Worldbuilding: Social Design and Social Forces

[DShomshak]

Over in the Turakian Age is Seriously Underrated thread, Steve Long mentioned the possibility of publishing a book version of the talk on worldbuilding he gives at conventions. That reminded me: I haven't posted my favorite technique for designing societies. I've shared versions of this essay with several friends and colleagues over the years. Most recently, I adapted it for White Wolf's game Exalted and posted it on a forum for that game. But it can apply anywhere. In fact, it isn't just for Fantasy settings. Y'all might as well have it too. Interested persons might try coming up with Case Study examples drawn from the Turakian Age or other Hero Universe settings.

I'll also break it into bite-size chunks for easier reading.

 

Dean Shomshak

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DESIGNING CULTURES THE SHOMSHAK WAY!

 

Designing made-up societies is a craft, and like any craft you can get better at it. Here is one of the techniques I use in critiquing and designing societies for game settings. I’ll draw examples from Exalted, but what I’m talking about will work for any kind of setting.

 

Be warned: I draw on a notion I took from a book about history and social science, but I’m not a historian or social scientist. Experts can probably tear all of this apart. This essay gives suggestions for gamers, not a technical discussion for scholars.

 

THE GOAL: While world-building can be fun in its own right, the purpose for a game is to create an exciting and memorable setting for the PCs’ adventures. Preferably, for more than one adventure: If you go to the trouble to make a cool setting, you want to get plenty of use from it, yes? And if your players think the setting is cool, they will want to see more of it.

 

THE PROBLEM: All too often, a game writer had one idea for a society, and didn’t look for a second. The resulting society looks boring or gimmicky or just doesn’t make sense when you look at it closely. Exalted fell into this trap early in 1st ed, with “gimmick” cultures such as Chaya, Varangia or Paragon, and the setting has struggled to get out ever since.

 

Even if it’s a cool gimmick, building a society around just one idea limits the stories you can tell about it. Fine, the PCs had a fun adventure coping with the Chayans’ yearly freak-out. [Did you ever see "Return of the Archons," in ST: TOS? It's that.] Then what?

 

There’s no sense that a country could be a real place, with people who have lives apart from when the PCs show up. (To use Tolkien’s terminology, it does not inspire secondary belief.) It’s hard to care about such a setting or the people who live in it.

 

ONE PARTIAL SOLUTION: To make a culture more interesting, start by looking at it from more than one perspective. Real people never lead simple, one-dimensional lives: Neither should the people of your imaginary world.

 

Then use the different aspects of the society to generate factions and conflicts, both internal and external. These conflicts, in turn, present members of the society with choices — and choices are the stuff of drama. But that’s a subject for another essay.

 

[DShomshak]

Part Two:  THE PENTANGLE OF ALL-ENCOMPASSING POWER

 

Lucky for you, social scientists already came up with a set of perspectives by which you can view your made-up society: Social Forces. I learned about them from a course on Introduction to Historical Analysis, and have found them useful. (Specifically, see Carl G. Gustavson, A Preface to History, though I have changed Gustavson’s ideas somewhat.) Examining a society through the filter of each social force won’t guarantee your society is cool, fun and playable, but by Gods, it will work and you will know that society inside and out.

 

"Social Forces" are ways in which people and groups, including governments, can get things done. There are many specific forms of power, but they fall into (appropriately) five general categories: Political, Economic, Ideological, Military and Technical power. In most societies, all five forces are at work to some degree, but a few may dominate. Look at a society from these perspectives to see how it works, who has power, how they use it and what they want.

 

POLITICAL power comes first because all other forms of social power comment on it to some degree. Political power is all-pervasive, yet becomes shifty and circular when you look at it closely. In brief, though, this form of power grows out of the social structure itself. Somebody has to make decisions for the society, so societies invent ways to appoint Deciders. Political power is legitimate, in that most people agree that certain individuals have a right to tell the rest what to do. Usually, this act of collective make-believe is so ingrained that nobody notices it. In short, "Do what I say because I am the person who says what to do."

 

Most importantly, political power is "whoever" power: whoever holds the office, gets the power. If they leave the office, they lose the power. The other social forces tend to create or define their own offices, without regard to pre-existing social structures or notions of legitimacy. Given time, though, power entrenches itself and becomes routine and political. Once an institution appears, its members try to perpetuate it, entrench it in society and maybe even extend its powers. The institutional drive for self-preservation and expansion is another aspect of political power.

