"Scientific Council" needs some work

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Jamie Palisades
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"Scientific Council" needs some work

Post by Jamie Palisades »

This topic has come up a couple of times recently, so let's get it on the table for the next RA.

SC seems long to have quorum problems, and little effective way for dealing with it.

Judiciary acts. The most important of its functions is adjudicative, and only needed episodically: dispute resolution on demand. Not frequent, we hope, but essential to a real government when rarely needed. The results there have been disappointing, in my view.

I think it is a serious flaw that there are no procedural rules. None. Of course it is the SC that should have done something with its own rules ... ever. In SL and CDS, we need to be tolerant of our volunteers and their schedule needs. In six months as chancellor, I have been trying to clear up the CDS executive a little .. and in many ways I still am woefully behind! But at least I have been putting some effort in. Patroklus, you preceded me as LRA; would you not have been a little embarrassed if you had no operating rules for the RA? But this is an embarrassing and long-neglected state of affairs, for the SC. We do not need something complex. But years and years of nothing is inappropriate, even for SL. We are now years past the old judiciary debates that obsessed a prior pack of CDS politicians ... and we are capable of far more constructive, efficient dialogue today.

Administrative acts. The SC also has some periodic, regular functions. One is CDS election management. This last one went poorly. We got multiple frustrated calls from candidates of all factions, and no one could do anything. Status was unclear, reports cursory and late. I feel it was badly done. The second continuing SC job is to moderate these Forum boards. Look at the names on the BBS marked as admins. Gwyneth, no longer on SC, is still doing it; one SC member also has admin rights, recently, but the other SC members never were. Nice of Gwyn, but the current SC's not ever bothered to take this on? I may not know the whole picture there, but here as well, there are some moribund signs.

Finally, there are no conflict of interest rules! SC members are free to vote to seat ... or unseat ... or ban from CDS ...their own friends or enemies. I find this unprofessional beyond words. It utterly robs SC of credibility. That problem is instantly obvious to anyone who is not in a long time powerholding group. If we want to support e-commerce, a simple, clear method ... and plausible, fair neutrals ... are essential.

It is my plan to ask the next RA to ask the SC to write procedures within two months, or it they fail to do so, to launch a commission with a deadline to amend the constitution or take other steps within the RA's power accordingly.
.
Regards Jamie

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    Re: "Scientific Council" needs an overhaul

    Post by Cindy Ecksol »

    Jamie Palisades wrote:

    Administrative acts. The second continuing SC job is to moderate these Forum boards. Look at the names on the BBS marked as admins. Gwyneth, no longer on SC is still doing it; one SC member is marked as having admin rights, recently, but the other SC members never were. Nice of Gwyn, but the current SC's not ever bothered to take this on. So on periodic tasks as well, there are some moribund signs.

    Actually, Jamie, SC members ARE set as moderators, and that is the only function that I'm aware of us being responsible for. Even that is not written into the Constitution or any legislation that I'm aware of. Be that as it may, right now as an SC member I can moderate any of these boards although I can't recall that I've been asked to moderate during my term. But as far as I can tell the fact that I have this power is a matter of undocumented custom, not law (as are most of the SC procedures, I might add).

    It's not clear to me who is actually supposed ot be responsible for board administration. But I am kind of curious as to why Peleanor Eldritch and Fernando Book are still listed as administrators since they have not been active for quite a while. And Gwyn too -- seems as though there should be an admin account passed to the Dean of the SC and perhaps the Chancellor or something like that rather than Gwyn maintaining the access forever. I suppose someone COULD decide this question. But again, as far as I can tell, it's not really in the purview of the SC to decide: SC cannot take any powers that it has not been given. Looks to me like the "custom" is that Gwyn is the board administrator, just as it is our custom that Sudane holds the estate keys. There are no formal processes for

    Jamie Palisades wrote:

    It is my plan to ask the next RA to ask the SC to write procedures in a month, or it they fail to do so, to launch a commission with a deadline to amend the constitution or take other steps within the RA's power accordingly.

    Well, the RA can certainly amend the Constitution, but what amendments would you propose, exactly? And given the fact that there has not been any attention focused on documenting the existing processes in so long, why the rush to do this in a single month? And do you REALLY want the RA to be writing procedures for another branch of government? Doesn't seem like a good idea to me if it can be avoided.

    SC is in already in the process of revitalizing itself, and a public meeting to approve new members will be announced shortly. Perhaps it would be better to wait a week or two until new members are in place and approved by RA. When new members come before RA these topics would certainly be fair game for questions, and the RA would be free to make its interest in process documentation clearly understood. Certainly the Chancellor should meet with the newly constituted SC and discuss these issues. But it seems to me that asking the RA to set ultimatums is more of a last resort that could follow a less command-oriented process than something to take action on immediately.

