Worldbuilding is about creativity! Make a harsh timocracy where the supreme leader is called Tim and is of Tim dynasty! Heck, history wrote it first with Timurid Empire! Tamerlane is basically Timur, thus Tim.
You used the modern definition of ‘tyranny’. During the Bronze Age and Iron Age, Tyrannies were a rather common form of government. The closest modern equivalent, at least in structure, is a dictatorship. While it was rule by a single individual like a monarchy, the Tyrant did not legitimize his rule through claims of divine appointment or descent from a previous ruler. Instead, he either seized it using an army loyal to himself, or convinced the people of the city-state that granting him complete authority over them would help them more than it would hurt them. Since the difference in power between the Tyrant and the people was not as great as it can be today, the Tyrant couldn’t fail to protect and provide for his subjects too much or they and/or the soldiers under his command would off him and replace him with a new Tyrant.
The term dictatorship has also evolved as a pejorative or antithesis to democracy over the last 100 years. For example Marx’s use of the word “dictatorship of the proletariat” wasnt supposed to mean anti-democratic.
While it's not common for nomadic societies to quickly evolve into settled ones, it's not too uncommon for them to conquer and take over their settled neighbors and become a part of this settled culture as a new elite. So if one wants to write about a nomadic society changing, it's worth looking into such examples.
History nerd here, just an interesting anecdote: you said democracy usually emerges from other government types, the Celtic and Germanic peoples are an interesting exception to this. There was of course no "standard" political structure in these broad cultural groups, but democratically elected chieftains or councils seem to have been common in these societies, at least during the time of the early roman empire. It is possible that hunter-gatherer tribes that begin settling down do often form democratic (or democratic-adjacent) political structures as a direct evolution of their more loose egalitarian organization. We don't really know of course because this transition almost always happens before writing has been adopted by a society. Anyway it's an interesting thought, as it seems the more democratic tribes in Gaul and Germania slowly became less democratic as temporarily elected warlords started using their prestige and wealth to hold on to power permanently, thus reshaping their society into a Chiefdom. So in that case you do see proto-democracy first, which then morphs into autocracy.
Republics really didn't scale that well being the modern era: the 19th century or so. Early republics generally took the form of city-states (Rome, the Greek democracies) or leagues of city-states (Dutch republic, Switzerland). Even the USA was a loose federation of smaller republics at its foundation. The pre-modern republics often worked on the "city with an empire" model, in which the capital city was essentially the state, and empire was a mere possession of the city. This was due to pre-modern republics being hesitant to grant voting rights to recently conquered people, or indeed expand the ruling oligarchy at all, as that would just dilute the voting rights of the current voters. The "natural" state of man is probably a tribal democracy of some sort. A stratified society implies at least some level of complexity, so among small bands of hunter-gathers, there are not social classes. However, human societies tend to naturally tend to monarchies, at least in the pre-modern era.
Armenius, who famously beat Rome in Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, was killed by those that felt he was getting to powerful (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arminius) and Celtillus, father of Vercingetorix who fought Julius Caesar, was "put to death by his own countrymen for seeking to rule all of Gaul" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vercingetorix#History).
CGP Grey did a video on why Monarchies exist. They have a consistent chain of change of power, which makes them far more stable than a government type where a new ruler has to be chosen when the last one dies or just loses an election. Granted, that falls apart when the reigning monarch dies "Without Issue." Nothing ever works perfectly as intended.
Meanwhile European monarchies were constantly embroiled in succession crises, and civil wars with uppity vassals. Monarchies were absolutely not stable. If anything, European democracies have proven far more stable, simply because the death of a single leader can't plunge the entire country into chaos. Presidents and Prime Ministers can come and go, but the state apparatus does not draw its legitimacy from those leaders. It draws its legitimacy from the proper adherence to the country's constitutional laws, and the consent of the masses. Only when those elements are lost does the state lose legitimacy. Meanwhile a monarchy can lose legitimacy if word gets out that the reigning monarch fell out of the wrong vagina as a baby.
