Perestroika programme in english

You've got to have a program, or there's nothing to fight about. :) Let's imagine for a change that 10 anarchists are going to sit in the Riigikogu (Parliament). Suppose they still give a damn. What might they want?

From an anarchist perspective, the state is a vice - an institution that sprang up from the insufficiency of people's capability to self-organize, and justifies its existence with arguably preventing more violence than it causes. (We can always re-check the latter after some war.)

It is worth noting that state is capable of re-distributing wealth, but generally it is the "ruling classes" which wield influence over it, as a result of which the state focuses on offering cheap protection for property and extensively ignores the concepts of equality and justice. To defend your interests, you generally have to be wealthy.

We think that state should cut down on making people do things. It might as well keep protecting property, but stop doling out that service for free. Defense of private property is worth a good payment in taxes. To ensure it won't bo too much, the extent of state should be severely limited so that the reasons for its creation (mutual assistance and collective defense against risks) might become visible again.

It's clear that we cannot get rid of state quickly at all. Until we figure that out - wouldn't it be nice if a person's customer experience with state would be significantly improved over what Orcs of Mordor experienced with Sauron? :D High in its tower, it can hear no complaint, but sees everything and commands constantly. Started with the best of intentions, it swiftly made a full turn on its axle. Institutional and societal interests have become hopelessly confused. Welcome to modern state! :D

Accountability is part of politics

If a candidate gets elected, they have a moral obligation to show what they did with the power they received, every working day. If they cannot do better, they sit down in the evening and write a 15-minute blog entry, so voters know "how sausage is made".

Change that society can adapt to

As anarchists, we find it necessary to have a word about the rate of change, especially since people expect anarchists to have revolutionary goals. Unfortunately, happy revolutions are quite rare in history and change that goes fast, often goes wrong.

Our preference - of change being predictable and smooth - results from understanding the limits of human adaptability. Shocking someone generally doesn't achieve much good, for which reason posturing and shocking statements ought be discarded as political tools.

Rework the electoral system

Perestroika's recommendations for improving the health of Estonia's democracy are based on the article 'How to use democracy [et]' published by Jaan Veski (pseudonym) in Feministeerium on 25.06.2019.

• Two-chamber parliament + sortition
  

  A permanent elite is an existential risk for a society because an elite can benefit from inter-faction conflict (to gain more power or ardent followers). In a society with a permanent elite, an electable politician must prove themselves to voters, and often enough that happens via conflict - by posturing against another politician. Both can even be great patriots in their own opinion, but regrettably such practise often flushes countries down the tube - because the basic rules of the game are broken. If you can win a game of politics with conflict, politics will attract players who will start it.

  The recipe for grounding risk is simple: sortition, that is, appointment of public offices by lot. Multiple states have used various flavours of sortition (Athens, Firenze, Venice, etc). The downside to sortition however is that representatives picked in this manner can be uneducated or inexperienced. In a parliament formed with sortition, members must work in teams and be assisted by (dreadful ;P) bureaucrats with experience in the field. In one scenario, the first act of a politician selected by lot, is to hire state-funded advisors and start asking experts for opinions.

  As an initial programme, we propose a second house of the Parliament formed by sortition, both houses having a mutual veto over each other. A veto ensures that negotiation will occur instead of steamrolling each other. Two houses ensure that party elites won't pass decisions unacceptable to common people and random folks won't do anything too stupid from a politician's perspective.

• Multiple preference vote
  

  Just like the voters of Eesti 200 can tell you, currently 4.8% of voters are not worth any seat in parliament. Alltogether, the opinion of about 10% of people who did vote, stands unrepresented entirely. To ensure that nobody feels voiceless, a person should be able to cast at least 3 votes in order of preference.

• Negative vote
  

  A politician stirring up trouble has no rightful place in a parliament. To avoid politics turning into a troll cave, a voter should have the right to cast their vote against a politician. In case of multiple-preference voting, this would mean that if the downvoted politician still gets elected, the vote gets transfered to the next preference.

• No party preference lists
  

  A peculiarity of parliamentary elections in Estonia is that party back offices have real power. They can draft lists of candidates and using a compensation mandate, send a person to parliament with merely 10% of votes that a mere mortal would need. This is obviously cheating and party lists should be re-ordered according the the number of received votes.

Business, work, taxes

• It must be possible to open an entrepreneur's account
  

  Sester (IRL) and his colleagues already did the hard work. There is a legal framework in Estonia for a private person to open an entrepreneur's account in a bank, and practise business with zero bureaucracy, if their "company" does not involve capital from other people. Now the surprise: no bank in Estonia will let you open that account. What's the use for them? Another state-linked service to worry about.

  It's pointless of a state to offer a form of doing business that's dependent on banks bothering to support it. Let's bring the banks to negotiate once more. They already follow a million and one rules. Let's agree upon a reasonable deadline, remove some particularly stupid regulations but agree that opening an entrepreneurial account if a basic right. If you want to be a bank, offer it to people along with holding accounts.

• Rework social tax into progressive income tax
  

  Earning passive income (dividend) is taxed lighter than working in Estonia. That is simply unjust. Living off the work of others should not be cheaper than living off your own work.

  As a result, as mentioned in the chapter about health care, the social tax is on really thin ice. More and more people (including us) are forming LLCs (OÜ-s) to avoid paying it. Instead of people with more organizing skill scheming (justifying themselves by saying that risk should bring rewards), a large majority getting taxed unjustly with an income-independent rate of 33% + 20% + 2% + 1.6%, and some people who "fell between the wheels" before reaching pension age getting left without social security and not getting back on feet... instead of that, we propose Estonia should have a good, old, simple progressive private income tax, and automatic health insurance for everyone who bothered to pay it for all their income.

