As of earlier today, the RA moved to approve the amendment as proposed by Jamie on the previous message. Although there are two votes missing (Brian's and Sonja's) to validate it as a constitutional amendment (which requires a supermajority of 2/3 of all RA members), the likelihood of approval is very high.
The SC also did not veto the merger bill of last week, so that went through. The Constitutional change will not have any impact on it whatsoever, even if it fails to attract the two additional votes it requires (or that it gets veto'ed by the SC on grounds of unconstitutionality).
So the merger is now a reality. Congratulations to all that have made this possible, on the CDS and of course on AA as well!
This should appease all fears of our fellow AA members that there might be some "last moment" back-stabbing attacks that might disturb the whole process. There will be none!
However, I'm afraid that I have a few unanswered questions. It's too late now for the AA merger, but I definitely hope that for the next round of mergers, we are a bit more careful in the way we transparently deal with the integration aspects of the two communities.
The last few rounds of the RA were a bit confusing for me, because I was often told "we don't see things this way". Who is this "we"? Today, the question was answered: "we, the AA". It was weird to be sitting in a RA meeting of representatives elected by universal suffrage of all CDS citizens where there was, besides me, just another person who was not an AA member. I usually susbcribe to Moon Adamant's school of thought that the best way to deal with impartiality and neutrality is to invite representatives of all possible viewpoints to the same meeting. So of course I'm very happy to have AA citizens discussing, at the RA, how things should go ahead with the merger. From the perspective of AA citizens, who for some reason might still be "afraid" of a subversion of the process, they can rest assured: all this process has been closely followed by AA citizens inside the RA and the Executive, and they represented the large majority of people present in the discussion. What could be best for AA than controlling the process from within?
Personally, I don't view this as a problem at all. In fact, it might be the best reason why the process did, indeed, finish under very favourable terms for AA, which appeased their "fears". I might be a bit irked by the problem of conflict of interests, but, to be honest, it's impossible to find anyone without any conflict of interests, personal agenda, or bias. My own bias in the process, for instance, is that I love most of the people I know at AA, I'm an expansionist, and welcomed the merger since it was first discussed 
So stopping it at this stage is a folly and would also go against my own desires.
No, the problem lies elsewhere. If AA is allowed not only full access to all decision processes in the CDS — something which should only be natural if we're talking about a "merger of equals" and encouraged to the fullest extent — but actually driving the process on the CDS side (which, again, is not as bad as it sounds — what better reassurance to give AA citizens but to make them understand that the decision bodies in the CDS are, in effect, composed of a majority of so-called "dual citizens"?), I would think that the reverse should apply, too. What this means is that if the CDS is behaving within its goodwill, allowing AA citizens to tell the CDS what should be done about the merger, as "equals", the CDS ought also to be in the same position and expect, also in goodwill, that AA allows CDS citizens to make suggestions, ask questions, and oversee the process.
So far, this hasn't been done. I have been silent about it (sadly, I have other priorities — posting on the forums is not one of them!) since I didn't really worry about the whole issue. The community leaders of AA are my personal friends. The Executive is an elected body with oversight by the RA. The RA is elected by secret ballot among all CDS citizens. This is the basis upon trust is founded in the CDS. The people appointed (and overseen) to participate in the process, on the CDS side, are lawful, respectful, above reproach, and have worked hard, publishing their results, and being open to discuss it publicly, either on the forums, in-world at any occasion, and at the RA in formal session. There was nothing really to worry about during the whole process.
At last we come to a small, tiny, roadblock. Over a month ago, at least, we were told that AA is basically all for the merger, with a slight quirk. They mistrust the CDS' "democratic processes". They fear that once the AA and the CDS sims are under the same administration, AA citizens will be neglected. They fear that the CDS will "impose its will" upon the poor, unresisting AA citizens. They fear that the CDS "culture" (which is not viewed by AA as being democratic at all) might squash their own cultural ways.
And so, after much discussion, a proposal was presented to the RA where, as an act of goodwill, the CDS would relinquish their focus on democratic processes for selecting its representatives, allowing AA citizens to appoint their own representatives directly, without a vote, on the new and expanded RA of nine members.
