Does anyone else feel like it's time to go completely with secret ballot when voting on laws and in elections?
Does anyone else feel like it's time to go completely with secret ballot when voting on laws and in elections?
Does anyone else feel like it's time to go completely with secret ballot when voting on laws and in elections?
You know, that might not be a bad idea.
As a supporter of the Act, let me try and address the concerns people have.
1) My opinion on this is that it would do little to nothing to address people's concerns. If we are worried about another region invading, I doubt a week would deter them. If we are worried about creepy pricks like my former colleague then that to would be useless to. So any kind of waiting period would be unworkable.
2) Tyranny of the majority, also know as democracy.
3) Considering that Moot would still have to pass bills and acts, I see no problem. If we want someone else to have veto power, the OA can appoint someone.
4) I always thought abstaining was simple, not a vote for or against, just stating that you don't want to vote.
5) The role of officers can be decided by the OA. My personal idea would be a speaker to organize votes and other things, a vice speaker in case the speaker is unavailable and a whip to bring as many people as possible to vote.
6) Again, we are putting the cart before the horse, a COC can be decided by the OA.
I think an Open Assembly is the best way forward for all of us. If the people want more discussion or another way, however, I will oblige. I just wanted to get my two cents in.
No more bandwagoning? People being free to vote however they want without being judged?Does anyone else feel like it's time to go completely with secret ballot when voting on laws and in elections?
You know, that might not be a bad idea.
What would the benefit of this be?
No more bandwagoning? People being free to vote however they want without being judged?Does anyone else feel like it's time to go completely with secret ballot when voting on laws and in elections?
You know, that might not be a bad idea.
What would the benefit of this be?
You want to change human nature?
As a supporter of the Act, let me try and address the concerns people have.
1) My opinion on this is that it would do little to nothing to address people's concerns. If we are worried about another region invading, I doubt a week would deter them. If we are worried about creepy pricks like my former colleague then that to would be useless to. So any kind of waiting period would be unworkable.
2) Tyranny of the majority, also know as democracy.
3) Considering that Moot would still have to pass bills and acts, I see no problem. If we want someone else to have veto power, the OA can appoint someone.
4) I always thought abstaining was simple, not a vote for or against, just stating that you don't want to vote.
5) The role of officers can be decided by the OA. My personal idea would be a speaker to organize votes and other things, a vice speaker in case the speaker is unavailable and a whip to bring as many people as possible to vote.
6) Again, we are putting the cart before the horse, a COC can be decided by the OA.
I think an Open Assembly is the best way forward for all of us. If the people want more discussion or another way, however, I will oblige. I just wanted to get my two cents in.
1) I do agree that the waiting period really means little, just as post count does, in that department. Someone could be active for a week, and then leave the region forever. Same goes for a month.
2) No, North. We're speaking of people who are afraid to speak up because the majority opinion is essentially the "only" opinion that matters. Otherwise known as peer pressure or bandwagoning simply because you're afraid to go against the majority of voters. That's something we don't want in the OA since it should be something where EVERYONE'S opinions matter.
4) It's supposed to be simple, but it never has been...especially concerning bills that require a majority.
I don't even know if I want to stay here anymore.I don't think that anyone is really happy at the moment, but it is just one incident...does that take all that I hope has been good since you joined the region? I hope not, and I would miss you if you left. :(
As a supporter of the Act, let me try and address the concerns people have.
1) My opinion on this is that it would do little to nothing to address people's concerns. If we are worried about another region invading, I doubt a week would deter them. If we are worried about creepy pricks like my former colleague then that to would be useless to. So any kind of waiting period would be unworkable.
2) Tyranny of the majority, also know as democracy.
3) Considering that Moot would still have to pass bills and acts, I see no problem. If we want someone else to have veto power, the OA can appoint someone.
4) I always thought abstaining was simple, not a vote for or against, just stating that you don't want to vote.
5) The role of officers can be decided by the OA. My personal idea would be a speaker to organize votes and other things, a vice speaker in case the speaker is unavailable and a whip to bring as many people as possible to vote.
6) Again, we are putting the cart before the horse, a COC can be decided by the OA.
I think an Open Assembly is the best way forward for all of us. If the people want more discussion or another way, however, I will oblige. I just wanted to get my two cents in.
1) I do agree that the waiting period really means little, just as post count does, in that department. Someone could be active for a week, and then leave the region forever. Same goes for a month.
2) No, North. We're speaking of people who are afraid to speak up because the majority opinion is essentially the "only" opinion that matters. Otherwise known as peer pressure or bandwagoning simply because you're afraid to go against the majority of voters. That's something we don't want in the OA since it should be something where EVERYONE'S opinions matter.
