Guide to the Security Council
So, you’re new to the Security Council! Welcome, these parts can be treacherous… but given the proper amount of sunlight, you’ll be in full bloom before you know it! If you've got any pressing questions, little curiosities or things you've always wondered about, feel free to ask them in this thread! Perhaps you'll even contribute to a future section that'll help generations of Security Council members to come...
History and Introduction
So, you’re new to the Security Council! Welcome, these parts can be treacherous… but given the proper amount of sunlight, you’ll be in full bloom before you know it! If you've got any pressing questions, little curiosities or things you've always wondered about, feel free to ask them in this thread! Perhaps you'll even contribute to a future section that'll help generations of Security Council members to come...
History and Introduction
The Security Council, often abbreviated to the “SC”, is one of two chambers that make up the World Assembly. Previously a part of a single chamber known as the “World Assembly”, it was split from the General Assembly in 2009 to create the current World Assembly’s second chamber. The SC is responsible for the passage of a wide breadth of legislation that, unlike its sister chamber in the General Assembly, focuses less on policy and more on issues of international recognition or regional security.
Similarly to the General Assembly, members of the World Assembly can vote on SC proposals that make it to the voting floor. Any member of the World Assembly with two or more endorsements can propose a piece of legislation in the SC — upon becoming a proposal, a piece of legislation must receive the approval of 6% of all World Assembly Delegates before reaching “quorum”, at which stage it will enter the queue for the voting floor.
Proposals must follow the Security Council Rules in order to make it to vote. If they do not, the Moderators (typically Sedgistan, Crazy Girl, or Goobergunchia) will mark them illegal, and they will be discarded from queue upon the approval period ending. The Secretariat are not responsible for marking Security Council proposals illegal — they are responsible for the General Assembly.
Once at vote, a proposal will stand for four days. At this time, all members of the World Assembly can vote on it — at the end of the voting period, if a majority of votes are in favor, the proposal passes and enters the halls of the Security Council as a World Assembly resolution, and the authors and co-authors receive a badge. If a majority are against, the proposal is eaten by a World Assembly gnome.
Since its conception in 2009, two proposal types, to expand on the Commendation/Condemnation and Repeal, have been added — the “Liberation” in 2009, created with the intention to aid in obstructing regional destruction, and the “Declaration” in 2021, which gives authors a broader scope in establishing the SC’s stance on an issue or event.
Proposal Types
Proposals in the SC are divided into five distinct categories — Commendations, Condemnations, Liberations, Declarations, and Repeals. Let’s touch on each briefly:
Commendations and Condemnations seek to recognize nations or regions for notable accomplishments or achievements, and award them with a shiny badge! They are the most commonly-written form of proposal, but despite this, the standard for Commending or Condemning a nominee is usually incredibly high — proposals usually consist of a multi-layered argument, detailing a nominee’s history and incredible breadth of contribution to a community or communities.
The distinction made between Commendations and Condemnations usually stems from the nature of the actions or accomplishments being recognized. Usually, Commendations seek to recognize more “good/constructive” accomplishments while Condemnations revolve around “evil/destructive” actions. Yet, many other achievements, from extensive roleplay to prolific writing of Issues, can often be characterized as either “commendable” or “condemnable” — this is an ongoing debate that we will touch on in more detail later.
Liberations seek to ensure the security of a region by making sure a Delegate can not impose a password on it, and by removing any Delegate-imposed password. This seems counterintuitive at first. Why would removing a password promote regional security? Some regions are taken over by outside forces, who seize the Delegacy and can destroy or “refound” a region by kicking out everyone inside it — in removing a Delegate’s ability to password the region, the SC severely limits an outsider Delegate’s control of the region. As such, these are usually drafted to quickly respond to invasions of regions, quickly going over the context of the situation, and done in a time-sensitive and urgent fashion uncharacteristic of the expected pace of the SC.
Declarations are a new form of proposal introduced to give the SC a wider scope in terms of responding and commenting on, well, anything really! Declarations have been passed on anything from the sanctity of “historical regions” to International Maxtopia Day, and what Declarations really are all about is still under consideration and a subject of debate — while this doesn’t mean you should write about anything, you can let your creative mind wander a bit!
Injunctions are an even newer form of proposal in the process of being introduced in the Security Council as part of the "Frontier/Stronghold" Update. This proposal type prevents regions from switching between a Frontier and a Stronghold (in both directions), so long as the process is initiated by the Delegate. This proposal type has not yet been released, and will likely undergo lots of defining in terms of usage upon release. More on this as that occurs!
Repeals are, as suggested by the name, proposals that seek to abolish previously-passed resolutions. This can be done for a variety of reasons — writing quality, merit, politics, or in the case of Liberations, simply because invaders have left the region — but often require foolproof arguments that create a solid case for repeal. Resolutions are also often “repealed and replaced”, as passed resolutions can not be amended. More on this later!
Wow! That’s a lot, right? Where is one supposed to start in all of this? Well, there are no rope lines forcing you to go a certain path — many find their way by writing draft after draft, adding to the SC’s never-ending halls one resolution at a time. Others prefer to guide the process from the sidelines, sparking key debates and offering the crucial feedback that helps this institution grow. Some simply observe and understand, whether to protect their region’s interests or simply because they like to be around. Together, they make the SC a living, breathing institution, and have paved a thousand roads ahead for you to walk along. Below are guides to a few of the most commonly traversed paths members of the SC take. While somewhat in-depth, they do not at all cover the full breadth of possibility, advice, or understanding within the SC — do not take it in any way as an end-all be-all for anything you encounter around here!
