How much direct democracy do we want?

San Francisco's current Board of Supervisors redistricting shitshow is slightly more comprehensible if we consider the history of how we got here.

Until 1977, San Francisco was one of the largest cities in the country which elected its governing body "at large." That is, in order to win a seat on the Board of Supes, candidates had to have citywide recognition and plenty of money. This suited the city fathers -- real estate developers and haute-capitalists -- just fine. But people from all over the city agitated and organized for less attenuated representation. In 1976, we passed Proposition T, instituting elections to the board from smaller, neighborhood districts where we might know our Supervisors.

The effect was immediate: in 1977, we got more women; we got Harvey Milk; we got a whole new cast of governing characters. It was a near revolutionary moment of deep polarization -- district Supervisor Dan White murdered district Supervisor Milk and Mayor George Moscone in 1979. In an obscure August election in 1980, the old timers persuaded the tiny segment of people voting to repeal district elections. Progressives tried to reimpose the districts that November, but lost 48 to 52 percent.

And so the organizing to return to district elections began again. This took more than a decade and a half of patient and impatient agitation. Finally, in the November election of 1996, San Franciscans voted to return to district elections, to begin in 2000.

That meant that the city had be redistricted into 11 electoral areas. The progressives who had agitated for district elections feared they could loose the neighborhood power they had been working for if the boundary drawing went badly. We organized some more and built racial, language, and economic coalitions. (I consulted with several groups on this effort.) The redistricting commission largely listened to the organized people. The resulting districts were much like what we've lived with until this year. Then as now, District Six emerged as an arena of contention that, I was once told privately by one of the commissioners, "got most of the leftovers." Also Treasure Island, where, then as now, hardly anyone votes. That map took effect in 2000 and remained little altered by redistricting in 2010.

If I'm to believe the Chronicle, the map that this year's divided redistricting taskforce has come up with won't make much political difference. If I'm to believe Joe Eskenazi in Mission Local, the new map is a power grab by San Francisco's "moderate robber" barons. I have a long history of believing Eskenazi.

And because this is a real fight over political power and spoils in the city, we can be sure this isn't over. Look for a struggle to change the outcome by way of law suits and ballot propositions. This may go on for a few years. For as long as I've lived here, San Franciscans have rallied to local democracy. I don't see us giving up on this because some big wigs cooked the deal.