Which of the rp's are the most beginner-friendly? I'm having a hard time staying consistent with my logins, which is why I haven't been that active at the moment.
Finally, a bread question... It depends! If I'm making a grilled sandwich? Not so much, until it goldens/browns a bit. Toasted juuust enough to be crunchy on the inside and soft inside! Now, fo soup? Definitely toasted in and out, and with a generous amount of butter and oregano~
Hello and Welcome to Starlight! – In a starless night, we are the light!
To get started, join the World Assembly and endorse Vintrel and Kaidan. This helps make our region more powerful and secure, while giving you the opportunity to collect endorsements of your own!
Hello once again, Starlighters! The Ministry of WA Affairs is pleased to present the latest edition of our regions' monthly WA newsletter, The Intergalactic. We have our usual data on legislative activity in the WA, particularly that of our Starborn, as well as two textual articles diving deep into intriguing aspects of drafting and feedback respectively.
Any prospective authors should certainly give those articles a read, and also consider looking over our recently-released basic guide to WA drafting - a simple source of information that will help you get started in the world of the WA!
The Ministry ended the term with another strong month - we are especially proud that all of our “For” and “Against” recommendations matched the final vote outcome. This was interspersed with a few "Neutral" and "Abstain" stances, all of which resulted in the target proposal passing. Thus, the post-reset period remains robust and largely unified.
While the early-mid summer was largely characterized by foundational legislation and expectations, the recent General Assembly has shifted toward basic international law and infrastructure. Resolutions such as the World Assembly Research and Innovation Organization (WARIO), Against Torture, WA Headquarters, and Protecting Places of Cultural Significance center around principles of inherent rights, shared resources, and proportionate national sovereignty.
The post-reset period has continued to inspire an influx of proposals from budding authors, both from across the multiverse and our own Starborn - all but two passed proposals (in the GA) included at least one Starborn! These include "Protecting Places of Cultural Significance", by our previous Aetherion Alainian Federation, and "Against Torture", by Untecna and former Aetherion and WAA Minister Cessarea. WA Secretariat member Merethin has also been involved in the drafting of the first post-reset repeal, targeting "International Agricultural Biodiversity Safeguard".
The Security Council saw healthy activity levels, though notably less so than the previous month. This quiet period could largely be a reflection of the recent stability within the R/D sphere. In all, three repeals and two commends were passed, alongside the World Cup recognition. The Ministry did not issue recommendations for these.
Overall, both chambers showed healthy activity, and a trend toward new legislation and reform. We are very pleased that the Ministry successfully continued its work at the forefront of this.
STARBORN AUTHORS
This month, the Ministry has found eight proposals that Starborn have participated in, with many post-reset drafts being submitted.
With a strong lineup of authors and Ministry contributors, as well as our Proposal Drafting Scheme, Starborn in our regions have an easier time than ever in writing their own proposals and contributing to the WA affairs of Starlight & Horizon! The Ministry is always appreciative of new members looking to get into this part of NS. Feel free to message the Ministerif you need any guidance or have any interest in participating, and join our Discord to find out about more opportunities for regional advancement!
The new General Assembly has no doubt experienced a seismic shift in its attitudes. Gone are the days of last-minute legal challenges and sixty-resolution authors; in are the days of more collaborative authorship and a strong community feedback effort. But to that latter point, we've lost something in the transition. We've dropped forum feedback.
Forum feedback has not been itself for some time now; one could argue this has extended even beyond the first inklings of GA2026 and the rise of the S7 before that. Truthfully, the World Assembly is a niche part of the game. As NationStates experiences a wholesale decline in active players over time, so too will the WA experience a slow decline in available talent. But I feel as though the loss of forum feedback, in recent months especially, may only serve to accelerate that problem.
Feedback has largely become a Discord-centered part of the gameplay loop of the WA. Discord offers many conveniences the forums simply do not, especially in allowing faster communication between authors and others. Prospective authors can seek feedback in a variety of ways, whether in DMs, or in the NSWA or S7 servers. While forum feedback has stagnated, Discord feedback has bloomed. But this convenience and multi-threaded access carries two consequences: 1. that authors without Discord may be siloed off from feedback, and 2. that the discussions and questions which are responsible for generating changes to proposals are not in the public eye.
