Why not?

[Fort Pitt]

Democracy demands every person being active. Here it is hard to keep everyone active and thus it doesn't work. However since this world does not deal with morals, Totalitarianism works best.

[ChairmanHal]

So I have heard from many people on these forums and through out the game that an alliance with a full democratic system of government can not work? Why is this?

It is my personal oppinion that it can, however we just have not been able to find a way to make it work yet. As many new alliances create a system of full democracy they ultimatly are doomed to fail. However those failures are not completly lost as there are lessons learned about what can and can not work. It is my belief that one day democracy in CN will evolve or mature enough to create a fully functioning democratic society, and we will see the end of totalitarian states and partial democracies.

Please state your thoughts about why it could, could not or will not work in CN?

Because when your alliance is facing a crisis, you can't always stop to take a vote.

That said, a representative democracy with a strong chief executive and a well run military organization should be able to be successful.

[MTTezla]

Democratic republics work fine. Straight up democracies really don't.

This man is correct.

[AnCapistan]

Sorry let me clarify Representative Democracies are the way to go. We cant have the membership vote on everything it would impede progress.

[Jipps]

There is no democracy in CN unless you elect all your forum admins.

We actually do that for some strange reason.

[Cataduanes]

ODN has a long history of not honoring his treaties or not sticking by their friends but you want to me change me judgement about ODN just because they didn't did that in the last month? Really?

...sigh...nah your not likely to change your judgement anyhow, but if you must keep up the grudge how about gathering your fellow haters and put your money were your mouth is ...unless of course sniping and the odd trolling is more your style?

Edited July 31, 2009 by Cataduanes

[Penguin]

I think if there is the proper culture, democracies can add flavor, excitement and a greater connection between the members and leaders. If poorly managed, they can also lead to rivalries, infighting and inconsistent positions due to rapid turnover rate. Polar has always tried to get the best of both worlds, with an appointed upper government for stability and consistency and an elected lower government that usually ends up being promoted to upper government for the activity and a connection to the membership. I have noticed that a decent amount of long term strategy requires leaders willing to stay in place for great lengths of time, something that is far more difficult in a democracy.

I'm not so sure why we're discussing this in a thread about Democracy in CN but I want to reply to Cataduanes.

Yeah well it seems the official line does not radicaly differ from your own, i am not saying its not justified but you conviniently forget how some in ODN actually fought beside you last August (Dujek for one), your penchant to snipe at us insults them more than anyone else and perhaps that is something you should bear in mind before issuing more generalizations.

Ah yes you will find no disagreement over CDS (i was pro-CDS back in the day), another bad decision (made largely by leaders now in Valhalla) yet i wish to be judged by AA based on the present, considering everyone is complaining about grudges towards NPO, etc, etc here we are with someone confirming a grudge, you have been consistent in your sniping so why the surprise over my reaction? did you think all ODNistas were too spineless to pipe up?

As far as I thought, there was nothing at all between us? Our members have a variety of past experiences, just like yours. To say that those who have held onto their grudges speak for the rest of us is the same faulty logic that ties you to the mistakes of your own past governments. You're welcome to defend yourself against D34th's points, in fact, I'd encourage you to stand up for yourself no matter the alliance affiliation of the one insulting you. Remember, however, that he expresses his own opinions, which I certainly don't always agree with, and he doesn't expect to be seen as a spokeperson for anyone but himself. Calling his opinions somehow aligned to our "official stance" on ODN is misleading and inaccurate.

Penguin has been cool, and Grub has been shall we say at times generous and other times certainly not and others? i think we both know how things are between ODN and Polaris right? i am for one no longer willing to be silent, we have shown regret but if blood is all that your after you know were we are, stop sniping and take a shot.

We do not want your blood. We do not want you to feel guilty or ashamed over what happened a year ago. We do not want to keep you from defending yourself against those who call you cowards citing our example. We've never asked for you to show regret or for special treatment as penance. We officially moved on the day the treaty cancellation period was waived by Grub. Sure, lingering grudges have stuck with some of our members more than others, but we've not interfered with ODN in any kind of official capacity since Ice Lollies was canceled and so I am not sure why you think we would want to take a shot at you.

