|
|
|
 |
 |
Index of Governance: measuring and rewarding government performance |
|
Score
81%
|
|
9 votes,
Feasibility
74%
Originality
78%
Humour
13% |
|
The Problem:
Oppression, tyrrany and the "humanitarian" wars which result therefrom
The Social Invention:
Reducing Oppression – And “Humanitarian” Wars Caused By Oppression
The arbitrary and illegal actions of the US-led “Coalition of the willing” in Iraq have caused unprecedented hostility and controversy. Yet on the other hand only a few people support the idea that the international community should sit back in the name of laissez faire and watch while atrocities and genocide take place as in Rwanda and Kosovo – or Iraq for that matter.
In his Millennium Report to the United Nations General Assembly, Secretary-General Kofi Annan challenged the international community to address the real dilemmas posed by intervention and sovereignty. The independent International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS) was established by the Canadian government in September 2000 to respond to that challenge, and has presented a report that discusses when and how military action might be taken against an oppressive regime.
This leaves us in the unpleasant position of using military violence against a state, violence in which innocent civilians are bound to be injured and killed. Before we resort to this, the UN needs a non-violent system that rewards good governance and gives disadvantages to governments that are tending towards oppression and genocide.
The Index of Governance is a two-stage proposal that addresses this question.
First we need a reliable measure of governmental performance. A couple of models for this already exist, based around human rights – political prisoners and torture, the best known being the Amnesty International/observer Index of Human Rights. It would not be difficult to develop an instrument of this kind so that each country in the UN could be ranked in order, with well-performing governments with good human rights records at the top, and badly performing countries at the bottom.
The second phase of the process would be to allocate diplomatic advantages and disadvantages to governments in each band on the scale. Those at the higher end of the scale would have least restrictions. Those lower down would be subject to a progressively tougher “smart sanctions” – designed to restrict the regime without hurting the people.
[This proposal is set out in more detail on GreenHealth.org]
|
Dr Richard Lawson was born in 1946, qualified in medicine in 1969, and became a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in 1978. He has been in general practice in Congresbury, North Somerset since 1979.
He has been a Green Party member since about 1977, holding various national offices including Co-Speaker in the last General Election, and was Health Speaker for the Party for a couple of years. He was elected to Woodspring District Council in 1986, retiring after six years' service. He is the author of "Bills of Health", which shows that about one fifth of NHS effort is wasted in trying to cure illness caused by unemployment, poverty, poor housing and environmental pollution, was published in September 1996 by Radcliffe Medical Press. He is a keen advocate of changes in the benefit system in order to prevent this waste.
Married, with three children, he enjoys gardening, cycling, windsurfing, sand yachting, skating and roller hockey, plays the flute, and is an ex-hanglider pilot. He is the inventor of a successful double film aerofoil sail, which he is currently testing on sand yachts. He has several other inventions under development, including a web based symptom sorter programme which is currently up in a beta version.
After a 20 year layoff due to preoccupation with political matters, he has started to write poetry again. Several poems have been published in small magazines.
website: GreenHealth.org.uk
|
|
|
 |
| Give us your ideas and join
the most exciting thing to happen to social invention since two hairy
guys rubbed a couple of sticks together! |
| SUBMIT YOUR
IDEA NOW » |
|
|
