Frequently Asked Questions

The Independent Parties of America (IPA) is proposed as a new grouping of numerous independent parties in American politics. Its foundation is the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights, held as the highest law of the land and as the shared property of every faction within it. Its method is a body of practice called holistic management, adapted from the working landscape to the way people govern themselves.

Its one requirement to run is not wealth, family name, or famous backers. It is authorship: to run on the IPA ticket, you must have helped write your community's own statement of how it wants to live. Start at the home page, or read the book.

A community context is a written answer to three questions: how do the people want their lives to be, what has to be produced to live such lives, and what must the land, water and soil look like hundreds of years from now. No candidates, no parties, no policies. Consensus, not compromise.

Write yours on the Register a Context page. Registered places appear on the context map.

Because the requirement to run on the IPA ticket is authorship, not wealth or a famous name. People who helped write a community context may run on the ticket. The community votes, and its elected representative carries the context to the next table up: city, county, state, nation.

Seven honest questions, run in order, judge every policy a candidate creates or votes on. Most proposed laws fail at question one. A decision that passes all seven is usually a good one.

The questions are set out in Part Three of the book, alongside the community context, the candidate's burden, and the fail-safe clause.

Every policy carries a fail-safe clause written in advance: the moment an unintended negative consequence is confirmed, the policy is void and must be re-debated from scratch, in public.

What was missing is a written statement the board can be held to. A community context is that statement: three questions answered in your community's own words, by consensus, written before the next decision arrives.

Once it is on the public record, any proposal can be run against the seven honest questions in order, and a fail-safe clause can be written in advance so the decision reopens the moment an unintended consequence is confirmed. The next election then turns on authorship: who helped write it.

Register your community's context Read the method in the book

A $10 filing fee covers steward review and the permanent public record entry. Your draft is saved in your browser while you write, and the public copy goes live after the stewards verify your filing reference.

Registration starts on the Register a Context page.

The book carries a fifty-state annex: real ballot access rules for all fifty states, each with its sources. The Sources page lists the primary links for all fifty states so you can check any entry yourself. Summaries are drawn from Ballotpedia and each state's own election office. Rules change; verify before you file.

The Independent Parties of America (IPA) is proposed as a new grouping of numerous independent parties. It is not one more party added to the two that already exist, and it is not affiliated with, funded by, or endorsed by the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, or any existing third party.

Its foundation is the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights, and its candidates must help write their own community's context before they can run.

The digital edition is $4.99 and the paperback is $12.98. Both carry the same edited text: 80 pages, 11 chapters, and a fifty-state annex. Checkout happens on the Order page, and the digital edition arrives by email in minutes.