Issues due to the size of polities

crewdude48 wrote:Every one joined the SEM voluntarily, just like Masada and Selisia. I am not saying that those worlds are not better off, I'm just saying that there is a precedent for taking systems against their will.

I realize there is a degree of . . . irony, shall we say, in your formulation here. However, there are a couple of points I think should be made.

First, Masada is not a Manty possession and there are no plans to annex the system. Manticore has imposed conditions the planetary government must meet before it regains complete autonomy. In the meantime, Manticore exercise purely a police function, preventing certain specifically proscribed actions and events. For example, the recreation of a Masadan Navy, the reimposition of the laws which deny female equality under the law, etc. A new constitution has been drafted (and ratified) which imposes minimum human rights and citizenship conditions and guarantees freedom of religion and conscience, and Masadan police forces have been created under it which have been armed and trained by Manticore. This is still very much a work in progress, but the intention --- and they're doing better than they really anticipated on keeping within shouting distance of their originally projected schedule --- is that Masada will become an independent star nation under new management in the fullness of time. In the meantime, Manticore has been working to build up the Msadan economy and space infrastructure on the theory that affluence will help in the acceptance of the new political and religious system being set up. Whether a future, fully independent Masada will choose to create, maintain, or seek a close political relationship with Manticore afterward will be up to Masada, although there are obviously reasons to think that might be the case.

Second, Silesia. The Manties acquired their share of Silesia through negotiation with and treaty arrangement with the Confederacy's legal government. The circumstances may have carried a flavor of "an offer you can't refuse," but they honored the letter of the law at least procedurally. The objective wasn't to acquire Silesia permanently, however. The objective(s) were to eliminate a source of ongoing tension vis-à-vis the Andermani; bring the Andermani into military alliance at a time when they seemed desperately needed; secure one of Manticore's most important trading areas by cutting local bases and allies out from under the pirates operating there; clean out the slavers who'd made Silesia a big part of their transfer, shipping, and holding facilities; put an end to the long-running insurrections and revolts which had killed millions of Silesians over the years; and create stable local government. To accomplish those goals, Manticore has declared that its share of Silesia is a protectorate and has imposed governors and administrators from the outside, supported by major forces of light and medium fleet units. Eventually, the planets of that protectorate will be allowed to choose to join the Star Empire if that's what they want to do. No one in Manticore envisions forcing them to join the SEM or establishing some sort of permanent military occupation in perpetuity if they don't. In addition, unlike OFS, which sees the protectorates primarily as cash cows, Manticore wants to develop the SIlesian economy in ways which were never possible under the corrupt previous system and its frequent episodes of violence.

To be honest, the greatest risk to Manticore isn't the size it may attain; it's whether or not it can maintain or non-destructively expand the unique amalgam of qualities which made the Star Kingdom of Manticore what it was. That's one reason for the federalism that it's adopted. The main reason is to develop local government hubs or nexii where local problems can be dealt with responsively on the local level without huge communications lags. Imperial policy and law will be created by the imperial parliament which will meet in the Manticore System if only because of the MWHJ, but local autonomy will trump imperial decree/regulation except in certain areas specified constitutionally and accepted by each unit of the SEM as it seeks membership. Economically, imperial policy will be to develop the greatest possible economic strength for all of its citizens everywhere, but just as the political system is based on a dispersed federal model, the SEM isn't going to try to build some intimately integrated economic system in which every part is dependent on every other part or in which some sort of "top down" structure defines what each part of the whole contributes to it. In other words, economies --- like the political system --- will be organized locally, with each "lobe" of the SEM encouraged to develop its own economic strengths rather than depending on anyone else. Central policy will be shaped to help those local economies, but they won't be micromanaged by the imperial parliament, nor will one local economy be subordinated to any of the others. That is, the MWHJ will remain a resource of the SKM, not the SEM. The SKM will be responsible for its share of the imperial budget based on the income and wealth of the SKM as a component of the SEM, but in terms of local law and custom and local economics, it will retain the same autonomy as any other unit of the overall Empire.

The belief (and hope) is that this will (1) allow the SEM's subjects to rule their own lives with an absolute minimum of interference, (2) prevent the sort of bureaucratic monolith needed to try and govern some sort of unitary state over interstellar distances; (3) promote the sort of interstellar free trade which has been the life's blood of the SKM for centuries and extend that same sort of prosperity (if possibly on a lesser scale) to all members of the Star Empire; (4) provide a political "relief valve" to prevent the sort of accumulated pressure which was already driving the SL towards dissolution even before the outbreak of hostilities; and (4) protect the SKM's unique political structure and society in the Manticore Binary System (local autonomy) while continuing to encourage the influx of immigration which has also been part of the SKM for centuries at a rate which can be integrated into the existing society without disrupting it.

