George Galloway , London, U.K. mayoral candidate who is using block chain technology in running his 2016 campaign, has called for the city to adopt block chain technology to provide full public accountability of government business.
Galloway was scheduled to present his outline for London’s future today at the Railway Tavern in Liverpool Street. He was to be joined by Max Keiser, host of the “Keiser Report.” Galloway and Keiser are promoters of MayorsChain, an initiative to use the block chain for managing government business.
“Since governments spend public funds on shared public resources, the public has a right to transparency,” Galloway said in his prepared remarks.
Now, for the first time, the radically disruptive technology of block chains can provide a technological backbone for true, 100 percent transparency. Political accountability, it seems, is about to take on a whole new meaning.
Galloway claims there is currently no “intrinsic” incentive for governments to make optimal use of their resources and to act for the greater good. “But what would correctly align incentives would be true transparency, and it is exactly this that block chain technology can provide.”
He says a block chain is an immutable, permanent record of data, stored on computers in a peer-to-peer network. The block chain stores data in such a way that anyone using it can prove, mathematically, that the data is a faithful account of occurrences, even if the user does not trust anyone delivering the data.
As such, using block chains to account for government budgetary allocations and spending will enable the public to know exactly how funds are being used, as they are used.
The city could utilize the block chain to manage public budgets that are to be audited collaboratively by its citizens, who share the benefits and responsibilities collectively. “We are calling this model, decentralized city governance by block chain.”
Galloway further noted that due to the decentralized nature of block chains, it is also feasible to enable direct public participation in budgetary decisions more extensively and more securely than before. “Just as payments can be tracked securely and without having to trust that no one has manipulated the data, members of the public may vote for proposals without having to trust that the vote is fair,” he noted. The results of public discussions would be preserved, securely and permanently for all to see.
Any city department could place its budget on the block chain.
Galloway thinks the block chain could be revolutionary for government accountability. “Instead of governance being handled by several elected members and a handful of highly paid in-house auditors, Blockchain Governance allows for it to be handled in a transparent and practical way by an open transparent assembly of voters, through a block chain,” he said.
In a word, blockchains make direct democracy possible in ways that were not previously imaginable, and radically empower the public.
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Galloway said he is partnering with block chain technologies Blocknet and Horizon to develop MayorsChain.
Horizon is a Bitcoin 2.0 platform with a high node count.
The Blocknet, known as the “Internet of block chains,” enables block chains to communicate with one another.
Galloway has launched a fundraising campaing on startJOINcrowdfunding.