@@tbotalpha8133 I don't think that's a good example. Those democracies have only been around for a paltry span of time, most of them less than a hundred years (the British have an older system but it's a weird hodge-podge pseudo-democratic system held together by tradition and duct tape). That's nothing at all in historical terms. It's entirely possible that the seeming-superiority of democracy is nothing more than the spirit of one particular age, which will pass away and be forgotten in time (for one thing the very idea that "the consent of the governed" is a source of legitimacy is a relative novelty, a belief sprung from the Enlightenment, and which is far from universal across time and space). Monarchy of one kind or the other is the easiest and simplest form of government, because it is human nature to "listen to the big man" whenever things start to go horribly wrong. Did succession crises cause chaos? Sure. But if monarchy was really that awful, it would never have become popular. If democracy was obviously superior, people would have adopted that instead, but instead the vast majority of history was dominated by monarchies. For that to make sense, monarchy would either have to not be so bad, or else humans would need to be EXTREMELY stupid.
@@Illuminat-ve5ue There's a reason why democratic forms of government never made a comeback until the Enlightenment. The concept of Constitutional Limits, Rights of Man, and the like has to emerge to make larger scaled democracies viable.
@@CantusTropus Monarchy became "popular" because it's easy for wealthy people to stomp on poor people, and control cultural narratives about who "deserves" to be in control of society. Most humans throughout history acquiesced to monarchs, because they were unaware of any other system of governance, and because they had no power to demand reform even if they did. Humans do not need autocrats - that is the propaganda of those same autocrats, who really don't want the plebs to realise that their elitist, parasitic bullshit is unnecessary. Go look up the concept of "elite panic". It is not human nature to huddle around autocrats in times of crisis. It is human nature to cooperate and self-organise for survival, a behaviour that does *not* require authoritarian control. The idea that humans need strong authorities looming over them has caused far more damage in times of crisis, than the actual crises themselves.
Literally same thing for me. Same video, showed up in my recommended video list last night too. Must be the youtube algorithm pushed that one specific video to a wider audience. I do like it when the algorithm gets it right like this, I love this sort of content.
This is something that I would certainly be interested in, I'm no artist myself! Please feel free to email me (worldbuildingcorner@gmail.com) and we can discuss properly :)
@@WorldbuildingCorner Might be late to the party, but if not would love to throw my hat in the ring too. Been following along for a while now and you've created lots of things that would be cool to illustrate.
You forgot about Confederacy ...a looser form of Federation often found in stateless Tribal/Inter-Tribal Alliances but also possible in a State Society.
Confederacy was probably not mentioned because, unlike a federation, it doesn't have sovereignty. At its core, a confederacy is just a series of treaties between sovereign governements; whereas a federal government becomes sovereign over its constituant states.
@@AraliciaMoran That's not quite true. Federal Government only has partial Sovereignty of members of Federation. US States for example exercise sovereignty in most things. That is why they have State Legislatures. A Federation of state is a more ordered, regularised, systemised structure than a Confederacy true, but it's more than just a Treaty Partnership/Alliance.. In theory most Federations are of Equal Partners, same for a Confederacy except that the members are even more so Sovereign than a Federation member. The Federation member might give up 30% of it's Sovereignty while the Confederate State gives up only 10%. Federati surrender responsibilities for Defence, Trade & Foreign Affairs to the Federal Body. The Confederate State generally only surrenders collective Defence to the Confederal Body. It is not so common in Organised Territorial States for Confederacy though it was common in past & known as a League for a bunch of City-States in Greece like the Delian League or later in Germany, the Hanseatic League that though Territorial did not necessarily exercise contiguous Domain between the members. Confederacy more common for Tribal Alliances with a Supreme Chief/Paramount Chief/First of Equals (in theory) with a Council of equal Chiefs in support. Mongols, Iroquois etc.
