Lore:Voting
 Voting in SolFed |
Other Names: Doing the Dirty Democracy |
How Voting Works
Each member state in SolFed nominally gets one vote in any particular vote. However, the size and location of a nation's office in the Federal Assembly are dictated by their population/wealth, so that larger nations can keep more staff on-site and have better insight on active votes. The minimum threshold for a nation's ability to qualify for a vote isn't one of concrete numbers, but practicality: a tiny nation has an office so far from the voting hall that they are physically incapable of sprinting from their office to the voting box in time. At current projections, an on-site office of 100 workers is the bare minimum to keep tabs on all the concurrent debates and votes and submit an informed decision on each.
The first cliques were literally just coworkers from nearby offices that you trusted to carry your ballot, so you could sit in your office and watch the debates about another pressing matter to learn how to vote in your own interest. In time, this escalated to allowing these ballot runners to vote on your behalf, and to freely signing whatever vote your trusted ballot runner stops by your desk with. Gradually, these informal voting blocs grew structure, ideals, and congealed into the modern Cliques seen today. They hold grander ideas and networks of sprinters, but are still fundamentally just an orchestrated means of getting more votes into a box than can be carefully considered by individuals alone. This comes about as new waves of nations literally have to bolt new rooms onto the Federal Assembly, which they can do because it's a space station. Even if it's not an office thing, a new nation means at bare minimum a new chair in a debate hall, which still gets bad as nations are added gradually and up to the 10,000some nations theoretically possible.
Votes
Each nation is assigned one vote power per person in its population. This gives a lot of power to the big member states while small ones have to band together to get any impact.
Each vote is a physical ballot, congealed into denominations of 1 10 50 100 1,000 50,000 1m 25m Larger denominations have historically existed, but through the push of the Unity Clique toward One Nation One Vote, larger denominations were deemed "too great a security risk" and "atrocious for accountability", and that individual citizens had the right to track their specific vote (they do not) which would be made infeasible by including them in a conglomerate ballot. Ulteriorly, which is a real word, this stifles the ability of large nations to effectively vote at full strength, as having to sign each ballot to validate them imposes a strong time investment. Autopens were briefly banned in fear of fraud, until the first Synth Senator stepped aboard the Federal Assembly and everyone got a little too uncomfortable to bring it up again.
The largest nations' embassies in the Federal Assembly look more like a print shop than a place of legal asylum, rushing to leverage their full constituency and often losing sight of lesser votes. Paradoxically, this means that tiny measures can easily pass with only smaller nations' approval, as they have only a few ballots to certify, leaving spare time to address numerous votes at once.
Physical Ballots
Ballots coming in physical denominations means that political alliance and vote trading is also a physical act, a literal trade of signed blank ballots for specific issues. For a short time, ballots were used as the currency of corruption, votes for personal favors to the senators. This, combined with the ramshackle assemblage of the Assembly, promoted certain business opportunities that, of all groups, the Monarchists were keen to capitalize on. Eschewing the standard political office, these royal representatives gained power through small vote donations in exchange for ready, well-cooked food, saving serious senators hours of off-site restauranting or valuable office space for personal cooking appliances. None grew as pervasive as the Burger KingYou may boo, now..
Eventually this would be cracked down upon, as this detracts from biological societies disproportionately more than non-consumptive species, as well as the deep fryer stench being recognized as an act of war against neighboring offices.
How To Vote
A typical vote goes as such:
The Proposal
A nation has an idea for a measure to pass. For this example, we'll follow the failed "Vote C3-196: Is Daylight Lighting A Hatecrime Against Shadekin?"
The nation presses a button in Federal Assembly Vote Calling office and is assigned a unique Proposal NumberEach nation can press this button once a day, barring other conflicts, but are under no obligation to use the proposal number., in this case C3-196Each proposal number is derived from the nation's charter number, times they've proposed thus far, and date of pressing, but is hashed securely for anonymity and to prevent blind bias. Yes, nations do auction off notable proposal numbers for favors. Proposal 69-420 was allegedly sold for twenty billion votes and has yet to be filed.
