Canadians for
 Direct Democracy (CDD)

Alphabetical Index to Authors

Notes:
Books marked thus   are worthy of special note.
Superb indices of books, and book reviews of some of the books on this list will be found at:
Banyen Books a unique Vancouver bookstore
Amazon.com Books "Earth's Biggest Bookstore"
Several books in this listing are published by New Society Publishers whose mission is:
"to publish books that contribute in fundamental ways to building an ecologically sustainable and just society  .  .  .  "

Beedham, Brian, London Economist, 12 page article Full Democracy December 21, 1996 -- a comprehensive analysis of (mostly Direct) Democracy in Europe and worldwide.

Boyer, Patrick, QC, The People's Mandate, Referendums and a more Democratic Canada, Dundurn Press, Toronto, Ontario, 1992.
A former Conservative MP, who introduced a private member's bill in 1991, he ran for the party leadership in 1993. This detailed survey of Canada's flirtations with Direct Democracy is one of his several books on Referendums and politics.
8 pages of Notes on The People's Mandate, www.npsnet.com/cdd/boyer.htm#index

Carrel, André, Citizens' Hall: Making Local Democracy Work, 2001, Between The Lines, 720 Bathhurst St., Toronto, Ont. M5S 2R4 http://www.btlbooks.com 1-800-718-7201.
How the small B.C. municipality of Rossland broke the rules of local government to empower its citizens in local governance. It is a practical guidebook for all politicians and administrators who value direct democracy, in B.C. and Canada. Extracts www.npsnet.com/cdd/outstanding2.htm#carrel

Hock, Dee, Birth of the Chaordic Age, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc. 450 Sansome St, San Francisco, CA, 94111-3320, - 1999.
This book reads like a funny thriller, crammed with fresh insights, yet it contains more governance know-how, and more community than my 1970s MBA. Hopefully Politicians, Managers, Journalists, Book reviewers, Bureaucrats, Activists, and Readers everywhere will read it, and sloooooooooowly absorb, adjust and EVOLVE!
This book deals with governance in corporations. Direct Democracy is a parallel process more applicable to government.
"Written by the founder of VISA, the largest business enterprise on earth, with 22,000 member institutions worldwide, 750 million customers, and $1.25 trillion in transactions annually. Visionary yet pragmatic ideas about the nature of money, information, organization, and community, and hope for a better future in an increasingly complex and troubled world."
Dee Hock's website
5-STAR ***** Review at Amazon.com
Notes on Birth of the Chaordic Age www.npsnet.com/cdd/outstanding3.htm#hock

Rebick, Judy, Imagine Democracy, Stoddart Publishing Co. Ltd., 34 Lesmill Road, Toronto, Ontario - 2000.
One of Canada's leading feminists and TV personalities overawes us with a wealth of fact and opinion about Participative Democracy, community, and a host of other topics. She tells, almost incidentally, a strong tale about the role of Direct Democracy in her world.
The final chapter of Imagine Democracy www.npsnet.com/cdd/outstanding2.htm#index

Yankelovich, Daniel, Coming to Public Judgement, Making Democracy work in a complex world, Syracuse University Press, Syracuse, NY 13244-5160, - 1991.
"Yankelovich, the Dean of U.S. public opinion polling offers a prescription for strengthening the public's hand in its silent power struggle with the experts. With insights gained from 30 years of research into how public opinion is formed, Yankelovich sees that "creeping expertism" undermines the country's ability to reach consensus on how to resolve crises: such as homelessness and drug abuse, the threat to the environment, lagging educational prowess, etc"
Notes on Coming to Public Judgement www.npsnet.com/cdd/outstanding3.htm#yank
See also Yankelovich, Daniel, The Magic of Dialogue -- Transforming conflict into cooperation, Simon and Schuster, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, NY, NY 10020 ISBN-68485457-0 - 1999. This book is about creating Community at the most elemental level, that of one-on-one-or-more dialogue. It complements his "Coming to Public Judgement", which is about reaching something close to Community at the national level

Alphabetical Listing

 Benello, C. George, and Roussopoulos, Dimitrios, (Ed) The Case for Participatory Democracy, Viking Press Inc. 625 Madison Ave., NY, NY, 100221971
.A collection of Essays by Bookchin, Lens, Kanter, Klynd, Calvert, Oppenheiner, Woodcock and others

 Blondel, J., Comparative Legislatures, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.., one of the Contemporary Politics Series.
A very useful survey of the varieties of legislatures all over the world, it contains some interesting notes on Swiss and other systems as a whole.

Budge, Ian, The New Challenge of Direct Democracy.

Butler, David, Editor, Referendums Around the World.

