CoI: I am currently Founder of Meihua, citizen of Lazarus, and administrator of Forest. I can provide more details as well as a full history of NS participation upon request.

Hi everyone — 

I’m Somyrion — also known as Aumeltopia on gameside — and I’m your current Minister of Foreign Affairs. I’ve also held the position of Minister of Military Affairs, as well as Local Councillor, and I’m an active participant in the Ministry of Regional Affairs, so I know almost all aspects of this region quite well! I’ve endeavoured to serve the South Pacific as well as possible in this past term, and I’d like to ask for your support for another term. My tenure as Minister these past three months has taught me quite a bit, though, and I’m excited at the prospect of being able to put some new ideas and tweaks into practice and pursue some new goals!

I’m going to start right now with the concrete goals that I have and plan to accomplish with the Ministry. I believe that the best way to ensure that things in one’s campaign are actually carried out is to set specific steps to achieve, rather than drifting aimlessly on twenty paragraphs of ideology. I will, however, follow these goals with a bit of an explanation on my foreign affairs outlook, as that is certainly important in its own right.

First, here’s a summary of some of what’s been accomplished in the Ministry this past term:

• Replacement of the dysfunctional MoFA Team system with a Committee system, enabling newer members to be involved in Ministry management positions and organizing all Ministry functions into purpose-built channels. There are currently nine active committees, all established since the start of the term, including ones on Embassy Auditing, Foreign Update-writing, a WA project, and more.
  
• A new gameside embassy with Europe
  
• Debate on new embassies with Wintreath and South Pacific
  
• Closure of an inactive gameside embassy with Kennan
  
• The publication of a Guide to Being an Ambassador
  
• Assignment of at least nine new Ambassadors
  
• The institution of game-side polling on opening or closing embassies game-side, allowing those who prefer the RMB to discord or the forums to have a say in Foreign Affairs changes which directly affect them
  

All in all, the MoFA is quite a bit more organized and functional than it was at the start of last term. Now that the last term has laid the groundwork, it is time to move even further upward towards a FA ministry which can use that basis to produce content, further increase engagement, and handle diplomatic situations even more efficiently and appropriately.

I’d like to incorporate some operational changes into the Ministry’s planning:

• Planning for repeated events or duties to occur every week. I’ve found that setting a standard that specific duties must be carried out at specific intervals, instead of just “whenever we get to them”, aids in making sure that those duties are done. I have several ideas for weekly or near-weekly events.
  
• An increase in the use of polls. Amerion’s January Assembly poll was quite helpful in letting me know what regions people wanted more relations with — and in fact many of them were ones I was already thinking about! I immediately fast-tracked the pursuit of those embassies, and now we have Wintreath and South Pacific on the table in the Assembly. In hindsight, I should have done this more often all term long. While the Ministry can’t always reveal the nature of sensitive diplomatic discussions while they are happening, we can make sure that in those discussions we are always acting on the real interests of TSPers as expressed by themselves in polls, Overall ministry policy will be decided by South Pacificans’ votes all term long, not just in this cabinet election. So prepare for me to use polls like the Chair uses pings!
  

Should I be reelected, I intend to accomplish the following: 

• Right now the Ministry is right in the middle of working on several projects, including one with our new embassy region Europe, one more gameplay-related which I’d like to present to the Assembly as soon as possible, and the potential WA project which Glen-Rhodes alluded to. Felis and I have already discussed some ideas for the Europe event— we were actually planning on proposing it for this week, if cabinet elections had not gotten in the way! We were thinking of doing trivia on each region’s RMB, music-sharing on discord, and so on. I’d love to work with whomever is elected Minister of Regional Affairs on this. 
  
• Starting with Europe the week after cabinet elections conclude, and then Wintreath and South Pacific should they be accepted by gamesiders in weeks 2-4 of the term, I’d like to instate a tradition of a “new embassy party” in which we and each new embassy share our regional traditions with each other on discord and the RMB. (Spreading Geoguessr around the world, anyone? )
  
• The Europe event would also kick off a weekly “RMB cultural exchange” program. One day a week, the Ministry would encourage RMBers to introduce themselves and chat with members of a specific embassy region on their RMB. (Of course, fair warning would need to be given to that region to ensure they’re prepared!)
  
• A further-down-the line idea would be to do a WA/endorsement event with TNP and Europe, to tie in with SWAN. The three of us are all top WA regions, and I think we’d each be able to contribute a lot and gain a lot. Prarie also mentioned this, but a potential agreement between the three of us might be a long-term goal to work towards if these first events turn out well.
  
