on electronic participation, collective moderation, and voting systems Issue 2
2014-10-07
LiquidFeedback: Gamification of Politics?
“I beat the game of LiquidFeedback without losing a life”: LiquidFeedback contains elements of online role-playing games. Those objective is to build up a character in the game and to equip the character with as much power as possible. In LiquidFeedback, it's all about delegation votes.
Since 2009, LiquidFeedback is being developed by the Public Software Group e. V. In 2010, the Berlin branch of the German Pirate Party was the first to adopt the system. The party members can develop motions in the “Liquid” (how the software is called amongst Pirates) that are presented to the executive board of the party and, in case of approval, yielded to the parliament.
In this connection, LiquidFeedback endeavors to unite elements of direct and representative democracy. Every member can make proposals him- or herself, comment on them, and vote on them – or delegate their vote topic-based to another member which is assumed to be qualified in the respective subject area. The more delegating votes a member gains the greater the weight of his or her vote. A number symbolizes the transferred delegating votes, in fact the power of his or her vote.
Gamification
Since this reminds (at least superficially) of role-playing games in which the growth of power of the game characters is a key element, one ends up wondering whether LiquidFeedback applies gaming principles to digitalized political processes. The goal is to establish facilities for participation and co-determination that are more pleasurable and effective than our party democracy provided so far. Tweets and comments of LiquidFeedback users corroborate the analogy between LiquidFeedback and computer games:
The trend to apply game elements and operation mechanisms to other (non-gaming) contexts is subsumed under the label of “gamification”. At first, this is about working, learning, or consumption environments; if those are digitalized, then elements are often borrowed from computer games. The users shall be motivated to deal more intensively with a topic or product, or motivated to perform certain activities.
As essential characteristics of LiquidFeedback, Björn Swierczek (programmer with the Public Software Group) states transparency and objective measurability of decision-making processes.
Along comes a direct feedback to actions of a user. And also this is a key element of games: a transparent set of rules which ensure (a) that constant feedback motivates the participant to keep on playing and (b) that objective criteria yield a final result.
Game and reality
One of the most important game elements is the objective of the game, to which everything else is subordinated. Beside the pure power gain, Alexander Morlang, Pirate and member of the Berlin House of Representatives, sees the appetite and will to change the world as “game objective” of any politics.[6]
But games are particularly characterized by people acting in an artificial, symbolic space, detached from factual consequences. The players know of the game's limitations in space and time; they are aware that they could quit the game at any time.
The junction with real activities changes the game entirely. If we apply game elements to other areas of life, the fun may fall by the wayside. This constitutes the ambivalence of gamification: the apparent assumption that there are no real consequences is applied to areas which have indeed an influence on our life.
Alexander Morlang thinks that LiquidFeedback doesn't replace politics: the challenge of LiquidFeedback lies within writing good texts which then emerge as completed propositions. Insofar the software serves the Pirates as test space: political ideas are “pulled through the Liquid” in form of propositions. At the end of this process, criticism has been incorporated and opposite views and ideas for improvements have been voted on.[7]
The proposals are considered and checked more extensively – and have a greater chance to be approved by the executive board. Thereby, the backdrop is the democratic character of the proposition creation on the one hand and on the other hand the risk minimization of a “shitstorm”, that is another form of feedback particularly spread amongst Pirates. The critics could have easily participated in the “Liquid”.
The political work that is done with LiquidFeedback is a rather traditional form of work, says Alexander Morlang. Until now, it was the task of political advisers, continues Morlang; with LiquidFeedback, however, potentially every member may participate.[8]
Political participation
Currently, digital communication in the area of politics is mostly used for marketing purposes. More interesting, though, is the reverse channel: the possibility to participate. The success of the Pirate Party may certainly also be attributed to new forms of political communication. LiquidFeedback is taking up a central position here, since it systematically aims to extend the reverse channel to be a democratic medium for co-determination in politics. Herein, Alexander Morlang sees a stimulus to change the previous practice of our party-democracy in regard of transparency and participation possibilities.[9]
Adapting new techniques (including cultural techniques and patterns of behavior) for our democratic principles eventually contributes to their continuity and fits them to the changed perception and living habits. The newest adaption in the political realm consisted probably of the adjustment to the electronic mass media. In the course of this, the politician as a person took a central role due to the telegenic appeal. A possible consequence of the current adaption process to the digital individual media could be that personal attributes of politicians take a back seat in favor of factual and grassroots-based shaping of politics.
Powerful characters may be born in the digital world of LiquidFeedback, just as in online-games. They gain their power through expertise that is attributed to them by other participants and measured by the comments and motions in the system. It is a transparent world whose majority formation process may be objectively followed by every person who knows the rules of the game.
A variation of the above-mentioned tweet might be: “I beat the game of LiquidFeedback, and I gained a better life.” Certainly, this is idealistic, but idealism is part of it – in politics as well as gaming.