Coyne, Deborah and Valpy, Michael, To Match a Dream: A Practical Guide to Canada's Constitution. McClelland & Stewart, 1998. 0-7710-2277-8, 165 University Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, M5H 3B8 http://www.fedpubs.com/subject/constitution/match.htm
"It's tough to build a country to match a dream." Pierre Elliott Trudeau
For some two hundred years, we have been debating constitutional questions. What powers belong properly with the federal government and which with the provinces? Is Quebec a distinct society and what, in legal terms, does that mean? In areas of joint jurisdiction, do federal powers take precedence over provincial, or the other way round? Do we have to care?
Exerpts and E-mails with M. Valpy

Desbarats, Peter, Somalia Coverup: A Commissioner's Journal, McClelland & Stewart, Inc., 481 University Ave., Toronto, Ont., M5G 2E9., 1997
The just-retired Dean of Journalism at University of Western Ontario writes a scathing indictment that reads like a thriller. There are many powerful messages in this book:
Canada is far from being a democracy in any true sense of the word;
many elites, including the Commissioners, and many in the armed forces, are disillusioned with the way we are governed;
Desbarats has more confidence in the judgement of the rank-and-file than of the "officer class" -- Major Barry Armstrong being one of the few exceptions;
Deputy minister Bob Fowler does not fare well ...
Despite all of the above, the government prevailed, a sad commentary on the state of our democracy.

Johnston, Richard, et al, The Challenge of Direct Democracy -- the 1992 Canadian referendum. McGill-Queeen's University Press, 1996.
While it may contain more statistical analysis than the average reader relishes, the four authors present a detailed and balanced view of the many intricacies of the Charlottetown referendum. Their comments on politicians using referenda to manipulate public opinion is refreshing.

Linder, Wolf, A Swiss Democracy.

Loenen, Nick, Citizenship and Democracy -- A Case for Proportional Representation, Dundurn Press, Toronto, Ontario, 1997.
A former BC MLA makes "an excellent case for reforming our electoral system as the first priority in revitalizing Canadian democracy and returning politics to the people." David Mitchell, former MLA
Unfortunately this book gives scant attention to direct democracy.

McQuaig, Linda, The Cult of Impotence
Viking Penguin, 10 Alcorn Ave., Toronto, Ontario, M4V 3B2, 1998.
another of her serious exposés that reads like a thriller.
"The popular belief is that we [the Canadian government and the Canadian people] can't have [jobs, social programs etc. ] because of factors beyond our control -- because globalization and technology have left us powerless to achieve them.
 .  .  .  in fact the international community has the tools to regulate the world financial system in a way that would harness its enormous energy to our collective advantage. This was done before - for three prosperous decades after the Second World War- and can be done again  .  .  .  "

Morrison, Roy, We Build the Road as We Travel, New Society Publishers, 4527 Springfield Ave., Philadelphia, PA, 19143; 1991.
The Mondragon Co-operative is a large-scale example of a system that has many parallels to direct democracy.
From its origins forty years ago as an employee-owned cooperative manufacturing paraffin stoves, Mondragon has grown to 160 employee-owned cooperatives, involving 23,000 member owners, with sales grossing $3 billion dollars US in 1991.
Statistics show the Mondragon cooperatives to be twice as profitable as the average corporation in Spain with employee productivity surpassing any other Spanish organization. It has its own bank, a research institute, an entrepreneurial division, insurance and social security institutions, schools, a college, a health maintenance system and a health insurance cooperative. It is focused on relational cooperatives dedicated to the common good.

Plant, Judith and Christopher, (Ed), Putting Power in its Place, New Society Publishers, Gabriola Island, B.C. 1992.
The contributors advocate bringing control back home to the community, where it belongs. Only local people can know a place well enough to make decisions that are ecologically sustainable. Only when it has power can a local community learn from the consequences of its decisions.

Ranney, Austin, (Ed), The Referendum Device, American Enterprise Institute, Washington, DC, 1981.
Extracts from an international conference features contributions from 35 parliamentary experts, many of them famous politicians (U.S., U.K., Swiss ...). A balanced look at the diverse interests of the politicians, many of whom do not favour referendums.

Pue, W Wesley (Ed.), Pepper in Our Eyes, The APEC Affair, UBC Press, University of British Columbia, 2029 West Mall, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2 - 2000.
The contributors, many of them lawyers or prominent in the Inquiry, provide authoritative, diverse, and very readable summaries of the facts surrounding the APEC affair. The dangers to democracy of the alleged influence of the Prime Minister's Office on the RCMP are made crystal clear. UBC Press are so generous with their web extracts and photos that further commentary is superfluous -- http://www.ubcpress.ubc.ca:/featured/pepper.html

Raven, John. The New Wealth of Nations: The Sustainable Learning Arrangements Needed for a Sustainable Society, Royal Fireworks Press, NYC, NY, 1995.
The central problem facing society is still to answer Adam Smith's question about how to empower widely dispersed, and mutually interdependent, bits of information so that they lead to a desirable future. This book outlines the institutional arrangements needed to do this. These will involve radical change in our concepts of democracy, bureaucracy, management, citizenship, science, and wealth.
If Direct Democracy seems like a simplistic step, this book outlines the complexity of the task that lies beyond.
Chapters 1, 4 (Money), and 17 . www.npsnet.com/cdd/nwn.htm
Raven was in Vancouver in April 1998 for "Conversations with Raven".

