Succeeding a crisis committee is generally more complicated than succeeding in a general assembly. In order to be the best all-around crisis delegate, you need to dominate in-room debate, and control the committee’s crises. The key to dominating both aspects of a crisis committee is through intertwining your backroom crisis arc with the committee’s debate. Once your crisis arc is discussed in the committee room, you are on the right track to success! To accomplish this, there are a few different strategies that can be employed in almost any committee.
Working with the committee’s arc
Every crisis director designs their committee differently. Some plan out full crisis arcs and establish the direction of the committee prior to the start of the conference- others leave the outcome up to the delegates. Either way, you must be able to react to crisis updates in your notes. You can start by trying to predict the crisis director’s intended arc prior to the conference. The background guide can often reveal clues in the character list or the “guiding questions” for debate. A successful crisis arc that the staffers would want to entertain should, to some capacity, relate to the discussion topics that have been mentioned in the background guide. If you cannot determine any clues to the direction of the committee, you must be ready to react to updates as they are announced. Your ideas are more likely to be included in updates if they are relevant. For example, conducting an investigation to gain information after an update or taking control of an uprising/movement that was announced can increase your relevance to the committee’s overall arc.
Expose yourself
One of the easiest ways to get people talking about you is exposing your shady plans to the committee. The best time to do this is towards the end of the second/third day of the conference when debate is beginning to slow down. You should not do this too early because it may result in losing your position and/or delegates not trusting you. A successful exposition is subtle enough that the committee doesn’t think you did it for attention, but still appears relevant to debate. You can do this by submitting anonymous press releases to crisis or leaving evidence behind in your crisis notes. Once the information is leaked to the committee, you should try to have yourself put on trial. This will result in a substantial amount of time dedicated to you, and you alone. Even if you are not put on trial, the debate surrounding the decision will still put you in the spotlight. The amount of attention gained from this is invaluable to succeeding in crisis. At the conclusion of the conference you will be at the forefront of the chairs’ and staffers’ minds.
Releasing intelligence & information
Crisis committees almost always involve investigations. Delegates try to scramble to get the most information on crisis updates by launching investigation after investigation. If your investigation is a success, you have a clear advantage in the committee. Keeping this information private is important at first, but if you need more attention or you need your crisis plans to be talked about, you can always reveal it to the committee. The best way to do this is by proposing a moderated caucus on “crucial intelligence” or “important information.” These suspenseful topics will prompt delegates to vote on your caucus, during which you can reveal the information you obtained. Because the investigation occurred through your private notes, you control the information you release. This means that you can release as much or little as you want, and can also release false information to advance your own arc. Not only does this give you a spotlight, but can also distract the committee while you carry out your crisis arc. You can also release information that hints to your own arc to get committee debate to focus more on your actions.
Exploit public directives
Taking advantage of public directives is a great way to intertwine your arc with in-room debate and go completely unnoticed. You can either exploit directives by slipping in clauses that advance your arc or by giving further instructions in your crisis notes as to how the directives are to be carried out. This can only happen, though, if you sponsor the directive. If don’t sponsor the directive, you can thwart its outcome through your crisis notes. If the public directive goes against the goal of your arc, this is a helpful strategy. An example of this is if a directive deals with troop movements, you can sabotage that by having the troops ambushed or their weapons malfunction.
Take advantage of double-notepad systems
Many conferences use the “double-notepad system.” This is just a fancy way of saying that you will have two notepads to write crisis notes on, and only one pad will be out at a time. Many advanced delegates have two arcs occurring at once- one on each pad. Another way to divide your pads is by using one for your personal arc and the other to respond to crisis updates and in-room debate. By splitting your notepads this way it will be easier to keep track of your ideas and it also allows you to intertwine your plans from notepad with those on the other. This will, eventually, result in your personal arc colliding with what is occurring inside the room.