I hope this clarifies some of the differences between the SL and the SEM. Specifically, that it clarifies what the SEM has looked at in the SL and decided were the factors which turned it into the dysfunctional, predatory mess it had become by the time of Oyster Bay.

runsforcelery wrote:To be honest, the greatest risk to Manticore isn't the size it may attain; it's whether or not it can maintain or non-destructively expand the unique amalgam of qualities which made the Star Kingdom of Manticore what it was. That's one reason for the federalism that it's adopted. The main reason is to develop local government hubs or nexii where local problems can be dealt with responsively on the local level without huge communications lags. Imperial policy and law will be created by the imperial parliament which will meet in the Manticore System if only because of the MWHJ, but local autonomy will trump imperial decree/regulation except in certain areas specified constitutionally and accepted by each unit of the SEM as it seeks membership. Economically, imperial policy will be to develop the greatest possible economic strength for all of its citizens everywhere, but just as the political system is based on a dispersed federal model, the SEM isn't going to try to build some intimately integrated economic system in which every part is dependent on every other part or in which some sort of "top down" structure defines what each part of the whole contributes to it. In other words, economies --- like the political system --- will be organized locally, with each "lobe" of the SEM encouraged to develop its own economic strengths rather than depending on anyone else. Central policy will be shaped to help those local economies, but they won't be micromanaged by the imperial parliament, nor will one local economy be subordinated to any of the others. That is, the MWHJ will remain a resource of the SKM, not the SEM. The SKM will be responsible for its share of the imperial budget based on the income and wealth of the SKM as a component of the SEM, but in terms of local law and custom and local economics, it will retain the same autonomy as any other unit of the overall Empire.

The belief (and hope) is that this will (1) allow the SEM's subjects to rule their own lives with an absolute minimum of interference, (2) prevent the sort of bureaucratic monolith needed to try and govern some sort of unitary state over interstellar distances; (3) promote the sort of interstellar free trade which has been the life's blood of the SKM for centuries and extend that same sort of prosperity (if possibly on a lesser scale) to all members of the Star Empire; (4) provide a political "relief valve" to prevent the sort of accumulated pressure which was already driving the SL towards dissolution even before the outbreak of hostilities; and (4) protect the SKM's unique political structure and society in the Manticore Binary System (local autonomy) while continuing to encourage the influx of immigration which has also been part of the SKM for centuries at a rate which can be integrated into the existing society without disrupting it.

I hope this clarifies some of the differences between the SL and the SEM. Specifically, that it clarifies what the SEM has looked at in the SL and decided were the factors which turned it into the dysfunctional, predatory mess it had become by the time of Oyster Bay.

Thank you, and yes it does clarify most of my questions. That is much of what I suspected and was concerned for the SEM and the SKM in the future. I am always amazed how you can drop into a forum and word a single response so well that covers so much. Maybe I shouldn't be, writer that you are.
Not to steal you overly long on this topic, but have you gone through the basic concepts of how the SL started? Was it similer to this start up of the SEM and then they could not be maintained or that they destructively expanded? Or did you envision some other cause of the downfall of the SL ideals. I know you had said in other threads that the SL consitiution was riddled with problems. Do you envision those as the primary cause of the corruption and strife? Would the destructive expasion only be a symtom of this, and not a co-cause?

hanuman wrote:Oakius, the Maya Sector's leaders managed to avoid detection due to their distance from the centre, yes, but the reasons why they started their separatist conspiracy in the first place had absolutely NOTHING to do with Maya's distance from Sol. Those reasons were rather more complicated than that - firstly, because OFS refused to give up its dominion over Maya, so that the Sector could enter the League as a full member with all the rights, freedoms and privileges attached to full membership; and secondly, because both Barregos and Rozsak were determined to protect Maya from the worst violence that would inevitably follow the expected breakup of the League.

I should point out that, via the Erewhon Wormhole, Maya sector is one of the closest OFS sectors to Sol. In that respect, distance from Sol did influence the decision to plan "The Sepoy Option" -- they were close enough to see the rot at the center as well as OFS corruption.

