We've moved, ! Update your bookmarks to https://thesouthpacific.org! These forums are being archived.

Dismiss this notice
See LegComm's announcement to make sure you're still a legislator on the new forums!

So, how about that RA split, huh?
#1

With all the elections over and nothing else major going on or on the horizon (except the lovely Independence Festival that you're hopefully all participating in until it ends tomorrow), I think this is a good time to slowly and calmly restart the conversation.

Now, I deliberately used the word "restart" rather than "continue". I think the way the debate went last time wasn't conducive to potentially producing a good bill that went through the rough of robust assembly debate that Legislators can then vote Aye or Nay on. But we're in a better place now — the circumstances and events that made it so contentious last time don't exist anymore, sufficient time has passed to calm lingering visceral feelings, and we can now truly restart on something that undoubtably many Legislators have expressed an interest in. All of us, no matter on which side we fell last time, are now in a better, calmer, more collected, and wiser position to go through this, so I suggest starting from scratch rather than digging up old ideas, drafts, and talking points made when we were collectively less wise about the whole issue.

Going into this, there is one thing that (in my opinion) is more important than anything else: You have a voice in this discussion, and it isn't worth less than anybody else's. Use it! And yes, I mean you, the timid new player unsure if expressing an opinion is okay; and yes, I mean you, the older player that feels steamrolled by all these hyperactive young people; and finally, I mean you, whoever you are, if you don't fit into either of the two categories.

This is what democracy is about, and as the oldest extant NationStates democracy, we know a thing or two about democracy.

So, given that this is a fresh start, I'd like to start off with this prompt: Without any specifics on implementation, what goals can be achieved and what problems can be solved if we were to separate the Ministry of Regional Affairs into multiple ministries?

With heart-shaped lampshades for everyone,
-- Roa
[Image: XXPV74Y.png?1]
[-] The following 3 users Like Roavin's post:
  • phoenixofthesun14, USoVietnam, Whole India
#2

I hope all legislators understand that since we are restarting the debate, we only care about the merit of the split for now, not "how to split". 

I will present a list of questions for everyone here, especially those who work or have worked in MoRA so I and hopefully other legislators can get an accurate assessment on the matter rather than relying on "surprise" reveals in heated arguments.

Firstly, I feel like an important point that can resolve this debacle is details on the deputy minister structure implemented in Qvait's MoRA term that was supposedly to test the split idea out.

Before posting my own opinions, I hope those involved in top leadership of the Qvait MoRA term or those who are knowledgeable about it can give detailed answers to these questions:

- What is the structure of the deputy minister leadership system implemented under that term?
- How were deputy ministers chosen?
- What did a deputy minister candidate need to satisfy in order to be chosen?
- If deputy ministers were chosen via applications, how were applications reviewed?
- How did the minister lead deputy ministers? (Did the minister give detailed orders on what to do, did he give broad demands then let the deputies figure the details, or did he give deputies complete freedom over policies and implementation)
- Why did it fail?

Secondly, here are questions for those who involve in MoRA terms that are considered to be "successful" (E.g. Kringle's term).
- How many active members did we have in MoRA at the time?
- How were new members integrated and became active and contributing members?
- How did the activity "feel" like? (Was it regularly published media, a lot of new members came in and expressed strong interests, frequent festivals, high participation/readership?)

Thirdly, here are questions for all MoRA members:
- What are common causes for people to be inactive?
- What do you think hold MoRA back from being efficient on all sides (Poor planning/strategy, poor work ethic, poor institutional structure?) 
- What is your image of an ideal MoRA that can make you as productive as possible?

Finally, here are questions for everyone here:
- What is your ideal of an active MoRA?
- How do you know if a MoRA term is considered successful?
Chief Supervising Armchair
[-] The following 5 users Like USoVietnam's post:
  • Divine Owl, phoenixofthesun14, Roavin, Seraph, Whole India
#3

Oh Viet, these are good questions! I'll go ahead and answer as far as I can. So, you all do know that I was the Roleplay senior fellow under Jay's ministerial term, as well as Chair. During these debates, I did prioritize my position as chair over that as "MoRA Leadership", and as such I did stay out of the debate except to step in when I felt things were being pushed too hard, I think I was too concerned with the potential for others to view my statements as a Conflict of Interest rather than actually doing my job as Chair, and for that I do apologize.

Now, onto the questions.

- What is the structure of the deputy minister leadership system implemented under that term?- So, while Jay was the Minister of Regional Affairs, he had split the ministry into essentially 3 parts: a Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Integration, and Ministry of Media. Under these deputies, were the Senior Fellows. The line between these two were, truthfully, very unclear, and I don't think any of us really knew what was the purpose/what we were supposed to do, whatever.