It seems like you've had a harder time forgiving yourselves than we've had "getting over" the betrayal. I've seen you apologize to imagined victims who are only using what happened between us for their own agenda. Yes, at the time we felt personally betrayed by the cancellation, but a year later I doubt anyone in Polaris still feels sufficient emotional scars to require more apologies. I think all the energy you are expending to make amends is misdirected at third parties who were never emotionally attached to ODN to begin with. They certainly don't speak on our behalf, so when they don't accept your many apologies on behalf of Polaris I hope that you don't somehow interpret it as a reflection of our "official" stance. What's actually left is a few members that don't believe you've changed, a few that do, but mostly those who hardly ever even think about it.

Edited July 31, 2009 by Penguin

[Cataduanes]

My apoligies Penguin, i was guilty of having a few drinks in me last night and i am pretty fed up to the back teeth with the constant shots, and yeah i for one am having a hard time because of it in a manner of speaking. I sincerely apoligize to Polaris as a whole for any slight made by my angry posts

But D34th my offer still stands, as it does for all haters, you know were we are....

Edited July 31, 2009 by Cataduanes

[Penguin]

My apoligies Penguin, i was guilty of having a few drinks in me last night and i am pretty fed up to the back teeth with the constant shots, and yeah i for one am having a hard time bacause of it in a manner of speaking. I sincerely apoligies to Polaris as a whole for any slight made by my angry posts

That's kind of the opposite of my point. No more apologies are necessary.

Edited July 31, 2009 by Penguin

[Cataduanes]

Fair enough, i shall try to remember to bite back at trolls on an individual basis as opposed to their AA

[D34th]

You're welcome to defend yourself against D34th's points, in fact, I'd encourage you to stand up for yourself no matter the alliance affiliation of the one insulting you. Remember, however, that he expresses his own opinions, which I certainly don't always agree with, and he doesn't expect to be seen as a spokeperson for anyone but himself. Calling his opinions somehow aligned to our "official stance" on ODN is misleading and inaccurate.

I tried to say it to him, but looks like he preffer attack my AA than my opinions, all that he can say is "Yeah I recognize that my alliances just did !@#$ in the past but your alliances isn't good too"

...sigh...nah your not likely to change your judgement anyhow, but if you must keep up the grudge how about gathering your fellow haters and put your money were your mouth is ...unless of course sniping and the odd trolling is more your style?

But D34th my offer still stands, as it does for all haters, you know were we are....

Do you really think that I will lose my time hating ODN? Really? You guys just deserve my laughs and my disdain. It's not my fault if your alliance did what they did, but I think is funny you being upset because I'm pointing your alliances mistakes, but you can keep saying "bring it" if you want, but if your objective is put fear in my heart I have to say that you failed miserably.

Edited July 31, 2009 by D34th

[Cataduanes]

No i was not trying to instill 'fear' into your heart, but yeah your right i am being a prick...so i shall go boil my head or something

[Francesca]

Speaking as someone who was formerly ardently pro-democracy, and who has been a government member in both democratic and dictatorship-style alliances, I firmly believe that democracy doesn't work and that dictatorships are the way to go. Both have their strengths and weaknesses though.

Democracy sounds sexy, but really, it's more suited to real life. It allows factions to form within the body membership and encourages rivalry between these factions. This leads to massive internal drama. Elected governments are also often defined by disunity, which doesn't help the stability of alliances.

On the other hand, a dictatorship with appointed ministers means that there is a defined political stance to an alliance- namely the political views of the dictator- and the appointed ministers will usually reflect the political views of the dictator, meaning there is unity within the government and a lack of internal drama. Decent levels of transparency will maintain the relationship between the government and the body membership, and the alliance works well. Add to this a unifying philosophy (I believe all good alliances should have a philosophy, it strengthens the alliance) and genuine friendship between the members, and presto, you won't find a better alliance system. It's called Gatherism, I wrote about it a while ago.