I had to frown upon the suggestion since the very first day. The reason is simple: the RA is elected, as I don't cease to repeat, by secret ballot, among all CDS citizens — post-merger we're all entitled to a vote and to get elected, no matter where we have our plots of land. In fact, owning land in several plots of the CDS doesn't entitle citizens to have "more votes" or "more power", even if there have been attempts in the past to try to "protect the other CDS sims from the tyranny and oppression of Neufreistadt". If you remember, my own faction was the first to look at these claims as being silly — we're too tiny a community to talk about sim sectarism, and will continue to be tiny for many years. Time proved we were right: these days, the centre of power is in Colonia Nova (both in political power — as all RA meetings are held there — but also in commerce, since the most-selling shops are located in CN too), and the majority of events are held in Locus Amoenus (which might, however, rival Colonia Nova in commerce). Neufreistadt simply lost its significance as "the centre of power", and although the New Guild still meets there, even they are considering to move out.
That's not bad. It just shows group dynamics at work. Power, events, and commerce shift across sim boundaries easily, depending on where the people are going and what they wish to do. NFS is cute and quaint but laggy, with small spaces; commerce, events, and even power is better handled on less laggier places with larger areas. Thus, the notion that each sim (or group of sims) is in a sense "privileged" is absurd, and will continue to be so for a long, long while — until we reach, say, the size of Caledon and a thousand citizens. That's a very long way off!
Nevertheless, this doesn't mean that groups of citizens living in a sim don't informally aggregate in their neighbourhoods, spontaneously doing so, and push for their rights to establish themselves as a locus of interest. That's great! It lead to things like the Monastery and the Bowl Theatre in Alpine Meadows, for instance. It was not "centrally planned", neither was it "organised" — but simply recognised as the right of any citizen to associate with others and do interesting things.
Now let's get back to the issue with Al-Andaluz. In my mind, I was viewing the forthcoming elections as quite interesting. If I recall correctly, the largest factions in the RA tend to attract 18-20 votes or thereabouts. The new faction for Al-Andaluz would have 31 eager and strong voters, and win the next elections easily, with at least 4 out of 9 seats, but possibly even more. This would be quite interesting, as the power within the CDS would shift towards Al-Andaluz, and I viewed this as a good and positive trend. It would mean recognition of the hard work being done to keep Al-Andaluz alive. They will have half the landmass of the CDS and it would be a "natural" move to push the centre of power towards them. They would also be able to bring new, refreshing ideas to be discussed at the RA. Thus, the CDS would be revitalised, breathing new energy and ideas, as a lot of new citizens suddenly shift the power towards a different culture. As this would be done within the solid democratic principles that have been the hallmark of the CDS, I was preparing to embrace the change as very welcome, quite important, and a turning point in the CDS's history — a turn towards the greater good. One more reason to go ahead with the merger, and one reason that had not been obvious from the beginning!
However, it has been told to us that AA has the opposing view. What they see is that suddenly their "rights" will be removed from them, and they will feel the hard crush from the implacable boot of the CDS processes (how they would see such a thing as the majority party at the RA is hard to explain and I'm at a loss to understand it). So they made "demands". They labelled the CDS representative democracy as being "undemocratic" (!) and untrustful (!), and "demanded" the right to be represented at the RA — but without voting. Instead, they want direct appointment of two RA seats for at least 6 months.
Now, I know I'm a naive person. But I know my history. When a group of "democratic" citizens mistrust elections by casting a vote on a secret ballot and instead prefer to "appoint" their representatives, that gets me thinking.
The first reply I had was to remember that a fundamental principle of democracy is that there is no "right way" of being democratic. Rudy Ruml, in fact, was asked the very same question a long time ago, when he was still a CDS citizen, and his answer was pretty much the same: there is no "better" democracy, a "perfect" model that works for every community. Thus, communities usually have their own form of democracy, which fits better to them. Thus, the US democracy is different from British democracy, which in turn has little in common with the French or German models, and nothing whatsoever to do with the direct democracy in Switzerland. Each can rightfully claim that they have "the best model for their country". This is most reasonable as we're assuming one of the most fundamental principles of all these democracies: tolerance.