  The author of this portion of the programme thinks that state is never justified to request a person to part with more than half of their gross income. The current rule is: 1000 € gross income, 780 € net income, 200 € income tax + 330 € social tax + ~20 € unemployment insurance = 550 € all taxes. Taxes form 70% of net income, 55% of gross income, regardless of whether you're homeless or a millionaire. Sounds right?

  If their 2500 euros of monthly gross income were to be taxed with a rate of 30% (750 €) in a way that's unfeasible for anyone to avoid, the author of this part of the programme would agree with this and consider the game to be fair. For this money, one could pay some retired person a reasonable pension and do other things. The fact that state wants more, and the total rate is unfair, but one of the two taxes can be avoided (and many do avoid it) even if the downside is losing health insurance (a member of a board pays unemployment insurance for nothing in return), this does not motivate fair behaviour. Motivation drops even more if you know that some people declare their living expenses as business expenditure (the author of this paragraph doesn't practise that, but inversely, pays for smaller business expenses from a personal wallet to avoid bureaucracy, even if it means losing money).

  For comparison, if someone earns 1000 € of gross income, it is entirely unjust to attack them with the current tax rates, or their life will be less fun than in the Middle Ages. They won't even get their teeth repaired. In the Middle Ages, tax rates were more like 10%. Let's make their tax rate 15%, because there were no trams and no free medicine back in those days. If however someone makes 5000 each month, surely they won't wither if their tax rate turns out to be 35%. In our vision, the bigger steps are at the lower end of the scheme and the tax rate of a millionaire and billionaire doesn't differ much. It should be above 40%, but definitely below 50. Maybe we'll see a millionaire then who actually pays their taxes?

  The state is ethically obligated to favour equality, or it won't justify its existence. The invisible hand of capitalism can create inequality well enough on its own.

• Protection of small shareholders
  

  Kovalenko (SDE) already deals with this, we support her goals. It is not normal business, if owning less than half of a company enables you to be steamrolled so that you see no dividends, not even in your dreams, for what you have invested. For people to dare investing in local companies, for capital not to flee to better markets, a small shareholder must be protected against a majority shareholder.

• Favouring workers' cooperatives
  

  Tightly linked with the previous paragraph is the issue of equally owned companies. A cooperative under equal control of its workers is not sustainable before the rights of small shareholders are protected. To become effective anarchists, we first have to be effective petit bourgeoisie. :)

  Let's make it easier for a company that is under equal ownership of its workers. If a company is administered democratically, that company is less of a risk to society. It is less likely for that company to engage in massive fraud, pollution or other unwanted activity. A cooperative is also quite capable of growing big, for example Mondragon (Basque country) moved more money in 2015 than the state budget of Estonia was.

  Administration has to be easier for a cooperative, and competitive edge greater. Law cannot presume that all companies are hierarchical, with few owners and lots of alienated employees. On the contrary, of course we cannot also presume that everyone wants to be a shareholder of their place of work.

  Let's figure it out and describe which conditions must be met and on which scale, for favoured status to become available. If a company is very large, perhaps they don't need favours (large = successful, but likewise large = hierarchical, greater risk). Let's create a small tax advantage for cooperatives. Surely we all wish that people would receive a fair share of the products of their work, and would care about how their employer fares in future?

• Shrink the gender pay gap
  

  The gender gap in salaries in Estonia is big enough to compete with dragons. This kind of a situation will threaten people's well-being today and in future (via pensions). We have to get this inequality shrunk in size, or it will harm society.

  We believe that publication of anonymous per-seat salary statistics is the way to go. You query the business registry for a company and you get an anonymized list of all professions and their salary numbers. You don't guess. You know.

• Robots are coming
  

  Yes, they are. We still have time to determine the conditions. How shall we use their help? Will we build a society where it's strongly advised to be born with a portfolio of automation company shares? Will we slow development or try to direct it? What kind of a tax system is capable of transitioning smoothly to a society where only specialists are needed in some trades, and even specialists aren't needed in some others?

  Does anyone claim that Estonia has realized its full potential in education of adults? Free education ain't for kids only! Adults must also teach each other new trades. Public discussion of this topic is urgently needed. We predict that due to changes in market structure, large numbers of people will be unemployed, but for the time being, many could find jobs in other sectors.

  If however things turn bad, and the possession of the means of production falls in the hands of a select few, then we need more serious measures than education. The current social balance is stabilized by the ability of a person selling their skills to reach a fair bargain with the owner of the means of production. If this stops applying, severe crisis will ensue.

• The "second pillar" is a covert tax, stop this joke
  

  We are with Seeder (IRL). The obligatory pension savings scheme ("the second pillar") is just a disguised tax, of which a large portion goes to "feed the fund managers during winter". State with its power has obligated people to invest their earnings in private enterprise. No, that's not how things work! Pension savings schemes must be voluntary. This scheme must be politely dismantled, allowing people to transfer their shares either to the "third pillar" (voluntary pension savings) or to get their money back.

• Reformed land tax
  

  The current land tax in Estonia is working incorrectly. It should be adjusted to adequately tax the service of owning valuable property that an owner does not personally use. It should gain some properties of a real estate tax, but property that one lives on should be exempted just like currently.

Health care

• Comprehensive health insurance
  

  Kallas (REF) is with us, yield the way! ;P All authors of the Perestroika programme agree that the social tax system is working wrong. At the time of writing this, all of us avoided paying social tax! The very rich have always avoided taxes. If everyone takes up that habit, it will break the financing of health care. This is wrong, we write hypocritically and keep doing it to make our point.

