[pp.int.general] [RULING] 2012-5 (Validity of 2012 GA Conference)

Fri Aug 17 20:49:05 CEST 2012

Thanks Andrew, sincerity is crucial in our party, I guess indeed that
people who think everything was all right because the court of arbitration
decided it are missing the point: we may tolerate what happened once but we
have really to be better next time. The problem here was the consequence of
making the session invalid, it could have been seen as a major failure by
the press, by our political opponents and worst, by our followers.

My guess is if we wanted to look different than the other political
parties, we should have accept it as a failure. We would really have looked
like a clean, sane and very honest political party. But on the other hand I
understand why the court chose otherwise, out of fear of unlocking
something bad.

Anyway, I guess that concerning the content and the decisions we made
there, everything went fine and we would have no other conclusions if the
procedure would have been flawless, furthermore it was a great time there,
the 250 participants went back full of energy and motivation, and at the
end, this is the main point here. Anyway, next time we will have a perfect
PPI GA, for the external participants as well ;)

Cheers, Charly

On Fri, Aug 17, 2012 at 8:10 PM, Andrew Norton <ktetch at gmail.com> wrote:

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> On 8/17/2012 7:43 AM, Anouk Neeteson wrote:
> > Good news, on one hand the complaints of which one turns out to be
> > correct, well done Czech PP for noticing it. And also on the other hand,
> > the PPI has 'only' made a mistake in the procedure that can be
> > corrected, see court conclusion.
>
> Oh, plenty of people noticed it. Some, like me, just considered it 'par
> for the course'.
>
> I do find the following ruling funny
> "II) The Statute amendments passed at the conference are valid,"
> There were no amendments made (except those that would change the
> voting), that I recall. Mainly because the 2 hour election block took up
> the entire day, because of 'votes on how to vote to decide the method of
> voting' (I kid you not, people who weren't there) and interruptions to
> deal with things deemed 'more important', such as PP-EU.
>
> "That these procedural errors were not challenged during the GA,
> implying that there was no significant lack of consensus."
> I tried to, but since I was a 'remote' participant, I was ignored (and
> yet again, the 'court' failed to contact all participants so didn't
> conduct a thorough investigation). Consulting the official record is
> great, provided the official record notes everything. Since it didn't
> (because comments by the remote participants were NOT recorded, except
> in specific instances) it's not the whole story.
>
> Personally, the whole event was a disgusting show of sheer incompetence,
> and 'bureaucratic middle-fingering' (aka 'up yours with paperwork') to
> me. I'd suggest PPI hide the videos of the event, because if voters,
> journalists, or opposition parties actually saw the activities there and
> the way things were handled, they'd crucify the entire movement as
> self-important squabbling kids who have no clue.
>
> All I can say is that from my point of view, the annual meeting has two
> required parts.
> 1) That elections are held in a pre-determined manner to elect new
> officers (and the court has ruled that this didn't actually happen, just
> that something like it happened with the general indifference of the
> delegates, a bit like the 'advantage' rule with football fouls)
> 2) That proposed statute amendments are discussed and voted on (and this
> did not happen at all)
>
> Of these, the second is actually more serious. Statute amendments were
> submitted by authorized people in good faith that they would be attended
> to at the conference - the only time in the year they can generally be
> addressed. The only actual statute amendments made were to do with
> changing the positions of the board -
>
> http://wiki.pp-international.net/wiki//index.php?title=Statutes&action=historysubmit&diff=8334&oldid=7531
> - - immediately before the elections, when the agenda
> (http://wiki.pp-international.net/PPI_Conference_2012) made it clear
> that vote would take place AFTERWARDS, and therefore come into effect
> for the following year. Wasn't until TWO DAYS before the event. Given
> that all amendments had to be in 4 weeks before, and amendments
> distributed 1 week before, perhaps it might have been an idea to make it
> clear to those announcing candidacy that things might change.
>
> Meanwhile, Statute X lists the functions of the General Assembly
> (
> http://wiki.pp-international.net/Statutes#X._Functions_of_the_General_Assembly
> )
> and we clearly didn't fulfill it (since the ruling makes no comment on
> this, taking their lead, I assume they agree with me that it violated
