In concept, gameside self-government and democracy is an ideal for a democratic region. If the government is to be as close and accountable to its constituents as possible, the idea of having a government of the gameside elected by its constituents instead of predominantly forum and Discord using legislative-types is a dream.

If only this dream could come true. In practice, the Local Council is consistently failing its mandates in the Charter to “represent the interests of all players in the region, moderate the Regional Message Board, encourage activity on the gameside, and administrate itself on issues unique to the in-game community” in favor of serving as a poorly structured “moderation staff” for a chaotic RMB, with energetic players who have no structure or purpose to build their activity on. A Local Council which began to take on these tasks, attempting to cultivate and structure activity on the gameside, or serving as a bridge for new members to join regional institutions and become involved in the community, would be an invaluable asset to the region.

The reality is that the Local Council does not fulfill these functions. Instead, the RMB becomes a spam playground for the most energetic players, with pages upon pages of “legal” but valueless content, creating an unwelcoming environment for more structured and substantive contributors, and serves to drive away new players and potential talent from the region. The problems with the Local Council aren’t isolated to just one bad term, but at this point are inherent to the largely unchanging structure the Local Council has chosen for itself.

The Local Council’s structure right now exhibits three core flaws.

First, it is designed as a legislature but given executive powers and mandates. If the Local Council were a body analogous to the Assembly, empowered solely to write and pass laws, then its structure would be fine as there is no hierarchy, leadership, or assignment of roles and tasks. However, the Local Council’s structure is simply three people who should “do things”, with no specific mandates, structure, or agenda-setting ability for governance. Three co-equal and non-portfolio’d members of the Local Council will never be able to adequately divide and conquer the tasks of on-site community-building and integration with which the Local Council is entrusted.

Second, the Local Council is unaccountable. A central tenet of a democratic system is that leaders can be held accountable for systematic failures, dereliction of duty, or bad decisions. The Local Council lacks this mechanism as its members can only be recalled by the Assembly, which is also not their constituency. If the Assembly were to recall a Local Councillor for anything other than a clear cut abuse of power, with substantial outcry from the gameside community, it would be viewed as an overreach of the Assembly’s authority and a violation of the principles of gameside federalism. Since Local Councillors are not subject to recall, they have no incentive to deliver on, or way to be held accountable for, failures to deliver on election promises. Further, unlike every other institution of government under the Sunshine Act, the Local Council’s internal deliberations and processes are not subject to public disclosure requirements at any point. The public will never know if LC inaction is due to rejecting an idea, pure incompetence, or something more nefarious.

Third, the RMB is a poor venue for government and governance discussions, especially in the state the Local Council has allowed it to collapse into. The RMB simply moves too quickly, contains too little long-post content, and doesn’t encourage focused discussion of Local Councillor campaigns. Any effort to hold the Local Council accountable, even just through sabre rattling, has to be done via Discord to be heard in the first place, otherwise it is simply lost to a huge wave of content.

All of this points to the need for a radical change to the Local Council’s current institutional structure – radical change that can be obtained without the nuclear option of abolishing the Local Council itself, and within the careful compromise of gameside federalism. The Local Council can reform to address these structural issues, but it requires a decided effort rather than gradual change.

Some would argue that “well, the Local Council’s failings are clearly what is desired by the gameside community”. First, the failings of the Local Council affect the region writ large and are not isolated to only the gameside. A disorganized and chaotic RMB with no culture beyond escalating spam is detrimental to regional recruiting, integration, and outreach efforts. A Local Council which fails to provide cultural activities and structure to RMB life can’t hide behind the excuse that “this is simply what the gameside wants” when it begins to interfere with the entire region’s ability to grow and prosper. Second, a gameside community genuinely engaged with the possibility of gameside government cannot exist when it has not been given space to flourish.

Moving forward, the Local Council in the upcoming term should consider efforts at radical reform and the central question of the upcoming Local Council election should be the possibility of reform. I’ll offer a list of ideas to start with. This isn’t the be all end all of the conversation, but a set of ideas to try to get the conversation going.

Appoint the Local Council

The Local Council is currently elected by the gameside, but this does not have to be the case. The Local Council could be appointed, either by the Delegate or by prior Local Councillors. In the status quo, the size and chaos of the RMB prevents any form of accountability for members of the Local Council, or for them to make a pitch to elect them on the basis of any policy platform or agenda. Appointment by the Delegate or past Local Councillors shrinks the size of the electorate to where agenda-setting is genuinely possible. To check against rogue appointments, corruption, and ensure public oversight, confirmation votes could be required for any appointments.