  A general and comprehensive health insurance is needed. It avoids people falling into social traps wherein disease prevents work, and lack of work prevents treatment.

  The authors of the programme would want everyone to be taxed justly, with a tax that isn't practical to avoid, that would bring health insurance to its payers, regardless of their current capability for work, and would be counted as a small contribution to the calculation of future pensions. This tax could be a progressive private income tax. (Help, we lost sight of Kallas! :P Find the political compass, hold the course down and left!)

• Speed of treatment matters
  

  This is a hot issue. Treatment queues in Estonia are dangerously long. Talk of having to wait 4-5 months to visit a specialist are true. At this reaction speed, early diagnostics is impossible and quick treatment isn't either. Results are serious. In our ideal... lay-offs of non-essential officials would continue until pay level in health care makes it possible to visit a specialist in 1 months on average, and a sustainable number of new doctors finish studies each year.

• Early diagnostics saves money and lives
  

  If one can visit a doctor in time, early diagnostics is possible. Let's take for example the early detection of melanoma. Due to the aggressive nature of this disease early detection is hugely cost-effective.

  This however presumes that people can visit a doctor at least twice per year, that their family doctor examines them throroughly (no hurry), is qualified to suspect and doesn't shy away from sending patients to specialists - who are accessible before things turn bad, diagnosis isn't delayed and treatment is fast. A society that regularly checks on health, will save the lives and abilities of its members. Our society has got stuck in this regard, and doesn't develop.

• Prevention (tobacco, alcohol, narcotics) is profitable
  

  Ossinovski (SDE) may let people stone him, but we'd shoot all stones back from a slingshot. It may be currently unavoidable that a person breathes in exhaust gases on roadside, or gets into occasional smogs in Nõmme or Karlova. If however a person voluntarily starts inhaling smoke, we need to deal with advertising, culture and social attitudes. Lots of medical resources would be saved if people smoked less.

  Lots of accidents and unconsidered deeds would be avoided, if people didn't look to change their reality with substances that alter their consciousness too much. Alcohol is our most commonplace narcotic, under the influence if which people act rashly and some turn aggressive.

  Real prevention starts in childhood, with parents and friends offering a positive example. That is better described in our article "Icelandic wonder: why the youth won't drink?". The best prevention is when a person has interesting pass-times, which keep away bad habits.

  However, a plan of action must be twofold. We should not demonize smoking, alcoholic beverages or illicit substances. People have engaged in this folly for thousands of years, ever harming their health. We should talk about how it's possible to drop unhealthy habits, talk of the profit involved, emphasize that asking for assistance is perfectly fine and that a doctor keeps things confidential. For people who seek release from their problems via harmful habits, we should offer better exits from problems. Many can change their own life, but those who've fallen severely must have access to help.

  At the same time, we need to influence the alcohol and tobacco industry, as well as the illicit drug market. Legal merchants must face the fact that these goods cannot be advertised, and are sold from 10:00 to 20:00. Illegal business should be weeded out by legalizing it. A police state only raises the prices of drugs. A state that wants to become drug-free, must compete with the illicit drug market in supply, not only destruction of supply. In addition to prohibiting, one must undercut the price.

  Everyone except teens (because cannabis damages them more than alcohol), should get cheap and good-quality cannabis from an apothecary - after passing an exam on the risks of smoking and safe dosage. (As an exception, members of the board of the Conservative People's Party sholdn't be sold more of anything. Their reality is already sufficiently altered. ;P )

  Harder substances should be available for free within the framework of a monitored quitting program. Please show us a mafia that can stay on the drugs market as an illegal business (at high prices) while free drugs are available on the same market via state-sponsored exit programs. No sane mafia will sell drugs in such conditions, but will find a better business model.

• Caring for relatives is work
  

  Many people don't work, or work less than they optimally could, because they care for sick or disabled relatives. It's not fair to pretend that their work isn't work, or that they don't lose opportunities in life because of helping others. They do. Their work is valuable and must be compensated to them.

• Protection of animals is protection of health
  

  As long as intensive farming of animals in conditions of extreme stress is possible, people have cheap meat on their table. The right of animals to live in conditions suitable for their species, is taken so people could consume more calories than actually benefits their health.

  This situation must be influenced. All farm animals deserve conditions adequate for their species. A bird is living in an A3 sized cage? We cheer because the A4-sized cages were banned? We cheer too early, colleagues. Perhaps, just perhaps, chicken farms with individual cages shouldn't exist, or building them should be much more expensive than now?

  Providing something for cheap at the expense of environment, health and animal rights should be very expensive. The same applies to pigs, sheep and cattle... ...if we really want to eat them, the minimum price to pay for eating them, should be that they live a life worth living before it happens.

  By the way, lots of diseases that infect people too originate from food made of animal products. Many resistent strains of disease are linked to large-scale treatment of intensely exploited animals with antibiotics. We want safety measures against resistant strains of disease to be bolstered on the EU level.

Population and education

• Free education is a fundamental value
  

  We firmly reject all talk of paid education. If a rector cannot properly voice concerns for a university's worries about money, the solution should be finding a new job, not promoting the creation of class society.

  In the US, one year in a public university (which charges a tuition fee) costs only a little less than an average person's yearly salary (median yearly salary). As far as we recall, you needed seven years to become a doctor, less for other professions. It's plain and clear that in that kind of society, if a kid from a poor family has talent, they can practise that talent in a burger kiosk for minimum wage. If however they have ambition in addition to talent, they are already a threat to society.

