Architectural Classification

Architectural Classification is the first analytical stage of the Rotation Research Framework.

It identifies the operative form of an eligibility architecture before evaluation under Structural Validity (Module I) and Normative Adequacy (Module II).

Classification identifies:

• institutional scope;

• applicability architecture;

• unit of limitation;

• aggregation architecture;

• nonstandard service integration;

• Eligibility Regime Architecture;

• Transition Architecture;

• convergence; and

• the resulting compound architectural classification.

For a revision to an existing system, classification identifies the antecedent architecture, the successor architecture, and the transition connecting them.

Classification establishes what the governing architecture is. Module I evaluates its structural coherence. Module II evaluates the rule-in-structural-order under the Washington–Madison Doctrine.

Architectural Classification is completed once for each rule, proposal, revision, or formal design and its resulting classification is carried into both analytical modules. It may be performed as part of a complete Framework evaluation or through the standalone instrument below.

How to Classify a Design

Classify the architecture by answering the following five questions in order.

1. What is the institutional and eligibility scope?

Identify:

• the office or governing body covered by the rule;

• whether the institution contains a single office or multiple seats;

• whether the restriction attaches to the person, office, seat, district, chamber, institution, or another defined unit;

• whether service across offices or institutional subdivisions is aggregated; and

• whether separate offices, seats, districts, chambers, or other units create materially distinct eligibility scopes.

This establishes the formal institutional and unit scope of the eligibility architecture.

2. Which persons and classes are governed by the restriction?

Determine whether similarly situated persons are governed by a common eligibility restriction.

A Single-Class Eligibility Regime applies a common governing eligibility restriction across similarly situated persons within the covered office or institution.

A Multi-Class Eligibility Regime assigns different governing eligibility restrictions to defined persons or cohorts. This includes a permanently exempt class that remains governed by an antecedent eligibility regime.

Different antecedent-service counts, remaining eligibility, or transitional positions may occur within a common applicability class when the same governing eligibility restriction applies to all affected persons. Applicability classification follows the operative restriction assigned to each person or class.

Where the supplied materials do not establish the governing applicability classes, classify the Applicability Architecture as Indeterminate.

3. What unit measures eligibility, and how does service aggregate?

Identify:

• elections;

• terms;

• years;

• service;

• mixed units;

• appointments;

• vacancy service;

• partial terms;

• succession service;

• threshold-counting provisions; and

• any other unit used to determine qualifying service.

Determine:

• which service counts;

• when qualifying service begins to count;

• whether qualifying service accumulates continuously or in aggregate;

• the person, office, seat, district, chamber, institution, or other scope across which service aggregates; and

• how nonstandard service is integrated into the eligibility calculation.

Measurement and aggregation describe how qualifying service is counted and combined. The resulting Eligibility Regime Architecture is classified separately in Question 4.

4. What is the Eligibility Regime Architecture?

Determine the steady-state structure governing future eligibility after qualifying service accumulates.

Classify the architecture as:

• Bounded Eligibility Regime — qualifying service reaches a finite point at which eligibility for further authorization becomes non-restorably unavailable;

• Permission-Preserving Regime — the architecture preserves or restores a pathway to future eligibility after a period, interruption, sequence, unit change, or other recurring-permission structure; or

• Structurally Indeterminate Regime — the supplied rule or governing structure does not establish whether future eligibility becomes exhausted or remains available.

Where a Permission-Preserving Regime operates through repeated periods of service separated by required absence or restored eligibility, identify the applicable Stint-Permission structure.

Also identify, where applicable:

• the point at which Eligibility Exhaustion occurs;

• the condition through which eligibility becomes available again;

• any required period of absence or temporary ineligibility;

• sequencing among offices, seats, districts, chambers, or other units;

• Unit-Scope Fragmentation, Cycling-Permissive Architecture, or other recurring-eligibility structures, where applicable; and

• any unresolved feature affecting the steady-state eligibility pathway.

Eligibility Exhaustion is classified only where eligibility for further authorization becomes non-restorably unavailable under the governing architecture.

Eligibility Reset is a transition event and is classified under Question 5. It is not a steady-state Eligibility Regime Architecture.

5. How does the Transition Architecture operate?

Where the material under examination adopts, proposes, or revises an eligibility regime, identify:

• the adoption boundary;

• the antecedent eligibility regime;

• the successor eligibility regime;

• treatment of service completed before the adoption boundary;

• Immediate or Prospective Application;

• Prospective Service Counting, where applicable;

• Eligibility Reset, where applicable;

• Permanent Exemption, including Grandfathering;

• Prospective Cohort Split, where applicable;

• any Finite Transitional Allowance;

• transitional differences in operative eligibility position;

• Equal Application across the transition;

• convergence;

• convergence duration; and

• any expiration or other transition endpoint.

