This paper introduces the concept of trigonocracy, a novel government system designed to address the limitations and challenges of contemporary democratic structures. Trigonocracy constitutes a mixture of democracy, meritocracy and technocracy, and emphasizes the principles of competence, accountability, and transparency (CAT principle) to create a more stable, fair, and efficient form of governance. The paper outlines the theoretical foundations, including the current global socio-political landscape, and the motivation for a new system that integrates expert knowledge into decision-making processes. Key components of trigonocracy include a federal structure with multiple levels (municipal, regional, national, supranational, and global) and a unique election system based on subject-specific voting rather than candidate-centric campaigns. The system introduces five state powers: the legislative, executive, jurisdiction, mediacative (media oversight), and monecative (financial oversight), each with distinct roles and responsibilities to ensure balanced governance. The paper also proposes comprehensive educational reforms to prepare citizens for active participation in this new system, emphasizing critical thinking, digital literacy, and ethical behavior. Additionally, it highlights the importance of integrating scientific knowledge into policymaking and maintaining a secular approach to governance. Trigonocracy aims to foster international cooperation, sustainable development, and social justice, addressing both current and future global challenges. The proposed system seeks to transform political structures to better serve the needs of humanity, ensuring long-term stability and progress.
Content
I. Theoretical Foundations
1 Introduction
1.1 Current Situation
1.2 Motivation
2 Foundation
3 Methodology
4 Current Disposition
4.1 Politics
4.2 Public
4.3 Finance
4.4 Economy
4.5 Military
4.6 Media
4.7 Science and Education
4.8 Ethics and Religion
4.9 Anthropological Perspective
5 Deduction of Requirements
5.1 Preparing Thoughts
5.2 New Understanding of Roles in Politics
5.3 Requirements for Politicians
5.4 State Powers and Representations
5.5 Specific Requirements
II. The Trigonocratic Constitution
6 General Structure
6.1 Federalism
6.2 Trigonocratic Elections
6.2.1 Subject Election Principle
6.2.2 Election Example
6.3 Panel Sizes
6.4 Education Requirements
6.5 Cursus Laborum and Cursus Honorum
6.6 Remuneration
6.7 CAT Principle and Trigonocratic Principle
7 Powers and Institutions
7.1 Mediacative
7.1.1 Media Conventions
7.1.2 Constitutive Manifestation
7.1.3 The Mediacative’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
7.2 Legislative
7.2.1 Parliaments
7.2.2 Councils
7.2.3 Lobbyists
7.2.4 Law-Making Process
7.2.5 The Legislative’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
7.3 Executive
7.3.1 Election and Offices
7.3.2 Daily Affairs
7.3.3 The Executive’s Panel Composition and Remuneration
7.4 Monecative
7.4.1 The Monecative’s Areas of Accountability
7.4.2 The Pecunium
7.4.3 The Aerarium
7.4.4 The Monecative’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
7.5 Jurisdiction
7.5.1 Independence of the Judicial Power
7.5.2 Political Structure of the Jurisdiction
7.5.3 The Jurisdiction’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
7.6 Custodium
7.6.1 The Custodium’s Role
7.6.2 Educational Requirements for Custodes
7.6.3 The Custodial Structure
7.7 Eternal Council
7.7.1 Political Coherence
7.7.2 The Eternal Council’s Organization and Remuneration
7.8 The Final Structure of the Trigonocratic Constitution
8 Implementation of the Trigonocratic System
8.1 General Change Management
8.2 Implementation Framework
8.3 Important Aspects
9 Limitations
10 Conclusion
11 References
Figures
Figure 1: Levels of the State
Figure 2: Subject election principle
Figure 3: Legislative session cycle including FEM and SEM..
Figure 4: The final structure of the trigonocratic constitution
Charts
Chart 1: The Fibonacci sequence and the corresponding panel sizes..
Chart 2: Panel sizes for the mediatorium and the media delegation including the level, the n value, and the calculation basis..
Chart 3a: Panel sizes for the parliaments including the level, n value, and the calculation basis.
Chart 4: Concept matrix of the executive offices on the different political levels including the total number of offices.
Chart 5: Panel sizes for the pecunia and aeraria including the level, the n value, and the calculation basis
Chart 6: Panel sizes for the judicial councils including the level, the n value, and the calculation basis..
Abbreviations
Illustrations are not included in the reading sample
Symbols
Illustrations are not included in the reading sample
I. Theoretical Foundations
1 Introduction
1.1 Current Situation
To provide a somewhat overview and to describe a starting point which this work will build upon, it is crucial to depict the current situation of society. This will, indeed, be limited to a state-level view, as the aim of this work is to deliver a state-theoretical approach. Thereinafter, with the description of the current situation being provided, the actual motivation for this work can be formulated.
The international point of view engulfs a worldwide society of different cultures, differently evolving economic regions, regional politics, and, thus, asymmetric development on both regional and global scales. One can say that human culture has not changed since we roamed the earth in smaller groups, since these simply became tribes, villages, cities, and finally nations, or at least nationalities with their own cultures, views, values, and norms. Therefore, we still behave like we live in bigger tribes. As our different bubbles are eager to remain independent, whereas the (at least somewhat) globalized economy forces them into a net of interdependency, conflicts inevitably arise between the desired options and the actual circumstances. Furthermore, the interconnections between different mentalities might exacerbate occurring tensions, such as demographic imbalances and wage differences, each on intra- and international scales.
Moreover, the heterogeneity of natural habitats, distribution of resources, and strategic advantages as sea connection, infrastructure or geographical locations add to the asymmetric development of cultures. Given the interconnection of markets due to globalization, this explains very well the appearing of economical misalignments, which lead to volatile discharges, such as financial crises, state crises, or even wars, as we have seen in the last years, interdependently enforcing each other - especially in the vicinity of meeting or clashing cultures (Nozharov & Hristozov, 2023). Incidentally, the inadequate exertion of the free-market economy leads to systemic misalignments as well.
Due to the occurring discrepancies, people tend to become unsatisfied and are prone to frustration, resignation and anger, making it easy for elites to gain power. This, in turn, explains why there are autocratic tendencies all over the globe (Kneuer & Demmelhuber, 2016). Furthermore, misalignments in social environments or simply failing systems lead to oligarchies as in Russia, kakistocracies as in Germany, or plutocracies, as we can observe in the USA. Moreover, the interconnected market leads to an amplification of the famous butterfly effect, in which small changes of environment have the potential to lead to larger scale effects over time or distance. Lastly, this problematic relationship enforces autocratic governments, as their hierarchical traits allow them to deliver rigorously applied solutions without any delay due to a lack of discussions and votes. Incidentally, this also led to the discrepancy between democratic and autocratic states: Whereas democratic countries tend to provide slow, but well-thought solutions, autocratic countries provide fast, but sometimes dramatically misguided ones, as we have witnessed during the pandemic.
The seek for efficiency to overcome the respective ideological counterpart leads to such systems as the state capitalism in China, or the military-industrial complex observed in the USA. Both are eager to enhance efficiency, and thus effectiveness, seeking economic advantage with respect to the other. Either way, this type of behavior leads to armament, proxy wars, and ignorance of social problems - in sum, to an inadequate allocation of resources.
On a basic level, this behavior can be explained by the primacy of economy. The default maxime of gain maximization leads to the rear-end position of other priorities or values, such as freedom, participation, ecological consciousness, etc.
Especially, the effects on the ecological footprint have shown to be tremendous over the last 200 years, beginning with the industrialization, and peaking in the beginning of the Anthropocene, marking the geological footprint of humanity, e.g. by radioactive isotopes distributed all over the globe. Incidentally, the notorious myopia leads to somewhat paradox behavior.
For instance, wind turbines used to generate power from sustainable energy sources require Neodymium, an element which is used to transfer mechanical energy into electricity. Unfortunately, Neodymium is a so-called rare earth, and quite like its “sibling”, Thorium, which, in turn, occurs together with Uranium (Neodymium means in Greek “new twin”). Since these elements behave similarly, the chemical compounds need to be separated before using the desired metal. This process requires large amounts of energy. Furthermore, the waste of this process contains Thorium and Uranium, which are both radioactive elements. So, it comes that mines in China, which produce up to 90% of the worldwide needed Neodymium, use large amounts of energy, which usually is provided by coal-fired power stations, and leave radioactive waste, which is usually left into the environment. Thus, the wish to save the environment in one place leads to the complete opposite in another. Besides the release of carbon dioxide by burning coal, both nature and inhabitants are exposed to significantly high and persistent amounts of radioactivity. Therefore, regional environmental protection turns out to harm the environment in other regions even more than it intends to save it in its own vicinity.
In general, the unplanned, non-collaborative and incoherent activism leads to no progress - at least. Additionally, human beings are prone to misconceptions, especially when it comes to logical thinking. Misunderstandings towards scientific society, dependencies towards resources and norms, and finally the abuse of knowledge to gain or maintain advantages lead to the miserable situation of the human civilization nowadays. Frankly, our wish to maximize efficiency leads to the fact that we do not like to provoke global wars anymore. The efficacy of nuclear weapons could wipe us out within 48 hours, whereas the efficiency of our interdependent markets requires a somewhat stable peace - the latter as has been anticipated relatively successful with the interconnection of the European markets. However, these boundary conditions lead to punctual conflicts and wars, everlasting worldwide cold peace, and, finally, media warfare. The latter turned out to be quite useful to keep the stakeholders of states - its people - motivated. In other words: it seems reasonable to hold the stakes in the ground, while the motivation to raise them shall not be allowed to cease.
In sum, humanity came a long way, but struggles to develop in a purposeful, targeted manner. However, exactly that type of behavior managers do not want to witness in their companies is what we see on the larger scale regarding our whole species. Therefore, it is crucial for us to pull ourselves together, before our endeavor leads to technologies which require less than a launch code to drive our species into extinction. It is an inescapable obligation that we align our resources and energies and combine our intellectual power to overcome our mutual myopia. If necessary, we need to keep ourselves busy enough not to follow our habit of beginning wars out of, as it seems, boredom of unity. For instance, we might begin to finally expand civilization into the next celestial bodies, since this venture decreases the probability of extinction - at least, until we split apart again and develop new weapons of greater potential, which can be classified as a problem future generations may care about.
1.2 Motivation
Albeit democracy seems to be the most logical approach to distributing power, it has been proven by history that even this form of government has its drawbacks. For instance, a true distribution of power cannot be achieved, and therefore, Robert Michels’ iron law of oligarchy has been proven to be unavoidable several times since he formulated it in the beginning of the 20th century (Michels, 1911). A logical explanation for this circumstance has been provided by Kenneth Arrow in 1951, showing that democracy does not seek something on which people can agree on, but something on which people can less or not agree (Arrow, 1951). Another example is the discontinuity of changing governments and the typical “this is not my job” mentality of civil servants, leading to unmotivated parliamentarians, inconsistent politics, mismanagement, misappropriation and, thus, corruption. Furthermore, the decision-making process in democracies takes far more time than those in autocratic states, as we have witnessed during the last pandemic - albeit the longer process leads to more profound decisions. Another drawback of democracies is the tendency to dissolve themselves, either into a corruption-driven status quo of oligarchy, or into a noisily emerging autocratic state. In both cases, an elite manages to outrun the democracy’s principles in one way or another. Indeed, these facts cannot be the reason to dismiss democracy at all and move on to hierarchical states, as those tend to misuse of power. Nevertheless, today’s amount of knowledge about the human psyche and the technological advance enables emotional control of masses - far beyond the imagination of Gustave LeBon or Niccolo Machiavelli, but closer to Geroge Orwell or even Aldus Huxley. Therefore, neither hierarchical nor democratic structures seem to be the right answer, as they both lack stability. Even a monarchy or a dictatorship can fall, as it takes high amounts of resources to keep the masses in line, and a single episode of mismanagement or simply the time itself can crush the pyramid of power, leading to revolution, lost wars or other ways of destruction. Finally, the cycle of rising elites, inept mismanagement of power, weariness of masses and their own myopia leads to instability. The latter raises the ever-next generation of dissatisfaction, and thus, the idea of revenge leads to injustice from the other perspective, and so on.
Clearly, one cannot simply switch off the human genomes which make him act as he does. Therefore, to create a new form of government, it is important to take human nature into account, including its tendency to react without thought of tomorrow.
Summing up, one can say that democracies indeed represent the fairest forms of government, yet still not fair enough. They are still as unstable as other forms of government, whereas their fragility appears to be somewhat moderate with respect to autocratic structures. But the lazy answer that we must simply deal with it, could lead democratic states and even humanity as itself into a crisis, as the technological advancement could give birth to a form of autocracy, which cannot be overrun any more effectively. For instance, the rise of AI technology leads to punctual compaction of knowledge, which, in turn, can lead to a punctual compaction of power. Therefore, it is important to overcome the smug laziness of the western world and accept that there is a need for another, new form of government.
Therefore, the aim of this work is to create an intrinsically logical, stable, consistent, and both progression- and moderation-driven form of government, which is resilient towards both the inertia of masses and the stubbornness of individuals; a realistic form of government, which emphasizes competence, accountability, and transparency (hereinafter: CAT principle). Both derivation and description will be formulated in an understandable and logical way, so that the claim of being an adequate and realistic solution for today’s problems cannot (or at least: shall not) be denied using ideological approaches.
This work will follow a so-called sense-driven state design (SDSD) principle, beginning with a depiction of the current situation, which is to be used to derive the possibilities of state design to adapt the development of society to the required development of humankind. Finally, the derived form of government will be formulated in a constitutional form, which can be used as a basis for any state in the world.
2 Foundation
As has been seen throughout the previous decades, humanity gains steadily more power through technological and scientific development. Therefore, it is logical to think that it needs to have more responsibility, since its behavior affects itself and its surroundings proportionally to its capabilities. However, responsibility cannot arise without expertise: crucial knowledge about specific areas is the basis for the consciousness about possible effects of interventions. Thus, experts of the corresponding fields of science and technology must have the responsibility for the actions of these fields. In conclusion, experts need to have decision-making power.
Apart from the democratic view, it is crucial to have a realistic and legitimacy-oriented basis for such power. The realistic view is that only a favorable person can stay in charge. Else, it would cost too much effort to hold the powerful position, which would, consequently, decrease the efficiency of a governmental structure in the long-term. The legitimacy-oriented view aims at the sense of justice, which states that power must be representative. In either way, representation must be ensured, since conflicts to cope with will occur sooner or later.
As we live on the brink of post-humanism, alias dataism (Harari, 2015), we encounter fundamental changes of our everyday life, as well as the occurrence of disruptive innovations such as artificial intelligence or genome modification techniques. Without transparency, the development of human civilization and knowledge will grow uncontrollably. But as transparency grounds the capability to understand what is going on in the first place, it is, in turn, tightly connected to the premise of expertise.
Especially, the development of AI algorithms, and the anticipated crossing of the singularity, can lead to a disastrous future. Giving birth to GAI without being able to gather its capabilities or functionalities, thus being prone to manipulation, humanity can enslave itself. Therefore, we must learn to think critically and to cope with the responsibility which we gain from our knowledge and power. Hence, it is necessary to re-organize our structures of power, as the decisionmaking processes must be based on expertise rather than favor, renown and opportunistic success, as we are currently witnessing.
3 Methodology
This work applies a theoretical design methodology, whereas the empirical evaluation on an instance of the class of problems and solutions will not be realized in the course of this work as it is rather to be done in future by implementing the new form of government.
In order not to solely treat symptoms but to provide a proper and sustainable solution, it is important to develop a new structure of society. Therefore, a new form of government is to be deduced, which includes the requirements to provide the solution for the current problems. Furthermore, the aimed solution is to emphasize a controlled but ambitious development of humanity, since a punctual and uncoordinated development is unlike to become beneficial.
First, current problematics and developments need to be understood. Based on scientific insights and everyday apparent experience, conclusions about each field are deduced. These fields are:
- politics
- public
- finance
- media
- economy
- military
- science and education
- ethics and religion
- anthropology
Hereinafter, the requirements for a sustainable solution are derived based on the disposition. Afterwards, the new form of government is designed in a general structure. If one is solely interested in the ,creative‘ part of the new form of government, it is possible to skip these points. Based on the general attributes and the requirements, however, the granularity of design is to be increased to provide concrete structural concepts. As mentioned before, the application scale of a form of government is inadequately large for a field experiment, therefore, it is up to the course of history to show how this state design is to be evaluated empirically.
4 Current Disposition
4.1 Politics
As a first assumption and underlying principle, we can state that a state‘s citizens are its most important stakeholders. Albeit a state has, on its own, more institutional power than the people, its existence is dependent on the willingness of the people to follow the societal treaty to give up power to maximize inner peace and synergic effects. Furthermore, this statement grounds on the fact that it is the people who make the state work. Without their labor and financial transactions (taxes), the state would cease to exist.
Given this simple but remarkably important statement, it is easy to deduce that human behavior is the atomic element which determines the course of state affairs. The study of human behavior, praxeology, has been discussed by several economists, especially by Ludwig von Mises (Mises, 1940). From the praxeological point of view, a human is no homo oeconomicus. Rather, we are social, emotional beings, prone to manipulation and misunderstandings. We can be reasonable, rational and just, but also ideological, unethical, making unreasonable decisions. This realistic view must be occupied to ensure that we truly understand human behavior, from which we can deduce implications for state affairs and, finally, determine the requirements for proper state design. Else, the wrong assumptions would lead to idealistic, theoretical constructs, which, in turn, would lead to the very same problems in practice we are unfortunately used to observe. Accordingly, it has been shown that individuals tend to prefer a decision based on welfare rather than logical thinking (Lovett, 2023), as well as feelings of social resentment, as, for instance, euroscepticism (Abts & Baute, 2021).