Deputy Local Councillors

The Local Council could easily select “deputies” to assist with their duties and carry out specific tasks, thus providing valuable mentorship and experience for potential future Local Councillors. This idea doesn’t require a legislative change, just a modicum of effort by an individual Local Councillor to take “promising RMBers” under their wing.

Local Councillors Could be Elected to Specific Portfolios

Instead of simply electing Local Councillors to the Local Council collectively, Local Council members could be required to run for a specific position and elected based on a platform to fulfill that role. The Local Council could be divided into three seats – as an example: a Local Councillor of Culture, a Local Councillor of Role Play, and a Local Council of Engagement – allowing LC to be held accountable for fulfilling specific responsibilities. This could also be combined with any of the previous systems – for example, two seats could be elected and one appointed.

There has to be a Local Council Recall Mechanism

As explained earlier, Local Councillors right now are functionally unaccountable for the duration of their term. The Local Council should implement a recall mechanism, where Local Councillors can be removed by an on-site poll, maybe requiring a petition with a certain number of signatures before the poll is started to prevent frivolous recalls. The Local Council could also allow the Delegate to remove Local Councillors for gross misconduct or dereliction of duty.

The Local Council can take any one or any combination of these ideas or not. The central fact is something must be done, or else things will continue on this unproductive trajectory. Sabres are often rattled about the role of the Local Council, but if anything is ever to happen, a place to start is to throw ideas out there. If the Local Council fails to heed calls for reform in the upcoming term, the Assembly should consider invoking its power under the Charter to abolish the Local Council itself. At some point the line has to be drawn against continual failures of the Local Council so that the region itself can flourish.

The three largest regional communities in NationStates; The North Pacific, The East Pacific and The South Pacific; all hold a common political ideology. TNP announces it immediately in their regional motto, prominently displayed on their WFE, which begins, “Where the democracy is strong”. Their reasons to join TNP pamphlet proclaims the region “the preeminent democracy in NationStates.” TSP’s new player guide emphasizes the region’s status as “one of the oldest democracies in the game.” Both TSP and TEP are signatories of The January Accords seeking to “promote the ideals of democracy.” They are all clearly regions who are more than just democracies, they define their regional identities by it.

Democracy must be actively maintained but more than that it requires active participation to keep its strength. It must be reaffirmed as central to the community by its members over and over again. In Feeders that process of reaffirmation must also include making the pitch of democracy to the constant stream of foundling nations they receive. Less active participation will likely not put the regions at political risk (the security apparatuses of all three regions are not dependent on participation) but a shift in participation patterns may change regional identities. If new community members do not become active participants in their respective regional democracy, the strength of that democracy as a regional identity will be decreased.

With that in mind this article will evaluate the engagement levels of region members with their democracy by examining the two most basic actions a member can take to become a participant in it. The first being registering for voting. All three regions require a forum application of some type before considering an individual eligible to vote, although all three refer to it in different terms. In TNP this means applying for citizenship, in TEP and TSP, where citizenship is automatically conferred with residency, this means registering to vote and applying for legislatorship status respectively. The number of applications received in each region and the resulting number of eligible voters present are key indicators of participation in regional democracy. Further, with the concept previously mentioned of making the pitch of democracy to new members, the applications specifically are a key indicator of the efficacy of that pitch. The second basic action is voting, participation in democracy at its most fundamental and therefore probably the best measure of the health of a democratic culture.

In order to fully evaluate democratic engagement in the GCRs a time period of four years has been used to gather data. In each year the number of applications (whether they be for citizenship in TNP, voting registration in TEP or legislatorship in TSP) has been determined for January. The choice of one month being used both to enable efficient research and because founding rates differing each month would improperly colour the analysis. Active citizen totals have been taken from the electoral rolls published alongside election results in the first major election of each of the last four years. For TNP this is the January General Election, for TEP this is the February Delegate Election and for TSP this is the February Cabinet Election. Similarly the ballots cast total has been taken from each of the last four elections previously mentioned to allow a year over year comparison that should eliminate most background statistical noise.