4) It's supposed to be simple, but it never has been...especially concerning bills that require a majority.
I am a representative of everyone. I was elected by the people. Every time I proposed anything, I first put it up on the Citizens Platform to see public opinion. I saw exactly 6 people discuss what I thought was the best chance of compromise. Only 2 posted more than once.
Hell, the debate on the Act in the Citizens Platform was pretty much the same, a bunch of people posting once or twice, basically stating an opinion for or against and no more than 8 people being involved in the actual discussion.
Your worried about the Tyranny of the Majority? Quite frankly I don't think that people are involved in policy discussion anyway. The OA was one way to get people involved. Part of the reason why I think Robin, Laurentus and, I will admit, myself are so pissed is that when we ask people for opinions, few respond. When we go ahead and do what we wanted, then people come crawling out of the woodwork to criticize and, in some cases, belittle.
Maybe we shouldn't have a OA anymore. I thought that it would be the best way to serve the people. But now I'm not so sure anymore. Because I now think if everyone is asked to govern together chaos will ensue.
I don't even know if I want to stay here anymore.
Laurentus this isn't real life.This past day could have fooled me.
Laurentus this isn't real life.This past day could have fooled me.
Pengu, with all due respect, there's a difference between the workings of an online court system and this, since this system has constant debate and tempers that flare.
Everyone needs to relax. While I have been away most of the day as tensions came to the surface mainly due to IRC discussions because of IRL and my dad bothering me, this negativity had also turned me away as I am starting to catch up on things.Laurentus this isn't real life.This past day could have fooled me.
Pengu, with all due respect, there's a difference between the workings of an online court system and this, since this system has constant debate and tempers that flare.
That doesn't mean we have to throw away any idea of a civilized debate between people in a setting to where everyone feels comfortable chatting.
Yes, people get heated, most definitely. But if this is any indication as to what we're going to be facing in an OA where debates like this are going to be constant, then it's going to fail miserably.
One person is already talking about leaving, and you're talking about taking a break from Wintreath. Is that really what we want to look forward to if the OA comes to fruition? People leaving the forums or taking LOA because they can't handle the pressure (something we DIDN'T like about the UH's practices)?
Again we have so few people even bothering to comment.I don't know about other people, but I'm not commenting because frankly, I feel that the government isn't the main focus of Wintreath and so anything could work. The current system, while it can be viewed as broken, still stirs up activity every other month, and gets things done when it needs to. An open assembly would also work, as long as people are willing to contribute when necessary. But there are far more important things in Wintreath than the government, like the growing cultural events, and Wintreath will probably survive and thrive either way.
As a supporter of the Act, let me try and address the concerns people have.1) Ok, so what would you suggest instead?
1) My opinion on this is that it would do little to nothing to address people's concerns. If we are worried about another region invading, I doubt a week would deter them. If we are worried about creepy pricks like my former colleague then that to would be useless to. So any kind of waiting period would be unworkable.
2) Tyranny of the majority, also know as democracy.
3) Considering that Moot would still have to pass bills and acts, I see no problem. If we want someone else to have veto power, the OA can appoint someone.
4) I always thought abstaining was simple, not a vote for or against, just stating that you don't want to vote.
5) The role of officers can be decided by the OA. My personal idea would be a speaker to organize votes and other things, a vice speaker in case the speaker is unavailable and a whip to bring as many people as possible to vote.
6) Again, we are putting the cart before the horse, a COC can be decided by the OA.
I think an Open Assembly is the best way forward for all of us. If the people want more discussion or another way, however, I will oblige. I just wanted to get my two cents in.
We actually had a lot of these debates during the original Constitutional Convention, and these were some of the points raised...along with my own thoughts, especially where we didn't have these debates.1) See my answer to North - the week waiting period doesn't seem like the best way to do it, but either way if this was an issue that was settled it no longer is, as I've seen people complain about security concerns since the Act went up for ratification.
1) This is something I even encouraged discussion about, so it was not 'cast aside' as not important. It's just that most people who participated felt that it did more harm than good. I'm not really opposed to some measure, but I don't see the purpose of a one-week waiting period. It's not going to deter any serious region or organization from infiltrating the region if all they have to do is to wait a week before can start voting. If we must have some sort of requirement here, I would support an activity requirement over a 'waiting' requirement.
