"Declarations" are live in the Security Council and present a new and interesting obstacle in foreign affairs. While declarations aren't legally binding by their nature, it's important that we stake out a position on how we view them legally, before that position is imposed on us socially/diplomatically by the game. I propose amending the World Assembly Act to make clear that declarations won't be recognized by the Coalition unless the Assembly explicitly adopts them. They're essentially treaties being passed by the Security Council, so I've opted for the same process we use for treaties.

World Assembly Act
An act to define the World Assembly procedures of the Coalition of the South Pacific

4. Legal Impact of Security Council Declarations

(1) “Security Council” is an official organ of the World Assembly, to which the Delegate serves as the South Pacific’s representative.

(2) “Declaration” is an official resolution adopted by the Security Council that attempts to express the will of the Security Council on any issue under its jurisdiction.

(3) No declaration adopted by the Security Council will be recognized, abided by, or considered law by the South Pacific, unless sent to the Assembly by the Cabinet and ratified by a majority vote of the Assembly.

(4) No vote cast by the Delegate on a declaration of the Security Council will be considered implicit or explicit approval or disapproval of the declaration by the South Pacific itself.

(This post was last modified: 07-19-2021, 09:04 AM by Nakari.)

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(1) “Security Council” is the official organ of the World Assembly

Is there a particular reason why this says "the official organ" rather than "an official organ"?

(2) “Declaration” is an official resolution adopted by the Security Council

Are there unofficial resolutions that are also adopted by the Security Council?

unless sent to the Assembly by the Cabinet and ratified by a majority vote of the Assembly.

You say in your opening statement that Declarations are essentially treaties. With that in mind, are you purposefully proposing the above to outline a specific process for the passage of Declarations, or did you intend to suggest that Declarations be submitted, considered and passed in accordance with whatever process is outlined in the Treaties Act/Legislative Procedure Act?

Former Delegate of the South Pacific
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(This post was last modified: 07-10-2021, 03:19 PM by Kris Kringle.)

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I am a little curious as to the reasoning for the last clause. It seems like all other WA votes by TSP are determined by the region, so in a sense, if our delegate votes for, it can be taken as an approval for the resolution by the South Pacific? Why would declarations be different? Would declaration votes be also determined by the region, or would some other body decide how to vote on those?

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I'm not clear on why we would view Security Council declarations as expressing or implicating a foreign policy position in the South Pacific. They are non-binding declarations that canonise a position that the Security Council, as an institution, believes. Members can continue to believe and act as they please, similar to how we may be against certain resolutions but do not outright disavow them.

Should we be pursing WA citizens with the capital punishment policy in light of GAR #535 and #545?

(This post was last modified: 07-10-2021, 04:00 PM by Luca.)

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I'm not clear on why we would view Security Council declarations as expressing or implicating a foreign policy position in the South Pacific. They are non-binding declarations that canonise a position that the Security Council, as an institution, believes. Members can continue to believe and act as they please, similar to how we may be against certain resolutions but do not outright disavow them.

Should we be pursing WA citizens with the capital punishment policy in light of GAR #535 and #545?

A Security Council Declaration is a lot different from a General Assembly Resolution. The GA deals with nations. The SC, now that Declarations are a thing, can outline obligations and expectations on how we should act and how other regions would treat us in return. That has considerable implications for how our government acts and how it interacts with others.

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

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(1) “Security Council” is the official organ of the World Assembly

Is there a particular reason why this says "the official organ" rather than "an official organ"?

Nope!

(2) “Declaration” is an official resolution adopted by the Security Council

Are there unofficial resolutions that are also adopted by the Security Council?

No, but given that they are official resolutions, I'm not sure why we shouldn't call them official.

unless sent to the Assembly by the Cabinet and ratified by a majority vote of the Assembly.

You say in your opening statement that Declarations are essentially treaties. With that in mind, are you purposefully proposing the above to outline a specific process for the passage of Declarations, or did you intend to suggest that Declarations be submitted, considered and passed in accordance with whatever process is outlined in the Treaties Act/Legislative Procedure Act?

Our process for treaties is that the Cabinet delivers them to the Assembly, where they're debated and voted on by majority rule. I didn't say something like "in accordance with the Treaties Act" or similar, because the Treaties Act would need to be substantially amended to address how the institution of the Security Council is a "signatory." That act is just written too much from the perspective of regions signing treaties to be referenced. It's simpler to keep the Treaties Act as it is and just say what the requirements are for officially adopting a Security Council Declaration.
 

I am a little curious as to the reasoning for the last clause. It seems like all other WA votes by TSP are determined by the region, so in a sense, if our delegate votes for, it can be taken as an approval for the resolution by the South Pacific? Why would declarations be different? Would declaration votes be also determined by the region, or would some other body decide how to vote on those?

The alternative would be that the Delegate isn't allowed to cast a vote on declarations unless pre-approved to do so by the Assembly. The point here is to protect our sovereignty and make clear, "Just because the Security Council passes a declaration, one we may even have opposed, doesn't mean we're going to recognize or acknowledge it."  The Assembly holds all legislative power in the Coalition, so a Security Council declaration can't impact us without the Assembly's consent.

To be quite honest, this feature has been rolled out poorly, far too quickly, and with little thought to the ramifications for regions, Gameplay, and inter-regional diplomacy/politics. There's been no discussion ahead of time of what a declaration can do, what they should be used for, if they're binding, if the Gameplay community is even going to give them any weight at all, etc. It's up to us to define our relationship to the Security Council ourselves. The SC before didn't really require that, because it was either impacting individual nations or used a tool in R/D in ways that would never affect us (we can't be Liberated in any meaningful way). But now this new feature has been switched on and we're going to be hit with declaration after declaration trying to impose X policy or Y opinion on to regions as a whole, since regions are the main unit of power in Gameplay.

