, it would not be a party like those others. It would be unique in its structure and control. It would be a revolutionary party, in some ways akin to socialists but in most ways quite different.
This political party would be fiercely anti-totalitarian, fiercely devoted to personal freedom including free speech, decentralized in its power base, a defender of the free market while accepting government regulation that would protect people from plutocratic encroachments upon their freedom and occupational security.

The focus of its effort would be economic. Integrating people - all people - into productive jobs that maximize the return to labor would be the goal of government taken over by this party. This party would not idolize poverty. It would not engage in class warfare or other divisive strategies. The goal would be to make everyone rich to the extent that human ingenuity can arrange this within the confines of the earth’s resources.

What design or what mechanisms make Gold Party different from other political parties? What makes us think this will succeed where other third parties have failed? First, it builds upon an existing model of successful political activity. Second, it incorporates incentives for individuals to work to build the party that other parties lack.

Essentially, Gold Party combines insights gained from experience with the untested concept of a point system that mimics money in its motivating power. The goal of this party is simply to grow to the point that it can take over the government. If enough people are committed to the party and its ideals, anything becomes possible.

Motivation to join the party, to convince other people to join, and then, when the party has reached a certain size of membership, to engage in a political revolution that transforms both government and the larger society would be the key to making this dream a reality.

In a word, the source of political power is: communication. The politician or political organization which can communicate effectively with individual voters wins elections and gains legitimate control of government power. So Gold Party would advance itself through grassroots communication.

Yes, the aim of this party is to overthrow the U.S. government; but it would happen through elections rather than force of arms. No sensible person can be in favor of an armed insurrection against the government if other options are available. This peaceful revolution would take place by force of persuasion and - this is important - by providing party members with incentives to contribute to its ends. Good communication and strong personal incentives are keys to building a successful political organization.

A Landlord Organization as a Model of Political Action

With respect to an existing model of political activity, a landlord organization in the city of Minneapolis showed how a relatively small group of people could effectively fight City Hall. This group was called Minneapolis Property Rights Action Committee. The members, who owned property in poorer neighborhoods, were widely reviled as “slumlords” in the city’s political culture. They were seen as “irresponsible” business owners who brought crime into particular neighborhoods by failing to screen their applicants properly, by failing to police their properties, and by neglecting building maintenance. So strong was the stereotype that supporting evidence was unneeded.

The Minneapolis police department had a multi-million-dollar budget to employ “community police” who would work with neighborhood organizations and block clubs to promote this ideology of shifting the blame for crime to private-sector landlords. After being targeted by politicians and the police, the property owners typically were punished by aggressive building inspections which inflicted financial damage upon them. If the owner could not bear the cost, others could pick up his property at minimal cost.
Keep in mind that Minneapolis was basically a one-party town. The mayor and twelve of the thirteen Council members belonged to the Democratic Farmer-Labor (DFL) party while one Council member was politically independent. Also, the city’s sole daily newspaper, the Star Tribune, was hostile to landlords, both in its editorials and news reporting.

Previously, most landlords in this city tried to keep a low profile in hopes that city officials would not notice them. In contrast, the Property Rights group went after the politicians with tongs. They picketed City Hall and a police headquarters, protested building demolitions, spoke out forcefully at public meetings, conducted “crack tours” to show dignitaries seated in the back of a van how easy it was to purchase crack cocaine on Minneapolis streets, and, once, shut down a meeting of the Minneapolis City Council.

The group also held monthly meetings that were videotaped and shown on cable television at which Minneapolis city officials were regularly denounced. A member published a free-circulation newspaper repeating that message. The capacity to speak with an amplified voice was important to the group’s success.

Gradually, the idea sunk in among city residents that “people cause crime, not buildings”, that the city police rather than landlords were the ones responsible for dealing with crime, and it did not make sense for Minneapolis officials to be tearing down structurally sound houses at the same time that they sought funds to build “affordable housing.” The political direction of the city’s inspections department became clear.

The payoff came in the 2001 municipal elections. A sign prominently displayed at the landlords’ televised meetings listed the mayor and four City Council members whom the group wished to be defeated and four City Council members whom it wished to have reelected. All four of the favored candidates were reelected. The mayor and three of the four disfavored candidates were either defeated or inspired not to seek reelection. During their campaigns, the incoming mayor and several of the new Council members had been guests at the landlords’ meetings.