Now, best of luck, and wherever your journey takes you, I hope they serve you well!
Table of Contents
(* indicates suggested reading for first-timers)
Drafting a Commendation/Condemnation*
Step One: Choosing a Nominee*
Step Two: Research and Reaching Out*
Step Three: Writing and Contacts*
Step Four: Revising and Releasing*
Step Five: Submission and Beyond*
The Anatomy of a Proposal
The UNSC Format
Introductory and Conclusory Clauses
The First Layer: “What”
The Second Layer: “How”
The Third Layer: “Why”
To List or not to List
Making the Argument
In Short*
Suggested Readings*
Commendation vs. Condemnation: What’s the Difference?
How to Repeal a Resolution
Repeal and Replacements
Repealing a Historical Resolution
Repealing a Liberation
Writing a Liberation
The Age of Frontiers - Injunctions
How to Campaign*
The Counter-Campaign
How to Research
Coming Soon...
Declarations: What about them?
Breaking the Norms: Taking a Proposal Above and Beyond
Drafting a Commendation/Condemnation
So, you wanna write a Commendation? Or perhaps a Condemnation? Look no further!
The bread and butter of the Security Council is the Commendation/Condemnation, or C/C. It’s what most people think of when they talk about the SC, and the most commonly written form of proposal — and yet, it seems like so many efforts just go to junk or are shouted down!
In truth, C/Cs are far from being incredibly difficult to go about writing — however, the perception of the process is what usually keeps most writers from becoming authors. It’s important to clear up the misconceptions of how C/Cs are drafted and passed in order to go about becoming an author, so let’s go over some steps on how to do so!
Step One: Choosing a Nominee
The first step, quite obviously, is choosing a nominee. This is usually the greatest challenge for any aspiring writer — you may be tempted to choose a friend who’s been wonderful to you, or an enemy who you really do not like at all, or you might just be stumped as to who to choose! When choosing a nominee, it is important to keep in mind that C/Cs are intended to recognize players or regions that have played a particularly notable role in Nationstates — this isn’t intended to gatekeep certain communities or players from the institution, but rather is a byproduct of the fact that the SC and its motions are voted upon by nations from every corner of the site. These rather restrictive criteria can mean the list of available nominees feels short, and as you go through the process, might even feel completely empty — no worries, though!
The SC is, in a way, the intersection of so many communities at once — if you’re around here in the SC, you’ve probably at the very least seen or been a part of other communities before! If not, no sweat, NS has so many diverse communities that there are more than enough to choose from — and most definitely more than enough commendable or condemnable nominees to choose from. Think of a topic that you might be more familiar with or interested in, to start — making sure that your nominee is someone you are genuinely invested in is a good start to ensuring you see through the process, but at the very least being familiar enough with a community so that you have something to work off of is an extremely important step.
There are a variety of options to choose from - common choices are authorships (WA, Issues), Gameplay (including military gameplay), or region-building. If you’re involved in your region, that is always a great place to start! Roleplay and miscellaneous approaches like stats or cards can be a bit difficult, but if you're more familiar with those areas, go for it! The focus, so long as you're familiar with the background and how to measure c/cability against that background, is the main issue - being familiar with the nominee isn't completely necessary, as that's what the later steps are for!
I'm not going to spend a lot of time going over "commendability/condemnability" - that is a whole different debate within itself. But keep in mind that as a new writer, one may prefer a less difficult fight — consider breadth of contribution in comparison to other, particularly recent, targets. Read through at least the last dozen proposals, or at least the last few that have been published in similar areas — if you're still confused, reach out to someone you know in the related community who's knowledgeable and respected in that community! They might have a good measure for how likely your nominee is to be a good choice.
Step Two: Research and Reaching Out
So, you've decided on a nominee. You're excited about it - you think they've got what it takes from an initial viewing, and you've got a lot of energy! Now, what to do? This is a bit nebulous — there are a variety of ways that one can go from here. The key thing to understand from here on out is that you are, in essence, building up an argument. You are presenting reasons that a nominee is worthy of recognition, and this all boils down to what you choose to argue and how. Don’t worry too much about the big scary things like writing just yet — it’ll come naturally as you go along! I’ll provide the method that I feel is best, as a start, but this is in no way a set-in-stone path — you can deviate from it or alternate order as needed.
Your first step is doing some initial research. Before getting started at all, you want to confirm that the person or region you’ve chosen truly merits a c/c, and that you know exactly why that is the case. Say our hypothetical nominee is a gameplayer, who participates in a variety of regions. A good way to go about researching is to search through off-site forums related to their spheres of influence — what regions or areas may they have contributed the most? This can be a massive time vortex, and it will often feel incredibly boring, slow, or plain pointless. Not every forum post you find is going to be about what the nominee has done or is like. Some specific search strategies may be helpful — history threads or election threads, if the nominee has run for office in the past, can be helpful, as nominees will usually detail their careers or past accomplishments there. Additionally, if they’ve held office, opening, closing, and midterm addresses tend to go over what has and hasn’t been done.
The point of this step is to try to get a close feel for your nominee — this step is crucial for building the foundation for the rest of the drafting process. You don’t want to approach the later stages of drafting stumped when you reach a roadblock, or even worse, completely clueless — put in the effort now, clear every corner and search under every rock! Your goal, ideally, is to be able to respond to future feedback and questions flexibly and knowledgeably, especially since as a newer writer, you may not have the background or contextual exposure to be able to do so in a great manner. The better your research is, the smoother the process will go!