  The societal result is that in a dog-eat-dog competition-biased society, where the safety valves against inequality (free education, comprehensive medical insurance) are missing, a higher percent of people are imprisoned, than in Russia, China (even during repression of Uighurs) or any Latin American state. Only for North Korea can we tell for certain, that a higher percent are imprisoned than in the "land of the free".

  It's a fact that paid higher education is a door opening onto class society, and every class society lives in great tension, which gets regularly grounded by violence. Believe us, nobody wants to try that out.

  As a sidenote, national minorities have the right to receive education in their native language. We side with Allik (SDE), who wrote a reasonable article about it.

• Aging of the population
  

  Quite obviously, the most direct material impact of the population aging is taken by the health care system and its budget. If progress doesn't occur in that field, we can almost ignore this chapter. If health care works, we can talk about dignity and aging.

  There are no retired persons among the authors of the Perestroika programme, but there is a concern about future. In our society, once a person ages, they must often remain unemployed. In an ever more automated society, this will happen to ever younger people. It's a lot to expect that people no longer define themselves via work. We need to discover ways for older people to find bearable and meaningful work.

  Those ailed by disease need assistants too, since we don't think the prevailing family model can be turned back towards living together in great numbers. Whether those assistants are young people, other elderly people (let's favour mutual aid communes of the elderly?) or robots, we cannot suggest for now. We don't know. We are not the best group to ask about this topic, advise from others needs to be heard.

• Population decrease
  

  The easiest solution against aging of the population is of course population growth. However, population cannot grow more globally, even if it physically could in Estonia. Estonia is part of a larger cultural field, where having children is now a deliberate choice, not an accident or unavoidable thing. That is well and good. Childbirth must indeed be an awaited event, not an accident. A child raised in a family that is ill prepared to raise them, is raised with risk and hardship. Growing up in poverty by the way, increases a Finnish child's risk of engaging in crime by three times (no data about Estonian children).

  For people to decide for raising children, we must make the task safe and bearable, one that won't break your neck or crush the family either. Also, relationships aren't eternal. We can do our best at teaching and coaching people, letting them practise teamwork and cooperation in school, telling them among sexual education that falling in love doesn't last forever, but regardless, some couples who cannot stay together, will have children anyway.

  We take the position that it's better if a relationship broke in civil ways, as opposed to life forcing people together while they grit their teeth. A single parent must be capable of surviving while raising a child. With the question of how single parents survive and raise their kids (or don't), we suggest one should ask from people more competent in the topic, for example the folks at Feministeerium might point out useful sources.

  Others have already done worthwhile things in this field. Compensation upon becoming a parent is a reasonable programme. Child support money in Estonia, is unfortunately trolling people, as well as welfare support. The aliments compensation fund is a reasonable thing, again.

• Civil partnership vs. marriage?
  

  To discuss this topic effectively, we should pay attention to form and content: the content is rights, the form is the name of the union. Who weds people, is part of the formalities too. The right of assembly and cooperation is a basic right of everyone.

  Upon this right are built companies, non-profits, foundations, political parties, trade unions and congregations; relying upon this right one can hold protest marches or strikes. The right of delegation is also a basic right. Using that right we choose political representatives, hire lawyers or notaries, send representatives to negotiate a deal with employers or trust our care to doctors.

  The right to live together and establish a family derives from the same source. It's a basic right of people to decide, and confirm before witnesses, that they love and trust each other and "wish to keep their bread in the same cupboard" and share certain rights.

  The rights shared that way include living together with the partner in their homeland, representing each other in case of illness or accident and not being hindered by lack of documents, and some other, but not irrelevant rights (deciding what becomes common property, declaring income together).

  The form this decision takes, should be no concern of the state, as long as witnesses are reliable and confirm: everyone involved was aware of the weight of the decision and of sound mind, and knowingly made this important choice. A witness can be a notary, a priest of any religion, a shaman, a holder of the holy pasta sieve - what not, as long as they are reliable.

  The essence of the matter should end similarly: the state gets a message with three or more signatures. What label people want to give their life together, is no business of the state. The form to fill should be the same. The rights should be the same.

  P.S. Regarding gender the state should finally acknowledge that it's not a binary choice. What we perceive as binary gender is determined by numerous factors which don't always walk the same step. As a quite remarkable case, a person can grow up apparently female, yet carry a genotype that is male, simply because one gene ignores the signal of another (androgen insensitivity). That is just an example. There exist many more options, many of which science cannot currently explain in detail.

  About gender, ask biologists, nature is interesting! Some fish change their gender in the course of their natural life cycle, while the gender of sea turtles, alligators and crocodiles is determined by the temperature at which the egg develops. The habitual view of gender is just as precise as Newton's laws of motion. Approach the speed of light, and they are inexact. The world is more complex and puzzling than appears on first sight.

  Thus, if a person seriously tells their doctor that their current gender is a burden on them, that it contributes to feeling unwell, and they would like to influence their body, to make it match their identity better - then that is not a time to throw barricades in their way. A person must have ways of doing that, without state commissions or other grandiose nonsense.

• Migration
  

  Migration has always occurred. The force of states has grown so big as to prevent migration, during the past 150 years. The biggest problem of migration isn't that it occurs, but why it occurs, and when it occurs in wrong ways. A person has a fundamental right to choose between states, just like one chooses between communications operators. It is merely unsustainable when very many people get fed up with their state simultaneously.

  Neither is it a person's fault if they were born in a state that goes down the toilet. Why then, do states prevent migration? The answer is clear: living standards are so unequal in the world, that richer states almost fear the inhabitants of poorer ones. Meanwhile, every state wishes to maintain power, part of which is control over their borders.