 

Examples of this social force include kinship and hereditary leadership: The authority of parent over child is the first and oldest form of political power. Smaller societies may structure themselves entirely through kinship. Other examples of political social structures include elections, courts and judges, and any sort of social contract. How does your society decide who gives the orders? ... Even if these “legitimate” leaders aren’t the people with the real power. What entrenched institutions will resist any attempt to change society? Conversely, what institutions might back a person who seems likely to aggrandize their power?

 

Case Study: The Scarlet Empire. Her Redness began as utterly illegitimate. She had the biggest beat-stick in Creation, though, and most other institutions were in ruins. She made herself legitimate through the Thousand Mazy Paths of the Realm bureaucracy: Final decisions were not possible without her to resolve bureaucratic conflicts. She also had parental authority over the Scarlet Dynasty, even if this was not explicitly coded into law.

 

Case Study: The Haslanti League has an explicit political system, consciously designed by the nation’s founders as a social contract between the various city-states and classes of Haslanti society. While the election process is cumbersome, it ensures the many divisions of Haslanti society believe their interests are all represented at the highest level of power.

 

Case Study: An-Teng’s matriarchal clans are an implicit political structure, maintained by pure tradition. Men ostensibly dominate business and politics… but only so long as their grandmothers allow it. The Three Princes — hereditary monarchs who nominally rule An-Teng — simultaneously show fealty to the Realm and to native traditions through the legal fiction that the Scarlet Empress is the matriarch of their “clan.”

 

Dean Shomshak

 

 

[DShomshak]

Part Three:

 

ECONOMIC power is control of the production and distribution of goods and services. As the old saw goes, it's the Golden Rule: "Whoever has the gold, makes the rules." (Though in Creation, it’s silver, salt or jade.)

 

Economic power means a lot more than mere wealth, though. Farmers and artisans wield economic power because other people need what they produce. As a society becomes more complex, exercises of economic power can include control over hiring and firing, wages, prices, transport of goods, consumer boycotts, national fiscal policy, striking for health benefits... on and on.
 

Sometimes, economic entities such as corporations or trade guilds get mixed up in government. If the businesses create a government, you have Syndicalism, with the Italian merchant princes as RL examples. If the government directly controls economic activity, you have Socialism, more or less. Other forms of economic power include land ownership (particularly in pre-technological, agrarian societies) and plutocracy (political power explicitly limited to people with great wealth, however that's defined, from livestock to corporate stock).

 

How does your society organize itself to produce and distribute the necessities of life? Or the luxuries? What are the necessities and luxuries? What do people eat? (How people feed themselves may be the most basic economic issue.) Who has the wealth, and how do they get it and keep it?

 

Case Study: The Realm’s system of banking and jade scrip is both a source and exercise of economic power. The conversion rates between jade scrip and actual jade make the system deeply unstable without the Empress backing it up through her possibly imaginary Privy Purse. However, loss of faith in the system would harm just about every power broker on the Blessed Isle — so the Great Houses play along. For now.

 

Case Study: The Guild. Duh. See Masters of Jade.

 

Case Study: The Lap indentures everyone at a young age as a way to control their labor for state benefit. Officially, no one has a chance to gain private wealth until they are over 43, or acquire any privilege they can pass along to their children. Unofficially, money talks as loudly in the Lap as anywhere else.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

[DShomshak]

Part Four:

 

IDEOLOGICAL power is the power of belief. Political power arises from the social structure, but ideology claims authority beyond the social structure, and tries to create its own social order. Ideological leaders justify their power in ways that have nothing to do with decision-making: The Pope is Christ's vicar on Earth, so if you believe in Christ you should obey the Pope. Or, the Communist Party will create the utopian Classless Society, so you should obey the Party. Even mob rule is a savage form of ideological power, driven by primitive ideologies such as "Let's Get What's Ours From Those Rich Bastards" or "Keep Those Dirty <Insert Ethnic Minority> In Their Place." Cults of personality are also examples of ideological power — a belief in the superhuman qualities of the Great Leader. On a brighter note, abolitionist and civil rights movements demand that societies change their structures for the sake of fairness, inalienable rights endowed by a Creator, or other transcendent ideals. Whatever the ideology, followers believe that they act as the vehicle for some greater power and purpose: "I'm on a mission from God."

 

Theocracy — rule by a god or divine representative, such as a priest-king or church — is one manifestation of ideological power, but other forms can exist. What transcendent values does your society endorse? Or at least claim to endorse? Who defends and promotes these beliefs, and how, and what privileges do they claim for doing so?

 

Case Study: The Scarlet Empire operates in symbiosis with the ideology of the Immaculate Order. It doesn’t matter, the Order says, what you think of your Dragon-Blooded master personally. The Dragon-Blooded are higher beings, and disobedience to them violates the fundamental order of Creation.

