Security Council category: Declarations

[Sedgistan]

It's ready to go live now, and has been tested. The "when" is when I'm comfortable there's sufficient support for it, that we've ironed out the details, and are comfortable with how we'll approach the moderating of this new category. I would suggest that's an ETA of days at most.

[Jedinsto]

Excellent.

[Unibot III]

Just a thought on the subtitle…

“ A resolution to recognize international law and memoranda”

I’m wondering if something like this might be a bit more open. The suggestions so far in the thread focus on expressing opinions, but inevitably players will want to think a bit bigger than memorandums and pronounce more foundational legislation — laws, agreements, protocols etc.

Edit: “ A resolution to proclaim international law and memoranda” might be more accurate choice of words.

[Sorianora]

Will the new category still give an “author badge”?

[Fauxia]

I still think this makes the SC a bit too GA-like, but I'm not utterly opposed, I guess.

[Minskiev]

On Walrus Hunting when???

Will the new category still give an “author badge”?

Read OP. Or don't, because the answer's no.

[Drew Durrnil]

Full support.

[Unibot III]

On Walrus Hunting when???

Will the new category still give an “author badge”?

Read OP. Or don't, because the answer's no.

I think Sedge was saying there would be no icon like Condemns/Commends, not no authorship badge.

[Sanctaria]

Just a thought on the subtitle…

“ A resolution to recognize international law and memoranda”

I’m wondering if something like this might be a bit more open. The suggestions so far in the thread focus on expressing opinions, but inevitably players will want to think a bit bigger than memorandums and pronounce more foundational legislation — laws, agreements, protocols etc.

Edit: “ A resolution to proclaim international law and memoranda” might be more accurate choice of words.

I think international law should remain the scope of the GA, not the SC. Declarations being a non-binding opinion of the SC is sufficient.

[Comfed]

Just a thought on the subtitle…

“ A resolution to recognize international law and memoranda”

I’m wondering if something like this might be a bit more open. The suggestions so far in the thread focus on expressing opinions, but inevitably players will want to think a bit bigger than memorandums and pronounce more foundational legislation — laws, agreements, protocols etc.

Edit: “ A resolution to proclaim international law and memoranda” might be more accurate choice of words.

I think international law should remain the scope of the GA, not the SC. Declarations being a non-binding opinion of the SC is sufficient.

I disagree. The GA is about international law in the imaginary in-game universe, whereas the SC is about in-game actions. The SC should be able to introduce "binding" laws, though it would be left to the players themselves to enforce it.

[Goobergunchia]

I think international law should remain the scope of the GA, not the SC. Declarations being a non-binding opinion of the SC is sufficient.

I disagree. The GA is about international law in the imaginary in-game universe, whereas the SC is about in-game actions. The SC should be able to introduce "binding" laws, though it would be left to the players themselves to enforce it.

A couple points:

1. GA resolutions do have a mechanical effect on nations when passed, which I've always viewed as the nations being brought into compliance with those resolutions. Declarations will not have a similar mechanical effect.
2. It's still completely legal to pass a SC resolution that's solely about NS forum roleplay.

[Sanctaria]

I think international law should remain the scope of the GA, not the SC. Declarations being a non-binding opinion of the SC is sufficient.

I disagree. The GA is about international law in the imaginary in-game universe, whereas the SC is about in-game actions. The SC should be able to introduce "binding" laws, though it would be left to the players themselves to enforce it.

That's not true at all. The SC has been used in the past, and it's intended in the future, to also recognise people in the RP community. It's not just the preserve of Gameplay.

Ninja'd by Goob. Hiya Goob.

[Comfed]

I disagree. The GA is about international law in the imaginary in-game universe, whereas the SC is about in-game actions. The SC should be able to introduce "binding" laws, though it would be left to the players themselves to enforce it.

That's not true at all. The SC has been used in the past, and it's intended in the future, to also recognise people in the RP community. It's not just the preserve of Gameplay.

Ninja'd by Goob. Hiya Goob.

