How does the B5 council work?

[Republibot 3.0]

So how does the B5 council work?

Earth, Minbar, Narn, Centauri Prime, and the Vorlon Empire each hold one vote, and Earth appears to permanently chair the meetings. All well and good.

Often they assemble "The League of Nonaligned Worlds" for full council meetings. We never SEE them really voting on stuff, but they must be there to vote, right? Otherwise, why invite them? Clearly, none of them have the power the big 5 do, but my hunch is the League - as a whole - has one vote.

So: Earth, Minbar, Narn, Centauri, Vorlon and League. Six votes. Who decides in the event of a tie? It never came up.

Second question:

How binding, exactly, are these agreements? The council is occasionally called "The Babylon 5 Advisory Council," which implies its mainly there to discuss how B5 itself should be run. We frequently see them doing UN-styled stuff, though, but how does that work. Is anything they agree on binding automatically, or do decisions have to go through a ratification process on their respective homeworlds first? Or is it more like a NATO kind of thing, where everyone just kind of says 'this is what we're going to do, and you can take part or not?'

Third Question:

Sinclair is sent to Minbar as ambasador, presumably, then, earth is dealing directly with Minbar and vice versa. Are they dealing directly with the other major powers? Clearly not the Vorlon, probably the Centauri. If so, if they're mostly dealing directly, doesn't this reduce the effectiveness of B5? What I'm asking is: is B5 the place where these decisions are really made, or are the various members continually doing end-runs around it?

Just wondering.

 

[fisheggs]

The Vorlon NEVER voted: They took action, or they didn't.:devil:




Side agreements were par for the course. Vorlon/Minbari, Earth/Non-alligned: Earth/Centari and, in the begining: Earth/ Narn.

B5 was the creation of Earth and Minbar/Vorlon with others "invited" in.

Earth's first contact was with the Centari, followed soon with the Narn and the League. Humans alligned with the League for the Dilgar War, learning and leading. Then they insulted the Minbari, grieviously. Before the war,Centari only knew to avoid the Minbari and the Narn knew less. The Vorlon were Legend. and obviously influenced the location, ie The Great Machine. After the war the Major Powers needed a place to talk: thus was B5 created.

 

[Springer]

Wow, long time since I've posted here.

I'm pretty sure you are correct in saying the League voted together, and only got one vote. I can't recall off the top of my head which episode that was mentioned in - possibly Deathwalker, when the League took umbrage to the Council's decision.

Certainly B5 was described as being like the UN, with the five major governments analogous to the Security Council. There was originally meant to have been a human ambassador to B5 as well, and Sinclair was only filling in – I guess that idea got dropped. Also, people like Delenn and G'Kar, and Londo by the second half of season 2, wielded a lot of power and could probably convince their governments to go with what they decided. Sinclair on the other hand always had to go through Senator Hidoshi and the senate committee. In Deathwalker Lennier had to consult his government before he could vote.

 

[Republibot 3.0]

Wow, long time since I've posted here.

I'm pretty sure you are correct in saying the League voted together, and only got one vote. I can't recall off the top of my head which episode that was mentioned in - possibly Deathwalker, when the League took umbrage to the Council's decision.

Certainly B5 was described as being like the UN, with the five major governments analogous to the Security Council. There was originally meant to have been a human ambassador to B5 as well, and Sinclair was only filling in – I guess that idea got dropped. Also, people like Delenn and G'Kar, and Londo by the second half of season 2, wielded a lot of power and could probably convince their governments to go with what they decided. Sinclair on the other hand always had to go through Senator Hidoshi and the senate committee. In Deathwalker Lennier had to consult his government before he could vote.

Remind me, I'm too lazy to look: Did they call it the B5 Security Council or the B5 Advisory Council? I think it was the latter.

Lennier was just an atache. He'd obviously have to call home for approval. Ditto Vir and Na'Toth, I'd imagine.

I don't recall there ever being any mention of a permanent ambasador to B5 from earth. I think it was always supposed to be the station CO, though I'll be the first to admit that never made any sense to me. (In fact, if B5 were being remade, I'd have Sheridan on board from day one as Station CO, and Sinclair as the ambasador. Whe he gets rolled off the station in year 2, Sheridan would take both roles)

 

[Springer]

This is attributed to JMS from the Lurker's Guide entry for Deathwalker:

"The Babylon 5 Advisory Council and the League of Non-Aligned Worlds functions in much the same fashion as the Security Council and the General Assembly in the U.N. The smaller worlds and alliances can't weild as much power as any of the Big Five. Together, they as a group get a vote equal to one of the Big Five; they can deputize one of their number to speak for them and cast that vote, which can often break ties or create ties. It is not a terribly equitible situation, but it was the only workable solution that would be accepted by the other Ambassadors. We'll see them chafing at this in "Deathwalker."

I can't find the reference to the Earth ambassador - I thought it might have been on the Lurker's Guide, but I couldn't find it, and my B5 magazines and script books are packed away so I can't check them at this stage. But I think it was something that was dropped from the series early on, possibly even at the pilot stage. It was never a concept that made it into the series.

 

[Republibot 3.0]

This is attributed to JMS from the Lurker's Guide entry for Deathwalker:

"The Babylon 5 Advisory Council and the League of Non-Aligned Worlds functions in much the same fashion as the Security Council and the General Assembly in the U.N. The smaller worlds and alliances can't weild as much power as any of the Big Five. Together, they as a group get a vote equal to one of the Big Five; they can deputize one of their number to speak for them and cast that vote, which can often break ties or create ties. It is not a terribly equitible situation, but it was the only workable solution that would be accepted by the other Ambassadors. We'll see them chafing at this in "Deathwalker."

I can't find the reference to the Earth ambassador - I thought it might have been on the Lurker's Guide, but I couldn't find it, and my B5 magazines and script books are packed away so I can't check them at this stage. But I think it was something that was dropped from the series early on, possibly even at the pilot stage. It was never a concept that made it into the series.

Cool! So I was right as to the function of the Council.

I knew the Ambasador thing was never in the show, but I didn't know it had been considered. It would have made more sense, but it wouldn't have been terribly pragmatic for TV for a number of reasons.