> Statute X)
>
> Don't get me wrong, I understand entirely why the court voted as it did.
> Were it to not assume apathy equated support, or that every person knew
> the statutes in detail and could accept that things had deviated and
> were happy with it; then it would have to hold the ppi elections as
> invalid.
> Not only would that mean that things like the WIPO membership would be
> invalidated (because Denis would not have been authorized to send it,
> and we're past the deadline) but also that the very members of the court
> adjudicating this would not be elected, and thus couldn't decide.
> So, as with last year's 'event', we have a question over the legitimacy
> of an election, where the court's own position is in question (see
> ruling IIIc)
>
> >
> > So over all this is a good example of the transparency of the PPI.
> > I CONGRATULATE US ALL :)
>
> I wouldn't cheer yet, since the ruling actually puts a big question mark
> over transparency.
>
> Of course, no court that was worthy of the name would allow itself to be
> an arbiter in a case where it was itself a party. That's what we call
> 'conflict of interest'. A 'good example of transparency' would have the
> whole court recuse itself at the start because it's nomination and
> election is at question. It would then have looked for non-involved
> parties to look into it, and stated so publicly. It's not the first time
> either, as the court has already been asked to examine if it's own
> actions were acceptable
> (http://wiki.pp-international.net/PPI_CoA/PPI_CoA_Ruling_2011-1-A) and
> 'surprisingly' decided it was, with clarification. I mean who would have
> thought that the same people who were asked to decide something, would
> decide a few weeks later that their decision was fully acceptable?
>
> These are my thoughts, y'all can do with them what you will. I hold the
> Pirate Party name to a high standard, the same standard I expect of
> anyone else. It's a shame that some feel like the internal standard for
> pirates is so low by comparison. I mean I could make this a formal
> request that the court investigate their own ruling on the grounds of
> conflict of interest, but I won't bother, because I'm sure there will be
> a 'motivated reject of the claim within one week', since every judgement
> of the court has been a rubber-stamp for 'status quo' (even if it
> requires extensive redefinitions of words, such as 'country' to mean
> 'part of a country' -
> http://wiki.pp-international.net/PPI_CoA/PPI_CoA_Ruling_2012-3 - to do
> so.)
>
> To my mind, the 'Court of arbitration' is a highly flawed body, with
> deep-seated questions as to it's existence, and with it's establishment
> and its ongoing actions fundamentally at odds with the PP core values
> (that of open democracy, informed rule-making, transparency, and honesty).
>
> Andrew
> PPUK Member
> (who values integrity more than some title, or being 'liked' for that
> matter - flame away, I don't care.)
>
>
> >
> > On Aug 17, 2012 12:13 p.m., "Mozart Olbrycht-Palmer"
> > <mozart.palmer at pp-international.net
> > <mailto:mozart.palmer at pp-international.net>> wrote:
> >
> >     Fellow Pirates,
> >
> >     The Court of Arbitration has made the following ruling:
> >     http://wiki.pp-international.__net/PPI_CoA/PPI_CoA_Ruling___2012-5
> >     <http://wiki.pp-international.net/PPI_CoA/PPI_CoA_Ruling_2012-5>
> >
> >     ==Summary==
> >
> >     The Pirate Parties International Court of Arbitration received a
> >     complaint from the Czech Pirate Party about the proceedings of the
> >     April 2012 General Assembly Conference of PPI. Due to the volume of
> >     complaints and requests, the Court of Arbitration apologises for the
> >     delay in ruling on this matter.
> >
> >     The Czech Pirate Party also lodged an addendum to the complaint,
> >     which is included as part of this ruling.
> >
> >     Regards,
> >
> >     --
> >     Mozart Olbrycht-Palmer
> >     Court of Arbitration, Pirate Parties International
> >     W: www.olbrychtpalmer.net <http://www.olbrychtpalmer.net>
> >     T: @OlbrychtPalmer
> >
> >     ______________________________________________________
> >     Pirate Parties International - General Talk
> >     pp.international.general at __lists.pirateweb.net
> >     <mailto:pp.international.general at lists.pirateweb.net>
> >
> http://lists.pirateweb.net/__mailman/listinfo/pp.__international.general
> >     <
> http://lists.pirateweb.net/mailman/listinfo/pp.international.general>
> >
> >
> >
> > ____________________________________________________
> > Pirate Parties International - General Talk
> > pp.international.general at lists.pirateweb.net
> > http://lists.pirateweb.net/mailman/listinfo/pp.international.general
> >
>
>
> - --
> Andrew Norton
> http://ktetch.co.uk
> Tel: +1(352)6-KTETCH [+1-352-658-3824]
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