Once you've gone through the research and really feel like you have a solid argument down, maybe with something on paper, it is time to consider going to your nominee and asking permission. This can come before the previous step, especially if you’re stumped in terms of what to research, and isn't necessarily required but is very recommended, both out of respect and practicality. When asking a nominee, be sure to be respectful and polite — oftentimes, they are reachable through offsite platforms like Discord or regional forums, but you may need to send them a Telegram. Be prepared to wait or be rejected, but do be polite as well!
Once you’ve gotten approval, your nominee may be able to give you further insight into what you can look into now that you have a solid feel for where you want to focus and what you might be missing. Getting a feel for the nominee's personality is a great first step for taking your proposal beyond simply being "good" - but again, a whole different discussion so I'll leave it at that for now. Still, you may want to sit down with your nominee, and gauge how they feel about the proposal — usually, nominees are not very involved at all, but you can ask them for pointers for areas of their careers to touch on, people to contact, and confirmation of what you’ve got so far! It can be very valuable to interview them a little bit, if they’re up for it — but again, it is of utmost importance that you respect your nominee’s wishes. If they simply don’t want to have anything to do with the proposal, please be okay with that!
Step Three: Writing and Contacts
Right! You've got permission, you've got initial research done - a good step here is to evaluate if you can put something down onto paper, or if you need more info. Now is a good time to take a look at the Security Council Rules if you haven’t already, as they contain key points of information that will be important for shaping your proposal. Keep these in mind as you write — if anything seems to even toe the line, raise it as a potential issue when you begin drafting. Beware, not following these come submission time will mean your proposal gets tossed out! Additionally it should be noted that proposals can only be 5000 characters long at maximum, including spaces and BBcode (but not linebreaks) — factor this in as well when writing!
If you feel like you haven't gotten enough from research, you ideally should have at least gotten a feel for who might be closest or most knowledgeable about the nominee either from your research or your talk with the nominee.
Reaching out to others is a critical step - they can give close perspectives on what the nominee did, if you're over or understating the breadth of their contributions or their achievements, if you're missing anything or if you could expand on certain aspects. Be it their friends, colleagues, or former rivals, anyone who can give you a close and more personal understanding of the nominee so that your draft reflects the full breadth of your nominee's achievements is good to ask. Ask nicely, and approach with politeness — remember, they're doing you a favor, and this can be a difficult process for people to remember as a nominee's work may go back years, even decades! Write up thoughtful questions guided by the knowledge you already have from previous research (this is where initial research and nominee interviews come in handy) and specifically targeting areas that you are most confused about so that you aren't spending too much time or effort rehashing things. Once you've got satisfactory info, you can either finish up your standing draft or start on a satisfactory one!
Step Four: Revising and Releasing
From here on out, you've got something good to work with. Once again, you’ve reached a crossroads — how you want to approach things is up to you now. I recommend reaching out to helpful friends, experienced members of this council, or others who might be able to help you with initial feedback, especially if you’re not confident you can put your draft up on the forums yet. There are great spaces and people to contact for this, and I guarantee you that they are incredibly helpful and kind. Some organizations, like the Partnership for Sovereignty or Heroes of Valhalla, offer specific feedback on nominees close to their respective spheres of influence; your region may also have a World Assembly Affairs program that may be incredibly helpful for resources and feedback!
Once you’ve got a draft that you like, it can be a good idea to return it to the nominee to see if they feel it is sound, accurate, and something that they can approve of. Most importantly, though, please please please post it on these forums! Even if you’re confident that it is in good shape, it is important to solicit feedback from the Security Council as a whole — this is where the biggest glaring issues you might’ve missed get hashed out, and there are some awesome voices around that will improve your draft by whole degrees. Proposals that are not posted to the forums are often looked poorly upon, and will generally fail at vote. This is an important step, so do not skip it!
When posting a thread, you generally want to tag it with “[DRAFT] {Name of Proposal}”, as to indicate that you are in the drafting stages. Post your draft, and ask kindly for feedback, suggestions, or generally any comments — often this will flow in slowly, but stay patient, and it will come. Criticism can often be harsh, and force you to make big changes to your draft that you might not want to — but keep an open mind, respond kindly, and take every bit of feedback into consideration. The hardest steps to take often strengthen your draft the most! If it’s been a week and your draft is starting to drift towards the bottom of the page, it can be a good idea to “bump” your post — don’t do this excessively, though. This process usually takes several weeks. It’s a long and grueling endeavor, but stay patient, and stay disciplined — remember, you want to create the best argument possible!
Step Five: Submission and Beyond
Once your draft has been up for a while, and the general consensus is that it’s in good shape, it’s time to start considering submission. You can bring your draft up to “last call”, tagging it as such with “[LAST CALL]”, and start getting ready to tidy up the final bits of your draft. Big feedback can still come at this moment — don’t be frustrated if you’re forced to postpone for a while if some particularly useful criticism comes up!
After a few days of being at “last call”, you can get ready to submit. It can be a good idea to notify your nominee during this period so that they can confirm one last time that they’re in agreement with everything on the proposal. Make sure to do a final check-up as well, and look over your proposal for potential illegalities if you haven’t already — if you’re uncertain, make sure to request that a moderator perform a legality check before submitting!
Once you’ve submitted, the work isn’t over — it’s time to campaign for delegates to approve your proposal, which is an essential step to reaching quorum. That’s a topic for a later section, though — for now, the writing process is just about done. All your efforts have culminated in this!
