In some countries around the world, it is
usual practice for politicians running for election to declare their manifesto
of their intentions if they are voted into office.
We don’t do this in Australia (at least,
it’s not called a manifesto) and the UK they do.
I really like the idea of this. It’s upfront,
public and ideally as potential voters we have a public record what is being
promised. It’s all about being open and transparent.
The big challenge with this is that running
a country is a complex thing and there are lots of issues to be covered. And
not all of as the general public are able to decipher what is being pledged and
whether this is a real or even realistic opportunity.
This manifesto is the summary of what was
said by the Conservative Party for the 2019 UK general election. I think it’s a
great article by iNews.
I like the neat summary and I even more I
like the personal comment rating the chance that this pledge is likely to be
kept.
The Startup Manifesto was created by nine
leading European entrepreneurs:
Zaryn Dentzel, Founder and CEO of Tuenti Daniel Ek, Founder and CEO of Spotify Kaj Hed, Chairman, Rovio Entertainment Lars Hinrichs, Founder and CEO of Hackfwd Martin Lorentzon, Founder and Chairman of Spotify Joanna Shields, CEO of Tech City UK Reshma Sohoni, Co-Founder and Partner of Seedcamp Boris Veldhuijzen Van Zarten, Co-Founder of The Next Web Niklas Zennstrom, CEO of Atomico
Purpose
A manifesto for entrepreneurship &
innovation to power growth in the EU
Manifesto
Headline
Help internet-driven economic growth
transform the lives of millions.
Preamble Opening
Economic conditions in Europe remain hugely
challenging with the European Commission forecasting that euro-zone GDP is set
to shrink by 0.4% this year. Yet the growing importance of internet-driven
economic growth could transform this picture by helping improve the lives of
millions of people providing them with new jobs, new skills and renewed hopes
for a better future.
Key Recommendations
Drawn from the combined experience of
dozens of Europeans who were lucky enough to imagine, build and grow successful
businesses — businesses that created thousands of jobs — we have distilled 22
actions which, taken together, can give European businesses the best chance of
future success. We now call on entrepreneurs, investors, advisors and other
stakeholders across the continent to engage in this dialogue and share their
views on the manifesto to help move us towards the adoption of this singular
digital growth plan for the EU.
Our recommendations are:
1. Education & Skills
Make teachers digitally
confident and competent to rise to the challenge.
Teach our children the
principles, processes and the passion for entrepreneurship from a young age.
Encourage university students
to start a business before they graduate.
Prepare graduates for a
radically different marketplace.
Encourage large companies to
provide training for the general public.
2. Access to Talent
Turn Europe into the easiest
place for highly skilled talent to start
a company and get a job by rolling out a pan-European Startup Visa.
Make it easy for companies to
hire outside their home countries.
Make it easier for companies to
let employees go.
Bring the best brains back
home.
3. Access to Capital
Increase private and
institutional investment in startups.
Make it easier for high-growth
companies to raise capital through public markets.
Buy more from smaller
businesses.
Institute an E-corp: a new type
of cross-European corporation.
Tax share options as capital
gains, not income.
4. Data Policy, Protection & Privacy
Revise and normalise data
protection laws.
Remove the requirement for data
providers to store information in any given country.
Make government data public.
Make governments think
digitally.
5. Thought Leadership
Initiate a mentality shift
across Europe in terms of how we define success.
Appoint a Chief Digital Officer
for every country in the EU.
This is an excellent manifesto. Well
thought, clearly written with some strong action points. But there is one thing
that was a recurring thought for me as I read this:
What’s in a name? A lot.
What you call your manifesto is crucial. It
will shape how people will relate to what you have to say. In particular, it
will determine whether you can attract people’s attention to even pay attention
to your manifesto.
The ‘Startup Manifesto’ is a good name. But
in my opinion, it’s not a great name.
It’s a good name because it describes what
it is. But it’s not a great name because it doesn’t fully share the power of
the vision they are creating.
Essentially, what the authors are
suggesting is that if the governments of the EU fully invested in
entrepreneurship and startups then the economic potential would go from 0.4% to
a predicted 8% and as high as 18%.
This is not about startups. That’s just how
you get there.
Let me say it this way. When you tell your
friends you’re going on holiday, it’s unlikely that you will talk only about
the type of plane you’ll be riding in to get there. No, it’s more likely you’ll
talk about the more exciting thing, which is the destination you’re heading to.
I don’t see this as a black and white rule.