2) I'm not sure you can legislate away this problem...to some extent is's a problem with all democratic governments, but it may be a larger issue here in Wintreath since our culture places emphasis on consensus decisions. You can have a longer debate period, but this Convention had months of debate and discussion and that didn't avoid the problems that arose today. At times the Underhusen has also been apt to expedite debates and vote on legislation, even when it wasn't necessary to do so. I'm not sure the solution for this problem yet, but I don't think it's something that any legislation can fix on its own.
3) The current version is actually the result of a compromise...if I remember correctly it was 2/3 to begin with, but after some people suggested an absolute veto this was the compromise. I don't personally really care, although of course I like 3/4 just fine, lol, but there are some people who want a strengthened Monarchy in the region, and this compromise was a nod to them.
4) How about we vote aye if we support it, nay if we don't support it, and abstain if they are neutral toward it like it pretty much is already? If people absolutely don't want to vote, they could just...not vote. It's not as if voting is required or there's some punishment for not voting, even for those in the Storting as it is.
5) I don't know what they would do, but it seemed like a good idea to have a system in place to allow the option for other officers if they were needed. When the Underhusen started it was just the Speaker, and then the Speaker Pro Tempore was written into the Procedural Rules, and much later the Secretary position was written into them. Arguably, even without the system written into the Fundamental Laws, the Storting could still create officer positions by modifying the Procedural Rules...so it may be unnecessary, but not due to lack of potential use.
6) If there's a concern about things being changed on a whim, perhaps the solution is to make it more difficult to change the Procedural Rules instead of putting them directly into the Fundamental Laws. Don't forget that besides being ratified, amendments require approval from the Monarchy...just seems kinda odd to have veto power over Procedural Rules as an extension of that. :P
I like a lot of what your saying, @Weissreich, but I have a couple of thoughts.Good points all round, so here's my response (numbered based on paragraph breaks in your post):
We could make it 15 posts, we could make it 1500, a dedicated raiding region could and would still infiltrate us, hell, I got 15 posts by applying for citizenship and opening a QnA. No measure we make would really address the issue and would only serve to alienate potential Citizens. Which is why I am against any form of a requirement, be it length of citizenship or number of posts.
I happen to agree with a "Devil's Advocate" position and would introduce legislation to create a "Loyal Opposition" position in the OA.
I agree that we might need someone to be a legalise expert. I disagree that they should be elected.
The definition of a ABSTAIN VOTE is being discussed so that is no longer a issue.
Other than that I agree.
Actually now that I'm thinking about it again, I would actually be in favor of a small post requirement -- not as a security measure, but to make sure the citizens are even minorly dedicated to the region.Yeah, the more I think about the idea of a post requirement the more I realise its use as an activity/dedication measure over it's application as a security measure. The idea of a Whip Officer has already been suggested, but by your count 50 is far more manageable and I'm very in favour of the suggestion.
If you look at the "Citizens" group at the bottom of the home page, you'll see that we currently have 102 citizens, all of whom would currently be part of the OA. If you sort by posts, however, you'll see that only 37 have more than 15 posts, and only 32 of those have been active in the past three months. Add the rest of us who have other positions (UH, OH, Riksrad, Paragons), and the OA would consist of about 50ish people, which is much more manageable. If we had a whip (or just something to account for all the members who vote or whatever), having this small requirement would be very helpful.
Yeah, the more I think about the idea of a post requirement the more I realise its use as an activity/dedication measure over it's application as a security measure. The idea of a Whip Officer has already been suggested, but by your count 50 is far more manageable and I'm very in favour of the suggestion.Raising it to 30 would remove 6 people, while lowering it to 10 would add 9 people. I personally think 15 is good.
Would 15 posts be acceptable? Should it perhaps be as high as 30, or as low as 10?
Raising it to 30 would remove 6 people, while lowering it to 10 would add 9 people. I personally think 15 is good.Fair enough then, does anyone else have any thoughts on this 15 post requirement?
Hmm..Honestly, if we're allowing people to participate in debates with the only thing the 15 post count requirement preventing being actually voting on proposals, I don't think we'll push anyone away. Most people I'm sure can understand the merits of an activity check before they're fully integrated in the region, and it might well help us retain more of the 1-post citizens we get applying every so often :)
As a security measure a requirement is useless but as a measure to check activity it would work. I just worry about pushing people away.
Eh, Honestly I don't think that's a good idea Wintermoot.
The main reason are that it won't help bandwagoning, it may actually make it worse because people that are afraid of speaking up will not, and then be denied a voice. Also someone may not post because of the fact that someone else has already said what they think, and possibly done so better than they could (or feel they could), as such they don't respond to not make a 'useless' post or to simply repeat something already mentioned.