I have noticed that ancient governments are rarely just monarchies and usually involve some version of a council which can be anything from a form of democracy to aristocracy. This is because monarchies tend to be rather unstable with people fighting over the chair. More often than not monarchies tend to end up with subpar rulers. It is also impossible for the ruler to be on the ball of everything and so the advice and cooperation of the council is greatly needed and appreciated. Of course the octopi would be on the ball regarding government structures however the forced in trait of parasitism dooms them to fall. They don't have a way to enforce compliance and by taking over people's bodies and viewing others as lesser makes them as an innate threat to every other race and guarantees rebellion that they would be unable to suppress once it gets started. This is why being parasites, dispite having no need to push them into parasitism in the first place, is a death sentence. It makes you everyone's enemy especially if it is used for anything other than death sentences or capital punishment. Without the hosts there isn't much they can do.
Monarchies were typically very stable, that's why the system was used for most of human history. Very rarely did the death of a ruler lead to a succession crisis, in comparison to the times power was transferred smoothly. The claim that monarchies had sub par rulers "more often than not" is flat out wrong. If it was such a terrible system, people would have found something. You are correct about monarchs not holding absolute power. This is where the feudal system came from, monarchs decentralizing rule of the nation by creating lesser noble titles. This was also the purpose of royal councils, though they were typically trusted advisors whom the monarch could delegate important tasks to, rather than some kind of pseudo-senate.
@@addisonwelshthat is also the reason why most monarchys to the human history were Aristocratic Monarchys not Absolut Monarchys. The monach woes in the posion to theoreticly rule over every one but dont had a burocracy or structures to Do so. Be couse of that Absolut monarchys were only small states untill the burocracy evolft to Controll every one.
@@addisonwelsh I believe you are referring to the second stage of Anacyclosis. While there is cut-through, the structure of governance is notably different between strictly monarchical and more aristocratic regimes.
Interesting thing to note also is that the state, settled living, and agriculture are almost always spread by conquest, very seldom does a stateless society choose to become settled, either the environment forces them to, or their neighbors do.
That is absolutely not true. The first settlements were founded by Nomads either as trading posts with other tribes or because they found life easier there with continuously available Water & realisation that more effective to plant than to gather & a realisation that they could build bigger healthier herds more free from predation than they could wandering in the Plains. It was only after these first settlements arose did conflicts between them arise & conquests begin. Also plenty of Tribes still Nomadic looked upon the cities with desire. History is full of Nomad raiding of Cities, then more & more the tribal Chiefs started to imitate the cities norms and began to call themselves Kings even while still Nomadic & also began to initiate hostile takeovers of City-States.
There is no such thing as a stateless society. Like the whole definition of society literally requires some degree of organization, moreso then can be found in small groups of hunter gatherers
@@Edmonton-of2ec the state generally refers to a codified system of law and order designed to rule over a society, a system of governance if you will, if such a thing doesn't exist, or exists only by family to family or clan to clan then it is a stateless society.
I'm honestly super excited about the Naquil - I mean, just the idea of a civilization whose main strength is an ability to use other sapient species for their own purposes? There's so many layers to that. Granted it's sort of built on a combination of slavery and necromancy, but I mean like... Fictionally speaking, that's pretty neat anyway. Like, are there various subcultures that prioritize different species of host, perhaps? Could there eventually be social castes based on what species your host is, or how healthy they are? What would happen to the culture if they discovered a way to preserve hosts that aren't actively used/infested, for later re-use? If the Naquil aren't as long-lived as a particular host species, could a host be inherited? So many weird, freaky possibilities. Love it.
It's a good day whenever WC uploads! I really like how you manage to progress the history of the world by implementing the stuff covered in the rest of the video, it's all seamless.