In general, political affinity can be regarded as social activity (Manning & Holmes, 2014). Therefore, representation is perturbated by emotions (Plescia & Eberl, 2019.
However, only two thirds of political decisions are congruent with majority opinion (Rasmussen et al., 2019). An individual must feel powerful, otherwise the democratic capacity of a state, i.e. its citizens‘ political knowledge, political efficacy, and intention to vote, decreases (Schmidthuber et al., 2020). In this context, institutions and their structure and integrity influence a citizen’s attitudes towards the democratic process (Pellagata & Memoli, 2018). For instance, workplace democracy depends on the perception of organizational politics and workplace incivility. Organizational democracy with supportive environment, in contrast, reduces its incivility (Ahmed et al., 2023). This finding can be generalized and applied on a larger scale of a state.
These findings must be included in the solution to the citizen representation problem. Else, no reasonable outcome can be expected, and policy making becomes grid-locked (Kunde & Rudd, 1988). Especially, voting occupies a central role in the complex structure of democratic states, whereas it also requires negotiation and compromise (Usher, 2003).
To address this topic, a rational public discourse must be based rather on facts than on beliefs (Kirchner, 2017). Additionally, political processes are required to be communicated properly (Van de Walle & Migchelbrink, 2024), thus, their transparency is to be enhanced. It is important to prevent political instances from evolving to become symbolic features, such as, for instance, the US presidency (Frame, 2016), since their solely symbolistic nature will provoke unreasonable commitment. However, commitment to and invocation of ethics leads to enhanced violence of war (Zefhuss, 2018). The latter, however, has been witnessed during the current decade multiple times.
Albeit it is a matter of course to maintain peace in the first place, currently, the USA serves as an imperial agent, seeking to interpellate the masses or multitudes to the juridical framework of the Protestant Ethics (or its mutations) and the spirit of capitalism (Tomlin et al., 2023). This role is increasingly difficult to maintain, which leads to crises and wars, as contradicting ideologies rise in their confidence to hold their ground and extend their spheres of influence.
To create a global steady state system, it is required to provide a multi-level federalism ranging from the world, through major regions, nation states and to localities (Gare, 2001). This federalistic approach sounds quite realistically, since the current international state organizations already resemble federal structures.
Nevertheless, it is crucial to start with the atomic particles of political structures, i.e. politicians themselves. While it is yet to understand empirically which circumstances motivate individuals to become politicians (Gulzar, 2021), it is known that they do not act as experts - even with vast amounts of experience (Loewen et al., 2014)1. Usually, their lack of expertise is sought to be compensated by access to external expert knowledge. Referring to this, politicians with a relevant academic or professional background can become ,allies‘ for epistemic communities, enhancing the interaction between political and expert fields (Grodem & Hippe, 2019). Incidentally, experts themselves do not resemble the desired decision-making alternative within the process, as they occupy a rather advisory role. Contrary to this, according to surveys, most citizens want them to work as a piece of representative government, not just as an alternative to it (Ganuza, 2020). In particular, the role of political scientists must be re-evaluated. To provide an instance, the concrete case of UK‘s advisory system has been discussed by Flinders et al. (Flinders et al., 2022).
However, the reasons for the occurrence of an unprofessional political class are manifold. The absence of a clear and just tradition of political life contributes to this phenomenon as well as the “presence of a low political culture and a mercantile understanding of politics” (Chedia, 2020). This relation can also be observed in other branches where managers involve their subordinates in branch affairs and decision making. This behavior can be explained by the tendency of people to use their power to the maximum extent beyond the optimal amount according to their competencies, if there is no systematic limitation.
Referring to this, the so-called value-lateness of science can be addressed by response of basic values. Especially, the development of institutional innovation through which both citizens and scientists can engage with the values and interests guiding scientific research promises to positively affect the decision-making for politics (Pamuk, 2021). In terms of economic pursuit, organizational allocation of power is another possible approach (Kennedy, 2018).
As it turned out, especially in crises, technocratic government appointment increases statistically (Pastorella, 2016) - we have witnessed this behavior in the drastic decision-making of several states during the COVID pandemic. However, a bureaucratic trend is seen, especially in Europe, where the Commission rather than the Parliament gathers more power, leading to economically harmful redistribution (Svendsen & Brandt, 2009), resembling the communistic phenomenon of planned economy. Additionally, the security of political tenure leads to lower efforts expected by the parliamentarians, and, hence, worse political performance (Beldowski, 2022).
Therefore, the design of democratic institutions shall follow the principle counteracting ambition with ambition’, as competitiveness enhances the translation of citizens‘ will. Administrators play an important role through their influence over legislative decisions (Miller, 2012), and, thus, need to be in the focal point of such design. Generally, it is important to give experts as representatives of science more power to improve the administration‘s efficacy and efficiency.
However, the sole focus on nature sciences does not help with economic development. Hence, social sciences are not to be ignored or treated with less dignity (Brogan, 1948). Either way, it depends on the purpose of study how the concept of politics is to be re-formulated (Brown, 2015).
These social developments are to be taken into account as well as the technological aspects of our society‘s development. Especially, the effects of digitalization occupy a special place in current development. The importance of social media in politics is growing, as it represents a new level of citizen engagement and advocacy, enhancing the principle of open debate (Pullman et al., 2013). E-participation initiatives by governments act as a mediator in the relation between social media usage by citizens and power distance to e-government development (Vakeel & Panighari, 2018). Especially, Linkage Diplomacy is applied in modern politics, whereas diplomacy and domestic politics are strongly related to each other (Nagata, 2019).
However, through digitalization, media has reached the peak of importance and danger due to its great influence on stirring up public opinion against developments and changes, especially in terms of social values, intellectual beliefs, religious approaches, and different concepts in the affairs of human life (Abujanah, 2021). For instance, ideological misinformation occurs due to translation intransparency, which is intentionally initiated by media (Ethelb, 2020). The power of media grows as the interest in politics declines: In the “anti-political age”, politicians tend to address disaffected voters via ,democratainment‘, transferring this behavior into more politicized times, which can lead to highly devoted masses and thus less democratic capacity (Schmidthuber et al., 2020; Wood et al., 2016). Therefore, regulation and accountability mechanisms for political communication are crucial if one aims to maintain openness and equity in governmental structures (Daud, 2021).
As a consequence of the dilutional trend of political culture, politicians tend to become more corrupt. Incumbents do not limit their corruption to one incident (de Graaf et al., 2010). Besides, if it comes to fighting corruption, it is important to know that large governments benefit less from reducing corruption than smaller ones do (Afonos et al., 2021). Referring to this, anti-corruption motivation is tied to national context (Polk et al., 2017), and needs to be engaged on this level. Therefore, there need to be mechanisms which motivate politicians to avoid corruption on the national level in the first place.
Summing up, the rapid development of technology, world politics and a parallel decadency of political elites lead to the requirement for a change in the political structure rather than a simple and inept treatment of symptoms. The structural integrity of political life crumbles under the pressure to cope with the rapid changes, leading to desperate reactionism, and, consequently, to chaos, economic disasters and wars. As more complex situations require more expert knowledge, it should not be held as a reserve but needs to occupy a crucial position within the decision-making process. Moreover, as digital development drives the inevitable rise of direct democracy, it also enhances the power of media, which gathers its new role as a social and ubiquitous tool. This tool, in turn, is abused for political misinformation and manipulation campaigns on a tremendously regular basis. Thus, the role of media and its regulation is another important point to consider. Finally, the treatment of corruption deserves to be focused on meticulously, especially in larger states, whereas a systematic approach promises more efficient and effective results.
4.2 Public
As the public is tightly interconnected with politics, the relevant aspects of politics also account, at least partially, for public affairs. However, there are different perspectives to occupy and several other aspects to consider.
The view of the public needs to be the ground on which a state is build, as the democratic principle turns out to be the most resilient one throughout history (albeit its limitations and problems), since it is the only one consistent with justice (Briffault, 1919). Moreover, as has been stated before, only two thirds of policy cases are congruent with the majority opinion (Rasmussen et al., 2019). However, people in groups tend to behave unlike the individuals the groups consist of (LeBon, 1895), which complicates the question about representation and, thus, legitimacy. Especially, the work of the latter author has been misused to manipulate the masses, and perturbate the democratic legitimacy to provide a basis for autocracies. Frankly, the application of such techniques can be easily spotted throughout current events.
Notably, groups of people are prone to emotional behavior and perception rather than logical thinking. This applies on manifold scales, such as at the workplace (Ahmet et al., 2023) or nationwide (Abts & Baute, 2021). However, knowledge of the norms makes people more likely to concede victory to the party with the largest vote share and less likely to exclude a larger number of parties from the government formation process (Plescia & Eberl, 2019). This leads to the conclusion that a higher normative education can lead to a more stable democratic, thus legitimate, state. Still, education can be manipulated, and media-driven manipulation of emotions can whitewash logical and normative thinking.
Incidentally, affinity does not solely engage at the level of individual reflexive deliberation and (dis)engagement with politics. Moreover, it is also a decidedly social activity (Manning & Holmes, 2014). Thus, normative education needs to be understood as an individual appealing, but socially interactive instrument to maintain the efficacy and persistence of democratic structures. Especially, the usage of deep fake media requires the ability to detect unserious content.
Although this approach might appear promising, the manipulability of the masses has a deeper cause and can be explained by the asymmetric relation between the unorganized features of masses with respect to the organized smaller groups (Preisendörfer, 2016). There are several examples of smaller, better organized counter-groups of people: First, the whole agglomeration of media tends to manipulate unorganized groups of people by using its own synergy effects (for instance, see Foos & Bischof, 2022). Second, elites in general play important roles in delegitimating non-governmental, industry-involved decision-making structures, thus using the organizational advantage between politics and economy against the voter‘s will (Neuner, 2020). Contrary to those examples, a positive influence is possible as well. For instance, even military can play the role of a soft power on the acceptance of foreign populations. By transferring positive economic effects onto the host countries, negative perceptions may decrease (Allen et al., 2020). However, these effects can be whitewashed by the effects of military presence and emotional, social, and economic effects of war, reducing the positive impacts to sheer side effects. Currently, public opinion plays a modest role in the diffusion of gubernatorial announcements and state-level grand activity, as has been shown on the example of ACA by Pacheo and Maltby (Pacheo & Maltby, 2017).
As discussed in subsection 4.1, the involvement of experts in decision-making processes enhances their efficacy. Moreover, this can also lead to increasing trust towards the process (Ganuza & Font, 2020). Incidentally, it depends on which expertise is included, since the state differentiates with respect for the organizational origin of expertise (Puljek-Shank, 2018). Furthermore, both public service outcomes and processes have a significant impact on citizens‘ trust in public administration (Van de Walle & Migchelbrink, 2024). This implies that, again, punctual engagement is not sufficient to invoke trust towards the government.
In general, the positive impact of openness depends on citizens‘ democratic capacity (Schmidthuber et al., 2020). Hence, professional behavior in politics does not solely increase trust, but also the possibility for the individual to be a part of the decision-making process. Referring to this, transparency and accountability in government occupy a quite important position (Mahmood et al., 2024).
Especially digital media plays an important role. Incidentally, there are no grounds for expecting digital media to displace existing channels of public engagement. Interestingly, digital media is beginning to play an important role in defining and reconfiguring the role of citizens within local governments (Firmstone & Coleman, 2015).
To provide an example which illustrates the problematic of the public representation towards economy, one can put trade unions into the focal point. In terms of these, we need to broaden our view of how the /traditional’ forms of representations can sometimes renew themselves - especially as spaces and experiences for ,genuine personal resistance, hope, and mutual support‘ (Blackwell, 2016). Where unions are united, they can support the social demands of outsiders (Rathgeb, 2016). One can conclude that the individual, as a common worker, thus taxpayer, and, therefore, stakeholder of the state, can also exert power through trade unions. Hence, these deserve a special consideration in terms of representational activity.
Additionally, public obligations have grown much more rapidly than economic resources, thus it requires monitoring systems to adapt to changes (Kettunen et al., 2016). Referring to this, regulation and accountability mechanisms for political communication are crucial for maintaining openness and equity in the government (Daud, 2021), thus meeting the requirements for ensured trust, and, therefore, stability of democratic structures.
As stated before, e-participation initiatives by governments act as a mediator in the relation between social media usage by citizens as well as power distance to e-government development (Vakeel & Panighari, 2018). Interestingly, social media, which can be regarded as a subfield of digital media, behaves differently. By sharing information, people lose their privacy, enabling third parties to extract vulnerable information (Aslan, 2022). Therefore, digital literacy is required, if citizens are intended to engage in political issues more directly through digital media.
Nevertheless, the negative effect of mass participation in decision-making processes needs to be considered as well (Ahmet et al., 2023). Behavioral and, moreover, moral education must, therefore, be a part of citizens‘ social preparation for their political role. Referring to this, it is recommended that learning activities involving specific digital skills need to be included in teaching and assessment of critical thinking and citizen participation (Gonzalez-Mohino, 2023). Albeit uncertain, to some extent, the future can be known and actualized - especially since technologies provide previously unknown opportunities (Kiepas, 2021). For instance, reliability of measurements of public opinion are increasing with technological advances, e.g. sentiment analysis (Howe & Krosnick, 2020). However, this may provide another advantage for governments against their citizens. Therefore, it is crucial to strengthen the digital disposition of the individual. Incidentally, it has been deduced that being younger, having higher income and higher education is weakly associated with public opinion (Bergquist et al., 2022). Hence, it is to be considered that population‘s political motivation may be dependent on attributes that must not be biased in representation.
Summarizing the previous points, the inclusion of public opinion is inevitable for trusted, stable, and, therefore, resilient democratic structures. The motivation to participate in democratic processes highly depends on the democratic capacity. However, this requires a systematically integrated institution of direct democracy. Since humans are prone to manipulation and unreasonable behavior, their position with respect to the government and other parties needs to be protected and its integrity needs to be ensured. The rapid development of digital, and especially social media makes direct democracy not only possible but inevitable. It is up to the state design to provide a canalized and fair structure to enable citizens to exert their power without being influenced in their opinion-making. Especially, digital literacy and moral behavior are to be taught to meet these requirements. Finally, a reform of trade union policy is required as well, as they are a useful and important part of the employer-employee relationship in societal and economic means, but still lacks the capability of providing effective results (as can be seen in France, Germany, and EU in general).
4.3 Finance
Already in 2010, Hannoun has warned not to overburden central banks, as they have reached the apex of their powers after the financial crisis in 2008 (Hannoun, 2010). As has been described before, the incivility increases with involvement of lower levels in decision-making processes (Ahmet et al., 2023). Therefore, the democratization of finance is a delicate subject. On the one hand, public participation is to be mobilized. On the other hand, private interest groups that currently play a disproportionally large role in policy making need to be weakened (McCarthy, 2019). Otherwise, the tension between public and private sector is transformed into the financial field as well.
In general, delegation and independent agencies open possibilities to exert an independent influence on policy outcomes (McPhilemy & Moschella, 2019). Accordingly, the independence of national banks does not only become popular in the developed world, but also among emerging economies (Illieva, 2003). This trend leads to the conclusion that independence is a crucial aspect to be considered and aimed at, especially in the context of reorganization of the financial field for the sake of stability and transparency. Incidentally, it has been shown that delegation to central banks and independent regulatory agencies is in many respects quite similar (Gilardi, 2007). Hence, as the processes remain mostly unchanged, it is feasible to restructure the financial field to become more democratic, whereas it is to consider that financial education must be guaranteed to ensure a financial democratic capacity.
Referring to this context, the tendency towards an integrated supervisory system is not always linked to a demolition of the central banks‘ powers in the supervisory domain (Apinis et al., 2010). Consequently, it occurs to be reasonable to assume that a well-thought reconstruction aiming a democratic architecture of finance will be also welcomed by the national banks as well.
In sum, the role of finance needs to be reconsidered, given the ability of legislative to ensure its own existence and power without having any balance to this political power. Therefore, it is crucial to rethink finance and an own institution which needs to be understood as a balancing counterpart rather than an institution beneath the legislative.
4.4 Economy
Market forces will always tend towards concentration, especially towards concentration of innovational power. The enhancement of innovations, however, is only useful if applied before market concentration occurs (Grisold, 1998). In this context, concentration of wealth leads to corruptive tendencies, as can be witnessed in countries with high slope of income, as has been observed in several cases (Afonso et al., 2021).
Referring to this, the positive effects of democratization and post-industrialization as the two key driving factors of welfare reform in East Asia (Fleckenstein & lee, 2017) can be considered as a blueprint for a reform approach in western civilization. However, there are several negative trends to be addressed. In the EU, economically harmful redistribution is caused by bureaucratization (Svendsen & Brandt, 2009). Additionally, it is seen that lobbyism is gaining power and transforms democracies into plutocracies with an alarmingly low level of transparency. Furthermore, the military industrial complex, especially in the USA, drives the global politics of the western world in quite ominous ways and leads to escalation of conflicts (Dunlap, 2011). As another example, in Germany, states found NGOs to work as stepstones for large companies to influence political decision-making processes (Sutyrin, 2022). Such structures are neither sustainable nor politically reasonable in the long term. Therefore, it requires a new understanding of the role of economics in politics.