Distance in the Honorverse is more often a function of travel time than it is of light-years. For example, Beowulf and San Martin are "next door neighbors," despite the many hundred of light-years between them in normal space; it is actually possible to make a "day-trip" between them.

The same travel time argument applies to the Talbot Quadrant; thanks to the Lynx terminus, every world in the TQ is not much further from Manticore than it is from any other system in the TQ. They are far enough apart that direct rule is not practical, but close enough that it would be difficult to hide gross corruption.

It seems likely that similar proximity via the Wormhole network will be a large factor in requests to join the SEM and/or approval of those requests. It doesn't seem likely to me that Manticore will over-extend it's communications lines the way the SL has, at least not for a very long time.

IIRC, the SL was essentially the UN in space. With every member having a veto instead of just 5 members and strict rules against the SL getting involved in how members govern. The idea was for the UN to deal with all the annoying fiddly bits of maintaining infrastructure and taking care of issues that everyone agreed were a problem.

But I figure we'll see in House of Cards.

Commodore Oakius wrote:

Hutch wrote:
Point taken gentlemen, albeit I would remind you that the Sileslian planets are more in a 'protectorate' status and not full members of the SEM. Presumably, once local governments in Silesia that respect their citizens rights are established, they will have the right to dissolve any ties with the SEM. And Masada certainly isn't part of the Star Empire--they were a festering sore that had to be lanced and still requires treatment but certainly not part of the SEM.


Still, some very interesting discussions.

And OFS had a lot of protectorates too. The idea was for them to stand on their own as well, or at least that is my extrapolation of what it was menat to be. I don't doubt the Silesia may very well do so, but, and again I am harping on the work, it sets a precedent.
And yeah, Masada was out right conquored.

crewdude48 wrote:Actually, I meant to be a sarcastic a-hole.

I'm sorry, I was just making a joke. I didn't mean for it to be offensive. I apologize if it was too flippant.

Yes, neither Masada nor Manticore's share of Silesia, nor for that matter Basilisk, came under Manticore's jurisdiction voluntarily.

However, that overlooks some facts:

1. Masada was occupied well before the official start of the First Havenite War, as a consequence of Manticore's mutual defense treaty with Grayson - and only AFTER Masada had launched an attack on Grayson with the intent of committing planet-wide genocide. The occupation continues because of the difficulty of establishing a moderate local government on the planet, and the sure knowledge that, should the occupation forces withdraw, the Masadan religious fanatics will quickly seize power and continue their genocidal attacks on Grayson. Masada is not, and never will become, part of the Star Empire in any capacity.

2. Initially Manticore proclaimed its sovereignty ONLY over the Basilisk terminus of the wormhole, with a protectorate over the rest of the system (but not Medusa itself). After the events portrayed in On Basilisk Station, that protectorate was extended to Medusa itself in order to prevent any future Havenite plots on the planet. However, the updated law wrt Medusa and the Basilisk system clearly rejected Manticoran sovereignty over the system, except for the wormhole terminus itself. The stated intention of the protectorate is to allow Manticore the legal authority to control the introduction of technology to the Medusans, so that they can develop at their own pace with a minimum of cultural contamination.

3. Silesia is an entirely different story than the kind of protectorates the Solarians established under the OFS. As far as I can figure out, the Star Empire's administrators in Silesia stays out of local government as much as possible, except for defense, economic development assistance, and preventing corruption and human rights abuses. Moreover, clear provision is made that Manticore's Silesian protectorate will be given the opportunity to join the Star Empire as a single unit (similar to the Talbott Quadrant), in the not too distant future, once the chaotic situation in the protectorate is deemed to have stabilized. Again, contrary to the way things were done in the Solarian League, Manticore has no intention of bleeding the member systems of its protectorate in Silesia dry before allowing them the chance to join the Star Empire. As a matter of fact, I clearly remember that Elizabeth and the Grantville government insisted that the same kind of economic policies be implemented in Silesia as in the Quadrant, with incentives that are geared towards maximizing economic development instead of economic exploitation.

Once again, the differences between the Star Empire and the Solarian League are crystal clear.

The Star Empire has a strong constitutional system, with a clearly delineated division of powers and assignment of government functions, a strong human rights tradition, and an active judicial system and civil society that are committed to upholding and protecting both the constitution and that human rights tradition.

The Solarian League has none of that, and that makes possible the kind of human rights, political and economic abuses that took place all the time.

Yes, too big is simply too big, but there are plenty of examples throughout history OTL in which the same kind of abuses took place quite close to the imperial heartland. Just look at the histories of Scotland and Ireland, after they were conquered by or became part of the United Kingdom.