Re democracy - totalitarianism scale? I would argue this misses several important factors. 1. Institutional strength. Some states have very strict norms or laws enforced very effectively. Western countries are examples. Petty corruption, for example, is almost non-existent in such societies whether democratic or not. 2. Scope of government. Not every state performs the same functions. A neoliberal state might have a scope which includes military spending, national security, state security, public safety, tax collection, environmental protection, the court system, private property rights, and enforcement of financial transparency laws. Meanwhile, embedded liberalism or social democracy might well add to that list, regulation and guidance of the market and providing a certain minimum of living standards. A socialist state might add management of the entire economy, deciding what to produce and where it should go, and intensely regulating any markets or private property that exist. A warlord state doesn't care about most of that stuff, just how to get money flowing to their second rate military, and might even raid its own population for cash without providing public services. Keep in mind it is likely that even in a democracy, dictatorial or pay-to-play organizations fill everything not in the state scope. 3. Conscious ideology. Almost every state is ideological. However, in some states, ideology is used as the justification for the government's right to rule.
Have only just found your channel recently. Love to hear an Australian voice among all the others! Thia whole series gives me wonderful ideas and food for thought when it comes to building worlds for my writing. Keep up the great work!
Well, the claim that settled society inevitable/automatically develop states is absolutely wrong and I've actually never seen it in any modern, serious academic anthropological text. (lel, there even was an industrial stateless society in Ukraine 100 years ago :'D) And considering Ukraine, the Cucuteni-Trypillia culture in the neolithic/chalcolithic had settlements as large as 30-40k inhabitants without any sign of a state (or even some formalised hierarchy) In fact, most neolithic settled societies seemed to be stateless for 5-7.000 years, with the state only evolving in the bronze age, and as an endogenous factor evolved in only a small fraction of areas with neolithic technology.
I thought that Aristocracy had the definition you gave to Oligarchy, and the merit-based rulership was Meritocracy. With Oligarchy being rulership under a council of rulers?
@@ApexPredator1000 According to Wikipedia: _Although the concept has existed for centuries, the term "meritocracy" is relatively new. It was first used pejoratively by sociologist Alan Fox in 1956, and then by British politician and sociologist Michael Dunlop Young in his 1958 satirical essay The Rise of the Meritocracy. Young's essay pictured the United Kingdom under the rule of a government favouring intelligence and aptitude (merit) above all else, being the combination of the root of Latin origin "merit" (from "mereō" meaning "earn") and the Ancient Greek suffix "-cracy" (meaning "power", "rule"). The purely Greek word is axiocracy (αξιοκρατία), from axios (αξιος, worthy) + "-cracy" (-κρατία, power). In this book the term had distinctly negative connotations as Young questioned both the legitimacy of the selection process used to become a member of this elite and the outcomes of being ruled by such a narrowly defined group. The essay, written in the first person by a fictional historical narrator in 2034, interweaves history from the politics of pre- and post-war Britain with those of fictional future events in the short (1960 onward) and long term (2020 onward)._
@Alex Panciera Ah, yes, that makes sense. Thanks for clearing it up! So aristocracy with its original intent then lines up with crafting ancient civilizations then since that was how they started. Meritocracy for more 'modern' or futuristic society crafting then
@@ApexPredator1000 Ancient Greek thinkers considered Aristocracy as it was intended (no hereditary power, everyone who lead had to earn their position by demonstrably proving their worth) to be superior to Democracy (every citizen, which meant a land-owning man, had a vote regardless of him actually having the brains to exercise his responsibilities properly “the best argument against democracy is a five minute discussion with the average voter.”), but it’s corrupted form Oligarchy (a minority of wealthy families consolidate all political power within themselves and are neither accountable to everyone outside their rich asshole club nor interested in the well-being of them) to be even worse than the corrupted form of Democracy, which is Ochlocracy. (mob rule. Best modern example: Trump voters.)
Asking everyone for help. For a World Map with scale representing 1 cm = 400 miles, what should I actually draw on the map? Only the Ridgeline of Mountain Ranges equivalent to the Himalayas, Andez and the Alps? I shouldn't be showing hills right? Only the major rivers equivalent to the Nile,Ganges and the Amazon? What about smaller Rivers like Rhone or Thames? Should I draw Only the navigable parts? How many cities should I actually show? Of what sizes or importance? How do I show Forested or Desert regions without colour codes but by symbols without messing up the map?
