Fourth Imperium or Fourth Republic?

[EvilDrGanymede]

If I understand the Regency Sourcebook correctly, the Regency seems to be a more democratic institution than the Third Imperium was.

Which makes me wonder why we'd end up with a 'Fourth Imperium'. Perhaps the Regency doesn't survive... but nevertheless, following such a massive reboot of society, wouldn't people want a more democratic way to run their interstellar society? Why does it have to be an Imperium?

 

[William]

Originally posted by Evil Dr Ganymede:
... but nevertheless, following such a massive reboot of society, wouldn't people want a more democratic way to run their interstellar society? Why does it have to be an Imperium?

In the OTU, the original rational for an aristocracy is the communications lag. I do not see that fact changing. And while a democracy could run over a sector (what, roughly 8 weeks to go from one corner to it's opposite. Similar to very early US experiance.) However, get much beyond that? Look at the Rebellion Sourcebook and see how long even the J6 times are.

Representative democracy requires an information flow between the ruled and rulers - the theory that those who are governed must consent to be governed requires that that the governed be fully informed. Pure Locke (and Hooker before that too).

Personally I would probably be really tempted to write in a break of the J6 limit or on FTL commo as a result of the mass war with the Dominion (? That the right group?) to facilitate this. However, then we simply get yet more Yanks in Space...

6 of one; half a dozen of the other.

William

 

[savage]

I agree William.

Never bought into the Imperium surviving without better communications for that long. And a democracy
might actually work worse in the dark.

The Regency works miracles within a 100 yrs; sends fleets towards the core, fights off virus, incorporates Aslan occupied worlds (no racial problems are mentioned despite an invasion) slaps out all the nobles, starts getting tough with the pocket empires, incorporates the darrians (if they wanted in wouldn't they have done it earlier), and starts trying to retake cooridor. The 4th imperium should be shaped differently and not include the Regency. Perhaps its a virus driven dark evil thing.

Anyhow, I always like breaking the 6j barrier, stargates and/or at least partial subspace communications.
Savage

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

OK, fair enough... but IIRC one of MJD's posts implied that the new Emperor was somehow directly linked to the emperors in the Third Imperium (something about the 4I being officially formed once they'd found someone suitable for the Iridium Throne?).

If that's the case, Why bother doing that? If the 3I is gone and dusted, why maintain that link to the past? Why not just start a new 'Royal Family'?

 

[William]

Originally posted by Evil Dr Ganymede:
If that's the case, Why bother doing that? If the 3I is gone and dusted, why maintain that link to the past? Why not just start a new 'Royal Family'?

I can't speak for MJD (bloody obviously I hope), however, there is a long (millenia long) idea that the emperor comes from a select group of families... I am _not_ saying this is correct or anything else, however many of the _public_ may well beleive it.

I once wrote and tossed a "real" Strephon variant based on the old Arthurian mythos. It fits better than it first seems - I think there was more than one sub-conciousness influenced by their childhood reading.

William

 

[daryen]

Originally posted by Savage:
The Regency works miracles within a 100 yrs; sends fleets towards the core, fights off virus, incorporates Aslan occupied worlds (no racial problems are mentioned despite an invasion) slaps out all the nobles, starts getting tough with the pocket empires, incorporates the darrians (if they wanted in wouldn't they have done it earlier), and starts trying to retake cooridor.

The Regency walked a razor's edge.

They did all of these things, but were only barely keeping things together. The RQS was riddled with corruption; massive coverups were just waiting to be found; the Aslan/human conflict was always simmering; the independent Aslan clans bristled at the Quarantine restrictions; the Islands and Sword Worlds were bubbling with unrest; they had disenfranchised nobles running around.

Not to mention the continuous close calls with Virus, their coopting of the Darrians, and the massive flood of Zhodani refugees.

The Regency described in the Regency Sourcebook is ready to explode. It would take only one major incident to cause a massive cascade to run through the Regency ripping it apart.

I don't know exactly what MJD has in mind for how the Regency fails, but even the Regency Sourcebook shows a Regency walking a very, very thin line.

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

Originally posted by William:
I can't speak for MJD (bloody obviously I hope), however, there is a long (millenia long) idea that the emperor comes from a select group of families... I am _not_ saying this is correct or anything else, however many of the _public_ may well beleive it.