Prospective Service Counting applies the successor eligibility restriction while excluding specified pre-boundary service from the successor calculation.

Eligibility Reset occurs when accumulation under a previously operative eligibility calculation ceases and a new eligibility calculation begins at the transition boundary.

Grandfathering is a form of Permanent Exemption in which a person or cohort remains governed by an antecedent eligibility regime rather than the successor restriction.

A finite transition may place governed persons in different eligibility positions while all remain subject to a common successor rule. Different transitional positions therefore do not by themselves establish a Multi-Class Eligibility Regime.

Convergence records whether and how differentiated transitional positions resolve into a common operative eligibility rule through time.

Institutional context informs how each feature operates. Classification remains grounded in the actual scope, applicability, measurement, Eligibility Regime Architecture, and Transition Architecture established by the governing rule.

What Classification Produces

Architectural Classification produces a structured description across the following dimensions:

Institutional Scope
The office, body, seat, district, chamber, institution, or other unit governed by the rule.

Applicability Architecture
The persons and classes governed by each eligibility restriction.

Unit of Limitation
The elections, terms, years, service, or other unit through which eligibility is measured.

Aggregation Architecture
The person, office, seat, district, chamber, institution, or other scope across which qualifying service accumulates.

Nonstandard Service Integration
The treatment of appointments, vacancies, partial terms, succession service, mixed service, thresholds, and other nonstandard service.

Eligibility Regime Architecture
The steady-state structure governing future eligibility: Bounded, Permission-Preserving, or Structurally Indeterminate, including applicable substructures such as Stint-Permission.

Transition Architecture
The relationship between antecedent and successor regimes, including adoption boundary, antecedent-service treatment, application, Eligibility Reset, Permanent Exemption, cohort differentiation, finite allowances, and other transition structures.

Convergence
Whether and how differentiated transitional positions resolve into a common operative eligibility rule through time.

These dimensions support a compound architectural classification and a neutral structural description. The complete output becomes the controlling architectural input for Structural Validity and Normative Adequacy.

Example Compound Classifications

Examples of compound classifications include:

• Single-Class Bounded Eligibility Regime with Lifetime Aggregation

• Single-Class Permission-Preserving Regime with Stint-Permission Architecture

• Single-Class Bounded Eligibility Regime with Prospective Service-Counting Transition

• Multi-Class Eligibility Regime with Grandfathered Permanent Exemption

• Per-Office Bounded Eligibility Regime with Separate Aggregation

• Permission-Preserving Regime with Cycling-Permissive Architecture Across Separately Limited Units

• Structurally Indeterminate Eligibility Regime

A complete classification records each structural dimension that materially affects the design. Terms describing applicability, measurement, aggregation, Eligibility Regime Architecture, and Transition Architecture remain separately identifiable within the compound description.

Relationship to the Modules

Architectural Classification precedes Structural Validity and Normative Adequacy in the Framework’s analytical sequence and supplies the structural classification used by both modules. The three stages may be executed within a single complete Framework evaluation or through the standalone instruments provided for each stage.

Architectural Classification → Structural Validity (Module I) → Normative Adequacy (Module II)

Each stage has a separate analytical responsibility:

• Architectural Classification identifies the operative architecture and its component structural classifications.

• Structural Validity evaluates whether the classified architecture is coherent, determinate, internally consistent, and mechanically administrable.

• Normative Adequacy evaluates the classified rule within its surrounding structural order across fourteen dimensions under the Washington–Madison Doctrine.

Module I produces an overall finding of Structurally Coherent, Structurally Compromised, or Structurally Incoherent.

A Structurally Coherent finding supplies a determinate structural basis for full normative evaluation. Structurally Compromised or Structurally Incoherent findings identify limitations affecting the scope, confidence, or interpretability of Module II findings.

The complete Architectural Classification and Module I results carry forward as controlling inputs. Each stage preserves findings established by the preceding stage while applying its own analytical responsibility.

Continue into the analytical modules:

→ Structural Validity (Module I)
Structural coherence, determinacy, internal consistency, and administrability of the classified architecture.

→ Normative Adequacy (Module II)
Rule-in-structural-order evaluation across fourteen normative dimensions under the Washington–Madison Doctrine.

→ Case Library
Applied Framework analysis across real-world governance arrangements.

Last updated — August 2026