- How were deputy ministers chosen?- Jay had chosen the Deputy Ministers.

- What did a deputy minister candidate need to satisfy in order to be chosen?- That was unclear, you'd have to ask Jay himself.

- If deputy ministers were chosen via applications, how were applications reviewed?- I don't recall there being applications.

- How did the minister lead deputy ministers? (Did the minister give detailed orders on what to do, did he give broad demands then let the deputies figure the details, or did he give deputies complete freedom over policies and implementation)- This was also fairly unclear. No offense to Jay, but he seemed to be more of a ceremonial figurehead rather than actual minister. This is very so much likely due to the planning for PacificCon, which all the focus went there rather than other ministry things. Which makes tons of sense, planning interregional events takes a lot of time and effort and communication. But, it was clear that the Deputy Ministers were more calling the shots rather than the actual elected minister when it came to the ministry. Additionally, the confusion as to what the senior fellows were between the transition from Aggie's term (basically the lead fellow, the Deputy minister position so to speak, but with clear and active communication and expectations from Aggie) to Jay's term, where there were Deputy Ministers and Senior Fellows, we were very much confused and we essentially really figured this out on our own.

- Why did it fail?- Lack of direction from the Minister, confusion between Deputy Minister and Senior Fellow roles, and most of the attention devoted to PacificCon and the Ministry being accused of inactivity and the arising debates that led to the echo chamber and Roavin's investigation all contributed to everything that had happened last term. This was, after all, very rough on everyone and ultimately led to everything happening as it did in my opinion.

As for your questions to MoRA members:

- What are common causes for people to be inactive?- Busy IRL, being preoccupied elsewhere, maybe lack of interest in the current projects being done. Lack of leadership.

- What do you think hold MoRA back from being efficient on all sides (Poor planning/strategy, poor work ethic, poor institutional structure?)- Seraph's term is certainly seeing a sort of revival in the ministry. Making it open to anyone wanting to participate, who can contribute ideas as they please, it feels more like a collective work rather than bureocratic. But last term, definitely the lack of leadership (which Penguin honestly made up for in every way), so I think one issue was *too much structure* rather than not enough.

- What is your image of an ideal MoRA that can make you as productive as possible?- What we have right now, where all departments are more unified rather than not is ideal, where you can pitch in wherever. It all being truly community-based, rather than not. Like how it is being led right now.

And, your last set of questions:

- What is your ideal of an active MoRA?- An active MoRA is a MoRA that is working together to engage with our region. Different projects being done by everyone, together.

- How do you know if a MoRA term is considered successful?- I guess you would have to compare it to the quality of everything that the MoRA did. If a MoRA did a lot of things poorly, I wouldn't call it successful. If the MoRA did a couple things really well without trouble, then I would call that successful

These all here are just my views and reflections. As far as I'm concerned regarding a split, I think it should be done, since Integration and Graphics are somewhat different in mandate to Media and Culture, but don't quite merit their own ministry per say... it's difficult.
Fire Fire Fire Empress of Fire  Fire Fire Fire
Current Minister of Military Affairs
Chair Perch of the Assembly (February to June 2020)
SPSF Soldier
MoRA Fellow
Ambassador to Forest and Lazarus
[-] The following 3 users Like phoenixofthesun14's post:
  • Divine Owl, Seraph, USoVietnam
#4

I'll just take this opportunity to reiterate my promises from earlier in the year. As MoRA, I'll continue to run the ministry as I have so far, regardless of the continuing nature of this discussion, until such a point (should it come) as an outcome is implemented that means there is not a single MoRA to run, which I wouldn't anticipate being within anyone's term anyway.

I will also continue to honour my promise not to get involved in the debate, should anyone want someone to offload to in the (hopefully unlikely) event that things get heated again. As such, this will probably be my last post on this thread. I'll be paying attention, though, as this is obviously an area which interests me a lot.
Founder of the Church of the South Pacific [Forum Thread] [Discord], a safe place to discuss spirituality for people of all faiths and none (currently looking for those interested in prayer and/or "home" groups);
And The Silicon Pens [Discord], a writer's group for the South Pacific and beyond!

