Governance works best when those who feel the impact of the decisions are those involved in making the decisions. That principle works as well in the private sector as the public sector.

The other sections of the New Rules web site focus largely on outcomes. This one focuses largely on process. What are the mechanisms that encourage the most democratic and socially responsible kinds of decisionmaking?

Embracing Subsidiarity - The burden of proof should be on a higher level of government to justify its intervention in local affairs.

Marrying Authority and Responsibility - Those who make the decisions should be those who will feel the consequences of those decisions.

Devolving Economic Power as Well as Political Authority - Concentrated economic power is the enemy of a well-functioning democracy. Develop rules at all levels that strengthen local enterprise.

Democratizing Productive Capacity - Encourage not only rooted economies but democratic technologies.Enable technologies that decentralize productive capacity to the city, neighborhood and even household level.

Enacting Minimum, Not Maximum Standards - The Bill of Rights was enacted to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority. Civil liberties must be protected, even when that requires the intervention of higher levels of government. But these should exercise authority cautiously to allow for maximum individual freedom. They should establish not ceilings but floors, a minimum standard of adequacy that allows communities the autonomy to do even better.

Featured New Rules:

• Banning Water Withdrawal by Corporations - Barnstead, NH
  The Barnstead Water Rights and Local Self-Government Ordinance [Warrant Article 31] was presented and passed at the Barnstead Town Meeting on March 18, 2006. The ordinance declares that water is a common resource for the residents of Barnstead and prohibits corporate water withdrawals for resale. More...
• Civil Rights Protection Resolutions
  The Bill of Rights Defense Committee (BORDC) is leading the charge in encouraging communities around the country to enact some form of a Civil Liberties Safe Zone resolution. As of January 2003, at least 21 cities have passed some form of the resolution and similar efforts were underway in 26 states. The resolutions generally forbid community resources being used to implement certain requirements of the 2002 USA Patriot Act, The Homeland Security Act and other executive orders passed after the terrorist attacks of 2001. More...
• Corporate Personhood Ordinance - Porter Township, PA
  On the evening of December 9, 2002, the elected municipal officials of Porter Township, Clarion County - a municipality of 1,500 residents an hour north of Pittsburgh in Northwestern Pennsylvania - became the first local government in the United States to eliminate corporate claims to civil and constitutional privileges. The Township adopted a binding law declaring that corporations operating in the Township may not wield legal privileges - historically used by corporations to override democratic decisionmaking - to stop the Township from passing laws which protect residents from toxic sewage sludge. More...
• Unified Development Budgets
  As Greg LeRoy (GoodJobsFirst) points out, "As states grapple with their worst deficits in more than half a century, policymakers seek better data to help with budgeting decisions." One promising innovation: Unified Development Budgets -- an annual statement to the legislature with all forms of spending itemized in one place. The State of Texas has enacted such an innovation. More...

More:

• Preempt This: Michigan Cities Fight Back - by Daniel Kraker, The New Rules, Fall 2000
• A Devolution Test for George W. Bush - by David Morris, The New Rules, Winter 2001
• One Percent for Citizenship - by David Morris, The New Rules, Fall 2000
• It's the Community, Stupid! - by David Morris, The New Rules, Summer 2000
• The Place of Place in the 21st Century - by David Morris, The New Rules, Winter 2000
• Devolution as if Community Matters - by David Morris, The New Rules, Fall 1999
• Democratizing Ownership - by David Morris, The New Rules, Summer 1999
• The New Rules of Localism- A speech by David Morris presented at the International Forum on Globalization in Washington, D.C., May 1996.Anything left to Legislate About? - State Legislatures magazine, September 1999
• Urban Institute's Assessing the New Federalism Program - a multi-year research project to analyze the devolution of responsibility for social programs from the federal government to the states.
• Democracy Unlimited of Humboldt County- working to assert local sovereignty by challenging corporate rule at the local level.