  Setting borders and limits is not an unilateral act in game theory. Only in law does it appear simple: we ban this! In reality, every ban changes the profile of people who can overcome the ban. Imagine for a chance that you're an inhabitant of Sudan who got utterly fed up with their homeland. To make it to Europe, where life is very remarkably better you must: a) take loans from all of your kin, promising to send back money b) risk your life and freedom, to perhaps reach Libya c) pay the mafia, hoping that they won't rob your money and enslave you d) risk drowning in the Mediterranean and finally e) accept that you won't find a legal job in Europe and must quickly disappear if you see an official.

  Now, suppose you're a person who doesn't like risking, and your profession isn't suitable for practising "in the dark". Will you come? No. Suppose you're a foolhardy young person, who thinks the sea is shallow enough to walk through? Will you come? Perhaps. The first selection influencing the profile of arriving people has occurred. A doctor aged fifty years won't come. Not unless their house is burnt down around them.

  Now suppose that you made it here. Your only potential employer is shady business, your only job - a job you can quietly do behind a corner. Well, there we go. Some people complain that "people come and won't become lawyers". No shit, that is impossible. The legal way is shut. We wish that there would exist a legal, paid way into the EU, consisting of a background check, a lottery and buying a ticket, whereupon language and professional skills get you a discount. Then we won't have to worry about population decrease, only about getting the best possible new neigbours.

  Even the USA, which tends to lack all social security guarantees, has shown that it's bearable to accept *very* many immigrants. Migration shouldn't be feared. One should approach it pragmatically. The profile of arriving people should be influenced. The processes pushing them to arrive should be turned around. Most people do not want to leave their homeland. To trigger migration, either the emigrant's homeland must be a massive pig, or the difference between living standards very high.

  For example, the US started to interest the Irish particularly when famine occured in their homeland and the UK authorities were repressive. The solution to migration isn't making Estonian state a particularly repressive pig that pokes everyone in the eye with its dirty snout. (If that happens to everyone coming, it happens to half of us here.) Neither is the solution organizing some massive crisis here, so nobody would dare to come. :P

Digital and cyber

• Paper as a backup option must stay
  

  A digital society is vulnerable. Occasionally very vulnerable. Among us anarchists, talk has repeatedly surfaced (terrorism! ring the alarm bell!) about whether it's feasible to build a drone that flies over a city and after that, no car will start (VAZ is not a car, the A-Team's red and black GM van also belongs to the category "not a car, thus starts").

  A future where everything is a computer is a vulnerable future, because every computer can be hacked to do something unwanted.

  Every official proceeding must in future also be possible on paper. Elections should preferably occur using paper, because the correctness of electronic voting procedures is in practise impossible to validate. Deciding who won the elections should not rely on blind trust.

  Cash must remain a universal means of payment, any person must be able to pay any company in cash, and every bank transaction should be possible to do with paper in an office. Otherwise we might find ourselves insolvent together, one some very inconventient day.

  Unconsidered and obligatory transition to digital means of communication also threatens the ability of the older generations to conduct public affairs. It is likewise unjust if the state doesn't bothere to support some operating systems and in order to be a full citizen, you need to buy Microsoft software. :P A backup option must always remains. Just like you can lower a lift in an apartment building down the next floor in an emergency, to help your neighbour out, it must continue to be possible to pay taxes, apply for a driving license and go to court with paper.

  Making vitally important services vulnerable due to digital control systems should be prohibited, and such control systems should pass a thorough audit, We want people to think about civil defense, learn about it, and also act to ensure it exists.

• Advertisement and propaganda into school curricula
  

  You are reading this text, because we advertised, that is, spread our propaganda. Someone who calls themselves anarchists (are we as we say? how to find out?) is trying to influence your opinion, occupy your attention and tilt your decisions. Surely you are at least somewhat critical while reading: you weigh whether claims are factual, referenced materials credible and propositions feasible to carry out.

  Unfortunately, there are likewise people who won't: won't consider, won't acknowledge how, and remain uncritical, especially towards claims originating from their cozy everyday information bubble. Emotion sells and spreads better than dry fact, and negative emotion spreads especially well.

  Education about how opinions form in society, how rumours spread, how social engineering works, what is phishing, all that is regrettably underrepresented in school curricula. A skeptical view and critical thought can be learnt and practised, however.

  As a sample of utter decay in critical thought, we might cite the lynchings in India which occurred based on internet rumors. Not without reason were the biggest massacres of human history carried out by people struck blind by the proaganda of powerful states.

  To avoid becoming a pawn of mass maniuplation or a mere victim of scammers, a person must be educated in how that sausage is made. They need to know how propaganda works, how to estimate the credibility of a source, what motivation might a rumour-monger have. A person must also recognize in which social relations they are a customer, and in which relations they are merely a natural resource whose attention is sold to real customers.

Environment and foreign policy

• Climate change and sustainable society
  

  Let's start from the beginning. "Warmed by 1 °C, air can contain 7% more water, amplifying the devastation of hurricanes and floods," writes ERR, citing the IPCC report (advisable to take look at the animated graph showing the distribution of warm and cold years of the last century).

  If only the political Greens are green, that is not enough! The topic must be addressed fast, because the process already moves in a dangerous direction and could be in positive feedback with itself (via release of greenhouse gases from permafrost). Otherwise it's likely that future will give us a taste of our own medicine and for the next generations, that taste may be too much to bear. If a storm won't rip the roof off, or fir trees won't go extinct on this latitude, if there won't be an Õismäe ferry line in the Kristiine bay, we'll still need to deal with exceptional drought during exceptionally many summers, exceptional rain in autumns, strange winters where permanent snow won't arrive, and the results of distant catastrophes (wars, migration, price shocks).