Yahweo usenneo ir varleo, ihraneo jurlaweo hraseu seu, ir jiweveo arladi.
Salma 145:8
[-] The following 5 users Like Seraph's post:
  • Divine Owl, Omega, phoenixofthesun14, USoVietnam, Whole India
#5

Hello fellow legislators, 

I wanted to be a part of this marvelous discussion, since I came in TSP and finally I have got the moment. Last time when the discussion turned to debate and nearly to the mark of chaos I felt that a moral understanding and basic skills of expressing opinions in positive manner are required for a good discussion. I hope the things and critics remain good this time. Now to the questions [well I am young so not any of the big terms]

Thirdly, here are questions for all MoRA members:
- What are common causes for people to be inactive? 
Ans: RL [Real life] and busy days. Non-Presence AKA absence of strong leader and lack of freedom to projects.

- What do you think hold MoRA back from being efficient on all sides (Poor planning/strategy, poor work ethic, poor institutional structure?) 
1] Poor planning
2] Suppression of Freedom to carryout projects
3] If Projects are allowed to happen [the minister doesn't want's those projects, but is still okay willingly] then indirectly discouraging them.
4] 0% Management
5] Lack of openness.

- What is your image of an ideal MoRA that can make you as productive as possible?
Ans: I have been trying for many projects as a small fellow, but few people discourage them or avoiding people's participation by telling 'heavy workload in the project'. So if such atmosphere prevails then working for MORA is slavery. So there are many productive people, but freedom isn't given to them.

Finally, here are questions for everyone here:
- What is your ideal of an active MoRA?
Freedom to carryout projects and reducing burden by more division and encouraging new fellows.

- How do you know if a MoRA term is considered successful?
If activity and many projects are accepted and a friendly atmosphere prevails a 100% successful term is there.
[-] The following 1 user Likes Whole India's post:
  • USoVietnam
#6

(07-22-2020, 03:05 AM)Whole India Wrote: lack of freedom to projects.

Can you further elaborate on this, what projects did it happen and when?


—————

Looks like I see two lines of thoughts here
- All RA departments under one ministry with central direction from the Minister allows for effective communication between them at the cost of the minister having heavy workload and reduce the wider community’s ability to choose its favorite policies on a specific RA area (e.g. when you vote for a MoRA, you may like his integration policy but dislike his culture policy, you have to make tradeoff between candidates) Potential solution: Pursuit the policy of deputy ministers but allow people to apply for deputies via application and allow deputies to come up with their own policies. This relieves pressure of being perfect on everything for the minister while still allow effective central coordination when needed.
- A split relieves the responsibility of the minister and allow leaders of respective departments to pursuit their own policies and allow the wider community to decide on those policies but in-exchange, reduces communication efficiency between departments and requires cabinet-level coordination (this assumes the MoRA minister is working like a mini-PM) Potential solution: A joint server for all RA-related departments allows for easy cross-staff communication. If the aforementioned assumption is true, it should be alright for the PM to be the central coordination guy since integration, media, and culture are actually different (1)

(1): Someone with more experience please tell me, what do media, culture, and integration share in common?

In my opinion, they are totally different, both in skills and in plans. The only reason people seem to treat them as the same stuff is because the current MoRA structure makes people or to be more precise, notable people have to be relevant in most or all of these areas. From my experience in MoRA, those who prefer to work on integration don’t usually work on media or culture and vice versa. For notable members, you have them work in perhaps two departments at once but not all. This may need conclusive proofs through, I may have to run through the MoRA discord to collect role statistics.

The only things shared between those areas are their needs of graphics and coordinated promotion (so is MA and FA which proves they need their own institutions, especially integration)

I used to be anti-split based on the communication efficiency and “the people will still be the same” arguments. This is true in the short run, but the long run, clear differences in staff between institutions will happen. I very much prefer this as I firmly believe you are the most efficient when you do one or very few things at once. Real-life experience and NS have proven me times and times again the more things you do at once and the more different they are the less their quality will be.
Chief Supervising Armchair
[-] The following 1 user Likes USoVietnam's post:
  • Somyrion
#7

(07-22-2020, 03:05 AM)Whole India Wrote: 2] Suppression of Freedom to carryout projects

WI, I hate to say this, but what you're saying is simply untrue.
You have proposed many different projects that Seraph and your colleagues shot down for various reasons - too big, lack of interest.
However, you kept proposing ideas, to the point where Seraph had to give you a hard 'stop doing this' because you had kept doing it even after he kindly told you to stop.
So, TL;DR, There no suppression of freedom in the MoRA currently.