Further if the ability to debate is something that can be taken away be the OA, then that would block someone out completely, because they were both unable to debate and unable to vote, when one could just have something to temporarily remove them from the OA...
Is it at all possible to have some sort of area of the forum where all posts are anonymous?
@WeissreichThat doesn't really paint you in a positive light going forward all things considered :p
There will ALWAYS bee rule-lawyering from me...as long as we have rules I will lawyer them and be their lawyer :P
I'm still of the opinion that security measures aren't really necessary. It's very unlikely that Wintreath would come under any attempt to influence it due to the fact that it's a UCR, has a vibrant community, and has a legislature with little to no authority on gameplay and foreign affairs issues. And to be honest, I don't think Wintreath is on anyone's radar except for the occasional outside rant about us 'hoarding' Govindia.Eh, just reflecting the issues I've heard/seen/had raised with the Act as it stands. If there's something we can do to make the region more secure, surely it should be done? I mean, you hold founder status still, so it's not like we're really at threat at all, but more safety isn't a bad thing :p
1. The Winter Nomad shall be regarded as the Founder of Wintreath, and shall hold root administrator status on all official off-site Wintreath properties.
2. The Winter Nomad shall have the sole authority to appoint subordinate administrative officials on any official Wintreath property, and invest in them any administrative powers as he or she believes is necessary.
3. The Winter Nomad shall hold this position until he or she resigns from it. Upon resignation, The Winter Nomad shall have the authority to appoint his or her own successor, and shall hand the root administrator accounts for all Wintreath properties to the successor upon them taking possession of The Winter Nomad, unless the root administrator is tied to a personal account used outside of NationStates.
4. The Winter Nomad and all subordinate administrative officials shall be responsible for protecting Wintreath properties from any content which is illegal, violates the terms of service of the provider of the Wintreath property, or otherwise brings harm to the region or community. Actions taken under this responsibility shall supersede the Declaration of Rights.
5. The Winter Nomad and all subordinate administrative officials shall also be responsible for the maintenance, organization, security, and technological development of all official Wintreath properties. No government official shall be empowered to make decisions in any of these areas.
7.1 Understanding that the majority of the defence of our region falls in the hands of the Monarch, this Act allows the Monarch to, with evidence, impeach any citizen of Wintreath with due suspicion of wrong-doing.Wintermoot is currently both our founder and Monarch, which means that as long as he remains with us, we should be safe. The Storting doesn't have executive power anyway, and can't do much. While it is theoretically possible for Wintermoot to appoint an untrustworthy successor, a small activity/post requirement wouldn't help with such an issue anyway. (Not to mention that, as some people have pointed out, Wintreath is unlikely to survive in its current form without Wintermoot.)
7.2 The Monarch has the right to supercede [note: potential spelling error?] the court process in extenuating circumstances such as war or invasion.
ACTUALLY the Storting has a hell of a lot of power in theory. It just doesn't use it. This is because of the Necessary and Proper clause in Article I, Section 10. This theoretically allows the Storting to assume power over executive authorities, and certain executive authorities have been granted to the Monarch, such as Citizenship.Yes, but also in theory, the Winter Nomad can also revoke suffrage/citizenship for Storting members he/she deems a threat to the region. So in practice, if the Storting were to exercise that power, they would still be kept in check by the founder.
However the theoretical abilities of the Storting under the necessary and proper clause would likely never be used, because of the fact that no one here is crazy enough to try to do that (well that can be elected to the Underhusen) and the Overhusen wouldn't let that occur. (The only way this would be possible is with a Storting with a super-majority that is purposefully acting that was, and overrides the Overhusen a lot...which would lead to a bit of a mess..)
Also, Chanku - it's rogue. Rouge is a colour and a type of make-up thing, I believe.:P
In which case, I'm surprised the security issue was raised in the first place. As that's very obviously dealt with, what do people suggest on any of the other points I've collated? Any ideas for how to improve things? If you're going to poke holes in something, please at least try to provide an alternative suggestion or a way of rectifying said holes poked in things.
Also, Chanku - it's rogue. Rouge is a colour and a type of make-up thing, I believe.
In addition - if you voted "Bicameral Legislature as per a post I will make in this thread", and didn't make a post in this thread, congratulations. Excellent work as always :p
Yes, HOWEVER I have serious doubts that Wintermoot would ever do that, even in the case of a 'rouge Underhusen' as Wintermoot does seem to prefer doing things according to the laws of the region, and not to use his power.Source? We have seen Wintermoot use his executive powers several times before when necessary, so I am not sure where this doubt stems from.