The first concern is certainly a troubling one. Many new authors may not have Discord or may be unaware of the new norm which has formed itself. As a result, it becomes much harder for them to seek feedback from the experienced authors who have by-and-large moved many of their discussions offsite. Conversely, it means that experienced authors and commentators may be unaware of proposals until it is too late to give feedback. The new GA, in particular, will require more time before we can truly assess the real impact this issue has, but it is certainly important to consider.
The second concern is, in my eyes, more immediately pressing. Feedback placed in Discord servers is not immediately accessible to anyone except those in those servers, and anything in DMs is as private as it gets. Crossposting of feedback is not typical; in fact, I can't really remember a recent case of such happening. As a result, the most authors can say is that discussions were had offsite. Perhaps they can explain the discussions in some detail, but it largely becomes the job of authors to relay how and what feedback was given.
There is, though, a great utility to Discord feedback. It finds itself at its most useful when a proposal is initially drafted, before it gets placed on the forums. Starlight and Horizon's Proposal Drafting Scheme provides a strong example of this; prior to forum submission, a proposal in the scheme can be worked on and refined in our server, along with an experienced mentor to give advice on best practices in authorship. In these cases, the benefits of Discord communication are at their most useful.
Ultimately, I want this article to be a call-to-action. I want people to make their best effort toward engaging on the forums more. They may be old and less convenient, but there are demonstrated utilities to communicating feedback in that manner. I would implore anyone, even less-experienced individuals, to take some time and read proposals through on the forums; to look for any issues and make kind posts helping out authors. The health of the GA has massively improved, but it is my opinion as an author that it can improve even further by keeping the tradition of forum feedback alive.
The forums are an incredibly useful place for the GA. Let's do our part to keep them that way.
CONTRADICTION AND SUBORDINATION CLAUSES A few notes and recommendations BY Cessarea
I usually prefer to write articles in a way that even encompasses people who have never touched a World Assembly resolution; including newcomers in our efforts is, I feel, part of our mandate as a Ministry and as a regional government more broadly. This effort will continue here, but it is fair to warn you that the subject of contradiction is historically rooted in rulesets and their interpretation from a legalistic point of view, and it interacts with basic legal logic and hermeneutics. Nevertheless, it’s a very important topic that is at the forefront of long-term issues for this new World Assembly to overcome. Read slowly and with care, and you’ll get the hang of it.
First, what is a contradiction? The lay, generic definition of contradiction is self-evident. Per the Cambridge dictionary, it is “the fact of something being the complete opposite of something else or very different from something else, so that one of them must be wrong.” A contradiction, then, are two things asserted together that go against one another in such a way that it’d be absurd to say they’re both true.
The use of this concept in the World Assembly is derived from this lay definition, as we can see from how the old rulesets of the General Assembly defined it. In 2015 it was paired alongside duplication:
“Duplication: Proposals will be deleted if any of their provisions substantially overlap with previous resolutions or if they would render one or more previous resolutions largely meaningless or obsolete. This is an area where moderator discretion comes into play, so please take the time to thoroughly draft your proposal to ensure that you are not duplicating prior legislation.“
“Contradiction: The opposite of duplication. This is where a proposal1 does the exact opposite of an existing resolution.”
The latest iteration of the old ruleset (prior to its scuttling) gave a more precise and independent definition:
“Contradiction: A proposal cannot enact any policy which would conflict with an active resolution.”
Contradiction in a proposal means that it establishes mandates through its clauses that go against the mandates of currently-active resolutions. The new ruleset, of course, has no such provision, but this doesn’t mean that it is in the best interests of the GA community to accept this phenomenon, and it certainly is not a desirable thing for the dominant power of the Assembly as of late; the Sovereign Seven, of which Starlight is a member. The GA is, at its core, a collective attempt to build a coherent corpus of laws, and accepting the addition of contradictory laws would undermine the effort of dozens of authors who seek to shape it into a workable set of mandates.
