New Zealand Police Act Wiki Lets You Write the Law

PhoenixOr writes "New Zealand is now on the top of my list for cool governments. They've opened a wiki allowing the populace to craft a new version of their Police Act, the legislative basis for policing in New Zealand."

Comments

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Tuoqui]

Now if only this would catch on... we might actually see laws that are representative of what the people want instead of some asshole with a few hundred thousand dollars more than they should have in their pocket.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[Anonymous Coward]

Opening a wiki for creating laws is insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to formation of new laws, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

Yeah. I heard that someone also had a wiki to build an encyclopedia, but that's just as insane. It would just invite vandalism, and instead of leading to an informative and complete reference, it would waste money and manpower involved in maintanence and moderation.

A Public Relations exercise

[gihan_ripper]

From the wiki (emphasis mine):

An official Bill is currently being written-up by parliamentary drafters, but in parallel there's an opportunity for others to suggest how a new Policing Act might look by contributing to a wiki Act.

OK, it's unrealistic to believe that New Zealand would let anyone write the law. That would lead to anarchy. However, what they're doing is trying to get people interested in the law-making process, and in the laws themselves by opening up this wiki. I can see a number of purposes this could serve:

1. Educational: teaches citizens about laws and law-making.
2. Political: by getting citizens involved in the process, they're more likely to support the new Act.
3. Police PR: gets citizens to think about policing in a new way and perhaps gain a new respect for the Police.

Re:A Public Relations exercise

[bug1]

"OK, it's unrealistic to believe that New Zealand would let anyone write the law. That would lead to anarchy."

Quite the opposite.

Anarchy is the absense in laws, so letting anyone write laws would move New Zealand further away from anarchy.

Allowing anyone to repeal laws might lead to anarchy.

Re:Not such a good idea..

[dangitman]

Laws have to be constant, same for everyone, and not open to discussion or question.

WTF? Laws should be constant? So slavery never should have been abolished, I guess. They should not be open for discussion? Sounds like fascism to me.

It should be the exact opposite - laws should change to reflect the times, and they should be constantly discussed and questioned.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Virtual_Raider]

I don't think we would see to many of those laws. The final draft will be reviewed by a relevant body before submitting it for approval. Not doing so would be insane, as all manner of abuse could find their way into the law otherwise. The thing is, it will be reviewed by those same people that we are supposing take "financial aids" from interest groups. So they will just snip out whatever doesn't suit their agendas.

I know this is a police law, but think of the possibilities in other areas. What if I want to expand the definition of Fair Use? Or if I want to shorten copyright duration? Do you see those amends surviving even on the face of overwhelming public support on the wiki? On top of lobbyists there would be astroturfers for one thing. And let's not forget that usually the only people that are vocal about something are those with a vested interest. I wouldn't want the nosy bastards from some retarded Home-Owners association slipping in some ordinances that would, for example, prevent me from installing a solar array on my backyard because it "ruins the aesthetics of the neighborhood" or such. Particularly if I don't even live on their area but get covered by this laws.

I think is a good publicity stunt and it may even generate some novel ideas, but I just don't see it suddenly making sense of the legal landscape in any meaningful way. I'd much rather they put the existing laws in a database with strong referential integrity. That would be interesting.

Just some ramble =)

Re:Not Practical In The U.S.

[Jane Q. Public]

Wikipedia has some VERY serious flaws. For example, it is too vulnerable to vandalism, even though that vandalism is often easily fixable... if anyone happens to notice it in a timely manner.

There are other flaws as well. From my own participation, for example, I have found that often certain groups of people will "take over" a topic as "their own", and interfere with input from outside sources, however valid that input may be. In some ways this is analogous to problems we see today with "peer review" in scientific journals.

Wikipedia would be a disastrous model for anything having to do with government. It relies too much on the "good nature" of contributors. As we see very often, some people simply don't have any. And that is double true when it comes to government.

Re:kiwis use wikis

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

You act like the default relationship with the government should be love. You should hate your government until they give you a reason not to.

Re:An alternative

[kiwipeso]

New Zealand follows the German MMP system. We have one house of representatives. We will have 121 Seats unless there is another overhang next year. About half are directly elected, of which 7 are Maori seats. The rest are list seats allocated by putting in party nominees according to their share after counting what they won.

So, to get represented in parliament, you either need to win : a general electorate, a maori electorate or 5% of the party votes.

What this means is simple, Labour or National win a load of ordinary seats and fill with up a few list MPs.
NZFirst gets the elderly and the patriot vote. Sure to be there. :-(
Greens get the young and the hippy vote. Like the smell of their voters, sure to be there. :-P
Act gets the ambitious and business vote. Too well funded to lose, but I like them more than others. :-)
Maori party, gets enough of the Maori seats and Pacific Islander votes to be there. A new party.

That irrelevant few that split up and now have bugger all chance. (One has gone to be the christian party with the MP who is in the first corruption trial.)

What would be easier would be if you are just going to make laws into online referenda (with postal voting allowed).

Re:kiwis use wikis

[Elemenope]

Hating your government for no good reason is nearly as silly as loving it on the same basis. I would say one should be rationally engaged and emotionally disinterested in their government unless and until that government unduly interferes in your life or perpetrates some act you consider to be unjust.

But maybe that's just me.