The nation writes a petition for this proposal and acquires signatures from approx. 5% of all SolFed nations. The major Cliques easily have the numbers to do this without "outside" discussion. This proposal is ratified by an automatic scanner in the main Council Chamber, which initiates an immediate Vote.
It is expected that by this point, the proposing interests have already gathered support, informed all nations of the proposal, and are reasonably confident it will pass. Motions still in this pre-vote phase of canvassing and informing are called "Proposed," as in "Proposals" or "proposed amendments."
The Ballot
For every nation in SolFed, their Embassy prints off blank ballots with a specific issue pre-written on them, e.g. a batch of ballots for "C3-196 Shadekin Hate Crime", one ballot per "district" in the above denominations. This is anywhere from a thousand to several thousand paper ballots.
Each Embassy has unique letterhead, tying a ballot to the nation. Each ballot has identifying marks for each citizen represented, e.g. "this 1000 Vote ballot represents the Intent of the persons with Social Security Numbers 122-134-552-XXX". These ballots need not be printed at the time of the vote, and are often pre-printed with known, inconsequential proposal numbersProposals the nation knows it has no opinion on. There are no protections against a nation declaring a proposal number will be about one subject, but changing it to a different matter just before the Vote is called, (but it is a "Dick Move") so pre-printing ballots holds some risk., to be used as currencywant to each burger.
The Vote
The ballots are marked with the specific Yea or Nay marking unique to the specific VoteNot guaranteed Unique, but cryptographically the chance of collision is low., via stamp or pen or whatnot. This means that each ballot must be touched during the 6 hour voting window in order to properly cast it, even if pre-printed and pre-signed. This ensures liveliness of interested parties.
The nation's team sticks these physical ballots through an autopen to register a specific vote. Varying security measures are applied at this stage, depending on the era and the nation. The signature is unique to the office, fictionally altered slightly to be unique to the vote; e.g. "distort the second letter turnwise for every vowel" etc. The ink can be chemically unique, etc.
The signed ballots are inserted into a central ballot box held in the core of the Federal Assembly, and the physical ballots are kept "secure" for like a year. They will be auto-counted by computerized systems, but the physical ballots are retained as physical proof of a physical voteIn the event of two identical ballots being cast, e.g. selling one ballot but reprinting it to cast yourself, the first submitted ballot is counted. The identities of the contradictory ballot-submitters are recorded and disclosed during an audit, so fraud can be detected, but there are no innate protections against voting fraud in this manner. There are also no innate protections against the kneecaps of those who would double-cross their sold votes, and no protections against said nation being heavily tariffed by majority vote.
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The Anti-Dick-Move Clique does not often have to take action, but when they do, it is conclusive..
After a short time, around 6 Earth hours, the ballot box closes, accounting for folk rushing to a box, etc. The votes are counted and tallied in a narratively satisfying amount of time, often a day. In theory a Recount can be called, and by all means someone always calls for it, but Real, Serious recounts where they actually have to break out the physical ballots are rare.
VoteCoin
The Blockchain. Cliquetocurrency. An immutable ledger of bribes, favors, and votes codified into law through the daily proposals from the Bribe CliqueThey go by the Ledger Clique, but given how small they are, even calling them a "clique" is an exceptional stretch.. Any SolFed member can propose a bill outlining a transaction between that member and the unquantifiable concept of currency.
Buying into the currency typically takes the form of "Nation X offers the vessel and crew for 120 squadrons for active SFAF patrol, above and beyond their standing obligations or duties, and in doing so will gain Ten Votecoin." If this proposal passes Vote in the Federal CouncilThe main reason it wouldn't is because the exchange rate proposed is awful, just absolute dogshit trolling., then the army is raised, and Nation X can claim they have 10 additional Votecoin. Cashing out for various favors looks like "Nation X offers Nation Y five votecoin for this favor," which is immutably recorded in the ledger of successful bills once it is voted upon.