I stand by my position, namely that it is the nature of the civil contract between government and governed (as someone else called it) that determines whether the kind of abuses that are commonplace in the OFS protectorates occur or not, much more so than the subordinate political unit's distance from the centre.

Commodore Oakius wrote:Thank you, and yes it does clarify most of my questions. That is much of what I suspected and was concerned for the SEM and the SKM in the future. I am always amazed how you can drop into a forum and word a single response so well that covers so much. Maybe I shouldn't be, writer that you are.

Not to steal you overly long on this topic, but have you gone through the basic concepts of how the SL started? Was it similer to this start up of the SEM and then they could not be maintained or that they destructively expanded? Or did you envision some other cause of the downfall of the SL ideals. I know you had said in other threads that the SL consitiution was riddled with problems. Do you envision those as the primary cause of the corruption and strife? Would the destructive expasion only be a symtom of this, and not a co-cause?

As Hanuman has suggested, the problems with the Solarian League were inherent from the very beginning because of the fashion in which it was originally organized.

The original Solarian League constitution contains all sorts of human rights provisions and other provisions intended to prohibit the growth of a central government which would be able to intervene in the internal affairs of its member worlds. Those provisions, like those in the United States constitution, were defined primarily in negatives: that is, things that the League government could not do to its citizens or to the political and social structures of member planets and star systems. It most emphatically did not define what those member planets' and star systems' governments could do within their own jurisdictions. In other words, there is no provision of the Solarian League constitution equivalent to the US' Fourteenth Amendment which is the primary basis for federal law overriding state and local law on issues of constitutional infringement.

Now, when the Solarian League was created in the wake of Old Earth's Final War, the human race was confronting some significant changes and problems. Obviously, the effort to save the Sol System from the consequences of the weapons used in the Final War (and the aftermath of the war itself) produced an unprecedented density of interstellar traffic to and from Sol. At the same time, however, the beginnings of a true interstellar economy began to emerge as the hyper generator/Warshawski sail/counter-grav combination made (you should pardon the expression) "dirt cheap" interstellar shipping costs possible. There was no true infrastructure to support that interstellar trade, however. Each inhabited star system had its own laws, including those governing its commerce, and interstellar law — especially interstellar admiralty law — was very sadly underdeveloped. In addition, there were a certain number of interstellar bad actors littering the astrographic landscape who could be counted upon to make problems for law-abiding merchants and star systems unless they were somehow constrained to behave themselves.

The solution was the League, which grew out of the multilateral agreements between Beowulf and several of Old Earth's other, older daughter colonies who had rallied to the homeworld's aid when catastrophe struck. This was not a government, and had never been intended to function as one; it was simply an administrative arrangement which had been worked out to provide the efficiency and direction (and avoid duplicate effort) required to bring old Earth back from the brink. One has to remember that Beowulf had been settled for over a thousand T-years at the time the constitution was actually drafted, and some of the other older colony worlds had been settled almost as long. The rescue effort began immediately after the Final War (which began in 975 PD, if I remember correctly, although I didn't look the date up to check it); the League wasn't officially created until the 12th Century PD. Partly that was because the people who initially organized it were too busy for the ensuing 150-200 years with putting old Earth back together again, partly it was because the need for something to straighten out humanity's increasingly chaotic interstellar relations and interactions, and partly it was because it took that long for the people who initially organized it to grasp that they could create a governing entity on that scale. Humanity had grown (not unreasonably) accustomed to thinking of itself as existing in isolated clusters in specific star systems which were fully self-contained units cut off from any other human-occupied star systems by the incredible distances between them. The extent to which the Warshawski sail had changed all of that took a while to trickle through humanity's view of itself and its environment.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending upon one's perspective), the authors of the Solarian constitution didn't really want a true interstellar government. They were, if you will, drafting something much more like the Articles of Confederation than the United States Constitution. In terms of the ability to intervene in the domestic affairs of its citizens, the League might as well not have existed in the view of the people who created it. Its function was to regulate and moderate (not govern) what happened between those star systems, and that was a primary reason for the limitation on the League's ability to enact legislation. In theory, the Solarian League Assembly can/could pass any law it wished so long as it did not infringe upon one of those negative rights provisions of the constitution. In fact, the fact that every member star system of the League has effective veto right means that no truly meaningful laws were ever likely to be passed if there was the least chance that those laws would impinge upon a single member system's perceived rights or be perceived as setting a precedent which might someday impinge upon them. In addition, the constitution was specifically written in a way to starve the central government of funds in order to prohibit its unrestrained growth.

