From: schuldy@math.harvard.edu (Mark Schuldenfrei)
Message-Id: <9401191751.AA26272@math.harvard.edu>
Subject: Re: Principality, of course
To: levey@netcom.com (Don Levey)
Date: Wed, 19 Jan 1994 12:51:56 -0500 (EST)
Cc: carolingia@bloom-beacon.mit.edu
In-Reply-To: <199401190232.SAA08622@mail.netcom.com> from "Don Levey" at Jan 18, 94 06:32:43 pm
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Don Donal Artur wrote:
  So what do we do, and who do we listen to?  I would be interested to see
  how a group in Bikhail will have its interests served by voting to allow
  (or deny) Malagentia (both examples only) to break off.  I would suggest
  that the principality vote/poll be linked with the inclusion of the area
  in question.  This way, those contiguous areas/branches who vote for 
  the principality are also voting for inclusion in that principality.
  A group who feels that the "system" of the East, whether administrative or
  monarchal, is not serving their best interests should be allowed to
  leave so as not to foster discontent.  To some involved, they will walk
  regardless.  The question is then whether they leave the kingdom or
  the society.

Forgive me, Don, but this seems to imply information about the selection
process that is not accurate.

Polls are not designed to tell other groups what to do. No group can do
that. They are designed solely to determine what a local group would want to
do.

Say, for a ridiculous arguments sake, that we are down to the final polling,
and Carolingia is still in the running. However, it is the unanimous feeling
in Carolingia (ha, unanimous, this is hypothetical) that if Malagentia were
in, we would have to be out. We would have no control. All we could do in
this hypothetical instance is vote ourselves out, because Malagentia would
do whatever it wanted.

Once there is a clear indication of which groups want in, which don't and so
forth, the whole raw data is used to create the boundaries.  Say, again
hypothetically, that Smoking Rocks wants in to the Northern Region, and
Carolingia was pretty neutral. We might get folded in, just to allow for
physical continuity.  However, if Smoking Rocks had a bare majority for
inclusion, but Carolingia was truly against inclusion, than perhaps it would
be decided that Smoking Rocks was cut out of the principality.

If this system doesn't make sense to you, then you understand it perfectly
(:-).

	Tibor