Naturally, large companies have a systematic advantage not only with respect to the public (as described before), but also with respect to small and medium enterprises (SMEs), as the synergy effects of larger companies allow them to allocate their resources more efficiently and thus exert power, and, on an international level, minimize their taxation (O‘Donnel et al., 2022). A simple prohibition of lobbyism would simply transfer it into an unofficial form, i.e. corruption. In contrast, it is more feasible and reasonable to include the power of economy into the political process while regulating it to channel its effects.
In sum, the aim is to provide both appropriate representation of economic interests in politics and transparency for the public. With ensured power on the one hand, and accountability on the other hand, a justified and stable involvement of economic parties can be established.
Furthermore, the economic structure is to be adapted to the modern development of societies as well. Concretely, there is a need to find a compromise between the typically American overconfident pragmatism, the European micromanagement bureaucracy, and the Chinese and Indian exert of control. It is reasonable to select organized democracy as the weapon of choice to ensure prosperity, economic and political stability, and social justice.
4.5 Military
As has been mentioned before, the military industrial complex is an important aspect to consider with respect to the relationship between the military and politics. After the turmoil of the 20th century, states have moved from the primacy of military to the primacy of economy. Still, the most alluring characteristic of the military is its tremendous potential for revenue. This tempting opportunity led to the formation of the military industrial complex, which is, to some extent, self-sustaining (Dunlap, 2011). Especially the summoning of commitment and invocation of ethics enhances the readability to violence, thus the advocacy, acceptance, and a generally positive attitude towards war (Zehfuss, 2018).
Interestingly, the military‘s ability to play a soft power on the acceptance of foreign populations (Allen et al., 2020) can also serve as a geopolitical-social advantage. These considerations lead to the conclusion that the military is not solely a hard power in terms of enforcement of interests in foreign affairs but also a psychological tool for control in domestic policy. Especially, in the era of mutual assured destruction due to nuclear weapons, the military occupies the role of a single-operation squadron for single and spatially limited conflicts. Additionally, on larger scales, it becomes an indirect instrument of enforcement. For instance, lawfare can be regarded as a principle of using or misusing the law to achieve an operational military objective (Hodges & Morkevicius, 2019).
However, this interconnection with politics and the economy leads to a problematic outcome. Considering the power of media and its relation to politics, a somewhat chain reaction of interdependences leads to an unproportionally advantageous position of military with respect to the people. The ability to manipulate masses through media can lead to an increasing militarization of a state. Given the military‘s interdependencies with economy, politics, and, thus, financiers, the military industrial complex can, at least to some extent, exert control over media consumption. Consequently, those citizens the military is obligated to serve end up being controlled and manipulated into acceptance of military strategies. Since the control over masses is to be achieved through rather emotional than logical communication (LeBon, 1895), military-driven manipulation leads to ideological attitudes. Therefore, most conflicts arise from ideological rather than, for instance, resource-based dissimilarities, whereas the intensity can be driven by other factors as well (Basedau et al., 2022). Albeit resources play an important role for economies, and, thus, may be worth engaging in conflicts, modern technologies and economic abilities enable efficient production, processing, and distribution. However, it may appear that simply occupying foreign land turns out to be more feasible, and that ideological control over populations is the most efficient way to provoke and sustain such conflicts. One of the best previous examples is the war between Ukraine and Russia. No one can doubt that Russia occupies enough land, and that its connection to the Black Sea has been still apparent without the annexation of Crime. However, the ongoing conflict raised from the ideological differences between Ukrainians and Russians, and will dwell until those differences are eliminated, or until the ultimate destruction leads to a defeat of at least one of both parties.
In sum, the increasing interconnection of military, economy, politics, and media leads to the erosion of international law and the domestic independence of citizens. However, it is quite unrealistic to assume that people would simply give up their intentions to overthrow their hateful enemies; that generals and companies would withdraw their soldiers and machinery, and, consequently, lose the opportunity of revenue. Therefore, the most feasible approach would be to use the military‘s interconnection with the economy to restrict its influence. Concretely, it is necessary to strengthen international interdependency to maintain peace without drifting into cold peace. A somewhat successful approach has been realized in the European Union (whereas its inability to sustain economic and financial stability is to be considered as well). Furthermore, the interconnections need to be cut apart, so that the military‘s role is reduced to a sole server of politics and economy, and, most importantly, the citizens of the state.
4.6 Media
As discussed before, digital media is becoming more important and requires regulation and accountability mechanisms in the political context (Daut, 2021). Especially, social media provides a plethora of possibilities for its users, but also dangers in terms of privacy (Aslan, 2022). Additionally, there are ways to influence citizen trust while promoting transparency and accountability in the government (Mahmood et al., 2024). Moreover, social media represents a new level of citizen engagement and advocacy (Pullmann et al., 2013), especially in terms of e-participation initiatives, as has been stated before (Vakeel & Panighari, 2018). In addition, social media enables us to overcome the stiff information distribution of bureaucracy (Li et al., 2020).
Incidentally, the exposure to public television news programs alternates the willingness to vote for a specific candidate (Gattermann et al., 2016), and a long-term exposure leads to boycotts of whole sources of information (e.g. Foos & Bischof, 2022). Furthermore, it has been shown that political trust declines steeply during adolescence, due to a lower duration of media consumption (Moeller & Vreese, 2013).
In general, media can manipulate or stimulate political thinking through movies and other free time related content (Singh, 2018). However, this ability is used for the mobilization and ideologization of masses, as has been discussed before in the context of politics and military.
In fact, media has reached its peak of importance and danger due to its ubiquitous influence on controlling public opinion for or against developments and changes, especially in terms of social values, intellectual beliefs, religious approaches, and further different aspects of human life (Abujanah, 2021). Therefore, its ubiquity leads to the requirement to accept its mighty role and to cope with it instead of trying to fight its inevitable development to a potent instrument for the executive. Such development is currently witnessed in China, where the direct collaboration, especially with social media, leads to a more effective mobilization of citizens and non-profit organizations (Li et al., 2020).
Additionally, commercialization of media leads to a gap between elite politicians and the somewhat fickle public, so that citizens can be distracted easily (Bondebjerk, 2006), which is why autocracies are always eager to bring media under their control. Hence, contrary to the current developments, political endeavors should be observed through mass media as a national model and beyond fractional and party-related limits. Furthermore, its domain should be extended (Zaeri, 2019). Journalism activities undertaken by citizens serve as a manifestation of aspirations and the delivery of popular opinion, hereby citizen journalism as a part of the press is a means to achieve democracy (Ukka, 2019).
Summing up, the most realistic approach to cope with the development of media is to accept its de facto ubiquitous instrument characteristics. Concretely, it is feasible to promote media to an official and integrated power de iure. However, this is to be realized with appropriate regulations, which can be seen as “Geneva Conventions” for media, forbidding unethical behavior such as manipulation and ensuring transparency and accountability. Additionally, the consequence of such a promotion would underly the principle of separation of powers, dismantling the political-medial complexes, and disrupting the inappropriate intercorrelation with the military. In general, the media shall not be used as a tool for manipulation but is to be seen as an own power of communication, thus coordination of state organs between each other and with respect to their stakeholders, i.e. the citizens. Incidentally, the special role of social media as a democratized information instrument of the public needs to be respected as a solitary instance.
4.7 Science and Education
Earlier in this chapter, we have ascertained that experts are to be part of representative government rather than solely an alternative to it (Ganuza, 2020). In addition, the focus on natural sciences alone may help to engage in economical pursuit, but to address other aspects of life, all types of sciences need to be emphasized (Brogan, 1948). For instance, the role of political science within the UK‘s policy advisory systems appears to be significant (Flinders et al., 2022). In the case of the recent pandemic, uncertainty first led to politicians relying on medical expertise for justifying severe constraints. In later states, however, gaps emerged between scientific advices and politicians who intended to relax the restrictions due to economic and social pressure (Hodges et al., 2022), which is simply a circumscription for their fear of loss of political power due to decline of voters‘ favor and financial support of the economy. However, this leads to the conclusion that science needs a more integrated position in politics, as it allows it to better explain and engage its decisions in a discourse with the public. In addition, it would cause simply less chaotic decision-making and political “zigzag courses”2.
If democratic decision-making is to preserve basic values, such as inclusion, accountability, and legitimacy, it should respond to the “value-ladeness” of science - especially, the development of institutional innovation through which both citizens and scientists can make explicit and engage with the values and interests guiding scientific research (Pamuk, 2021). This demand is supported by a more than sole ethical need for stronger involvement of science in politics. The formation of civilizations and the recent globalized society has happened thanks to a resilient biosphere and a hospitable climate. To provide a stable biosphere in the future, it is crucial for governance to mobilize the best knowledge science can offer. Hence, science‘s role in policy making reaches the level of survival importance.
Additionally, science generates matters of concern and may become a site of politics in either way. It is dependent on the purpose of study how the concept of politics is to be formulated (Brown, 2015), meaning that science occupies an intention-critical role in politics.
However, the scientific community needs re-orientation as well. Especially, scientists‘ aim to write papers leads to a somewhat market-oriented situation with respect to publishers, i.e. scientific journals. The consequence of this mar- ketesque behavior is, for instance, a high sorting out rate of submitted scientific papers. At first sight, this sounds quite logical, since science is to be driven by the most important, thus best and admired advances. However, this also leads to the so-called file drawer problem. This problem constitutes the fact that a vast majority of studies are never reported, since they do not prove the functionability of theoretical basis or concepts (Rosenthal 1979). In contrast to this, negative knowledge, i.e. the knowledge that something does not work under special circumstances, and the knowledge of not knowing something, are at least as important as positive knowledge (Taleb, 2007). Furthermore, scientific publications have a financial interest in serving manifold stakeholders, which makes the selection of topics biased, distorting the statistical distribution of outcome (Krimsky, 1996). Hence, it is crucial to liberate the scientific community from both external and internal limitations.
To enable science effectively to be a pioneering element of politics, it is important to realize a fundamentally rational public discourse, one that starts from the facts, and not from beliefs. Subsequently, questions about societal behavior can be engaged (Kirchner, 2017). Occupying a broader perspective, this requires a sustainable and relational reconstruction of societal integrity. Of course, such transformation will take time, but the best approach should be the motivation from above combined with an intrinsic motivation. Therefore, the political structure should motivate people to think and behave in a rational way, whereas the economic structure should motivate them to do so from an opportunistic point of view. Hence, education needs to play a pioneering role in this transformation, and later, the sustaining part for the concept‘s resilience.
First of all, schools need to be adapted to tasks universities have, i.e. education, research, and service to society (Kajevska, 2020). Hence, schools need to be seen as pre-institutions for universities and other forms of high schools or education establishments, in a similar way to kindergartens are seen as pre-institutions for schools. Post-school education needs to prepare students for their course of life, not simply to be functional workers and diligent taxpayers. The education system must be designed to prepare them according to their wishes for their future career. As the courses in post-school education are means of specification, it is crucial for schools to provide the students with knowledge which everyone should have. Aiming to create a rational society which engages scientific discourse and, therefore, requires a fundamental understanding of its principles, it is inevitable to teach the foundations of science as well as its concrete applications as early as possible. Moreover, democratic capacity can, realistically, only be maximized, if citizens have the necessary energy and cognitive freedom. This, in turn, can be constrained, if they must mobilize vast amounts of energy to cope with their everyday life. Therefore, it is necessary to teach them how to deal with it as well. For instance, subjects as household, financial planning, nutrition, career and family planning could be included in the obligated curriculum.
For the sake of even distribution of education, equal access must be guaranteed. Furthermore, the labor market is to be adjusted to the educational level of students (Bol et al., 2019), whereas this adjustment needs to consider that students need more time to learn their required skills.
During education, cooperation, collaboration and dialogue in relationships of either type are key elements in the modelling of an education for democratic citizenship. Nevertheless, the dynamic, troublesome, and potentially disruptive nature of a democratic education contradicts the traditional agential, power-related positioning of teacher-student relationships and role identities in the classrooms (Leach et al., 2023). Therefore, a re-thinking and re-modelling of these relationships needs to be undertaken. Scientific knowledge needs to play the role of the basis on which the decisions of the transformation of education is to be realized. Otherwise, just another ideological approach would lead to the same problems we witness today. Referring to this, government‘s role in education must be re-designed as well (Friedmann, 1955).
Especially for politicians, there must be a clear, systematic, and prepared course of education, based on the reasons discussed in subsection 4.1. Their course of education must provide a deep understanding of political science and activity as well as specified fields in which the future candidates seek to be active in as an expert. As politicians have the burden of governing, potentially, all aspects of life, it is a justified demand that they need to be highly competent experts in their respective field - and in politics in general.
Hence, politicians need to acquire their scientific knowledge in the field they prefer and absolve additional studies as a preparation for their political activity. Given the plethora of required knowledge, it is crucial to have a broad field of study. Concretely, this may include sociology, philosophy, MINT fields, and economics.
4.8 Ethics and Religion
Ethical considerations are of the most striking reasons to rethink the purpose of politics and reconstruct its concept. First, asymmetric politics is driven by the radicalization of one political actor. Voters choose their vote based on group identity and economical welfare, rather than ontological thinking (Lovett, 2023). To prevent such radicalization, an ethical basis for all political actors is to be provided. Furthermore, the empowerment of these rules is required. However, an according instance needs to be independent from the observed subjects. Else, they could dictate their own rules, thus the ethical aspect would be annihilated. Especially, lawfare, as has been discussed in subsection 4.5, is to be banned (Hodges & Morkevicius, 2019).
Moreover, conceptions of bare life blend with politics and the inability of reaching beyond socially embedded and mediated interpretations of life (Ticktin, 2006). However, this must be the goal for political actions. Hence, an ethical education is required for politicians as well, complementing the list in subsection 4.7.
Based on considerations with respect to discourse ethics, federalism is to be preferred as a sustainable state structure. A world order capable of creating a global steady state system is required to be a multi-leveled federalistic structure (Gare, 2001), since the different cultural entities throughout the world need to be represented properly and need to have the chance to undergo a broad process of communication and debates. Therefore, a state order needs to be federal in both ways: in its domestic structure, and towards its foreign affairs.
In terms of religion and its role in politics, it is to be noted that religious nationalism can be, on one hand, an important organizing divide for mass politics. Referring to this, secularism tends to struggle to cope with the strengthening of religion-leaning political parties (Kamath & Shetty, 2023). On the other hand, however, the requirement of a rational society brings along the demand of religious diversity. Incidentally, it is to be avoided to round up religious people into closed groups, as they will hinder the social integrity by their reactant behavior, provoking even harsher discrimination (Hodge, 2020).
Therefore, a respectful treatment of religion is to be practiced. Religion must be seen as something deeply private. And states, in turn, have no right to interfere in private affairs. Thus, religions as private affairs have no right to interfere in states. Such secularism should prevent distortion of political discourse by religious endeavor. Lastly, religious organizations shall receive financial help from the state, but only on the condition and to the according extent that they serve the whole society, and not solely themselves. This should prevent power-gaining radical-religious groups by promoting charity instead of demarcation.
4.9 Anthropological Perspective
Since a wider perspective is helpful for long-term planning, an anthropological point of view is to be occupied. Therefore, hereinafter, society is understood as a social structure with special customs and culture transmissions, maintaining common understandings and balancing stability and change (Cook, 1943). Any intelligent life form that is enabled to play a decisive role in its own evolution is also capable of understanding that if it fails to fulfill its role it will, consequently, represent a failed evolutionary experiment, i.e. go extinct (Stewart, 2010). Furthermore, the evolution of a species is always interdependent with its environment (Levins, 1968). Therefore, as we are gaining the ability to alter our evolution, we obtain the responsibility for ourselves - and our surroundings. Hence, we cannot rely on ideologically based decision-making anymore. Our species thus requires stronger and more persistent foundations for our decisionmaking, such as data, scientific analysis, and, consequently, reliable information. Living in the post-humanistic world, we tend to rely less on feelings or norms, but rather on data. Therefore, the current ism can be referred to as dataism (Harari, 2015).
However, only because we survived hitherto, there is no reason to expect our continued survival in the future. Therefore, it is urgent to develop a systematic understanding of the nature and causes of catastrophic and existential risks (Currie & O hEigeartaigh, 2018). This leads to the conclusion that humanity is required to focus its organizational ability on scientific development and its application.
As already mentioned, our ability to affect the whole biosphere (Folke et al., 2021) brings along the responsibility to sustain it. We can predict the future, and our new technologies provide previously unknown opportunities, especially the usage of AI (Kiepas, 2021). Incidentally, the predictive power of our tools implies a more substantial aspect of responsibility; we cannot talk ourselves out of it anymore.
It is also important to unify humanity‘s efforts for the sake of its future survival. Mutual misunderstanding, controverses, and, especially, aggressiveness is to be overcome by constructive and respectful dialogue (Associated Press, 2024). However, human nature forces us to be able to invest in our aggressiveness somehow. Therefore, the most feasible approach is to simply keep us occupied enough so we do not seek reasons for conflicts.
Currently, the best way to ensure human survival, the sustainability of our existence in the biosphere, and to keep us occupied enough not to provoke any redundant conflicts, is to expand into space. To achieve this, humanity must act as one society, based on proper education and ethical behavior. For instance, many countries facilitate the expansion of private value extraction based on international law (Feichtner, 2019), which could serve as a blueprint for an international approach of legal preparation of space expansion.
