Green Rainbow Party Platform Working Group

This page is for developing the Green Party Platform. Before participating in the edit, please contact volunteer@occupyboston.org. It's important for the editing group to have read through the background info and be up to speed on what the group is going. The group that started this intends to work this draft on their own before asking people who haven't been participating in the meetings to have a chance. We anticipate publishing an invitation for others to participate within a couple of weeks.

Meeting participants, please edit at will. If you want a lesson on how to use the wiki, please contact Brian or Terra. or write to volunteer@occupyboston.org to set up a phone tutorial time. Most lessons take about 5 minutes. Also, you can get "real time" help from the Occupy Boston techs, by choosing "Working Groups" on the left, choosing "OBIT" and then going to the online forum. They are speedy and great.

Target Audience for this Document

Potential and Existing Green-Rainbow Party Members. People interested in a sustainable future for human kind.

NOTES to Wiki participants

Terra: I put an inquiry in to OBIT admin to ask how to do "notes", rather than brackets, which appear to be rather cumbersome for a group this large. Please use brackets for now, or for huge notes, I'm creating a new page for each one...so debate there, and keep "the results of the debate" on the main page. If this convention doesn't make sense, please let's talk on email or something, or create a page about making huge notes. BrianC: How about using the discussion page for dialog on the article? It's built-in; there's one for each article page - the link is in the upper menu bar, beside the 'page' tab.

1) Preamble

Green-Rainbow values rest on understanding the interconnectedness of everything on Earth, respect for life, its creativity, and the capacities of human beings. These Ten Key Values imply a vision of the common good and offer guidance on the pathway. [Terra: is this a note to "National"? a comment about the national platform? or should it be referenced as the opinion of the state-level platform?] [JH: Green-Rainbow means MA]

The Green-Rainbow Party of Massachusetts, on the 10th anniversary of its founding, endorses the platform of the Green Party of the United States. [Joanna: no qualification?] [Danny: I think we need to discuss this more. For example, does this mean if the GPUS platform gets amended that we automaticallly endorse?]

The Green Party of Massachusetts and the Rainbow Coalition merged in 2002 on the basis of their shared values and aspirations (footnote on merger statement of 2002?). [Terra: do we want to say something about wanting a "strong [commons]"?] [Joanna: Why here?]

While governments are strangled by special interests, we seek ways to bring the wisdom and energy of all residents of the Commonwealth to work toward a sustainable future.

As such, we seek methods to encourage and facilitate inclusiveness and transparency in government, including [Participatory Budgeting]. [Joanna: this should be item in main body of platform.]

When economies are staggering from speculation in the financial system controlled by the powerful, we recognize the interdependence of all beings on earth and the role of local self-reliance, cooperation, and meeting the needs of the most vulnerable.

DISCUSSION: [Issues with Favoring Locally Based Economies]

Where social relations are blighted by inequality, lack of opportunity and violence, we seek means to enable all to thrive together in peace. [Joanna: Who added 'together in peace'? That carries the idea away from what government can do to help all to thrive, aside from reforming law enforcement, maybe. The intro can't have many specifics or it loses its pace.] [BrianC: following phrase doesn't connect with preceding phrase][Danny: I didn't add it but I think placing of 'peace' is appropriate; it relates to mention of 'violence' 8 words earlier.],shifting to revenues from taxing resource use and accumulated wealth. taxing accumulated wealth. [Joanna: If we think gov't has role in equalizing income and enriching opportunity, there is need for revenues to do it with, but maybe we can leave that unsaid. Alternative sentence: "WHERE SOCIAL RELATIONS ARE BLIGHTED BY INEQUALITY, ALIENATION, AND VIOLENCE [changed back to unfairness?], WE SEEK TO BUILD HEALTHY COMMUNITIES WHERE ALL MAY THRIVE."]

[BrianC: the phrase 'taxing accumulated wealth' isn't specific enough, as I see it. We should shift taxes from wages and sales to polluting resource use, specifically. [Joanna: Specific types of taxation should go in body of text under 'rational taxation'.] [Brian: Let's leave taxation out of this paragraph on peace and equality]. [Joanna: This paragraph was not intended to be about peace and equality, but about what government can do for society to which it answers.] [Danny: I think that 'peace' and taking care of the vulnerable need to be a part of the preamble. 'A chain is only as strong as it's weakest link.' The concept of 'self reliance' does not make sense to the most vulnerable: prisoners, many hospital patients, etc.]

DISCUSSION:[Issues with Using the Words "Fairness" and "Unfairness"] [ Joanna: unfairness gone.]

2) Proposed Platform text

[JH NOTE: CAN ANYONE SEE HOW TO GROUP THESE UNDER GO'VT, ECONOMY AND SOCIETY?]

At a time of severe cutbacks in spending, fiscal reform of State government operations requires full-cost accounting for all government approved projects to reduce ecologically destructive waste of natural resources and to increase employment. Continuous auditing of expenditures, both physical and monetary, must be instituted in such a manner as to prevent further transfer of wealth from the less to the more affluent.

To remedy the harm caused by excessive and continuing growth in disparities of income, we seek legislation needed to achieve these goals; the eradication of poverty, the local assurance of a livelihood, freedom to pursue personal ambitions, and security of domicile. Among the means to these ends are; rational taxation, (JH: will shifts in taxation from income to resources, land, wealth come here?} the institution of a state-owned bank, the establishment and funding of independent ecological research, and the development of a sovereign wealth fund which only invests sustainably.

