Translation of the French article by Jacques Rouchaud
Hello to all the French people.
Everywhere, from the top of the State down to the smallest town hall, our rulers have only one idea in mind: to direct everything, control everything, decide everything in our place. This centralisation at every level is the source of our ills.
All this comes from human weakness. Selfishness, laziness and a vision that goes no further than the end of one’s nose. Whoever holds a small piece of power, in a ministry, an agency, a town hall or an office, thinks only of himself: his post, his comfort, his budget. He no longer does the work, he has it done. And it is always the one who asks — the citizen, the patient, the user — who has to do everything himself: run around, fill in, prove, wait, start again.
Health is the perfect example. The Regional Health Agencies (ARS) are administrations located far from patients. They decide in place of the carers where people must be treated, how and by whom. Their solution to medical deserts: create health centres with our taxes, staffed by salaried doctors, employees of the administration, instead of supporting free and independent practitioners.
Who pays? We, the taxpayers, twice: once through our taxes to build and run these centres, and once through our contributions. Who loses out? The patient, who no longer really chooses his doctor, and the independent doctor, who is discouraged instead of being helped to set up practice. An independent doctor answers to his patients. An employed doctor answers to his hierarchy.
And it does not stop at health. Today every constituency, every town hall, every grouping of municipalities wants to govern everything: the economy, housing, culture, education, and even the human being. Administrations, agencies, commissions and elected officials are piled on top of one another. Everyone wants his share of power and his budget, and no one is responsible for anything.
The madness of “super”: super-regions, super-cities, super-centralisation. In 2015, our 22 regions were merged into 13 large regions, without asking the inhabitants’ opinion. Giant metropolises such as Greater Paris were created. All in the name of efficiency, but the only result is to concentrate power in the hands of a few elected officials. The president of a super-region or a super-metropolis becomes the master on board. He decides alone, or almost, for millions of people: Île-de-France alone accounts for nearly 20% of the country’s population. He is an absolute king of modern times, ever further from the realities of each person.
Even our screens have become closed counters. The software and websites of governments, banks, hospitals, social services and all administrations, public or private, are designed for those who order them, never for those who have to use them. No one has thought of the user. It is he who has to do everything: create accounts, remember passwords, scan papers, fill in endless forms, start again when everything crashes. The work that employees used to do is passed on to the citizen, often elderly, alone and with no one to help. This is called modernisation. Above all, it is a way of making us work for free.
Demosciocracy says the opposite.
- The territory decides what it needs, based on the needs conveyed by its 20 districts. It does not decide in place of individuals (Article 1.6).
- The corporations, including that of doctors and carers, are represented on an equal footing with the people in every Territory Council. They are the ones who know how to treat patients, not a regional office (Article 3.1).
- The Region never becomes a political level above the territory. It is only a relay for coordination. Power remains in the 352 territories, decided collectively by Councils of 40 members, and never by a single elected official (Articles 1.7 and 7.5).
- A light administration: any body that duplicates another structure or no longer serves any purpose is abolished (Article 8.3).
- Digital technology is at the service of the citizen. It must considerably reduce unnecessary formalities for citizens and businesses, not multiply them (Articles 8.4 and 12.3).
The administration is a tool in the service of the population, and not an organisation intended to ensure its own permanence.
Let us stop paying for administrations that rule over us. Let us give power back to citizens and to the professions, territory by territory.
LONG LIVE DEMOSCIOCRACY!
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