(Nevertheless, one should also point out that all democracies in the world are representative, parliamentary democracies But let's skip that point for a moment)
It's irrefutable that the CDS model of a representative, parliamentary democracy, based on an universal secret ballot that elects factions to seats in the Representative Assembly is just one possible model that just happens to be the favoured one in the CDS. It works for us. Other communities, of course, might have different ways of looking at what democracy means for them and develop their own models.
On the other hand, when different communities merge their respective administrative governments into a single one, it's inevitable that compromises have to be met. Such was the case when creating the United States out of individual states, or the European Union out of individual countries. In several countries across Europe, minorities get representation through "special elections". I remember visiting a Landsrat (parliament) of a state in northern Germany in the late 1980s. They explained to us that since they're at the border with Denmark, and lots of Danes live in Germany — as lots of Germans live across the border in Denmark — both regional parliaments have special rules for the "minorities". The faction lists have to guarantee that at least a few Danes are represented on the German side; and vice-versa. They still get elected, but they have a special "bonus" to make sure that at least a few seats are filled by the minority from across the border. This is normal and common throughout most modern democracies.
So, the request to get "special members" from the AA sims to be automatically represented at the RA is, in essence, a good idea, and has solid backing from historical and existing models throughout the democratic world. I don't see any problem with that.
The problem is actually in the way these representatives from the AA sims enter the (unified) RA. The first drafts hinted that the AA sims would elect 2 members out of 9, while the non-AA sims would elect the other 7. This seemed to be acceptable to a degree (even though it seemed unfair for AA, since, as said, the AA citizens, as a group, could easily elect 4 to 5 seats).
The Constitutional amendment approved today, though, uses this strange wording: "the special election or selection of additional RA representatives from the newly joining estate, by that estate, separate from the regular CDS election" (emphasis mine).
Naturally enough, I have no qualms about "special elections", but the word selection bothered me. So, I asked, very openly: how will citizens in AA sims "select" their representatives?
The answer surprised me. The first reaction was "by consensus". That's fine with me, but what is the actual process of achieving consensus? On the few bodies I know iRL, this usually means that all members cast a vote, and if all agree on the same thing, the decision is made. While it seems quite burdensome to work as a "consensus of 31", if the AA citizens prefer that way of "selecting" their representatives, and we can be given a reasonable assurance that this process doesn't take too long so that we can start the new term with the 9 representatives, I would be fine with it. Skeptic, but fine — it's hard, for instance, to reach a consensus in the RA with just 7 members (of which usually only 5 are available at any given meeting). But, alas, it might just be that we're naturally quarrelsome and hard to achieve "consensus", and that the AA citizens are much better at that.
But then I was told that "there is no vote". AA citizens, apparently, abhor voting. O-kay... so... I'm probably biased, since all organisations I know where people abhor voting are anything but "democratic", but, well, that's fine. Perhaps they tie the notion of "voting" to secret ballots and prefer instead to call out their decision in public — that's also fine, since, except for electing the RA, all other forms of voting in the CDS are done calling out the vote in public.
The next question, of course, was about how this whole process was put into practice. I was explained that AA calls a Town Meeting for important decisions. All right, that's also fine. And whoever appears on that Town Meeting is able to "participate in the consensus".
Mmh right. Adhocracy — we also have that in the New Guild, for instance. It requires a quorum, of course, but after that, anyone appearing on the New Guild is allowed to cast a vote on any item. Since the New Guild hasn't got that many active members, this is a good method for quickly deciding things without getting "stuck" at having to comply with complex procedures. It also works well.
Someone also mentioned that usually, only 4-5 people appear at the Town Meetings anyway (I'm sorry, I haven't seen the transcript yet). So, hmm, what this actually will mean then is... out of 4 or 5 members... two are selected... the remaining 2-3 will accept these as representing "the will of 31 citizens"... and these will then get two seats at the RA for 6 months?
I was told that "this method works". Well, of course it works. I have no doubts that it works quite well! In fact, it will even work better if the Town Meeting only has two people in it and they both agree they should represent the AA and get two free seats at the RA. What could "work" better than that?
When I pointed out that just because a method "worked" it doesn't automatically mean that it is legitimate, democratic, free, open, transparent, tolerant, or representative of the will of the people, I was told to... shut up.
