On Sun, Mar 15, 2020 at 10:57 PM Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion <agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote: > > Now that it looks like the statute reform proposal is going to squeak > through, I started thinking about where we might first want to create > non-statute bodies of law. Contracts are the natural choice, but on > reflection, I think that the first test of new fundamental rules of > the game should not be opening them up to a realm where players can > create arbitrary law, and most importantly can do so unilaterally > without review. > > So a better choice is in regulations, I think, and I want to see if > maybe we can bring the idea of official regulations and the work on > administrative interpretations together. > > So I propose that we allow every officer to create a body of > regulation governing the execution of eir office. This can include: > > - How the officer will exercise discretionary power. For instance, as > Herald I would put in rules governing thesis peer review, and perhaps > some guidelines about other patent titles as well since they are > largely done by discretion of the Herald these days. > - Anything specifically delegated to it by rule, for instance, using > the Herald example again, the rules could allow the Herald's > regulations to authorize patent title awards directly. > - Rules of interpretation over areas of the rules within the officer's > purview. Initially, I think we shouldn't go with making them > platonically binding, because we would need to be careful about the > difference between an interpretation of the rules and outright > ignoring them. Given the discussion that came up around my proposal to > amend Power Controls Mutability, best to be cautious here. > So instead I would suggest that we could have the interpretation > provisions not be binding, but act as guidance, including by > explicitly permitting judges to rely on them where their correctness > isn't explicitly challenged. This wouldn't change the underlying > platonism, but would encourage consensus as to what the perceived > state of affairs is. A change to pragmatic judgments would be much > more radical, and requires more work in the area of legal fictions. > (Incidentally, for all that discussion on fixing ratification, we > never did it, did we? Signs that we've become very pragmatic; Wooble > would be disappointed.) > - Recommendations to other players on how to interact with the office, > such as editorial guidelines for the rules.
I very much like this idea! I request that interpretations not be installed, at least in the first version, since those are controversial. Also, to clarify, would this include allowing other persons to act on behalf of the officer to exercise eir official powers? If not, it should. -Aris
