Discussion: When is it appropriate for a citizen to post an official poll?

[eyrei]

Our constitution allows a citizen to post a poll on any subject and apparently at any time. However, this is a recipe for chaos in my opinion, as a 'mere' citizen is not answerable for a badly worded poll as an official is, and because of the wording of the poll, one posted by someone outside of the appropriate department could end up with contradictory results that are impossible to interpret. I suggest we develop some guidelines for citizens posting polls. Here are some suggestions:

One of these first two conditions must be met:

1. The citizen must request that the department post the poll first. If the department head does not respond within 24 hours, the citizen may post the poll.

or

2. A discussion must have been posted and available for comment for 48 (maybe just 24) hours. After this time has elapsed, if a poll has not been posted, any citizen may post the poll. However, they must post it in an unbiased and responsible manner.

Further, I think that these polls should be able to be invalidated more easily than a poll posted by an official. This is primarily because, while the official faces the possible penalty of being impeached for a truly bad poll, there is no appropriate punishment for a citizen posting such a poll. Thus, they have no reason to post the poll in a responsible format. One way to deal with this would be for the poll to be invalidated by a simply agreement between the appropriate department head and one member of the judiciary. Another would be to simply make it so if a poll of similar nature is posted by the department head with enough time to be considered binding, then that poll's results supercede those of the citizen's poll.

Finally, I have no problem with citizens trying to help out and be active in the game. But, allowing citizens to post polls whenever they feel like it is really going to cause a great deal of confusion, as well as allow any citizen to substantially disrupt the functioning of any official they decide to.

 

[Bill_in_PDX]

A couple of thoughts on this.

First, for the citizen sourced poll to be binding, it must have been posted and discussed in a seperate discussion thread, and the required period of discussion time must be met. Therefore it is unlikely that a hundreds of random polls that can be binding are going to sprout up all over.

I could agree though with a change that indiciates that if a leader fails to respond to the request within a certain period of time that they then can post the poll (within the bounds of the law).

Secondly, I take issue with your thought:

"while the official faces the possible penalty of being impeached for a truly bad poll, there is no appropriate punishment for a citizen posting such a poll."

I think that no one should ever be impeached for a posting a poll, even if it is a bad poll. Plus, were an official poll passed though a vocal minority disapproves, as was the case in the Great Border Proposal Debates (tm), then again by definition, the majority of citizens would find the poll to be good.

 

[Veera Anlai]

An improper poll would be a Code of Standards violation, and as such, is an unimpeachable offense.
The predominant problem is when a citizen posts a poll that overlaps currently existing polls; this can cause problems that are difficult to sort out. Imagine one poll with results saying "Drop all alliances" and another poll that's results say "Only drop alliances with the Babs and the Chinese"

That is what our department heads are for; it is stated in our laws that they must organize decisions that relate to this department. This gives them final say in what is reported to the DP, and if they have polls with contradictory results, it is up to them to determine which poll more accurately represents the Will of the People.

On a side note, I believe a new law should be:
All official polls must have a dedicated discussion thread open for at least 24 hours before the poll is created.
All feasible options discussed in the discussion thread must be included in the poll.
This would mean a discussion thread *solely* dedicated to that thread.

 

[Bill_in_PDX]

I believe the law actually requires that discussion period already. We just are selective on how it has been handled in the past. Perhaps that needs to be revisited.

Secondly, the worst polls I have ever seen were posted by elected officials, so I am not sure our problem is with citizens at all.

 

[eyrei]

My point is simply that there is nothing to stop or deter a citizen from flooding the game with polls posted in any manner they wish with whatever options they wish. At least an elected official has to worry about reelection.

 

[GenMarshall]

What about the event when neater the Department leader and the Deputy are not pressent in an office. With an Empty Department (When the Leaders and Deputies are inactive or resighned)

 

[eyrei]

Originally posted by CivGeneral
What about the event when neater the Department leader and the Deputy are not pressent in an office. With an Empty Department (When the Leaders and Deputies are inactive or resighned)

This situation is covered by presidential appointments, I believe.

 

[Octavian X]

Considering the time requirements set on all offiical polls, I doubt that an active leader will miss the poll. Besides, if a leader isn't posting discussion/polls, there is a problem.

 

[amirsan]

I believe that a citizen should have the right to post a poll. Many just joining citizens may have very good points that have to do with our game, you never know. All they have to do is first learn how to post a proper poll.

 

[FortyJ]

Originally posted by Bill_in_PDX
...as was the case in the Great Border Proposal Debates (tm)...

...trademarked...

 

[eyrei]

Originally posted by amirsan
I believe that a citizen should have the right to post a poll. Many just joining citizens may have very good points that have to do with our game, you never know. All they have to do is first learn how to post a proper poll.

In all seriousness, this is what the citizens forum is for. Noone should be posting polls that noone has ever even thought about other than them. If you have a good point, please either start a new discussion thread or post in an existing one. This way others have a chance to offer their opinions and possibly offer other ideas based on the original one before it goes to a poll. Premature polls often can cause good ideas to be pushed to the wayside.

 

[jorge_roberto]

Every citizen must have the right to post any message or poll (including polls). This is the main point of democracy applied in this game.

Any problem (like dubious decision) should be resolved by the Judicial Power.

 

[Cyc]

The citizens have the right to poll the public. I agree with amirsan and jorge_roberto.