 

Case Study: Halta and Linowan have spent centuries locked in a religious war over which type of forest is better, evergreen or deciduous. What began as a spat between their patron gods has become a mutual hatred so deep and pervasive that either society would likely disintegrate if it gave up the war — it’s one of the few things every member of these far-flung wilderness empires has in common.

 

Case Study: Sijan exists to honor the dead. Everyone wants a little respect when they die, and Sijan serves that purpose. Its holy mission lets Sijan remain neutral and unarmed; its morticians travel unmolested. Any warlord, prince or bandit chief who ordered an attack on Sijan would find his own troops in revolt, and not just from fear of revenge from angry ghosts. Desecrating the dead, and their keepers, is just wrong.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

[DShomshak]

Part Five:

 

MILITARY power is simple and obvious. "Do what I say, or I'll kill you." Or for a slightly subtler form, protection from enemies and dangers: "Do what I say, or they'll kill you." Or "Do what I say, and I'll kill them," if people feel aggressive.

 

Military organizations can achieve political legitimacy if they adopt rules of conduct, a chain of command, and other formalities. A military might even take over ordinary social and political functions. Warlords, on the other hand, make no pretence of legitimacy. In this mode, soldiers don't follow a chain of command; they are personally loyal to the warlord (if only to the warlord's money). Criminal organizations often show aspects of military power, even if the criminals don't explicitly rob people: They use force to protect their turf and profits from other criminals and to intimidate legitimate authorities.

 

In your society, who uses violence to gain power and get what they want? (Besides the PCs!) Is their use of force sanctioned by some other group, or is it raw threat of force?

 

Case Study: The Realm Defense Grid is the greatest source of military power within Creation. (It is arguable whether the Daystar counts as “within Creation,” and anyway it is rather firmly kept out of human hands.) The Realm’s legions, however, are far from insignificant. The satrapy system ultimately rests on the threat of retribution by the occupying legions.

 

Case Study: Through the Staff of Peace and Order, the Perfect of Paragon literally holds the lives of his subjects in his hands. His subjects can die if they consciously violate his law. This is not as sweet for the Perfect as you might think… But every citizen knew the deal when they swore their oath on the Staff, legitimizing his power. Swearing the oath keeps them safe, from foreign attack and from each other. No small thing, in a dangerous world.

 

Case Study: The Mask of Winters maintains a façade of government in Thorns, but he is about the most brutally illegitimate a warlord-conqueror one could imagine.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

[DShomshak]

Part Six:

 

TECHNICAL power is the power of specialized knowledge and skills. Scientists and inventors possess technical power because their discoveries and inventions change what people can do and what they know. The priests of Egypt held technical power because of their monopoly on writing, the calendar and geometry. Nowadays, lawyers wield technical power because the law is so complicated that only a specialist can understand it. Any group based on technical power can claim authority on the grounds that only its members possess some skill that society needs to function, whether the skill is writing, law, engineering or alchemy: "Leave it to us, we know what to do."

 

What does your society treat as specialized skills and knowledge? Who has power through their possession of such skills? How do they use it?

 

Case Study: The Realm may appear somewhat weak in the field of technical power (though the sorcerers of the Heptagram qualify as possessors of specialized knowledge, and so do the artisans who increase the Dynasty’s panoply of artifacts). Keep in mind, though, that the complex bureaucracy of the Thousand Scales is a form of technical power. Prudent Realm-folk should not ask how much that power is meant to assure competent administration and how much it screens the people who really run things.

 

Case Study: In Creation, shamanism is not always coupled with piety. Small gods and elementals have power; the shaman develops special skills to chivvy the spirits into using their power for the benefit of the tribe (or at least not to use their power to its detriment). While shamans might learn thaumaturgy for this purpose, just the diplomatic skill to bribe, browbeat, wheedle or otherwise persuade a spirit is a form of technical power.

 

Case Study: The astrologers of Varangia decide everyone’s occupation, as well as the times to initiate war and peace and just about everything else. Their divinations are real, if not infallible. This assurance that everyone and everything is in the right place, doing the right thing at the right time, makes Varangia an example of a government that is explicitly based on technical power.

 

AFTERWORD

 

Keep in mind that every social force can affect the other four, and institutions often combine more than one social force. In the Scarlet Empire, for instance, the military occupation of the satrapies brings in the tribute that enriches the Great Houses and opens the way for Immaculate missionaries. The Lap’s enormous food surplus, an economic resource, is used tactically to reward and punish societies through half the South. Or, the Varangians guide their lives through astrology because of an ideology that elevates stasis as a social goal, and ordains astrology as a way to achieve it.

