Re: How to organise space
^.^
This all assumes that your empire is not set up like the US, with a strong central government, sitting atop a territory administered by smaller, but loyal provincial governments. At that point, it wouldn't matter where any rebellion happened, the provincial government, or even the planetary government would have the first crack at putting the rbellion down, and Oh, By The Way, the provinvial government would call up the central government and inform them, so that the reinforcements can be on the way sooner.
Think about it this way, notice how secessionist groups never really get going in the US? Conspiracy theories aside, the fact that the Feds are willing to come in on families and religious groups that in no way threaten the stability of the nation as a whole, shows me that on a galactic level, a rather large empire can be created through the use of a federal/state bureaucracy and power system.
Now if a nation gets extremely large, like the Imperium in Traveller, the Galactic Empire in Star Wars, and such, the biggest threat is either systemic corruption in which case, the government system breaks down under its own weight, or the threat of MULTIPLE revolts in disparate areas of the empire, which strains the resources of the state.
Artemis_san
Laramie, WY