Without a ventil of population to emigrate and energy to be invested into expansion of our species, it could become impossible to sustain peace and respectful collaboration, as well as a stable biosphere without overpopulation. Therefore, this approach could provide the key factor for coexistence among humankind.
Furthermore, expansion could maximize our chances to survive cataclysmic events, even increasing our living standards by providing us with more space and resources. The latter makes us more interdependent on each other, additionally minimizing the risk of wars.
To facilitate this development, the societal self-understanding as a rational society must be introduced. Moreover, we require a political structure which emphasizes the value of competence, accountability and transparency rather than opportunism, ideology and manipulation.
5 Deduction of Requirements
5.1 Preparing Thoughts
Regardless of the theories describing historical reasons for the forming of states, a state is a conglomerate of individuals who decided to combine their resources to solve problems. To be more precise, they combine their resources to face challenges, which even the sum of them would not be able to overcome without collaboration. This somewhat game- theoretical view implies that the state as a conglomerate needs to maximize the benefit across the whole civilization it engulfs. To do so, the resources need to be allocated in a most favorable way, i.e. so the problems can be solved most efficiently and effectively.
The allocation of resources to reach a desired point is the very definition of a strategy. Therefore, states have the tremendously daring task of creating and executing strategies. If we look at the types of resources a state has access to, we discover that one of these resources is the stakeholder itself - the individual. Hence, a state needs to allocate individuals in a favorable way to solve its problems. To obtain a more precise description, the term “favorable” needs to be defined yet. It is reasonable to assume that an allocation is favorable, if it does not only ensure the maximization of benefit across the citizens, but also includes that the allocation is efficient, effective, precise, and appropriate. In the remainder, these requirements and their consequences will be briefly discussed.
Maximization of benefit means that the sum of benefits of all individuals is to be maximized. Indeed, as has been mentioned before, Kenneth Arrow managed to demonstrate that the complete satisfaction of all individuals in a group is a mere utopia (Arrow, 1951). However, a stipulation demanding the maximization of the overall benefit within a group does make sense, since the demanded task is both feasible and desirable. Nevertheless, it depends on the constellation of the responsible subjects whether the acquired allocation of resources truly reflects the maximized benefit or not. Naturally, democracies tend to provide the most accurate reflection of the maximized benefit. Albeit these forms of government are prone to instabilities, they still represent the best solution so far.
Efficiency can be described by the ratio of outcome per invested resource. An allocation can be regarded as efficient, if the invested resource is used to maximize the outcome. From the point of view of a state, the resources given by its citizens are to be used to maximize the outcome, i.e. to provide the best service to its citizens for their investments. Especially, when it comes to the interpretation of resources as the citizens themselves, the efficient allocation becomes even more crucial than, for instance, the allocation of financial resources. However, there are manifold attributes which can be used to decide by whom which position shall be occupied. For instance, it may be popularity, fidelity, or abilities. Clearly, the most reasonable approach is the latter, i.e. the allocation based on competence.
Effectiveness refers to the achieved outcome with respect to the desired outcome. Therefore, an allocation which maximizes the outcome with respect to the expected one can be regarded as effective. As a state, it is clearly important to act effectively, so that the desired strategy can be accomplished, and that the state is regarded as functional.
Precision means that the invested resources are allocated in such a way that they contribute to a desired set of outcomes. Especially, the ratio between the set of contributed desired outcomes and the set of total contributed outcomes is important. Therefore, an allocation is precise if the resources contribute to the desired outcomes only, without any side effects. Notably, this is quite unrealistic, since complex structures, e.g. economies, will always deliver side effects after a perturbation, i.e. artificial resource allocation. However, the understanding of complex systems decreases the risk of side effects. Since the only other alternative would be not to allocate them artificially at all (which, in turn, would make the whole idea of a state obsolete), it is crucial to increase the understanding of the corresponding structures to provide precision. In other words: to increase the precision, we must increase the knowledge of decision makers.
Proportionality refers to the appropriate assignment of resources to the desired outcome. Thus, an allocation of resources is proportional, if their assignment and deployment is neither exaggerated nor understated. To estimate a proportional assignment of resources, a state requires knowledge of the processes involved and needs a somewhat experienced and objective staff with an appropriate attitude to do so. Again, competence also increases the chance to provide a proportional allocation of resources.
Therefore, competence is the most important treat an individual shall be assigned to a position for. However, the requirement of an informative state which can use the competence of its elements leads to the conclusion that there must be, additionally, transparent structures. Otherwise, the information between one individual and another could not completely be transported, and possible manipulations could neither be detected nor understood. Therefore, besides competence, transparency is another requirement for a state which is to allocate its resources in a favorable way. In addition, a proper guideline is necessary for individuals to be motivated to follow the state’s interest. It is important to note that positive motivation is not simply the negation of negative motivation. Rather, they are two different dimensions of experiences. Therefore, it is crucial to use a combination of both as a motivator. Although there are many approaches, it is rational to be eager to provide a simple, but effective motivator concept. In this context, the theory of praxeology demands the rational integration of the irrationality of human behavior. Therefore, control mechanisms are important to guarantee that civil servants will meet the state’s expectations - which are, in turn, the expectations of the state’s most important stakeholders: the people. To apply such mechanisms, transparency needs to be enhanced. However, including the principle of competence and transparency, accountability must be a logical addition, as it allows proper enforcement. In the remainder, all three together will be referred to as the CAT principle.
The implementation of the CAT principle in politics is a feasible, albeit still challenging task. Nevertheless, we shall not hide behind excuses and let the problems continue to appear simply out of the coziness of habit. Indeed, the concrete implementation is to be derived, but we can already deduce that it would be pointless to implement the principle solely in politics itself. Rather, the achievements of a successful implementation would be annihilated, if the direct surroundings would not follow them. Regarding the law of opportunity-seeking individuals, the surroundings of politics would even seek to negate the CAT principle, i.e. to avoid the barriers installed by the implementation. But what is the so- called surrounding of politics? Given the fact that politics affects almost everything in everyday life, one can say: mostly everything. In fact, even personal relations can be affected by politics, although many claim that this is not the case. Besides, one cannot deny that politicians are under great responsibility, since their decisions affect nearly everything - from whole economies in the macroscopic view to the fate of single individuals in the microscopic view. Therefore, it is not clear which is the direct or indirect surrounding - or environment - of politics. For instance, the default of technical competence in politics (such as a profound knowledge in economics) could be avoided by individuals by using their personal connections. Thus, the political barrier is avoided using social skills. Hence, we must assume that individuals seeking to avoid barriers in politics could find them in nearly any milieu. The logical consequence is that the principles installed in politics are to be installed in the whole society; otherwise, their efficacy is highly questionable.
However, an upheaval of the whole society is neither feasible nor desirable. Therefore, the installation of the CAT principle needs to be undertaken in a precise way: It is crucial to identify the main drivers and key institutions whose changeover will effectively transfer the effects into the desirable directions. Besides, a simple enumeration is not enough. It is also important to know their role in society and regarding the political landscape. Especially, when it comes to the decision of how to implement the CAT principle, the roles of the plethora of institutions become critical.
Moreover, some further considerations are to be made. We must consider the fact that we find ourselves on the merge of the sixth Kontradiev wave. Either the development of AI or a revolution in genetic science will usher in economic, political and social turmoil. As in the previous Kontradiev waves, we are about to witness the loss of millions of jobs, whereas new possibilities to earn money will occur. However, the global interconnection of markets and societies requires an alignment of approaches and actions. Otherwise, there will be unguided developments throughout the whole fabric of civilization, leading to chaos, mistrust and the loss of upcoming opportunities. In fact, we are already witnessing these types of developments, given the asymmetric digitalization successes within Europe alone. However, an alignment of the approaches to address the disruption effects is only possible, if the individuals responsible for the decision-making processes simply know what they do. In fact, this is not the first Kontradiev wave we witness (otherwise, there would be no name for it). Therefore, it is possible to use the predecessors as blueprints and the mistakes made as lessons. This is only possible if those individuals know what happened and dedicate a significant amount of their effort into understanding. In other words: To cope with the upcoming disruptions, we need people who understand economics and history in responsible positions.
Especially, the rise of ever new and advanced AI algorithms poses a danger. As the vast majority do not understand the principles and functionality of AI, they are prone to manipulation. Deep fake pictures, videos or the simple misunderstanding of AI regarding its potential become a threat to the democratic principle. Therefore, one may argue that the profound understanding of AI principles should be an important aspect of public education. In fact, in Japan, students already learn about AI in school. However, this cannot be realized on a profound level. Nevertheless, an understanding of the basic principles as well as rapid development should be an important aspect of youth education. Furthermore, ethical considerations need to play a role in public awareness. Otherwise, a new form of elites will appear: elites emerging out of pure knowledge and thus control AI, using their knowledge to control the remaining masses. Indeed, the only way to escape such a dystopic is to invest effort by learning the required information. Therefore, one can say that freedom (from manipulation) needs to be gained and maintained by effort. If we do not invest in this work of education, we will find ourselves in a comfortable but controlled society.
Incidentally, facing such disadvantages, we need to consider one that is of a mere structural nature. When a group of individuals unite to form a conglomerate, they tend to give up power to a leader. The occurrence of such hierarchical structures leads to the formation of, as Coleman named it, corporate actors (Wilkins, 2020). Since the nature of hierarchical structures leads to a higher efficiency and efficacy, such corporate actors tend to have an organizational advantage with respect to individuals. This leads to an asymmetric relationship between them (Preisendörfer, 2016). For instance, the sole individual has nearly no decision power about which ingredients are used for the food he buys in a supermarket. The corporate actor (the company that runs the supermarket), however, can change the ingredients as they wish. The only way an individual can affect the behavior of the corporate actor is by buying something else. This is, as can be simply seen, limited to the fact that there must be other suppliers or sources of this type of food. If there are monopolistic circumstances or restricted access to other sources, the individual has close to no power against the decisions of the corporate actor. This asymmetry does not only occur in economical situations, but also in informative milieu regarding media and education, or in political milieu regarding political parties and the government regarding media and education, or even in political milieu regarding political parties and the government in total. As power can be seen to be accumulated, it is logical to deduce that once the asymmetric relationship occurs, the advantageous party will tend to keep its position. The disadvantageous party, however, will play along until the asymmetry provokes a compensation - either from above or from below. The first may be called reforms, whereas the latter is the more violent variant, namely a type of revolt or revolution. Therefore, this asymmetry of relationship must be considered when one is eager to provide an intrinsically stable form of government.
Based on these considerations, in the remaining chapter, the roles of the following institutions or political stakeholders will be discussed: The public, especially workers and taxpayers; politicians and political parties; trade unions; media; finance; economy; military; science; religion; education.
Building on these discussions, the whole situation will be analyzed, leading to the elaboration of the new form of government.
5.2 New Understanding of Roles in Politics
Given its current development, technology constitutes an important focal point in re-shaping the political structures. Especially, digital development needs to be used for acquiring better data and analysis, thus information for more effective decision-making processes in politics. However, the dataistic approach of decision making (Harari, 2015) needs to be fused with the humanistic approach represented by the public. If only dataistic methods are used, the public will eventually protest, destabilizing societal structures and thus the state in general. Accordingly, a sole humanistic approach would lead to ideologic politics, eventually resulting in the same problematic situations we witness today. To cope with those requirements, politicians must occupy the role of experts in both fields. Additionally, they need to acquire expertise for their specialized field.
Through education, society needs to be transformed into a rational one. Therefore, the state’s architecture must emphasize the CAT principle. Hence, education needs to be treated as a nation’s most important resource. The educational course must prepare students for their life and their role in society and needs to be well-suited to the upcoming challenges of their profession. Thus, it must provide crucial knowledge, hard and soft skills as well as critical thinking. However, the irrationality of human nature must be considered as well. The feasibility of the resolved transformation depends on its realizability. Whereas democracy can be understood as a means of emotions, the political choice must be pre-shaped by rationalism. This can be understood as a manifestation of weak voluntarism, in which rationality provides the borders of emotional choice.
Moreover, the state design must ensure that human life is treated appropriately. Therefore, ethics must be an important part of political endeavor. Hence, not only nature and societal sciences are to be involved during education, but also ethical methodologies. Furthermore, the position of the individual against the organized state is to be balanced, i.e. its integrity needs to be ensured. Democratic structure is thus to be emphasized.
To lower the chance of military conflicts, it is necessary to construct an interdependent ecosystem in which it is not feasible to conquer each other. In addition to this, education and prosperity are to be recognized as the beacon of guarantee against conflicts.
Speaking of conflicts, religions, which have been misused as a moral basis for hostilities throughout human history, need to be treated with respect, but appropriate distance. Therefore, a secular system is to be achieved. However, if religions play a beneficial role in society, e.g. by providing a concrete surplus value via hospitals, they may be remunerated by the state for their service for the society.
Finally, the political domain may realize the transformation of humanity into a developed society with the responsibility over its own planet, and the need and the ability to expand beyond. Humanity must emphasize peace through interdependence and canalize its energy as an effort-seeking, development-oriented species. We need to (re-)allocate our resources in the long run, i.e. achieve a development which ensures our survival and expansion. Therefore, the world society needs a stable steady state. As mentioned before, their requirements can be met by a federal structure. However, the federal system needs to be installed not only on the intranational, but also on the international level.
5.3 Requirements for Politicians
As politicians hold power over almost every aspect of life, they are responsible for their actions, especially for their according field of action. Therefore, it is crucial to ensure that said politicians are educated appropriately. Their education needs to include all important aspects of political, but also scientific and methodological fields to ensure that they truly understand what they decide about. As has been mentioned before, their curricula must include sociology, philosophy, MINT and law studies, and economics. However, the politicians’ competitiveness must be considered as well. Incidentally, it must motivate them to translate citizens’ will more effectively into political action. It would be naïve to simply accuse them of being selfish, since it is a crucial human trait that cannot be eliminated effectively. Nevertheless, it is equally naïve not to undertake anything and let the problems evolve as always. Therefore, the system needs to be designed in such a way that politicians’ competitiveness is channeled to make them act as they should.
To be more precise, the channel is to be constructed by individual preparation and an additional political study, ensuring that they are educated appropriately to cope with the responsibilities of political decision-making. That is, politicians need to be prepared to act as experts rather than amateurs in their specialized field. The more competence politicians have, the more responsibility (thus power) they may acquire.
After fulfilling their duty, they need to give up their power and go back to the everyday businesses of a normal citizen, as their effort is already paid back. There is no need to waste their talent and workforce for the sake of thankful worshipping. Additionally, their leaving ensures that new politicians can climb up the ladder of power, bringing in new ideas and ideologies, which represent the actual social trends better than an aged political elite. However, those who protrude through high competence and fidelity to the political system, may have the possibility to participate as role models in political endeavor.
To ensure that they focus on their political career and accompanying responsibilities, it should not be allowed to have an active income besides the remuneration for the service in their actual position. However, said remuneration and their workload must be appropriately high, to keep politicians ‘well fed and too busy’ to engage for other incomes. Hereby, corruption can be prevented rather than treated, as has been required before. To do so, the political structure must be redesigned in such a way that politicians have simply less opportunities and motives to commit crimes.
5.4 State Powers and Representations
Based on the previous discussion, several implications for the pillars of state are to be formulated. Especially, the architecture concerning the state powers must be reformed. In the following, according to requirements will be formulated.
First, the institution of media is to be reshaped, and its role redesigned. The media is, usually, used by the executive as an instrument for manipulation. Contrary to this, it has the potential to be understood as an instrument for democratic engagement, i.e. through the guarantee of transparency, accountability and direct discourse through social media. The latter, in turn, must be understood as a solitary instance to keep the democratic discourse out of centralistic control. However, to keep the discourse appropriate, there must be rules for the media to follow. In addition, the independence from the executive must be guaranteed by the political structure as well. Again, it would be naïve to assume that authorities would just leave the power of the media unused, simply because the law says so. To keep track of the media activity, to break media-politics complexities, and to ensure its integrity against other state powers, the media is to be elevated to the rank of a state power.
Second, it occurs that finance is used, or abused, by the legislative and executive as well. Additionally, each financial crisis proved that the complex interdependencies between the state powers and financial institutions leads to instability, and, subsequently, to intransparency during unstable times. Therefore, there is a need for an equilibrium between the financial market and the other state powers. Hence, finance itself needs to be reshaped as a state power as well.
Furthermore, it is important to provide a set of regulations to guarantee accountability and power equilibrium between all five state powers. Additionally, separation of powers needs to be intensified through the state’s architecture.
Moreover, the economic endeavor needs a regulated and transparent possibility to protect its interests in political decision-making. Unlike the current state of corruption, or, as called euphemistically, lobbyism, the communication of economic interests needs to be tracked, so that lobbyists can be found accountable for their influence on politics. Therefore, the economy must be represented in an appropriate proportion to its contribution to the public’s welfare. Both employers and employees are to be a part of this representation. Accordingly, the policy and the role of trade unions is to be adapted to such a structure. Furthermore, less bureaucracy and more organized democracy within the economy are to be achieved. Hereby, the democratic exchange and communication of interests is to be ensured. By including the economy as an integral part of political decision-making, the feasibility of political decisions are to be enhanced.
As mentioned before, the role of science is quite important for the welfare of society. Speaking of economy, however, the relationship between science and economy needs to be understood as a pioneer-enabler relationship. While scientific endeavor leads to new knowledge that can be used economically to increase welfare, economy provides infrastructure and financial means to pursue scientific research. Furthermore, the relationship between science and democracy needs to be engaged and understood as a service-provider relationship. On one hand, this means that scientific endeavor leads to knowledge, which, in turn, leads to higher welfare, thus higher stability of democracies. On the other hand, democratic structures emphasize equality. Especially, the access to education leads to scientific pursue. Finally, the relationship between economy and public needs to be understood as a provider-provider relationship between employers and employees. In each of the relations, the corresponding third element can play the role of moderator, which, in turn, stabilizes the whole system.
