‘Athens’ on the Net By ANAND GIRIDHARADAS Published: September 12, 2009 PERHAPS the biggest big idea to gather speed during the last millennium was that we humans might govern ourselves. But no one really meant it. What was really meant in most places was that we would elect people to govern us and sporadically renew or revoke their contracts. It was enough. There was no practicable way to involve all of us, all the time. The headlines from Washington today blare of bailouts, stimulus, clunkers, Afpak, health care. But it is possible that future historians, looking back, will fixate on a quieter project of Barack Obama’s White House: its exploration of how government might be opened to greater public participation in the digital age, of how to make self-government more than a metaphor. [...] Continua: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/weekinreview/13giridharadas.html