Jon Barnes

Democracy Squared Jon Barnes

Trump, Sanders, Corbyn, Farage, Brexit. 2016 saw 'democratic' decisions which shook the world. Contradictory and unexpected decisions. I see it as the sign of an antiquated system in desperate need of an overhaul to bring it into the 21st century. These disparate decisions are to me indicators of a system which lacks nuance and doesn't allow us to express ourselves other than in binary terms. Red vs blue; in vs out; him vs her. The complexity of the modern world is lost in a largely reductionary format dominated by political parties wedded to pre-determined ideologies rather than enacting the will of the people. The democratic system has seen little change since Sir Tim Berners-Lee founded the world wide web 25 years ago and it is time for a change. A more direct, more frequent, more human-centred, more participatory form of democracy. In this book you will hear real cases from 5 tech revolutionaries around the world using the internet to create real alternatives to the current binary system. This is I hope no more, no less than a digital revolution in democratising democracy.