NationStates Jolt Archive

Ok, I'm not 100% certain if this is the spot to suggest this idea, but I think this may be a very good idea.

Ok, so imagine the UN in NS has a Secretary General. A Secretary General that would have the power to go through UN proposals and allow certain ones to go to the general assembly to be voted on. In order to make the game interesting, the Secretary General must be a UN Delegate, and must be voted on (Each UN Delegate holds only one vote for this purpose), and cannot hold office two terms in a row, however can be allowed to be elected during a later term.. (office of Secretary General could be held for 30 to 45-day terms.. or whatever seems reasonable) The Secretary General is a powerful position because He/she can basically decide which proposals are important and worth the General Assembly's time what should be voted on next--remember, what is worth the general assembly's time is at the discretion of the Secretary General. Because of the enormous responsibility and power of the Secretary General, it would be necessary for UN Delegates running for office to campaign in order to tell other delegates why they should be Secretary General. Because the UN is a democratic body, Any UN Delegate may run for office, and is allowed to campaign.. However, In order to openly begin campaigning, (since many many many many delegates will want the office) There should be a minimum number (which can be decided upon later) of endorsements in order to be "nominated" and therefore able to campaign. (a secondary "endorsement" system where Delegates may endorse other delegates, up to 10 endorsements, will be necessary). Campaigns have no limitations, unless the campaign is distasteful, or somehow "unfair" as deemed by the Game Moderators. Consequences for such campaigns are also up the Game Moderators.

There are still some things that can be changed/tweaked but I think that the above is a good idea, and a very good framework.

If you have any questions, please reply!

Not all proposals make it to the floor of the General Assembly as it is. Only those that a quorum of Delegates endorse do. Before that, proposals are screened by the senior mods. It takes a helluva lot of knowledge of existing resolutions, UN rules and the practice that's built up to know whether a proposal is legal.

So, are you suggesting any delegate who's able to whip up political enthusiasm should decide what proposals go to vote? Whether they're legal or not? Or would you have some sort of "qualifying exam", where would-be SecGens proved how much they understood of the obsessively specialised art of NS UN resolution writing?

It looks to me like such a ghastly task I imagine the mods who do it would be glad to get rid of it, but I don't think they'd welcome the consequent UN chaos.

You can have your own say on whether a proposal gets to the General Assembly by voting, of course, if you're a delegate. Whether you are or not, you can also influence this by looking at the proposals queue and posting in the Silly and Illegal Proposals (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=397276) thread. It's a help to the mods and it also helps build your own understanding of what makes an acceptable proposal.

I see what your saying with the UN Delegates already having to endorse resolutions and therefore having their say in the politics. I completely forgot to add this fact to the "SecGen" idea (It was almost 1am when I wrote it, but I've had the idea for ages) What I propose is that basically yes, the UN Delegates can still endorse the resolutions that go to the table. Where the SecGen comes in is in the fact that he/she can pick from already endorsed resolutions. The political bias behind this is that the SecGen can put out resolutions he/she feels are relatively more important, and hold off on those that are relatively unimportant. It would have to be up to the next SecGen to table resolutions that are "skipped" by the previous SecGen. The UN would, in essence, still run the same; UN nations and delegates will be presented with a tabled resolution to vote for or against on, they all can still draft resolutions, and Delegates can endorse other resolutions. Resolutions with the minimum number of endorsements will still be queued. Where it changes is the order in which the resolutions are presented, and also in the added excitement of campaigning for the SecGen position.

All proposals that reach quorum go to vote. I doubt that will ever change. I see little need for a UN "czar" to decide which ones are more important than the others. The UN is a "democracy," and whether or not a proposal is important enough for the General Assembly to consider is decided by a vote of the delegates. Do you think electing some "Super-Delegate" effectively to overturn (or delay) the democratic decision of the delegates would make the process more or less "democratic"? The moderators already have the power to remove queued proposals on legality grounds; why do we need another official to vet them?

Then there's the matter of the UN being full of idiots, and the general mistrust in their judgment to pick the right person to give such power to, but that's a separate mater entirely.