  Surely we'll also get some new parasites and diseases. Globally, it's likely more grim. There are regions where temperature will regularly exceed human limits, including part of India and China's best farmlands (wet heat is unbearable). There are costal cities which must retreat before the power of seas. I don't know what the Dutch are planning, but it's not a party.

  How to react? First, a large portion of our environmental footprint is transport. Having an electric vehicle is only for the rich so far, as before an ordinary apartment house there is no place to charge one. We want to speed up the building of charging infrastructure in houses and on streets. Let's forget the strange Mitsubishi "standard" and put standard one and three-phase charging points where they need to be. We might just as well compensate the entire charging current spent during the next 5 years in 100%. Let them charge for free, as long as the ancient car population of Estonia develops a little.

  We support the extension of wind power generation facilities and construction of a power storage facility. Regardless of whether it's a water reservoir on the edge of a coastal limestone bank (perhaps modeled after the Kruonis pumped storage plant in Lithuania) or an electrolysis plant capable of burning hydrogen in gas turbines, a power storage facility makes it possible to add more renewable generating capacity into the grid. Also, hydrogen can be used to operate cars, and methane produced from hydrogen is even more beneficial for that.

  We support free public transport and increasing its convenience. No further electric bus lines will be cut, and no more buses with internal combustion engines will be purchased by any municipality (hybrids are OK).

  We'll simplify and support traveling by bicycle, as it can both improve people's health (provided that they aren't breathing in half-burnt fuel) and slow down climate change.

  Autonomy of systems is a topic between environment and civil defense. A household or a company that is energetically autonomous is a source of stability for society. Even if the state with its electrical grid accidentally stumbles, someone will stand and can help others. We want to support the planning and building of new houses as autonomous systems.

  The supporting of house companies in renovating old houses to increase their energy efficiency must continue.

  A car tax may disproportionally hit the wallets of people owning less valuable cars who would likely be poor and perceive the hit as even more severe. Unless studies show how a car tax would be unquestionably beneficial, we don't support it, a fuel excise is sufficient.

• De-escalating military risk
  

  Within our possibilities, we wish to support finding a global agreement about prohibition of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and autonomously deciding weapons systems. In an anarchyst society, nobody would possess more nuclear warheads than there are Tallinn-sized cities on Earth. Of course we cannot abolish states from Earth, but it would be progress if states weren't so prepared to abolish the human kind.

  We are not against NATO, but NATO should do what the sticker says, that is, be a defensive alliance and share certain minimum values. It is unacceptable if one NATO member is stomping their Kurdish minority into ground and almost bombs the forces of another NATO member, while democracy has disappeared from that land. We should make noise worthy of vertebrate creatures about this! Allies who don't share values are unlikely to help in real trouble!

  We think it's OK if the EU duplicates NATO in defense cooperation. Why? Because one day, NATO might break down, and it would be a joke to be mighty and sovereign alone then.

  Foreign policy in accordance with principles, not convenience, ought extend to all situations. If some government represses their people, kills or imprisons dissidents, or lets extremists practise extensive violence, that is not an internal matter - they should stop or ask for assistance. Warm relations with such parties are excluded.

  There should be no irreplaceable states. Certain rules should always apply, no matter how big a trading partner or how valuable an ally is involved. If an ally picks a total dictatorship as their ally, they get reminded that it's a short-sighted step.

Power and bureaucracy

• A court is independent
  

  One family party (EKRE) has made lots of noise over their foolish idea of electing judges. No, damn it! If a judge were electable, a judge would have to campaign and advertise their loyalty to something. A judge would become a political position and the separation of powers a memory. Instead of an independent and stubborn court system, we'd soon have the Estonian version of how appointing a judge is a big political game, and some Brett Kõvanahk who's suitably loyal to the current executive powers lies before parliament while sounding like a wounded seal.

  We'll offer a far better idea: judges are drawn randomly by lottery from amongst all inhabitants capable of representing themselves! :) They will pass consultation (every profession isn't for everyone, there are requirements) but the decision to train as a judge is theirs. Existing judges will oversee if they have learnt their job. This is how you do it right.

  Also, the court doesn't co-habit with prosecutors. Just as judge Kunman said in his parting interview, putting prosecution and court into the same house is a strange and hazardous idea. Let's stop this joke. A court and executive powers don't live under the same roof, just like you don't put your toothbrush and toilet brush on the same shelf. If they do, basic psychology will guarantee that they'll feel like members of the same tribe.

• Suppress serial litigation
  

  Estonia's court system and legal sphere is recently being littered by a new phenomenon which could be described as "serial litigation". Perhaps the clearest sample of this effect are defamation suits brought via Robert Sarv, who's gained notoriety by representing public figures about whom people have "had their say" on the Internet or elsewhere. A good sample of how things should not happen, would be the head of the Tallinn cultural department Aini Härm demanding 2588 € from colleagues for a critical letter.

  Sometimes having that say has been actual defamation and requesting damages can be understood. Sometimes however, it has been criticism and the essence of the legal action is suppression of public criticism. We think that a public figure must endure polite criticism without complaint.

  We think that serial litigation should be suppressed in Estonian legal environment. The time of courts is not for wasting. Bringing a civil suit against 50 people should be economically feasible only if damages are sought in an amount that the court will freely specify, for payment into charity or the state budget, or if the lawyer is working pro bono (without economic incentive).

  In all other cases, the fee for filing a lawsuit must grow exponentially in relation to the number of people sued in this case, and by this lawyer during this year - so that no lawyer would specialize in such actions.

