I wrote this for the UDS as a precursor to an article I wanted to write in my newspaper there. Then I realized this is a) a tad bit bland and b) a tad bit long and probably wouldn’t work out well for such an article?
But also I spent like an hour writing this for no reason and I think it’s ok to read so i’ll just post this here. ig. yeah.
So this is an idea that’s been kinda running around in my head a lot. My idea of how a region kinda… operates, maybe. As someone who’s been around the block in terms of region-building for a while now, even if not particularly successful at it… you tend to notice things! And I think one thing I’ve noticed is an interesting interplay that exists between a community and its institutions that exist - and how if one fails, the other usually doesn’t do too hot. Or it just fails outright. Kinda depends on context, but in any case - it’s something I think is important for the regions I’m in to consider. And probably important for other regions to keep in mind as well.
Now, I’m sure anyone who is a region-builder inherently knows this stuff. It’s common sense, almost, I’d like to think, if you’ve been region-building for years. Maybe you won’t agree with everything, but I think the general trends will make sense. So I guess the reason I’m writing this is less for people who already know what they’re doing, and more so perhaps for those who don’t know… and for me, so I can solidify this concept in my head. I guess it’s kinda like those studies that link together common things just to prove it or re-prove it. Like yeah, duh, we know - but it’s still nice to have it written out somewhere, isn’t it?
So here’s how I think a region may look like, from a certain perspective based around the community.
The Community
So the first part, and really the main part, of any region is its community. And I’m sure anyone who has been in a region before can say “yes”, because what else keeps people in a region for the long-term? You can always ask many older NSers who have been in their regions for eons - “hey, why do you stay here?” - and very likely more than not the answer will relate to how good the region’s community is in some way, shape, or form. So yeah, the community of a region is the integral part. The community is the region, its populace, etc. So yeah, of course, it’s the main part of a region - in terms of what gives the region substance. There are, of course, the leaders who keep a region running - but without a community to draw from or entertain or help out… then one isn’t really much of a leader of anything, are you.
In any case, what is super interesting about communities is the things they particularly bring to the region. Communities are essentially massive groups of loosely connected friend networks all revolving around a singular need. So they establish a common ground between individuals - for NationStates, that’s residing in the same region - based on a single unified identity. That gives communities an ability to offer something no other entity or concept quite can - comradeship. The ability to do things with others, even if they may not be your closest friends, simply because you all share a common identity and common values associated with those identities. (Although that in itself does tend to lead to friendships forming as relative strangers begin interacting within a community.)
And I do personally think that’s a beautiful thing about communities, and really about NS regions themselves more specifically. Many people on this site have been able to build areas wherein people, sharing similar general identities, values, and patriotic pride in a region, are able to come together and enjoy each other’s presence. They can work together in the World Assembly, in roleplaying, in sh*tposting, in playing with cards, etc. In effect, a community makes it easier to find people to do things with than it would be if you were just plopped into a crowd of strangers you don’t know whatsoever. Being a part of a community offers a way to, really, share the act of playing NationStates with others, rather than doing it isolated and alone. And since we humans are social creatures - anyone who dares reach out beyond issues usually does fall into a community of some sort, with many calling a regional community home.
But the thing about a community is that it’s also pretty large. Communities aren’t like small friend groups, wherein the norms are well understood and you can generally rely on just generally following the vibes. Communities are chonky - and after a certain point, you end up needing some form of structure to help regulate a community and ensure being in such a place is fun for all. This leads to the need of institutions for said community to function properly - and in the case of NationStates regions, we can say these are regional institutions.
Regional Institutions: Leadership
It’s no major surprise that regions in NationStates have leaders, second-in-commands, deputies, workers. Etc. Every community will ultimately need some form of regulation, and in that light you’ll need some form of leader to watch over the community’s well-being. This is because by itself, a community is generally too big to keep itself together. Therein needs to be some active force to eventually push a community beyond being the size of like 6 people or whatever arbitrary number is a sustainable friend group versus an unstable community network.