Therefore, a triangle of relationships can be described. The state structure based on this triangular relationship between economy, science, and democracy, may be called the Trigonocratic Form of State or Trigonocracy. The term “trigono- cratic” can also be deduced from the approach that not only democratic, but also meritocratic and technocratic elements will be used to balance out each other, as will be discussed later.
In the following, several special requirements will be enlisted and explained. Afterwards, the Part II of this work will focus on the architecture of the trigonocratic constitution, which is the main artifact of this thesis.
5.5 Specific Requirements
The state must understand itself as a service provider for the people, which are, in turn, its stakeholders. In exchange for the services the state provides (security, infrastructure, welfare, etc.), it receives income (i.e. tax). Although the state can increase tax, it does not really constitute a sustainable approach for political endeavor. In this regard, the treatment of tax income surplus is crucial, as it is not a reason for lavishness, but an opportunity for intelligent investment. Furthermore, the tax system must be restructured to be simple, effective, and gapless. Every citizen ought to give 33% of his income to the state, so that everyone pays an equal share to the state, which, in turn, treats everybody equally as well. Accordingly, the separation of financial power of state from the legislative and the executive ought to act as a guarantee for appropriate taxation.
In general, laws must be formulated with minimal complexity, following the rule of Ockham’s razor. It is not quite reasonable to create a legal system in which solely highly specialized lawyers can understand what is going on. Normal people do not have the capacity to engage in understanding such complex law. Thus, to adapt its service towards their most important stakeholders, the state must create understandable law systems. Accordingly, the state must take responsibility for minimalization of bureaucracy.
Furthermore, officialdom must be elite-oriented. Therefore, a good salary oriented on efficiency and effectiveness needs to be provided. With a steady workload and importance of competence, civil servants need to play the role of an effective representant of a state rather than being a synonym for ineffectiveness and low diligence. In accordance with that, poor performance needs to be followed by appropriately serious consequences. However, education of civil servants is required to prepare them for the upcoming challenges. Hence, in addition to judicial knowledge, officials must learn to use the newest technology and project management, since an efficiency-seeking state needs to act swiftly and update its infrastructure regularly. Thus, continuing education must be a crucial part of an official’s work profile. Indeed, these requirements lead to the conclusion that civil servants will be paid way better, and that their number would decrease. However, given the technological development, such a reduction of work staff appears to be mandatory.
Moreover, as it is practiced in some countries already, penalties should be set to be percentual values of income instead of absolute values. Hereby, all citizens are treated equally with respect to their abilities. Accordingly, the treatment of prisoners should be at the state’s expense. As they committed crimes which, objectively spoken, lowered the welfare of society, they need to re-obtain this loss. Therefore, they need to work in appropriate shifts (e.g. 8 hours a day, 5 days a week), until they re-gain the welfare loss they caused. Beside the costs for their food, security, and prison’s infrastructure, the saved costs of prisoner work shall be summed up until the welfare debt is paid off. In the case of murder, the lost welfare which could be produced by the victim is to be repaid. Hereby, serious crimes lead to increased penalties, which shall have a deterrent effect on criminals.
Besides penalties, remuneration needs to be designed to motivate people to work and study. To do so, students of professions of critical infrastructure must be paid during their education well enough. Hereby, sufficient labor running the critical systems is to be ensured.
In terms of infrastructure, the state is accountable for functioning services. To rule out the possibility of usury, exploitation or lower quality in the public sector, all infrastructural institutions must be forbidden to engage in profit-oriented processes. As said above, workers must be paid accordingly, so that their loyalty and endurance is ensured in critical times. Generally, guaranteed infrastructure is to be seen as a citizen’s right. Cities, regions, and states need to be designed to be resilient against crises, and to be easily developed and re-designed, if necessary. As soon new technologies or organizational knowledge occur, their implementation must be undertaken with minimal transaction costs. With respect to natural catastrophes and climate change, all human infrastructure must be, as far as possible, ‘elevated’ from nature, so that biotopes are invaded at minimal scales. Hereby, for instance, the chance of disastrous dissemination of zoonotic diseases can be minimized as well.
II. The Trigonocratic Constitution
6 General Structure
Based on the theoretical foundations discussed in Part I, the trigonocratic constitution is to be elaborated in several steps in the following. The aim of Part II is to describe the powers and institutions specifically, including their functions, relations to each other and the overall state dynamics. First, however, the general structure is to be developed, providing a framework for the concrete formulation of constitutional elements.
6.1 Federalism
As has been explained in the previous chapters, a federal structure of state is to be preferred to fulfill the requirements for a just and sustainable state structure. However, the federal principle is to be installed not solely on the intranational level. Fortunately, the somewhat egoistic attitude of nations would not allow centralistic supranational governments anyway - at least for the course of the next centuries. Therefore, a federal international structure provides a realistic and effective opportunity to forge a stable society beyond the borders of nations and cultures. In this regard, the aspect of interdependency is as important as the respect for self-determination. Thus, an appropriate trade-off is mandatory to sustain a state structure on a long-term basis.
In this regard, politicians need effective motivation for efficiency maximization to emphasize a channeling of their personal ambitions. However, it is crucial to maintain their motivation for loyalty towards the part of the population they represent as well. These requirements can be met by federalism; it has been shown before that this form of state increases governance efficiency.
Overall, it is reasonable to depict the federalistic structure using five levels: municipal, regional, national, supranational, and global. The differentiation between supranational and global level is chosen due to the differences of culture areas beyond national borders, which need to have the possibility to unite in order to combine their common visions on a supranational level. On the global level, however, humanity is to be represented thoroughly. Figure 1 shows the according structure, which will be used in the constitutional description afterwards.
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Figure 1: Levels of the State. The pyramidal structure resembles the upward decrease of number of instances per level.
6.2 Trigonocratic Elections
As discussed above, one of the problematic characteristics of today’s democracies is the lack of representativeness of leaders and the emotional tenure of election campaigns. To address these issues, the following trigonocratic election principle is described.
6.2.1 Subject Election Principle
To explain the subject election principle (SEP), some basics must be provided. First, the legislative sessions are determined as follows:
- Municipal and regional levels: 4 years per legislative session, at maximum 2 times
- National, supranational and global level: 4 years per legislative session, only one time
Politicians planning to stand for office need to undergo psychological tests that attest to their mental ability to cope with the challenges the office poses. To enhance state sustainability, its decision-making legitimacy needs to be guaranteed by its constitution. As the most legitimate decision-making processes include democratic discourse and the possibility to include anyone’s opinion, the concept of direct democracy is to be used. Accordingly, elections focus on subjects rather than people. Candidates can present their statements to subjects as the core elements of their campaign. These statements are collected, grouped into subject areas, and doublettes are erased. The obtained number of statements are voted about. Each voter has the possibility to either agree, disagree, or to be neutral. Indeed, this principle leads to increased effort, since the voter must actively decide about his actual opinion. However, an appropriate representation of the voters’ will be worth the effort, and appropriate digitalization can reduce the workload.
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Figure 2: Subject election principle. The voters vote for statements rather than candidates. Through the assignment relations between the statements and the candidates (weights), the latter receive their vote power according to the election of statements.
To guarantee that voters read and consciously decide upon the statements, control questions per subject area may be implemented to verify the voter’s attention3. If too many control questions are answered wrongly, the votes of the subject area are dismissed. This option, however, is just a suggestion to guarantee that voters seriously take part in the democratic process. In any case, the voting age is to be limited from both sides, as the mental abilities to cope with the complexity imply the requirement of a mature and agile mind. Therefore, the voting age is to be set from 21 to 70.
Hereby it is guaranteed that people are not easily manipulated, and, that they are to witness the (at least somewhat) longterm consequences of their vote. Furthermore, based on the stakeholder principle, multiple voting rights with respect to different regions are to be banned, as the citizen can only be regarded as a stakeholder with respect to the political units representing the population he is a part of.
To have a clear understanding of the suggested voting principle, the mathematical construct is to be explained. The overall principle is depicted in Figure 2.
Statements are called T, and candidates X. The number of candidates is n, and the initial number of statements is l. The percentage values of voters are described by p, and the corresponding association between a statement T j and a candidate X i as called w j,i. Each candidate suggests a set of statements, ranging from statement T i,a to statement T i,b. All those statements from all candidates which is then integrated into a normalized and minimized set of statements with the cardinal number m (condensed and doublettes-free)4:
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The weight w j,i between the statement and the candidates depends on whether this candidate suggested the statement or not. Therefore, w j,i = 1 if T j suggested X i, and w j,i = 0 if T j did not suggest X i:
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During the election, citizens D k (k G [1;o]) vote for the statements, which is shown by an opinion factor t. Either they agree with the statement (t = 1), or disagree (t = -1), or are indifferent towards the statement (t = 0). Hereby, an absent reaction is interpreted as t = 0 as well. Therefore, the voting action of each citizen creates an m-tuple D k:
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Given the number of voters, o, we can define the democratic disposition d as the sum of m -tuples of all voters:
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To reduce calculation effort, the percentage value of the democratic disposition, e, is defined as the division of d by o:
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The percentage of vote power, p(X i), is accordingly deduced by dividing the vote power by the sum of the powers of all candidates:
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Explicitly, this can be written as:
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If the sum of the opinion factors in the democratic disposition is negative for a statement, the value is set automatically as zero. The reason is as follows: If a candidate provides two different statements and one of them is highly liked, whereas the other one is clearly disliked, he will lose his chance to receive votes, if the negative opinion factors were simply added. This, in turn, would decrease the quality of the representativeness of the election, since he would lose the chance to act according to his highly preferred statement just because of a disliked one. Therefore, the negative outcome is simply to be annualized. However, the electoral outcome is to be regarded as the basis for the actual agenda of the elected candidates, as they ought to work according to the statements that people prefer.
The election itself is to take place during an election month. For instance, October may be an appropriate choice, since it neither lies at the end of a quartile, nor during longer vacations, in which most people would rather take care of their families than think about state affairs. However, the election month takes place every two years. It is to be differentiated between the first and the second election month (FEM and SEM).
In FEM, voters have time to cope with the statements of candidates, deciding upon their preferences in each subject area. Here, the elections on each level take place. In SEM, however, a first evaluation of the voted incumbents’ performances takes place. Those voters who participated in the preceding FEM are allowed to evaluate whether the incumbents actually acted according to what they have been voted for, i.e. whether they did what the voters told them by the electoral outcome described above. To emphasize just voting, the electoral commission is obligated to publish the electoral outcome for each candidate during the FEM. Furthermore, the performance of elected candidates during the first two years is documented and published in the beginning of the SEM. Thus, each voter can make a reasonable decision based on the electoral outcome and the actual behavior of the incumbent. Concretely, each evaluation (both during SEM and FEM) includes a grading with performance grades 1 to 5, with 1 for worst and 5 for best possible performance. If the mean grade of an incumbent is below 1.5, the jurisdiction decides objectively whether this evaluation is just. Hereby, incumbents can justify their behavior. On can say that the “bad grading” of politicians can be regarded as an accusation, leading to a trial. However, this process is not to be interpreted as that grave, but more like a usual assessment of proficiency. If the jurisdiction agrees with the voters’ opinion, the incumbent is dismissed, or delected. If more than 20% of incumbents are evaluated to have failed their voters and thus delected, new elections for the remaining two years take place, whereby the failed incumbents are not allowed to candidate anymore. In any case, the next FEM includes an evaluation of the incumbents’ performance during the whole legislative session. Figure 3 depicts the described process.
Since the trigonocratic system emphasizes expertise rather than ideology, parties as we know them are not meant to exist in the suggested system. Instead, politicians can organize themselves in expert parties, which focus on several subjects, i.e. different ministerial areas of responsibility or scientific fields. In each expert party, it is mandatory to have a representation of each relevant scientific field. These expert parties then organize themselves to promote their candidates.
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Figure 3: Legislative session cycle including FEM and SEM.
6.2.2 Election Example
To depict the functionality of the described system, a simple example can be used. Let us assume that there are 10 voters (o = 10), who vote about five statements of three candidates (l = m = 5, n = 3):
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Therefore, candidate X i is in first place, X 2 in second place, and candidate X 3 is in third place.
6.3 Panel Sizes
As already explained before, efficiency is one of the most important aspects and requirements of trigonocracy. Therefore, the panel sizes need to be adjusted as well, as an increasing or large number of incumbents leads to redundant expenses. Hence, the number of incumbents is to be calculated with respect to population and economic power of the accordingly represented area.
In a first step, the size of the represented population is to be regarded according to the level (G=global, S=supranational, N=national, R=regional, M=municipal). In accordance with the classes, and with the number of populations, all panel sizes will be assigned. However, it depends both on the state power and the type of instance as well, which amount is implicated by which class.
To address the issue of an appropriate number of incumbents, a simple, but effective rule from nature can be used. For each power and institution, a panel size according to the Fibonacci Sequence may be used. The reason for this decision is grounded in the nature of the sequence. Each number is the outcome of the sum of its two last predecessors. Hereby, the relation between a number and its successor is nearly the same as the relation between the number and its predecessor, resembling the principle of the golden ratio, i.e. approximately 1,618. In fact, this relation is found in manifold cases in nature, from seed distribution in sunflowers to the form of spiral galaxies like the Milky Way. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that this principle constitutes a naturally optimal state of relationships within a system. Hence, it is not far-fetched to assume that this principle could also work in social and political structures.
However, the Fibonacci Sequence includes odd and even numbers. As we require panel sizes with the ability to make clear decisions, there cannot be clear 50-50 distributions, thus, no even numbers are desired. Therefore, all even numbers from the Fibonacci Sequence are to be added by one. Chart 1 shows the possible panel sizes according to the modified sequence.
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Chart 1: The Fibonacci sequence and the corresponding panel sizes.
Now that the actual set of possible panel sizes is determined, the panel sizes for all state powers with respect to the different levels and population numbers can be assigned. These assignments will be presented in the subsections discussing the state powers and their institutional manifestations in chapter 7.
However, it is important to note that panel sizes need to be adjusted on a regular basis, since population numbers can change over time. In this regard, it is reasonable to set the period of five legislative sessions, i.e. 20 years. Therefore, every two decades, the size of all panels is to be adjusted.
6.4 Education Requirements
Given the SEP described in subsection 6.1, it is obvious that the trigonocratic system requires sufficient education standards. Voters are faced with the challenge of actively grappling with the subjects, thus they must have at least a basic understanding of the underlying principles. Therefore, it is crucial to provide a general basic education for all people. Furthermore, to guarantee the same chances for everyone, education should be free and based on equal standards for everyone.
In particular, the school system5 must be innovative and following actual scientific domain knowledge, instead of being traditionalistic. For instance, opening times may be at 10 a.m., since many studies have shown that the human brain is not able to receive information effectively at earlier times. Teachers need to get paid accordingly, as they are obligated to stay up-to-date and educated steadily. This sounds, indeed, quite demanding, but only the one who learns knows how to make people learn. And this is, in fact, the main point of an education preparing people to actively participate in elections: It would be not sufficient just to educate people to accept and copy information the way it is desired. Rather, it is mandatory to educate them to learn steadily. In this regard, teachers must act as appropriate role models. Especially, the requirements made in subsection 4.7 must be addressed in an according education reform.
However, schools must prepare people not only to have enough intellect to cope with complex issues of politics during elections, but also prepare them for everyday life. Especially, it is important to support students of early ages in their social and intellectual development. Additionally, education is required to enhance critical, free and creative thinking as well as mental discipline and endurance, to address the challenges of vast technological development on the one hand, and the urge for social stability and versatility on the other hand. Moreover, students must learn how to act both as team players and independent thinkers, rather than being forced into competition and partitive systems. As said before, education is to be seen as the most important economic resource, and, thus, treated accordingly.
Particularly, following subjects are to be educated in schools:
- Useful things for studying
o Learning strategies
o Psychology, pedagogy, medicine
o Citation rules
- General knowledge
o Independent work
o Creative thinking and solution seeking
o Strategic thinking
o Time management
o Project management
o General statistics
o First aid
o Hazard knowledge
o Self defense
o Appropriate behavior in stressful situations
o Environmental protection
- Rhetoric
o Theoretical background
o Application
o Identification of rhetorical tactics
- Etiquette
o Behavior rules for every situation
o Clothing styles
o Work etiquette
o Career planning and orientation
o Job search
o Job Application
o Job interview
o Accountability and diligence
o Negotiations
- Housekeeping
o Housekeeping plan
o Healthy nutrition
o Fitness
o Cooking
o Crafting
o House hunting, moving
o Home furnishings
o Self-sufficiency
o Work-life-balance
o Raising children
- Law
o Basics
o Organization, handling of transgression
o Rental law
o Work law
o Tax law
o Private business law
o Data law
- Finances and bureaucracy
o Self-organization
o Bureaucracy functionalities
o Contracts and fraud prevention
o Tax return
o Calculus of interest
o Cost accounting
o Excel for finances
o Finance planning o Pensions
o Investment
- Politics
o Basics
o Geopolitics
o State theory
o Culture science
o World politics
- All MINT subjects, including informatics, and astronomy
- Languages
- Sports
- History and anthropology
- Ethics and philosophy
This explicit and long list does not include religion for a particular reason. As has been stated before, a trigonocratic constitution is to be secular. Therefore, no religion as a class by itself ought to be in schools anymore. However, students will learn the basics of religions in ethics. Deeper knowledge may be gained, if explicitly wished, in churches, mosques, etc.
