RA Foreign Policy Input Proposals

[Lord Dominator]

RA Directed Treaty Repeal
1. Article 2 of the Constitution shall be amended as follows:

6. The Regional Assembly may remove a government official from office by a two-thirds majority vote.
7. The Regional Assembly may repeal a treaty by a two-thirds majority vote, provided the support of a number of citizens equal to quorum.
8. The number of votes required to achieve quorum for any vote of the Regional Assembly except elections will be determined by law.

2. All subsequent clauses will be renumbered appropriately.

One of the things that I think the drama with TSP and the subsequent repeal of our treaty with them is that the RA is very bound to the Delegate in matters of treaties. I don't think this is entirely reasonable, especially considering the 2/3rds majority requirement to repeal them already imposes the broad agreement that would otherwise justify the Delegate having the sole decision-making authority in the area. As such, I think that it should be entirely possible for the RA to repeal a treaty despite or against the Delegate - however, in order to keep it from causing more issues during any diplomatic debacle, my draft here currently requires a quorum's worth of citizens to support the measure in order to bring it to vote in the first place. As quorum is a third of the citizens that have voted in the last three legislative measures, this would effectively require that half of the necessary two-thirds of votes support it in order to vote on it. This may be a rather roundabout way of keeping it a serious measure to propose, and I am welcome to alternate ideas or changes to my wording to achieve the proper effect.

 

[Lord Dominator]

RA Directed Diplomacy Restrictions
1. Section 7.7 of the Legal Code will be amended as follows:

56. The Delegate may choose to designate a region or organization to be prohibited from creating in-game embassies and forum embassies, hosting cultural events together or other formal collaborations with The North Pacific with a majority of the Regional Assembly confirming such.
57. Any other citizen may propose to designate a region with the same prohibitions provided, with a two-thirds majority of the Regional Assembly confirming such.
58. These prohibitions may be repealed with a majority vote of the Regional Assembly.

2. All subsequent clauses will be renumbered appropriately.

In pairing with my thoughts on treaty repeal, I do believe the general citizenry should have the same power as the delegate to propose diplomatic restrictions - the recent attempted embassy with 10000 Islands indicates it is very possible for the Delegate and general citizenry to be out-of-step with each other on the subject, and the RA should have more direct options than recalling the Delegate or passing a motion to try and force them to propose the restrictions.

In line with the usual standard, my draft sets the citizen-initiated version at a 2/3rds majority.

 

[Comfed]

I am categorically opposed to letting the RA dictate specific foreign policy to the delegate. The delegate is the official in charge of foreign affairs for good reason--when officials from other regions come calling, there is one person who can make definitive statements on what the policy is, and if the policy gets us in hot water everyone knows exactly who is responsible for it. A conflict between branches, especially one where the legislative branch overturns the delegate's foreign policy, would be a disaster. Don't like the delegate's policy? Don't vote for them next time.

 

[Comfed]

This, like your other FA-related bill, is an absolute no from me. For future reference -> here.

And specifically to this bill--if the RA hated a treaty so much that they could invoke these procedures, but the delegate refused to repeal the treaty, then the RA should just recall the delegate.

 

[Lord Dominator]

This, like your other FA-related bill, is an absolute no from me. For future reference -> here.

And specifically to this bill--if the RA hated a treaty so much that they could invoke these procedures, but the delegate refused to repeal the treaty, then the RA should just recall the delegate.

What you suggest is reasonable for such a situation, I just don’t see why we should have to rely on such a roundabout method of forcing a treaty repeal.

 

[Lord Dominator]

As a note, this was initially two threads that were merged upon my request, since much of the debate regarding matters of RA involvement in FA is likely to be duplicated otherwis.

 

[Robespierre]

I am categorically opposed to letting the RA dictate specific foreign policy to the delegate. The delegate is the official in charge of foreign affairs for good reason--when officials from other regions come calling, there is one person who can make definitive statements on what the policy is, and if the policy gets us in hot water everyone knows exactly who is responsible for it. A conflict between branches, especially one where the legislative branch overturns the delegate's foreign policy, would be a disaster. Don't like the delegate's policy? Don't vote for them next time.

As I mentioned on Discord, I'm not really a fan of this reasoning.

I think that should our foreign policy get us in hot water, as you say, it’d be a much better outcome to have the responsibility for that situation rest on the collective shoulders of the citizenry as opposed to one person or their administration. I can see a situation in which the Delegate, or their MoFA, makes a decision related to the region’s foreign policy that, though well-intentioned at the time, ends up doing irreparable damage to the region’s standing.