What were the elements of success in this case? First, the landlords refused to be intimidated by overwhelming political power arrayed against them. Not bothering to conceal their identities, they spoke out conspicuously against their adversaries in City Hall. The group chose to advance its cause through protest activities rather than by attempts to convince elected officials to listen to their arguments or do favors for them.

Most importantly, the group had its own communications media. The free-circulation newspaper and the cable-television show allowed the landlords to tell their stories to a wider audience than what could be reached at the meetings. Even if their megaphone was smaller than most, the message went out in an unvarnished, unedited form to the voters and had a cumulative effect.

In a nutshell, the lesson to be learned from this experience is that any group which operates in a persistently hostile political environment cannot count on “working within the system” to achieve its ends if that means trying to convince the decision makers to change their minds. It seldom happens. A more effective strategy is to bypass the system. Go straight to the people.

With respect to communication, do not try to convince unsympathetic media people to give your cause favorable coverage. Instead, bypass the commercial media, especially big media. Publish your own newspaper. Air your own program on public-access cable television, or on a radio station, on the Internet, or whatever else is available.

A sharply focused message repeated often enough, even one reaching a small audience, will eventually seep into public consciousness. And that is the seed of political power

.A System of Weighted Voting

That is the part of Gold Party taken from experience. The other part, whose approach is untested, has to do with motivation. It is based on a simple insight. If money controls politics, let’s analyze how money works and then mimic its operation.

Let’s suppose that you invest money in a business. You own this business and are its only worker. A person in that situation is motivated to work hard and resourcefully so as to attract a growing number of customers and make more money because the success of the business equates with personal success in monetary terms. The more money the business makes, the more money the owner will have. He can spend this money however he pleases or he can pass the money along to his children. In other words, there is a permanent result of having worked effectively to build a business. There is money.

Compare that situation with the situation of a worker in a political campaign who is a “volunteer”. Presumably, he donates time, effort, and money to the campaign because he believes in the candidate’s fitness to hold public office or in the package of policy proposals which the candidate advocates. If the candidate loses the election, he has nothing for this volunteer work. If the candidate wins, the candidate then becomes an elected official who has full discretion to cast votes. Those who helped him to get elected are now out of the loop. There is no "ownership" interest in this situation.

Maybe the candidate, now a public official, will be grateful to his former campaign workers and be inclined to vote the way they want him to vote. Maybe he will get some of them hired for government jobs. That's up to him. At most, the majority of campaign volunteers will likely be left with a sense of satisfaction at having participated in a winning campaign.

When seeking reelection, the elected official will have less need of those who “brung him to the party” the first time because incumbent officeholders attract money and support from various interested groups. Money alone has staying power in the game of politics. Previous volunteer work in a campaign means little or nothing.

Political parties typically hold conventions to nominate candidates for public office, elect party officials, and adopt policies for government that are included in the party platform. Members of the party have an equal vote in making such decisions. This system provides no incentive to help build the organization. If its members expend unequal effort on behalf of the party but receive an equal reward, the rational inclination is to claim the reward while doing as little as possible by way of contribution.

Now, of course, hard-working members do tend to gain more influence and power within the party than the average member. Even so, the difference in positions resulting from work in party-building activities remains ill-defined. Compared with money-based distinctions in the business world, political distinctions lack clarity. People do want to know where they stand in terms of rank and position.

If politics mimicked the business world, then members of a political party would receive credit for the work they do in building the party. The more credits a person received, the more influence he or she would have in party affairs. Such an arrangement might be embodied in a system of unequal voting based on a member’s credits or points received for contributions to the organization.

What kinds of contribution might that be? If the goal of the party is to increase in size of membership, then points ought to be awarded for a person’s role in aiding that process. First, points would be given for one’s own membership. (Memberships might come in several grades based upon the level of dues paid.) Second, points might be awarded for recruiting new people for the party. Third, there might be a system of merit-based points, awarded by a committee, which would reflect the member’s contribution to party-building activities.

Keep in mind that the purpose of Gold Party is to grow in size of membership so that it can win eventually elections and take over the government. Until that happens, the accumulation of points would have an air of unreality. It may also be insufficiently rewarding, as so often happens, for members to work hard on behalf of a political organization only to have a small group of people take over when the party gains power. “What’s in it for me?,” rank-and-file party members might legitimately ask.

