The Concord Principles: An Agenda for a New Initiatory Democracy
by Ralph Nader
February 01, 1992
Whereas, a selfish oligarchy has produced economic decline, the
debasement of politics, and the exclusion of citizens from the
strengthening of their democracy and political economy;
Whereas, this rule of the self-serving few over the Nations
business and politics has concentrated power, money, greed, and
corruption far beyond the control oaccountability of citizens;
Whereas, the political system, regardless of Party, has degenerated
into a government of the power brokers, by the power brokers, and for
the power brokers that is an arrogant and distant caricature of
Jeffersonian democracy;
Whereas, Presidential campaigns have become narrow, shallow,
redundant, and frantic parades and horseraces which candidates, their
monetary backers, and their handlers control unilaterally, with the
citizenry expected to be the bystanders and compliant voters;
Whereas, a pervading sense of powerlessness, denial, and revulsion
is sweeping the Nations citizens as they endure or suffer from growing
inequities, injustice, and loss of control over their future and the
future of their children; and
Whereas, we, the citizens of the United States, who are dedicated
to the reassertion of fundamental democratic principles and their
application to the practical, daily events in our Nation, are
committed to begin the work of shaping the substance of Presidential
campaigns and of engaging the candidates attention to our citizen
agendas during this 1992 election year;
Now, therefore, we hereby present the ensuing Concord Principles to
the Presidential candidates for the 1992 election and invite their
written, consistent, and continual adherence to these principles
during their entire campaign and in whatever public offices and
responsibilities they hold or may hold upon cessation of their
campaigns:
First, democracy is more than a bundle of rights
on paper;democracy must also embrace usable facilities that empower
all citizens
- (a) to obtain timely, accurate information from their
government;
- (b) to communicate such information and their judgments to one
another through modern technology; and
- (c) to band together in civic associations as voters,
taxpayers, consumers, workers, shareholders, students, and as
whole human beings in pursuit of a prosperous, just and free
society.
Second, the separation of ownership of major
societal assets from their control permits the concentration of
power over such assets in the hands of the few who control rather
than in the hands of the many who own. The owners of the public
lands, pension funds, savings accounts, and the public airwaves are
the American people, who have essentially little or no control over
their pooled assets or their commonwealth.
The American people should assume reasonable control over the
assets they have legally owned for many years so that their use
reflects citizen priorities for a prosperous America, mindful of the
needs and rights of present and future generations of Americans to
pursue happiness within benign environments.
Third, a growing and grave imbalance between the
often converging power of Big Business, Big Government and the
citizens of this country has seriously damaged our democracy and
weakened our ability to correct this imbalance. We lack the
mechanisms of civic power. We need a modern tool box for redeeming
our democracy by strengthening our capacity for self- government and
self-reliance both as individuals and as a community of citizens.
Our 18th century democratic rights need retooling for the proper
exercise of our responsibilities as citizens in the 21st century.
Fourth, the new democracy tool box contains
measures for the purpose of protecting voters from having their
voting powers diluted, over-run or nullified. These measures are:
- (a) a binding none-of-the-above option on the ballot;
- (b) term limitations, 12 years and out;
- (c) public financing of campaigns through well-promoted
voluntary taxpayer checkoffs on tax returns;
- (d) easier voter registration and ballot access rules;
- (e) state-level binding initiative, referendum, and recall
authority, a non-binding national referendum procedure; and
- (f) a repeal of the runaway White House/Congressional Pay
Raises back to 1988 levels -- a necessary dose of humility to
the politicians.
Fifth, the new democracy tool box strengthens
taxpayers who wish to have a say in how their tax dollars are being
used and how their taxpayer assets are being protected. These
objectives will be advanced by according taxpayers full legal
standing to challenge in the courts the waste, fraud, and abuse of
tax monies and taxpayer assets. Presently, the federal judiciary
places nearly insurmountable obstacles in front of taxpayers,
thereby leaving the task to the unlikely prospect of government
officials taking their own government to court.
Further, a facility for taxpayers banding together can be
established by a simple taxpayer checkoff on the 1040 tax return,
inviting taxpayers to join their national taxpayers association
which would be accountable to members on aone member-one vote
standard.
Finally, obscure, overly complex, mystifying jargon pervading
federal tax, pension, election and other laws and procedures is a
barrier to taxpayer-citizen participation. The language of these
laws and procedures must be simplifid and clarified as a matter of
national priority; otherwise, only special interests hiring decoders
will be able to participate while the general public is shut out.
Sixth, the new democracy tool box strengthens
consumers of both business and government services by according
them:
- (a) computerized access in libraries and their own homes to
the full range of government information for which they have
already paid but are now unable to obtain, either inexpensively
or at all;
- (b) facilities in the form of periodic inserts, included in
the billing of other envelopes sent to them by companies that
are either legal monopolies (for example, electric, gas,
telephone utilities) or are subsidized or subsidizable by the
taxpayers (for example, banks and savings and loans). These
inserts invite consumers to join their own statewide consumer
action group to act as a watchdog, to negotiate and to advocate
for their interests.
A model of this facility is the Illinois Citizen Utility
Board which has saved ratepayers over $3 billion since 1983, and
filled the consumer chair before utility commissions,
legislative hearings, and courtroom proceedings on many
occasions.