Applications and Eligible Voters

The graph at left shows a distinct pattern for each region. Overall decline in TNP applications, overall increase in TSP applications and mostly steady TEP applications (January 2022 is not representative due to legislative change from citizenship applications to voter registration applications occurring in that month). The raw totals still very obviously favour TNP but the decline in applications is significant and difficult to explain from a cursory look. Unlike the structural change that explains TEPs 2022 collapse, TNP application procedure has remained shockingly uniform, continuing in the same thread and with the same application form for all four years covered in the data. Here perhaps we do see a sign of democracy, and participation in it, losing its centrality to a region’s identity. TSP and TEP have more comparable numbers to each other than TNP. What’s really of interest is the 2021 TSP spike aside, applicant totals are below TEP totals, well below in 2019 and 2020. What made TSP applications trail so significantly? Is the Legislator title, the only meaningful difference between the three region’s application process (prior to 2022 TEPers applied for Citizenship, just like TNPers), perhaps too intimidating to new nations?

The citizens graph at right is not as useful in TEPs case as by my understanding they were not required to keep public voter rolls until the Voter Registration Act was passed. As such only information regarding citizens (which will be used as the blanket term from here on out for anyone with voting rights, even if citizens in TSP and TEP are defined differently) at the time of the February 2022 Delegate Election is presented. Before considering TSP and TNP I will mention again, the graph only demonstrates citizens at the time of the first major election in each year. The TSP graph is almost identical in shape to the applications graph above. This would seem to indicate a very fluid base of registered citizens, increasing and decreasing based on the increasing and decreasing rate of applicants. The negative implication of that is TSP would therefore appear to have less holding power on accepted applicants, completely opposite to TNP where the applicants graph is almost perfectly reversed here. TNP’s citizen count increases year over year (with the exception of 2022) despite applications declining each year. Therefore it would seem reasonable to conclude TNP has better retention of applicants than TSP.

Ballots Cast

Now for what is likely the most reliable measure for determining the importance of democracy to regional culture, the voting records. Here we’re presented with a near mirror of TNP’s applications graph. How does that make sense if citizen levels were not impacted by decreasing applications? New citizens are the most likely to vote, as often an approaching vote becomes the impetus to apply for citizenship, so with the decline in applications comes a decline in votes. TSPs voting trends results in almost the same graph as for applications and citizens (subtle increase from 2019-2020, sharp increase to 2021, decrease to 2022 but still higher than 2020 levels). This description holds true for all three TSP graphs. TEPs total ballots cast waver more, it is difficult to get a sense on an underlying trend especially absent the voter rolls before 2022.

Comparing between the graphs gives an indication of how they impact each other. Interestingly from the limited data gathered it appears more likely that applications influence ballots cast more than citizenship totals. The real importance though is in determining what all the graphs mean when put together. Clearly TNP participation in democracy is declining. The two main measurables put forward to start, applications for voting rights and exercising those rights, have both declined four years running. TSP participation has, in the main, increased in those two categories with a notable jump in 2021. TEP is more scattered but participation in both regards appears relatively steady.

All of these numbers however are most relevant when compared to the nation total of the regions. When considering the strength of democracy as a regional identity, more nations should mean more participation. A decline in participation coupled with a decline in regional population does not necessarily represent a decaying democratic culture, there are just less nations to espouse it. Over the four years studied however, regional populations have almost uniformly increased. Over the four years covered in the data above the average nation count of the three regions has increased from below 8,000 to around 10,500 at the time of the most recent election for each region (and has only continued to increase since). Since all regions have increased in nation count all regions should have seen an increase in electoral participation if the centrality of democracy to their identities was being maintained. Yet only TSP saw an increase in participation and even then not anywhere near as much as the changes in nation count should indicate. For this we can turn to the table below.

Ballots as a Percentage of Nations

Region	2022	2021	2020	2019
TNP	0.81%	0.96%	1.35%	1.43%
TSP	0.37%	0.53%	0.41%	0.45%
TEP	0.27%	0.48%	0.40%	0.51%

TNP’s participation as a percentage of nations was by far the best throughout the entire period which is a given considering the totals presented in the above graphs. Additionally every region’s percentage participation declined from 2019, TSP faring the best only losing .08% while TEP and TNP lost close to half their 2019 percentage. The surge of Brazilian nations is no doubt responsible for the 2022 numbers being particularly bad, after all just looking at the nations graph shows a massive spike for all regions year over year that can likely be attributed to that rush. Disregarding that year and focusing on 2021 instead has better results but even then only TSP improved on their 2019 participation.

Clearly participation in democracy, either percentage based or the raw totals gathered, is in decline, partially so for TEP and TSP and inarguably for TNP. For a region that features its democracy most prominently this should be somewhat concerning for TNP. Although their total numbers remain far and away the strongest, the pace of the decline might put those in doubt sooner rather than later.

