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quote:
Originally posted by notyoueither
Stey tuned, Nathan.
It seems that democratic traditions may take hold even with the current Constitution.  |
With most of the world now trying to embrace (forced on them by the US) democracy, it is easy to see such a movement being consumated here. Everone has a voice and each wants to be heard, though not all voices will be acted upon.
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Sir Ralph
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Long live teh Schwampel!
Dec 2001
time: 06:26
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I'm unhappy with that current constitution. It gives way too many power to the consulate and to change its members is too much of a pain. It completely neglects the opinion of the late comers. There is a strong feeling like "my opinion is unimportant anyway, so why bother", at least in me, but I'm sure in others too. The feeling to live in a dictatorship, no less. Mind you, that all real dictatorships have constitutions too, and all they sound as if they were backed by the people, while they are not.
Also, it should be required, that once the consuls meet decisions, they have to explain them to the senate. Not like it was last turn. To let the people discuss and then shortly announce "Flash! We met a decision" without explaining why leaves the feeling in me, why did I waste my spare time to discuss at all, I could have done something more enjoyable.
Things, that should be changed/clarified:
1. All consuls are re-elected periodically, at least every 2 or 3 months (or perhaps every 50 turns?)
2. The ministers are re-elected as well, right after the new consulate is in power.
3. The ministers are proposed by the senate and appointed by the consulate (as it is). If the consulate refuses to acknowledge the majority choice of the senate, it has time to explain its decision and then to cast another poll, which of both candidates (senate or consulate) should be appointed.
4. If key decisions were subject of public discussion and the government or consulate meets their decision, it has to be explained, and not only announced.
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vondrack
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Praha, Czech Republic
Jan 2002
time: 06:26
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quote:
Originally posted by Sir Ralph
I'm unhappy with that current constitution. It gives way too many power to the consulate and to change its members is too much of a pain. It completely neglects the opinion of the late comers. There is a strong feeling like "my opinion is unimportant anyway, so why bother", at least in me, but I'm sure in others too. The feeling to live in a dictatorship, no less. Mind you, that all real dictatorships have constitutions too, and all they sound as if they were backed by the people, while they are not. |
OK, let's sort this out NOW.  I hereby ask all the latecomers that are unhappy about how things are currently being organized to speak their mind. Be your issue a feeling of unimportance, a problem with a dictatorship or whatever, RAISE YOUR VOICE NOW. If there is a significant group of people unhappy about the current state of affairs, the Consuls will consider holding new elections, that I believe. Having to constantly fend off attacks like this would be just getting into our way, so we better get rid of it ASAP, establishing a government that will be "legitimate" in everybody's eyes.
quote:
Originally posted by Sir Ralph
Also, it should be required, that once the consuls meet decisions, they have to explain them to the senate. Not like it was last turn. To let the people discuss and then shortly announce "Flash! We met a decision" without explaining why leaves the feeling in me, why did I waste my spare time to discuss at all, I could have done something more enjoyable. |
Sorry, I disagree. We will do our best to provide reasoning for our plans (like that for Turns 2-4), but explaining retrospectively (which I did do even for the first turn!) will often be a waste of time, as most people will know what aspects were to consider from following the discussions in the forum.
If you believe that we should submit our plans, explain our reasons, wait for the approval by the team, resubmitting revised plans if not approved, and so on and so on, then we will never ever get out of ancient times with this game. There is something to be said for flexibility.