  Our goal is that courts would only work on issues that matter, the system wouldn't be burdened by non-issues and the burden of litigation would not be usable as a club to deter polite and reasonable speech. As a side benefit, perhaps then people won't complain of court cases lasting years.

• Bureaucracy cripples, no to bureaucracy
  

  Back in the old times, a person could build a wagon and drive it on public roads - and if they had land, could build a house. These days, the most you can do is perhaps build a motorcycle. A car is already science fiction. Even a full customs declaration can't be filled out in 20 minutes, even if you imported one item. There are over 50 form fields.

  Building a house on your own has been made so difficult, that most people cannot do it. As a result, construction is terribly expensive. A change to release the construction laws somewhat, so a person could build a tiny (up to 20 m2) house without papers (believe us, they won't build bad houses for themselves) or a small house (up to 60 m2) with minimum paperworkd - this has instead produced municipalities which deliberately interpret law wrong, so nobody could build without their approval. Unclear general plans are drawn, municipalities grant themself powers not delegated by law, etc.

  Bureaucracy must be reduced. The extent of laws and regulations may not grow. If something is added, something must be deleted or clarified, made easier or simpler!

  A person must be easily able to do things which they think benefit themself, if these things don't cause any clear harm to others. The scope and definition of public interest has grown way beyond sensible limits. It must be limited severely, as must the powers of a municipal self-government.

• An official holds responsibility for their deeds
  

  At the moment, it is possible that a public official (and their office, standing behind them) deliberately ruin a person's plans (e.g. construction) for years, with no risk to themselves. They can even knowingly make illegal decisions, and it's not punishable before the exceed a rather high threshold. Demeaning a person and wasting a sizable portion of their lifetime with artificial obstacles, which a person must overcome via court, is not considered a form of damage in Estonia.

  This must change. A person who wants to do something that is regulated, already has the motivation to be careful, as their mistakes are punishable. The supervising official however is free from responsibility unless they cause thousands of euros of material damage.

  This balance needs to change. If a public official knowingly makes a wrong decision, that must be an offense that can be sued in administrative court and the official who knowingly made a wrong decision should compensate for any damage they have done, personally, and in case the decision was made collectively, liability should be on those who voted for the illegal decision.

  Using power should require taking care. At the moment, in some departments and municipalities, there exists a perfect circle of defense - "we are the czar and our oprichniks can do anything". No they can't. If somebody picked up power and started waving it around, and hit the other person with their power, it is time to compensate.

• Damage done with property reform will be compensated
  

  It is now 25 years since property reform started. Steamrolling entire groups, new injustice was created for up to 100 000 people.

  The state took from some people their living premises, and gave those to the heirs of people who had owned these decades back. Without inhabitants, these premises would have been wrecks, and indeed, many of them were burdened by loans taken by their owners decades ago. The property was returned, the residents made dispossessed, and the debt forgotten.

  If the residents of returned premises were compensated for the injustice, this chapter in Estonia's history could be closed. Until that is done, it haunts. There are lots of people who can honestly say, that the first thing the Republic of Estonia did was to rob and impoverish them.

Candy for armed offices

• Abuse of power investigated independently
  

  When a cop or other armed service member commits an abuse of power, or illegally conducts state supervision, currently the deed is investigated by the police or prosecutor's office.

  Unfortunately, the police and prosecutor's office are partners in everyday cooperation - their success in work depends on each other. A prosecutor is not motivated to bring to court violations by the police, except for the most severe. The right hand of the state washes the left hand of the state.

  This is, of course, a game theoretic dead end. To investigate abuses of power, there must exist a separate office with independence comparable to courts of law. Only a separate branch of power focused on this task only will be fully motivated to fight abuses of official power.

• A soldier isn't a slave, they come voluntarily and get paid
  

  Slavery was supposed to be a thing of the past ("nobody may be forced to work", "nobody may be denied freedom"). People were supposed to be equal, regardless of their gender and age. Unfortunately the state ignores its principles from the very start. Hypocrisy won't earn it respect.

  For starters, no anarchist is loyal to the Republic of Estonia, but neither are we loyal to any other state. The state didn't create the Earth, but grew up upon it due to people's incompetence. The state is not eternal, and the state isn't always right.

  Compelling every generation of male citizens to attend military service is a form of violence and unequal treatment. Indoctrinating young people with sugar-coated patriotic fiction and nonsense isn't nice either. If the state can't manage without forcing people to serve itself, that tilts the balance against the state being justified.

  Besides, can a state hope that someone whom they threatened with loss of a driver's license (transport is a right, not a privilege) to get them to serve in the military, will actually bother to defend that state against another similar state? Who knows. Should the state believe that a person whose family the state wrecked economically during property reform, respects that state? No, certainly not.

  It's time to understand: not all people love or even respect the state. That's how it is. By assuming blind loyalty, the state makes itself a mere stupid tyrant and loses some people's trust forever. A state can however, make itself possible to understand, and make it easier for people to accept it, by behaving politely. The state may not force people to serve itself. If soldiers are needed, offer them a fair salary for voluntary service, and revise what is taught in the military. Anarchists are not against that.

• A process has limits
  

  A process (administrative, criminal or misdemeanour proceedings, etc) is a way of bringing clarity to a situation. After things are clear, an official from the executive branch makes a decision: either to end the process, set a punishment or raise charges. During the proceedings, the word of an official is obligatory to a person, unless a court defends them. It's not necessary to be a genius to understand: the power balance is strongly in favour of the official. During the process, a person can be obligated to do many a thing, that is not in their best interest.

