In Today's Jerusalem Post

Today's Jerusalem Post included an article in the "In Focus" magazine section, titled "Power to the people," dealing with currents and undercurrents of electoral reform. You can read it at the following address:

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1188392551714&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/Printer

Among other things, the article describes the work of the people at CEPAC. CEPAC is the Citizens' Empowerment Public Action Committee. CEPAC advocates, among other reforms, the direct election of 60 MKs (half the Knesset) in 60 single-representative districts. The CEPAC web site's "Background and Goals" page, at http://www.cepac.org.il/Site/Site_ViewPage.asp?id=3, states

"Ideally we would like all 120 M.K.'s elected by district (perhaps a future goal) but realistically we feel that the 60-60 split has the best chance of being adopted."

Just because an alternative is easier to achieve in the short term doesn't mean it is the better alternative. CEPAC has good intentions and good people working for it; I know and respect their leaders. However, compromising on vital principals of governance in order to achieve quicker results is not a winning strategy. Such a compromise may nullify any potential gains in public service that these good people are working so hard to achieve. It's worth waiting a while longer, working a little harder, to get it right. It's worth being stubborn.

We, at Shelanu, don't think that the public should have to compromise on principles of true representation. We certainly don't owe senior members of the major parties guaranteed job security as MKs. We believe that all members of Knesset should be elected by the same criteria. We believe that the public should have the last and only say in how it wants to be served, in which form of representative democracy. We believe that the public can bring about the changes it wants if it well organized around focused, principled goals.

We have good reason to believe that such partial compromises will not result in progress towards our goal of the direct election of all Knesset members. When the influence of directly elected MKs is diluted, such that they constitute only half of the Knesset, narrow interests and corrupting influences have a good chance of derailing legislation in the public interest. In the past, we saw an important reform, the direct and separate election of the prime minister, become tainted and then abandoned because of a tragic "compromise" of its applied principle; the cause of government reform was set back over a decade.

Real reforms don't occur very often. If we're going to make the effort to reshape Israel's political culture, there is no point in aiming for the mediocre, no point in gratefully accepting what today's failed legislators are willing to offer. An unsatisfied employer does not let a mediocre employee decide how to run the business. It is time to get serious about reform, time to decide what we, the People, want and pursue it. It doesn't take a PhD to understand the principles of good governance. It does take steadfast determination to achieve worthwhile change.