    Cindy

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    Re: "Scientific Council" needs some work

    Post by Jamie Palisades »

    Hi Cindy.
    I completely agree that it would be better if the SC writes its procedures. It has not, for years. I'm very pleased to hear that there's some activity to get new active & qualified members. If the SC meets, and appoints some, they ought to have some time to fix this. Nothing would please me more.
    I don't know why the various parties are and are not Forum board administrators either. I am pleased to her you as a current SC member have some access; that's not apparent from the BBS, which as you know shows Gwyneth, Claude, Fernando, Pel, etc as admins, and not you and Dnate.
    As you suggest, Gwyneth is included there for *precisely* the same reason as Sudane is EO ... they're kind enough to help out and provide resources. Not concerned about Gwyn; concerned about whether the rest of the SC is acting.

    Perhaps we disagree? Did you feel the election was well handled, and the SC is in good shape, then?

    Regards Jamie

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    Re: "Scientific Council" needs some work

    Post by Cindy Ecksol »

    Jamie Palisades wrote:

    Finally, there are no conflict of interest rules! SC members are free to vote to seat ... or unseat ... or ban from CDS ...their own friends or enemies. I find this unprofessional beyond words. It utterly robs SC of credibility. That problem is instantly obvious to anyone who is not in a long time powerholding group. If we want to support e-commerce, a simple, clear method ... and plausible, fair neutrals ... are essential.

    Just a brief comment here. Sure, SC accepts nominations to its membership and votes them up or down. But (as I well know) that is certainly not the end of the process. RA gets a vote as well: candidates approved by the SC must go in front of the RA within 30 days for confirmation. So it's not QUITE as insular a club as one might think.

    Actually if it WERE that insular a club, I wouldn't be a member, seeing as how I've only been a CDS citizen for a year now. This is not to say that perhaps CDS (in the person of the RA) might not want to look at the SC nomination and confirmation process again and consider changes. But the current process is not quite as bad as you postulate.

    Cindy

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    "Scientific Council" needs (conflict of interest)

    Post by Jamie Palisades »

    Sorry, maybe I am not clear. I have high hopes for the SC *selection* process.
    It's at two other points that it seems not to work well.

    First, people drop off; some seem to fade away and become unavailable to CDS ans SC long before they admit it. As I said, it's a quorum problem. If the RA fills vacancies, the Dean TELLS us when they need more members, and there's some rule that SC members who vanish for long periods lose their seat, that would probably take care of it.

    Second, seated SC members who vote on an issue are not required to recuse themselves if they are personally involved. One of the measures in RL of a fair adjudicating system is whether the judges or arbitrators are neutral. In other words, if the SC hears a case between me and Dnate about some dispute (I'm making this up), Dnate should not be voting as an SC member on that appeal.

    Regards JP

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    Re: "Scientific Council" needs some work

    Post by Patroklus Murakami »

    I can see the sense in some of what Jamie is saying but I wonder why this is suddenly an issue which the RA is being expected to make headway on when it was not in anyone's election manifesto and, as the Executive Branch, it is not within your remit! I'm hoping this is a 'shot across the bows' to raise issues which some would like the SC to make progress on. Otherwise it starts to look like the Executive is over-reaching itself.

    A few quick points:

    The primary function of the SC is *not* to act as a judiciary. It is rarely called upon to resolve citizen disputes and we should consider whether we want it to retain this responsibility. I can see good arguments for taking this out of the Constitution. It's often better to let people cool down, or get them to talk and resolve their differences themselves rather than wading in with an SC ruling. If it's *that* serious it probably needs to go to LL or a real world court in any case.

    The primary responsibility of the SC is to interpret and enforce the Constitution. Despite one or two failings in this respect, it has done pretty well. This is really important. The RA can do pretty much anything if they have enough votes - repeal the Constitution, change the theme of our sims, delay elections for fifteen years. They are only constrained by the Chancellor's (weak) veto and the SC. Since the SC is only called on to interpret the Constitution if they, or a private citizen, consider that the RAs actions might be unconstitutional it is necessarily a less 'activist' branch of Government. Do we want a noisier SC that throws its weight around more? I'm not sure we do.

    The SC has ended up with the job of running elections.... but it's not entirely clear why given that the Constitution is silent on this matter! We had a huge amount of (invented) drama after the elections to the 9th RA after which there was a lot of discussion of electoral procedures. We could do to bring that to a resolution and be clearer about who does what and when. I'm not sure the SC ought to be hung out to dry though for any quibbles with the announcement of the results last time though when it's not even clear what their constitutional responsibilities involve.