Since the primary concern of the drafters was to regulate and manage those interstellar affairs of theirs, however, the central government was given some pretty sharp regulatory teeth from the very beginning. And since the staff and infrastructure to make those regulations work — and to provide the Solarian League Navy which would become the League's mailed fist for dealing with any of those "bad actors" out there who made trouble for the League's members — was going to cost money, a revenue source (the various use fees and allowable shipping duties) was provided. At the time, most people's predictions of how big the cash flow of the League was likely to become were absurdly low compared to those which actually exist by Honor's time, the better part of a thousand T-years farther down the road. However, by the same token, most people's predictions of how enormous the League's bureaucracy was likely to become had also been absurdly low (and optimistic).

The problem was threefold. (1) In order to do the job for which it had been created in the first place, the League bureaucracy simply had to get bigger and to continue getting bigger. (2) Because the political organs of the League had been deliberately stultified, and because there was no direct political accountability on the part of the bureaucrats running it in the absence of strong political direction, careerism, cronyism, and corruption became an ever increasing part of the (largely) hidden underbelly of the League. (3) When the Assembly could (rarely) agreed to enact legislation, it left it up to the existing central, permanent bureaucracy to enforce that legislation, which meant that bureaucracy (with the connivance of a Solarian judiciary which was both underdeveloped and thoroughly corrupted by the system it was supposed to keep an eye on) could pretty much interpret the laws to mean whatever the bureaucrats wanted them to mean.

This is how the Office of Frontier Security, which was created by act of the Assembly, became such a nightmare. The drafters of the legislation (those of them who were honest, at any rate) intended OFS to do pretty much what Manticore is doing in the case of Masada and in the Manticore-governed portion of the Silesian Confederacy. It is supposed to prevent malignant system regimes from engaging in the sort of adventurism that leads to interstellar wars and also to intervene in star systems where human rights violations are especially egregious or where the very survival of the inhabited planet(s) of a star system might be in question. Because it was recognized that this was going to be an expensive effort, OFS was specifically allowed to impose "reasonable" fees (not to be confused with the constitutionally-prohibited taxes) in order to finance its operations in a specific star system. There is some evidence to suggest that some of the people involved in drafting the legislation fully understood — and intended to create — the ways in which that provision could be abused, but the majority of the drafters and of the assembly members who voted to pass the legislation clearly never envisioned what Frontier Security was going to become. However, the abuses which occur under OFS' auspices were inherent in the fundamental system from the very beginning because of the lack of political oversight and political accountability.

I'm sure that quite a few of my readers have figured out that an important portion of the Solarian League's literary DNA is to be found in the U.S. Congress' abdication of its responsibilities into the hands of an ever growing horde of bureaucrats and bureaucracies which increasingly govern by regulation rather than by legislation. In the case of the League, however, the system was more inherently flawed from the very beginning, on the one hand, and far less pernicious for the League's member systems, on the other. Even by Honor's time, League policies and regulations had only an indirect and very limited impact on the citizens of its member systems. Remember that the League was specifically structured to stay out of its member systems' domestic affairs, and aside from the fashion in which its regulations on things like interstellar shipping impinge upon those member systems, that's pretty much the way things have stayed. Don't get me wrong. There are instances in which the central bureaucracy's decisions and regulations have had significant economic consequences even for the League's member systems, but these have been primarily secondary effects and, by and large, have been sufficiently modest enough that there's been no massive outcry in those star systems.

People who understand what's happening out in the Protectorates, and people who grasp the extent to which the transstellars and bureaucrats have climbed into bed with one another (especially over the last 200-300 T-years) have recognized that however indirect the consequences in their own star systems may have been, the League has become a cancerous organism as far as the galaxy at large is concerned. Moreover, people like the citizens of Beowulf, recognize the way in which the League's alliance with corrupt transstellars (and I'm speaking here not simply of individual regulators or naval officers within the League, but of the permanent undersecretaries themselves and their staffs) directly impinge on every single one of the League's citizens because of the fashion in which those who are responsible for preventing criminal behavior are instead profiting from those same criminal behaviors. Some of those who recognize the dangers are also insightful enough to recognize that specifically because the central regulatory bureaucracy does not depend upon taxation for its revenue stream, it is far, far more difficult — or would be far, far more difficult, assuming anyone was prepared to make a serious attempt – for the Assembly to somehow regain control of the bureaucracy. In effect, the bureaucracy is the "executive branch" of the Solarian League, and the traditional weapon of the legislature against the executive — the control of funding — is not available to the Assembly because of the way the constitution itself set up the central government's funding.

