Text proposal: Preamble

Board 8th Board
1

Link to the latest version is here: Proposal for preamble, first part of discussion - #21 by anderserk

A movement for the third millenium/21st century (alternative)

The pirate parties constitute a movement from the 21:st century, for the 21st century. As pirates, we are children of the internet, a new virtual room where most people spend big parts of their time today. The internet rests on a new culture of creativity, knowledge and sharing, without involvement of money. It contains sharing of advanced computer programs for all needs, and those programs have made possible a creative globalisation for people. Money comes into the picture as we pay for the equipment and to reach the net, and today many traditional commercial activities are also present, trying to adapt to the expectations of free sharing, with free versions, free trials, financing by advertisements or donations, adding free value etc.

All the way the sharing culture has been facing challenges from legislation regarding copyright and state-sponsored mass surveillance aimed at detecting criminal behaviour. The older political parties and powerful entertainment companies see the free sharing culture mostly as a threat. The opponents to the new culture called the free sharing “piracy”, a concept used for illegal copying of goods. When the promotors of the sharing culture organised themselves as parties, they somewhat provocatively call themselves the Pirate Parties, as a symbol of freedom and independence.

As a new movement from and for the third millennium the Pirates also open up new perspectives for democracy and creative cooperation, and deal naturally with modern problems that the established parties often fail to handle. The digitalisation of functions in society has vast possibilities, but it is often applied thoughtlessly, depending on a lack of mutual understandings of involved people. The pirates want to promote a development of the great potentialities of the Internet and digitalization in general with insight and care, while finding solutions to the downsides. The domination of big tech companies should be reduced. The rapid development of AI must be set in a context that benefits the whole society. We want to see a free, fair and sustainable society, embracing protection of all fundamental human rights, integrity, dignity, the rule of law, justice, non-discrimination, democratization, political transparency and promote a responsible self empowerment in all areas. [The latter is a favourite of mine, what do you think?] .

The pirates and the EU

The imperfect democracy within the European Union has existed since its formation and has not been sufficiently addressed in the course of its integration process.

An important goal of all Pirates is to build a solid democratic foundation for the Union. In order to achieve that goal it is crucial to ensure that political processes are more understandable, transparent and accountable, and allowing for participation and influence from citizens.

The EU has ideas of making decisions on appropriate levels. Decisions should not be taken at EU level if they can be better resolved at national, regional or local level. (called subsidiarity). This has to be followed. Decisions at the European level need to be preceded by Europe-wide debate in the nations.

The EU tends to see the Internet primarily as a new commercial market, the digital market, overlooking the potential of the basic free culture of knowledge and sharing. A wider view on culture than that within the present treaties has to be implemented.

Pirates strongly believe that all people must have the right to fair and equal treatment. It is essential that society respects the rights of minorities. We will stand against discrimination of any kind and oppose movements and institutions that act against Human Rights.

The Internet and its new culture as a medium of communication and free exchange offers tremendous opportunities for political development, overcoming top-down, one-way communication. Pirates will therefore defend the freedom of the Internet with fierce determination at European level as well as on a global scale.

2

Hello,

I don’t like this proposal due to its tone and length.

To my opinion the best way forward is to start from the 2019 proposal and tailor it a bit to reflect or underline pressing issues : democracy, digital rights, european cohesion, policies (towards the US, China, autonomy and environmental issues).

In short, submit the 2019 version to Council member and call for their counter proposals while providing guidelines (as I tried to exemplify in the last paragraph) ?

3

Here is another proposal. Though we could not yet have a broader discussion about it. It seems like only Anders and me have been working on the preamble lately and we are not convinced that just the two of us should make the decision for all European pirates.

Alternative proposal:
The Pirate Party is not just another political party, it is an international movement that was born on the internet. The internet has been redefining the way we communicate, work and live and it still continues to change how humanity interacts and develops.

Conservative forces are afraid of the changes, the freedom of communication, disruption of classic concepts for intellectual property, and a new dimension of interaction and collaboration made possible by the internet. They try to control it, contain it and use it for constant surveillance of all people.

The Pirate Party does counter these ambitions. Instead of for control we want to use technology to provide greater freedom, access to knowledge, stimulation of creativity, and space for collaboration.

We do believe that a society has to be free, fair, and sustainable.

Free means a society in which each individual has the freedom to develop their potential, only limited but also supported by the common wellbeing of the society. Freedom and responsibility are two sides of the same coin.

Fair society and economy provide participation and living in dignity.

Sustainable is when material and immaterial resources of nature and society are handled in a way that is not destroying, depleting, or degrading them.

Freedom, fairness, and sustainability are universal standards and we want to make sure they are established world wide. We want to make sure that future generations have the means for living in freedom and dignity.

Pirate Party and the EU

The EU is a prime example for peaceful cooperation but we see a lot of necessary improvements.

The democratic foundation of the EU is insufficient. Political processes have to become more transparent, understandable, and accessible for the citizens. The parliament as the only directly elected body has to have more political power, like the right for law initiatives.

4

I tend a little bit to Guidos version. I like your version, Veronika, but it is long and not easiest to read. So, let’s see, what the others say.

5

Guido’s version is better, but not 100% convinced with the tone.