After school, and before university or other types of further education, every citizen is to be obligated to take part in either basic military training or social services, such as fire department or geriatric care. This societal service or societal duty is to last for one year. It is without saying that this service is to be paid for appropriately. However, only after completing this year of societal duty, students are allowed to attend universities or follow another type of education path. Again, the financial status of students must not decide whether they can afford said education paths. Hence, financial aid and the opportunity to work must be ensured to be appropriately high.
As universities and other training facilities constitute the main institutions of higher education, and therefore, the basis for expertise in economy, science, and politics, they deserve to be treated specifically. First, patent standardization is required to provide a certain quality of knowledge domain development and to minimize redundant patent quantities, leading to a focus on relevant aspects of science and technology.
Furthermore, higher education institutions need to form panels that decide over curricula. In addition, these panels must discuss and adjust them with the office of education, scientific institutes, and economy. This is to ensure that there are equal standards, relevance, and a guaranteed quality of education. Moreover, scientific results need to be represented as the basis for political decision-making, as already concluded before.
In the context of scientific methodology, it is crucial to organize larger scientific projects to encourage publications to be coherent in a specific scientific field. Incidentally, not solely positive, but also negative results need to be accepted and published. It is important to understand that not only affirmative scientific findings are relevant for scientific research, but also those who contradict the initial assumptions. Hereby, science can coordinate itself more effectively. Additionally, scientists can also gain motivation to develop new theories by discovering which current approaches and concepts do not work as expected.
With respect to the constitutional architecture, it is evident that universities must educate the future political elite appropriately. In order not to end up with a political two-class society, all universities (and, naturally, other training institutions) are to receive the same quantity of funds with respect to their capacities. The institutions, however, decide by themselves how to spend it. In general, studies are to be free of charge for the standard period of study, and the curricula must ensure that the required academic performance is in fact feasible in this period. However, the maximum time for studies is to be set to 10 years, as the student’s workforce is required in the economy as well (of course, this does not apply to guest students).
As the democratic structure is to be taught and lived throughout the whole society, students require the possibility to organize themselves and to participate in the university’s decision-making processes. Hereby, it is guaranteed that not solely the requirements of science, politics, and economy are met in terms of curricula design, but also the ideas of the young, future elites are considered.
The structural characteristics of curricula are to be mentioned in the following subsection, especially with respect to the educational course of politicians.
6.5 Cursus Laborum and Cursus Honorum
With respect to the required expertise of politicians, it is crucial to provide a framework for their course of education. On the one hand, citizens, in general, must complete school as well as the social duty, and have the possibility to attend university or another training facility. Politicians, on the other hand, are obliged to complete the latter. The knowledge gained during this educational phase defines the specific field of a future politician. This first academical education is to be called Studium Primum or prime study. After the Studium Primum, a normal citizen can either engage in the usual economic life, or attend specific studies, in which they are prepared for their work in politics. This is to be called Studium Res or affairs study. Herein, students consolidate their knowledge about important competencies, i.e. social sciences, philosophy, MINT, and economics and law. Each field is taught over the course of one year, i.e. two semesters.
During the Studium Res, students attend the following courses:
- Social year
o History
o Psychology
o Anthropology
o Political science
o Diplomacy
o Rhetoric
- Philosophy year
o Philosophy
o Science theory
o Ethics
o Logic
- MINT year
o Mathematics
o Statistics
o Data science
o EDP, AI
o Basics of civil engineering
o Media science
- Economical and judicial year o Economics o Project management o Law
- Specialization year
Students are to attend specialization courses during a fifth year (specialization year), in which they deepen their knowledge from the Studium Primum regarding the requirements of political endeavor. The hidden agenda behind this additional specification is twofold. First, politicians need to know not solely the scientific or practical aspects of their work, but also need to understand the political context of their specific field. Second, as has been deduced before, the state must act in excellence. Therefore, an additional consolidation of knowledge is crucial to meet this requirement.
After the Studium Res, students are obliged to work for at least for five years in the free economy (labor years). Hereby, they learn to self-organize themselves, prove themselves as a worthy member of society. Thus, they learn to stay indigenous, regardless of the political power they may gain.
The whole process until this step is to be called Cursus Laborum, or labor course. Afterwards, the Cursus Honorum, or honorable course, begins, in which the studied and work-proved citizen may stand for office. The term ‘honorable’ is to be taken seriously: If the future incumbent is delected (see subsection 6.2), he or she loses the permission to candidate for any other office. Consequently, his Cursus Honorum ends ultimately. Hereby, political discipline and loyalty towards the people and the constitution is to be enforced, and lavishness, corruption, and deceit are to be inhibited.
The Cursus Honorum begins on the municipal level and proceeds according to the constitutional dynamics of the state structure. The phases and their durations will be described in chapter 7 for each individual power of state and summed up in the overall depiction of the constitution.
6.6 Remuneration
All planning and construction of social programs and groups is prone to total collapse because of one simple issue. If people are not paid enough, they do not care about honor or appropriate behavior. Food comes first, then ethics. Therefore, all precautions against corruption, power misuse and other flaws of human behavior must be entangled to appropriate remuneration. However, the height is to be adjusted to the responsibility an incumbent inherits. Hereby, lavishness is to be impeded as much as frustration.
From the behavioral perspective, to motivate the incumbents’ devotion, they need to depend on their income through their work alone. Hereby, the motive for corruption and conflicts of interest are to be prevented. To impede lavish behavior as well, the income is to be coupled to the income of the people the according panel represents. Therefore, incumbents receive a remuneration coupled with the median income of the population they represent or are responsible for. In particular, the legislative receives a remuneration of p+vcA of the income of the represented population. p is the mean value calculated from the income of the population, whereas the highest 10% are excluded. Hereby, politicians cannot raise their own income by preferring the richest 10%. cta is the standard deviation, and v is the factor which is to be specified for each panel. While p is dependent on the type of panel and will be specified in chapter 7, v depends on the panel level and the institution. Given the tokens for the different levels in subsection 6.3, following v values are determined for regular incumbents: vm = 2, vr = 2.5, vn = 3, vs = 3.5, vg = 4. For pensions, the incomes are cumulated and derived by percentages with respect to the whole time the person has been able to work. If a politician is delected, the entitlement for pension for the corresponding legislative session is to be left from the calculation. Therefore, delection constitutes a harsh punishment for politicians, and is reserved for grave misbehavior such as treason, misappropriation, electoral fraud, and corruption. In any case, the pension is only activated after the age of 60.6 The exact formula for calculation is to be determined by the monecative (see subsection 7.4). Of course, these values can be adjusted. However, the principle needs to be set by determining initial concrete values.
In either case, this coupling will lead to the situation that all members of the panels are motivated to work for the welfare and maximization of the people they are to represent.
As said before, representatives are not allowed to have additional active income besides the remuneration for their political duty. Civil service is to be regarded as their highest and only priority.
1.7 CAT Principle and Trigonocratic Principle
Finally, as stated in the beginning, the CAT principle constitutes the basics for political endeavor based on the three aspects competence, accountability, and transparency. For civil servants, and for the state powers in general, they represent the pillars of work mentality and highest directive.
In particular, the principle includes the directive that without competence in crucial fields, no decision power is to be granted. Furthermore, accountability is to be guaranteed for decisions made, and incapabilities or errors must lead to consequences. Therefore, servants must be accountable for their behavior. Concomitantly, transparency is to be seen as a basis for accountability, i.e. as a basis for proper control of incumbents.
The importance and the implications of the CAT principle need to be communicated in early stages of education. Hereby, citizens learn to act, and judge based on these three aspects, and the resulting political caste is highly motivated to act according to the internalized maxim.
As an institutionalized counterpart, the trigonocratic principle constitutes the requirement that political power is to be legitimized by competence and the voter’s direct will, that the inheritance of power leads to accountability towards those who are the providers of power, i.e. the voters, and that all decision-making must be transparent. In the following chapters, this principle will be the basis for the state structure’s design.
7 Powers and Institutions
After the principles and requirements of the trigonocratic system have been determined, this chapter (re-)defines and describes the state powers’, their functionalities and relations to each other. In the following, each individual state power is discussed including the overall structure, electoral aspects, panel sizes, remuneration requirements, as well as authorities and obligations.
It is important to note that not all details can be covered by this thesis. Their elaboration and implementation are dependent on the corresponding cultural framework. Different mentalities and cultural identities need to be considered if one is to implement the trigonocratic constitution. Therefore, the following chapter solely describes the obligatory shell construction of the constitution. In chapter 8, important implementation particularities will be mentioned, but the decision upon the final constitution design is to be made during the implementation process itself.
7.1 Mediacative
First, the new state power overseeing the media, hereinafter referred to as the mediacative, will be discussed. The me- diacative constitutes the central political institution of the media and represents a novel type of state power. Therein, trigonocratic aspects are to be implemented. Its main task is to guarantee independence of the media from the executive and the legislative.
In particular, it oversees the information flow on the political level, especially with respect to elections and political decision-making. Hereby, the public is to be enabled to base its opinion on undiluted information, and the political processes must remain transparent for the public. Moreover, the mediacative ensures an information quality standard in general. The latter is especially important for social media activities, as the prevention of spreading fake news is crucial for democratic endeavor. Thereby, undistorted public information exchange is to be enhanced. In addition, the medi- acative conceptualizes guidelines for media institutions.
7.1.1 Media Conventions
Especially, compliance of general media conventions is to be guaranteed. These include the following objectives:
Requirement of impartial educational mission as the executive means of science. The mediacative is to be understood as the communication power of the state. Through communication, not only ideas and opinions, but also facts and knowledge are to be spread.
Prohibition of war propaganda. In 2001, Anne Morelli systematized the essential war propaganda techniques of Arthur Ponsonby, who discussed the propaganda approaches to enhance readiness for war (Morelli, 2001; Ponsonby, 1928). One objective of the mediacative is to prevent, identify, and prosecute these ten techniques of war propaganda:
- “We do not war.”
- “The opposite party alone is guilty for war.”
- “The enemy is inherently evil and resembles the devil.”
- “We defend a noble cause, not our own interests.”
- “The enemy commits atrocities on purpose; our mishaps are involuntary.”
- “The enemy uses forbidden weapons.”
- “We suffer small losses, those of the enemy are enormous.”
- “Recognized artists and intellectuals back our cause.”
- “Our cause is sacred.”
- “All who doubt our propaganda are traitors.”
Prohibition of emotional coverage of politically relevant subjects. Political decision-making must be grounded on logical thinking, facts, and respectful discussion. Emotional mobilization of people contradicts these requirements. Therefore, reporting must be objective and free of emotional accentuation.
Requirement of the use of unmistakable, non-suggestive, and neutral wording. In addition to the latter objective, the information needs to be formulated in clear and neutral speech, without suggestive intrusion of ideas. Thereby, the public’s opinion can evolve without manipulation.
Requirement of transparency of coverage. For all information delivered, their source and acquisition are to be reported as well. It is to be guaranteed that their origins are verifiable.
Requirement of the independent perspective principle. To prevent usage of substantive focus and one-sided reporting, for situations with far-reaching consequences, three perspectives need to be communicated.
Prohibition of distortion of facts, statistical context distortion, or usage of deepfake media. Statistics are often used to convince the public to develop a particular opinion. Albeit the educational system of the trigonocratic system should minimize the danger of manipulation, the reporting must provide crucial information about the background of statistical values and the reported content in general.
Prohibition of proliferation of fake or incomplete news. On the one hand, distribution of fake news and context-less information in social media is to be prohibited. On the other hand, however, media institutions themselves are obligated only to spread confirmed and context-based information.
Prohibition of discrimination or discreditation of individuals or groups. Often, some people or groups of people are unofficially declared to be disagreeable. However, the only institution to decide upon someone’s guilt is the jurisdiction. Before and besides eventual judgements, people are to be treated with respect. Even reports about convicted criminals must be as neutral as possible. Hereby, scapegoating is to be prevented.
Prohibition of defamation and undermining of presumption of innocence. In addition to the convention before, media is prohibited to imply that a person (or institution) is to be regarded as guilty, although it is only accused. Until the jurisdiction decides upon the final judgement, the principle in dubio pro reo must be respected. However, if there are justified doubts about the innocence after the judgement, it can be communicated, but solely on a reasonable basis rather than defamation-like presumptions.
Prohibition of capitalization of panic or public emotions. It is inevitable that, especially in times of crises, the public is prone to turmoil and panic. Humans were and are emotional beings, thus emotional debates will take place in future as well. However, the heating up and capitalization of panic and emotions is to be forbidden, as it constitutes an intervention into the natural behavior of societies.
Permission and support of independent, investigative journalism. Albeit the institutional power of the media can mobilize large numbers of contingents, proactive investigations have the advantage of flexibility and leads to discoveries of crimes. Therefore, independent investigations are to be permitted and, if necessary, supported and protected.
7.1.2 Constitutive Manifestation
The institutional corpus of the mediacative is a panel called medium. Its members are elected parallel to the legislative and are treated equally. Accordingly, the candidates on the municipal level must be absolvents of the Cursus Laborum. To candidate on higher levels, they need to prove themselves as trustworthy politicians on lower levels first.
The medium consists of two chambers. The elected members of the first chamber are called the mediators and constitute the mediatorium. The second chamber consists of the representatives of the media on the according level, the media delegates, constituting the so-called media delegation. If a media company operates on a higher level (e.g. nationalwide), it cannot be represented on lower levels additionally. Hereby, the power of media companies is distributed according to the political level. The assignment to a level is defined by the coverage of the media company’s broadcast area. Therefore, small media companies can decide upon their operation area. Thereby, the trigonocratic principle is respected by combining the educated, elected chamber of mediators with the economic representation by the media delegation. Each chamber elects their head by voting. Each member of the chambers can suggest themselves or someone other.
Within the medium, the mediators request reports from the media delegations whether they obey the media conventions in their respective area of responsibility. They both report their activities to the custodium, an institution that will be described in subsection 7.6.
7.1.3 The Mediacative’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
In accordance with the requirements stated in subsection 6.3, the panel size depends on the population size of the corresponding represented area. In the following, the n-factor and the modified Fibonacci number fn,mod of Chart 1 is to be mentioned. The index n is the token for each level, as used in subsection 6.3.
The following panel sizes are prescribed for the mediatorium: On the municipal level, nM = 5, therefore, the panel size is five. On the regional level, nR 6 [6;7]. Hereby, nR is chosen by the percentage of the according region with respect to the next level. Hereby, the lower half of percentage share receives nR = 6, and the upper half nR= 7, respectively. In the following, this principle will be referred to as the next level share principle (NLSP).7 Hence, the panel sizes are either nine or thirteen members. On the national level, nN 6 [9;10], thus either 35 or 55 members. The national panel sizes are decided upon population size. If the population is lower than one billion, nN = 9, else nN = 10. For the supranational level, ns G [11;12], so that the panel size is either 89 or 145. Again, the decision is based on the percentage share with respect to the next level, the global level. There, nG = 13, thus 233 members.
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Chart 2: Panel sizes for the mediatorium and the media delegation including the level, the n value, and the calculation basis.
For the media delegation, the following panel sizes are constituted: For the municipal level, nM= 5, therefore, the panel size is three. For regional level, nR G [5;6], according to the NLSP. Therefore, the panel sizes are either five or nine. Furthermore, for the national level, nN G [7;9], according to the population. Thereby, the panel size is 13 for countries with population size below 100 million, 21 for countries with 100 million to one billion inhabitants, and 35 for countries which population size is larger than one billion. For the supranational level, ns G [10;11], according to the NLSP. Hence, the supranational panels include 55 to 89 members. On the global level, nG = 12, thus 145 members. It is important to note that the delegation is to be elected among the corresponding media companies via SEP (subsection 6.2.), whereas each company has one vote and can nominate a candidate. The panel sizes are summed up in Chart 2.
It is important to note that for the calculation of the remunerations according to subsection 6.6, p constitutes the mean value of population the mediators represent. For the media delegation, p is the mean value of all journalists of the media companies of the according level.
7.2 Legislative
According to the trigonocratic principle, lawmaking must ensure that not only the will of the people is included, but also the boundaries and requirements of the economy are considered. However, as stated before, this circumstance is, de facto, guaranteed to some extent anyway. The economy will always find a way to manipulate the legislative to obtain advantages for itself. Incidentally, this procedure leads to what we call corruption, or, in a pseudo-legal way, lobbyism. In any case, the consideration of economic desires turns out to be partially effective. As larger companies benefit from scale effects, they gain more political influence, leading to larger incomes and so on. Consequently, smaller companies and family businesses are left behind.
To bring more transparency and justice to the consideration of the economic part of society in lawmaking processes, the following structure includes lobbyism as an official way of representing the industries’ interests. However, the other two aspects of the CAT principle, competence and accountability, are implemented as well.
The overall structure is the following: There are parliaments on each level, which include incumbents elected by the people directly. In addition, lobbyists represent the economic interests of the according level. Finally, from the regional level on, there are also councils representing the second chamber, i.e. the interests of the corresponding lower level. All of them form the institutional manifestation of the legislative, which is to be referred to as the congress. Thus, each level has a congress, which contributes to the consistence of the one on the next level.