In the end, though, it's not as much about what specific steps you take, even as I've laid them all out here as one very narrow way to approach things, as it is your mindset, focus, and process. Display tenacity, but also kindness; resilience, but also politeness. In the end, our goal as members of this chamber is to cater to and recognize the contributions of others — and that can be a long, tough, or even nigh-impossible process. It's also incredibly intertwined with the various communities that form this site, so you may inevitably run into political issues as well. Keep an open mind, be ready to accept criticism, delays, and defeat — and you will be sure to succeed!!
Feel free to reach out to people for advice, so long as you are keeping the above in mind. Most are more than glad to help where they can, even if they have limited time in their day! You've got this, and best of luck!
The Anatomy of a Proposal
“Now, hold on!” I hear you saying. “That’s all well and good, but how do I write a proposal?” Great question! I’ve separated this section from the previous one as it deserves its own focus. The process of researching and drafting a Commendation/Condemnation is distinct from actually writing and putting it together. Each process deserves its own in-detail examination.
There are dozens of different ways you can write a proposal, depending on the type and what goals you aim to achieve with it. Because the most common and standard format sees the Security Council Commend/Condemn a nation target in a style modeled off of real-life United Nations Security Council resolutions, we will examine that format and dig deeper into it as a model for writing an SC proposal!
Before I move on, I will first warn that this discussion gets fairly technical at many points — I’ll leave a TL;DR summarization at the end with the key points, with specific resolutions that I feel are good for reading and getting a grasp for how a good SC proposal should feel, since there isn’t really a right way to write at all! Rather, I often hear people asking “how can I write better?”, especially when stumped by criticism, and this is my bottom-up analysis of issues and solutions.
I will also once more reiterate that there are countless ways for you to go about an SC proposal, be it a Commend, Condemn, Repeal or otherwise. This is simply one example that has proven the simplest for most to execute. Let your creative mind roam free!
The UNSC Format
The UNSC format, or, as I will refer to it for simplicity, the standard format, is centered around what is technically a single operative clause — your proposal will start with “The Security Council”, and end with “Commends/Condemns (Nominee)”. What truly makes the difference is what comes in between!
So what comes in between? Your argument, of course! You will want to touch on the keynotes of your nominee’s career, providing ample detail and reason for why each point is commendable or condemnable. This will take the form of a variety of clauses that each express the SC’s feeling or view on a particular point in a nominee’s career — that might be a little confusing, so let’s get into what that means!
Introductory and Conclusory Clauses
First, let’s go over Introductory and Conclusion clauses. These differ from the rest of your proposal, which are usually more “content clauses”, as they do not necessarily contribute distinct arguments or points of the nominee’s career. Rather, Introductory clauses often serve as a “thesis” for your proposal — what about the nominee is commendable or condemnable, and what about them, in broad terms, should we be looking out for?
This seems like a fairly simple task, and really, it is! You technically could present, at face value, a plain argument that “this nominee has done a lot of things, and we here at the SC like to commend people for having done a lot of things, and as such we believe this person should be recognized” — but this is a time-worn practice that often leaves many yawning before the reading has begun! Rather, introductory clauses can serve as a taste of your proposal, a greater commentary on the work of the nominee and the theme that your proposal will run around.
To illustrate this, I’ll give an example. A particular Issues writer might be commendable because, say, they’ve written 15 different issues, among other region-building contributions. That’s pretty good! But saying that a particular nominee is commendable because “they have written a lot of issues and helped build a region” is rather bland. An introductory clause should 1. Help to introduce the nominee and their contributions in a compelling way, and 2. Provide the reader a strong grasp of what they are about to read about. To do this, we should aim to define certain aspects of our nominee — namely, the values that they espouse in their work, the character they introduce to whatever communities they are in, or the nature of their efforts across their career. This is where your proposal finds its direction, and distinguishes itself from others — so take those wings and fly!
What do I mean by values or character? Well, think of the nominee you have in mind. Many have their own M.O., in that even though they approach a particular task or have accomplished something that others have also done, they have done so in a distinct way. A region-builder who has been a diligent, meticulous member of their region with a soft yet strong voice during times of crisis has a clear persona built around them, and one should capitalize on it by highlighting that not only have they contributed greatly to many parts of the region in X, Y, and Z fashion, but that they have also done so with care and firmness — see SCR#422: Commend Kringalia for an example of how values can be incorporated into and highlighted within a resolution. Consider another nominee, who has been a prolific issues author, but perhaps has often played up a more “evil” character — this gets into a whole different discussion for later, but turning that on its head and describing the nominee as a force of evil, who manipulates the nature of issues against nations across the world, is a neat way to portray the unique character of a nominee in an introductory clause; see SCR#314: Condemn Australian RePublic for a fairly neat example of this being split between two clauses.
Essentially, when building your introductory clause, ask not only what your nominee has done, but the way in which they did it — your nominee is commendable or condemnable because something about them stood out. What is it? Are they more of an anti-hero-like character? Someone whose efforts have united a larger community under certain subsets of values like compassion or empathy? A roleplayer whose focus has been playing the villain in a certain manner? Take those unique aspects of your nominee, and shine a great big spotlight on them in your introduction!