Ultimately this examination brings another issue to light. Instead of simply a change in the importance of democracy to regional identity perhaps there is a change in how players fundamentally approach NationStates. There is clearly no issue with new nations being founded in NS, the GCR population graphs mostly increase with the usual erratic spikes in between. All these new players may be engaging in the game in a different way, placing less importance on and showing less interest in the regional government format that has been accepted practice. The shift this data identifies may be one away from government activity and toward treating NS as another space for community interaction similar to a social media hub.

So is Feeder democracy alive and well? Well, it’s certainly not close to death, even with percentage participation at recent lows the total citizen populations remain strong. The real question is what trends will carry forward through the eventual change to F/S. Will lower founding rates increase percentage participation again? Or is the reason participation has declined tied to a different perception of NS and less foundings will simply mean even less participation in government?

The Brotherhood of Malice was originally founded by Reventus Koth and Venico in 2012. It had become a fairly notable raider organization, engaging in several significant operations such as the occupations of Osiris and St Abbaddon. In the former case, then-Delegate of Osiris Venico went rogue, purging several defenders (such as Wopruthien and Campania on questionable claims of being subversives), as well as prominent members of a group known for organizing their own coup d’etats in several regions, the Empire (also questionably placed under the umbrella of “defender subversives”); the occupation established by the Brotherhood of Malice then became the original version of the Osiris Fraternal Order.

The Brotherhood of Malice’s activity declined after their occupation of St Abbaddon, and was practically dead by 2017. However, following the occupation of A Liberal Haven this past January, where invaders attempted to grief the region before it was liberated by a major defender force, the Brotherhood of Malice was revived by its founders. Old members of the Brotherhood of Malice who had long since retired from the game, such as Zeorus, returned to join the region. Many current raiders have also joined the Brotherhood of Malice.

Since the revival, the Brotherhood of Malice has been extremely active in a raider faction that had fallen on hard times in 2021. Through the use of a spy placed in The Mystical Council, Diviciacus, The Mystical Council was occupied and destroyed permanently in the largest occupation in history, despite nearly ten liberation attempts. Their griefing operation was accomplished with the aid of filling the Security Council queue with spam proposals, Liberate Ukraine and Condemn Suspicious, in order to delay the much-needed liberation of The Mystical Council from reaching vote.

Significantly, the return of the Brotherhood of Malice has also brought about the use of Suspicious as a shared jump point between raiders, rather than the previous use of individual regional jump points. This new “Raider Unity” as it has been called represents a renewed threat to regional sovereignty across NationStates.

Last month’s cabinet election saw five of the six positions contested, the joint most since the current cabinet structure was implemented. There is however a difference between an election being physically contested, with multiple candidates running, and for lack of a better term, intellectually contested. Anyone reading the campaign statements or candidate debates would likely be hard pressed to point to distinct differences in goals and promises made by candidates for their potential ministry (with the usual exception of the abolish/don’t abolish Ministry of Media). If candidates typically hold the same views on what to try and accomplish in a ministry what does that say about our region’s political culture?

To demonstrate the point let’s turn to the Prime Minister candidacies of HumanSanity and Witchcraft and Sorcery. Both of course were extremely qualified, having served as Ministers and Prime Ministers before. The difference in content of their campaigns though came down merely to a difference in leadership styles, all the other intentions stated were mirror images of each other. Both campaigns mention MoFA completing the current projects it is already handling. Both mention needing changes in the Tidal Force of the SPSF. Both advocate continuing the Ministry of Media, WS more so by pledging to counter a potential abolishment effort but the point remains. Both say Culture needs a focus on events beyond the simple games that have become the norm; OWL needs better discussions; Engagement needs to maintain its current course.

The similarities in campaigns aren’t limited to the Prime Minister race. Both MoFA candidates in their debate explicitly acknowledged the similarity of their positions. The Culture campaigns were almost identical, with Eshia’s being slightly more flushed out. Voters are faced with deciding on which person, not which platform, is best; certainly this is a part of any election but a lack of campaign diversity has to be of some concern, or does it?

Campaign monocultures are not actually indicative of a problem, instead I’m tempted to call them a strength of the community. It demonstrates a clear general regional consensus across and in all Ministries (again excepting Media). Having a mostly uniform understanding of what is expected out of the cabinet, no matter its composition, indicates a regional unity of purpose that allows us to put a strong foot forward interregionally. We have a sense of where we want to go and what we want to be as a region, it’s just a matter of getting there and that’s why we’re seeing echoes across campaigns.