Examining and improving We The People
Last month, the White House launched a new website called We the People, which allows citizens and residents to create petitions, gather signatures, and then submit them to the White House for review and response. If a petition gathers over 25,000 signatures in 30 days, the White House will release an official response to it and ensure that the petition finds its way to the appropriate policy makers.
A recent Wall Street Journal article on the website says that the petitions do not tackle some of the more important issues of the day such as jobs plans, wars or unemployment. In response, iSolon president JH Snider writes in the Huffington Post that petitioners do not need to bring to light issues that already have the attention of the White House. Rather, We the People provides an opportunity for underrepresented groups to organize and highlight issues that have otherwise been ignored or have received little response from the government:
The democratic purpose of the We The People website should not be to poll public opinion on hot button issues. It should be to help put new issues on the public agenda that aren’t already there by making it easier for politically underrepresented groups to mobilize themselves. In the technical language of political science, it is to use new information technology to help solve collective action problems.
Campaign steering committee member AmericaSpeaks, along with the National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation, International Association for Public Participation – USA, and deliberative-democracy.net have collaborated on a website to improve how We the People works. Until October 31, the groups will be collecting feedback on their website, Improving We the People, and will submit a petition in early November.
We the People can be a very useful tool for the public. New issues can take the forefront and require consideration from those in power to take a position or release a response. This is a new medium for public participation, and everyday citizens can be assured that their issues reach the White House. Improvements to the process are necessary, but We the People is a step in the right direction towards a stronger democracy.
