The reality is that there has only ever been the struggle of the rich and powerful few against the rest of us, and democratic theory was supposed to solve that imbalance of power by the electoral process. This has proven to be an easily evaded mechanism for the elite, and is not a particularly helpful system at this point.
Today, local governments are clearly instruments used by global private power to pursue the interests of the elite against the will and aspirations of the people.
Our challenge is to develop a new means of addressing the imbalance of power while recognizing that multinational corporations and financial institutions reign supreme over conventional state structures and their sovereignty is unreachable by normal democratic processes. That means, our solutions are not going to be found there.
We also have to recognize that they are not going to cede control voluntarily, and they are not going to disappear. It is upon us to explore strategies by which we can impose accountability and create responsiveness in the institutions of elite private power, so that they will employ the instrument of government, which they entirely control, in a way that reflects our interests and values.