Yeah, but I'd imagine that many of the public in 1248 are likely to want to CUT ties with the Third Imperium. It could easily be argued in 1248 that the 3I was responsible for a lot of the problems that afflicted interstellar society for the past century and a bit - they started fighting among themselves, they made Virus, they released it, they destroyed everything. (some of this may be exaggerated, it doesn't matter. 120 years of strife does that to people's perceptions

).

Hence I'm wondering why the people of the new Fourth Imperium would want their society to even remotely resemble the old one that caused them so much pain.

 

[MJD]

There is an assumption here that the 4I is founded by the Regency. It is not.

Indirectly, the Regency is involved in the formation of the 4I, and indeed some of its brightest and best do journey there, leaving behind the failing Regency.

Democracy cannot work over parsec distances with J6 coutrierrs. There is no FTL commo or J6 breakthrough. Therefore, democracy is not an option but for a small state.


The Regecny is a brave experiment, but ultimately doomed to failure. It needs to do too much in a short time, while its problems and internal divisions multiply.

Of the successor states to the Regency, some follow its better ideals, some go their own way and one rejects everything the Imperium ever stood for, yet manages to drag itself down into darkness anyway.

The Fourth Imperium is founded on the concept that the only way to govern over long distances is through trustworthy local leaders owing fealty, allegiance and honour to their far-off superiors, but who are trusted to do what they must within a framework set down by the central commnaders.

This was the ideal of the Third Imperium, and it worked. Once iot became corrupted, it failed. The Emperor Search is simply a quest to find someone that is worthy to lead and rule; for a long time the 4I answers to a council of advisors and a Vacant Throne.

Two pivotal events change that - the emergence of an unlikely paragon in the last hours of the Dominate War, who shows that sometimes central leadership is the only way, and that even the worst people aren't totally evil - and the discovery of a person deemed fit to ascend the Vacant Throne.

The 4th Imperium is smaller than the third, and in many ways it is the core of what the Imperioum should have been - burned clean, purified in the dark days of the Reconstruction, and born of the actions not of generals and admirals, but of diplomats.

History records the founders of the Fourth Imperium as visionaries, but they were not warriors. They were peacemakers.

Their ideal was the man who stopped fighting to sdave his people - Strephon. Though he had more reason than anyone to fight on, he stopped because that was all he could do for his people.

It is that side of the Imperial Nobility that the 4th Imperium reveres. People like Duke Craig, who also refuised to fight for rulership, instead choosing to look after his people. Those are traditions to be proud of.

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

Iiiiiiiinteresting. Very interesting indeed.

Thanks muchly, squire

 

[Anthony]

Yes, it is an item of Traveller canon that democracy cannot work over interstellar distances. IMO this canon is false, though it may well be believed by the people in the Imperium.

If you look at just the Nobles as citizens, the Zhodani have an interstellar representative democracy. Of course, a citizenship rate of a few percent isn't very impressive (and would typically be called an aristocracy or oligarchy), but not an awful lot worse than some historical 'democracies'.

 

[DED]

Originally posted by Anthony:
Yes, it is an item of Traveller canon that democracy cannot work over interstellar distances. IMO this canon is false, though it may well be believed by the people in the Imperium.

If you look at just the Nobles as citizens, the Zhodani have an interstellar representative democracy. Of course, a citizenship rate of a few percent isn't very impressive (and would typically be called an aristocracy or oligarchy), but not an awful lot worse than some historical 'democracies'.

Even the Zhodani Consulate had begun to reach its limit by 1120. Time lags were beginning to affect it as well. Remember it was only 8 sectors (approx) in size, not including the inhabited corridor created by the Core Expeditions. That's roughly 25 weeks to cross it at J6. The 3I took twice as long.

And it's obvious that the Zho's society wasn't perfect either. It started to crumble right around the time of MT. And the refugee problem around 1200 should be even more evident of a major problem.

I'm hoping that Martin will shed some light on this in the TNE sourcebook. Was it solely the EW that broke the Zhos? Or was something else involved. I've heard some pretty interesting speculation, but I'm curious as to what the OTU explanation will be.

 

[Anthony]

Originally posted by DED:
Even the Zhodani Consulate had begun to reach its limit by 1120.

Sure, but is there any reason to assume that a hypothetical '4th Imperium' would be any larger? If you assume the recreation of the Solomani Sphere, and leave the Domain of Deneb independent, the rest of the Empire would be about the same size as the Consulate (and the solomani would also be about the same size).