There are times when you want to stop something (Stop Uranium mining) so your
title and manifesto should reflect that. At other times, it’s more likely that
you will focus on the aspiration, the goal, the vision of what the future will
look like.
While I love startups and have worked for
myself for most of my life, when I read this manifesto the thing that stood out
was the possibility of a digital Europe. Or even better ‘Startup You’. (Maybe
that’s a bit cute, Startup EU). Or perhaps Startup Europe might work.
Even though this was written in 2013, I
wish Australia had a document like this!
PS: I would have added a visual – at the
least a visual for the cover of the document.
The Universal
Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is a milestone document in the history of
human rights. Drafted by representatives with different legal and cultural
backgrounds from all regions of the world, the Declaration was proclaimed by
the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on 10 December 1948.
Purpose
As a response to the atrocities that
happened during World War II, the UN decided their current charter was no
sufficient. This declaration of human rights was the updated response.
To create “a
common standard of achievements for all peoples and all nations. It sets out,
for the first time, fundamental human rights to be universally protected.
This declaration is generally viewed to be
the foundation of International Human Right Law
Manifesto
The manifesto consists of a preamble and 30
Articles. Below is a selection. Download the full list at the UN source link
below.
Preamble (Selection)
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity
and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is
the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human
rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of
mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of
speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the
highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to
be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny
and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the
development of friendly relations between nations,
Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY
proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard
of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every
individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in
mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these
rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to
secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the
peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under
their jurisdiction.
Articles (Selection)
Article 1 – All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Article 2 – Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.
Article 3 – Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
Article 4 – No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.
Article 5 – No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Article 6 – Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.
Article 7 – All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.
Article 10 – Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.
Article 13 – (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Article 14 – (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. (2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 15 – (1) Everyone has the right to a nationality. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.
Article 19 – Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Article 30 – Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
The Black Panther Party originally formed
in 1966 in California to monitor the behaviour of members of the Oakland Police
Department because of suspicions of police brutality in the area.
They evolved into a revolutionary political
party with a strong presence during the period of Civil Rights disputes, mostly
in the United States.
Purpose
The Ten-Point Program, officially known as
The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was outline the ideals and aspirations
of the Black Panther Party. It’s a combination of a Bill of Rights and a
Declaration of Independence.
Manifesto
The 10 Point Program has two parts that
both have 10 points: What we want now and What we believe
We want freedom. We want power to
determine the destiny of our Black Community.
We want full employment for our people.
We want an end to the robbery by the
white men of our Black Community. (later changed to “we want an end to the
robbery by the capitalists of our black and oppressed communities.”)
What we believe
We believe that Black People will not be
free until we are able to determine our own destiny.
We believe that the federal government
is responsible and obligated to give every man employment or a guaranteed income.
We believe that if the White American business men will not give full
employment, the means of production should be taken from the businessmen and
placed in the community so that the people of the community can organize and
employ all of its people and give a high standard of living.
We believe that this racist government
has robbed us and now we are demanding the overdue debt of forty acres and two
mules. Forty acres and two mules was promised 100 years ago as redistribution
for slave labor and mass murder of Black people. We will accept the payment in
currency which will be distributed to our many communities: the Germans are now
aiding the Jews in Israel for genocide of the Jewish people. The Germans
murdered 6,000,000 Jews. The American racist has taken part in the slaughter of
over 50,000,000 Black people; therefore, we feel that this is a modest demand
that we make.
The two parts of the Black Panther 10 Point
Plan showcase two important parts of a manifesto, one of which is usually
included in the typical vision and mission statements and the other is usually
missing.
The first part ‘What we want now’ is the
usual fare. It includes specific and concrete outcomes. Most businesses focus exclusively
here.
The second part ‘What we believe’ is often
included in social manifestos but not corporate or business visions.
I believe (yes, I’m using my own framework)
that most corporates focus on earning maximum revenue for shareholders. That’s
their true reason for existing.
I don’t have a problem with that as an
objective. What I do have concerns about is that this is not publicly stated.
The challenge here is not the goal; it’s
the engagement of the people that are employed to achieve these goals.
There is a lot of research that suggests
that the vast majority – anywhere from 60-80% of employees – are disengaged
from their work.
In my opinion, this has less to do with the
actual work and more to do with the context they are operating within – the
meaning or the beliefs of why they are doing what they are doing.
There is an old story of three men working
on a construction site. One is stacking bricks; another is building a wall and
the third is building a cathedral to celebrate God. While they may all be doing
the same work, which one is more likely to be inspired by what they do?