    As for the Forums - well, like much in the CDS these are a volunteer effort. After resigning from the SC when I was elected LRA I had to pester Gwyn to remove my forum moderation rights. If the BBS rights don't perfectly reflect the make up of the SC at any point in time... blame Gwyn! But let's remember that like all of us she has a day job and maintains our forums in her spare time.

    Conflict of interest rules. There's a good debate to be had here. I think there is potential for developing transparent rules which will help us going forward. One thing we have to keep in mind though is that we are a small community. When you have taken account of all your 'friends' and 'enemies' there's probably no one else left! Let's consider how to make our system better but avoid developing too 'pure' a solution whereby no one on the SC can ever express an opinion on anything because of perceived 'conflict of interest'.

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    Re: "Scientific Council" ... what do we want from it?

    Post by Jamie Palisades »

    Pat, it's within your remit to comment, as a citizen. Me too. There's no clause in our constitution that says "branches cannot criticize each other." Note, when I do, it's openly, in civil words, and in terms of functions and rules ... not personalities, factions, sneak attacks or impeachments. : ) Worth a try.

    I mentioned it now, not because of the chancellor and RA term turnover ... but because the SC and RA soon will consider adding members. Thus, it's a good time to think about the SC's role and performance.

    I made two points above, and you haven't disagreed with either:
    -- SC members often seem to fade away, and then aren't augmented or replaced.
    -- A reasonable conflict of interest rule wouldn't hurt, to prevent lurid self-dealing,

    You and I also heartily agree that it's a good idea for CDS to ask:
    -- Should the SC be available for disputes other than CDS constitutional ones?
    -- Should some agency which is not the SC run the elections?

    Personally I do see CDS as a potential attractive home venue for commerce in SL. Not necessarily as a sim location, but as a 'host country' haven, making good use of our laws and democratic structure. Look what it's done for Switzerland : )

    What do others think about those issues?

    Regards JP

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    Re: "Scientific Council" needs some work

    Post by Jon Seattle »

    The voting system was moved to a new server running a new variant of Linux, and the voting software was upgraded two whole versions to the latest release of Django. Nevertheless the technical side of collecting votes was surprisingly trouble free. I was able to send out the final numbers shortly after the polls closed.

    I also had immediate and very helpful communication from Claude on all voting issues. We ran into trouble at the last stage when it was necessary to gather the other SC members to approve the final numbers. This has been a bit of a problem in some past elections as well. It just took more time to get them together this time.

    One of the problems with the SC is that it's volume of work is low and so there is a natural tendency to drift away or to go do other things. There may be little warning that people have disappeared. Perhaps we should require SC members to renew their own appointments monthly?

    I think the best available solution is to keep the responsibility of supervising elections with the SC. The RA and the executive both depend on the election's outcome and so cannot take on this task. I am a little skeptical of an additional organization devoted just to overseeing elections. With the rate of change in SL, an organization that had a function only every six months would have trouble maintaining continuity.

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    Re: "Scientific Council" ... what do we want from it?

    Post by Cindy Ecksol »

    Jamie Palisades wrote:

    I made two points above, and you haven't disagreed with either:
    -- SC members often seem to fade away, and then aren't augmented or replaced.
    -- A reasonable conflict of interest rule wouldn't hurt, to prevent lurid self-dealing,

    You and I also heartily agree that it's a good idea for CDS to ask:
    -- Should the SC be available for disputes other than CDS constitutional ones?
    -- Should some agency which is not the SC run the elections?

    Personally I do see CDS as a potential attractive home venue for commerce in SL. Not necessarily as a sim location, but as a 'host country' haven, making good use of our laws and democratic structure. Look what it's done for Switzerland : )

    What do others think about those issues?

    I think that SC members (and RA members and residents in general) often seem to fade away and there is no process to determine when and how they should be replaced.

    I think that a conflict of interest rule for SC (and RA) would be reasonable. Each body should be encouraged to adopt an "ethics policy" that is not necessarily law but is documented and clearly understood by all.

    I think that before the SC can be available for extra-Constitutional dispute resolution it needs to document a process for accepting and resolving CDS appeals and practice it for a while to make sure any kinks are out.

    I think that SC is the logical body to run the election, but that it needs to document its processes for this too.

    And i think that that's enough thinking for one night :-)

    Cindy

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    Re: "Scientific Council" needs some work

    Post by Rose Springvale »

    And please, minimal due process that provides notice and an opportunity to be heard . If the SC accept jurisdiction over a complaint and investigates, there is no rationale for not reporting back when charges are unfounded, ESPECIALLY if the SC conducts an investigation. I can also think of no reason for unfounded allegations to stay on forums forever. It only serves to confuse people later and create suspicion where no wrong doing occured.

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