Merger Agreement between Labor and Peace Parties

[Sestak]

The Labor Party of Atlasia (census coded "Lab") and the Peace Party of Atlasia (census coded "Pax") do hereby agree to merge pursuant to F.L. 15-05§2.4 under the following terms:


The resultant party shall be considered as the legal continuation of the Labor Party of Atlasia, and shall retain the name, census code, branding, bylaws, leadership structure, and leadership of the Labor Party of Atlasia.

The resultant party shall adopt the policy platform of the Peace Party from February 2019, with the following edits:

- Section "Game Reform" shall be omitted
- "The Peace Party" shall be replaced with "The Labor Party"
- "Peace believes" shall be replaced with "Labor believes"
- “Peaceniks” shall be replaced with “Laborites”

Be it resolved on this sixteenth day of July, two thousand and nineteen,




Sestak, Chair of the Labor Party



YE, Chair of the Peace Party

[YE]

X YE

I'll make a statement very soon - I'm occupied with something non-Atlasia related right now but still, it's in the cards.

[P. Clodius Pulcher did nothing wrong]

Hi, Vice Chair of the Peace Party here……… if some of our members want to join the Labor Party, can't they just change their registrations in the Register Thread? There are some of us (like me) who are perfectly happy with the current setup and see no need for a merger, as I've made clear in the past.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Hi, Vice Chair of the Peace Party here……… if some of our members want to join the Labor Party, can't they just change their registrations in the Register Thread? There are some of us (like me) who are perfectly happy with the current setup and see no need for a merger, as I've made clear in the past.

The next time someone forcibly changes my registration, I can tell you this, second amendment solutions will be on the table.

[Bleach Blonde Bad Built Butch Bodies for Biden]

I'm going to miss Peace, but I support the agreement.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Hi, Vice Chair of the Peace Party here……… if some of our members want to join the Labor Party, can't they just change their registrations in the Register Thread? There are some of us (like me) who are perfectly happy with the current setup and see no need for a merger, as I've made clear in the past.

The next time someone forcibly changes my registration, I can tell you this, second amendment solutions will be on the table.

Arizona will be glad to have you!

[GM Team Member and Deputy PPT WB]

Hi, Vice Chair of the Peace Party here……… if some of our members want to join the Labor Party, can't they just change their registrations in the Register Thread? There are some of us (like me) who are perfectly happy with the current setup and see no need for a merger, as I've made clear in the past.

The Ban Nazis party is always here with open arms for anyone who wants a left-wing alternative!

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Hi, Vice Chair of the Peace Party here……… if some of our members want to join the Labor Party, can't they just change their registrations in the Register Thread? There are some of us (like me) who are perfectly happy with the current setup and see no need for a merger, as I've made clear in the past.

The next time someone forcibly changes my registration, I can tell you this, second amendment solutions will be on the table.

Arizona will be glad to have you!

Damn it Truman, you ruined the perfect setup.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

That's not a merger, it's an acquisition. 

[PSOL]

If we’re going to merge, we are going to need two inter-party referendums.

[Lumine]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

A feature of presidential politics, sadly—the way our elections and our system of government functions incentivizes duopoly and discourages minor parties from competing against the largest party in their hemisphere. Even House elections, supposedly "proportional," reflect this, as parties stand a better chance of getting their candidates in if there is an even distribution of first preferences, encouraging the growth of two opposing coalitions. Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything, so eventually every third party will either meld into one of the two big coalitions or become irrelevant and collapse as soon as the charismatic figure leading it is no longer in the spotlight. The only way to really change this would be to adopt some form of list voting and/or a parliamentary system —which, needless to say, will not be on the table any time soon.

[Lumine]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

A feature of presidential politics, sadly—the way our elections and our system of government functions incentivizes duopoly and discourages minor parties from competing against the largest party in their hemisphere. Even House elections, supposedly "proportional," reflect this, as parties stand a better chance of getting their candidates in if there is an even distribution of first preferences, encouraging the growth of two opposing coalitions. Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything, so eventually every third party will either meld into one of the two big coalitions or become irrelevant and collapse as soon as the charismatic figure leading it is no longer in the spotlight. The only way to really change this would be to adopt some form of list voting and/or a parliamentary system —which, needless to say, will not be on the table any time soon.

Depressingly accurate.

Still, it doesn't help when both parties willingly try to smash any semblance of a party balance (case in point, the absurd levels of zombie recruitment for the last election), though it is hard not to understand why the mentality of victory at all costs often prevails. After all, one does want to win elections.