 

Conversely, activities and institutions that seem similar might operate within a context of different social forces. For instance, look at religion in Creation: The Immaculate Order is explicitly ideological; but shamanism is often an exercise of technical power. A god who extorts worship by threatening mortals uses military power, whereas a god who promises boons in return for worship enters into an economic relationship. Spirits can even become legitimate heads of state, as the Syndics of Whitewall have done — albeit by promising safety and prosperity as well as honest and competent government.

 

As an exercise, you might look at a country’s description in the CoTD books and see how each social force operates within it. If you want to use a country as the core setting for a campaign, the Pentangle of All-Encompassing Power can suggest areas to develop your own material.

 

Dean Shomshak

I'll post some further addemda tomorrow, but I'm sicj of getting posts merged and having to edit them apart again.

[Steve Long]

Great stuff as usual, Dean!

[L. Marcus]

Again! Again!

[DShomshak]

Incidentally, I re-watched the ST: TOS episode "Journey to Babel" the other night, and it gave a good example of using the Five Forces to create and develop a dramatic situation. The Enterprise is carrying a bunch of ambassadors to a special meeting on admitting the planet Coridan to the Federation -- a political shindig, and giving a glimpse of how the Federation operates. Coridan is of special interest because it's rich in dilithium crystals -- the economic angle. That wealth creates conflict between those who want to secure the crystals for the Federation while ensuring the Coridanians enjoy the profits, and those who see advantage in getting the crystals at the expense of the Coridanians. Some of those exploiters are outside the Federation; some, it is hinted, are inside. But the stakes are high enough that someone is willing to commit murder and try to destroy the Enterprise -- perhaps unraveling the Federation in war -- for the militaryt angle.

 

On the personal scale, Spock won't turn over command when Kirk is injured, even to save his father's life, because Vulcan ideology places duty above personal interest. As he points out to his human mother, his father would agree with his reasoning. Technical power enters peripherally through the mystery of the attacking ship, which seems impossibly powerful for its size -- though Spock figures it out, and Kirk is suspicious when he sees the ship uses ordinary (if powerful) phasers. And Uhura finds the spy by localizing the transmissions to the attacking ship.

 

Dean Shomshak

[DShomshak]

BUILDING GOVERNMENTS

 

So far, I've discussed using the Pentangle analytically. You can also work synthetically, starting with particular forces and building societies around them. A fully developed society will involve all five forces, but a government might emphasize one or two. Examples follow.

 

These examples also use Aristotle's classification of governments as autocratic/monarchic (one person rules), aristocratic/oligarchic (a small group or class rules), or democratic/pluralistic (a large segment of the population rules, at least in theory). When I went looking for some systematic guide to all possible governments, I found Aristotle gave the first analysis, and apparently nobody had done anything since. So I tried using social forces as an aid to see new possibilities.

 

SAMPLE POLITICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

DEMOCRACY: Pluralistic. Government by taking a vote on all decisions. The voting franchise may be limited in various ways. Purely political franchise limits include: by gender (ANDROCRACY, GYNOCRACY); by age (GERIATOCRACY); by race (ETHNOCRACY). (For instance, ancient Athens was a pure democracy, but only freeborn male property-owners could vote.)

 

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC: Pluralistic. Government by elected officials. Both who can vote, and who is eligible for office, may be limited in various political or non-political ways.

 

Note that for all elective forms of government, voting franchise limitations can be Ideological as well as Political, depending on how conscious the people are of the limitation. If the limitation is practiced just because of tradition (“But women have never had the vote!”) and the government doesn’t have to work to maintain the limit, then the government remains purely political. If the limitation is conscious — indeed, if the government claims to be legitimate because of its limited franchise (“God has commanded that women shall ever be slaves to their husbands, and the State upholds the will of God”) — then the government becomes ideological.

 

ELECTIVE DICTATORSHIP: Autocratic/Pluralistic. The head of state has absolute power, but is elected by popular vote or by a parliament. The position may be for life, or may be limited by a fixed term of office or some means of popular deposition. (Roman Republic dictators were appointed by the Senate in times of emergency and held office for one year.)

 

ELECTIVE MONARCHY: Autocratic. The head of state’s power is more or less absolute, but the monarch is elected from a pool of candidates who are considered legitimate for some reason — anything from aristocratic birth to omens. (Late Medieval Poland apparently used something like this.)

 

HEREDITARY ARISTOCRACY: Oligarchic. A confederacy of nobles, clan chiefs or other politically-defined hereditary leaders.