  To avoid damaging a person's rights too much, law tried to ensure that legal process wouldn't occur in absence of the accused. Even this however, can turn into a parody of evil clowns, for example an enviromental official can indeed ask the police to forcibly bring a person to attend their proceedings, due to unmown lawn. Absurd? Yes. Let's finish it. An administrative official should have no power to regulate activity which doesn't damage anyone, and certainly no power to use force in these affairs. Any sort of police assistance in administrative disputes (e.g. building, parking, etc) should be excluded. If an administrative official wants police assistance, let them prove they need that to a court of law. As for municipal police, we should simply abolish those time-wasters.

  For a process to not last forever, it has deadlines. Unfortunately, some types of a legal process don't have clear deadlines and only court can find that they should exist. Let's clarify this: all types of legal process will have deadlines, if necesary, deadlines linked to the complexity of the process. Let's also make it so, that if a process exceeds its deadline, the official conducting it loses the power to carry on. The process is over. Just like a person loses their right to appeal a decision if they delay, the offcial must lose their right to make a decision if they cannot decide in time.

• Surveillance should be hard, finding the lost easy
  

  Lawyer Oliver Nääs has mentioned that in 2017, a total of 4596 phone calls were intercepted in Telia Estonia's network, while Telia Sweden intercepted 3822 calls (and Telia Finland eavesdropped on 3640 calls). The conclusions are clear: if a country 8 times bigger eavesdrops on less calls, the powers of Estonia are eager users of surveillance.

  Surveillance is permitted in Estonia for most processes run via a prosecutior's office, we don't know about unmown lawns and riding without a ticket. This tap must close. Surveillance should only be possible in case of suspicion of serious deeds.

  On the contrary, surveillance to find lost persons should be easy, possible instantly and witout limits until contact is made, so that providing assistance to a person who might need help wouldn't be delayed.

  Already in 2014, the European Court of Justice decided, that the Data Retention Directive (directive 2006/24/EC) contravenes the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. Estonia has still not removed from its legislation the products of this illegal directive. Communications operators continue to record the metadata of millions of everyday communications sessions, as ordered by illegal law, at the expense of taxpayers. How long? How long until the state bothers to follow its own rules? If people want to be trackable, they can arrange it themselves and easily.

  In addition to surveillance conducted within criminal cases, there is of course spying. Currently, no statistics about data acquisition for spying ever reach the public. While we understand the wish of certain offices to do their things quietly (privacy is a spy's most precious thing, and privacy of the opponent the juiciest target), we still demand regular and honest statistics about the volume of intercepting communications.

  Anvelt (SDE) has proposed an idiotic idea that speed cameras should photograph everyone because people now speed between the cameras, and hold in hand items which aren't related to driving (e.g. handkerchiefs, sunglasses, but also mobile phones). Anvelt, by the way, ignores the well-known fact that deaths in traffic do not correlate to speed cameras, but economic booms - people who hurry take lots of foolish risks. It's a matter of culture and can't be solved with surveillance.

  That can't be called even a Soviet Militia mindset, because that militia didn't have enough film. :P If anarchists would install a herd of cameras on a tree before the headquarters of Security Police, the wailing about unselective surveillance would start next day, and not a day would pass until masked employees of KaPo would be cleaning up with lifting equipment. :) Why should the rest of people in Estonia tolerate mass surveillance? They should not. We'd not buy any more speedcams, no replacement parts either, let them amortize for 3 years and take them down.

• No tasers for cops, not even a piece of wire
  

  We managed to block the introduction of electrical weapons with protests in 2009, but they've now been introduced "by the back door". Let's stop buying them, stop buying spares, and not give the cops even a replacement battery or a piece of wire. Let's make a law that takes effet soon and removes electrical weapons from among police equipment. They can have puncture-proof clothes if they want, that's fine for us.

• Legalize squatting houses abandoned for 5+ years
  

  Squatters are the anarchists' favourite branch of confrontational services. :) Unfortunately, squatting is practically illegal in Estonia and during some panic attack during Euromaidan, it was turned even more illegal, though the law was written stupidly. The law still has gaps, even if they're small.

  The author of this paragraph of the programme has himself squatted a house in 2009, a house abandoned since 1991, but still capable of standing many decades. That house got an "owner" of building title 2013, an owner who had no connection to the previous owner aside from a rent contract. They wanted to demolish, but didn't have enough money for that. Squatters moved out, metal thieves made their second round of work (the first round was in the 90-ies) the the house still stands abandoned. Wonderful.

  It should be differently: if a house has stood abandoned over 5 years, squatters have taken it over without prohibition or resistance by the owner, one month has passed, squatters have installed at least 1 new lock, ensured that the house has all windows and a door that can be locked, and have taken to the house a chair, table and bed, they may notify the local (tyranny/municipality) that they have squatted for themselves a place of living.

  The local (tyranny/municipality) must then take that into account, send the Rescue Department to check the safety of the squat, who will advise the squatters on how to improve the safety situation and may prohibit the activity from continuing if the situation threatens life.

  The owner will be notified that their house has been squatted, and that they can reclaim it via court via a really simple process, but squatters will be given until the first of June to move out, of until the first of October if that has passed (that is, no expulsions in winter).

• Abolish biometric passports
  

  Enough of fun - going crazy with biometrics prevents nothing. The organs of power have no right to consider everyone a suspect. We'll stop issuing biometric passports, destroy the data set of fingerprints collected for these, and pre-emptively ban automatic face recognition in the public space, with a harsh anarchist law. :)

• (Electric) mopeds free of registration
  

  The registration of mopeds is another joke. It was started in 2011 without any good reason. We shall revoke it, but let's be sneaky: to sofly influence people to adopt environmentally friendly transport, we shall only free electric mopeds from the requirement of registration. :)