You're right, but my point is that the GA is mostly RP while the SC is not, therefore the SC should be able to pass legislation that isn't RP (unlike the GA, which cannot). I did not phrase that well >.>

[Wallenburg]

That's not true at all. The SC has been used in the past, and it's intended in the future, to also recognise people in the RP community. It's not just the preserve of Gameplay.

Ninja'd by Goob. Hiya Goob.

You're right, but my point is that the GA is mostly RP while the SC is not, therefore the SC should be able to pass legislation that isn't RP (unlike the GA, which cannot). I did not phrase that well >.>

I disagree, and so does the SC ruleset established by site staff. The Security Council is a fundamentally IC institution, in which even the most obviously OOCly motivated actions must be couched in roleplay for the purposes of passing law.

[Unibot III]

Just a thought on the subtitle…

“ A resolution to recognize international law and memoranda”

I’m wondering if something like this might be a bit more open. The suggestions so far in the thread focus on expressing opinions, but inevitably players will want to think a bit bigger than memorandums and pronounce more foundational legislation — laws, agreements, protocols etc.

Edit: “ A resolution to proclaim international law and memoranda” might be more accurate choice of words.

I think international law should remain the scope of the GA, not the SC. Declarations being a non-binding opinion of the SC is sufficient.

Most of international law is not legally binding…

The SC won’t be enforcing agreements proclaimed in the same way that the GA does via a mechanical effect, but using the terms “expression of opinion” or memos etc. has the impression of limiting the scope of the category as being a kind of memo or statement of facts of sorts, when really the category offers an opportunity to proclaim memoranda or issue non-binding agreements, conventions, and more broadly speaking, international law.

Take for instance C.O.P.S, if it were reintroduced to the WASC — the oldest long-standing international convention in NSGP — it seems very diminutive to refer to something like C.O.P.S as an opinion or an expression or memo or something. It’s international law. A convention. Sure it’s proclamation would have no enforcement mechanism, but that doesn’t diminish it in terms of its status as an important piece of international law.

[SherpDaWerp]

Maybe the operative clause rule should be tweaked (for the new category, no others) - a lot of the current proposals out there have ended up a bit unwieldy thanks to the way they've met that rule.

Because there has to be a "hereby does $stuff" as-currently-written, we end up with sentences like

Hereby prohibits raider organizations from tag raiding for the purposes of advertising or promoting a WA proposal, a regional campaign, a dispatch, a nation, a region, or an organization not listed here.

The Security Council hereby gives its seal of approval to these organizations, as well as any future organizations, by the passage of this resolution.

Hereby discourages regional-government-supported recruitment of nations from regions that are neither a Feeder nor a Sinker.

These run the gauntlet from actively legislating (not allowed) to horrifically wordy to literally just cramming the entire proposal into one sentence. Alternative versions have placed the "Hereby" halfway through the proposal, so that anything after the preamble is included - it's better but it still seems like a hack to get around an unwieldy rule.

I'm not terribly active in writing though, tbh, so if actual authors wanna weigh in on whether they think the rule is restrictive or not that would be great; from my viewpoint as an Average Proposal Reader™ it seems like it might need a change.

It seems like the "evolving process" has figured out a way around this, nevermind.

[Kranostav]

You're right, but my point is that the GA is mostly RP while the SC is not, therefore the SC should be able to pass legislation that isn't RP (unlike the GA, which cannot). I did not phrase that well >.>

I disagree, and so does the SC ruleset established by site staff. The Security Council is a fundamentally IC institution, in which even the most obviously OOCly motivated actions must be couched in roleplay for the purposes of passing law.

Basically this and what Sanc said as well. The SC still requires RP to an extent.

Additionally, the SC cannot be binding as it literally cannot support such a requirement. At best it can be a collection of vague statements (currently looking like poorly written vague statements at that), which I guess is okay? But otherwise wont be able to create anything that an international body could 'enforce'.

Even if we want to create legislation that could set guidelines for commends or condemns, we would likely need a new ruleset to help facilitate this new form of legislation.