Conclusion clauses are fairly similar in this regard — they want to do the same thing, encapsulate your nominee’s unique character into a single clause, while summing up what your proposal just read in a nice and clean fashion. Generally, follow the above advice and focus on developing the character for your nominee while going over in brief or abstract the things they’ve done; a unique approach to conclusion clauses may be adding another “assertion” that the SC has come to as a product of this proposal, beyond that we must commend/condemn said nominee. Oftentimes, proposals about raiders will see the SC continue to reiterate its stance against raiding — something like that, but developed further so that it applies directly to the nominee (see SCR#326: Condemn Ever-Wandering Souls for a good example of this) or a greater theme inherent to them (SCR#296: Condemn Gatesville Inc. is a fair example of this) is leagues ahead of a conclusion clause that simply reiterates in brief what the proposal states, or that the nominee is deserving of a commend/condemn.
Intros and Conclusions are the first thing your reader will see, and the best chance you’ll get to build up the character and mythos of your nominee. Introductions and Conclusions are not at all necessary, nor do they need to be incredibly well-developed — but the best proposals will establish, in the reader’s mind, an image of the nominee before they’ve read the proposal and after they’ve finished it that will stay with them for much longer.
Now, without further ado, let’s get to writing the content clauses!
The First Layer: “What” (i.e. your reaction to reading this)
Let’s take an example clause: This one comes from the “Praising” clause of SC#414, Commend Refuge Isle:
Appreciating Luca for also promoting environmentalism beyond Refugia by passing international legislation such as GA#473 “Responsible Land Management”, which reduced the permanent destruction of habitats due to careless agricultural practices through its mandates, as well as alerting nations to the economic consequences of their refusal to sign climate treaties through the document “Trading Climate Sours”,
As you can see, the clause begins with a present participle that sums up the SC’s point of view on a particular accomplishment or effort by the nominee. While there is no strict line along which you must choose your beginning phrase, it is common to see many Commends default to phrases like “Praising” or “Appreciating”, which are largely interchangeable, while Condemns tend to use “Shocked” or “Horrified”, reflecting the different nature of approach by the SC to the nominee. You don’t need to worry too much about choosing a preambulatory phrase — as long as it fits, go along with it!
Most clauses will begin with the same introduction to the nominee and the focus of the clause:
Appreciating Luca for also promoting environmentalism beyond Refugia by passing international legislation such as GA#473 “Responsible Land Management…”
Here, the preambulatory phrase applies to Luca, the nominee, and the focus is their work in promoting environmentalism in the General Assembly through the authoring of environmental legislation. Similarly, in the “Ecstatic” clause of the same resolution,
Ecstatic at Luca's further contributions to global recordkeeping and preservation through the creation of the Eyebeast…
Once more, the preambulatory phrase, now an adjective (note that there can be variation!), applies to the nominee, Luca; the focus comes right after, in their creation of the database Eyebeast. These examples help us sum up how we enter clauses:
(Preambulatory Phrase) (nominee) for (focus of clause)
Simple, right? Didn’t need that many examples to get that across. This is the first layer of a good argumentative clause, the what of your argument, and the bit that is most definitely the easiest to grasp. Here or in the next section are where you’ll often fit in your position/title drops and say “Nominee was X thing” or “Nominee did Y achievement”. It should lay out the focus for your clause, similar to a thesis – and while it isn’t restricted to the format above, and is often modified as basic grammar rules allow, you want to get across what this clause will be in the first few words so that readers have an idea of where exactly you’re going with all of this, as they aren’t necessarily the most familiar with your nominee! Thus, to take from your primary school English teacher, your clause generally starts with the what of its argument. Let’s move on to the second layer: the how.
The Second Layer: “How”
Turning back to SC#414:
Applauding the unique culture of environmental protection and conservation Luca cultivated within Refugia as its Councillor of Culture, in which they established the Green Week event and initiated the publishing of the Eco-Report, encouraging national leaders to enact environmentally-supportive policies,
You have your introduction (in a slightly different format) from “Applauding” to “Councillor of Culture”. The how is touched on in the next sentence:
Applauding the unique culture of environmental protection and conservation Luca cultivated within Refugia as its Councillor of Culture, in which they established the Green Week event and initiated the publishing of the Eco-Report,
This goes over specific, objective content that focuses on the details of the nominee’s work — you’re expanding on the focus here. In this example, Luca is argued in the first layer to have cultivated a unique culture of environmental protection and conservation; the how is then their role as Councillor of Culture, with the implementation of the Green Week event and the publication of the Eco-Report being part of that. These are the bread and butter of every proposal, and the meat of every clause — in the same way you must cite evidence for an argument in an essay, one must provide evidence for the claim made in a clause. For another example:
Amazed by Luca's meteoric success in TGW, rapidly rising to the rank of Warden-Commander, where they painstakingly maintained Warden service records in their role as the organisation's Chamberlain in addition to their labor in pushing integration efforts and organizing defensive operations,
Here it must seem that the first and second layer, the what and how, are somewhat fuzzy, which is completely normal being that they are near-arbitrary assignments of purpose to grammar constructions that were likely written without those specific delineations in mind. But even here, they are identifiable — the what is “Luca’s meteoric success in TGW”, a sideways nod to their greater contributions to the organization as opposed to a head-on acknowledgement of such, while the how is their “ris(e) to the rank of Warden-Commander” and “their role as the organization’s Chamberlain”. Why not the bits in between? We’ll get to that in a bit; but it is important to note that the how seeks to indicate the concrete evidence of the main claim of a clause. As seen in the previous clause, this usually revolves around projects or positions in which work is inherently done. So, for our model, we are left with:
(Preambulatory Clause) (nominee) for (focus), by (key positions) (key accomplishments) (key achievements)
All that to say write an argument and back it up? Well, yes. Let’s go one step further, into the key third layer: the why.