The Black Panther 10 Point Program provides for both the ‘physical and the philosophical’ needs of it’s followers. If you want to inspire your people in your workforce you might want to consider both sides of this equation too.
More
Related: The Hate U Give – The Black Power 10 Point Program is mentioned several times in this movie
Adolf Hitler was a German politician and
leader of the Nazi Party. He was Fuhrer or leader of Germany from 1934 until
his suicide in 1945. He provoked World War II by invading Poland in 1939.
Purpose
Mein Kampf was written as a launchpad for
Hitler’s political career. Many potential leaders – for example US Presidential
candidates – continue to use this strategy to launch their campaigns.
Hitler wrote these books while interned as
a prisoner for political crimes. His intent was to share and strengthen his
position within the German Socialist Party.
The book was a best seller in Germany in
the 1930s and by the end of World War II, about 10 million copies had been sold
or distributed in Germany – including a copy for every soldier fighting at the
front.
Interestingly, when he became Chancellor of Germany in 1933 he distanced himself from his writings suggesting they were mere “fantasies behind bars”
Manifesto
Mein Kampf translates from German into
English as either ‘My Struggle’ or ‘My Fight’.
Hitler’s manifesto was published as two
volumes – one in 1925 and one in 1926. It has been suggested that the second
version was written because he believed that the ideas in the first volume were
misunderstood. They are part autobiography and part political ideology.
The primary thesis of Mein Kampf is his
belief of “the Jewish Peril” – a conspiracy by the Jewish people to gain world
leadership. This follows his first encounters with Jews when he moved to Vienna
and his growing hatred of them. He also shares his disdain for Communism.
From this base, Hitler also proposes a “New
Order” for Germany that includes military action and hints at the genocide of
the Jewish people.
He also shared his intent to completely
destroy the German parliamentary system because he believed it was corrupt.
The books were banned in many countries and
in some cases remain so. In Germany, their copyright laws enabled the book to
pass into the public domain in on January 1, 2016 – 70 years after Hitler’s
death in 1945.
This is one of the great examples of the
potential sharp edge of a manifesto. They are often offered as a statement of
belief and this means not all of us are going to agree with all of them.
They also show the awesome power of a
strong manifesto, which can equally be used for both good and evil.
Creator: Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie wrote the song “We Are The World” as a charity single in 1985. It was performed by the supergroup USA for Africa and sold over 20 million copies. The project was instigated by Harry Belafonte and Ken Kragen who selected Jackson and Richie to author the song.
Purpose: The song was created to support African famine relief and followed from the success of Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?”
We Are The World Manifesto
There comes a time when we hear a certain call
When the world must come together as one
There are people dying
and it’s time to lend a hand to life
Their greatest gift of all
We can’t go on pretending day by day
That someone, somewhere will soon make a change
We are all a part of God’s great big family
And the truth, you know,
Love is all we need
[Chorus:]
We are the world, we are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
So let’s start giving
There’s a choice we’re making
We’re saving our own lives
it’s true we’ll make a better day
Just you and me
Send them your heart so they’ll know that someone cares
And their lives will be stronger and free
As God has shown us by turning stones to bread
So we all must lend a helping hand
[Chorus]
When you’re down and out, there seems no hope at all
But if you just believe there’s no way we can fall
Let us realize that a change can only come
When we stand together as one
Purpose: “to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.”
Manifesto: Declaration of the Occupation of New York City
As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.
As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.
They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless nonhuman animals, and actively hide these practices.
They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.
They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
They have donated large sums of money to politicians supposed to be regulating them. They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantive profit.
They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. *
To the people of the world,
We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.
Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.
To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.
Creator: David Harsanyi, is a nationally syndicated columnist, including Blaze.com and Editorial Manager at Mercury Ink. He is the author of Nanny State: How Food Fascists, Teetotalling Do-Gooders, Priggish Moralists and other Boneheaded Bureaucrats are Turning American into a Nation of Children.
Purpose: To end to a corrupt Wall Street.
Manifesto
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men, women, and transgendered—and any other human who is able to elude the tyranny of work for a couple of weeks—are created equal. We gather to be free not of tyranny, but of responsibility and college tuitions. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that a government long established and a nation long prosperous be changed for light and transient causes. So let our demands* be submitted to a candid world.