Should that be the case, it’s highly likely that they wouldn’t be re-elected anyhow. However, ultimately, I believe that the citizenry ought to have more options available to them and should be empowered to direct the region’s policy in accordance with their cooperative wishes. Those aforementioned cooperative wishes, of course, are to maintain a region in good standing with the interregional community and to have the region remain a place that they’re happy and/or proud to be a citizen of.

A Delegate and their MoFA can and, in recent times, have gotten it wrong. Whereas the RA, as an institution, isn’t nearly as subject to the whims of one or two people’s outlooks and would instead undergo due consideration with such a move as imposing diplomatic restrictions. If the citizenry at-large gets it wrong, then so be it.

But I think that there’s a degree of stability and an element of transparent due diligence that the RA would offer that the executive, by its nature, simply cannot. I also don’t believe that it would be a “disaster” should the two branches disagree with one another.

 

[Lord Dominator]

I am categorically opposed to letting the RA dictate specific foreign policy to the delegate. The delegate is the official in charge of foreign affairs for good reason--when officials from other regions come calling, there is one person who can make definitive statements on what the policy is, and if the policy gets us in hot water everyone knows exactly who is responsible for it. A conflict between branches, especially one where the legislative branch overturns the delegate's foreign policy, would be a disaster. Don't like the delegate's policy? Don't vote for them next time.

Conflict between branches I do think is perfectly fine in a democracy - we don’t elect (or appoint) anyone, even the Delegate, on the presumption that they will never be out of line with the citizenry. Moreover, the difference between the RA potentially overturning a bit of foreign policy or a treaty immediately isn different in my mind to doing so immediately after the next election - except that we have to live with whatever region we dislike enough to invoke either of these (which are both at 2/3rds right now) in the meantime.

Further, neither of these proposals can actually add to our foreign policy - only allow the RA to express its dissatisfaction with a decision by the Delegate or another region in a legally binding manner. A check on the foreign policy making of the Delegate, if you will.

 

[Comfed]

What you suggest is reasonable for such a situation, I just don’t see why we should have to rely on such a roundabout method of forcing a treaty repeal.

Because it's two different concepts - if the RA repeals a treaty, then it's the RA dictating policy. If the RA recalls the delegate because they refuse to propose the repeal of a treaty, it's because the delegate has committed misfeasance in office by not repealing the treaty, say because the treaty partner has committed an act of war against us or something (that's an extreme example) and shouldn't be in charge anymore because they're bad at their job.

I think that should our foreign policy get us in hot water, as you say, it’d be a much better outcome to have the responsibility for that situation rest on the collective shoulders of the citizenry as opposed to one person or their administration. I can see a situation in which the Delegate, or their MoFA, makes a decision related to the region’s foreign policy that, though well-intentioned at the time, ends up doing irreparable damage to the region’s standing.

When the time comes the minister of foreign affairs or head of state of our ally isn't going to want answers from the citizenry as a whole, they're going to want answers from the delegate. If the RA compromises the delegate's ability to represent TNP in this way, meaning that even our head of state can't definitively represent the region, then no one can claim to fully represent our region on the world stage at all. We would have an incoherent foreign policy, which is how the situation with LWU deteriorated so quickly.

Like, let's just say that the RA decided that because of the recent situation with TRR our treaty with Europeia should be repealed. Let's also say that the delegate gave assurances to Europeia that our relationship wouldn't be affected by these events. This situation is entirely hypothetical. If the RA then went ahead and repealed the treaty against the wishes of the delegate, then it would mean our other allies, in addition to every other region in the game, wouldn't be able to trust the delegate's assurances about our relationship with them, and it would give bad actors carte blanche to undermine the government of TNP by claiming that they don't truly represent us. And if the delegate truly can't represent us? Then they shouldn't be in office.

Conflict between branches I do think is perfectly fine in a democracy - we don’t elect (or appoint) anyone, even the Delegate, on the presumption that they will never be out of line with the citizenry. Moreover, the difference between the RA potentially overturning a bit of foreign policy or a treaty immediately isn different in my mind to doing so immediately after the next election - except that we have to live with whatever region we dislike enough to invoke either of these (which are both at 2/3rds right now) in the meantime.

Obviously we understand that the delegate isn't always going to be in line with the citizenry. That's how elections work - the citizenry picks the person they want to represent them the most. But once that person is elected, let them do their job. If you don't like they way they do it, don't renew their contract or fire them if it's especially bad.