This type of facility costs taxpayers nothing, costs the
carrying companies or government mailings nothing (the consumer
group pays for the insert and there is no extra postage) and is
voluntary for consumers to join. Had there been such bank
consumer associations with full-time staff in the 1970s, there
would not have been a trillion dollar bailout on the taxpayers
back for the S&L and commercial bank crimes, speculations,
and mismanagement debacles. These would have been nipped in the
bud at the community level by informed, organized consumer
judgement. So too would have costly and hazardous energy
projects been replaced by energy efficiency and renewable power
systems; and
- (c) Citizen consumers are the viewers and listeners of
television and radio. Federal law says that the public owns the
public airwaves which are now leased for free by the Federal
Communications Commission to television and radio companies. The
public, whose only option is to switch dials or turn off,
deserves its own Audience Network.
The Audience Network would enhance the communication and
mobilization process between people locally and nationally. The
owners of the airwaves deserve a return of their property for
one hour prime time and drive time on all licensed stations so
that their professional studios, producers, and reporters can
program what the audience believes is important to them and
their children. The proposal for Audience Network, funded by
dues from the audience-members and other non-tax revenues, was
the subject of a Congressional hearing in 1991, chaired by
Congressman Edward Markey.
Similarly, in return for cable company monopoly and other
powers, cable subscribers should be able to join their own cable
viewers group through a periodic insert in their monthly cable
billing envelopes. Modern electronic communications can play a
critical role in anticipating and resolving costly national
problems when their owners gain regular usage, as a community
intelligence, to inform, alert, and mobilize democratic citizen
initiatives. Presently, these electronic broadcasting systems
are overwhelmingly used for entertainment, advertising and
redundant news, certainly not a fair reflection of what a
serious society needs to communicate in a complex age, locally,
nationally, and globally.
- (d) Access to justice -- to the courts, to government
agencies, and to legislatures -- is available to organized,
special interests, and they widely use these remedies. In
contrast, when consumers are defrauded, injured,rendered sick by
wrongdoers or other perpetrators of their harm, they find costly
dollar and legal hurdles blocking their right of access. They
also find indentured politicians and their lobbying allies bent
on closing the doors further. Systems of justice are to be used
conveniently and efficiently by all the people in this country,
not just corporations and the wealthy. Otherwise, the citizen
shutout worsens.
Seventh, the new democracy tool box for working
people contains rights of bringing ones conscience to work without
having to risk being unfairly fired or demoted. Ethical
whistle-blowers have alerted Americans to numerous abuses in the
workplace that damage workers health and safety, contaminate the
environment, and defraud consumers, taxpayers, and shareholders.
However, they often pay the penalty with the loss of their jobs. The
exercise of conscience needs simple, effective legal protections
which will build inside the corporation, government, or other large
bureaucracies the incentives for care, prudence, and accountability
that foresee or forestall larger harms.
Eighth, working people, who own over $3 trillion
in pension monies, need a reasonable measure of control over where
these monies are invested. Presently, a handful of banks and
insurance companies control and make these decisions. During the
1980s the use of pension monies for corporate mergers, acquisitions,
leveraged buyouts and other empire- building maneuvers showed what
does happen when ownership is so separated from control. Control by
the few often left economic wreckage behind in many communities, and
such capital draining takeovers did not produce employment or new
wealth.
Pension monies are gigantic capital pools that can be used
productively to meet community needs, but not when their owners are
excluded from any organized participation or even the right to know
and review what has been decided.
Ninth, the new democracy tool box applies to
recognizing shareholder democracy as well. Whether large, small or
institutional shareholders (such as pension or other trust funds),
the separation of ownership (of the company) from control has been
documented impressively, starting with the celebrated study by Berle
and Means fifty years ago. The business press is filled with reports
of executives of large corporations repeatedly abusing shareholder
assets and worker morale with huge salaries, bonuses, greenmail, and
golden parachutes, (untied to company performance),
self-perpetuating boards of directors, the stifling of the proxy
voting system and blocking other shareholder voting reforms such as
cumulative voting powers and access to relevant shareholder lists
and information. The owners of corporations should be able to
prevent their hired executives from engaging in what Business Week
called casino capitalism that often ends with mass layoffs, loyal
shareholder losses and communities undermined.
Tenth, the new democracy tool box needs to be
taught in its historic context and present relevance as part of an
engrossing civic curriculum for our countrys schoolchildren.
Involving all students during their later elementary and secondary
school education in practical civics experience so as to develop
both their citizen skills and the desire to use them, under the rule
of law, can enrich schools, students, and communities alike. Where
teachers have made such efforts, the children have responded
responsibly and excitedly to the frequent surprise and respect of
their elders. Schooling for informed and experienced participation
in democratic processes is a major reservoir of future democracy and
a profound human resource to be nurtured.
In conclusion, these tools for democracy have fairly common
characteristics. They are universally accessible, can reduce
government and other deficits, and are voluntary to use or band
together around. It matters not whether people are Republicans,
Democrats, or Independents. It matters only that Americans desire to
secure and use these facilities or tools.
Without this reconstruction of our democracy through such
facilities for informed civic participation, as noted above, even the
most well- intentioned politicians campaigning for your vote cannot
deliver, if elected.
Nor can your worries about poverty, discrimination, joblessness,
the troubled conditions of education, environment, street and suite
crime, budget deficits, costly and inadequate health care, and energy
boondoggles, to list a few, be addressed constructively and
enduringly. Developing these democratic tools to strengthen citizens
in their distinct roles as voters, taxpayers, consumers, workers,
shareholders, and students should be very high on the list of any
candidates commitments to you. Unless, that is, they just want your
vote, but would rather not have you looking over their shoulder from a
position of knowledge, strength and wisdom.
Ralph Nader
February 1, 1992
|