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***Tsunamy*** · 02-08-2016, 12:08 PM

This post has probably been a long time coming, but I haven't quite had the balls to make this case. However, in light of recent activities and discussion, I think it's really important to make the case now

We need to have an non-executive delegate. And possibly Vice Delegate. But we'll come back to that in a minute.

I've been mulling this over now, so a bit, and I think having elections for delegate is really the root of our problems. It opens the door to manipulation, sure, but more importantly it open the door to mistrust. If the delegate goes rogue, we have little means of recourse. Sure, we can engage in a long, drawn out battle, as we were ready to do in the latest instance. We would have likely won that battle, but that's never a certainly. This has only increased our mistrust of each other.

According for these suspicions, let's look at a few pointed moments in TSP over the past few years.

Operation Brave Toaster — Yes, we're all sick of it. But, the kernel at the center is that Bel didn't trust Uni and GR. The fear was that if they rose to power in TSP, they would take it fully defender and there would be no way to return it. I'm not making a judgement call on the merits of Bel's view, or defenderism, but this was the fear. If this happened — and because we have an incredibly open system, it could — Bel feared the precussions.

Wolf, "The Empire" and Citizenship Issues — Last year, we had a disputed election over the MoFA and resolutions to reject all applicants who might have been associated with "The Empire." Again, the fear was that if we welcomed these people into our system they would be able to manipulate it and ultimately seize control.

The recent dispute — I'm purposefully choosing not to call it a coup, but, again, this whole situation comes down to mistrust. Imki didn't trust that Glen was processing citizenship's correctly, while there was a dispute over the legality. Further, however, was the idea of trusting Hile to undertake a massive change in the laws and restore democracy. The region was, ultimately, at his mercy. In other situations this might have worked, but for a lot of reasons, Hile didn't have the complete trust of the community (myself included), which ultimately undermined this action.

So, my points here are two fold.

First, trust is — by far — the most important thing in this community. We can argue and vehemently disagree, but we need to trust the system, first, and the people in power.

Second, I believe the way to do this is to establish a long-acting delegate who is non-political and can intervene if the situation becomes dire. This means separating the delegate from the election cycle, and allowing the a Prime Minister (or something akin to that title) to dictate policy and such.

This fixes the situation on two levels. First, the delegate will have plenty of influence and can make sure the laws are followed. Second, now with regional officials, the PM can have, essentially the same power. As such, we can still have open and free elections, without the constant fear of the region being ripped out from under us.

Admittedly, this would need to be a very trusted member of the community. But, TSP is ripe with examples of this being able to work. LadyRebels, htz, Fudge and CR — for history buffs — all come to mind, as does Southern Bellz, B&N, Bel, Kris and — most recently — Feir. (And, I'm sure I'm missing people.)

This falls over into the forums, as well. We've often had debates over who should be admins and/or how we can trust admins. Back in the day, delegates were given admin power. And, that wasn't a problem since delegates were well trusted. It wasn't a political position or one that varied often.

I'm not saying this will solve all of our problems. There were still disputes and there were still accusations of misusing power. But, it gave us a solid backstop to know that TSP would remain TSP even with new people coming into the region.

It made the region more open less stressful because it wasn't a zero-sum.

-tsunamy
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**Belschaft** · 02-08-2016, 02:43 PM

The idea of trying to return to a system of government closer to the origins of the Coalition, with a longer-serving apolitical Delegate, was a core part of the various reform proposals flowing around on the other forum. I know that Cormac has a particularly impressive looking draft based on ideas several of us discussed.

_{Minister of Media, Subversion and Sandwich Making}
^{Associate Justice of the High Court and Senior Moderator}

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Zak6858 · 02-08-2016, 05:06 PM

I'm not too sure about it, and I'm not a very 'political' person, but if this was executed correctly it might work.

I am Zadiner/Zak. Part of Assembly, some other stuff, Founder of some other region.
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Rach · 02-08-2016, 05:27 PM

This is the system Balder uses and it's worked extremely well. You can then have all the political fighting you could want and it would never damage the region like a coup. Of course, this means that the delegate has to be picked carefully.

HEM · 02-08-2016, 05:42 PM

I think this idea has promise. I have proposed a conflicting idea that the Delegate and Prime Minister share day-to-day power and work to counteract each other in different ways, which I also see as a solution, but I like this as well.

Formerly Relevant, Currently Former.

Rach · 02-08-2016, 06:37 PM

I personally feel to have the focus on a PM type position is superior to having a split focus as it can lead to apathy. People are more likely to -want- the PM position if it has all the governance goodies rather than a mixed bag.

**Belschaft** · 02-08-2016, 07:06 PM

Plus, it reduces the likelihood of Delegate-PM squabbling.

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~~Cormac~~ · 02-08-2016, 08:35 PM

As Bel indicated, I have a draft that basically pursues this idea of a head of state Delegate with limited in-game responsibilities, and a Prime Minister as head of government. My draft would see the Delegate have one year terms and the Prime Minister would have four month terms.

I will be posting my draft shortly.

(This post was last modified: 02-08-2016, 10:02 PM by Cormac.)

W. Charlesfort · 02-08-2016, 09:20 PM

there are certainly a few nice thoughts in it

Omega · 02-08-2016, 10:15 PM

I highly support this from a view of separating the game from the government approach which I think is essential to maintain the health and stability of the government in the long term. I believe I also had a very detailed proposal on this on the zeta forums that laid out a couple of other changes to the executive branch.

Above all else, I hope to be a decent person.
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