At first, it seems easy – if annoying – to avoid contradiction as an author: do your research. Read previous resolutions, find out which ones apply mandates relevant to yours, and write around them or, if you cannot, propose a repeal to go alongside your positive proposal. While, doing your research is one of the best ways to avoid contradiction in your proposal, but it can – and will – fail you as the amount of active resolutions balloons in size over time and the prospect of parsing through all of them becomes unrealistic at best.
The new “search resolution” feature is a serviceable continuation of InfoEurope’s utility in that regard. Most resolutions will be completely irrelevant to your proposal, and so reading through them all is unnecessary for writing. Simply go through the resolutions with a variety of keywords in different searches and select a few that, on a skim reading, seem relevant. Then you can more carefully analyse them for any potential source of contradiction, or even some other issues and adverse interactions your ideas and drafts might have with them.
With 15 active resolutions this is a benign process, but once you have to go through hundreds of them some might start wondering if there is not an easier way. Some will find the simple subordination clause and will run with it to the edges of the world. Let’s take a moment to define and understand a subordination clause. Take for example article 1, item c of GA2#008 (World Assembly Research and Innovation Organization), highlight mine:
“WASIF shall have the authority to create relevant sub-branches, subject to World Assembly legislation, to aid in the pursuit of knowledge of specific research disciplines, including the physical sciences, social sciences, medical sciences, engineering, mathematics, or any other subject areas deemed relevant.”
The resolution grants the WASIF2 (World Assembly Science and Innovation Foundation) the authority to create sub-branches, a rare autonomy for a Committee, but subjects it to “World Assembly legislation”. This means that the granted power may be regulated or limited by future mandates or even previous ones already in force. As it is not a conditional subordination – that is to say it doesn’t lock the ability to make sub-branches behind further laws – WASIF can currently create sub-branches to its heart’s content, as long as it follows the impositions of WA legislation on itself specifically and on Committees generically. Let’s take another example, this time from old Assembly, GA#766 (Convention on Expropriation):
“Hereby, subject to past WA legislation still in force:”
This subordination clause is more restrictive with which WA laws it applies to, but certainly far broader in its implications. It is the final preambulatory clause (which I call annunciatory clause), meaning that it announces the legal contents of the resolution and, therefore, applies to its full extent. This means that all clauses of GA#766 were subjected to every mandate in force that preceded it. Repeals of those mandates would mean an end to that effect due to the “in force” qualifier. As you can imagine, this is a big scope of application for a subordination clause and it’s why among many experienced GA players they are perceived as a “cheat”. It essentially allows you to produce a proposal that formally bears no contradiction with past resolutions without having to do any research or think about how your proposal interacts with the rest of the GA.
In my opinion, these are examples of a good and a bad subordination clause, respectively. But what makes them so? First, let’s take a look at the basic structure of a subordination clause.
There are two elements to a subordination clause. Subordinated mandates are the mandates (usually one or more clauses entirely, although it could be only a part of them) that will be under the subordination of the subordinating mandates. Fairly self-evident, but important to clarify for the sake of the next part. These two elements of a subordination clause will interact with each other through the lens of their qualifiers, words that change the scope and characteristics of the subordinated or subordinating mandates. These potential specificities can be explored through several criteria:
General/Specific: whether or not the subordinated clauses amount to the entire resolution or only a part of it. Self-evident. If all mandates of a resolution are under a subordination clause, it’s general; if not, it’s specific.
Restrictiveness: whether or not the subordination cares about the validity of the subordinating mandates. A restricted subordination only allows for the application of resolutions in-effect, an unrestricted one permits the understanding of repealed resolutions to affect it. Generally it can be presumed that a subordination clause is restrictive unless specifically stated otherwise, as a repealed resolution can be understood to no longer be a part of World Assembly legislation and is, thus, not be included by any formulation that cites it.
