Special Rules

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Rating Leadership Rule (RLR).  By resolution of the high council, an order may adopt or repeal a rule that members in all councils may not rate other members in contradiction of the most recent rating of that member by an immediately superior leader.  Under such a rule, a member cannot legitimately give anyone a merit that the individual’s own immediately superior leader most recently gave a demerit, or give any one a demerit that the leader gave a merit.   No other rule may ever bind code authorized ratings.

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If the congregation adopts the RLR, any rating of a person is void if it is opposite of the most recent one given to that person by that person's next higher leader.  Within a council this means that rank and file members of the council can only give ratings to express which leader decision they are most enthusiastic about.  This rule intensifies the power of leaders greatly and links councils together much more:  higher leaders can prevent a subordinate council leader from being supported by the council, so higher leaders have extra leverage over their subordinate leaders.  In all it makes the order more top down.  It's in the kit bag for you if you want to use it, but is not the default. 

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And the final sentence is important to say explicitly.  This code calls for a certain way of doing ratings and assigns people power to rate but somebody will surely think that leaves them room to take away the rater's freedom of decision.  If you want to make the system more authoritarian, the RLR is the most you can do.   And it's not really that bad.  It's kind of like the way you have to vote for somebody from the limited selection on the ballot if you want your vote to count.  Which of the people the party likes do you like the most?  

 

Nomadic Orders Rule.  By unanimous vote, the high council can declare an order nomadic, as opposed to the usual which is sedentary.   Also, by unanimous vote, the high council can take the order the other way, making a nomadic order sedentary. In nomadic orders, each participant has only one seniority score which is tracked at order level, but otherwise council ratings modify that score as usual.   Thus, participants who are not leaders can retain seniority and transfer into another basic council if it will have them.  When an order goes from sedentary to nomadic, each individual’s score becomes the total of the all the council scores that individual was a member in.  When an order goes from nomadic to sedentary, each individual’s score on each council is initially equal to that individual’s former order seniority. 

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In a nomadic order everybody has only one seniority score, rather than a different one in each council.  Setting up a different score in each council was an important innovation that makes this whole system work, so nomadic orders will be cruder.  Also, there would have to be some way of reporting ratings to central headquarters.  Fraud could become rampant if not controlled for.  But there could be circumstances when an order's participants have a high turnover rate at any one location, and in that case a nomadic order would be the best that population could do.  

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Property Rule.  Orders may register as corporations that can own property.  The disposition of that property is entirely under the control of the high council and the law.

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There's no way I could anticipate what might be needed here so this is the best I can do.  Designate somebody.

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Congregation Rules.  Sedentary orders may also designate just one other level of sector for permission to also incorporate and own property.  Such subordinate sectors which may incorporate and own property are called congregations.  The disposition of congregation property is entirely under the control of the congregation council.  Congregations must be extended the following special protections.  1.  By majority decision of the congregation council, a congregation may secede at any time and become an independent order.  2.  When a congregation loses the right to remain a congregation it must give all property to the order, or else secede and become an independent order.  3. Finally, the high council of the order may give all congregation leaders a term of office just like that of an order president.  If they are in effect, such terms extend from one leap day to the next and two such terms cannot be served consecutively.

 

Having a subordinate organizations that own property is likely to create huge headaches, but centralizing all property ownership would put a damper on growth so it's worth it to have at least one other level that can own property.  The complexities are dealt with best in practice by setting a chosen level and leaving it that way.  But if you have to change things, the response should be tuned for simplicity rather then beauty.  Maybe this will help discourage changing it.  Giving congregation leaders the possibility of a four year term also introduces complexity, the way the long term does for a president, but multiplied by the number of congregations.  The option is there in case it's needed.    

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Dissolution Rules.  Before an order dissolves, its property should be divided equally between the former departments which will be its successor orders.  Exceptions can be made by consent, such as if a successor order is willing to give up a certain amount of cash in order to retain a piece of real estate rather than have it sold so the proceeds can be divided.  But the law takes precedence over this preferred way.  Planned transfer prior to dissolution is ideal, so for that purpose departments may establish themselves as corporations prior to an inevitable order dissolution. 

 

Unless departments are the congregation level they would normally not be able to incorporate, but for them to receive shares of soon to be former order property they have to be allowed to do so prematurely.  I'm going to leave it up to orders to negotiate details and please note that "should."  The high council controls order property and "can" give it to one favored successor or embezzle it.  

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Officer Rules.  For incorporation, orders and congregations may have to fulfill legal requirements such as appointment of officers.  The order president or congregation leader has unilateral authority to take all such required actions, appointing and dismissing other officers at will. 

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Again, simplicity is the focus, not elegance.  There's no way I can anticipate and creating a provisional flow chart of possibilities and it would probably be useless work.  If you can't trust the top leader to make such decisions why did you make this person the top leader?    I've provided a well defined system for making sure you are only led by someone who has been vetted.  I shouldn't have to try to blindly micromanage your chosen one.  

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