I don't know if you found what you're looking for, but here are my (non-expert) ideas: For ridgelines, definitely define the bigger mountains. You don't usually have to note hills unless they're important somehow, although foothills and larger should be considered for noting. For rivers, I would say that they should be mapped as far up as they could be navigated by a simple log raft. If the river is smaller than that, it is most likely a brook or similar tributary at that point. Bear in mind that most rivers start in mountains as joining snow melt streams and brooks. For cities, it depends on who the map is for. A map for foreigners will most likely only contain cities, towns and villages of note. A good way to figure this is to see if the dwelling contributes to the economy of the land in any way. An isolated town that only produces timber may still be on a map, but a self-contained village that doesn't trade with or is destinationally notable to the rest of the country, most likely won't appear on such maps. On the other hand, a King would definitely want to know as much as he can about his country, and would most likely have all the residences, from grand cities to lowly hovels noted. At the end of the day, the more informed your map user is, the more detailed the map will be. As for the symbols, for forests you can draw small trees loosely based on the ones in the forest. Deserts, you can draw the borders, and then fill it with diagonal hatching. Including the name of the desert helps as well. In conclusion, it really comes down to how much information you think the map needs. The typical use of a map is for navigation by landmarks, so think of what you might need if you were using your map to traverse the land. You most likely don't want to make topographical maps, especially at the scale stated, but noting the shapes and positions that one would be abe to see unassisted (probably about 10-15 miles max) would help with the purpose and believability of your map. Of course, it also depends on who the map is for, like I stated above. Maybe it's a plot point that a certain town isn't marked. I hope this helps! I'm not a professional by any means, but I've spent a lot of time doodling on my homework! Now get out there and draw some maps!
This is a great video. I have decided to try to apply this concept for my worldbuilding...Focusing on just elves, for now. The Drow, or Dark Elves, live in city-state monarchies, in which religion forms both the justification for the government and assures public service. The cultures that had established in-land where never militarily strong, due to being mostly nocturnal and spending most of their time underground. They where mostly agnatic and peaceful. The Eastern Alpine cultures have on the contrary been very war-like, since they were constantly forced to compete for ressources with other cultures, and where very matriarcal. The various cultures expanded mostly through claiming land that nobody else wanted. The two surviving settlements are monarchic city-state, one patriarcal, using a syllabary writing system and mostly peaceful, where priests and patriarchs (clan fathers) hold most of the political power, the king being mainly an overseer. The other is matriarcal, uses an alphabet, most political power is held by dynastic priestesses and is war-like. The Ice Elves on the other hand are stateless, and tend to have magicratic chiefdoms, in which warrior-mages hold most of the power. Clans tend to have patriarcal (men generally know their children are, tend to be monogamy married and holds most important decisions of the household) and matriarcal family (the mother or mother-in-law hold most of the authority, the masculine figure of the household is not the father of the children, and the women feels no pressure to remain chaste) structures interchangeably, depending on the current needs of the clan. They are nomadic or semi-settled. They live in bands and tribes, most of the time, and lord undisputed over alpine tundra. Those who inhabit latitudinal tundra are frequently forced to compete for their ressources, becoming more war-like and brutal to survive this situation. By virtue of inhabiting tundra, which is inhabitable for most humans, they generally are mostly left alone by other cultures, except artic dwarves and the very occasional humans. The extinct forest elves had a variety of social structures, before they where either outcompeted or persecuted out. Still in the temperate to continental climates, the water-elves (inhabiting near rivers and swamps), the forest elves, mostly subdivided into the birch tree culture, the beech tree culture and the pine tree culture. The birch tree culture being a monarchy, but the administration is run democratically. They tended to be a defensive culture, as many fungi on birch trees are edible for humans. The beech tree culture was rather similar to the birch tree one, excepte covering a far smaller geographic area. The pine culture tended to be more in pine dominated areas. All forest-based elven cultures tended to have a similar political structure to the birch-tree culture, but with slight twists to them. Before the Elven Hunts, the birch culture was the most successful one.