[Lord Dominator]

Given how extremely broad this is, I figure it could use some better definitions (how it's meant to be used, how rules would be enforced on it). I think the idea is intriguing in that it could be a way to bring roleplay back to the SC after so many years of stagnation.

Are definitions the right way to go with that? Because if it's deliberately left open, it allows more freedom for people to use the category in ways we couldn't anticipate,

Challenge accepted

[Sedgistan]

On Walrus Hunting when???



Read OP. Or don't, because the answer's no.

I think Sedge was saying there would be no icon like Condemns/Commends, not no authorship badge.

Correct.

Also my "days" prediction was slightly over-optimistic, as a small bug was detected* - you'd think that this would be the simplest type of resolution to code as it does nothing, but because it's a kind-of GA-esque category that's within the SC council of the WA, there's a slight issue with how something is displayed. It's a trivial looking thing, but because it's an absolute nightmare to "fix" resolutions after they've passed, it's got to be resolved before we go live - and it may require a bit of re-writing of some SC-related code. I'm therefore currently predicting first half of July (and hopefully the first week of July) for this to go live, foolish though it is to give any sort of ETA.

*by my one beta-tester, Sanctaria. Some of you may remember us mentioning before that we have a "playground" test version of NS up. I may shoot some invitations out to some people here this evening so they can have a go at breaking testing Declarations there too.

[Wallenburg]

I don't really want to play with Sanct's toys, but I'm upset that they're having fun without us.

[Cormactopia Prime]

Additionally, the SC cannot be binding as it literally cannot support such a requirement. At best it can be a collection of vague statements (currently looking like poorly written vague statements at that), which I guess is okay? But otherwise wont be able to create anything that an international body could 'enforce'.

The real life UN passes international law all the time that it can't enforce. Sometimes they end up not being enforced, but other times they end up enforced by sanctions imposed by UN member nations, military action undertaken by international coalitions, etc. That could as easily happen in the SC. So I'd have to agree with those saying these resolutions should be called international law whether they have any enforcement mechanism or not. Let regions decide whether to enforce them.

[Kranostav]

Additionally, the SC cannot be binding as it literally cannot support such a requirement. At best it can be a collection of vague statements (currently looking like poorly written vague statements at that), which I guess is okay? But otherwise wont be able to create anything that an international body could 'enforce'.

The real life UN passes international law all the time that it can't enforce. Sometimes they end up not being enforced, but other times they end up enforced by sanctions imposed by UN member nations, military action undertaken by international coalitions, etc. That could as easily happen in the SC. So I'd have to agree with those saying these resolutions should be called international law whether they have any enforcement mechanism or not. Let regions decide whether to enforce them.

I'd argue that's the job of the GA, and the GA did end up finding a method to deal with such non-compliance (method of enforcement).

These declarations should be anything but international law. They appear to be nothing more than broad statements of shared opinion. Otherwise you risk just becoming a Walmart brand GA with looser rules and no ability to enforce or do what the GA is already doing.

[Cormactopia Prime]

I'd argue that's the job of the GA, and the GA did end up finding a method to deal with such non-compliance (method of enforcement).

These declarations should be anything but international law. They appear to be nothing more than broad statements of shared opinion. Otherwise you risk just becoming a Walmart brand GA with looser rules and no ability to enforce or do what the GA is already doing.

I don't think that's necessarily true, provided the GA and SC are still kept distinct in what they do. There are things the SC addresses -- specific nations, specific regions, gameplay-related matters, specific RP things instead of broad principles -- that the GA can't touch. I don't see any reason the SC shouldn't be able to make international law in regard to those matters through Declarations in the same way the GA can make international law through its resolutions. They wouldn't overlap.

That said, I think it's totally possible to creatively give Declarations teeth without binding force, so it's not a hill I'd want implementation of the category to die on.

[August]

I may shoot some invitations out to some people here this evening so they can have a go at breaking testing Declarations there too.

Not sure if you are seeking volunteers, but if so, I would be interested.

[Fauxia]

I am strongly in favor of subcategories and rendering those that don't fall under certain subcategories illegal. There is so much risk that this will simply become the GA at the moment.