Under our system of representative democracy, elected officials control the government. That would not change in the event of a Gold Party takeover. However, commitments can be sought from candidates for public office in advance of the elections to carry out the party's agenda. The question is how strong are those commitments and what can be done if they are broken.

In a party-centered politics, as opposed to one where individual politicians become media-created brand names, candidates gain access to the ballot by virtue of their endorsement by a political party. If the elected official reneges on promises previously given to party members, the party may deny endorsement to that official when seeking reelection. It will then be a question of whether the voting public values the candidate or the party more. It will be a matter of what the public expects to accomplish through the political process.

There are two motivations which may matter to party members and to voters. First, they will be hoping to have a certain program of government that is congenial to their purposes. Second, they may be hoping to gain something personally from the party’s victory. That means money - jobs.

The Gold Party agenda would therefore carry a clear understanding that party members would get government jobs in the event that its supported candidates win and that the party's point system would determine eligibility for those jobs. Such a system would serve the dual purpose of motiving people to work to build the party and of ensuring that government would carry out its program. If the government bureaucracy at all levels is staffed with persons committed to the party’s ideals, the party program would surely be implemented.

A New “Spoils System”?

The idea of party members shamelessly taking over positions in government (and, through their political connections, also in society) may offend the political sensibilities of Americans. But that’s how the world works. The concept of assigning jobs on the basis of “merit” is largely a myth. Politics always plays a part in the selection of individuals for jobs, especially at a higher level. Gold Party would simply be open about this.

In nations with a totalitarian system of government, party membership equates with leadership positions in society. Boris Yeltsin was once asked why he remained a member of the Communist Party if he no longer believed in its ideals. “Party card” was his short but honest answer. Being a communist in the old Soviet Union conferred many benefits. Party membership was a requirement of high rank in the socioeconomic hierarchy.

In the United States, jobs are generally awarded by criteria other than membership in a political party. We say that education “qualifies” a person to hold certain positions. Except in some technical positions, however, the correlation between course content and the requirements of real-life employment is quite weak. “Merit” is in the eye of the beholder. In fact, personal connections, mode of speech, dress, and, indeed, conformity to the prevailing values of the group (including political ones) all count for more than what we would admit. The specific "knowledge" gained from education is less important.

In our society, corporate and professional power have effectively merged with political power. We live in a plutocracy more than in a democracy. If Gold Party takes over the government, that would change. The totalitarian fusion of political and economic power would end. Party members would dislodge the plutocrats and their minions from positions of government power. We would then have two power structures, the economic and the political, checking each other’s abuse. And that’s good.

We credit newly elected Presidents with compentence for putting together a successful political campaign. Why not credit members of Gold Party with competence as well for making identifiable contributions to the success of the party? Such contributions, too, demonstrate “merit”.

The spoils of public office will become a suitable reward for those who carried out a bloodless revolution to restore democracy in our nation. Obviously, occupationally competent people must be staffing the various positions; but there are many such individuals in our society now denied an opportunity to show what they can do. With respect to the role of politics in selecting people for jobs, Gold Party’s system of preferences for party members would be transparent rather than hypocritical.

A Prospective Program

That brings us to a third point of consideration: what program Gold Party would bring to government if it assumed power in the United States. The short answer is that party policy would be determined at convention-like meetings at which the members voted according to their individual number of points. The party’s platform of issues therefore could be anything that the members wanted.

At the same time, no political party can exist without suggesting a certain package of issues since it is issues which interest people the most about politics. Rather than to propose a blank slate, it might be helpful to propose in advance what issues the party might embrace. Because answers to this question are long and complicated, we will redirect this discussion to another page.

It should be said, however, that after the years of the second Bush Administration, the American people may be faced with a crisis. Back in the 1930s, our people faced a similar situation when the economy collapsed into Depression. The program of government was then obvious: Get the economy back on its feet. Restore confidence in the banks. Get people working again.

Today, we will be trying to recover from the Iraq war. We will be dealing with the cumulative effects of chronic fiscal and trade deficits. Our manufacturing base will be gone. Our natural resources will be under stress. It may, then, be equally obvious as in Roosevelt's time what the U.S. government needs to do. Gold Party would be an enforcing agent to make government serve the needs of the people.

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