Retroactivity: whether or not the subordination derives mandates from previously-passed articles. A retroactive subordination does, a non-retroactive subordination does not. It may also be atemporal, meaning it does not discriminate subordinating mandates by time.
Thematic/generic: whether or not the subordination derives subordinating mandates from a specific topic (mandates regarding a Committee, healthcare, education etc) or not. A thematic subordination clause has a specific topic, a generic one does not.
Joining these qualifiers together can give us a great number of classification types, each with its uses (and many with no good use at all), and some of them are notable or useful enough to receive names of their own as shorthand. Here, I’ll name three of them3:
Cheat clause (general/specific restrictive retroactive generic subordination): the dreaded cheat clause of the GA, exemplified already by my previous mention of GA#766 but further present in GA#6494 (Legal Equality Act), GA#6575 (World Psychoactive Drugs Act), GA#3356 (Prohibiting Animal Abuse), GA#6957 (Dual Citizenship Arrangements) and many others. Almost necessarily so, it’s present in the annunciatory clause of a proposal. This subordination serves, effectively, as a generic immunity granted to the entire resolution (or most of its contents) against any possibility of contradiction. If a contradiction exists with previous WA legislation, it is automatically resolved by the subordination, and its addition has no further purpose.
In general, the flaw with this use lies in the lack of intent in the application of the subordination. It does not serve to create a cohesive or convenient legal system, nor does it have an outstanding legislative purpose. If you have done your due diligence and have researched in-force WA legislation on the subject you are writing on, you’ll have no use for this kind of subordination unless you fear, for some reason, that you may have missed something and dread an accusation of contradiction. In the modern GA, given that contradiction will now longer legally invalidate your proposal and cause it to be held at queue by moderators, such a fear is unfounded and may be safely discarded.
Reserved addition or accommodation clause (specific restrictive retroactive/non-retroactive/atemporal thematic): as already seen in GA2#008 but also present in others form in GA#6918 (Cannibalism Act), GA#3349 (Protected Status in Wartime), GA#77910 (Preventing Employment Discrimination). Here, the subordination seeks to either allow for the WA to make further legislative additions to a topic without finding the subordinated mandates as hindrance or to work around previously-established desirable mandates without having to repeat their mandates or cite them directly, as the latter would likely violate the house of cards rule, in any of its iterations across GA ruleset history11.
This is a more tasteful application of subordination, allowing the WA to create complex multi-resolution legislative structures with intentionality, still respecting previous mandates on other areas and presuming the author’s due diligence in the way of knowing, particularly if the subordination is retroactive or atemporal, which mandates in effect would be subordinating, and in what way they would interact with the subordinated mandates.
Necromancy clause (any unrestricted subordination): this is, to the best of my knowledge, an entirely theoretical clause with no real examples. It is possible to reference extant12 World Assembly resolutions so as to make the subordinating mandates it mentions have a one-time legislative effect on subordinated mandates that cannot be canceled by the removal of the former from the hall of WA legislation.
A hypothetical example of this would be: “The following is to be considered a practice of torture, as defined by previously passed World Assembly legislation, regardless of their current validity”. Taking validity to mean the legislative status of a resolution (repealed or in-effect), this subordination clause would therefore take the definition of torture from a previously passed resolution and would keep that definition for itself regardless of repeals. In effect, as mentioned by Cretox State in a conversation I had with him, such a clause would “functionally [enact] those provisions itself”, entrenching its mandates.
Now that we’ve analysed all this, how should one use a subordination clause? With intentionality. They are enablers of complex legislative systems and harmonious additions to WA legal code.
As an example, when crafting a resolution on international crimes, writing a “high crime” category and enabling future WA resolutions to state what constitutes a high crime, beyond what the initial resolution encompasses, lends the Assembly a certain flexibility that allows an author to contribute harmoniously to existing systems if they have an idea, in a way that makes repealing and replacing, a torturous activity at times, less necessary. If you establish a Committee and its potential area of activity are too broad, it may be a good idea to allow for further legislation to delineate how that entity will interact with other aspects of the topic at hand; further flexibility and reactiveness to the reality of constant development and innovation of international law.