• I’d like to experiment with a program of “RMB Ambassadors” for the gameside community, if the Local Council and RMBers as a whole showed interest. RMB Ambassadors would be active TSP RMBers — preferably people who aren’t on discord— assigned by the Ministry to one of our in-game embassy regions, to watch and take part in that region’s RMB very much like Ambassadors do for the whole region. They would then report back not to the Ministry on discord, but to the TSP RMB as a whole, and we might be able to collate a publication for RMBers with a list of what’s going on in all the embassies. I am imagining this to be quite a bit less formal than an actual Ambassador position, sort of like the Reserves in the SPSF.
  
• I will endeavour to carry out a weekly AMA simultaneously on discord and the RMB.
  
• Among larger regions, I’d like to look at restoring relations with Lazarus, the West Pacific, further relations with 10000 Islands and Forest, and continuing strong relations with all our allies, as well as the current new embassies Europe, Wintreath, and South Pacific. A couple other regions that South Pacificans have mentioned an interest in are The Internationale, Pacifica, and The Western Isles, and I’d like to open a poll on those to gauge interest.
  
• Unless unexpected events come up, I have no plan to decrease the number of our allies. 
  
• At present, several of the FA committees include only the Cabinet and whatever representative is present from another region. In order to help train enthusiastic new Ministry members, I will rework those “closed” committees so that each one includes a newer person, and will make a point of encouraging that person to take part in the discussion going on in the committee. 
  
• Although I can claim no credit for it, I fully support the idea Roavin put forth in his campaign of making Ambassador reports more public and accessible. (Any legislator who is in the MoFA server currently has full permission to view the #foreign-affairs-updates channel where Ambassador reports are made, but creating a collated dispatch and forum post with the reports would help as well.) 
  
• I will restructure the forumside Ministry application process. Right now, there is only an application for Ambassador, so someone who wants to participate in FA committees but doesn’t have the time or interest in being an Ambassador has no place to apply. Instead of the current thread, I will set up a new application to join the Ministry as a Member (which is already a distinct masking on discord), with the ability to select interest in being an Ambassador — or in any committee — which can then be used by the MoFA Management Committee to find the appropriate place for the applicant.
  

There will certainly be more along the way. If you have any questions, please, please ask them!

(I’ll put up a Part II on my FA / gameplay outlook in a bit, bear with me! )

~ Aumeltopia ~

Raccoons are bandits! First they steal your food . . . and then your heart/identity!

(This post was last modified: 02-06-2019, 06:59 PM by Somyrion.)

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Just a note: I realise that some of these questions may come across as pointed but I think given that this is essentially a job interview, candidates should expect to be grilled ...

Replacement of the dysfunctional MoFA Team system with a Committee system, enabling newer members to be involved in Ministry management positions and organizing all Ministry functions into purpose-built channels. There are currently nine active committees, all established since the start of the term, including ones on Embassy Auditing, Foreign Update-writing, a WA project, and more.

What is your evaluation of the Committee system? Would you say that it has been a success and if not, how do you propose to improve it?

Assignment of at least nine new Ambassadors.

Your opponent, Glen-Rhodes, recently had this to say in his own campaign:

... The renewed ambassador corp, if we’re being honest, hasn’t really trained any of its members. Giving informational updates in the MoFA Discord isn’t preparing anybody for the real work of being the next Minister ...

What is your response?

The institution of game-side polling on opening or closing embassies game-side, allowing those who prefer the RMB to discord or the forums to have a say in Foreign Affairs changes which directly affect them

I do very much approve of this

...and the potential WA project which Glen-Rhodes alluded to ...

I take it then that Glen-Rhode's activity (quoted below) was done so at your urging? I confess, when I read his statement, I was mildly surprised given the lack of communication by the ministry on such an initiative.

... Additionally, this past term I have been in talks with our allies about cooperation in the World Assembly.

snip

While I was glad to see the number of activities the ministry undertook over the last three to four weeks, I do question the timing. Certainly, it was heartening to see you leap into action with some of the programs you have outlined in your campaign but there were two if not three months prior when the ministry seemed at a standstill. I suppose my question is why should I vote for you when new blood such as North Prarie and Glen-Rhodes (who is new in a way) could potentially be more active throughout the whole of their term rather than the weeks preceding an election?

Edit:

Lastly, do you intend on continuing your previously outlined policy of disengagement with NSGP?

(This post was last modified: 02-07-2019, 02:45 AM by Amerion.)

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- Is the Cabinet as a whole aware of that "gameplay-related project" you're alluding to?
- Can you explain why you think TSP and TWP are not close at this time?
- In which way do you think we should be involved in the APC-NPO war?
- Is there anything in the campaigns for Prime Minister candidates over which you expect there to be conflict should both of you get elected?

Reply

Thanks for all the questions!
 