First, we are imbued with as many inalienable rights as a few thousand college kids and a gaggle of borderline celebrities can concoct, among them a guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment and immediate across-the-board debt forgiveness—even if that debt was acquired taking on a mortgage with a 4.1 percent interest rate and no money down, which, we admit, is a pretty sweet deal in historical context…
…but down with the modern gilded age!
We demand that a Master of Fine Arts in musical theater writing, with a minor in German, become an immutable human right, because education is crucial and rich people can afford to fund unemployment checks until we find jobs or in perpetuity, whichever comes first.
We demand a minimum wage of $10, no … make it $20. We earned it. And we demand the end of “profiteering,” because there is no better way to end joblessness than stopping the growth of capital. We also demand a maximum wage law, because selfish American dreams need a firm ceiling.
We demand the institution of direct democracy, because if a bunch of people say it’s OK, it’s OK. And everyone deserves to have his or her voice heard. Except Mr. Moneybags, who we demand stop contributing his own money to candidates we disagree with, to issue groups we loathe, and to lobbyists who do not work for organizations featuring “Service,” “Employees,” “International” and/or “Union” in their title.
We demand the end to bailouts and corporate subsidies, unless we’re talking about companies that feature sunflowers or sun rays in their logos, because that’s the kind of morally gratifying institution we approve of, and thus, they should totally be fast-tracked and bailed out with your money to bring the fossil fuel economy (“the economy”) to an end.
We demand the end to a corrupt Wall Street (“Apple” “your 401(k)”) because banks hold too much power. We demand that government consolidate authority so that elected officials can make prudent choices for us. All that cash in banks was printed by the war god Mars and has nothing to do with the voluntary deposits by ordinary Americans, so we do not consider this theft.
We demand the end to corporate censorship, because if we can’t force private news organizations to run the types of stories with which we agree, there can’t be a healthy democracy. So actually, we demand the end of all corporate news organizations in the name of free speech.
We demand the end to health profiteering, because everyone knows that all the wondrous and lifesaving advances in modern medicine were invented in the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos. Smart people work for the good of humanity, not because they’re greedy.
We demand these rights because of the mass injustice of being able to freely protest against racism and corporatism without any real fear of imprisonment in the most diverse city on earth. And to the wiseguy who walked by the other day and claimed that I’d be writing this manifesto with a quill pen on parchment paper if it weren’t for capitalism, we have two words for you: Koch brothers. Think about it.
This is the fifth communiqué from the 99.9 percent. We are occupying Wall Street, and we’re not going home until it gets really cold.
Creators: Ana Sofia Suarez used to be a rights activist for the indigenous Zapatistas in Mexico. She has also worked on global justice in India and west Africa. Shimri Zameret is an Israeli peace activist. He was imprisoned for two years for refusing to serve in the Israeli army; he helped facilitate G8 protests in Italy, Germany and Japan.
Purpose: To shift from the imbalance of world power from the few to the many and create a new vision for Global Governance.
Manifesto
On 15 October 2011, united in our diversity, united for global change, we demand global democracy: global governance by the people, for the people. Inspired by our sisters and brothers in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Bahrain, New York, Palestine-Israel, Spain and Greece, we too call for a regime change: a global regime change.
In the words of Vandana Shiva, the Indian activist, today we demand replacing the G8 with the whole of humanity – the G7,000,000,000.
Undemocratic international institutions are our global Mubarak, our global Assad, our global Gaddafi. These include: the IMF, the WTO, global markets, multinational banks, the G8/G20, the European Central Bank and the UN security council. Like Mubarak and Assad, these institutions must not be allowed to run people’s lives without their consent. We are all born equal, rich or poor, woman or man. Every African and Asian is equal to every European and American. Our global institutions must reflect this, or be overturned.
Today, more than ever before, global forces shape people’s lives. Our jobs, health, housing, education and pensions are controlled by global banks, markets, tax-havens, corporations and financial crises. Our environment is being destroyed by pollution in other continents. Our safety is determined by international wars and international trade in arms, drugs and natural resources. We are losing control over our lives. This must stop. This will stop. The citizens of the world must get control over the decisions that influence them in all levels – from global to local. That is global democracy. That is what we demand today.
Today, like the Mexican Zapatistas, we say “¡Ya basta! Aquí el pueblo manda y el gobierno obedece”: “Enough! Here the people command and global institutions obey!” Like the Spanish Tomalaplaza we say “Democracia Real Ya”: “True global democracy now!” Today we call the citizens of the world: let us globalise Tahrir Square! Let us globalise Puerta del Sol!
