Webs for Minister of Foreign Affairs!

:spider: A spidery candidacy for MoFA :spider:

*Don’t worry though, it’s like the cute spiders and the Spider-themed superheroes, not like big scary ones. I promise I will not eat the department. Or poison them.

Who am I?

Hi, I’m Webs, also known as The Web of Life and Destiny, also known as the player formerly known as Aramantha (mostly because that sounds really cool). I’ve been on NationStates since 2019 and have flitted about regions quite some time. In coming to the South Pacific again, I am un-retiring and have decided to devote all my time here in an attempt to fight off NS-burnout.

If you’ve seen me since my return, you know I’m constantly questioning things, attempting to make sweeping changes like rewriting the charter for the entire region, and generally making a nuisance of myself.

Foreign Affairs

Why would I be a great Foreign Affairs minister? Because unlike basically every other initiative I’ve worked for in the last two weeks, I intend to essentially leave the department exactly as it is. In a very boomer-like way, I think the department is in very good standing, and improvements don’t necessarily have to be made to make FA a good and healthy branch of the government.

Unlike many other parts of government, it’s important for foreign affairs to keep a strong, consistent, and steady stance. We ally with good regions, and we sometimes treaty with folks we have good relationships with. By this point, Pacifican foreign affairs have solidified to a point where consistency is key more than any other value, and I intend on maintaining the good standing we have with regions all across the NS-verse.

That being said, I’m not afraid to make sweeping changes or stand my ground in an argument if necessary.

My experience!

I’ve worked in two other FA departments before although never in The South Pacific. I maintained an FA position for around a year in Karma and I spent several months as an ambassador in TGW. In both of those positions, I maintained ambassadorship with several regions, and in Karma, helped to weed out problematic regions to help maintain decency among allies.

Maintaining Decency and Putting Out Fires

The most important role of FA is being a front-line for dealing with emergencies, putting out statements regarding important FA-related regional announcements, and generally making sure allies maintain a level of decency that matches the South Pacifican way. In addition, this means often working with the MoD when FA matters involve protecting allies R/D related FA affairs, and I’m more than happy to work with whoever does get elected as Minister there.

Conflicts of Interest

Shockingly, for possibly the first time in my entire NS existence, I have no conflicts of interest. I only keep one other nation alive, purely for the badges and archives I maintain there, and I am currently a part of 0 other regions. Unprecedentedly, I am actually not a cosmo right now

Questions, thoughts, etc.

Aka, I’m happy to answer anything ya’ll want to know. I’m sometimes slow because I have many classes at assorted times, but I will answer questions because I’m cool like that (and also possibly because the rules require it).

Have a great day or night or 4am wherever you are, peace out and have a spidery time!

Will you keep the current Ambassador roster? Or change it everything up and make your own roster from scratch?

Hail Pacifica, eh? :stuck_out_tongue:

1 Like

Can’t say I would mess with ambassadors unless there’s a need to. If an ambassador is failing to perform their duties or requests a change, I’m more than willing to facilitate that, but otherwise, I think a lot of unnecessary administrative change does nothing but confuse people and add a lot of chaos.

Oh hush, I’m used to the rp names for stuff :stuck_out_tongue:

2 Likes

I can appreciate your desire for consistency in foreign policy, but do you see the foreign policy landscape as being static? If so, why you believe it is unlikely to change and thus lends itself to a consistent foreign policy? Conversely, if you believe the landscape is dynamic, what changes do you expect to see, and do you believe an emphasis on consistency can adequately respond to those changes?

To clarify, I’m not talking about the emergencies and ‘fires’ that you mention in your campaign, but rather more gradual shifts (or lack thereof) in the gameplay landscape.

Honestly, in my time on NationStates, I’ve come to the belief that foreign policy just doesn’t change that often. Especially with big and influential regions like TSP, as time goes on it becomes less and less likely that we end up having to confront or cut ties with an ally. Usually if we’ve vetted our allies, it won’t turn out in 6 months that they were actually an evil fascist region or something equally not cool.

I think the biggest changes, if anything would involve one of three things:

  1. As mentioned above, somehow we found out dirty secrets about a region and have to drop them and put out a statement about it.
  2. Probably the biggest one, R/D shifts. Because TSP is a pretty big player in the defender community, R/D alignments end up being super important to those we ally with. If somebody switched their side, that could potentially allow us to either become their friend or drop them. As far as I know we have no relations with raiders at all, although I could be wrong on that.
  3. New regions. UCRs go in and our of importance all the time. Occasionally a new region is built and they’re cool and we want to establish ties with them. Often new regions take a more extensive vetting process since they aren’t well known in the community, but it can still represent regions becoming new allies and friends.
  4. Bonus number four, if regions become inactive or no longer meet embassy or consulate requirements, one would have to approach them and potentially drop them.

As for the gameplay landscape as a whole, in my experience GPers are like the most stubborn, unchanging people ever to live. You wake up every day, someone has probably started an r/d argument over something that happened a month ago and has long since slipped past the media’s radar. Honestly a lot of the consistency of the GP landscape comes from how split everybody is because of r/d. Very two-party sorta situation. Active independents have become less and less common as the years have gone on. The world revolves around a concept which we have made our side quite clear on, so there’s certainly a baseline that strengthens any foreign policy decision we make.

Have you seen the shift in gameplay politics over the past year, especially the first six months or so?

To be honest, the extent of the shift I saw this year was up until like May when basically everything was just widening the line between raiding and defending. A lot of hate for BoM and a lot of unnecessary long form pieces about how the GP community is still not that healthy. I’ve also seen a lot of UCRs die this year and the few large ones begin to take shape in a fashion that will better suit the F/S update. I definitely saw some breaking down of old grudges in an attempt to unite against Malice and raiding in general. As I recall, TNPs defender switch was this year too. Lily died for a while and came back and continues to be its usual wild self. I don’t see as much raiding presence anymore but I also stay a bit more out of the loop on R/D affairs nowadays.

All in all, I can’t think of exactly what major shift you’re referring to, but I’m sure it’s a valid point.

I’m not saying everything in that paragraph is necessarily relevant to our foreign policy. But even if each one of those changes might not be much of a ‘major shift,’ do you believe a static foreign policy is the best approach to deal with those changes?

I wouldn’t say static, I would say steady, but in a way, yes. I think remaining consistent in foreign affairs is paramount. We may put out statements and declare our position in important conflicts, similarly we may defend or drop allies, but behind it all, the same principles must remain. We’re a strong, democratic region, we love our allies, we welcome foreign friends and ideas, and we are defender. To change our stance too much would only stand to cause more chaos in the GP sphere. I rather pride myself on the fact that as a region, we know who we are, and we don’t intend on changing that for anyone.