7.2.1 Parliaments
As explained earlier, parties as we know them are not allowed in the trigonocratic system in order to enhance the truthfulness of an incumbent’s conviction. However, parties grouped by competencies are allowed. Furthermore, each politician begins his or her career, i.e. Cursus Honorum, on the municipal level. Candidates with absolved Cursus Laborum are to submit their political programs at the electoral institutes. These programs must include up to three statements for each subject: Foreign affairs, inner affairs, military, education, finance, social affairs, economy, work, and a special field of choice, which can be one of the ones or another, further field. The statements are to be collected, and the electoral process starts as has been described in subsection 6.2. The congress in general can suggest members of the parliament to be candidates for the corresponding next level. Again, they formulate their statements, and the people vote according to subsection 6.2.
7.2.2 Councils
The councils constitute the second chamber of the legislative body. From the regional level on, they consist of delegations of parliamentarians of the corresponding lower level. These are voted by the according parliament to represent its interests on the higher level. The maximum number of council members is discussed in subsection 7.2.5.
7.2.3 Lobbyists
Lobbyists are organized as a delegation of economy according to the corresponding level. To enhance the federalistic structure and the political power of smaller companies on their levels, the division is defined by a maximal contribution to the GDP. If a company contributes more than 5% to the GDP at a certain level, it is automatically forbidden to be represented there, thus it must be considered for the next corresponding political level. It is important to note that subsidiaries and their economic power are considered as well, so that corporal structures cannot be used to gain lobbyist monopolies within a certain area. Of course, this restriction does not apply to the global level8.
In general, the representation of companies is organized in the same way as in the mediacative. Hence, the SEP (subsection 6.2) is applied within each level among the corresponding companies.
Companies vote for two kinds of representatives: the representative for the employers and the representative for the employee (consul of employer versus consul of employee). The division of both sides is set to be approximately 50% of the seats, whereas the consuls of employees receive the excessive seat. As all panel sizes are to be odd numbers, the panel size minus one divided by two constitutes the number of seats for the consuls, whereas the consuls of employees receive one additional seat. Hereby, the somewhat excessive conflicts between employers and employees are to be canalized into institutional barriers, aiming to make labor disputes less violent.
7.2.4 Law-Making Process
Laws are suggested, presented, and discussed with the lobbyists and the council together. However, the voting process about laws does not include the lobbyists, as the democratic pillar alone must decide upon their approval. In general, all laws from the regional level on are voted upon by the parliament and the council. Furthermore, parliament and council have both compulsory attendances, as they are paid for their societal service. If they cannot attend due to illness or personal reasons, they are obligated to organize their secretaries or other representatives, which act on their behalf.
In general, every discussion is recorded by the media. Thus, accountabilities can be assigned appropriately. The particular dynamics of law-making process, however, is to be established according to cultural preferences.
7.2.5 The Legislative’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
Again, the panel sizes are based on the Fibonacci sequence as discussed in subsection 6.3.
For the parliaments, the following panel sizes are defined, according to population. On the municipal level, ii\i 6 [8;9]. Therefore, the panel sizes are 21 or 35 seats. The size is chosen by the NLSP, whereas the maximum number is to be set to be nR-1. For the regional level, in< 6 [10;14] with a maximum value of hn-2. Therefore, the possible numbers of seats are 55, 89, 145, 233, and 377. Again, the size is to be chosen according to the NLSP. On the national level, the population size is used to directly determine the panel sizes. For countries with population sizes up to 10 million, nN = 11. Countries with population numbers above 10 million up to 100 million, have nN = 12. Furthermore, population sizes above 100 million up to 300 million leads to nN = 13, and above 300 million up to 600 billion leads to nN = 14. Countries that are populated by more than 600 million up to one billion people have nN = 15, and any country beyond this number has nN = 16. Hence, nN 6 [10;16], with possible panel sizes 89, 145, 233, 377, 611, and 987. Based on these numbers, the panel sizes of the supranational level are deduced. In particular, ns 6 [nN,max + 1;17]. Thus, the minimal value for nS is defined by the maximal nN value of the represented countries. Hence, the possible panel sizes on supranational level are 145, 233, 377, 611, 987, and 1597. On the global level, nG= 18, thus the panel size for a global parliament is 2585.
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Chart 3a: Panel sizes for the parliaments including the level, n value, and the calculation basis.
For the council and the lobbyists, the relation discussed in 6.3 is used as a basis for the representation power relation between the first and the second chamber. Their panel sizes are simply given as nCouncil nParliament 1, and nLobbyists = nParliament — 2, but minimal nLobbyists = 4 (for the municipal level). Hereby, the parliament occupies the largest role, followed by the council and the lobbyists (except for the municipal level). For all three elements of the congress, Chart 3(a,b,c) sums up the panel size distribution.
In terms of remuneration, the mean value p, as described in subsection 6.6, is to be calculated for the parliaments and the councils based on the population these institutions are to represent. For the lobbyists, however, the remuneration of the employees is to be set as a reference.
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Chart 3b: Panel sizes for the councils including the level, n value, and the calculation basis.
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Chart 3c: Panel sizes for the lobbyists including the level, n value, and the calculation basis.
7.3 Executive
The executive of a state must not only resemble but also focus its social and political values, norms and dispositions. Otherwise, as has been discussed in the earlier chapters, political imbalances occur, leading to turmoil and instability, thus weakness of the state. Hence, the following structure and regulations are to guarantee an appropriate resemblance of political endeavor through the executive.
7.3.1 Election and Offices
The nomination of the executive is to be contingent on the election of the legislative. Thus, the elected candidate of the corresponding parliament with fulfilled requirements (see below) and the highest vote power is automatically nominated as the head of the executive, alias the president. If there are several incumbents with equal voting power values, the parliamentarians are to vote for the most preferred candidate. Thereafter, the president chooses his ministers out of the parliamentarians with the highest 10% of vote power within the corresponding competence field of the elected parliament. In accordance with the process within the legislative (subsection 7.2, see also subsection 6.2), voters also evaluate the executive in the SEM and FEM. Therefore, if a member of the executive is delected, new elections take place.
According to the trigonocratic principle, there must be a competence-based limitation for the nomination of executives. This limitation is provided by the aforementioned competence fields. The latter are to be given by the subject of the Studium Primum or the specification year within the Studium Res of the incumbents.
In general, fourteen offices and the corresponding minimal educational requirements are possible. It is important to note that some of the offices have been invented to meet the requirements discussed in Part I. These offices are the following:
- Presidential Office: This office acts as a leading entity within the executive. Diplomacy in the specification year of the Studium Res is required. How the head of the office is called - chancellor, president, or else - is left to be adapted according to the cultural circumstances.
- Foreign Affairs Office: This office takes care of the foreign diplomacy of the state towards other states, but also
to the upper levels of federalism (supranational and global level). Diplomacy in Studium Primum is required.
- Home Office: This office focuses on intranational affairs, especially on infrastructure and food supply. Economy in Studium Primum is required.
- Economy Office: This office oversees the economic development of the country. Economy in Studium Primum is required.
- Defense Office: This office is responsible for the country’s defense capabilities. Military science in Studium Primum is required.
- Finance Office: This office regulates the executive’s relationship with the monecative, which is the financeoverseeing state power described in subsection 7.4. Economy in Studium Primum is required.
- Judicial Office: This office regulates the executive’s relationship with the jurisdiction. Law in Studium Primum is required.
- Education and Science Office: This office oversees the education politics and regulates the relationships with universities, which, in turn, decide upon the educational basis for the scientific and political elite in the country. MINT in Studium Primum is required.
- Ethical Office: To include ethical considerations in the political endeavor, this office represents philosophical and ethical points of view. Philosophy in Studium Primum is required.
- Food and Health Office: This office focuses on healthy nutrition and health care. Medicine in Studium Primum is required.
- Work and Social Affairs Office: This office focuses on the social aspects in the country, especially employment, family affairs and youth. Social Sciences in Studium Primum is required.
- Environmental Office: This office focuses on the relationship between humanity and its environment, ensuring that the political endeavor does not neglect nature. MINT in Studium Primum is required.
- Cooperation Office: This office does only exist on the higher levels (supranational, global). Its responsibility is to maintain peace and respectful interaction between nations. Diplomacy in Stidum Primum is required.
- Spacefare Office: As an important aspect of the security of survival is to expand into space, this office regulates and oversees spacefare programs and guarantees an efficient and effective collaboration between nations. Physics or mathematics in Studium Primum is required.
In each case, the incumbents are additionally obliged to have gained working experience in the corresponding field during their five labor years in their latest stage of the Cursus Laborum. Furthermore, it is important to note that the specific challenges of politicians are met by an extensive education during the Studium Res. Hereby, politicians know not only their own resort, but also have insights into other fields.
Notably, the number of offices remains fixed not to artificially increase costs. However, specific fields may draw attention to politicians. In this case, additional sub-offices may be installed, acting as a specialized sub-organizational entity to their corresponding offices. Hereby, the cost will increase, but due to a subordinance towards the ‘fixed’ offices, leading to softened increasement of costs.
7.3.2 Daily Affairs
During the legislative session, the legislative forms the opposition to the executive. Thereby, the mediacative is obliged to report about the discussions, thus, to inform the public. The executive can, depending on the subject, discuss with the minor congress (parliament and council), the main congress (parliament, council and lobbyists), and with the extended congress (main parliament and the pecunium as the representation of the monecative - see subsection 7.4), depending on the subject. The occasions in which the three kinds of congress are used for discussion can be elaborated in further works, depending on the specific requirements and frameworks of cultural values and norms. However, the extended congress is to be preferred - obviously - for debates about the budget plan of the legislative session as well as finance- related affairs.
In general, the executive has accountability towards the legislative, the jurisdiction, and the mediacative. In addition, the custodium (see subsection 7.5) oversees its actions by making protocols.
7.3.3 The Executive’s Panel Composition and Remuneration
Although there are fourteen different offices in the trigonocratic system, not every level requires all of them. The composition needs to consider the requirements of the corresponding level. Therefore, the following constellations are determined:
For the municipal level, no Foreign Affairs, Defense, Cooperation, and Spacefare Offices are required. Therefore, municipal executive panels only consist of ten offices. For the regional executive, the same composition applies. However, national executive panels consist of thirteen offices, as only the Cooperation Office is excluded. The supranational panels, accordingly, include all fourteen offices, as all offices are required. On the global level, the Foreign Affairs Office is excluded, leading to thirteen offices on this level. Chart 4 sums up the compositions in the style of a concept matrix.
In terms of remuneration, p is calculated as the mean of the represented population according to subsection 6.6, whereas a slightly higher factor v is used: vm = 2.2, vr = 2.3, vn = 3.2, vs = 3.7, vg = 4.2 for all heads of offices except for the presidency office. The head of the latter, however, has the following v values: vm = 2.4, vr = 2.5, vn = 3.4, vs = 3.9, vg = 4.5.
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Chart 4: Concept matrix of the executive offices on the different political levels including the total number of offices.
7.4 Monecative
After the financial crisis in 2007, several supervision authorities have been founded, and regulations have been toughed to prevent lavish handling of large number of financial resources without appropriate securities. These regulations include both macro- and micro-prudential supervision but exist somewhat beside the political structures. Therefore, they act relatively independently besides the political structures. Indeed, the Basel Committee on Bank Supervision constitutes a formidable approach to meet the risks of financial crises, however, this decoupled behavior can lead to uncoordinated decision-making, which may, in turn, lead to further crises. To combine the advantages of independence and coordination, the power upon the finances is to be included in the trigonocratic constitution.
Similarly to the mediacative, the monecative constitutes a novel power of state. It represents the basis for institutions, overseeing the finances of the state, independent from the legislative and executive. However, the trigonocratic principle constitutes a central aspect of its architecture. Therefore, a structure resembling that of the mediacative is to be achieved, including democratic and meritocratic requirements of legitimization.
7.4.1 The Monecative’s Areas of Accountability
In general, all powers and accountabilities of the central banks are to be included in the new power of state. In addition, several competencies of the legislative and the executive are to be subtracted and added to the monecative. This is due to the requirement that the decision-making process concerning financial issues must prevent lavishness among the parliamentarians, who are eager to improve their position against their own stakeholders, i.e. the people.
Therefore, additionally to the supervision of banks, the monecative must be authorized to supervise the financial expenses of the state in general, overseeing the state’s budget, i.e. handling of tax income, especially the adequacy of tax law. Furthermore, the monecative is responsible for the prevention and detection of corruption in politics in particular. Hence, the monecative discusses the financial decision-making with the legislative and the executive. In accordance with the federalistic structure, this overseeing authorization must be adjusted to the corresponding state level.
Further determinations must be made in consideration of the corresponding cultural values and norms, the customary laws and the people’s expectations. In each case, the institutional implementation of the monecative is to be called the monetariate. Its two elements are to be explained in the following subsections. Again, the custodium (see subsection 7.6) guarantees the compliance towards the CAT principle.
7.4.2 The Pecunium
To ensure that the monetariate does not decide against the voter’s will, the pecunium constitutes the people’s representation within the monecative. As already determined in other institutions, the pecunium is to be elected by the voters according to the SEP. The incumbents, called pecunians, are elected as the parliamentarians, whereas the absolvents of the Cursus Laborum first candidate for the office on the municipal level. After they prove themselves to be appropriate representatives, they can candidate on higher levels.
As the pecunium represents the voters’ interests, they are obliged to communicate requirements and demands towards the other element of the monecative (see subsection 7.4.3), thus ensuring that the monecative follows its duties appropriately. In the course of decision-making processes, both chambers can vote.
7.4.3 The Aerarium
In accordance with the trigonocratic principle, the aerarium constitutes the representative of the central banks. Its members, the aerarians, are elected among the subsidiaries of the central banks according to the SEP. Their objective is to enforce the central banks’ interests, and to ensure, on each level, that financial accountability is met by all incumbents. The aerarium discusses with the pecunium, which position towards the other powers the monecative is to occupy. Again, the federal structure leads to a hierarchical pyramid, in which the candidates first apply on the municipal level and can apply for the next one as soon as they prove themselves reliable.
7.4.4 The Monecative’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
For the pecunium, the municipal panel sizes are determined by nM = 5, thus there are always 5 members in municipalities. For the regional level, nR 6 [6;7] according to the NLSP. Therefore, there are either 9 or 13 incumbents in the according panels. For the national level, however, nR 6 [8;10], determined by population size. For countries with population numbers up to 100 million, the panel size for the pecunium is 21. If the population size is larger than 100 million but one billion at maximum, the panel size is to be 35 seats. For any population sizes beyond this border, however, the panel size is to be 55. On the supranational level, ns 6 [11;12], according to the NLSP. Therefore, the panel sizes are either 89 or 145. Finally, on the global level, nG = 13, leading to a panel size of 233 seats.
For the aerarium, all panel sizes are characterized by the rule that nAerarium nPecunium 1. For both panels, the panel sizes are summed up in Chart 5.
With respect to the remuneration, the p for pecunians is to be calculated based on the population the incumbents represent, while aerarians are remunerated based on the p value of the bankers of the corresponding level.
Illustrations are not included in the reading sample
Chart 5: Panel sizes for the pecunia and aeraria including the level, the n value, and the calculation basis.
7.5 Jurisdiction
7.5.1 Independence of the Judicial Power
To guarantee the recently unattended independence of the judiciary from the legislative and, especially, the executive, the jurisdiction is to be completely separated from the other powers in the trigonocratic constitution. Therefore, the election and nomination of judges is to be left completely within the judicial system. Hereby, no influence from executives can compromise the integrity of the power which acts as a control lever against the aspirations of incumbents with enough power. Accordingly, solely judges themselves decide upon the panels within the power, making the corresponding decision-making processes dependent solely on the opinions of law experts rather than political temporary fashion.
7.5.2 Political Structure of the Jurisdiction
Whereas the organization of courts may remain largely the same with respect to the corresponding cultural or national customary law, an appropriate parallel panel system is to be established. Judges are automatically members of judicial boards on the corresponding level. They decide which candidates with completed the Cursus Laborum, including law studies in the Studium Primum, are to become members of the boards. Therefore, judges decide about their successors by themselves in accordance with the SEP. Corresponding to the hierarchy of levels, board members of each level may be a candidate for a seat on a board of the next level. Accordingly, they need to prove their abilities in the same way as the panel members of other powers. In this case, however, their voters do not decide upon their capabilities (this would imply that they vote upon themselves). Hence, they are evaluated by citizens who have studied law in their Studium Primum.
In addition to the boards, there are to be judicial councils, which are elected by the boards of the corresponding level. The candidates are members of the boards who have completed at least one legislative session. The councils cope with political aspects of law, including delection, structural aspects, or legal proceedings about politicians of any kind and political power. Again, the hierarchical principle is to be complied with. In this context, the council can be interpreted as a political court. The enforcement of their resolutions is the responsibility of the custodium (see subsection 7.6).
7.5.3 The Jurisdiction’s Panel Sizes and Remuneration
For the judicial boards, the number of seats is determined by the number of courts of the corresponding level. In order not to constrict the judicial capabilities of the state, these sizes are thus left to be flexible. However, each board announces a head of board and two assistants as the principals of the boards.
For the council, the following panel sizes are determined: On the municipal level, nM = 4, thus the panel size is always to be 3. On the regional level, however, nR = 5, leading to the panel size of 5. Furthermore, nN = 6, nS = 7, and nR = 8, leading to the panel sizes of 9 for the national level, 13 for the supranational level, and 21 for the global level. Chart 6 sums up the panel sizes for the judicial councils.
