Preparation

Attire

Business attire befitting a hard-hitting diplomat, of course! Dress to impress - for the gentlemen, this generally means dress shoes, suit pants, a collared shirt, tie and a suit jacket; for the ladies, this generally means dress shoes, suit pants or a skirt, a collared blouse and perhaps a suit jacket for that professional touch.

That said, the wearing of national business attire is welcome and encouraged.

For the Saturday night social, depending on where you live, there will be time for you to head home and change into your dancing clothes before a fun-filled night of infamous 'after-dark lobbying' (the highlight of the conference for some delegates).

Registration

Registration is where you will meet your Directors and collect your Delegate Packs. These will include your Conference Handbook which will have all the information you need about when things are happening, where to go and what to do. You will also receive your ID, which will identify you as a BrizMUN 2012 Delegate. DO NOT LOSE THIS! It will be your entry pass into the Social Events. It will also have your country's flag on it, to swell your feelings of national pride.

Research - Getting Started

Once you've received your confirmed Committee/Country allocation, you can start to prepare your research. We suggest that you do a minimum of 4-6 hours research. We know everyone is busy, but you really do need to know the basics about your country and your topic in order to make a contribution to your committee. Obviously, feel free to do more research if you have the time - the more you know, the more you will get out of your committee sessions. As our USG for Finance will tell you, there's nothing like a carefully-timed piece of crucial information to leave your opponents speechless and your allies cheering!

To help guide your exploration of your committee's topic, each is narrowed somewhat by the Background Paper (available on the brizmun file dropbox [see committee pages]), which has been lovingly prepared by your awesome Directors and will have a section with suggestions for further research. These will be available for download on your committee's page. If you want to get started before then, though, you could familiarise yourself with the politics and policies of your country, and have a think about who your allies might be. This is always an important consideration, which many Delegates overlook.

A good place to start, for any committee or country, would be UN Data, which contains up-to-date country information and databases on a wide range of topics: http://data.un.org/.

Other sources for research include:

Newspapers
The International Herald Tribune:http://global.nytimes.com/?iht
The Guardian:www.guardian.co.uk/
Sydney Morning Herald:www.smh.com.au/
The Australian:www.theaustralian.news.com.au/
Australian Financial Review: http://afr.com/

News Sites
BBC:http://bbc.co.uk/news
Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/
ABC:www.abc.net.au/

Think Tanks
The Lowy Institute:http://www.lowyinstitute.org/
Centre for Strategic and International Studies:http://csis.org/
Royal Institute of International Affairs - Chatham House: http://www.chathamhouse.org.uk/
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace:http://www.carnegieendowment.org/
Council on Foreign Relations:http://www.cfr.org/
The International Institute for Strategic Studies: http://www.iiss.org/
The Brookings Institute:http://www.brookings.edu/World.aspx
RAND Cooperation:http://www.rand.org/research_areas/international_affairs/

Position Papers

A position paper is a very brief summary of your country's/organisation's position on the topic, as a way of letting other countries know where you stand right from the beginning. Once you've done your research, have a think about what the key issues are to your country in relation to the topic. These should form the basis of your position paper. Your paper should be around 200 words, and can be in whatever format you like. If you need help, a basic but effective structure is to divide your paper into two sections:

A guide to writing the position papers can be found HERE.

1. The first should deal with where your country stands on the issue to date, including any action already taken, and any reasons why.
2. The second should deal with what you would like to see as the end result of your committee's session - what your country thinks can and should be done about the issue.

Please send position papers as attachments to: files@brizmun.org. Please name the files as: 'Committee Abbreviation_Position_Name_Description' or similar. For example: SC_United_States_John_Smith_Position_Paper.

To help guide your research for Position Papers, check out

BBC Country Profiles:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/country_profiles/default.stm
The Economist Country Briefings: http://www.economist.com/countries/
CIA World Factbook:https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook
United Nations Bibliographic Information System:http://unbisnet.un.org/
United Nations Official Document System: http://documents.un.org/
United Nations Treaty Collection:http://treaties.un.org
Treaty Database from the Fletcher School at Tufts University (very useful!):http://fletcher.tufts.edu/multilaterals/

Also see the website of your country's foreign ministry as well as the website of their permanent representation to the UN.

Note that Position Papers are due by April 12th at 5:00pm, and should be emailed to files@brizmun.org as a Word or PDF document, with your Committee and Country in the subject header. Be sure to bring a copy of your position paper to your first committee session on Saturday, April 14th, as they will be presented to the committee in the form of position statements.

Rules of Procedure

The Rules of Procedure is a document that governs the proceedings of committee sessions, including debate, voting, and the particulars of resolution formulation. Please read carefully through the Rules of Procedure to familiarise yourself with how MUN committees are structured. Do not worry if you don't get it the first time (as I didn't either!), these will be explained and practiced with you further during Delegate Training session on Friday, the 13th of April.

The Rules of Procedure is available HERE.

Committee Sessions

Some general pointers to note whilst in Committee Session:

1. Be diplomatic at all times.
2. Take care in presenting an accurate representation of the attitudes, beliefs and foreign policy of the country/organisation you're acting as. Be open to compromise without sacrificing the foreign policy of your country/organisation.

There are three general types of positions:

1. Proactive: Seek to build on what's been done in the past and work towards a solution in for the future.
2. Neutral: Neither seek to build on the past nor do they wish to undermine it. These countries/organisations are usually mediators and power-brokers. In any resolution they can be swing voters.
3. Inactive: country's/organisation which seek to undermine action and delay/halt any future activity.
4. Have fun!

Thanks!

A big thanks to you all for taking the time to make BrizMUN 2012 a fantastic experience for yourself, as well as your fellow Delegates.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at info@brizmun.org. Your Directors and the Secretariat look forward to meeting each and every one of you at BrizMUN 2012!