 

HEREDITARY MONARCHY: Autocratic. The head of state is legitimated by descent from the previous monarch. Selection is theoretically automatic, although in practice disputes arise about who is the proper, legitimate heir. The monarch may be absolute or their power may be limited through a constitution.

 

JUDICRACY: Oligarchic. Rule by judges, on the theory that all government is basically arbitration between competing interests. Judges could be elected, hereditary, or for a pure judicracy, appointed by other judges.

 

MATRIARCHY/PATRIARCHY: Autocratic. Government by the oldest woman or man in the ruling family. This sort of government is limited to societies organized by kinship.

 

SENATORIAL REPUBLIC: Oligarchic. Government by voting, but the franchise is limited to non-elected heads of aristocratic families. (I guess the Roman Republic began this way, though there were also "Popular Assembles" I don't know much about. Later some purely elected offices were added. Rome's such a big inspiration for Fantasy cultures, I really should look this stuff up.)

 

Dean Shomshak

[DShomshak]

ECONOMIC GOVERNMENTS

 

FEUDALISM/MANORIALISM: Landowners govern tenants.

 

PLUTOCRACY: Only those with sufficient wealth have power.

 

SOCIALISM: Government controls, or at least influences, production and distribution of goods and services. (Yes, I know that's a gross over-simplification of socialism.)

 

SYNDICRACY: Oligarchic/Pluralistic. Major business leaders have taken over (de facto or de jure) government functions. One leader may emerge as a dominant “merchant prince,” but this leader often remains “first among equals” rather than a true autocrat. If corporate managers and owners control the government, this is CORPORATE SYNDICRACY. If the government is run by trade unions, it is GUILD SYNDICRACY.

 

Syndicracy does not preordain any particular standards of freedom, enfranchisement or civil rights. Such a state could range from totalitarian, in which people are controlled through drugs and constant surveillance, to virtual anarchy, in which anyone can get away with anything if they have enough money.

 

Dean Shomshak

IDEOLOGICAL GOVERNMENTS

CAESAROPAPISM: Secular leader is also the head of an ideological organization, such as a Church or Party. The head of government appoints the acting directors of the Church or Party.

 

CHARISMATIC: “Cult of personality.”

 

PARTY RULE: Only members of an ideological organization are enfranchised.

 

THEOCRACY: Autocratic. Rule by a supposed god or divine representative such as a High Priest.

 

Although normally there is just one head of state, oligarchic forms are possible through juntas (a “college of cardinals”) or a confederacy of cults or cultic states.

 

Dean Shomshak

[DShomshak]

Oh, frack. Well, they were short posts anyway.

 

[DShomshak]

MILITARY GOVERNMENTS

 

STRATOCRACY: Autocratic/Oligarchic. Rule by leader or leaders of a military organization which has siezed power by raw force. There may be just one leader, or a junta of high ranking officers. Stratocracies are notably unstable. (Many Third World nations have been stratocracies.) Also called an ARMY STATE or POLICE STATE.

 

 

WARLORDISM: Oligarchic. There is no real government, just leaders of non-legitimate militias. Whatever the militias may call themselves, they are really just bandits. The warlords are probably all mutually hostile. (Somalia was a classic case of warlordism.)

 

There's really not much to say, here. It's hard to build a government on nothing but the use or threat of force. Or maybe I just lack imagination.

 

Dean Shomshak

[Steve Long]

I remember discussing governments with you, aeons ago, using that strange form of communication we now know as "snail mail."   I think I still have those letters around somewhere, though it would probably take me a while to find them.

[DShomshak]

TECHNICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

BUREAUCRACY: Power through providing specialized social services, administered according to complex rules. Arguably, rule by no one, as it is notoriously difficult to find anyone who holds clear responsibility for decisions.

 

 

CRYPTOCRACY: Oligarchic. Rule by secret society or other hidden, illegitimate authority. The secret society’s power is technical in the sense that the conspirators know how to create and use channels of power hidden from most people, and how to manipulate the system of government. (Other forms of power may be involved as well, based on how the conspirators gained access to power in the first place.)

 

GNOSTARCHY: Autocratic. Rule by some “infallible expert”; the usual ruler in science fiction is a super-computer (making the state a CYBERARCHY). Whatever its nature, the super-administrator controls all services, including judging disputes and maintaining order, and tracks everyone’s activities. Such a system could range from totalitarian to anarchic, depending on how much control over people the super administrator exerts. A computer, for instance, might be programmed to run the society with totalitarian, clockwork efficiency, or it might be programmed to permit virtual anarchy.

 

Of course, for the system to be purely technical, the super-administrator really must be infallible. If the system only works because people believe in it or that the leader has divine sanction, the gnostarchy gains political or ideological aspects.