Of course, in many communities on the internet - this essentially means just having some site owners, moderators, a rule-set, and that’s it. For many internet communities and even some NationStates regions, that’s more than enough to justify regulating their community and ensuring everything goes right.
But since this is NationStates, which is a political simulator with communities tied to regions, which by nature are forced to interact with the game in a variety of different mechanical ways, things are a little bit different. Regional communities tend to gravitate to a more formal government structure - which makes perfect sense in the context of this game. But with a formal government does come the question of how powers should be distributed. This is usually decided at a region’s founding, but in general you either have regions choose to be democracies (i.e. with the community having a much more stronger, active role in the leadership process) and autocracies/oligarchies (i.e. with the community having a inherently weaker say in the leadership selection process). This extends both IC (i.e. positions unrelated to Administration-related jobs - tend to see more mixes across regions) and OOC (i.e. positions related to Administration-related jobs - tend to be oligarchic/autocratic due to the high level of trust and stability needed for OOC things).
In either case, the regional institutions for any regional community on NS do serve a second clear purpose beyond establishing rules. They help to keep the region alive, they recruit for it, and they make decisions about the regions’s wellbeing into the future. In effect, regional institutions are how the community makes decisions for itself, through delegated individuals given more-than-usual authorities than what regular community members get.
And that’s essentially what regional institutions are: structures built by the community or its founders to delegate authority to certain community members to regulate community conduct and perpetuate the community. But interestingly, the dynamic between communities is more than that.
Regional Institutions and Communities: How They Interact
So now we’ve established two key players in a region: the community and the institution. We know what regional institutions generally do for a community - regulate it and keep it alive. But what does that look like?
Well, a cursory look at any region gives a quick answer to that. Beyond just keeping the community alive with fresh blood and regulating conduct, regional institutions also work to enhance the community - make it something beyond just people talking to each other with a shared identity. This, of course, involves a variety of different methods - but there’s generally a few distinct approaches.
The first approach is one that focuses on facilitating chatting, primarily. In this type of approach, the regional government doesn’t do too much to foster massive programs for the community, but it does do some more minor things - like creating off-site social platforms (Discord) or running on-site polls - to keep the community engaged. This type of approach is pretty basic, to the point wherein pretty much any successful region will co-opt this approach with at least one other. And that makes sense - of course, a region will do things like creating more organized social platforms or making use of NS’s basic features for fun. Doesn’t take that much work, but it provides a lot of reward. The most prominent example I can think of for this kind of region would be the Alstroemeria Commonwealth - a group of regions that tend to not do too much in government stuff, but mostly just have fun chatting with each other whilst holding the odd-event with their friends.
The next approach to discuss is holding a regional roleplay. Regional roleplays are self-explanatory roleplays that a region holds for community members to participate in. Roleplays are pretty great community enhancers in two ways - the first is that they offer NationStates players a way to roleplay their nations interacting with other nations, which is nigh impossible to do with issues alone. Roleplay allows a community to express its creativity and get immersed in a world of its own making. The second thing that’s excellent about roleplays is they offer a way for community members to give back to the community - whether it be via creating regional maps, serving as a Roleplay Moderator, developing guides to help newer players in the roleplay, and so on. This essentially creates an interesting loop wherein community members join the roleplay and rise in the ranks so to speak. It’d be accurate to say that depending on the region, whatever entity directly runs a regional roleplay could very well be the region’s primary regional institution or a secondary regional institution with its own rules and customs, if a more government-based primary institution exists. An example of a roleplay region I’ve heard of is The Hole to Hide In - a region totally focused on roleplay with roleplay moderators having equal reverie as government officials. It’s a nice region, and they take their roleplay seriously.