At this point I'd rather hope things won't get dull and uncompetitive fast, but it does seem to be a possible end road here.

[Goldwater]

Dang it Labor, you killed a perfectly good party.

[Fmr. Representative Encke]

Truly a disturbance of the Peace.

[P. Clodius Pulcher did nothing wrong]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

Dang it Labor, you killed a perfectly good party.

The Peace Party will not die on my watch! If some of our members want to be Laborites that's perfectly fine, they are a great party. But I'll stick with good ol' purple.

[YE]

Alright I’ve had a bad evening so I’m tackling this just now. I’ll start chronologically with a bit of a history lesson.

Labor obviously ran on some tough times after Adam’s first two terms as president and slowly, starting really in 2017, the Labor Party institution itself began to collapse. Siren, a long time independent, created Peace and while I don’t have many details on this time frame, it also over time developed into a home for disaffected Laborite of sorts by the end of 2017. A few months later, Labor finishes its demise while Pax stays stagnant, and as such, PUP forms in Labor’s place. Seeing disfunction on the left, I join the game in early 2018, and really stay out of partisan politics. PUP was basically run by players who had little experience and by mid 2018, Peace wasn’t cordial (which I was eventually recruited into) with the leadership of PUP. A series of Senate resignations destabilized the political climate in late Summer 2018 and YT and LT helped recruit an anti-PUP candidate in Lincoln to attempt to take down the PUP establishment. Meanwhile the leadership of Pax is largely MIA, with Scott being forced to leave the game for IRL issues shortly thereafter and had been withdrawn from the game mentally by that time the aforementioned Lincoln Senate race along with a Senate race in Fremont in which the right wing GOatV’d candidate (Sestak) ousted another PUP incumbent.

The anti-PUP non-Pax faction of the left, with the help of Jambles and a few others, revive Labor. Meanwhile, Pax just remained kind of idle. Out of pure ambition really, I decide to go for the vacant Pax chairmanship. At that point Labor had an effective and viable organization with officeholders with potential and overall, I didn’t seem to have any qualms with voting for their candidates and I didn’t think any of the stable members of the party really bothered to disagree, even if Pax at that time had a separate identity and infrastructure to Labor at that point.

Weatherboy was an inactive president but given how new Labor and most of the elected people in it at the time were, I understood that the struggles of actually governing was growing pains to an extent, although the Lumine versus Pericles Fremont Senate race was an exception and one at which I stayed out of in terms of actually campaigning. Anyway, flash forward to late December 2018, and we know WB was not running again. Several people on the left are mulling the presidency, myself included. Sestak, being the Chair of Labor, is basically the one most capable of clearing the field. I realize that running as a Peace candidate I could not run for President without forcing a three way race but due to fear of precisely that Sestak offered me VP. Given that the two of us have gotten along for quite a bit, I accept.

During this time, I made some attempts to at least give Pax a zombie base of sorts but results were marginal and statistically less successful than Labor recruitment efforts despite similar format. Anyway, the Sestak/YE ticket is when the identity of Pax becomes not distinct with Labor for reasons that should not be hard to explain; we were both party bosses fighting for a unique common goal. Sestak’s departure from the game now left a power vacuum in Labor leadership of sorts, and now as the unexpected nominee of Labor, I’m forced to basically step up, and be even more involved with Labor affairs. By this point Pax is effectively no different from Labor. Little really has changed in the four months since then in terms of structure, even though the power player composition has changed in Labor during that time.

I’ll continue later. I can’t find my glasses and am on mobile and don’t want to lose my work.

[YE]

Lol just realized I made a few accidental references to 2017 when I meant 2018.

So yes following the Sestak/YE ticket, Pax was basically a satellite of Labor. Still, my stubbornness and overall wish to preserve the status quo in terms of maintaining the identities of the two parties as well as the initial lack of upside, I held off any attempts at a merger for a bit. However, with Adam’s election has changed some of my thinking. Labor is an older party with more player depth than it was a year ago and by staying separate, the two parties cannot have a primary system nor can they Pax members despite varying influence on Labor vote in Labor leadership races (although I did twice as a meme). And no one in this day and age wants a three way race either. So basically at this point I see little fundamental sense in staying separate. It simply isn’t in the parties best interests to continue, given the trajectory of Peace the last 6-8 months.