 

PSYCHOCRACY: Oligarchic. Rule by mind control. Methods of mind control include media manipulation, psychoactive drugs, mass brainwashing, brain implants and ray devices. While the elite may control the masses directly, psychocracy would seem most effective if the elite operated in secret, making the state also a cryptocracy.

 

DIRECT TECHNOCRACY: Probably oligarchic. Literal rule through exclusive control of some vital skill or technological resource.

 

LOOSE TECHNOCRACY: Oligarchic to pluralistic. Only people meeting standards of education or skill are enfranchised.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

 

[DShomshak]

Ah, yes, back when dinosaurs walked the Earth and we scratched messages on tree bark (well, something made from dead trees anyway!) and gave them to complete strangers called "Mailmen" in hopes they would someday arrive at their destination. 😀

 

Anyway, things get juicier when you build governments on two forms of social power.

 

POLITICAL/ECONOMIC GOVERNMENTS

 

FABIAN SOCIALISM: Pluralistic. The government controls major industries and sets many wages and prices. Conversely, trade unions and industrial leaders may have quasi-governmental status. (The United Kingdom and the Scandinavian nations have been run this way, and some might still be; I haven't kept up.)

 

HEREDITARY SYNDICRACY: Autocratic/Oligarchic. The Company owns everything, and one person or a small cadre of persons have inherited de facto ownership of the Company.

 

LABOR DEMOCRACY/REPUBLIC: Pluralistic. Only members of trade unions or guilds can vote or hold office.

 

PLUTODEMOCRACY/REPUBLIC: Oligarchic/Pluralistic. Only people with sufficient wealth can vote or hold office. Wealth may be measured in terms of income, land ownership, corporate stock or other ways. The British House of Commons was originally oligarchic, in that the number of voters in an MP's district might be in low double digits. Or signle digits. Or none? Maybe some expert in British history can explain what "Rotten Boroughs" were all about.

 

SOVIET SOCIALISM: Oligarchic/Pluralistic. Trade unions form a council which determines wages, prices and production quotas, but also performs general legislative functions, not just industrial policy. Whether the system is oligarchic or pluralistic depends on how much influence the union members have on their leaders or representatives in the council. Or indeed, on whether the unions have real power at all.

 

SYNDICATE SOCIALISM: Oligarchic. Dominant companies organize a council to control the government; the council’s legislative powers go beyond just industrial and trade policies. The CEOs and major stockholders form the oligarchy.

 

POLITICAL/IDEOLOGICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

CAESARISM: Autocratic. Rule by “The Great Man.” It doesn’t really matter how the leader first gained power, the leader is now unassailable because of his charisma. The “Caesar” keeps power by promising everything to everyone, to keep all the factions happy. This invariably means contradictory promises, and everybody knows it, but everybody thinks that they might get what they want — and is sure that the nation will fall apart without the Great Leader’s charismatic presence. (Recent examples include Charles deGaulle in France and Juan Peron in Argentina, leading to the other names of this style of government: Gaullism and Peronism.)

 

HIEROMONARCHY: Autocratic. An extreme form of Caesaropapism, in which the hereditary autocrat (the king) is also High Priest of the religion. Although the office is hereditary, kings might be deposed if they seem unsuccessful at winning favors from the gods. (The Maya city-states were hieromonarchies. The kings kept their office through religious pageantry and glory in war — which would make the Maya states ideological/military, except that Mayan warfare might have been so formalized that it was practically a religious ritual itself.)

 

PARTY DEMOCRACY/REPUBLIC: Pluralistic, at least in theory. Only members of a secular but highly ideological Party can vote or hold office.

 

PARTY DICTATORSHIP: Autocracy. The details of the Party ideology don’t matter. The dictator controls the Party and through the Party controls the organs of government. Such a state probably has an extensive secret police, propaganda and purges to keep the dictator in power. The system experiences great instability whenever the dictator dies. (See the Soviet Union, the People’s Republic of China, Cuba, and so on. Though China seems to have stabilized in the last few decades, without repeating the chaos after Mao's death and the fall of the "Gang of Four.")

 

THEODEMOCRACY/REPUBLIC: Pluralistic. Only members of the right cults or churches can vote or hold office. The necessary level of initiation may vary, from all congregation members to only priests.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

[DShomshak]

POLITICAL/MILITARY GOVERNMENTS

 

FEUDAL WARLORDISM: Oligarchic. People depend on manorial lords (or some analog, such as regional crime bosses) for protection. In return, the lord controls their production of goods and services. Each hereditary warlord is independent of the others. A constant threat permits a highly authoritarian society. The threat could be the other warlords, bandit tribes replenished by runaways from the manors, native wildlife or imaginary threats such as witches or demons. (Medieval Europe saw a lot of this.)