Ravitch, Diane, and Thernstrom, Abigail (Ed), The Democracy Reader, HarperCollins Publishers Inc., 10 E. 53rd St., NY, NY 10022. 1992.
Distils all the enduring issues of democracy and the rights of the individual into in a fascinating collection of more than 100 documents, essays, speeches, poems, and declarations tracing the rise of democratic ideals and societies throughout the world..

Rees, William, and Wackernagel, Mathis. Our Ecological Footprint: Reducing Human Impact on the Earth. New Society. May 1995. isbn 1550922513
WANTED: At least two unused planet Earths. If everyone in the world lived like today's North Americans it would take at least two additional planet Earths to produce the resources, absorb the wastes, and otherwise maintain life support systems.
"Our Ecological Footprint" cuts through the verbiage about sustainable development and shows how, armed with a pocket calculator, some basic questions, and readily available resources, we can all begin to assess to what extent we are living beyond our means -- or overshooting the ecosphere's ability to cope.
The book contains 17 applications of the analysis. e.g. The residents of British Columbia's Lower Fraser Valley, "appropriate" through trade and natural ecological flows the productivity of an area 19 times the size of their home region.
Review at Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/086571312X/o/002-4921502-9123224

Reich, Robert B. Locked in the Cabinet Knopf, New York, 1997.
Clinton's first Labor Secretary paints intimate pictures of being in power. It is excellent reading and it doesn't sound very democratic.
Review at Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0375400648/6230-7978734-410818

Rifkin, Jeremy. The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era, Putnam Books, New York, 1995.
Also Entropy. 1989. We are in an energy crisis NOW and science can have no solutions.

Ritchie, Gordon, Wrestling with the Elephant, Mcfarlane Walter & Ross, 37A Hazelton Ave., Toronto, Ontario, M5R 2E3, 1997.
A well-written, gripping account of the FTA and NAFTA negotiation processes by one of Canada's top negotiators (Simon Reisman the other). Then a career bureaucrat, Ritchie's blow by blow account of the duplicity of the U.S. negotiators rings true, and he provides insight into the thinking of several of Canada's brightest elitists. Ritchie believes that NAFTA was right for Canada, but seems naively uncritical of the larger issues - in contrast to Robert Reich (above). Ritchie is not a fan of Saul or of David Orchard of CCAFT.

Savoie, Donald J. Governing from the Centre. University of Toronto Press, 1999.
Since Trudeau, Prime Ministers have increasingly transferred power to themselves, weakening Parliament still further and even weakening cabinet, while building up the power of the Privy Council Office and the Prime Minister's Office. A great read, a worrying trend.

Saul, John Ralston. The Unconscious Civilization. Anansi Press, 1995.
CBC Massie Lecture: "Our society ... is conformist and corporatist, a society in which legitimacy lies with specialist or interest groups and decisions are made through constant negotiations between those groups." There are no simplistic solutions. Saul proposes a dynamic balance among 9 factors.
Also Voltaire's Bastards and The Doubter's Companion.
Reflections of a Siamese Twin, 1997.

Wilber, Ken. The Eye of the Spirit. An Integral Vision for a World Gone Slightly Mad. Shambhala, 1997.
What would a truly integral culture look like, a culture that included body, mind, soul, and spirit?
Shambhala's "Ken Wilber Forum" at http://wilber.shambhala.com/

We recommend the books of Ken Wilber because they outline a context in which everything can be held.

Wilber, Ken. Sex, Ecology, and Spirituality. Shambhala, 1995.
An extraordinary work bringing the history of the evolution of mankind and his/er consciousness within the reach of the ordinary reader - with a little perseverance.

Wilber, Ken. A Brief History of Everything. Shambhala, 1996. "It brings the debate about consciousness, evolution, and our capacity for transformation to an entirely new level. More practically, it will save you many missteps and wrong turns on whatever wisdom path you choose to take." Questions and answers based on "Sex, Ecology, and Spirituality".

Wilber, Ken. Grace and Grit. Shambhala, 1993. If "Brief History" is too difficult, "Grace" may be too human - the story of Ken Wilber's 5 year partnership with his new wife Treya, dying from cancer.

Yankelovich, Daniel, The Magic of Dialogue -- Transforming conflict into cooperation, Simon and Schuster, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, NY, NY 10020 ISBN-68485457-0 1999 This book is about creating Community at the most elemental level, that of one-on-one-or-more dialogue. It complements his "Coming to Public Judgement", which is about reaching something close to Community at the national level