The main use of Votecoin, however, comes in modifying the voting threshold for other proposals, in the form of "Nation X redeems 50 votecoins, and as such Proposal J7-335"Petition To Make Vending Machine Injuries Deemed Not The Vendor's Fault." Passed, then later amended with "J7-212: UNLESS USED AS A PROJECTILE!!" will require only a 35% 'Yea' vote to pass." Of course, this proposal itself needs to pass a standard vote, meaning that both the exchange rate and specific allowances are still subject to common sense and public sway. The longest chain of using Votecoins to make passing Votecoins easier to make passing Votecoins easier came in 2450, allowing for the dissolution of the 
NekomimeticTo the casual observer, this language is an incomprehensible mess of broken Japanese. To the felinids, it's somehow comprehensible.
Not available to speak on station except through weird means. Dissolute as a recognized language as of 2450. language to pass with a threshold of only 5% 'yea' neededIt passed with 5.6% of yea votes, formally dissolving the language. It wasn't clear at the time what dissolving an intangible concept of syllables and grammar would look like, but regardless, the language is no longer taught in schools..
Votecoin hold value as a currency for the sheer fact that none feel powerful enough to doubt the Votecoin. The first Proposal involving a "Votecoin"All permutations of capitalization are tolerated, so "Votecoin" and "VoteCoin" and "votecoin" and "VOTECOIN" are all understood to mean the same thing. was January 3rd, 2299"SMU-71: Petition to Make Votecoin A Thing.", early in SolFed's span. The Ledger Clique formed half a century later (2350, during the second Migration), as new investors saw the potential for a longer-term Federal Assembly currency.
The Ledger Clique does two things:
- Consolidate proposals into a single proposal, so nations need not spend their single daily Proposal on bookkeeping. This, of course, gives the Ledger Clique finer control over exchange rates, giving a centraler authority to a currency whose central authority was already the central authority of the galaxy. Common sense rules could be applied, with the Ledger Clique managing dollars and sense, ensuring that each included transaction in the proposal would not be so radically wild that the entire proposal would get voted down.
- Keep track of Votecoin. By 2350, several jokesters had already attempted to exploit the system by redeeming votecoin they did not have, or "earning" votecoin for favors they did not perform, or conning folk into accepting "vatecoin""Vapecoin" holds with diamond hands, however., and so on. Trust in the Votecoin system, while already low, dropped even further until the Ledger Clique DeclaredJust regular "declared", but with a capital D for additional legitimacy. otherwise. The Ledger Clique now tracks the results of proposed contracts, adding an inconsequential "This Nation recognizes that the prior transaction between Nations X and Y from Proposal Z has been satisfied and the Votecoin transferred." to their conglomerated Proposals, which holds no legal precedent but makes everyone involved feel a little more legitimate.
In 2360, the Ledger Clique was publicly informed that the current implementation of "Votecoin" was not actually a cryptocurrency or a blockchain. To correct this:
- The Ledger Clique does keep a ledger. Each of their conglomerated proposals states the proposal number of the previous conglomeration, providing a theoretically unbroken chain of Votecoin proposals stemming back to 2352This does mean that the first conglomeration had a LOT of prior proposals to write down. It was not their finest hour..
- The Ledger Clique addresses Votecoin-related Proposals that, despite not going through them, somehow made it to vote and passed. If a nation wants to waste their daily Proposal on gaining Votecoin without involving the Ledger Clique, and all of SolFed fairly votes to accept that Proposal, the next conglomerate will remark that the Ledger Clique observes that this proposal Passed and that nation should be considered to have the Votecoin they were voted to have. Going outside the Trade Clique for this will, however, incur disfavor, leading to less favorable negotiations and potential stonewalling.
- Several members of the Monarchist Clique printed out paper copies of the Ledger Clique's ledger and sealed them in an elaborate mausoleum, later going back to inscribe them directly onto stone blocks. None of these copies hold any standing or significance, and it's not entirely understood why this was done. Still, there is technically a crypt o' currencyYou may boo. It helps with the spooky atmosphere. with VoteCoin.
The Ledger Clique is barely noteworthy as a clique, holding few actual votes of their own and few external ambitions. Commonly confused as a subclique of the Trade Clique.
Work in Progress: Footer subject to change at a moment's notice. Do not take a red link's presence, struck-through or otherwise, as confirmation (or denial) of their canonicity.