The Third Layer: “Why”
This is a fairly ambiguous layer, and yet it ties together everything about a clause that makes it good. Oftentimes, newer players will be criticized for poor writing quality and lack of research because they do not offer a strong third layer, if any at all. It is easy to argue that a nominee has completed their obligations within a certain role — Delegates do in fact lead their regions in one way or another, Regional ministers do complete certain aspects of their delineated portfolio (or hopefully so), and World Assembly authors do in fact write proposals that affect nations. The why stands for why do we care? It acts as a guiding focus for how to get your point across in a clause — having researched a nominee, it might be obvious to you why they are commendable/condemnable, but not necessarily so for others! So we ask the questions, why is this position important to your argument, why is this accomplishment distinct from others, why did they receive this particular level of recognition or deference? Similarly, it helps a writer develop the argument they are making — why did the nominee do this thing and why are you placing this clause specifically where it is? The answers to those questions should be present in the clause.
Let’s go back to our previous examples.
Amazed by Luca's meteoric success in TGW, rapidly rising to the rank of Warden-Commander, where they painstakingly maintained Warden service records in their role as the organisation's Chamberlain in addition to their labor in pushing integration efforts and organizing defensive operations,
The why here is the answer to the question “why did they receive this particular level of recognition or deference?” There are several ways to approach an answer to that question; this clause chooses to do so by pointing out the key results of their efforts in TGW, in that they “painstakingly maintained Warden service records… in addition to their labor in pushing integration efforts and organizing defensive operations”. Some points here are expanded upon by later clauses, largely because these details actually somewhat fall under the “how” consideration of objective accomplishment, but the point is heavily implied — the nominee put in great levels of effort in improving many internal aspects and functions of their organization. Giving it at least this level of credence, and perhaps choosing to expand it further, is necessary to bring a clause to life.
This is also a good example for noting the nuances of this layer — it is heavily reliant on a comparative or relative argument, in that when we think of a commendable/condemnable nominee, we expect them to have done something to a greater degree than others. Here, that is present in the “how”, actually — the roles themselves are generally understood by many to be of great importance, though perhaps there is an argument to be made that more expansion is warranted. Let’s move on to another example:
Ecstatic at Luca's further contributions to global recordkeeping and preservation through the creation of the Eyebeast, an exhaustive and easy-to-access repository of regional data that allows those restoring or interested in a region's past attributes to promptly access them,
The “why”, here, answers the question “why is this point important”, providing an explanation of what “Eyebeast” exactly is. Once again, without certain context, this clause is a little bit wanting in terms of distinction, as the questions of “why is Eyebeast particularly important/what is Eyebeast used for” are touched on only briefly, and is indicative of a greater weakness in many proposals, though that is not to discredit any authors (the character count in these things is rather constrictive sometimes!) — answering these questions in a clean, understandable manner is difficult, and exactly what this guide is for! Not every clause will be able to sweep away the “why” questions, but as you improve in your writing, this will come more naturally. Let’s take another example, this time from SCR#367: Commend Maowi;
Admiring Maowi's service to Europeia through their diligent and well enumerated recruitment efforts, serving as Minister of Recruitment following the untimely departure of the Minister while Maowi was in a position to answer the call to serve, and creating a tournament for members of the region based on their recruitment activities, thus bolstering Europeia's recruiting prowess;
Here, the “what” is Maowi’s recruitment efforts; the “how” is their service as Minister of Recruitment and their creation of a tournament; and the “why” is 1. Their stepping in during a time of need and 2. Their bolstering of Europeia’s recruiting prowess. This provides good context on why this is important, and a fair argument for the nominee’s recruiting efforts with brevity. For one more example, let’s take a look at SCR#365: Commend Pope Hope;
Praising Pope Hope’s monumental efforts to unite the defender community in unparalleled levels of cooperation at the time, harmoniously working with other contemporary organizations in innumerable successful missions including the famed Puppetmaster liberation of TNP from the followers of Francos Spain in 2004 and setting a strong precedent for future defenders to follow,
The “what”, here, are Pope Hope’s efforts to unite the defender community; the “how” is their working efforts in defender missions like the Puppetmaster liberation of TNP; and the “why” answers 1. Why they deserve this level of recognition, in that they set a strong precedent for future defenders and 2. Why is this point important to the argument, in that it evidences Pope Hope’s success in increasing cooperation and unity within the defender community as a part of their contributions to defender efforts as a whole.
A good “why” provides context, strong reasoning to get behind your nominee, and leaves a lasting impression on the reader because the “why” is exactly what we hook on to — at the end of the day, few will remember the number of times your nominee held X position or how many issues they wrote, but rather the length and breadth of impact they had, or the notability of their place in history, or their unique style or contributions to a community.
In a similar way, if you find yourself grasping at straws while writing a proposal, the “why” questions are a good place to start. Answering your why questions will give you an understanding of whether you have a truly strong argument or not — if a point expressed in your “what” and “how” positions is not important to your argument; has no reason to be in the place it is in; is not distinguished from other, similar efforts; or does not contribute to an argument for recognizing the nominee, along with you being uncertain why the nominee did such a thing, you have yourself a dead argument.
If these points are so crucial to a proposal, surely it’s a good idea to provide some guidance on how to answer them? Well, most certainly! I’ll touch briefly on good ways to address the “why” in each proposal below.