Of course this move strengthens or at least removes an artificial deflation of the duopoly, which I understand draws many skeptics from people like Lumine who I respect greatly. I was skeptical of a merger at first but my general belief is the duopoly isn’t inherently a bad thing if the people running the duopoly are competent and have no interest in breaking the game and would arguably benefit from a check on power of sorts, whether it is a separate party or not. With that said, I think Truman did a good job of why fundamentally a duopoly remains evident in a game like this and seems to have gotten stronger in recent months.

I should note that while the terms have been agreed to, this merger is not complete. Per statue, both parties must agree within 30 days. 

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Oh boo, all our maps, graphs and tables are going to get a lot less colourful and a lot more boring and bland.

[Former President tack50]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

Labor's true objective is the establishment of a one party state though

[Trans Rights Are Human Rights]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

Dang it Labor, you killed a perfectly good party.

The Peace Party will not die on my watch! If some of our members want to be Laborites that's perfectly fine, they are a great party. But I'll stick with good ol' purple.

I'm another member of purple gang. If they don't keep free hugs in the platform, change their demonym to Labia, and appoint me to an office with no real duties except the pun called Justice of the Peace, I'm joining Gayle's Surprise!

[Former President tack50]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

A feature of presidential politics, sadly—the way our elections and our system of government functions incentivizes duopoly and discourages minor parties from competing against the largest party in their hemisphere. Even House elections, supposedly "proportional," reflect this, as parties stand a better chance of getting their candidates in if there is an even distribution of first preferences, encouraging the growth of two opposing coalitions. Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything, so eventually every third party will either meld into one of the two big coalitions or become irrelevant and collapse as soon as the charismatic figure leading it is no longer in the spotlight. The only way to really change this would be to adopt some form of list voting and/or a parliamentary system —which, needless to say, will not be on the table any time soon.

Actually, I could see Lincoln eventually doing this. Lincoln is already close to full parliamentary; implementing party lists would not be too hard to do. However because of influence from the national 2 parties I doubt even party lists would help with a multi party system.

Also, it's worth noting that a multi party system, even with party lists, is hard to do when there are only 9 seats available (or the 7 for a maxiumum capacity Lincoln Council, which seems more realistic). It's not impossible for it to happen, just harder.

Anyways, federal parliament or party lists are not happening any time soon for many good reasons.

[P. Clodius Pulcher did nothing wrong]

Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything

I have won election to the House multiple times and I still want to belong to my party

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything

I have won election to the House multiple times and I still want to belong to my party

. . . because Peace and Labor were working together, yes. My post was an explanation of why third parties in Atlasia almost always either (a) immediately collapse; or (b) affiliate themselves with one of the two large coalitions. Pax ceased to be distinct from Labor a long time ago—it's basically only a nominal difference at this point.

At any rate, I'm confused as to how "I have won election to the House multiple times" serves to refute the observation, "Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything."

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Not that the merger won't go ahead anyway, but I must say it is a shame to see the Peace Party go. Having their perspective around - particularly before moving so close to Labor - was a rather fun thing, it added ideological and political diversity, and it was a great help in terms of having a somewhat more balanced party system (which is healthy for the game).

I suppose it makes sense from the perspective of those involved, but the growing disappearance of a multi-party system and the further expansion of a single party into being closer and closer to having more than half of registered voters can't be a good thing for the game.

A feature of presidential politics, sadly—the way our elections and our system of government functions incentivizes duopoly and discourages minor parties from competing against the largest party in their hemisphere. Even House elections, supposedly "proportional," reflect this, as parties stand a better chance of getting their candidates in if there is an even distribution of first preferences, encouraging the growth of two opposing coalitions. Nobody wants to belong to a party that never wins anything, so eventually every third party will either meld into one of the two big coalitions or become irrelevant and collapse as soon as the charismatic figure leading it is no longer in the spotlight. The only way to really change this would be to adopt some form of list voting and/or a parliamentary system —which, needless to say, will not be on the table any time soon.

Actually, I could see Lincoln eventually doing this. Lincoln is already close to full parliamentary; implementing party lists would not be too hard to do. However because of influence from the national 2 parties I doubt even party lists would help with a multi party system.

Also, it's worth noting that a multi party system, even with party lists, is hard to do when there are only 9 seats available (or the 7 for a maxiumum capacity Lincoln Council, which seems more realistic). It's not impossible for it to happen, just harder.

Anyways, federal parliament or party lists are not happening any time soon for many good reasons.

I'm a long-time advocate of regions experimenting with different voting systems and constitutions, but let's be realistic: this will have zero effect on the party system because parties are fundamentally national organizations at an organizational level. I agree entirely with your point re: the mathematics of third parties in a game where there are a couple hundred players voting for fewer than a dozen seats.