The extent to which the person-in-the-street in the Solarian League completely misunderstands what's happening between the League and the Grand Alliance is due in no small part to the fact that actual League citizens — which should never be confused with League subjects, since that includes the citizens of the Protectorates — are totally out of touch with what's actually happening in the Verge. They don't know, and in many cases they don't want to know, what the OFS has become and what it has been doing outside the confines of their own reasonably comfortable lives. And because they have no direct participation in League policy (since political oversight is effectively nonexistent), Solarian League voter participation on the interstellar level is incredibly low. The majority of those actively involved in politics, are involved on the intrasystem or purely planetary level. Beyond the hyper limits of their own star systems, they tend to be incredibly poorly informed and largely incurious, and they don't actually identify very strongly with their own "central government" or its policies. They identify strongly with the idea of the Solarian League, but they have only a very imperfect understanding of the Solarian League's reality, and the Mandarins and the (literally) multi-million (as in high numbers of multi-million) direct and indirect employees and members of the League bureaucracy not only prefer for their fellow citizens to remain ignorant, disinterested, and poorly informed but work hard to keep them that way. The avenues through which they do this are well established and well polished, which helps to explain the extent to which they have managed to control the narrative within the League so far. The Battle of Spindle and what happened to Filareta will obviously make that task harder, but readers really shouldn't underestimate the degree to which all of those individuals who are stakeholders in the League's power structure and the corruption which it both engenders and feeds upon are still determined (and well positioned) to continue to control the narrative.

Hope this helps. Now I have to go cook supper, so I don't have time to proofread it properly. If there are any typos or small continuity errors in here, that's why.

Your descriptions of the intentions of the SEM seem rather familiar.

Sort of like Bush Jr and the Neocon's theories about Iraq and Afghanistan.

My sarcasm is tempered by the acknowledgement that I was supportive of these experiments in nation building because I understood what the only realistic alternatives were.

This being acknowledge, why would Manticore's efforts to civilize Masada (Silesia might be doable) be any more successful than Bush's efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan?

runsforcelery wrote:

crewdude48 wrote:Every one joined the SEM voluntarily, just like Masada and Selisia. I am not saying that those worlds are not better off, I'm just saying that there is a precedent for taking systems against their will.

I realize there is a degree of . . . irony, shall we say, in your formulation here. However, there are a couple of points I think should be made.

First, Masada is not a Manty possession and there are no plans to annex the system. Manticore has imposed conditions the planetary government must meet before it regains complete autonomy. In the meantime, Manticore exercise purely a police function, preventing certain specifically proscribed actions and events. For example, the recreation of a Masadan Navy, the reimposition of the laws which deny female equality under the law, etc. A new constitution has been drafted (and ratified) which imposes minimum human rights and citizenship conditions and guarantees freedom of religion and conscience, and Masadan police forces have been created under it which have been armed and trained by Manticore. This is still very much a work in progress, but the intention --- and they're doing better than they really anticipated on keeping within shouting distance of their originally projected schedule --- is that Masada will become an independent star nation under new management in the fullness of time. In the meantime, Manticore has been working to build up the Msadan economy and space infrastructure on the theory that affluence will help in the acceptance of the new political and religious system being set up. Whether a future, fully independent Masada will choose to create, maintain, or seek a close political relationship with Manticore afterward will be up to Masada, although there are obviously reasons to think that might be the case.

Second, Silesia. The Manties acquired their share of Silesia through negotiation with and treaty arrangement with the Confederacy's legal government. The circumstances may have carried a flavor of "an offer you can't refuse," but they honored the letter of the law at least procedurally. The objective wasn't to acquire Silesia permanently, however. The objective(s) were to eliminate a source of ongoing tension vis-à-vis the Andermani; bring the Andermani into military alliance at a time when they seemed desperately needed; secure one of Manticore's most important trading areas by cutting local bases and allies out from under the pirates operating there; clean out the slavers who'd made Silesia a big part of their transfer, shipping, and holding facilities; put an end to the long-running insurrections and revolts which had killed millions of Silesians over the years; and create stable local government. To accomplish those goals, Manticore has declared that its share of Silesia is a protectorate and has imposed governors and administrators from the outside, supported by major forces of light and medium fleet units. Eventually, the planets of that protectorate will be allowed to choose to join the Star Empire if that's what they want to do. No one in Manticore envisions forcing them to join the SEM or establishing some sort of permanent military occupation in perpetuity if they don't. In addition, unlike OFS, which sees the protectorates primarily as cash cows, Manticore wants to develop the SIlesian economy in ways which were never possible under the corrupt previous system and its frequent episodes of violence.