Very cool! Excellent worldbuilding as usual, I love the state and stateless examples for the elves, takes what already feels 'drow-like' but you've fleshed it out really well!
I like this video, even if I find your definition of a revolution a bit flawed. Most of the time, revolts were just influent group A taking charge at the place of influent group B. There was rarely a ''class consciousness'' that could have led to a revolution like you described (the only one I'm thinking of rn is Spartacus's revolt) were for let's say a pesant in some ra dom place of greece, being ruled by the monarchy of Thebes or the monarchy of i dunno sparta is basically the same (i know they were city state but you see what I mean) If politics are for an elite (king, priest, classical citizen...) And there's no consciousness of the casts in the population, revolution will only be family one throwing loyals to family two and not the soldiers fighting back against their rulers. Anyway it still is a good video
So funny thing, in my world there is a continent called Kalandria (spelled Kal'andria) which I chose to mean "Shattered Realm" in Elvish. I just wanted to say that cause it was just a funny coincidence
This is such a good series, but my favorite part is seeing the examples in action of the different species evolving, creating trade routes and governments etc. It's so good! How far in the world building timeline are you planning to go for this series? Are we gonna hit steampunk times? Cyberpunk? Going to space?
I was so excited to see this posted! I'm feeling inspired to try to sort out my world and will now try to do that! ....but I have to do the races first. That's been on the to do list for ages... I have winged people, humans, and "other", someone who can relate to the winged people's plight of being discriminated against by humans but not nearly as severely (the other are disliked while the winged people are now hunted). I used "elves" as a placeholder but I really should figure it out... Main focus being they can sometimes be mistaken for human... I'll try to do this again! (it's obvious I used this place to think aloud, thank you!)
This series is amazing I can't believe where it came from. Really highlights how asking one question can spur a thousand others. I feel like the humans who were culturally effected by the zombie fungus would be particularly extreme in their hatred and desired eradication of the octopus body snatchers. I'm imagining real inquisitional savagery
hey idk if you know this but there is a lot of evidence that non settled societies tended not to live wit their kin groups. in fact non settled groups in africa can live with less than %10 of their groups being kin once they are grown up. as well as this during the bronze age we have evidence of cities existing with large population without states. i dont want to undermine your video as its largely good. but i think this is good to consider in potential future works. thanks for the content :)
Even in the past century, some large scale territories have lived in stateless egalitarian societies for short duration, like Makhnovchina in Ukraine and Revolutionary Catalonia+Aragon. Both were young revolutions though and where not equipped to withstand the power of large states. The Zapatistas in Mexico and Rojava in Northern Syria are a bit smaller examples as well, currently existing. As worldbuilding goes, I'd say Ursula K. LeGuin 's The Dispossessed is an interesting one.
Half a year ago I finished a book called _The Dawn of Everything - A New History of Humanity_ by David Graeber and David Wengrow. Using their fields of anthropology and archelogy, the two wrote a book basically trying to demolish the the orthodoxy of cultural stages that has been around for a couple of centuries or so. Even if you don't agree with their conclusions, they do give wonderful ideas about forms of government and states that is a bit broader than this.
Hey! Awesome video! Do you intend to make a video talking about cities, towns and villages? Since you started on a big scale (the universe), I wonder if you’ll get to how to make a city
Absolutely! As the series progresses my intention is to 'zoom in'. Most usable projects, either for writing or tabletop games, focus on specific areas of a world, such as cities and villages, and that's ultimately what the end product of worldbuilding (and this series) will be!
I was actually looking for something like this as im currently planning nations and trying to figure out which how the government system would work out in each nation so i do appreciate you for this magnificent video 😀 im currently world building a Dieselpunk fantasy setting and while there other sentient races that do exist Humans do make the majority of each of the major nations.