 

POLICE STATE DICTATORSHIP: Autocratic. This differs from a direct stratocracy in that some method exists for orderly transition of power from one dictator to the next. Each dictator may spend years grooming a successor, so that when the dictator dies the designated successor already has an unassailable position. Of course, the successor may speed things along by murdering the dictator.

 

If the society is authoritarian, the people are kept in line by terror and propaganda about domestic and foreign “enemies.” If the society is libertarian (very unlikely), laws are generally lax — but if one gets in the way of an officer, one faces summary execution.

 

STRATODEMOCRACY/REPUBLIC: Pluralistic. Only present or former members of the military (or paramilitary organizations like the police) can vote; or only military members are eligible for public office. (Robert Heinlein described a stratorepublic in Starship Troopers.)

 

POLITICAL/TECHNICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

CIVIL SERVICE BUREAUCRACY: Oligarchic. Rule by civil service experts. The heads of the civil service bureaus may be elected or appointed by some other body, but in practice they are largely autonomous. (Imperial China was a classic civil service bureaucracy. The bureaucrats were appointed by the Emperor, but the Emperor’s legitimacy depended on “the Mandate of Heaven,” which sounds religious, but really depended on how well the Emperor and bureaucracy kept China peaceful and prosperous.)

 

TECHNODEMOCRACY/REPUBLIC: Pluralistic. Only people meeting certain standards of intelligence, education or skills can vote or hold office. SCIENTOCRACY, rule by scientists and technologists, is an extreme form and may be oligarchic. (Again, this sort of government has been used in about a zillion sci-fi stories.) MAGOCRACY could be the same idea, if magic is something people learn rather than an inborn talent.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

[DShomshak]

ECONOMIC/IDEOLOGICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

SYNDICOPAPACY: Autocratic/oligarchic. The economic controller sets up or usurps the religion — or conversely, the Church assumes control of economic functions. Perhaps priestly bankers?

 

SOCIALIST DICTATORSHIP: Autocratic. The dictator is an ideological leader (Party Secretary, High Priest or a God-King who owns everything) and the State controls production and distribution of goods and services.

 

ECONOMIC/MILITARY GOVERNMENTS

 

EXTORTIVE STATE: Autocratic/Oligarchic. The government survives by using its military power to extort tribute from other states. This may not help the common people much, but by distributing booty the government can keep the military happy. Extortive states may begin through outright robbery or piracy. (Late in the Roman Empire, barbarian tribes often practiced this sort of extortion. The pirates of Tripoli ran an extortive state more recently.)

 

FEUDAL MANORIALISM: Oligarchic. Land tenancy (the only means of production) is linked to military organization (the fortified manor and service to a liege). The nobles hold power because of their ability to defend the manorial production unit, and because the tenants are virtually helpless. Manorialism implies poor transportation and constant danger of conflict: while there may be an official chain of command from monarch to manor lord, in practice there is little central control. (Feudal manorialism was almost universal in Medieval Europe. It’s been pretty common in Latin America, too: if anyone disagrees with the Padrone, they don’t get a job on the plantation, and starve. Or the death squad makes them disappear.)

 

KLEPTOCRACY: Autocratic/Oligarchic. Government fused with organized crime, either because a crime syndicate has taken over the government or because the government is so corrupt that it has become a crime syndicate. Either way, the state’s funds are treated as personal funds by the leader or leaders. Instead of serving the populace, the government loots the nation for the benefit of a tiny ruling class, and only force or threat of force keeps the leaders in power. (The U.S. State Department once officially listed the African nation Zaire as a kleptocracy. For years, that nation’s Pres. Mobutu treated its government as a personal cash cow, and used its army to keep himself in power.)

 

SLAVE STATE: Oligarchic. The ruling class uses force to keep most of the population in serfdom for its own profit. (The American South was a slave state. The South American and Caribbean sugar plantation colonies were even more extreme and brutal.)

 

ECONOMIC/TECHNICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

TECHNOPLUTOCRACY: Autocratic/Oligarchic. Someone’s inventions or technical services makes them so amazingly rich they can pretty much buy the entire government — and do so. (Bill Gates once seemed to be heading in this direction, and more recent techno-plutocrats may show more interest. The use of social media to influence voters may also develop this way, though so far the interests seem to be more ideological or geopolitical.)

 

TECHNOSOCIALISM: Oligarchic. The society depends on automated production. An information-gathering system finds what people need. The system may virtually run itself, or it may need an elite class of programmers and repairmen, but whoever owns the production units will have great power.

