NationStates Jolt Archive

Today i was looking at the UN proposals list and i counted up the number of delegates who had voted on ANY of the proposals. Including myself this came to a total of 122 but later on increased to around 150 tops.

Considering that to get a quorum a proposal must have 153 appraisals I decided to outline a proposal entitled "Demoting Non-voting Delelgates" fully aware that the description of my proposal basically outlines a change to the game, one which sees those regional delegates who neither vote on passed proposals, or who support others proposal or indeed submit their own proposals demoted to UN Member status in order to make the number of delegates who are required for a proposal to have a quorum more attainable.
However as I am aware that this is a proposal which may be considered as one whose objective is to change an aspect of the game, I understand that it may be deleted.

I would support the demotion of non-voting UN delegates except for two problems.

1) UN Delegates are selected by the members of that region. If a delegate is inactive, it is the right/responsibility of the UN members in that region to demote him.

2) A delegate essentially casts a "no" vote by not voting. UN delegates do not have the option to actively vote against proposed resolutions.


I propose two alternate solutions (knowing full well that proposals to change the game mechinaics won't be listened to):

1) Make acceptance to the general UN body more difficult than just answering an e-mail. Perhaps make membership require a certain minimum level of participation (as if the servers need any more strain).

2)Raise the number of endorsements required to become a delegate in the first place.

Also, please remember that it is not necessarily a bad thing that proposals do not easily come up for a vote. The government that governs best, governs least.

Sadly, this would be a game mechanics proposal... which is a shame, it'd be good to have some way of discounting the non-votes from those delegates who have no interest in the proposals side of the UN.

You didn't submit it already, did you? Submitting game mechanics resolutions tends to get you kicked out of the UN...

Maybe delegates could be encouraged to vote by increasing their nation's statistical strength when they do so.

This could be a carrot to go with, or instead of, the stick of demotion.

If you want to penalize delegates for not endorsing a resolution so as to bring it to a vote, then our UN Ambassador Count Midnight would say NEIGH! I mean, really, have you looked at some of those resolutions lately. Now once a resolution garners sufficient attention to be brought to the attention of the membership for an UP or DOWN vote, then yes, you should vote but since anyone in the region can track what side their UN Delegate is voting on... If a region has a King Log for a UN Delegate that's their problem. If they want a King Stork, then they'll just have to get up and start endorsing their buddies. Of course, if you've ever read Aesop's fable about Kings Log and Stork, you'll know that this could be considered "a prayer the devil answered". Giving UN Delegates/Members a benefit of some sort for exercising their vote might make a nice proposal, but would only encourage non-voters to vote carelessly since they'll be more concerned about getting the benefit than about any ol' resolution.

Emperor Pro-Tem "Big D"

You're absolutely right, Big D. Richardelphia rarely endorses a UN proposal for two reasons. 1) They are often joke proposals, and 2) they do not have the support of the members of my region.

Without the ability to actually vote AGAINST a proposal, there is no way to tell the difference between people against the proposal and people not participating at all.