I feel like the emphasis is too much on Pirates and the internet etc. The pirates are so much more, and able to tackle everything that goes inside the european parliament.

I thank you guys for your inputs, although I would feel more comfortable to submit the 2019 version, while your proposals can still be submitted in the Council Meeting to replace the board’s proposal.

I don’t have the time to offer something of my own, and I wouldn’t feel comfortable to submit it since it should be the fruit of a collaborative process.

I’d suggest building from the 2019 proposal, and refining it slightly with the challenges the european union faced, and the PPEU / pirates broad views on how to tackle them.
Covid → Sovereignty, industrial policy
Russian war on Ukraine → Defense spending and industry
Lack of european solidarity and the rise of far right movements → Democracy, cohesive and coordinated policies

These are example and my modest suggestions. We are running late :cry:

6
For the Preamble of the CEEP, the Board submits the following to the 13th Council Meeting :
  • The text posted by veronika in the first message
  • The text posted by TheBug (Guido) in the 3rd message
  • The text from the 2019 CEEP (see wiki)
  • Nothing

0 voters

7

It is not “my” version, just text which was prepared by Anders. I didn’t work on the Preamble at all.

8

The coordinator sent me another (shortened) version at 10pm yesterday, it is on this link. Text copied below.:

hello,

We notice that my (anders’) preamble text was not sufficient for acceptance by the board. Because of that, party leader Katarina and I worked together to create another proposal, substantially shortening it, and integrating the essential formulations of the former preamble with some of mine, into what we see as a reasonable structure. Here it is:

New proposed preamble to EU-program

A movement for the 21st century

The pirate parties constitute a movement from the 21:st century, for the 21st century. As pirates, we are children of the new culture of creativity, knowledge and free sharing, that rose with the internet, via scientific exchange into dissemination of free programs of all kinds making possible a new global creative and communicative virtual space.

Some of the free sharing has been met with criticisms calling it ”piracy” which has lead to the new movement somewhat provocatively calling themselves the Pirate Parties, as a symbol of freedom and independence.

The EU tends to see the internet primarily as a new digital commercial market, overlooking the potential of the new creative culture of free knowledge and sharing. We want to promote a development of these potentials and of digitalisation in general with insight and care. The domination of big tech companies should be reduced. The rapid development of AI must be set in a context that benefits the whole society. The Pirates will defend the freedom of the internet with fierce determination at the EU level as well as on a global scale.

The Pirates open up new perspectives for democracy and want to build a solid democratic foundation for the EU and the member states, making political processes more understandable, transparent and accountable, allowing for participation and influence from citizens. Decisions at the EU level need to be preceded by Europe-wide debate in the nations and decisions that can be better resolved at national, regional or local level should be taken there (called subsidiarity).

We want to see a free, fair and sustainable society, embracing protection of all fundamental human rights, integrity, dignity, the rule of law, justice, non-discrimination and the rights of minorities, and promote a responsible self empowerment for people in all areas.

There are now around 50 Pirate Parties established across the world, among them 18 in the common pirate organisation in Europe. This is their common program for the EU-elections 2024 and beyond.

9

hello, I don’t think the preamble should talk about covid, isn’t it declared over?

About the war in Ukraine, this text is for 2024 and beyond. We don’t know now how the situation is then. If we want to have it in mind and write something, it should be of a general character, of interest after the war, however it continues and ends.

About the former preamble. I have written about it early in the process, you can find that in my topics. Mainly, I think it doesn’t really aim at “general people” in my opinion. I seems like more of an internal document for EU-involved people. With EU-lingo and presentation of problems not understandable to others, such as at the beginning of the text.

I started to write based on my experience in meeting voters in election campaigns, trying to counter their bewilderment and ignorance about us. “Are you a serious party, with that name?! Aha, you were the ones that wanted to steal from the artists with your illegal downloading, a.k.a. committing piracy, OK, and you really stand for it with your name I notice. Well, good -bye to you.”

People didn’t know or think about that the file sharing was and is just a natural part of a new culture of creativity, making knowledge available to all and an ethos of sharing, beyond neoliberal ideas that we all are egocentric jerks. And that the internet is nothing but a “digital market”.

The above two perspectives is what is at the centre of why I took on the coordinator job. Both missing in the old preamble.

I have a tendency to want to be clear in my writings, and try to build a reasonable structure, something that is difficult in compromise texts, such as the one I presented after Strasbourg. My texts sometimes for that reason can be a bit long, and the more details you present for clarity, the bigger chance that people find some details the don’t like.

So after being informed that the presented text could not be approved, I asked our party leader Katarina to help me shorten it, and following her suggestions I put together a much shorter and rather detail free text, and sorted the contents from the compromise text ( where most of the contents from the old preamble was put after my text) into more distinct paragraphs, containing internet policy, EU democratisation, collected other values etc.

That text came late, but I started very early , trying to find people from different parties for their input, but failed during all the time before Strasbourg (with one exception) , and the strange thing there made me fail to present and have a creative discussion on my points also.

Anyway, those of us in Sweden who has seen the last version find it reasonable, nice to see comments from board members (may I say finally? :-)). here, however on the longer compromise version, please look at the new one and comment, in some way it will be around until the final decision, methinks.