I'm not clear on why we would view Security Council declarations as expressing or implicating a foreign policy position in the South Pacific. They are non-binding declarations that canonise a position that the Security Council, as an institution, believes. Members can continue to believe and act as they please, similar to how we may be against certain resolutions but do not outright disavow them.

Kris's response to this is really good. Just to add, these are going to be used as tools of diplomacy in GP. They're non-binding in the sense that Game Mods aren't going to ban TSP from the SC if we violate a declaration. But there's a big likelihood that these declarations will be considered "binding" in the political sense when it comes GP diplomacy/politics. We need to stake out our position right out the gate that we're maintaining our sovereignty-- set the expectation that a declaration needs to be ratified by regional governments to have any power. I'm not sure if other regions are even considering this, so there's an opportunity to set the expectation across the board if we're among the first to define just how these SC declaration interact with our laws, foreign policy, etc.

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I'm not clear on why we would view Security Council declarations as expressing or implicating a foreign policy position in the South Pacific. They are non-binding declarations that canonise a position that the Security Council, as an institution, believes. Members can continue to believe and act as they please, similar to how we may be against certain resolutions but do not outright disavow them.

I think the scope of Declarations is/will be more expansive than you indicate in this post. Just looking at some of the examples that have been submitted right now Advancement of Anti-fascist Action contains "No region shall/shold" and "No World Assembly Delegate shall" style mandates and On Interregional Recruitment ends with a discussion of appropriate government recruiting actions. I think that indicates that while not all Declarations will be "region should/shall do X" Declarations, some may be, and it would be best to clarify we do not have to abide by those.

It seems like all other WA votes by TSP are determined by the region, so in a sense, if our delegate votes for, it can be taken as an approval for the resolution by the South Pacific? Why would declarations be different? Would declaration votes be also determined by the region, or would some other body decide how to vote on those?

I think there's a difference between expressing a position on a resolution which binds nations as individuals (as in the GA) or a resolution which expresses an opinion about history (as in C/Cs in the current SC) and one that implies/suggests obligations onto regions, as Declarations have the potential to do. Only the Cabinet and the Assembly as outlined in the Charter can make (or revoke) treatied commitments, not OWL providing the discussion on WA positions.

I'll have to think more about the wording, but generally I support the idea of us having a law which clarifies how we interpret Declaration and think "we do not consider them binding unless we make them binding via our sovereign domestic processes" is a good approach

Minister of Foreign Affairs
General of the South Pacific Special Forces
Ambassador to Balder
Former Prime Minister and Minister of Defense

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I'm not clear on why we would view Security Council declarations as expressing or implicating a foreign policy position in the South Pacific. They are non-binding declarations that canonise a position that the Security Council, as an institution, believes. Members can continue to believe and act as they please, similar to how we may be against certain resolutions but do not outright disavow them.

I think the scope of Declarations is/will be more expansive than you indicate in this post. Just looking at some of the examples that have been submitted right now Advancement of Anti-fascist Action contains "No region shall/shold" and "No World Assembly Delegate shall" style mandates and On Interregional Recruitment ends with a discussion of appropriate government recruiting actions. I think that indicates that while not all Declarations will be "region should/shall do X" Declarations, some may be, and it would be best to clarify we do not have to abide by those.

My awareness of the new category appears to not be as fresh as it should have been. I wasn't aware these sorts of phrases would have been permissible under the rules. That is, indeed, concerning.

No objection to the proposed amendment.

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I'm not clear on why we would view Security Council declarations as expressing or implicating a foreign policy position in the South Pacific. They are non-binding declarations that canonise a position that the Security Council, as an institution, believes. Members can continue to believe and act as they please, similar to how we may be against certain resolutions but do not outright disavow them.

I think the scope of Declarations is/will be more expansive than you indicate in this post. Just looking at some of the examples that have been submitted right now Advancement of Anti-fascist Action contains "No region shall/shold" and "No World Assembly Delegate shall" style mandates and On Interregional Recruitment ends with a discussion of appropriate government recruiting actions. I think that indicates that while not all Declarations will be "region should/shall do X" Declarations, some may be, and it would be best to clarify we do not have to abide by those.

My awareness of the new category appears to not be as fresh as it should have been. I wasn't aware these sorts of phrases would have been permissible under the rules. That is, indeed, concerning.

No objection to the proposed amendment.

Declarations are able to use such language and make provisions of that nature, but mechanically they’re not going to be enforced. It would be interesting GP is a group of regions actively took it upon themselves to try to enforce the will of the SC via diploma and military action but I’m doubtful that it will happen.

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Declarations are able to use such language and make provisions of that nature, but mechanically they’re not going to be enforced. It would be interesting GP is a group of regions actively took it upon themselves to try to enforce the will of the SC via diploma and military action but I’m doubtful that it will happen.

I believe that's the intent and what Sedgistan is hoping for (and why he was so eager to implement it so fast). But yeah, for something that's so obviously targeted for use by big and influential regions (who else is going to impose costs on the non-compliers, or what other regions are going to cause any scandal by not complying?)... there was very little thought into getting those regions together and seeing if they'd actually take SC declarations seriously enough for that.

That being said, though, I think that's the direction we're eventually heading in, at least with declarations on things like recruitment, Antifa, and other hot-topic issues, and I'd rather we stake out our sovereignty early on.

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