 

Dean Shomshak

[DShomshak]

IDEOLOGICAL/MILITARY GOVERNMENTS

 

ETHNIC MEGALOMANIA: Usually autocratic. An ideology of racial purity is used to mobilize the population to conquer other states and to stifle dissent. (Nazi Germany, of course.)

 

FUEHRER PRINZIP: Autocratic. The dictator has been virtually deified, and the ideology is one of conquest. Military power is wielded internally to stifle dissent, and externally to keep the populace distracted. (As the name suggests, Nazi Germany was the classic case here, too. Similar elements could come together in other cultures.)

 

MILITANT THEOCRACY: Autocratic. The god and the Church demand Holy War against the infidel. (Islam has produced this sort of state several times. Christianity is not innocent of this either.)

 

OCHLOCRACY: Pluralistic/Autocratic. “Mob rule”: people riot to get what they want, or rather what charismatic demagogues convince them they want. The ideological element comes from the techniques of demagogues. It’s primitive and it isn’t pretty, but it’s still ideology. (The French Revolution saw instances of ochlocracy. Fortunately, ochlocracy is always short lived. Unfortunately, it usually ends with someone making themselves dictator.)

 

IDEOLOGICAL/TECHNICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

CYBERTHEOCRACY: Autocratic. The Computer is God. Trust the Computer. Oy. (Several episodes of ‘Star Trek’ featured cybertheocracies.)

 

MANTOCRACY: Autocratic/Oligarchic. Rule by sages, oracles or prophets whose charisma and presumed divine skills and infallibility win them leadership. (This differs from Gnostarchy in the religious awe which surrounds the oracles.)

 

TECHNOTHEOCRACY: Autocratic/Oligarchic. Techno-priesthood, running the state through a monopoly on technological skills. There may be a single “god” or High Priest, or an oligarchy of a “college of cardinals,” a council of allied cult leader or a federal state. (Fritz Leiber gave a brilliant portrait of a sci-fi technotheocracy in Gather, Darkness! but ancient Egypt fit this pattern in real life.)

 

MILITARY/TECHNICAL GOVERNMENTS

 

ECOCRACY: Oligarchic. Rule by control of vital life support resources. This implies a science fiction setting such as a space station, where everyone is utterly dependent on carefully-managed machinery for everything. The technicians then have immense, extortive (and therefore military) power: do what they say, or they’ll shut off your air. The phone and power companies practice a weaker form of ecocracy against people who don’t pay their bills. As its name suggests, ecocracracy also has an aspect of economic power, and will be Economic/Military instead if the vital resource does not depend on people with specialized skills.

 

HYPERKLEPTOCRACY: Autocratic. Rule by supervillain. The dictator controls some unique power or weapon which lets them quash all opposition. This could be as splashy as a James Bond-style superweapon or as subtle as a computer system that monitors and manipulates bank accounts. Or for this thread, the classic sorcerous Dark Lord such as Kal-Turak fills the bill: Great knowledge of the arcane grants vast power, which in turn enables the Dark Lord to recruit Legions of Terror and try to ruuuule the world!

 

Dean Shomshak

 

[L. Marcus]

Nitpick: the consuls of the Roman republic had a term of one year; the dictators had a term of six months. Unless, like Sulla and Caesar, you got the senate to name you dictator in perpetuity. Sulla gave up his power when he'd finished his " restoration", while Caesar never got the chance to do so because of the stabbings.

[archer]

16 minutes ago, L. Marcus said:

Nitpick: the consuls of the Roman republic had a term of one year; the dictators had a term of six months. Unless, like Sulla and Caesar, you got the senate to name you dictator in perpetuity. Sulla gave up his power when he'd finished his " restoration", while Caesar never got the chance to do so because of the stabbings.

 

I've read a socioeconomist argue that the stabbings were a form of election. As is the assassin's bullet.

[L. Marcus]

The sources say there were sixty-plus senators in on the assassination, twenty-seven stabs actually on the corpse, and only one of those actually fatal. Power at a point, eh?

[archer]

21 hours ago, L. Marcus said:

The sources say there were sixty-plus senators in on the assassination, twenty-seven stabs actually on the corpse, and only one of those actually fatal. Power at a point, eh?

 

If you can believe Wikipedia, there were 300 senators at the time. 

 

Considering they all had estates and various responsibilities, I wouldn't be shocked if that 60+ number was at least bare majority of the ones in the city.

[DShomshak]

Bumped for <Mr. R.

[Mr. R]

OK if I Copy Paste this to my Google Drive?