Effective democratic deliberation and decision making at the local level -- town, city, ward, neighborhood, and also decisions whose ecological effect is largely regional, may require the formation of citizen assemblies in addition to those already instituted as local governments. Such consultative and decision making bodies should be chosen openly and freely by those most directly involved in their outcomes, protected from the undue pressure of competitive private corporations whose choices. and demands on our communities are driven by the need to maximize their own monetary gains.

Commonwealth law to protect the land held in common [Danny: I would footnote appropriate section of Mass. Constitution here] and also the fundamental necessities of life, water, air, and freedom of movement must allow for the sharing of resources within and between local polities. Encouraging local initiatives and local markets, whether cooperative or private, must replace the use of tax revenues to subsidize large corporate enterprises.

The Commonwealth, through its courts, is charged with the protections of all natural persons residing within the Commonwealth from invidious discrimination. Wherever this is in doubt, it shall be the duty of the Attorney General to conduct a thorough investigation, and failure of that office to do so is an actionable offense.

All state institutions and private institutions must avoid policies that increase debt, [JH:whose debt?] especially debt that creates waste by jeopardizing social liberty or inhibiting the ability of persons to make reasonable choices as to employment, and other creative endeavors. Debt forgiveness may be necessary to protect the physical and social environment from the production of this waste. The use of local scrip should be encouraged.

Criminal law requires a careful examination of the use of violence to counter violence, as well as the testing of non-incarceration in the protection of the common good. The current prison system provides a glaring instance of unjust waste of human and physical resources. Imprisonment for non-violent but legally defined offenses remains an invidious practice that can no longer be ignored.

Growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is not a requirement of good government. The Commonwealth and its self-governing communities should be left free to innovate, and improve the quality of life of their inhabitants through social interaction rather than increase of wealth. The institution of universally available health care at no cost to the patient remains one of the chief tools to reduce human suffering and reduce ecological waste in human affairs. [JH: ?] Health care accompanied by the required freeing of medical practice from the constraints imposed by insurance corporations, and removing the burden imposed on private employers provides a powerful tool for reducing the waste of non-productive overhead.

A program of educational reform in the public school system should be pursued at the local and regional levels. The only role of State government shall be to see to it that all schools are supplied according to the needs of the children they serve, that critical thinking and conflict resolution is encouraged and not stifled, and that teachers and staff are compsenated as valued proffesionals. This approach will entail increasing the resources to deal with poverty and its consequences for children. The content of compulsory education cannot be fairly determined by job markets. Principles of democratic education are well understood and need [but] to be applied. The Government should not encorage private education nor should it allow public charter schools run by corporate agendas.

To ensure maximal choice in representative government requires State financing of candidacy for public office, majority election, and should also allow for representation of opinion at least as effectively as representation and conciliation of conflicting interest. Preferential balloting for single office in both primary and general elections allows for responsible and democratic choice in a way that the current system denies. Political diversity in the Commonwealth as a whole should be represented in its legislative bodies; and districts of roughly equal population should be drawn on the ground of shared concerns of these populations.

Private corporations in the business of mass transportation, communication, and energy production [JH: and distribution] must be held fully accountable for the maintenance of their infra-structure and the attendant costs, especially the wasteful consumption of non-renewables [energy]. The utilization of the noted social resources [?] by households, government agencies, industry and commerce must be made as efficient and ecologically sound as possible. [How about government being prepared to take on management of such enterprises where that would benefit common good, e.g. reverse privatization? How about facilitating municipal ownership]

Our politics emphasize social preparedness. No matter how advanced our technological means, we are not in charge of all planetary or local events. Hurricanes, epidemics, droughts, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes are no more selective in choosing their victim than a nuclear attack or accident. While climate change of a kind that raises sea levels may be anticipated, there are periods when geological events may assume catastrophic proportions. Healthy communities will show the greatest levels of caring and the least reliance on agencies of violence.

Obligation to protect the commons, land, air, water, ecosystems, and residents’ proper enjoyment thereof, embodied in Commonwealth law (Article 7 of Constitution), implies generous funding of environmental research and teaching at state universities, professional staff, long range regional planning, outreach programs, and local initiatives, and applying precautionary principle, especially to new technologies, e.g. nanotechnology. ][BrianC: this is a wonderful topic for inclusion in the platform; it has the general principal and some arenas where it applies.]

Why should we in Mass. use revenues to solicit relocation of big enterprises (including multinational) in MA simply as employers, when most new jobs are created by small businesses? What they do and how they do it matters... MA should be good citizen of the world... MA should examine implications of US internat'l trade treaties and tell DC what it thinks, e.g appoint people so that Trade Commission enacted to do this can function... Later...]

[Joanna note: I withdraw the alternative organization I had suggested, hoping that preface can carry the ideas of ecological wisdom, respect for diversity, etc. being relevant to everything, with special attention to government, economy and society. I tried to streamline preface. Right now, links and comments need to be digested to enable flow.] [BrianC: One of the decisions we did come to was to use the three-part division of the platform when writing. I realize, with curiousity, that we're neglecting that decision.] [Joanna: I hope the electronic text will imbed references as links (on paper in footnotes?)

Separate Platform project: Hope we can post some our our writing on vision and principles on G-R website. For sure, 2002 merger statement needs to be there to link to.]

REFERENCE DOCS/LINKS for Participants

Green Party Working Group Reference Docs