Besides, who would be to take the final decision? The team? Then what would we have the Consuls for? To organize polls only? And if the Consuls are to make the final decision (which is actually the only technically feasible solution), then what good would be to repoll over and over? The proposed plan shall always be based upon suggestions, discussions, and polls held in this forum. Thus, it is very likely that more suggestions and more discussions would change little.
quote:
Originally posted by Sir Ralph
Things, that should be changed/clarified:
1. All consuls are re-elected periodically, at least every 2 or 3 months (or perhaps every 50 turns?) |
What problem do you have with calling a Change-of-Command vote? How does it differ from reelections?? You can have the replacement Consul installed in a few days. Actually, the re-election would take exactly the same time as a CoC vote, as you would have to gather the list of canidadates first and then hold the vote. Which is what you do when you call a CoC vote! What kind of "too much of a pain" you are speaking of?
quote:
Originally posted by Sir Ralph
2. The ministers are re-elected as well, right after the new consulate is in power. |
Why should we elect ministers if they are not supposed to have any other power but to advise the Consuls on the future moves/actions? We need to either have Ministers in control, ordering the Consuls to do this and/or that (changing the whole system of government as currently in effect). OR, we can have the Consuls in power, actually being advised by the Ministers.
IMHO, the current system is more flexible and more straightforward, since there will always be decisions that will have to be taken without a lengthy discussion. Those that actually play the turn for our team will have to take them, often responding to unexpected events. They will NOT be able to poll, repoll, and consult Ministers on every single action taken ingame. Just think of how long would one turn take with two or three dozen units involved in a war. We will basically have only four hours to actually play our turn.
And if the Consuls/players need to have a certain degree of freedom, then where we would draw the line? As it is now, the line is drawn very clearly. The Consuls are the ones to take the decisions. They may follow or ignore everybody's else opinion, but they have the full responsibility for what they do, risking they would be removed form their office quickly, if the team disagrees with what they do. They can be removed because of ignoring the will of majority and they can be removed because of alibistically following the will of majority where they should rather act differently. That is a very fair deal.
quote:
Originally posted by Sir Ralph
3. The ministers are proposed by the senate and appointed by the consulate (as it is). If the consulate refuses to acknowledge the majority choice of the senate, it has time to explain its decision and then to cast another poll, which of both candidates (senate or consulate) should be appointed. |
And who would be to take the final decision? The Senate of the Consuls? If the Consuls, then there is no point in having another poll, as they would still be able to ignore the result. If the Senate, we do not need any other poll either, since the result of the first poll would be binding.
quote:
Originally posted by Sir Ralph
4. If key decisions were subject of public discussion and the government or consulate meets their decision, it has to be explained, and not only announced. |
I don't get this. As mentioned before, there was a poll organized on whether to settle or not. Majority voted to settle. Even if Pottery was suggested, the reasoning was not conclusive (at least, IMHO), so the initial will of the Senate, which was to go for Bronze Working, had quite some legitimity.
So, the Consuls could have just said they did what majority wanted... we did not do that. I explained in great detail what lead us to the decision. The decision was made after allowing everybody to have his/her say (there was more than 14 hours, suitable for both Europeans and Americans), so there was unlikely anything truly new could have emerged, affecting that decision.
Once again, I urge everybody unhappy about the current Constitution and the system of government to speak up! If there is a significant unhappiness, we either connect a luxury or build an MP unit ASAP, or hold new elections. If not, let this issue be closed.
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nbarclay
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Huntsville, Alabama
Dec 1999
time: 23:26
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quote:
Originally posted by vondrack
What problem do you have with calling a Change-of-Command vote? How does it differ from reelections?? You can have the replacement Consul installed in a few days. Actually, the re-election would take exactly the same time as a CoC vote, as you would have to gather the list of canidadates first and then hold the vote. Which is what you do when you call a CoC vote! What kind of "too much of a pain" you are speaking of? |
As things stand now, there is one huge difference. The Change of Command procedure is defined in fact, even if not in name, as a "no confidence" vote against one specific consul. It requires singling out one specific consul for possible replacement. In contrast, holding new elections all around would produce an effect in which a new candidate would replace whichever consul has the least support rather than replacing one specifically targeted consul.
quote:
Why should we elect ministers if they are not supposed to have any other power but to advise the Consuls on the future moves/actions? We need to either have Ministers in control, ordering the Consuls to do this and/or that (changing the whole system of government as currently in effect). OR, we can have the Consuls in power, actually being advised by the Ministers.