Replacement of the dysfunctional MoFA Team system with a Committee system, enabling newer members to be involved in Ministry management positions and organizing all Ministry functions into purpose-built channels. There are currently nine active committees, all established since the start of the term, including ones on Embassy Auditing, Foreign Update-writing, a WA project, and more.

What is your evaluation of the Committee system? Would you say that it has been a success and if not, how do you propose to improve it? 

The Committee system has definitely been an improvement over the MoFA Team. It's allowed the Ministry to stay more organized and keep track of things by separating them out into different channels. In a way it's like what we do with our allies - we have a separate channel for each of them, instead of one massive channel with representatives from each region. The Committee system allows the Ministry to involve people in speciifc topics which they're interested in (say, writing FA updates) as opposed to just adding them to every topic. I do think, as I outlined in the campaign above, that work could be done to get new people involved in every single committee, as opposed to just the "open" ones.
 

Assignment of at least nine new Ambassadors.

Your opponent, Glen-Rhodes, recently had this to say in his own campaign:

... The renewed ambassador corp, if we’re being honest, hasn’t really trained any of its members. Giving informational updates in the MoFA Discord isn’t preparing anybody for the real work of being the next Minister ...

What is your response? 

I wanted to start people off as ambassadors, and then move them into the more specialized diplomacy work. There were lots of completely new members, with little NS experience at all, and I thought it would make sense to assign them positions and then evaluate how they did there. To be honest, though, that evaluation never really materialized. Which is why it's something I'd like to see accomplished in the next term.
 

The institution of game-side polling on opening or closing embassies game-side, allowing those who prefer the RMB to discord or the forums to have a say in Foreign Affairs changes which directly affect them

I do very much approve of this   

Thanks!
 

...and the potential WA project which Glen-Rhodes alluded to ...

I take it then that Glen-Rhode's activity (quoted below) was done so at your urging? I confess, when I read his statement, I was mildly surprised given the lack of communication by the ministry on such an initiative. 

... Additionally, this past term I have been in talks with our allies about cooperation in the World Assembly.

This was a project before I was MoFA -- I believe it began with Serres' administration or earlier? He had appointed Glen to be the representative to it originally. Glen wanted it to be unveiled all at the same time so the project could be presented completely finished (so much for that to make a point in this campaign!), but some others involved went a bit ahead in other regions. When I began my term, I made it quite clear that TSP was and is not at all signed onto the project, though it seemed everyone already involved thought it was just a matter of drafting up and signing.
 

snip

While I was glad to see the number of activities the ministry undertook over the last three to four weeks, I do question the timing. Certainly, it was heartening to see you leap into action with some of the programs you have outlined in your campaign but there were two if not three months prior when the ministry seemed at a standstill. I suppose my question is why should I vote for you when new blood such as North Prarie and Glen-Rhodes (who is new in a way) could potentially be more active throughout the whole of their term rather than the weeks preceding an election?  

I will not deny the Assembly poll spurred me into action, combined with a glorious post-exam weekend to devote entirely to the ministry. A list of things to accomplish in the Ministry had been building up in the two weeks before, when I was studying for exams (just look at my !remindme's in #coconut-grove ), and that weekend and the week that followed allowed me to catch up on all of them. 
 

Lastly, do you intend on continuing your previously outlined policy of disengagement with NSGP?  

I'd like to see TSP continue disengagement from NSGP, unless it is official communication from the Ministry on a new policy relevant to the entire GP community or a formal Ministry response to an unfounded criticism of the South Pacific. Many of our problems on that front come from a history of unregulated spouting.
 

- Is the Cabinet as a whole aware of that "gameplay-related project" you're alluding to?
- Can you explain why you think TSP and TWP are not close at this time?
- In which way do you think we should be involved in the APC-NPO war?
- Is there anything in the campaigns for Prime Minister candidates over which you expect there to be conflict should both of you get elected?

1. It has not been brought up in the Cabinet channel at this point, no. 
2. Differing fundamental views of the role of the government and the delegate; derivative R/D differences; a different group of current allies. I don't think TSP and TWP are particularly suited at the present time as gameplay/political allies.
3. TSP does not have a role in the APC-NPO war.  TSP's role with relation to the NPO is to show its disappointment in the NPO's actions if those relevant to TSP are ever brought up and TSP is asked for an opinion. Beyond that, TSP nor any of its officials should be supporting either the NPO or the APC, or launching into defenses of either. They're both not at all support-worthy.
4. I don't see any major conflicts in the campaign above and the campaigns posted by the PM candidates. The idea of a Gameplay ambassador is worth being debated in the next cabinet.
 

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With all questions answered, I'd like to formally withdraw from this race.

~ Aumeltopia ~

Raccoons are bandits! First they steal your food . . . and then your heart/identity!

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