Illustrations are not included in the reading sample
Chart 6: Panel sizes for the judicial councils including the level, the n value, and the calculation basis.
In terms of remuneration, members of the council are paid equally to the heads of presidency offices on the corresponding levels. Therefore, vm = 2.4, vr = 2.5, vn = 3.4, vs = 3.9, vg = 4.5, with a p value based on the population of the corresponding level.
7.6 Custodium
7.6.1 The Custodium’s Role
As shown in the current chapter, the trigonocratic constitution works with several regulations, canalizing the incumbents’ ambitions to gain power. Hereby, the political endeavor is forced to serve its actual and most important stakeholder, i.e. the citizen. However, humans are prone to accumulation of power despite their own rules. Therefore, the regulations of the trigonocratic constitution require an appropriate enforcement strategy.
To meet this requirement, the custodium is to constitute the “right hand” of the jurisdiction, or the judicial council in particular. One can say that the custodium is thought to be a state police loyal solely towards the law and the judicial power of the state. The custodes, the members of the custodium, are an elite troop which have the following functions and responsibilities within the trigonocratic constitution:
- Leading the sessions of panels: The custodium leads the sessions to maintain order and to prevent the panels from behaving too soft towards themselves.
- Protocolization: The custodium records the sessions to maintain the transparency of political processes towards the people, and thus to enhance the basis for accountability for the incumbents.
- Organization and execution of elections: To prevent electoral fraud, the legislative is not allowed to organize elections anymore. Accordingly, the other powers face the same limitations. Therefore, the custodium organizes and executes the elections, counts the votes and declares the results.
- Securing the division of powers: The custodium is responsible for the compliance of incumbents towards the laws, especially towards the division of political power.
- Detection of corruption and law enforcement: Especially, corruption is to be a focal point of the investigative actions of the custodium.
- Personal security: Beside control, the custodium also protects the incumbents and the institutions, acting as a state security.
Of course, this somewhat short list is to be elaborated during implementation of the trigonocratic constitution. However, the presented points provide a somewhat clear image of the custodium’s significance.
7.6.2 Educational Requirements for Custodes
To become a custos, a candidate must have completed the Cursus Laborum, whereas the Studium Primum is to be replaced by a special education provided by an academy of custodes. The latter must include the following aspects:
- Trigonocratic structure and functionality
- Tactics and strategy; military history and theory
- Introduction to intelligence services
- Criminalistics
- Tactical combat
Only thereafter, candidates can apply for the different divisions of the custodium (subsection 7.6.3). It is important to note that the custodium operates parallel to the political structures, meaning that custodes are not allowed to apply for political offices, even after discharge, but especially if dishonorable.
7.6.3 The Custodial Structure
As the custodium constitutes a state police, it has a hierarchical structure. As the institution must align with the political system, the hierarchical levels are assigned to the corresponding political levels. For each level, there are three obligatory divisions: The division for personal protection, the division for administration overseeing, and the division for investigations. All three function parallel to each other, but on each level, a commander is responsible for the functioning of all together. To become a commander of a level, a custos must have served at least two years in each branch. Hereby it is ensured that the commander knows about the internal functionality of each division.
For each level, there are certain ranks to be responsible for each division and for all three. These are the following:
- Municipal level: division: Commander, overall: Captain
- Regional level: division: Second Major, overall: Major
- National level: division: Second General, overall: General
- Supranational level: division: Second General Major, overall: General Major
- Global level: division: Second Tesmeral, overall: Tesmeral
On the regional level and above, there are also special units for critical situations. Furthermore, on the national level and above, the custodium also includes intelligence services, which act as domestic secret services and the custodium’s own military police. If one wants to become a General (or the ranks above), it is obligatory to serve in the intelligence service for another two years.
Custodes are to be sworn to reject political power for themselves and solely serve for the sake of the law and justice. Those who serve exceptionally well are to be promoted to higher ranks, whereas the judicial council must confirm any promotion which elevates the custos to a higher political level. In general, each custos is answerable towards the corresponding judicial council as well as his or her direct superior. Therefore, the judicial council has the right to dismiss misbehaving custodes. Hereby, the custodium acts independently from the political establishment, leading to a coherent independent supervision of political business.
7.7 Eternal Council
7.7.1 Political Coherence
As has been mentioned in the first part of this work, the incoherent course of political endeavor diminishes the efficiency of societies with respect to their development (see subsection 4.7). As the meritocratic limitation of the trigonocratic system leads to a somewhat coherent level of competence within the political environment, the difficulties may decrease by a certain amount. However, the general course of societal development needs to be edged by an institution which represents the long-term memory of politics. Hereby, a consequent, coherent, and thus effective development of political endeavor is to be realized. “Zigzag courses” between rivalling parties are to be flattered, so that a state has the possibility to correct its own course of development without circuiting around without a clear outcome in sight. Especially in the context of climate change and the necessity to expand into space, this requirement must be taken seriously. In general, humanity’s technological development leads to the conclusion that our actions have long-term effects on our environment and thus ourselves. This means that we must become aware of our technologically driven responsibility. Hence, it is not feasible to be prone to political myopia anymore.
7.7.2 The Eternal Council’s Organization, Function and Remuneration
Therefore, the eternal council is thought to meet these requirements in the trigonocratic constitution. One can say that this institution can be understood as an intrinsic cushioning device against political tugging. In particular, the eternal council consists of former incumbents of any panel of every state power and the custodium who completed the Cursus Honorum with excellent grades, and who have served at least five legislative sessions, i.e. 20 years. Herein, the 2% of highest grades are allowed to join the eternal council every legislative session, i.e. every four years. The council consists of parts on the global, the supranational, and the national levels. The municipal and the regional levels’ most reliable incumbents are integrated in the councils on the national level. Else, each member has the right to choose at which level he or she is to be included, whereas the highest possible level is determined by the highest level they have occupied during their Cursus Honorum. It is important to note that members of the eternal council stay in their office until they are diagnosed to be incapable of coping with their mental requirements.
Internally, the members of the eternal council are democratically organized. Hence, on each level, they elect five leading members, the high councilors, according to the SEP. The first leading member, the highest councilor, however, is required to be a former judge of the corresponding level. However, the highest councilor acts as a primus inter pares.
The eternal council’s role in the trigonocratic constitution is to serve as a representative of the trigonocratic principle, whereas the highest councilor acts as the head of state, contrary to the head of the presidential office, who constitutes the head of government. The function of the council is to consult the incumbents of all panels, to act as a beacon of experience and orientation in critical situations, and to oversee the general movement and development of the state. Although the members are not allowed to actively participate in political discussions anymore, the highest councilor must refuse his or her signature on the certificate of appointment, if the majority of council members on the corresponding level ask him to do so. With respect to the remuneration, council members receive the usual values, whereas the p value is determined by the population, and the n values are: vm = 2, vr = 2.5, vn = 3, vs = 3.5, vg = 4. Hence, they are remunerated equally to usual panel members. Hereby, it is guaranteed that members of the council are paid sufficiently well, whereas those who seek to be rich are motivated to follow other possibilities. Thus, only people devoted to serving for the trigonocratic constitution accumulate in the eternal council.
7.8 The Final Structure of the Trigonocratic Constitution
The previous subsections presented the elements of the trigonocratic constitution, depicting the different authorities and relations between institutions. To sum up the elaborated constitutional structure, Figure 4 depicts the overall system. It is important to note that the depiction does not include all aspects. However, it provides an adequate overview of the described aspects of trigonocracy.
Indeed, the constitutional complexity stands out as a major treat. This complexity is based on the constitution’s claim to cope with current and future challenges of technological and social development, which both constitute quite complex problematics.
Illustrations are not included in the reading sample
Figure 4: The final structure of the trigonocratic constitution. The colors constitute different kinds of formation. Blue means election acc. to SEP of the people. Green means election acc. to SEP of the corresponding groups. Red means application after successful participation. Yellow means delegation. Purple means determination according to intrinsic regulation. White means usual formation, whereas white arrows mean nomination.
8 Implementation of the Trigonocratic System
8.1 General Change Management
The trigonocratic system, especially a concrete constitution, cannot be implemented directly and “overnight”, albeit some people might wish that to happen. There are manifold reasons for this statement. First, the cultural aspect does not allow abrupt changes on the political and social level of such a significance without instabilities thereinafter. Throughout history, only slow changes proved to lead to stable consequences, whereas disruptive occasions such as groundbreaking inventions and innovations, revolutions etc. led to turmoil decades and centuries after. In particular, an abrupt and fast change would lead to lower levels of acceptance, frustration, and therefore chaos. Hence, to maintain stability during the change to a trigonocratic system, a smooth transition is to be achieved. Another reason lies in the purely tactical, political argumentation. As the trigonocratic principle splits power, prevents accumulation of the latter, and forces politicians to behave appropriately, there will be much remonstration besides current rulers and beneficiaries of the present political system. To flatten the waves of the system’s intrinsic resistance, the approach of a slow transition does make sense. The third reason for the necessity of the latter lies in the trigonocratic constitution itself. Since the requirements for political careers need to be established, both the implementation of the initial infrastructure and the Cursus Laborum requires approximately twenty years for completion. Furthermore, the eternal council would be able to be filled only after approximately fifty years, including the Cursus Laborum, as well as the Cursus Honorum with its minimal duration of twenty years. Therefore, a stepwise change of political structure is to be achieved and overseen for a longer period. However, on the one hand, corresponding overseers need to change their positions to prevent artificial prolongation of the exceptional situation of change for the sake of power accumulation. On the other side, every decision for changes needs to be both democratically legitimate and coherent with respect to the whole implementation process. In addition to this, as already mentioned in previous chapters, the political structure must be adapted to cultural aspects, treating the peoples’ mentalities with respect. Indeed, these requirements are difficult to meet. Else, however, the system is prone to be manipulated in early stages, leading to autocracies or flawed or failed states.
How the transformation is to be achieved will be discussed in the following subsection. Hereby, the requirement of a steady and smooth transition will be met.
8.2 Implementation Framework
First, the constitutional basis of trigonocracy is to be provided. This includes critical institutions and the division of all five powers, as well as the implementation of the custodium and a provisional eternal council. To enable smooth operation, it is crucial to split the monecative from the legislative and the executive, and to ensure the independence of jurisdiction. Hereby, both financial power and the administration of justice can act as precursors for the transformation into a trigonocratic state. Concomitantly, the curriculum of schools and universities as well as other educational facilities are to be adapted to the requirements discussed in subsection 6.4. Hereby, an adjustment of the scientific field in general is crucial as well. The education level of the people determines its willingness and ability to sustain the trigonocratic state, especially the meritocratic elements of the constitution.
After the financial control and the judicial overseeing have become independent from the legislative and the executive, the custodium can be formed as the enforcement instrument of the jurisdiction. Hereinafter, the transformation of the media institutions into the mediacative is to be realized.
Afterwards, the SEP can be restructured, allowing for elections of all elements of the political powers. During the first elections have taken place, the first trigonocratic legislative session can be used to reshape the law, if necessary, via a tabula rasa approach. During the following legislative sessions, fine-granulated adjustments and consolidation efforts should be the focal point of the state. Successively, the political culture will change, as the panels would fill up with citizens who went through the reformed education system including the Cursus Laborum.
After the consolidation on the national level, geopolitical aspects can be considered. If several countries implement trigonocratic constitutions, they may form the first supranational organizations, following the federalistic system. In general, the most important stage is early development and the initial institutionalization according to the trigonocratic principle. Their importance arises from the necessity of a stable basis for further establishment of the new political structure.
8.3 Important Aspects
Of course, the aforementioned plan is solely a general framework based on the naïve assumption of ideal circumstances. However, not only specific cultural attributes must be considered, but also the resistance of politicians, organizations, and other states. History has proven that the spreading of new ideas usually leads to reactance, and, consequently, to resistance and conflicts. The trigonocratic principle may first be ignored, then discredited, then fought. Therefore, if the idea of trigonocracy becomes popular, it is inevitable that the implementation of the constitution will be accompanied by excesses of violence. Different groups may either fight this idea or misinterpret it, leading to different, hostile parties who fierce conflicts with one another. This outlook might appear somewhat pessimistic, but considering the recent historical events, it is reasonable to prepare for the worst.
However, the most important task is to get the process started. It is important to remember that the breakthrough point will be reached when there is a formidable acceptance of the trigonocratic principle in both society and politics. Thus, the process needs meticulous attention in the beginning. Regarding its development, this political innovation must not disrupt without control; therefore, it is crucial to have a controlled transformation via reforms rather than chaotic rashness via revolutions. Considering this matter, the implementation process must not exceed a certain speed, as fast changes lead to disadvantageous developments, as mentioned above. Contrary to this, too slow implementation may lead to frustration and the danger of variations promising faster changes on the one hand, leading to exploitation on the other hand.
In any case, the risk is worth the try. The current political developments are not sustainable in the long term, and profound changes in the political system are as necessary as inevitable. By providing a concrete framework for a new form of government, this work presents a reasonable and serious alternative to the current situation in politics. Although the real-life execution might be somewhat impetuous, we must accept that something must be done. The alternative may be an ever-increasing propensity to violence, leading to disastrous wars and misery.
9 Limitations
Although this work provides a clear image of the new form of government, it faces several limitations. First, it is important to note that this work does not constitute a complete constitution, as the author did not have the sufficient contingents to cope with the necessary effort. However, the formulation of a constitution would have been redundant anyway, as the specific manifestation must consider cultural aspects. Therefore, to opt with the limited resources and to provide a general framework, the author decided to remain on a somewhat abstract level. Furthermore, several aspects of the constitution’s architecture remain undiscussed, as the scope must have been limited to a basic elaboration of the trigonocratic principle. However, future research might fill the gaps and focus on the shortcomings of this work.
Lastly, one could argue that the remuneration formulae as well as the usage of the Fibonacci sequence constitute mathematical gimmicks rather than realistic calculations. If these approaches in fact turn out to be unsuitable, more sophisticated calculations need to be developed to replace them. Either way, the current lavishness of the political elites needs to be addressed - if required, by any means necessary.
10 Conclusion
In the first half, the present work constitutes a critical analysis of the current political situation worldwide, and deduces requirements for a political innovation to solve the identified problems. The second half constitutes the development of a solution according to the SDSD principle in the form of a new form of government, the trigonocratic constitution, which resembles a mixture of democracy, meritocracy, and technocracy. It is based on the CAT principle, which requires competence, accountability, and transparency in politics. The corresponding constitutional requirements are formulated in the trigonocratic principle, which demands that political power is not only to be based on democratic legitimacy, but also must inherit competence and consider economic interests. Moreover, the constitution is elaborated on the requirement to split the monetary power apart from the legislative and the executive, creating a new power of state called the monecative. In addition to this, the media has been elevated into the rank of a fifth political power, ensuring that its actions are independent, but verifiable. Finally, the independence of jurisdiction has been renewed, whereas a new institution, the custodium, has been invented to serve as its enforcement instrument. On this basis, a framework of the trigonocratic constitution has been elaborated, including a new election principle, the SEP, which constitutes a subject- oriented voting system to increase the accuracy of the reflection of the voters’ will, including the possibility to evaluate the performance of incumbents’ performance. Additionally, the panel sizes have been modified following the Fibonacci sequence to prevent lavishness and redundant expenses. For the same reason, remunerations have been set to be dependent on the income of the citizens the incumbents represent. Throughout the constitutional framework, the federalistic principle has been followed, preventing formation of centralistic states and autocracies. Moreover, several specific requirements have been formulated, including the requirement of understandable and just tax laws, and education reforms. Finally, an implementation framework has been formulated, providing a transformation plan for states to adapt the trigonocratic principle. In addition to this, critical aspects have been discussed, including the importance of the handling of opponents of trigonocratic reforms.
Albeit this work provides a solely abstract framework for a constitution, it presents a new form of government which grounds on the intention to solve the current problems. The present solution approach can be used as a blueprint for concrete reforms to opt with today’s challenges in politics and society. Although the risk of misinterpretation and propensity to violence must be considered, this approach constitutes a serious and valuable step towards a fair, stable and future-oriented world order.
If we now fail to cope with our own weaknesses, the next chance may probably occur among the radioactive debris of our hybris.
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1 See also Peter’s Principle (Peter & Hull, 1970).
2 It is important to note that also scientists cannot know the very best solution for a problem. Therefore, such “zigzag courses” will not simply disappear, but the change of decisions would, at least, have a scientific reason, i.e. new knowledge predominating the previous one.
3 As an example, a control question might include questions with obvious answers or instructions like “choose here the intermediate answer”. However, it is to be decided yet whether such an impudent strategy should be used or not.
4 It is important to note that the negation of statements is to be treated as a statement by itself.
5 Depending on the school system, high schools are included in the following by the term ‘school’ as well.
6 Hereby, the pension value can be combined with the pension from “usual”, i.e. non-political work. Hereby, lavish remunerations are to be diminished, leading to fair allocation of finances.
7 This principle is used hereinafter. In general, if there are m different possible n values, the percentage shares of all elements of the corresponding level on the level above are divided into m equal parts, leading to an according assignment.
8 At least not if there is no further level. However, if humanity manages to colonize other celestial bodies than earth and organizes itself in an inter-global political structure, the whole federalistic principle can be simply expanded by one level (and so on).
- Quote paper
- Sam May (Author), 2024, Trigonocracy. A New Form of Government, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.hausarbeiten.de/document/1574019