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If the ministers are elected, the consuls have an independent source of advice from people chosen by the team to give that advice. That independent source, in turn, gives the team an additional standard against which to judge the effectiveness of the consuls. Consuls would be free to ignore ministerial advice if they consider it unsound, but consuls who repeatedly ignore ministerial advice that the team as a whole considers sound would be likely to be challenged. In contrast, if the ministers are chosen by the consuls, and especially if they serve only at the pleasure of the consuls, at least some of that independence is lost. The ministers work for the consuls rather than for the team as a whole.
One would hope that this distinction is purely theoretical and that in practice, consuls would choose ministers who will feel just as free to speak out independently (sometimes voicing strong objections if the consuls overrule them) as if they were elected. But even if the difference is only theoretical, it has a significant effect on how much it feels like the consuls are running the entire show as quasi-dictators for however long they stay in office.
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vondrack
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Praha, Czech Republic
Jan 2002
time: 06:26
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quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
As things stand now, there is one huge difference. The Change of Command procedure is defined in fact, even if not in name, as a "no confidence" vote against one specific consul. It requires singling out one specific consul for possible replacement. In contrast, holding new elections all around would produce an effect in which a new candidate would replace whichever consul has the least support rather than replacing one specifically targeted consul. |
Well, yes, you are right. Unfortunately, while working out the Constitution, nobody thought of the need for such an arrangement. It was foreseen that once the leadership is established, it would be "revitalized" on the fly, never leaving the team with no legitimate leaders.
Quite frankly, considering the developments of the last few days (I'm not speaking about the differences we've had here - mostly about the enormous amount of time I have to spend with the ISDG stuff now), I'm leaning more and more towards accepting new elections, with hopefully more candidates running (not sure how to do it in the framework of the current Constitution though). It would definitely help me and other Consuls feel easier knowing we have the support of the whole ISDG team, including the "latecomers" and those that did not vote in the first elections. That was my primary reason to ask everybody to speak up his/her mind regarding the unhappiness about the current state of affairs. If there was significant unhappiness shown, I would not only consider the need to have new elections, but I would seriously consider not running again, since that would be a clear indication that I and the other two Consuls are running things contrary to what the team wishes. As I've shown most of how I intend to fulfil my duties as the Consul, it would be a very strong reason to step down.
quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
If the ministers are elected, the consuls have an independent source of advice from people chosen by the team to give that advice. That independent source, in turn, gives the team an additional standard against which to judge the effectiveness of the consuls. Consuls would be free to ignore ministerial advice if they consider it unsound, but consuls who repeatedly ignore ministerial advice that the team as a whole considers sound would be likely to be challenged. In contrast, if the ministers are chosen by the consuls, and especially if they serve only at the pleasure of the consuls, at least some of that independence is lost. The ministers work for the consuls rather than for the team as a whole. |
...however, the Consuls are supposed to work for the team, no? Even if there is a theoretical difference between these two approaches, I can see no actual difference. There are polls open for the Ministerial positions and I can hardly imagine that the Consuls would blatantly ignore the results (if they really wanted to appoint someone just licking their feet, they would need no polls).
quote:
Originally posted by nbarclay
One would hope that this distinction is purely theoretical and that in practice, consuls would choose ministers who will feel just as free to speak out independently (sometimes voicing strong objections if the consuls overrule them) as if they were elected. |
On this, I agree with you 100%. The common sense dictates that the Consuls will act in order to maximize the benefit for the team as a whole. For the unlikely case that they would not (be it a bad intent or incompetence), there is the CoC/no-con vote allowing to remove such (a) bad Consul(s) from the office.
My previous long post was not meant to say "shut up". Just the contrary - "SPEAK UP". As long there is only one or two members unhappy, it is not really something that one would hold new elections because of... but if there are many people unhappy, then, yes, by all means, let's deal the cards again.
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21-02-2003 11:05
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