“Why is a point important to your argument” is simple. First, you should have a coherent argument. This can be a clause-based argument, or one that is present as a whole in the proposal. If your clause’s argument is that your nominee was a good Minister of Foreign Affairs, touch on the key points of their Foreign Affairs portfolio, and if there are tangibles like treaties or partnerships, expand on the importance of those partnerships to your region (the first treaty of its kind, established groundwork for a relationship that has lasted for a while, etc.). Proposal-wide arguments are a different beast, but we can touch on those in a later section. Let’s take it at face value — if your proposal’s argument is that a nominee is a region-builder who has been key to promoting certain aspects of a region’s culture and internal workings, then your argument had better highlight a cultural shift that was either present for a while or still is; on the other hand, it should point to the construction of internal workings, like recruitment, that had fairly tangible results like a population increase — sometimes this isn’t possible though, and you may have to rely on word of mouth to make your assertions. And that’s okay, because that’s where strong research and interviewing comes in!
“Why is this accomplishment distinct from others” or “why did they receive this level of recognition?” is fairly easy, as the answer should be straightforward. If a nominee held a position that others have, what defined their term in that position? Was it the level of success in a certain capacity, like a Minister of Defense’s success in recruiting new soldiers? Or maybe the nominee is a roleplayer or issues author, and their style is distinct from others, in addition to the level of prolificity in their career.
“Why is this where it is in the proposal” is similar to the first point, and hopefully even easier, because you should have answered this already in research and drafting! If you chose to add something to a proposal, why the heck did you do that? And if you added it to a specific position in proximity to similar contributions to a community in the vein of, say, external policy and outreach, then play on a greater theme there and expand on it! If they expanded outreach to User-Created Regions and had a certain way of doing so, play that up!
And, finally, “why did your nominee do this particular thing”: this question plays on the idea of contextualizing your clause as well as possible, and can yield answers like “they worked to defend communities because their original community was raided/they worked to promote environmentalism because their home world was destroyed in an environmental disaster (RP)” that are helpful for breathing life into a clause in a different way than most other arguments.
Writing a good clause can take a lot of consideration — many fall into the trap of applying lots of the “what” and the “how”, making many proposals feel bland, dry, and not particularly informative or convincing. Others fail to provide great substance, opting to argue that a nominee has done something without pointing to that key layer 2 evidence. Some neglect in the first place to create a convincing focus. Putting all of it together will help in creating a convincingly strong clause!
A final disclaimer — this delineation does NOT need to be followed for success! It is my own way of approaching and understanding SC proposals, and is the easiest way, in my view, to present a clear step-by-step method of building up a clause without simply being told to “provide more context” or “be more informative”. This then, of course, is only useful so long as it makes sense to people — if clarification is ever needed, or if generally sections seem unhelpful, let me know and I will do my best to fix it!
Regardless of how you choose to go about writing your clauses, if you put the proper care and consideration into why you are writing each, you will find yourself far closer than you otherwise would be. Best of luck!
To List or not to List
Where and how should you go about writing in lists? There have been debates over whether lists in particular places are productive or not; proposals may be cited as “too list-y”, while you may hear suggestions asking you to break things down into a list. So which way should one list?
The answer is fairly simple — list to your discretion! Don’t take it too far — not every clause needs to be divided up into lists — but if you feel a clause can not grammatically or logically fit in all the content you’d like for it to include in a coherent manner, split it into lists. Often, when covering a specific position or time period for which a nominee contributed a greater variety of work, a list is useful for dividing up focus into each of those areas. Similarly, some achievements — namely sports tournaments won, specific issues or World Assembly Resolutions written, military operations taking place — of which there are more than two or three examples, each with fairly equal impact, almost always find their way into lists for simplicity (though this is not necessary; see SCR#340: Commend Singapore No.2 for a good example). In general, lists are useful for telling the reader where to focus — if a draft has many, many focuses, particularly more so on the specifics of several accomplishments in a single clause, a list can be a good idea for giving one the grammatical and attention space to expand on that.
So, don’t worry too much about lists — while too many can divide your reader’s attention too much, using them in moderation (perhaps going over no more than around half of the clauses in a proposal, though this is completely arbitrary as a measure) should be absolutely fine.
Making the Argument
Okay, so now you’ve got an idea of how to write your clauses, hopefully! The question is, how do you put it all together? This is a fairly simple process, and in this particular form of proposal, is often divided into two distinct organizational formats: resume-based and chronological.
Resume-based formats simply want to state all the nominee’s achievements, starting with the most eye-grabbing or notable points of their career first. This generally changes your approach to the proposal — you will first want to determine what most defines and pops out about your nominee, and then focus pretty heavily on that. Your clauses will each be fairly content based, wasting little time on storytelling, and aim to simply make it known to your audience that this person is particularly commendable or condemnable.
How does one know what is more or less notable? There isn’t usually an objective measure for this, and oftentimes those giving feedback may give you suggestions on where things might and should go. However, generally where your nominee has focused most of their work is a good start — this is where asking them or contacts where they personally have put in the most work comes in handy!
This is usually the format that most newer authors default to, for good reason — it’s intuitive, and it’s easy. There is little else to do besides presenting everything in a fairly straightforward manner. Storytelling, or chronological formats, on the other hand, takes a few more stylistic twists and turns to give audiences a more personal look into the career of a nominee.