To be honest, the greatest risk to Manticore isn't the size it may attain; it's whether or not it can maintain or non-destructively expand the unique amalgam of qualities which made the Star Kingdom of Manticore what it was. That's one reason for the federalism that it's adopted. The main reason is to develop local government hubs or nexii where local problems can be dealt with responsively on the local level without huge communications lags. Imperial policy and law will be created by the imperial parliament which will meet in the Manticore System if only because of the MWHJ, but local autonomy will trump imperial decree/regulation except in certain areas specified constitutionally and accepted by each unit of the SEM as it seeks membership. Economically, imperial policy will be to develop the greatest possible economic strength for all of its citizens everywhere, but just as the political system is based on a dispersed federal model, the SEM isn't going to try to build some intimately integrated economic system in which every part is dependent on every other part or in which some sort of "top down" structure defines what each part of the whole contributes to it. In other words, economies --- like the political system --- will be organized locally, with each "lobe" of the SEM encouraged to develop its own economic strengths rather than depending on anyone else. Central policy will be shaped to help those local economies, but they won't be micromanaged by the imperial parliament, nor will one local economy be subordinated to any of the others. That is, the MWHJ will remain a resource of the SKM, not the SEM. The SKM will be responsible for its share of the imperial budget based on the income and wealth of the SKM as a component of the SEM, but in terms of local law and custom and local economics, it will retain the same autonomy as any other unit of the overall Empire.

The belief (and hope) is that this will (1) allow the SEM's subjects to rule their own lives with an absolute minimum of interference, (2) prevent the sort of bureaucratic monolith needed to try and govern some sort of unitary state over interstellar distances; (3) promote the sort of interstellar free trade which has been the life's blood of the SKM for centuries and extend that same sort of prosperity (if possibly on a lesser scale) to all members of the Star Empire; (4) provide a political "relief valve" to prevent the sort of accumulated pressure which was already driving the SL towards dissolution even before the outbreak of hostilities; and (4) protect the SKM's unique political structure and society in the Manticore Binary System (local autonomy) while continuing to encourage the influx of immigration which has also been part of the SKM for centuries at a rate which can be integrated into the existing society without disrupting it.

I hope this clarifies some of the differences between the SL and the SEM. Specifically, that it clarifies what the SEM has looked at in the SL and decided were the factors which turned it into the dysfunctional, predatory mess it had become by the time of Oyster Bay.

If you really want to understand the beurocracy, go watch "Yes Minister"

With the caveat that David's arrangements for Masada in the series backstory CANNOT be based on the situations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

David's disposition of Masada, and his earliest remarks on the task as envisioned by the Foreign Ministry and Royal Army, predated Operation Enduring Freedom by ~8 years.

Plenty of other historical examples of nation-building are available. Both disasters and successes.

dreamrider

I suspect that major difference between Manticore's efforts and the US's efforts is that Manticore's government is better set up for a very long term effort.

IMO a ruling monarch (like Queen Elizabeth) doesn't face re-election and can focus on things other than the "next election".

An elected President can start a long-term project only to see the next President just discard the project.

A Manticorian Monarch can exert his/her considerable influence to keep such a project going even in the face of a change in government.

Of course, Prolong means the Monarch will be around decades longer than any current day person.

namelessfly wrote:Your descriptions of the intentions of the SEM seem rather familiar.

Sort of like Bush Jr and the Neocon's theories about Iraq and Afghanistan.

My sarcasm is tempered by the acknowledgement that I was supportive of these experiments in nation building because I understood what the only realistic alternatives were.

This being acknowledge, why would Manticore's efforts to civilize Masada (Silesia might be doable) be any more successful than Bush's efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan?

runsforcelery wrote:I realize there is a degree of . . . irony, shall we say, in your formulation here. However, there are a couple of points I think should be made.

