Initiative: regulating the revoking or amending of initiatives

Initiative to regulate the revoking or amending of initiatives
I. Preamble
Our civilization is best served by a fair and clear government that is "ready for battle". The citizens however have the privilege to amend or revoke initiatives, as stated in our constitution:

Article C - Decision Making

1. All decision making power within the Democracy Game is derived from the collective rights of all the citizens.
2. The Power of the People can be delegated to officials of the game in one or more of the following ways, or in other ways which may subsequently be discovered.
   • By Initiative in the form of a completed forum poll initiated by any citizen.
   • By Mandate in the form of game play instructions posted in the forum by a duly elected official with legal authority in the area covered by said instructions.
   • By Constituency in the form of citizen comments in favor of a decision, in a forum discussion.
   • By Designated Player Action in the form of actions made (and logged) during game play.
3. In the event that two or more such delegations of the Power of the People are in conflict, the following hierarchy shall determine which decision has precedence.
   • An initiative has force of law and supercedes any other decision type, including an earlier initiative on the same subject.
   • Mandate supercedes any other decision type (including an earlier mandate on the same subject) except an initiative or another later initiative.
   • Constituency supercedes only designated player actions.
   • Designated Player Action does not supercede any other type of decision.
4. A lower form of law may specify procedures and restrictions on implementing decision types, except
   • Initiative must always be allowed
   • No decision shall require more support than an amendment to the Constitution.

Click to expand...

Abuse of this privilege for personal gain or for the gain of a citizen group should be prevented at any time by imposing strict regulation.


II. Procedure for revoking or amending an initiative
Citizens or a citizen group, through their spokesperson, can start a procedure to revoke or amend an initiative but only after the poll has closed. The procedure involves creating a thread in the Civ4 - Demo Game II: Citizens section. The initial post must include a poll that meets the currently discussed Citizen's Initiative - The Polling Act of 4000 BC. The poll question for revoking an initiative must be formatted as follows:
When the precedure aims at amending an initiative the format must be:
The poll must be private, single-choice and set to expire in 4 days. Majority wins. If the procedure to revoke or amend an initiative is started by a citizen group the spokesperson of that citizen group must make the initial post. The spokesperson must also provide information concerncing the (political) interests covered by the citizen group.


III. Loosing the procedure to revoke or amend an initiative
A citizen or a citizen group that starts a procedure to revoke or amend an initiative may not start a new procedure to revoke or amend the same initiave within 7 days.


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Change log
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Is such an initiative really necessary? I believe that I am already entitled to post an initiative stating simply that, for instance, the 'Tribal Government Act of 4000 BC shall be considered null and void.'

Yes, there is the potential for abuse. However, that democratic process should be enough to regulate that - if an initiative passes by an overwhelming majority, that majority probably look unkindly upon an attempt to repeal it - I should hope that our voters are not sheep inclined to vote 'yes' on every poll presented to them! And any citizen who repeatedly posts new initiatives to revoke old ones will already run the risk of being viewed negatively by the public, as well as the risk of a ban from the forums for spam (should it be so excessive).

On top of that, there's too much of a structure implied in the draft that doesn't yet exist. It imposes regulations on polling when we have yet to create a body for the purpose of enforcing poll regulations. And why give spokespersons of citizen groups special authority?

As it's a draft it's not set in stone. Just as with other initiatives it's open for discussion, I'm more then willing to edit the initiative to reflect the opinion of the majority.

Your question whether this initiative is necessary is a valid one too and if this isn't necesary then that's fine with me too. But at least we know that then. With you I hope that citizens will not be so "annoying" to revoke/amend every initiative but I wonder if hoping that alone does the trick.

I agree with Octavian.

Even if an initiative poll doesn't spell out that it's revoking or amending a previous initiative, I believe that at least one citizen will mention it.

-- Ravensfire

I also think this is not needed. All we have to do to revoke or amend an initiative is pass another one. I think it is much more important to be able to use our poll votes to invalidate bad initiatives from the git go.