@@themonsterwithin4000 it is indeed but there is more too it than meets the eye while the name is intresting the world itself is even more so the only issue i have right now is settling on a plot but i got characters down aswell as the world, and countries itself
Very good video, I think this is the perfect video for looking at the broad strokes of government Would you come back to your government, for a more in-depth look into the relative power-structures behind one of your states? For example, a state like the Golden Horde was often backed by a military aristocracy, who often made or broke the rule of a particular Khan - so there was often a push and pull effect between the khan and the noyans for centralised power
Thank you! And definitely, as the series goes on I'd like to 'zoom in' on particular areas, and going further in depth into aspects of government is something I'd like to do in the future :)
This video is very low effort and flawed. It misrepresents both the types of governments mentioned and the aspects that differentiate governments in general. What about citizenship, the different powers of government such as monopoly on force, taxation, currency creation, religious duties and authority, who and the proportion of people with the right to serve in militaries, the right to vote, to run for office, societal coordination, the handling of interactions in courts/legislatures between the rich and the poor, poor vs poor and rich vs rich, governments as institutions vs personal/group relations, methods of legitimization, constraints on power due to its nature as a pyramid of supporters rather than idealized absolute monarchs, the type and degree of jurisdiction such as hard or soft borders, contracting out government powers, whether the political map is divided according to fixed regions or changing ones or simply reorganized according to new titles/resettlements, etc.
@@josecarlosmoreno9731 Name one story that details all the aspects of a state you mentioned. Just one. One story where every element you listed is mentioned and relevant to the story.
@@addisonwelsh Legitimization is a story aspect of many medieval inspired settings as is the concept of government as personal relations, constraints on power is an aspect of political dramas such as in Rome/US/etc, contracting out government powers includes bounty hunting, mercenaries, privateers, and stories critiquing corporations bribing governments, court dramas touch on the way courts function and the disparity of justice embedded in the system, religious/military/official/citizen duties are key parts of most worldbuilding, government losing a monopoly on force is part of lawless settings, overtaxation is a common plot point of corrupt empires, societal coordination is part of any story involving some collective action problem such as mustering an army or striking a truce to defeat a larger threat/natural disaster, jurisdiction is common in police stories, deeper stories such as the show The Wire touch on a lot of things such as courts/law enforcement/public services/etc. The deeper the lore of a world the more these get detailed out. Are a lot of stories shallow with childish world building? Yes, but it's not like these topics aren't present in a lot of stories, and a deeper world building provides both greater immersion as well as many opportunities to investigate/question/comment on how we organize our society, idealism vs pragmatism, competing visions for societal organization, human nature, etc, etc. Low effort world building and stories are sadly far too common and both prevent and drown out whoever actually puts in thought and care. Game of Thrones was good but failed in many ways in regards to their world building, such as the Dothraki being bland, mindless animals who's society should have crumbled in a day from starvation, or how no one cared that the Sept of Balor was blown up, there should have been an immediate armed revolt by the population and it should have shocked the military and nobles into revolt as well. Deeper world building greatly enriches stories, and the real world is far deeper than anything any author could write.
How was Norford able to appoint people to power based merely on merit? From historical examples, it can be observed that it is very likely for indivituals with considerable wealth and/or power to be appointed to the aristocracy, even if they aren't the most meritorious indivitual available.
Depends on how you define merit. If historically merit meant "had a lot of money," then rich people were chosen by merit. If we look at the Chinese Imperial bureaucracy, merit meant having enough knowledge to pass specific exams. Although I don't know this world beyond what was presented in this video, perhaps merit for Norfold was based on trade relations and diplomacy: the most meritorious individuals were the ones who brokered the best trade deals or maintained positive relations between the various peoples.
@@aquatsar1769 Isn't merit one's ability to do certain things well? For example, Napoléon's army's hierarchy worked on merit. If you were good at leading men and strategies, you got promoted.