K m80.
@Lychgate: You're a relative newcomer to the region, so I'd just like to know your thoughts in general. What would you like to see?
There'd still be Speaker elections. Tough ones. I started out in a region that only conducted business on the RMB too. Let me tell you, it's always a mess. I highly doubt the OA was the chief reason for the region's failure.Gonna agree with Laurentus here, I think RMB's do not make for a conducive atmosphere for political happenings :p Having a proper forum means the organisational side of things, if done properly, can be taken care of easily and will keep the OA working efficiently (if combined with good Proc. Rules/CoC)
K m80.
@Lychgate: You're a relative newcomer to the region, so I'd just like to know your thoughts in general. What would you like to see?
I had a NS nation from a long time ago, and was in a region (that CTE'd, unfortunately) with an Open Assembly-type form of legislature. It was living hell. Every day, I would be greeted with someone filibustering on the RMB (they didn't have offsite forums) and at least three different people opposing the bill because "I DO WUT I WANT". While I doubt that this would be the case here, I think that the idea of a smaller legislature, e.g. the current Storting, would be much better for the region. With elections, we could make sure that those who have an interest in regional politics had access to get involved with them, and those who weren't could stay out if that is what they so desire. In my opinion, Storting Elections are part of what makes Wintreath...Wintreath (or at least the one I've been in). Again, Nay.
Well, with so many likes it can't be wrong. :P I'm curious, what led to the development of such a system in Cynosure?I was pretty much the sole creator of the Constitution as it stands, minus subsequent amendments. My personal interest in direct democracy, and my basis of setting up the region with relation to how the Galactic Republic functioned in Star Wars, were the founding pillars in the creation of the Senate.
When I founded the region, I designed the Constitution to specifically lay out exactly how the Open Assembly (which Cynosure calls the Senate) would work. While it probably would be set out differently in Wintreath, it has worked rather successfully for Cynosure.I quite like the idea of an opt-in Open Assembly; that way, those who're interested can of course be involved, but those who aren't interested aren't there never voting or discussing things. I think it's a fair assumption to make that there'll always be those in regions disinterested in politics, and making it opt-in means the OA will (hopefully) only have active and interested members participating.
Citizen's can apply to become a member of the Senate, and those that do instantly gain access, providing they have been in the region for two weeks. They can also gain access prior to this two week probation with support of the Senate Manager (equivalent to the Speaker) or the Councillor (equivalent to the Monarch). This separates the citizens into two camps; those interested in participating in the legal side of the region, and those not. As Cynosure is primarily a roleplay region, the majority of citizens simply come on to roleplay rather than participate in law, so the Senate contains a subset of citizens.
The Senate specifically has three phases when passing law. Phase 1: Proposal Phase, involves Senators proposing an act with the idea of getting two co-sponsors to move it into the main body of the Senate. This is to ensure that the basis of the law is sound and has at least a small support.I actually really like this system - it's simple, ensures that laws being discussed are not only sound but necessary as well and ensures that law that goes up for debate and eventual vote is supported to some degree. I'm not too sure on the whole registering on bills thing, as I'd rather have everyone able to discuss proposed law once it passes the first stage, but maybe something like that could work. The third stage is pretty obvious, and with some timing alterations I could see a system like this working here.
Phase 2: Debate Phase, lasts a minimum of three days. During this phase, Senator's register on the act by motioning to either vote, hold or table. The Sponsors (the three Senators who introduced the act) are automatically considered registered and need to motion to move things forward. This is important, because when there is a 100% motion to vote of all registered senators after the three day minimum period, the vote automatically moves to a vote by, and only those who are registered on an act are eligible to vote on it.
Phase 3: Vote Phase, lasts four days or until everyone has voted enough to make it pass. The Senate requires 2/3 approval of all registered voters. The idea behind registration is that it further cuts down the size of the Senate to allow only those interested in a particular act to vote on it.
Now, that's the basics, and I suspect in Wintreath's case it'll work completely differently. My point here is not to bring this phased approach over to our Open Assembly, but to showcase a working Open Assembly in a different region. Given Cynosure's focus on RP, and the lack of focus on gameplay, the Senate offers a very relaxed atmosphere. It's only really used when needed, and even then it works on consensus, so that the outcome nearly always has the support of the region behind it. If done right, an Open Assembly can offer a far more cohesive outlook towards legislating.Obviously this would need alteration and adjustment to fit into Wintreath's unique set-up, but I think this has a lot of potential for fixing some of the issues people seem to be having with how the proposal sits at the minute (as well as other concerns people have about voting in general).