Chronological formats, as the name implies, aim to present the nominee’s accomplishments and career in a first-to-last format. Usually this combines with elements of storytelling to display the career of the nominee in a more artistic fashion, starting with their first notable commitments in Nationstates to the culmination of their efforts. Introductory clauses might be co-opted for content clauses that introduce us to the nominee’s first region, and wording that implies a chronological order (then, soon after, made their way, etc.), usually but not always strictly following the nominee’s career track, is present throughout.
Most proposals do not follow either path stringently — at this point in time, many simply opt to combine elements of the two, utilizing larger theme-based introductions and presenting the nominee’s first few steps as an introduction to their career, before adding in the “heavy-hitters” right after. As has been demonstrated time and time again, following one guideline or the other isn’t necessarily the best way to go! These templates simply give you an idea of what priorities proposals have in the SC — while the pure content and “commendability/condemnability” is important, we also choose to make room for storytelling and the persona of our nominees. Combining elements of both will allow your SC proposal to soar!
In Short
Okay, phew, that was a lot. If you didn’t read through that, it's completely understandable! Here are the key takeaways:
Firstly, your proposal will be formulated around an operative clause — usually “The Security Council, (Your argument here), hereby commends/condemns (nominee)”. Your argument/proposal text will usually consist of an introductory clause and a conclusory clause, and a series of content-based clauses in between.
Each introductory and/or conclusory clause should aim to establish both what your proposal will be/is about and the character of your nominee/overarching theme of your proposal. As such, your introductory clause may act like a thesis; in a standard format it should introduce, in a fairly abstract manner, the key takeaway we should have about your nominee’s accomplishments or career, while providing insight into the intangibles (character, values, playstyle) that make them particularly unique. Similarly, a conclusion clause should go over, very briefly, the content of your proposal that you’d like the reader to take away, and tie that in with the theme that your proposal operated on.
Each content-based clause, which should make up the bulk of your proposal, should aim to answer the following — what did the nominee do, how (in what way) did they accomplish that, and why is the manner in which they accomplished it or the nature of their accomplishment commendable/condemnable? You want to clearly delineate both the argument you’re trying to make — each clause wants to touch on that particular point in the nominee’s career and what they tried to do. Then, recount their successes — in what way did they accomplish their goals so that they are actually commendable? And finally, provide key context for why this is truly commendable — what is so important about their actions, what about their achievements distinguish them from similar achievements, what warrants this level of recognition for the nominee? Make it very clear how each point of argument ties into the next.
You can organize these clauses in whatever way you see fit — usually, commendations/condemnations lean towards either “resume-based” formats, in which they highlight the most noteworthy accomplishments of the nominee’s career first, or “chronological” formats, in which they employ chronological order and storytelling methods to make the proposal easier to follow with more of an artistic touch. Nowadays, proposals tend to employ a bit of both, often starting with the nominee’s very beginnings before jumping to their capstone achievements. How you choose to order your clauses is up to you, so long as you create a convincing and coherent argument with them!
As a whole, a good proposal gives credence to a nominee’s accomplishments and character; it fleshes out their career and touches on their style; it clearly lays out every argument, and seeks clarity over complexity, while answering the following question in full: why is this particular nominee noteworthy in their actions, achievements, and career?
A final disclaimer — this is not the right way, nor the best way, to write a proposal. I chose to present this method because it is the one I am most familiar with, and the simplest to digest, in my opinion. It tries to address the complex question of how to make a proposal well-written and convincing, though it admittedly falls shorter than I’d like — it’s a hard question to answer, and inevitably, new writers will have to face it and think for a minute! But a lot of SC writing is intuitive, and will come with practice — so I encourage you to stay firm in your resolve as you write your proposal and take in feedback, and give each criticism and comment a try. Keeping an open mind and a flexible approach will undoubtedly help you shape your writing ability into that of a competent and well-worn SC writer in no time!
For those who simply do not find the above a very helpful format for communicating advice, or simply want to get a more authentic feel for SC writing, below are some exemplary resolutions that I feel are good starting points for grasping an understanding of what makes a strong SC resolution, organized by subject area with a few tips for certain resolutions on the side. This is in no way an exhaustive list, and is only intended to at least get you started — the more you read, the better your writing will become!
Suggested Readings
Region-Building:
SCR#388:Commend One Small Island - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
SCR#414:Commend Refuge Isle - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
Gameplay:
SCR#326:Condemn Ever-Wandering Souls - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (Good example of storytelling style; repealed)
SCR#363:Commend Pope Hope - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (Good example of a historical focus)
SCR#372:Condemn Dalimbar - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (Good Condemn example of historical focus)
Issues-Authoring:
SCR#340:Commend Singapore No.2 - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (Good example of unconventional clause structure)
SCR#314:Condemn Australian RePublic - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (Good example of twist to Condemn)
World Assembly:
SCR#367:Commend Maowi - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
SCR#332:Commend Kenmoria - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
Roleplay:
SCR#389:Commend Zarkenis Ultima - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
SCR#423:Condemn Creeperopolis - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
Sports:
SCR#397:Commend Electrum - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
SCR#321:Commend Valanora - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
Cards:
SCR#287:Condemn Koem Kab - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
Stats:
SCR#362:Commend Pencil Sharpeners 2 - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2
SCR#342:Commend Northern Borland - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (Good for unconventional take on commends; repealed)
Regional:
SCR#412:Repeal "Commend Europeia - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (repeal and replace reading)
SCR#413:Commend Europeia - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (repeal and replace/regional commend reading)
SCR#296:Condemn Gatesville Inc. - https://www.nationstates.net/page=WA_pa ... /council=2 (historical focus, condemn-style region)
