Announcing the Launching of the Liberal Democracy Nepal (LDN) Forum
April 15, 2005
Dear Friends:
We are pleased to announce the official launch of "Liberal Democracy Nepal (LDN)", a web-based forum for hosting serious intellectual and sustained discussion on the future of liberal democracy in Nepal. A collaborative project with the Nepal Study Center (NSC) of the University of New Mexico that began in November 2004, Liberal Democracy Nepal (LDN) endeavor is governed by a commitment to establishing an open-ended and comprehensive web forum for the airing and exchanging of ideas among a wide range of actors and participants with stake and interest in seeing a successful liberal democracy take root in Nepal.
This project has received support of goodwill and encouragement from numerous notable personalities from Nepal such as political actors, policymakers, members of civil society, grass roots organizations, and the academicians both from Nepal and abroad including an intellectual giant like Professor Noam Chomsky of MIT.
Please disseminate the LDN site among your friends and organizations both in Nepal and abroad. We encourage you to be an active participant by joining the discussion forum and providing constructive comments.
This forum will have the following advantages:
- Web-based, available worldwide and immune to censorship
- Fully non-partisan
- Regularly featured views and analysis from groups and individuals at the forefront of political, social, economic practice in Nepal
- Forum where political leaders, thinkers, activists, journalists, academics, and ordinary Nepalis can interact with and pose questions to each other
- Non-Nepali and Nepal scholars sought and encouraged to participate actively in English (or Nepali)
- Recognizing that before being adopted and enacted reform agendas must be understood and endorsed by political parties and leadership, LDN will strive to involve Nepali political leadership in a continuous series of dialogue with non-politicians over a wide array of issues germane to democracy in Nepal.
In its first issue, we have invited thinkers from the major political parties in Nepal to contribute to this inaugural issue of LDN and to help Nepalis and friends of Nepal make sense of what happened on Feb. 1, why it happened, and what needs to be done to undo the political damage and restore Nepal back to the constitutional democratic path. Distance and post-February 1 communication issues both presented real challenges in reaching out to these individuals in Nepal. Nevertheless, we have tried to garner their views as best as circumstances allowed with the belief that the voices of the political parties deserve wide and public airing in light of the centrality of political parties in re-establishing a democratic order in Nepal.
In future editions of LDN, we will feature analyses and discussion on a full range of subjects relevant in conceptualizing and instituting a liberal democracy in the particular case of Nepal.
Forum and Features
In this issue, the policy makers? opinions are featured under the Op-Ed section of the forum. Dr. R.S. Mahat (NC), Mr. P. Nepal (UML), Mr. P. Rana (RPP), Dr. M. Rijal (NC-D), and Mr. P. Thapa (Jan Morcha) have graciously contributed their thoughts to the current situation in the country.
We encourage you to log on, sign in and give comments to initiate a debate.
liberaldemocracynepal.org
Your active participation will make this project a success. Please follow the simple steps to register and sign on to get email alerts. The discussion under the Op-Ed section is moderated and we expect comments to be professional, relevant, and constructive. The ?Organigram? item on the menu gives you an overview of the LDN project and its linkages.
We also have created an Express Your Opinion section for you to express your opinion on some weekly topic, and this section is monitored but not moderated. The first issue focuses on the Middle Ground that has been collectively proposed by a group of members from the North American Diaspora. Please provide your constructive comments to help sharpen this debate.
Then there is a Question Answer section that allows you to deposit your feedback and questions. Professor Dr. Lok Raj Baral, a noted Nepali scholar and political scientist, has given his thought on the issue of academic Freedom in Post-February 1 Nepal. We encourage you to read the FAQ section to understand the various features of the LDN forum.
Please read the section ?To Contributors? to find out how you can be an active participant and contributor.
Dissemination
The expressed opinion featured in the Op-Ed and a few constructive comments from viewers will be summarized and posted on the Nepal Study Center?s (Department of Economics, University of New Mexico) Digital Space repository (Dspace).
This open access Dspace repository goes out to more than 140 universities around the world and is easily accessible from Nepal as well. The Dspace network is growing very rapidly.
A summary of the Op-Ed issue and the select comments posted on the NSC?s Dspace will also be featured in Nepali newspapers on a regular basis both in English and in Nepali. We look forward to your involvement in this unique and urgent partnership.
And, many others who have given valuable suggestions and support at the January-Conference in Washington DC:
Sincerely,
On behalf of the friends who have endorsed the Liberal Democracy Nepal forum: political leadership, policy makers, academicians, members of civil society members and grass roots organizations, and the members of Nepali Diaspora, including those who have given valuable suggestions and support at the January-Conference in Washington DC:
- Dr. Alok K. Bohara
- Dr. Anup K. Pahari
- Ms. Mallika Shakya
- Mr. Sharda J. Thapa
- Dr. Gaury Adhikary
- Dr. Ambika Adhikari
- Mr. Girija Gautam
- Mr. Arun Sharma
- Dr. Shiva Gautam
- Mr. Suman Timsina
- Mr. Shambhu Lama
- Mr. Naresh Koirala
- Mr. Dilli Raman Dhakal
- Dr. Govinda Koirala
- Dr. Jeet Joshee
- Dr. Shyam Karki
- Dr. Tara Niraula
- Dr. Madhu Ghimire
- Mr. Dilli Chaudhury
- Mr. D.B. Gurung
- Mr. Subhas Darnal
- Ms. Bishnu Pariyar
- Mr. P.L. Bishwokarma
- Mr. Purana Bista
- Mr. Yubaraj Ghimire
- Dr. Murari Sharma
- Mr. Bishal K.C.
- Mr. Puru Subedi
- Mr. Prakash Adhikari
- Mr. Ujjwal Bhattarai
- Mr. Hom Raj Acharya
- Mr. Ratan Jha
- Dr. Pramod Aryal
- Dr. Pramod Mishra
- Dr. Mahendra Lawoti
- Dr. Mukti Upadhyay
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