Doesn't mean it's perfect. It's not an impossible task of government, however.

 

[DED]

Originally posted by Anthony:
Sure, but is there any reason to assume that a hypothetical '4th Imperium' would be any larger? If you assume the recreation of the Solomani Sphere, and leave the Domain of Deneb independent, the rest of the Empire would be about the same size as the Consulate (and the solomani would also be about the same size).

Doesn't mean it's perfect. It's not an impossible task of government, however.

Good point. I guess in that case it's an old Earth bias against democracy. You can't trust the rabble with the power of government. Only a select few are capable of governing.

Or it could be that they've thought things through and decided that w/o FTL comm, interstellar democracy won't work. Better to stick with old methods that are good for a millienia at a time.

 

[EvilDrGanymede]

I get the impression from what MJD's said about it that the Fourth Imperium in 1248 isn't actually that big...

 

[Anthony]

Originally posted by DED:
Or it could be that they've thought things through and decided that w/o FTL comm, interstellar democracy won't work. Better to stick with old methods that are good for a millienia at a time.

This is very true. A major factor in the success of _any_ government is whether the people being governed think it will work. Another major factor is legitimacy. As such, there is a good reason to use the names and symbology of the old Imperium.

As a side point, just because it's called the fourth imperium doesn't require it to be an empire. Plenty of real governments aren't what they call themselves.

 

[Arsulon]

Anthony makes an interesting point about the nature of government sometimes not being reflected in its formal title; for example, the United Kingdom might reasonably be assumed to be a feudal arrangement. Other misleading examples include the Roman Republic, which was very much a territorial (and hegemonic) empire. Athens is another case: we tend to think of it as a democratic city-state, even once it had passed the threshold of empire with its domination of the Delian League.

The Fourth Imperium could have a character entirely different from what we think of as an empire. Likewise, what we think of depends largely on the historical model we're imagining. Does it resemble the Roman Empire? The Spanish? The British? Even the character of those historical models are mediated over time. An excellent example of this is discussed in Simon Schama's History of Britain, in which he explains the unintended transition of Britain from Pitt's "empire of trade" to an empire of conquest (all thanks to those French

)

For all we know, the Fourth Imperium is an economic juggernaut which maintains it dominance through intelligence and commerce, perhaps nurturing a series of client-states on its borders to ensure its defence. Perhaps they have a tiny, but highly professional navy and armed forces tasked with guarding the spacelanes, but otherwise committing itself only to short, sharp actions for limited objectives. Aptly, this would make the 4I akin to early 18th century England: what seems to be the original model for the Third Imperium, which later becomes positively Victorian in its military and political outlook.

 

[savage]

A democracy wouldn't call itself an imperium if I'm reading the comment clearly. That would be counter productive. Unless only certain peoples voted.

More than likely those little Vilani (recording and printing everything) or virus would found the 4I.
Actually if the regency should versus a new imperium it would be an interesting contradiction. I could also see either trying to claim such authority.
The vilani might even be dangerous if the had vargr support. Just a thought...

Savage

 

[Anthony]

Originally posted by Savage:
A democracy wouldn't call itself an imperium if I'm reading the comment clearly. That would be counter productive. Unless only certain peoples voted.

Err...are you saying that the United Kingdom is not a democracy?

 

[savage]

Socialism, perhaps an Oligarchy. I've been to england on many occassions. The wife worked there for years. The class system is very dominant.

Sure it has the trappings of democracy. Well its really all how you define it. Wonder if our representative democracy will continue becoming less representative.

****
What should come after the pocket empires and the Regency. I'd say a Vagr-Vilani nation (build out of desperation), either a Regency or a transformed smaller empire (either way the UK), split zhodani kingdoms, a somewhat isolationist Aslan, a split Solmani govt, and the pocket empires. All holding off the beserker Virus Unification.

Do any of these govt really live up to the title of Imperium?

Savage

 

[BluWolf]

Would people want to go back to a way of life that didn't work?

Hmmm, why don't you ask those folks that are nostalgic for the USSR, or the "stability" of Saddam Hussein.

How about all those people who continue to propogate a "culture" that has erased a once liberated and educated society to abhorrant levels of poverty. (the middle east).

Its all relative.