Vote sizing is an innovative and provocative new way to design dynamic social systems by factoring in the ability to harness natural 'human' emotions such as satisfaction, inclusion, psychology and independent choice; into the collective decision-making process.

Vote sizing can be implemented in many situations; such as in political models, economic models, academic models... and anywhere else where people may want to hold elections in order to reach consensus. In this evaluation, we're going to try and stay away from the specifics of each of these systems, and instead investigate how each citizens personal responsibilities are affected when the outcome of the elections don't meet their requirements; and try to find new ways of predicting how the outcome may be better if citizens were more capable of projecting their own values through voting, without necessarily negating others people's values. Once we have realized how the cycle of poor outcomes/poor attitudes prevails in many current systems, we'll look at some new and innovative ways to simulate the system, allowing for as many different voices to be heard as loudly as possible.

There are two core processes that any system, or organism, undergoes. The first is to assimilate from the surrounding environment, and the second is to effect that environment. Any organization that fails to do both of these simply doesn't exist. As far as human organizations go, the way that we intake personally is through direct consumption and spending our money; collectively this purchasing of goods and services is our capitalist system. In terms of our output, the primary way we get to influence our world is through voting for leaders who pass laws that regulate behavior; and collectively this process is called democracy. Note that these are descriptions of the ideal situation, where things function according to our plan - and we have not yet discussed the real-world view in which these different things overlap and interfere with each other. Also note that both capitalism and democracy operate in negative space; in that by restricting access to property there is a net gain in property and restricting freedom to act there is a net gain in freedoms.

The two main processes break down even further, even without corruption. There are four dimensions which dictate how a system functions, its ability to:

1. In/Out: Take in from the environment, and give back, or put out, to the environment.
2. Build/Distribute: Build its own structures in which to operate, and distribute something of value back onto the parts involved.
3. Small/Large: Reflect the individual parts' functions, and allow for growth of the individuals within its structure.
4. Good/Bad: Harmonize the individual parts properly so that each part maintains its integrity, and the system as a whole provides the most satisfaction.

... together, this algorithm combines to form 24, or 16, unique pairs. In the attached chart you can see the way that several of them combine; for example we're now not only looking at the micro/macro view of the system operating in good form, but how a disharmonious, or corrupted system operates dysfunctionally and how a corrupted individual becomes sick. Also note how proper control of negative space is found in a healthy individual, and how they are then able to maximize their own input/output levels. It's important to realize that both corrupted and harmonious systems can be built. It's also important to realize the linkage between healthy, happy voters and healthy happy systems; and also the linkage between health/happiness and ability to freely choose.

In a corrupted system, the overlapping of separate functions trickles down to the individual level, and the parts of the machine, or organism, become confused and self-destructive. When the system loses control of itself, so do the individuals. This breakdown begins in depriving the individuals of having a legitimate voice in determing their collective future, and the system becomes corrupted at all levels - meaning that the different parts start to take on each other's roles, and it becomes harder and harder for anyone to discern what their own function is.

This corruption then gets internalized - meaning that the individual citizens no longer see themselves as unique parts of a larger whole - in ways that reflect the processes of the system. Without judicial law, people abuse themselves and each other. Without an opportunity to improve themselves and excel, they become smug. Without the right reward, they become greedy and disrespectful towards the environment, without proper representation by their 'elected' leaders, they become dissatisfied. Note that the progression moves from a collective institutional level into a personal level, and that the primary focus of our attention in fixing corruption should be on an institutional level, not a personal self-help on. Although we evolve along with our environment, its reformation precedes us.

An example of how simply adding energy into a corrupt system will not stem the problem, but exacerbate it, is outlined in our (the Democratic Empowerment Party's) energy policy review: More Energy Is Not the Answer. When a system demands more-and-more of both (intake) wealth and (output) power, while not finding any balance between the two, it simply is growing without control, like cancer, and is unstable and destined to implode. The best situation is for the system to find a way to slow down, not speed up.

Since adding more energy only adds to the conflict - and rather than just add more energy, we'll need to separate and re-arrange it - we need to look back in history and see how these kinds of changes have happened in the past. What we find is that from the earliest stages of human development, we've evolved as a result of the technological advances we've produced to modify our environment. In the beginning, cavemen used the invention/technology of language to come together as clans, and to give names to themselves and to property: "This bend in the river is mine!" as a clan. This new relationship to property caused its own conflict, in that the separation of private property and the rest of the environment allowed more people to live together, and lump themselves into groups, or casts. This could only be accomplished with the technological leap of writing. This kind of hop-scotch between social organization and technology continued to allow the growth of four things:

1. The amount of people who could live together.
2. The technology / property available to society.
3. The level of democracy, or average participation from the citizenry.
4. The average level of freedom available to the citizenry.

With any one of these four aspects missing, the evolution will not be complete and the conflict will remain. The final conflict, which we are currently facing as a society, is the gap between the 1-person-1-vote means of democracy, and the substantial large gap in incomes. The result is an organization where those with the most property (insulation) maintain a hold on power; leaving those without insulation at their mercy, or lack thereof. The technology that's allowed this to happen is the computer; which can just as easily be used to restore social justice and equilibrium as destroy it - just as technologies in the past have eventually been used by the citizenry to once again increase the level of their participation in their collective fate.

An example of how the changes can take place can be found on online at Vote Sizing Polls. These questions try to get at the core values of the citizenry, and also allow for the adjustment of the size, or weight, of each citizen according to certain criteria. In keeping with the evolutions of the past, the criteria we use is that of need, which can be measured easily enough by each citizen’s lack of wealth.

Even though we've looked ahead with the goal of trying to remedy the democratic deficit through a weighted vote to those in need of power/participation; we still need to figure out how exactly to do this kind of social engineering. For example: How can we discern someone's wealth? And once we decide on some kind of calculation, how should we use that result to compare the citizens to each other? Also, once we've determined the wealth and rank of a citizen, what formulas should we use to properly weight their vote so that no citizen has too much of advantage over another in terms of the combined total of their wealth (input) and power (output)? As we debate the various scientific aspects of this kind of political science, we find that many of the choices are based on set goals, and the goals themselves are subjective. We've outlines four formulas to give examples of: the most radical, the most equality driven, a balance of the two, the one most science fiction.

Also online at Flocking Simulation is a simulation which allows players to enter their own formulas for income size, production abilities, satisfaction levels and vote size. The goal of the game is to 1) come up with formulas which result in a stable middle class, 2) adjust the size of the votes to maximize this stability and overall satisfaction, and 3) understand some of the correlations, for example if GDP is strongly related to satisfaction, or if people can be just as happy getting by on less, so long as they maintain control over their government and their fate.

Wealth vs. Power Curves

Vote Flocking Simulator