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Dispatch → Account → Culture
[Old] The Admin Tower: Refugia
Welcome to The Admin Tower, the central organisational point and directory to all of our associated offices, archives, and research material. In lore, the Admin Tower is the conduit by which internet magic is converted into administrative magic via its anchor stone. Channelled by powerful Administrators, this magic forms the lands of Refuge Isle, as well as its digital buildings, such as the forum boards, wiki, lounge, and more. The collective body of which make up our IC and OOC community, Calamity Refuge.
Our NationStates presence is known as Refugia: a chill, left-leaning region that cares about the environment, human rights, and with a disproportionately large LGBT population. Notoriously independent and self-sufficient, by and large, Refugia rejects cumbersome diplomatic arrangements that infringe on our self-determination. We develop and operate our own internal infrastructure, so as to never need to rely on third parties. As a result, this community is jarringly stable, having existed since 2008 and with every intention to keep being around.
The Refugi government is comprised of the Regional Council, a group of co-equal leaders who oversee their area of focus with unimpeded authority. Our regional law, the Refugia Revised Statutes, is constructed from Member States' contributions. Proposed changes are voted on directly by all Member States at the time through a region-wide referendum on our secure off-site voting suite, Vote.CalRef.
Refugia is likely most notable for our contributions to the World Assembly. At the time of this writing, Refugi have brought about a total of forty resolutions (not counting co-authorships) to the voting floor. Thirty three of those were successfully passed into international law. Our semi-regular Green Week competitions champion our values as an eco region by challenging members to grow their eco-friendliness and environmental beauty in a two-tier approach that makes competition possible for both old and new nations.
We have been through such adventures as having twice survived zombie invasions without a single casualty, and most recently ranked 23rd in the world for survivors in 2022. Refugia has been a vital member of the Potato Alliance, a thermonuclear wartime faction, where we contributed to blocking 30% of all nuclear missiles during N-Day 2022. We were previously instrumental in the defence of Ba Sing Se, which was flawlessly shielded from all radiation damage during the nuclear assault of 2020.
Refugia is also 2nd in NationStates for most World Assembly endorsements, through our robust endotarting culture, and we boast one of the highest International Artwork scores per capita. All of which can be attributed to the awesome people that live here.
Refugia's government is composed of five different Regional Councillors, as defined by law in the Refugia Revised Statutes. Four of the Councillors are elected directly by Member States in three month terms, and subject to recall votes by the same. Each of the four Councillors are, further, limited to be elected but twice in a row to keep new ideas and innovation coming into the seat. For every position, a Councillor is largely at liberty to decide the fate and direction of their office and how it wishes to conduct its business (unless explicitly stated by law). Certain substantial decisions about the regional direction require votes that original from Council members. All Councillors have equal power in these matters.
Presently, the Regional Council is composed of the following members:
The Arch-Administrator, presently held by Refuge Isle. Although there is no head of government, due to the co-equal council structure, the Arch-Administrator is often a figurehead for the region as head of state. The Arch-Admin's responsibilities are primarily to appoint and dismiss other fairly elected councillors into their offices, as well as maintaining records and regional infrastructure.
The Councillor of Foreign Affairs, held by Chacapoya. The Foreign Affairs Councillor maintains relationships with Refugia's allies and is responsible for managing the diplomatic corps of the region, providing lines of communication and timely updates, as well as managing it's necessary staff. The Councillor provides regional advice for the opening and closure of embassies, which are carried out by regional referenda.
The Councillor of Culture, currently vacant. The Councillor is responsible for hosting regional events that develop regional engagement and cultural identity. By law, the Councillor must develop regular and updated Eco-Reports for the region, that describe Refugia's environmental goals and how members can help reach them.
The Operations Councillor, held by Morrigan. Operations requires a general knowledge of the world of NationStates, as its role is to be on the look out for threats to the region from outside and from within. When global events spiral all of known creation into turmoil, it is the Councillor of Operations that will determine the region's plan of action to deal with it.
The Councillor of World Assembly Affairs, held by Sylh Alanor. World Assembly Affairs is responsible for facilitating discussions on World Assembly resolutions-at-vote, developing dispatches with Information For Voters (IFV) on current resolutions at vote, and providing regional recommendations for votes to the World Assembly Delegate.
All of Refugia's regional law is currently contained within the Refugia Revised Statutes. Any legal member state is entitled to draft a proposal to amend the law, and all proposals are passed by a simple majority of member states within the region. In this regard, Refugia is one of the few regions of the world that practices a direct democracy style, instead of passing the right to legislate through a more exclusive body. The statutes were originally the charter which founded the region and previously called the Regional Organisation and Integration, which organised Refugi Member States to form a government from a previously disassociated collective.
There have, at this time, been approximately ten revisions to the Statutes, carried out by four different authors. There remains an entire world's worth of legislation has still to be created. All past referendums to modify the law are recorded for reference purposes here.
The Regional Map was first announced on September 24, 2019. Any Member State within the region can fill out the application in the dispatch and telegram it to Sylh Alanor. Once the completed application has been received, Sylh Alanor may reply with questions to better understand locations or specific details, and will then let the Member State know when they're in queue for the next map update. The application mostly consists of details about the nation that will be placed onto the map itself, and we highly recommend filling out all questions to the best of your ability.
The region of Refugia is a collection of variously-sized islands located on the divide between the Hipster Sea and the Sea of Art in the North Connection Ocean, granting the people that live there access not only to high quality coffee and bicycles, but also premium paints, pens, and musical instruments. The region famously sprung from the depths of the ocean on January 31, 2019 fully formed and ready to be populated, entirely unquestioning toward the things that may have existed in its place before, or how it got here.
The secret annals hidden away on floor 16 of the Admin Tower suggest that Refugia is actually part of some strange multiverse, a liminal space between different dimensions and possibilities, but in all respects outside of metaphysics, life seems to progress entirely normally.
The countries that make up Refugia cross boundaries of many different species, culture groups, and religions, but everyone works together to ensure a brighter future. Simplebots depart the Admin Tower approximately once per month to take new surveys of Refugia, noting the types of people that live in our region and reporting back to the Office of Cultural Affairs, which prepares and updates the official map.
Each Member State is given a gift basket upon springing from the earth, filled with essentials like chocolate, magic springs, and the dictionary of Travel Runes created within the Office of Foreign Affairs. By drawing these Travel Runes, any member of Refugia can travel to and communicated with the outside world.
How Does is a series of dispatches and Wiki.CalRef articles provided by the community of Refugia.
This program aims to provide helpful tutorials about all things NationStates through our membership's collective experience and know-how. Anyone is welcome to use this repository of knowledge, and we hope it serves to allow the reader to accomplish any of their goals. Should any dispatch here go missing, a backup will be available through the link in the far right side of the navigation bar, which will redirect you to to our off-site wiki.
If you are coming here from the wiki and notice that this article is out of date with the wiki's version, please contact the author of the dispatch in question, the Arch-Administrator, or the Councillor of Culture.
The Refugia Tower Archives is an ongoing project overseen by the Arch-Admin to record various data and statistics for both the region of Refugia and the wider NationStates website.
Originally started as a series of disconnected dispatches to record Refugia's regional history as it was being made, the project has since expanded into a much larger, ongoing process. Our informational dispatches currently include Refugia's historical regional data such as Council history and delegate voting records for specific World Assembly resolutions. There are also a growing number of dispatches such as top regions by World Assembly members, World Assembly trends and history, and other NationStates statistical pieces which are accessible to anyone.
Any data or record errors should be reported to the local authority.