Team CFC Constitution

I have lots of experience setting up election polls.

For turn players, I think what we need are "approval" polls, ie "do you approve of name being a turn player?". These are yes/no polls and simple majority needed for approval.

I think for contested elections we should use polls with a defined end date. The old democracy games typically used 3 days. The polls will be private, so the names of who voted are not shown.

Do we want to require a majority (use a runoff poll) or simple plurality (most votes wins unless there is a tie)?

How long do we want the terms of office to be? It might be some number of calendar days, some number of turns, until the official wants to step down, until n% of the team calls for an election, etc?

 

IMO, majority. Though you probably already know this, just reminding that a runoff majority can be reached in single round using Instant-Runoff Voting.

 

Just to clarify, is the idea to select single leader from the nominees, or do we vote for single Head Honcho? We could go for a triumvirate, or census of leaders as well. IMO, most important thing is that whoever is steering the rudderless ship will be motivated to do that. Sharing the responsibility could help keep up the motivation.

 

The forum's polling system only allows a single vote, or multiple votes without ordering. And I don't think we want to use a public vote method.

 

While the voting systems are novel, and probably quite good as well, I'd like to remind about the K.I.S.S. principle. Why make it complicated when we can do it simple? The less "bureaucracy" the better, IMHO.

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

 

I think we've waited long enough, time to vote on these positions! Here is the latest list of candidates:

Hopefully DaveShack is still willing to start the polling threads. Approval polls for Turnplayers sound good to me, and 3-day private polls for the contested positions. If there is no majority, then we can do run-off elections. Nobody has commented on length of term, what's typical for these games?

 

All of the above seems satisfactory.

 

Looks very good! I'm all for starting the votes as soon as possible

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

 

About the term lengths. In team Merlot we had 15 turns between each of the votes for the King. It seemed to boil down to approximately one vote per month, which wasn't so bad. However, I don't see the point of having to vote for these positions that often unless there is a need for it (i.e. someone calls for a vote, or someone resigns from a position).

In my opinion we need to consider a few things. Do we want to have a set amount of turns between each vote? The most obvious advantage to this is that if you are not happy with the holder of one of the positions, you don't have to go out and tell everyone, which means there is less of a chance of any bad blood between team members. The drawback is that someone needs to set up votes every X turns, which may lead to a whole lot of work just to let the incumbent get a vote of confidence (which again may be an advantage too, as the incumbent feels he still has the support of the team).

The other way to do it is to have some sort of agreement on how to deal with it if there is someone who is not happy with the holder of a position. This has a very obvious drawback, as already mentioned, where the person who is unhappy needs to tell the team about it. Few people like to be told that "Hey, I'm not happy with the job you're doing", so this is risky as it may antagonize people in the team. One way to deal with this is to appoint someone who can deal with this in PMs. It would need to be a non-minister, or a separate minister who would be responsible for only handling matters like this, and nobody except that person would know who asked for a vote to be called. In that case a general vote could be called, so that it was not immediately apparent what position the vote was called for either. It would still, however, not entirely remove the possibility for antagonism. Indiansmoke was replaced by slaze as the King of Merlot in the last MTDG, and did not post a single post in the Merlot team forums after that. He may of course have talked to someone on PM, but as far as the general team went, nobody knows how he felt about it. This also creates a lot of inefficiency, so I'm dubious as to how well it would work in the long run.

What we need to realize is that no matter how we do it, there will always be the possibility that someone who is replaced from their post may feel bad, and lose interest in the game. We also need to take into account that we cannot really take that into consideration if a person who is elected does a bad job. Hopefully those who have nominated themselves to these positions are aware of this, and are adults enough to not leave the game over it if they are replaced. The way I see it our team is based on a democractic principle, and these positions are a way to make the team operate more efficiently. As long as everyone keeps this in mind, and do not put too much prestige into holding one of these positions, I think we'll be fine no matter how we choose to deal with it.

 

Agreed on all counts. It occurs to me that if positions were frequently created or abolished, no position could acquire much prestige. Positions could also be more tailored to the situation at hand. The only permanent positions would be the non-changing ones: team admin and ambassadors.

 

Social Minister (Team Pleaser) of some sort...like this idea! I doubt I will ever sign up for any of leading roles, so if it is ok I could take a role like that. I am usually fair and broadminded, so a job like this could be nice to do.

 

I'll do election polls in 10-14 hours. Late at night here and don't want to mess them up from being tired.

 

Awesome, thanks DaveShack!

As for future voting, I think once a month (every 15-20 turns) triggered if one or two people privately request it (to the second in command or social minister) sounds good. I hope nobody would be offended for not winning the vote. We've got lots of team members who want to participate in this way, and I don't see why all or most shouldn't get a chance throughout the course of the game. Doesn't necessarily mean anyone is doing a bad job.

 

One thing we also need to vote on is a clean version of a constitution, if we plan to have one written down. It might not be necessary now, but helps a lot if a dispute occurs in the future.

 

Good idea DaveShack! The below draft is modeled on talonschild's original proposal, but I've updated it since a lot has changed since this thread was started. I want to point out that I added one line that might be controversial, "The Leader always acts as the tie-breaker, and has the ability to over-rule the results of a vote if he decides it is in the best interest of the team." That's just my personal view on the matter, and just like everything else in this proposal, it's up for discussion.

 

Excellent work, Yossarian. Clear, reasonable, and most importantly, short.

 

Do we really want elections every month or so?

 

Yes, very nice!

This is my concern too. It will be a lot of bureaucracy. It's very democratic though..

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

 

At least until the passage of time reduces our number, a little extra democracy can't hurt.

 

I propose we have a separate vote, before we agree on the Constitution, in regards to the voting paragraph.

My suggestions for alternatives are (in no order of personal preference for my behalf):

* Election every 20 turns
* Election every 30 turns
* Election every month
* Election every second month
* Election each yearly quarter
* Election based on a majority wish to change an official

If the last option receives a majority, we should nail down the details like I mentioned with e.g. a separate position that would only deal with these matters.

Obviously, but very importantly: None of the options excludes the possibility for an "emergency" vote to be called at any time due to bad management, abscence, or resignation.

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2