When I insisted that shutting up on such important changes to our Constitution was mostly unfair, I was further told that I have no place in questioning AA's methods of "democracy" and that I should hush and let things go ahead — or bear the burden of dooming the whole merger project.
Well!
While I obviously urge the Scientific Council to deem the amendment under consideration as having an unconstitutional formulation — since the notion of selecting members to the RA is contrary to the Constitution's Article I, Section 1 ("The Representative Assembly (RA) is a body of democratically elected factions which represent different ideological views of its citizens.") — the rest of the amendment is fine. I don't really care "how" the "interim members" of the AA sims are elected — so long as they're elected and not selected. The difference is quite clear to me. An election, even if it's an election by consensus, means that at least every AA citizen is allowed to have a saying in who represents them. A selection means that this choice is withdrawn from them. Furthermore, it was clarified that anyone participating in the AA representative "selection" method, will be prevented from voting in the CDS General Elections, if they happen to own land in other sections of the CDS as well, to prevent "double-voting". So this means that, on one hand, we have a mysterious selection process here. that magically puts two people into the RA without oversight by any body; and on the other hand, a list of current CDS citizens, who are just unfortunate enough to own plots in AA too, will be excluded from their right to vote in the CDS!
And calling this in public is deemed to be "dangerous" and "putting the whole process in jeopardy".
Now I'm not a fan of conspiracy theories. So it's really too early to say if this unfortunate sequence of events is just a coincidence (in real life we have far more coincidences than we think!). It might just be an obscure angle that nobody really cared much about. In the battle between "expansion at all costs" and "representative democracy at all costs", expansion won the first round. So it's a question of pragmatism ("representative democracy is too long-winded, takes too long, is way too confusing") vs. principles ("if we don't compromise with less democratic methods, we'll be stuck at the same size forever"). I'm happy to be defeated on the principles, of course — in the CDS, the majority wins! — but I was also surprised by the public attacks against my person when defending the principles of representative democracy — namely, when questioning that a model that lets a handful of people (ie. 4-5) decide who gets a fourth of the seats in our Representative Assembly might not be entirely "democratic" no matter how much the use of that word is stretched, bended, and twisted beyond recognition.
For the future mergers — since the past is the past, we shouldn't be delving in the past — I sincerely hope that questioning methods and processes used by the communities that wish to merge with the CDS (mind you, we're just questioning, not "interfering" or even "forcing" anything) is not equated with the desires of a minion of the Ninth Circle of Hell. I would even like to be allowed to be present when the Al-Andaluz Town Meeting choses their representatives — but since this clearly will make them "uncomfortable", I will obviously refrain from doing so, but for the next merger, I'll not be so lenient. The AA citizens, once the merger goes ahead, will be full citizens of the CDS and will be allowed to question any and every aspect of the CDS — in public, in private, or however they wish. They will be allowed to sit at the RA and demand their questions to be answered there. They will be allowed to see all records, all transactions, all votes, all transcripts. They will have the right to demand, in short, accountability of all aspects of the CDS life, political or otherwise. And they will be allowed to vote and get elected to any role in Government, if they wish to do so. They're full citizens like anyone else. That's the CDS side of the bargain.
On the other side, in the spirit of goodwill, I would at least expect some openness to be allowed to ask things without getting flagged as anathema, hushed in public, and threatened to "doom the whole project" if I make a simple question like "how will they select their representatives"? This kind of threatening to hush me into submission is quite unacceptable; I'll let it pass for this time (as the merger is now a fait accompli) but I will not be silent on the next one.
From me you can only expect that for the upcoming elections my focus for the campaign will be a defence of representative democracy. In the CDS I envision as a goal, there is no place for secret appointments or hushing up anyone who just wishes to be informed. That's not part of our culture and tradition, and I've always stood up for that — even if it harmed me in the past. And you can also expect that I will fight for the right of the AA sim residents to be fully allowed to question everything about our common government, without fear of getting hushed, ignored, or ostracised for simply raising their voices of concern.
And I do apologise if anyone feels offended by my harsh words. I'm sorry, but defending principles is not an easy task. It makes enemies. But I finish with a quote from my own teachers: getting offended is something that only happens in your mind. That will apply to me too, of course.