Edited July 31, 2009 by Francesca

[Salmia]

I actually like the way TOOL has it set up. I am for democracy IRL but online game? It won't work. People get too inactive/don't know what they're talking about etc. TOOL has a higher government that is appointed by one direct leader and the lower government is elected and earns their way up to the higher government by serving for a long time. The higher government ensures a stability in the government and by having one direct leader (as long as they're sane and a good leader..) you get things done and have an absolute say. Also having one stable government means it is not always changing and allows for the long term necessary for a successful alliance since they need a backbone. In successful democracies, I've noticed the same people get elected over and over, that is essentially is what is needed. Not so much change every time or you'll have issues with changing systems all the time.

[Kroknia]

I stand by with the fact that voted representation =/= democracy. I'm much more totalitarian in my IC beliefs than representative democracy. I am still much more real democratic than totalitarian.

[jerdge]

Upon further thought, considering that any ruler is completely free to edit his/her in-game Alliance Affiliation at any time, I am even inclined to think that democracy is actually the only possible form of alliance government in CN. Well, in a certain sense...

[SunnyInc]

Full democracy does not work in CN because it puts the decision making process into the hands of people who have no idea what they are talking about.

[Francesca]

Full democracy does not work in CN because it puts the decision making process into the hands of people who have no idea what they are talking about.

The same could be said of democracy in real life, I don't think that's the issue with democracy in either real life or CN. The idea with democracy is that it gives power to the people- to the intellectuals, to the working class, to the left wingers and the right wingers, and whatever suits the most people in the country is what the country gets. Plato discussed the idea of a philosopher king, and others have proposed ideas like rule of the elite, etc etc but in real life, I believe Western democracy as we currently know it is the greatest system of government the world has ever seen or ever will see.

Edited July 31, 2009 by Francesca

[shilo]

Of course democracies work in CN. Whether or not an alliance succeeds or not is not really tied to the system, rather to the members living with that system.

What is true however that sizes of alliances demand certain variations:

a several hundred member alliance with a direct democratic system is likely to get into trouble, inactivity etc might slow down things badly

a smaller active alliance with only 20-40 members can work that way, if there is a good relationship between all the people there, if the members are mature enough

An alliance which has relatively low standards for new members can get into trouble if this untested, inexperienced or maybe covertly hostile new member is directly thrust into democratic responsibility by giving him voting power right away.

As such, a more republican approach likely will enable the alliance to function by ensuring there are experienced people in position that help steer the alliance.

Ultimately, a democracy in CN gives a lot of responsibility to possibly completely fresh faces, alliances that practice this form of government thus must have a system in place that educates and tests a bit before letting the people vote.

Whether that is some sort of newbie screening and testing combined with education and a certain "trial" period in which certain rights are not yet applicable, or whether there is an elitist approach in a way, ie looking only for somewhat active, mature and experienced players, basically those that have passed the tests already in other alliances.

However, the system has relevance according to what the alliance actually is meant to accomplish: I do not want to generalize all democracies in CN, but I would say the type of player attracted to them is not purely interested about the game, and the events surrounding it, but also about all that which is part of democracy: elections, heated debates, politics

That by itself can be much more interesting than anything game related, including the larger events that accur ingame (ie wars etc), so a democratic alliance can sometimes end up becoming a "game" for itself, ie the "democracy simulator game in alliance xyz". From my own experience, I can definitely say that this is what kept me around for so long.

This is however rather surplus if ingame domination, an efficient warmachine, are the goals. Then democracy would distract and slow down.

What I however believe is the biggest advantage of democracy, especially comparing large democratic alliances with large autocratic alliances, is that new ideas, fresh faces have a much better chance of getting through in a democratic system.

When you basically have the same very small group of people controlling an alliance over years, it will get problematic to ensure that people that have rather different ideas and ideals also have a chance to rise to power, and that things like grudges on a personal level can last for years, and dominate the entire direction of an alliance for years to come.

In a democracy, ideas, opinions are constantly challenged. Now those that prefer long term planning (which is more of an ingame aspect though, thus back to my point of more military minded alliances) have a problem, cause they will constantly have to explain to new people why the old ways still apply. Thus grudges, or keeping down someone cause he said the wrong thing, are more difficult, cause the chance is the people with the grudges and problems to accept differing opinions won't always be in office.