We should not be trying to reduce the participation of our citizens in this game. The lack of activity in the poll sub-forum is disgraceful. The more polls we have the better. It's hard enough getting vague opinions out of our Leaders that are on topic (points to 40J and CT and a couple of others). These Leaders should stay on thread topic and give detailed opinions about how they feel about a subject. But when I look at the poll sub-forum and there hasn't been a new poll posted in a week, I see a problem. I will definitely fight any measure or proposal that limits or curtails any involvement of "mere" citizens in the polling process.

 

[eyrei]

Originally posted by Cyc
The citizens have the right to poll the public. I agree with amirsan and jorge_roberto.

We should not be trying to reduce the participation of our citizens in this game. The lack of activity in the poll sub-forum is disgraceful. The more polls we have the better. It's hard enough getting vague opinions out of our Leaders that are on topic (points to 40J and CT and a couple of others). These Leaders should stay on thread topic and give detailed opinions about how they feel about a subject. But when I look at the poll sub-forum and there hasn't been a new poll posted in a week, I see a problem. I will definitely fight any measure or proposal that limits or curtails any involvement of "mere" citizens in the polling process.

In this case we should probably just stop electing officials, since it apparently serves no purpose.

I have no problem with citizens posting polls, but they must be held to the same standards as an official. And the only way to do that is to develop a set of 'standards' to be followed when a non-official posts a poll for it to be at all binding. Posting a poll with no discussion period can cause some serious problems.

 

[Bill_in_PDX]

I believe laws for that are in place on the books now eyrei, and they define what polls are binding, and which are now, and in fact what all polls, official or otherwise should include.

 

[eyrei]

It is true that these laws are in the books, and maybe what I want is a clear definition of what makes an improper poll that can be declared invalid. Particularly, I am talking about the obvious lack of an option that is viable. Officials are expected to have analyzed the entire situation regarding their department, and should be practiced enough at posting polls that all viable options are included. When a citizen posts a poll out of the blue, and options are left out, shouldn't the existence of a subsequent or prior poll by the appropriate department leader and containing all options left out by the original poll render the citizen's poll invalid to avoid confusion?

I apologize for my ranting. Had this right not been abused recently, I would not even be making this argument. Basically, what I want is a well defined way of either holding a citizen accountable for posting a biased poll that is claimed to be official, or a well defined way of invalidating such a poll by posting another poll without having to wait for a judicial review.

 

[Cyc]

Quoting eyrei:
In this case we should probably just stop electing officials, since it apparently serves no purpose.
___________________________________________
Well, eyrei, if the Leaders can't lead without having absolute power over the official polling process, maybe they shouldn't be Leaders.

This is a Democracy, and people have to the right to express their feelings and poll the public to find support. Even though Bill can't come right out and say what he feels about the subject, he is right. There are guidelines and standards that define the polls and these should always be used. But to stomp your feet and preclude citizen involvement in the polling process, is not only a very bad poltical move (especially by a Mod), but also a very ill move for the forward movement of a Democratic people. Do not confuse citizen participation with detrement to your Department plans or a personal attack. A good Leader will be able to use all citizen participation to their advantage.

 

[eyrei]

Cyc, I think you missed the sarcasm in the first part of my post.

I am not the slightest bit worried about politics in this case, and the fact that I am a moderator for this forum is why I bring it up. One of my main duties as a moderator is to make sure this game runs smoothly, and when a 'right' that has been granted causes problems with this, I have to call it into question. I am not saying that citizens should not post polls, and I am not saying that they should not question their leaders. What I am saying, is that they must do this responsibly and without political or personal agendas. There is nothing in the books stopping a citizen from completely disrupting the work of an entire department by posting frivolous or heavily biased polls immediately after the turn chat. The department leader's polls then have to compete with these for votes, and many people will only vote in one of them because they think their civic duty is done on that subject and do not see the other.

I see no problem with citizens posting informational polls however they see fit, but when they are tagged official, this creates a huge problem if the poll was not formatted responsibly.

 

[Cyc]

I agree with you eyrei. There is nothing as bad as a poorly written poll. Unfortunately, as was mentioned earlier, some of the worst, most biased, and utterly inappropriate polls have been posted by our so-called Leaders. We will not cure the problem of poor polls by restricting the poll formats.

 

[donsig]

Originally posted by eyrei
I apologize for my ranting. Had this right not been abused recently, I would not even be making this argument. Basically, what I want is a well defined way of either holding a citizen accountable for posting a biased poll that is claimed to be official, or a well defined way of invalidating such a poll by posting another poll without having to wait for a judicial review.

When was this right abused recently? If you are referring to the two alliance polls that I posted recently then you should make a discussion thread specifically to discuss those polls. I do not see the posting of those polls as an abuse of this particular right. It is certainly an exercise of that right.

As for the general topic of this discussion I see nothing wrong with citizens posted polls when they see fit. I have zero faith in our citizens abilities to get leaders to post wanted polls. I tried using the official method of asking the domestic leader last term to post a poll about incorporating Bavaria into the province with Valhalla and Kukhuff. The request was seconded by two other citiezens yet the leader was too busy to post the poll and so the matter quietly ended. I could have requested a PI but I do not take those matters lightly. As Cyc has pointed out new polls have been rather scarce of late. I say the more polls the better. If we did happen to end up with two or more binding polls that were contradictory I think we have that covered in the Three Books: the appropriate leader has tie breaking authority. If one poll says do this and another poll says do the opposite then the leader would be within his or her rights to break the tie between the two polls. It would be interesting to hear the judicial Deptartment's views on this.