(Draft of a book review for work. Please comment.) A growing corporate “transparency movement” and growing global civil society-both enabled by information technology-will pull globalization into the side of the good. So says Ann Florini in The Coming Democracy: New Rules for Running a New World.
Florini likens the current information technology revolution to the revolutions sparked by Guttenberg’s printing press–one that will produce greater democracy and accountability and new forms of governance. “The tools are now available to do at a global level what the printing press helped do for national governance-to decentralize the flow of information, enabling democracy to emerge.” (16)
On the business side of the global political question, “transparency” is Florini’s key note. Previously secretive bodies like the World Trade Organization now release a wealth of information to the public. Dozens of nations have recently passed “freedom of information” laws. Transparency technologies (such as global satellite imaging) allow civil society groups to hold business and government both accountable.
And corporate behavior codes are on the rise. Some codes are aspirational, while others are more compliance based. UN Secretary General has offered his Global Compact–a voluntary code that relies on self-reporting. But the current trend among corporate codes is social accountability reporting, which details how a corporation’s behavior effects its many neighbors.
Click to continue reading “The emerging democracy will be transparent”
I wrote a review of a Slavoj Zizek book for work early last year, and it was recently republished in Chile. (It just arrived in the mail today.) For your reading amusement, the Google re-re-translation is here. (I had an easier time with the Spanish, but the Google version does make me sound more like a Continental philosopher.)
Stapler
White Noise
Speakerboxxx
Coffee Mug
SARS
Puzzler
Luke Skywalker
Thumb Tack
Thesaurus
Second Draft
Kleenex
Gramophone
Transistor Radio
Serial Monogomy
Phone Jack
TCP/IP
Mother
Grandpa Riley
Jake 2.0
Embedded
1986
Jesus Christ
Sometime last week or this week MyIrony had its first birthday. (Happy birthday to MyIrony, happy birthday to MyIrony…) I’m not sure about the timing because I spent a couple of weeks just futzing around with preliminary designs on blogger.com before I moved everything over to makingchutney.com using MovableType’s free software.
I highly recommend MovableType for my fellow bloggers. But if the thought of getting your own web domain and installing stuff on it scares you, then its sibling (for-pay) product TypePad is an easier way to go. For keeping track of updates on other folks blogs, I use the $25 version of NewzCrawler–saves clicking on several dozen bookmarks every day. And for composing entries I use Zempt’s free software.
Traffic at MyIrony has been pretty steady the last few months. Homepage hits seem to come in around 400 to 600 a week depending on how often I’ve updated that week and whether anybody has linked to me. Unique visitors come in anywhere between 1100 and 1400 a week. That’s all according to the stats package that comes from the folks MyIrony rents server space from (fellow Okies, I might add, not far from my old neck of the woods as it turned out.). If Site Meter is any closer to the mark, however, my numbers are off by about half. According to Technorati, thirty-some-odd blogs are currently linking to MyIrony. If Blogshares or Daypop is right, though, it’s many less.
Click to continue reading “MyIrony is one year old!”
From AKMA and Wealth Bondage: ordination as hazing. Son, we’re gonna have to teach you how to play ball.
Following up on Will Shetterly and Philocrites, I want to put in a vote for the Churches of Doubt as a replacement name for Unitarian Universalist. Probably not for good reasons, mind you.
Frankly, I like the thought that it would slightly trouble people. But immediately the old stand-by question of “So what do you guys believe?” would fall by the wayside. “Oh my, they’re not really sure what they believe, are they?” would be the new reaction. The follow up question would then become, “So what do you do?” or “Why do you get together at all?” Much better questions to be asked.
I’ve never found a satisfactory answer to the belief question, and I don’t think it’s because I haven’t taken “Articulating Your UU Faith.” It’s just a bed set up to begin with. My mother is still convinced that we can believe anything we want to (not true), which hasn’t helped her understand why I’m no longer a charismatic Christian. (“But if you can be any religion, why don’t you talk about committing your life to Jesus?”)
And I have a sense that friends don’t see the point either. If we draw from many religions and philosophies, well, why can’t they do that well enough from home? Any new name–if it’s to be an improvement–has to make it completely obvious what we believe so that they onus is on what we do. I don’t have a lot of hope for it, but “the Church of Doubt” might just whet the appetite a little. “Hmm, what’s a doubting church like?”
Of course, this completely sidelines the fact that too many UUs are completely bereft of doubt: they know what they believe, dammit, and they know (even better) what they no longer believe. Maybe “the Churches of Doubt” would be a corrective. But perhaps that’s another subject and another post.
But a new thought occurs to me. What about “the Churches of Faithful Doubt?” Now that might tweak some interest. Might lead to the question, “But what is faithful doubt?” Now that’s a question I’d like thrown to me. It’s a little bit ironic, paradoxical, contradictory. Leaves room to explore. Almost demands exploration…