---

Considering I am currently a fellow, I'll answer these questions as well:
- What are common causes for people to be inactive?
 Lack of interest, lack of constant activity. I, like most others, am most active when there's something that interests me. So I think that constant activity would be a massive booster, because it means more stuff happening.
- What do you think hold MoRA back from being efficient on all sides (Poor planning/strategy, poor work ethic, poor institutional structure?) 
Probably just inactivity, really.
Maybe poor work ethic on the part of some.
- What is your image of an ideal MoRA that can make you as productive as possible?
Probably the current one, plus more activity. I really like Seraph's open structure, and I think we should seek to implement it in all ministries in TSP, to differing extents (the MoRA works better for this than the MoFA, for example.)
Midwesterner. Political nerd. Chipotle enthusiast. 
Minister of Culture of the South Pacific // Former Prime Minister
[-] The following 1 user Likes North Prarie's post:
  • USoVietnam
#8

(07-22-2020, 03:05 AM)Whole India Wrote: So if such atmosphere prevails then working for MORA is slavery.

I’m pretty sure volunteering to do RA work doesn’t compare to slavery.
Former Delegate of the South Pacific
Posts outside High Court venues should be taken as those of any other legislator.
I do not participate in the regional server, but I am happy to talk through instant messaging or on the forum.

Legal Resources:
THE MATT-DUCK Law Archive | Mavenu Diplomatic Archive | Rules of the High Court | Case Submission System | Online Rulings Consultation System
[-] The following 3 users Like Kris Kringle's post:
  • Aga, Jay Coop, Rebeltopia
#9

(07-22-2020, 03:15 PM)USoVietnam Wrote:
(07-22-2020, 03:05 AM)Whole India Wrote: lack of freedom to projects.

Can you further elaborate on this, what projects did it happen and when?


—————

Looks like I see two lines of thoughts here
- All RA departments under one ministry with central direction from the Minister allows for effective communication between them at the cost of the minister having heavy workload and reduce the wider community’s ability to choose its favorite policies on a specific RA area (e.g. when you vote for a MoRA, you may like his integration policy but dislike his culture policy, you have to make tradeoff between candidates) Potential solution: Pursuit the policy of deputy ministers but allow people to apply for deputies via application and allow deputies to come up with their own policies. This relieves pressure of being perfect on everything for the minister while still allow effective central coordination when needed.
- A split relieves the responsibility of the minister and allow leaders of respective departments to pursuit their own policies and allow the wider community to decide on those policies but in-exchange, reduces communication efficiency between departments and requires cabinet-level coordination (this assumes the MoRA minister is working like a mini-PM) Potential solution: A joint server for all RA-related departments allows for easy cross-staff communication. If the aforementioned assumption is true, it should be alright for the PM to be the central coordination guy since integration, media, and culture are actually different (1)

(1): Someone with more experience please tell me, what do media, culture, and integration share in common?

In my opinion, they are totally different, both in skills and in plans. The only reason people seem to treat them as the same stuff is because the current MoRA structure makes people or to be more precise, notable people have to be relevant in most or all of these areas. From my experience in MoRA, those who prefer to work on integration don’t usually work on media or culture and vice versa. For notable members, you have them work in perhaps two departments at once but not all. This may need conclusive proofs through, I may have to run through the MoRA discord to collect role statistics.

The only things shared between those areas are their needs of graphics and coordinated promotion (so is MA and FA which proves they need their own institutions, especially integration)

I used to be anti-split based on the communication efficiency and “the people will still be the same” arguments. This is true in the short run, but the long run, clear differences in staff between institutions will happen. I very much prefer this as I firmly believe you are the most efficient when you do one or very few things at once. Real-life experience and NS have proven me times and times again the more things you do at once and the more different they are the less their quality will be. 

Your excellency, it happened in my milograd coup documentary project and many of the young fellows like me have experienced it a lot. In the 'I' day festival a poetry contest was in fixture and I was going to handle it, but suddenly it was changed to music and hence you aren't given the freedom to make projects. My milograd coup documentary project was first denied and then allowed, but it was indirectly discouraged by few saying 'I didn't liked WI [Whole India]'s style.'
#10

(07-22-2020, 05:05 PM)North Prarie Wrote:
(07-22-2020, 03:05 AM)Whole India Wrote: 2] Suppression of Freedom to carryout projects

WI, I hate to say this, but what you're saying is simply untrue.
You have proposed many different projects that Seraph and your colleagues shot down for various reasons - too big, lack of interest.
However, you kept proposing ideas, to the point where Seraph had to give you a hard 'stop doing this' because you had kept doing it even after he kindly told you to stop.

So I have to minister's order, assembly should keep this in records 'the fellows have to work on what minister asks them'




Users browsing this thread:
1 Guest(s)





Theme © iAndrew 2018 Forum software by © MyBB .