First, Masada is not a Manty possession and there are no plans to annex the system. Manticore has imposed conditions the planetary government must meet before it regains complete autonomy. In the meantime, Manticore exercise purely a police function, preventing certain specifically proscribed actions and events. For example, the recreation of a Masadan Navy, the reimposition of the laws which deny female equality under the law, etc. A new constitution has been drafted (and ratified) which imposes minimum human rights and citizenship conditions and guarantees freedom of religion and conscience, and Masadan police forces have been created under it which have been armed and trained by Manticore. This is still very much a work in progress, but the intention --- and they're doing better than they really anticipated on keeping within shouting distance of their originally projected schedule --- is that Masada will become an independent star nation under new management in the fullness of time. In the meantime, Manticore has been working to build up the Msadan economy and space infrastructure on the theory that affluence will help in the acceptance of the new political and religious system being set up. Whether a future, fully independent Masada will choose to create, maintain, or seek a close political relationship with Manticore afterward will be up to Masada, although there are obviously reasons to think that might be the case.

Second, Silesia. The Manties acquired their share of Silesia through negotiation with and treaty arrangement with the Confederacy's legal government. The circumstances may have carried a flavor of "an offer you can't refuse," but they honored the letter of the law at least procedurally. The objective wasn't to acquire Silesia permanently, however. The objective(s) were to eliminate a source of ongoing tension vis-à-vis the Andermani; bring the Andermani into military alliance at a time when they seemed desperately needed; secure one of Manticore's most important trading areas by cutting local bases and allies out from under the pirates operating there; clean out the slavers who'd made Silesia a big part of their transfer, shipping, and holding facilities; put an end to the long-running insurrections and revolts which had killed millions of Silesians over the years; and create stable local government. To accomplish those goals, Manticore has declared that its share of Silesia is a protectorate and has imposed governors and administrators from the outside, supported by major forces of light and medium fleet units. Eventually, the planets of that protectorate will be allowed to choose to join the Star Empire if that's what they want to do. No one in Manticore envisions forcing them to join the SEM or establishing some sort of permanent military occupation in perpetuity if they don't. In addition, unlike OFS, which sees the protectorates primarily as cash cows, Manticore wants to develop the SIlesian economy in ways which were never possible under the corrupt previous system and its frequent episodes of violence.

To be honest, the greatest risk to Manticore isn't the size it may attain; it's whether or not it can maintain or non-destructively expand the unique amalgam of qualities which made the Star Kingdom of Manticore what it was. That's one reason for the federalism that it's adopted. The main reason is to develop local government hubs or nexii where local problems can be dealt with responsively on the local level without huge communications lags. Imperial policy and law will be created by the imperial parliament which will meet in the Manticore System if only because of the MWHJ, but local autonomy will trump imperial decree/regulation except in certain areas specified constitutionally and accepted by each unit of the SEM as it seeks membership. Economically, imperial policy will be to develop the greatest possible economic strength for all of its citizens everywhere, but just as the political system is based on a dispersed federal model, the SEM isn't going to try to build some intimately integrated economic system in which every part is dependent on every other part or in which some sort of "top down" structure defines what each part of the whole contributes to it. In other words, economies --- like the political system --- will be organized locally, with each "lobe" of the SEM encouraged to develop its own economic strengths rather than depending on anyone else. Central policy will be shaped to help those local economies, but they won't be micromanaged by the imperial parliament, nor will one local economy be subordinated to any of the others. That is, the MWHJ will remain a resource of the SKM, not the SEM. The SKM will be responsible for its share of the imperial budget based on the income and wealth of the SKM as a component of the SEM, but in terms of local law and custom and local economics, it will retain the same autonomy as any other unit of the overall Empire.

The belief (and hope) is that this will (1) allow the SEM's subjects to rule their own lives with an absolute minimum of interference, (2) prevent the sort of bureaucratic monolith needed to try and govern some sort of unitary state over interstellar distances; (3) promote the sort of interstellar free trade which has been the life's blood of the SKM for centuries and extend that same sort of prosperity (if possibly on a lesser scale) to all members of the Star Empire; (4) provide a political "relief valve" to prevent the sort of accumulated pressure which was already driving the SL towards dissolution even before the outbreak of hostilities; and (4) protect the SKM's unique political structure and society in the Manticore Binary System (local autonomy) while continuing to encourage the influx of immigration which has also been part of the SKM for centuries at a rate which can be integrated into the existing society without disrupting it.

I hope this clarifies some of the differences between the SL and the SEM. Specifically, that it clarifies what the SEM has looked at in the SL and decided were the factors which turned it into the dysfunctional, predatory mess it had become by the time of Oyster Bay.