Subordination clauses are a legislative tool, created for the benefit of future authors. They cannot, and should not, replace your due diligence as an author – that would make their application more dangerous than beneficial to the health of your mandates and the maintenance of your legislative vision. A good author will use their knowledge of previous resolutions to catch onto the systems created by the WA and expand upon them, or create themselves new systems with which they and others can develop legislation in a cohesive and structured way.
Above all, the WA is a cohesive and structured corpus of laws. Subordination clauses are impossible to avoid if that is to be respected.
1 Note that this has never meant, to the best of my knowledge, that contradiction was analysed from the perspective of the proposal as a whole. If any mandate of a proposal is contradictory, that meant the entire proposal is contradictory and, thus, illegal. 2 This is a Committee! Read more about them in my previous article. 3 The examples gathered here were acquired by searching the InfoEurope historical resolutions catalog for the words “subject to” and “extant”, which are very commonly present in the formulation of subordination clauses, but are not necessary for its existence. Not every subordinative relationship is easily spotted or formulaic. 4 “The World Assembly enacts as follows, subject to relevant past World Assembly resolutions still in force.” 5 “The World Assembly enacts as follows, subject to past World Assembly law still in force.” 6 “Now, therefore, the General Assembly hereby enacts the following provisions, subject to the rules and laws set by earlier WA resolutions that are still in force [...]” 7 “Requires that a WA state may not, subject to extant WA resolutions [...]”; “Requires that if a WA state chooses to permit dual citizenship, subject to extant WA resolutions [...]” 8 “Personhood for the purpose of this definition shall be decided by the jurisdiction in which the meat is produced, subject to any exclusions or inclusions specified by section 1a.ii or other World Assembly law.” 9 “During a time of armed conflict, member states’ combatants shall not falsely utilize the protected status guaranteed to any other particular category or group of individuals and their associated symbols, subject to the immunities and exceptions granted by General Assembly law.” 10 “Noting that further immutable physical characteristics such as age may not be protected in the event of incompetence as delineated and subject to prior General Assembly and member-state legislation, but that it may be protected following such incapability.” 11 Subordination clauses are indeed often the way that authors find to rely on previous or future resolutions without violating this part of the ruleset. It is an inevitability that something as complex as international law will require more than 5k characters at a time to be effective. This use, while seemingly subversive at first, is necessary to the functionality of the GA as a cohesive corpus of laws and is something I support fully. 12 Extant is a funny word in WA history. In my opinion, it has often been wrongly used by authors with the connotation of being previous WA resolutions in-effect, but in truth “extant” by itself would mean any WA resolution in-effect; atemporal. Always use “extant” to mean the latter, not the former, and add a time adjective if you exclusively desire retroactivity or non-retroactivity.
Greetings, all readers, both foreign and domestic! My name is Aster or Ubertas, and I am Starlight & Horizon's newly appointed Minister of World Assembly Affairs (hereafter MoWAA). I know many may not know me, so I wanted to use this edition to address our readers about the Ministry's work.
Firstly, I'd like to acknowledge both my immediate predecessor and those before them. Our MoWAA has truly built an intrepid institution centered around access and successful involvement. We provide everything from the writing of Information For Voters (IFVs) to our NEW General Assembly Guide written under my predecessor, Idinist. We are additionally proud that our resolution writing program has enticed new writers, and that Starborn were involved in the majority of the new GA's recent docket. To that end, I want to continue this ethos and trajectory in this upcoming term.
Foremost, I will maintain the activity and infrastructure left by my predecessors. In addition, the Ministry hopes to further its efforts on quality World Assembly activity and education through several new planned initiatives. These include an IFV writing guide and template, a Community Resolution Drafting/Brainstorming event with the Culture Ministry, and a new recurring series for this publication, "Inside the WA", where we plan to interview some of the WA's heavyweights for newcomer advice.
