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Rot Weiss Rot, die Partei für Österreich

And here it is, the long-awaited Manifesto of Robert Knotsworth for the party presidency of Rot Weiss Rot.

I've been a citizen of Austria for a very long time now (between stints in other countries, admittedly), and I feel it's time I should do what I've, really, always wanted to do with my eLife, and that's serve as Party President of Rot Weiss Rot.

What I want is reform, and I have plans to make them happen.

You see, Rot Weiss Rot has stagnated recently. Member's have become, or stayed, inactive. We regularly see our numbers drop as deaths occur, and our success in congress decrease and decrease.

We are without charter, constitution, manifesto… In fact we don't even have a proper ideological footing.

It's time for that to change, it's time we promoted activity, drew up a constitution, charter and manifesto, gave ourselves officers, forums, organisation and democracy. It's time change in order to conserve, and make 'the great old party' a player in the field of politics it created again.

First off, I'd like to address the whole promoting activity palaver. This is the top of my priorities now, and will remain so if I am elected.
However, it seems obvious to me that it's the other things I mentioned that will actually make this happen. That is, and in this order:
1) Democratic decisions over policy;
2) A private discussion forum to host this on;
3) The creation of Officer posts and democratic appointment of those who will fill them;
4) The drawing-up of a manifesto and charter;
5) The drawing-up of a comprehensive codified constitution.

I will address all of these points in order, starting from one.

1) (see, I wasn't lying)

Whilst, like all of us here, I am a strong believer in Democracy and all (well, most) Democratic principles, that's not my main reason for promoting Democratic policy making.
The idea behind this is to give those interested members of RWR something to BE active with, something to do that does make a difference and gets them in contact with those other members and players between election times.
I intend to do this by holding regular polls over ideological, constitutional, political and official issues on the forum (detailed below), perhaps starting discussions around them and informing members about them.

Democratic elections regarding policy will all take place as and when issues come up, but I do promise to hold an election at the outset over the name, orientation and logo of the party. This will probably be shortly followed by decisions over Charter, manifesto and constitution.

2)

Now it's evident that, with democratic decisions and the like, we are going to need a discussion forum for Rot Weiss Rot members only.
On this forum, members will be able to start, participated in and observe party discussions while also, as stated, be able to vote in various polls and elections.
This will give us more control over our own functioning and remove the problems associated with our current bit on the main forum.
I've never set-up or administrated a forum before, but I sure will try and I sure will ask for a little help from friends.

3)

The officer positions I intend to created will be so constructed as to perform a variety of functions.
This is mainly to give aspirational members the chance to stand for a winnable position and thus give them more experience. That coupled with taking some of the workload off me, of course.
The only officer to be appointed by myself (or any successive PPs) will be the Vice-President, who's core function will be to provide advice to me (or any successive PPs) and to take over the administration of the party while I (or any successive PPs) are away.

The other officers will be:
A) Congressional Director;
😎 Media Director;
C) Publicity Officer;
D) Community Officer.

A: The Congressional Director will do what it says on the tin, and direct congress. They will be responsible for organising discussions on Congressional Debates or Decisions, making sure the congress members know the regulations, and advising the PP on decisions regarding congressional official picking.

B: The Media Director will be responsible for writing articles for the general public (to be edited by the PP), to be published through the Party Organisation.

C: The Publicity officer will have, perhaps, the most important job of all. The occupation will mainly be directly messaging members about policy decisions and polls in a weekly newsflash sent to all of them, though some of the sending process will be shared with other members and officers.

😨 The Community Officer will have a slightly unique position in the eWorld. The idea of the community officer is to utilise all the excess gold we have sitting in our accounts, by providing various different awards and gifts to members and to the general public for the common good of Austria.. For instance, any great service to Austria could be awarded with a high-quality house - which would be bought and donated by the party organisation (which is in turn owned by the PP), but decided and publicly presented by the Community officer. Gift programmes and donations to governmental or charitable organisations could also be examples of the work of the CO.

4)

To give the party electoral credibility and both a real aim and sense of purpose for RWR, I propose the drawing-up of a short manifesto and charter.

The charter will outline the general ideology and aim of the party, the regulations all members, congress members and other officials must follow and a set of promises (to always attempt to do good for Austria etc).

The Manifesto will include the charter, but also include relevant policy ideas or successes for each election it is used in.

5) (phew, finally)

The constitution will be a mere formality, but it will provide more detail as to the regulations, various systems implemented and appointments.

And that's all for now, folks; the floor is open for comment and criticism.

Rot Weiss Rot bis in den Tod!
-Robert Knotsworth.