All this however is rather irrelevant to someone logging 5 minutes every 3 days, which are the largest number of players. For them they both forms work, though they would miss all that that makes democratic alliances so fun to be, but if an administration is somewhat effective, those inactive players can quite easily be placed into democratic alliances as well, the system simply must be able to function with a smaller active core of the total membership (thus a charter demanding that let's say 2/3s of the total membership must vote or such would have a problem here).

Edited July 31, 2009 by shilo

[Vladimir Stukov II]

Yep. It's a popularity contest most of the time. An incompetant member who's always on IRC and the spam forum is more likely to win than a quiet, competant, hardworking guy who rarely posts outside the Finance department. I remember back in TOOL's mass-recruiting days, the recruiters always won elections because the masses of newbies knew them. That's not to say they were incompetant, a lot of them were very good in gov. And it wasn't their fault everyone knew them. Plus, only our lower-level gov was elected, so we didn't have a problem with upper positions. But yes, factors like popularity and charisma tend to decide elections more than competance and devotion to the alliance. Full democracy only works in smaller, tighter-knit communities where everyone knows who is and isn't competant.

Consistency is the other big thing. Like I said earlier, if you change military systems every month, you're screwed when a war comes. FA is even more killer. An alliance that changes it's foreign policy direction every month is destined for failure.

-Bama

That is exactly why I used to hate the idea of a democratic alliance. I spent most of my early CN career in GOLD. The membership was totally incompetent and would elect the biggest spammers to gov. The only thing these people were good at was posting massive amounts of pointless spam, all of the members with actual leadership ability barely posted in the spam forums and thus never got elected. So for most alliances, elections are just a popularity contest where the most recognizable name wins. When I joined TOP I was very surprised to see how the elections worked here. The membership was very active and knowledgeable and actually voted for the best candidate for the position. Everyone is involved in alliance matters, and while we do have a spam forum, the members that post there do it after they have read up on all the important discussions. A democratic alliance can work, it just takes a very active and knowledgeable membership. So this is why democracy is more suited for alliances with strict admission policies and dictatorship is more suited for mass recruitment alliances.

[Melchior]

With a limited amount of decisions and increased importance of those few decisions, it requires knowledge of what consequences a decision has, and most simply don't have that knowledge, thus we enforce minimal government, whether they are elected or promoted by previous government, there is a larger chance that they know what to do than letting the entirety of the alliance decide.

[avernite]

I guess succesfull dictatorships and democracies are quite possible, but the failures of democracy stay visible (the amazing tenacity of GATO is, I think, partly based on it being a democracy. I say nothing about their CURRENT state as failed or not) while the failures of dictatorships cause a sudden collapse (GOONS, maybe? The UjW thread sure seems to imply the 'dictators' got burned out).

Plus, of course, a military is usually run as a military, and indeed TOP turns into a near-total military dictatorship under the elected head of the alliance when war is declared. Thus democracies will usually adopt a military system for war-time, or simply fail when war comes.

[Kiss Goodbye]

Plus, of course, a military is usually run as a military, and indeed TOP turns into a near-total military dictatorship under the elected head of the alliance when war is declared. Thus democracies will usually adopt a military system for war-time, or simply fail when war comes.

I perceive this to be the biggest issue--people in this thread have highlighted "quick decision making" as a critical divergent issue between democracies and dictatorships. Wartime is the only time that really demands quick decision making. You can usually get away with not moving too fast during peacetime.

Outside of war, the social benefit of a democracy to an alliance full of active members is huge and obvious.

In war, a democracy had better have something in place to ensure that the right calls are swiftly made and followed.

Edited July 31, 2009 by Kiss Goodbye

[Iosif]

This discussion is silly and it's kind of saddening how some people in this thread really don't have the ability to go beyond their subjective experiences. But still, the way an alliance is organized is merely a miniature of attitudes prevalent in the alliance and thus I'd dare to say that there is no form of government that is imminently bounded to fail, but instead, they all just need proper environment and proper membership basis in order to flourish.

In other words, a democracy is an ideal form of government if the membership is dedicated and interested enough to uphold such a system; all it really needs is lots of contribution. If the conditions are right, the system in itself will stimulate activity and arguments within the alliance. But the more passive the general membership is, the more authoritarian government is needed.