I am proud to enter this term with an incredible and capable team. I'm excited to introduce WAA Deputy Minister Merethin, whose titanic reputation I am honored to work alongside, and the WAA Minister-Secretary Mala Gule/General TN, one of our accomplished Starborn authors. I anticipate an incredible upcoming term, and I hope to see many more come and join us as we take to the stars with the 8th Cabinet.
In a starless night, we are the light!
CLASSIFIEDS
CALLING ALL ASPIRING WORLD ASSEMBLY AUTHORS.
Do you want to successfully pass a resolution but don't know where to start? Want direct mentorship from experienced authors? Come join Starlight and Horizon and participate in our World Assembly Affairs Resolution Drafting Program through our Discord. Our regions have had involvement in a majority of the resolutions passed in the new GA! Here you'll learn from the pros how to write, edit, and pass a World Assembly resolution. In a Starless Night, we are the WA's Light!
ARTICLE SUBMISSION AND PARTICIPATION
If you like what you've read here, why not take the next step?Join the World Assembly, become a Starborn, and join the Ministry of World Assembly Affairs today through our Discord! You'll have a chance to help with the creation of new editions, create recommendations, discuss policy and much more. In addition, The Intergalactic is open to receive articles for its editorial section, which must abide by a few guidelines:
At most 10k characters (no minimum);
Decently related to the World Assembly, via politics or policy for example;
Written and submitted by non-sanctioned persons.
Any article must be sent to the Minister via Discord or to Ubertas viatelegrams. Upon submission, the Ministry has the discretionary authority to review and accept or reject the article. We highly encourage interested Starborn to participate, and the Ministry may be reached out to about any you have! We're always happy to hear suggestions.
Idinist*→Chief Editor; general writing; formatting; proofreading
*This edition was started during the 7th Government, and released during the 8th Government. Both the previous and current Ministers/Editors are credited
Technically, there no such thing as a Scythedom at the end of the books, so there is no laws, but that also means I wouldnt exist, so I'm doing it more near the end of the book series, where the Less than Honorable Scythe Goddard was Overbalde and Tonists were not a protected peoples.
Interim Government : October 28th, 2024 to December 22nd, 2024Starlight opens officially on October 28th, a few weeks after the region was founded on-site.
Vintrel appointed as Minister of Internal Affairs on March 12th
Cessarea re-appointed as Minister of World Assembly Affairs on March 12th
May 1st, 2025: Hjem System steps down as Minister of Communications, replaced by Eastern Arba Fir the day after.
3rd Cabinet : June 11th, 2025 to September 10th, 2025Luminarchs:Oseao & Irenae
Cessarea elected as Aetherion Kaidan re-elected as Flamewarden
Nova centaurus and Spaceship Earth appointed as Vice-Flamewardens on June 13th
Missouria re-appointed as Fleetmaster of the Galactic Armada
Ministers:
Zerph appointed as Minister of Foreign Affairs on June 11th
Eastern Arba Fir re-appointed as Minister of Communications on June 11th
Nanaea re-appointed as Minister of Culture on June 11th
Pellon Wesaurps appointed as Minister of Recruitment & Integration on June 11th
Nova centaurus appointed as Minister of World Assembly Affairs on June 11th
July 11th, 2025: Excidium Planetis replaces Nova centaurus as Minister of World Assembly Affairs, and Missouria replaces Zerph as Minister of Foreign Affairs.
July 25th, 2025: Dogeland replaces Pellon Wesaurps as Minister of Recruitment & Integration.
4th Cabinet : September 10th, 2025 to December 10th, 2025Luminarchs:Oseao & Irenae
Merethin elected as Aetherion Kaidan re-elected as Flamewarden
April 24th, 2026: Dogeland and Stevist Guam swap ministries, with the former becoming a Minister of Gameside and the latter becoming Minister of Culture.
April 25th, 2026: Borealicar becomes Acting Minister of Media, and eventually Minister of Media on May 1st.
7th Cabinet : June 8th, 2026 to September 8th, 2026Luminarchs:Oseao & Irenae / Irenima
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