POLITICS I
In my studies I have noticed a trend where as societies develop their technological understanding of the universe, the level of democracy in those societies decreases proportionally to the amount of progress they have made. It is similar in societies with very low levels of understanding of the universe. So, from hereditary leadership we rose, to hereditary leadership we shall return. The same holds true in Tusadu. The status of Tusadu as a state is fairly loose because Tusadu is a very loose confederacy of a variety of states. Over the years Tusadu has become more centralized, but the Tusadu Confederacy still mostly only manages the foreign affairs of its member states. Tusadu is also now capable of holding a standing army and taxing the member states, it now has a central judicial system to settle disputes between the states, and it does have a democratically elected legislature which does things occasionally.
That final institution, the legislature, is the most interesting of the bunch. To understand why, though, you have to understand the history of Tusadu as a country. When the people of Anhacu first took flight to the stars, it was as a competition between splintered nation-states as it typically is. But this competition never settled even as faster-than-light flight technology was developed. As colony ships reached far-away destinations, they claimed the land in the name of their home country. Then, as they realized their home country didn’t really care about some backwater swamp planet 2,000 light-years away, they declared independence. As these new countries declared independence, they were weak and many of the “common folk” were generally indifferent to the values of freedom and democracy. They just wanted to live their life without getting bombed. So, the architects of many of these new countries placed people who they thought would be good for their countries into spots where they would be an autocrat. Over time some of these governments developed into democratic governments; some never changed; and some turned into hereditary monarchies.
So, with this interesting diversity of governments, the countries decided that they needed some kind of communal body to present themselves to any aliens they may find in the future. It started with about five of them, but over time the Tusadu Confederacy, named for the city on Anhacu where the treaty creating the Confederacy was signed, grew to encompass the majority of states in modern Tusadu space. And everything was fine and great until someone decided that this system, which was working fine, needed a bit more “freedom” and “democracy.” And so, the Confederate Assembly was created, consisting of five representatives from each state. The question then became, well, how would they be chosen?
The key component of democracy, particularly at the scale of billions, is the impartial and comprehensive education of the voter base so that they are capable of making informed decisions. Unfortunately, education, particularly at the scale of billions, is hard. Ironically, the states ruled by a hereditary monarch with absolute power generally have better education then the “free” democratic republics of Tusadu. So, the leaders of the democratic states, generally being corrupt and not caring a whole lot about the quality of life of their citizens, just took the easy way out and said that the people will vote on the representatives and that it will be great and free and you will look the other way while I steal another trillion credits. Some were not this way, thankfully, but the majority ended up like that.
The states ruled by hereditary monarchs and dictators also had a variety of responses. The Confederate Assembly required that the representatives be elected, but it did not state by who. Many of the dictatorial states at this time were not ruled by one person, but by a collection of high-ranking military officials… otherwise known as a military junta. These councils would elect the officials among themselves. Eventually, the national government got on to them though, and so they had to at least pretend like they were holding free and fair elections. For the monarchs, it went much of the same way, although the more intelligent monarchs (although most of them weren’t that intelligent… 400 years of inbreeding doesn’t help) decided that they were going to use loopholes and limitations to get who they wanted in power. They didn’t really need to though—the states with intelligent monarchs generally had the best education in Tusadu… but it wasn’t necessarily impartial. In many of these states, citizens are trained from birth to serve the monarch, and so the concept of democracy was fairly foreign to them. In these cases, they just voted for whoever the monarch told them to. After all, if they’re selected by your deity of choice, then why question them?
And so, that is the story of the Confederate Assembly, the legislature of the Tusadu Confederacy. All this just to pass one resolution per year sending a strongly-worded letter to whoever the villain of the week is… although it is democratic. Somewhat.