Further, neither of these proposals can actually add to our foreign policy - only allow the RA to express its dissatisfaction with a decision by the Delegate or another region in a legally binding manner. A check on the foreign policy making of the Delegate, if you will.

No, it does. The RA has the power to make foreign policy by imposing legally binding sanctions or by repealing treaties. Those are obviously elements of foreign policy. A check on the delegate is something like "the delegate needs the RA's assent to create or repeal a treaty," not "the RA can repeal treaties all by itself." That's not adding a check to the delegate's power, that's removing a check from the RA's power.

I get that we want the RA to have a voice in foreign policy, especially when it's such a black box compared to a lot of the region. That's a good spirit to have, and if we didn't have it we'd be a lot worse off by uncritically accepting what the government's official opinion is. But we have to balance that with the need to have a coherent foreign policy and to have the ability to actually represent ourselves interregionally.

 

[Pallaith]

Treaties are a big deal. When we put one in place typically we intend for it to stand the test of time. And no treaty can get to the finish line without strong RA support.

I understand that many of you were impatient with how talks with TSP went, but in the end the RA was heard and it got its say on the treaty, and it decided to repeal it. The delegate stepped out of the way. As far as I’m concerned, the system worked as intended. If the delegate made a different call and the RA decided it was the wrong one, they have other tools at their disposal. Those are all checks on the executive.

I appreciate the safeguards out in place to make the repeal option more controlled, but I don’t support the idea in principle. Using this last situation as an example, I feel we ended up in a better place even with a repeal than we could have if the freshly angry response to those events led to a swifter treaty repeal. I think future relations with TSP would have suffered far more and we would have fewer options available to us. The way things played out, we have a chance to reconcile and rebuild what was lost after the appropriate work is done, and tempers cooled for the most part. That’s not necessarily the case of the RA can just jump to a repeal like this. I oppose this idea.

As for the diplomatic sanctions thing, I don’t know that I necessarily hate it. The RA can consider the same things the executive does and come to similar conclusions, and the threshold is higher for them to do so. These can also be more measured than repealing a treaty, and I can see the executive using these discussions to be able to point to domestic concerns and pressures at home that have to be considered when dealing with other regions. It’s true that it can embarrass them or put them in a rough spot diplomatically, though, and that’s not a small concern.

 

[Kaschovia]

Opposed. Treaty repeal motions can be informally demanded by the citizenry if it is felt they are required, as we saw with the repeal of the Aurora Alliance, but we elect the Delegate to set the course for our foreign policy because voters trust in their ability to do so. The current balances are reasonable; if the RA is unsatisfied with the Delegate in terms of not repealing treaties to the extent they don't re-elect or do move to recall, then so be it, but how does ascending the RA to powers historically entrusted to the Delegate to initiate treaty repeals encourage sustainable and cooperative internal debate between the two government functions?

On the second proposal, you need to change the section number: it is currently 7.6, which relates to the NPA, and should be 7.7 for diplomacy. I am also opposed to the second proposal for the reasons above.

 

[Lord Dominator]

Thanks for the correction Kasch, it has been fixed I believe.

In regards to the arguments above, I will say that I fully recognize that these may be a bridge too far in terms of RA input into foreign policy - especially the treaty one, which is why I kept them separate. That said, one of my reasons for proposing these is that I think holding the level of disagreement to "recall or don't reelect" isn't necessarily reasonable - I can say for instance I don't think Hulldom handled foreign policy the best during their term, but not want them to stop being Delegate because they were good at doing the rest of the job. We don't elect Delegates solely on their skills at foreign policy, just as we don't elect them solely based on their skills at running Culture or the NPA; it's a whole package kind of deal. On the particular point of the Delegate's ability to conduct negotiations I don't think the proper solution to "the RA undermines what the Delegate said" to limit the ability of the RA to do so, it's for the Delegate to not give the guarantee as such - I don't think it would particularly change much, since the given reason would ultimately be that we are a democracy and sometimes that means the government can't reasonably guarantee what the general citizenry will want (and on that point also, the Delegate can't even give full assurances now, because elections are a thing as noted).

 

[Lord Dominator]

I would add that especially for the treaty one, I view the proposed idea of “pass a motion telling the delegate to do [x] and possibly recall until it happens” to be both inefficient (in terms of number of votes) and counterproductive in general. I would prefer that that potential process be reasonably simple while retaining a high bar for actual use - hence the attempt at saying you need a third of active voters to support the motion to begin with.

(I will also note I don’t have any intent to attempt this on any particular treaty, much less the Europeia one - this is purely a process change)