Another approach for regional institutions to enhance their communities is creating a regional government. Regional governments essentially set up positions that specifically allow community members to serve, but unlike a moderation team or roleplay team, regional governments tend to avoid Out-of-Character moderation or directly managing roleplays. Instead, they focus on essentially cultivating every other aspect the region can participate in - the World Assembly, managing relations with other regions, domestic cultural events, etc. Not to mention that many governments have legal systems and courts that players can develop and serve within. In effect, regional governments are the most expressive way of a community to enhance itself, because by instituting a full-on government a community can encourage its own growth in a variety of factors. For example, the regional government could decide to form a WA-mentorship program, allowing community members to become more versed in WA-writing and perhaps bond over community experiences in that area. Regional governments can be difficult to maintain though, since they often require a multitude of individuals to keep their systems running.
Interestingly, there are two pretty divided perspectives when it comes to creating a regional government - which comes down to how intense serving in said government is. All regional governments (at least, those that are successful) will somehow serve as a region’s primary institution in keeping it alive (with another regional institution usually regulating OOC conduct in such a set-up).
But some governments go further by becoming pretty intense political simulators. These governments, usually being democracies, will give community members extremely high prestige for serving in a position - and high costs to reputation and likability if they end up not doing well. They’re also pretty strict on the law, making sure every letter of it is followed. Said governments highly emphasize climbing the ladder and making a name, and can be enjoyable for many NS players and a turn-off for others (a symptom of such intense political governments is often their own officials burning out and leaving the region). One major con to intense polsim governments is they often build their activity around elections and the push/pull of politics surrounding regional issues, which means they can often fall into inactivity struggles once regional issues get resolved. That being said, some regions manage to maintain this type of government - most notably Europiea.
The second kind of government is a polsim government’s exact opposite - a government that tends to avoid competition, strictness, and prestige-seeking. These governments are known to be more chill and more open than their counterparts, with an explicit goal of serving the region. Interestingly, you’ll find that most successful NationStates meritocracies/autocracies like the West Pacific tend to fall into this category. Autocracies obviously tend to avoid competition unless they hold elections for minor positions - so the focus for most autocracies is simply developing the region (thus why many call themselves “meritocracies” or governments based on merit). That being said, democracies can very easily fall into this type of category as well.
Regardless of the approach, it’s clear that regional institutions thus have a focus on bettering the experience of community members. Put it another way, they wish to offer a unique way or style of enjoying NationStates, tied to a common group identity.
But all this may make it seem like regional institutions have all the power. And indeed, this type of mindset does tend to occur in regional institutions sometimes - they forget who they’re serving and often focus more on self-preservation or setting up abstract gatekeeping ideals to prevent newer community members from joining said regional institutions (particularly for regional governments). What is important to note, however, is that regional institutions and the community need each other. The community needs regional institutions to upkeep and maintain whatever programs are currently running, because it is the regional institution that serves as a medium for people experienced in running certain programs to self-organize what they’re doing. On the flipside, regional institutions need a regional community to serve because… well, if you have no real community, what are you doing there?
This is why it’s important to remember another important aspect of communities and their institutions: that institutions are ultimately a reflection of the community’s interests. This holds true regardless if the institutions came before the community or vice versa; if a community is maintaining a successful institution, then it is in the interests of said community to maintain that regional institution because it gives the community some feasible benefit for its existence. If the regional institution stops reflecting the community - maybe moderators stop moderating the rules properly, the government becomes abusive with its powers, etc. - then the community may very well determine said regional institution no longer befits it. In many cases, this leads to regional fissures, with one part of the community leaving to form their own regional institutions.
Conclusions
Erm, that’s basically all I have to say. To summarize this idea of what a region is, a region is basically a community that has successfully managed to maintain itself by creating successful regional institutions which help the community become more diverse and interesting to its community members.
I feel like all of this is really just common sense, which is why no one wrote it out probably, but nonetheless. I wanted to say something else, but this article turned into something else. So I’ll write more about that something else in another article. Someday! :>