I agree, I was trying to ask "what are those certain things they need to do well?" If rulers are appointed or elected because they do things well, what are the things they need to do? If Norford is a trading hub then it would make sense that "making money" is something leaders should do well. If we take a more political leaning to things, forging relationships to gain or maintain power could be considered meritorious (they did "politics" well). The Napoleon example is fine for an army, but it could also work for a government. If it's a full statocracy, then only the military matters but it could be an aristocratic statocracy where the "best" military leaders are rulers (where best could be those who win the most battles, or get the most loot, or have won the most dangerous fights personally, etc.). What is meritorious in the eyes of the people says a lot about their culture, which is why it's difficult for me to answer the question for Norfold. I don't know what their culture is supposed to be like.
It's interesting that almost invariably, the high living standards and egalitarian democracy of tribal lifestyles are lost in favor of much higher population, higher organization, and rigid autocracy as civilizations develop. But it seems like they don't get both. Either everyone is well fed, there aren't many people, and society is primitive communism, or everyone is struggling but the upper classes, there are a zillion people, and it's some kind of dictatorship run for the benefits of those upper classes. Despite no theoretical reason it can't happen while maintaining living standards and democracy, agricultural societies with complex organization and large populations seem to invariably lose their high education, living standards, and egalitarianism.
I’ve got to be honest, I know a lot of people think that early tribal life was great and everyone had enough to survive, but that doesn’t seem true to me at all. When you have a society like that, it’s hard to have metal tools that improve the efficiency of hunting or making shelters. You’re at the mercy of harsh winters and long droughts and say wolves that come after your herds. Not to mention having to deal with other tribes who can try to take your stuff or who kill you so that they don’t have to compete for resources. Settled agricultural society certainly seems to introduce the extremes of inequality that we see throughout history, but it does also seem to benefit everyone to some degree. Some benefit more than others, primarily based on the control of land, but generally everyone benefits and it certainly isn’t destroying some perfect system where everyone is happy. It’s a strange utopian idea that Plato and later Rousseau have that just doesn’t make sense to me
@@user-bi3bv3xo1gbefore agriculture people were better fed (healthier, taller). But the agriculture had one advantage, it allowed support more people per square mile.
Another way to think of a state is.. it’s the limbs and skeleton of a nation. A nation is like the soul of a collective people. A nation is how they feel, view, their morals, culture - everything that binds a people together under a common perception. The state is usually a reflection of that people and becomes the nation’s will, if you will.. in a lot more practical way of living, so we don’t kill each other or exploit each other, but so that we can live not only peacefully but in conjunction with one another… but everything created by humans, will fall into degradation and corruption of not properly maintained. However if maintained, it can be a well oiled machine. Bureaucracy is made to make everything runs smoothly and effective. A well established bureaucracy can heightened everything. But as time changes and different kind of people goes in and out, bureaucracy can become janky and bloated… and it’s a perfect time for corruption. And something that may have been a huge boon to one generation of people, well the next may have a different moral compass and may exploit, what was once deemed too appalling to even consider.
I created a highly oppressive coastal nation ruled by a cabal of evil wizards - The Wotzi Party, led by Archmage Bile Krynk. Wotzi is short for "Wizardly Overlord Trust Syndicate", and its use is generally not permitted by the Wotzis themselves . The city of Tel'Aset is one of despair and fear, with a great spire looming over the skyline - for it is this cursed needle that serves as the Wotzi's mage tower. Worship of the gods is outlawed; the only cult allowed to flourish is that of Kaokhris, the infamously poorly-endowed arch-devil of greed. There is also a great deal of racial oppression; not only are half-elves and half-orcs "kill on sight", mere mention of their existence is enough to get a citizen thrown into a re-education camp.
You forgot that recently settled peoples usually take a very long time to become a state, unless rushed by foreign intervention. Everyone, even settle peoples, were stateless in the neolithic.
Not all monarchies in history were inherited through being a descendant/relative of the former monarch. Like Macedon for most of it's history had monarchs elected by the military, another example Bohemia and Holy Roman Empire even though the Habsburg dominated both for large periods of times and then the oldest one we know of Parthia where the emperor was selected among the nobles and well the royal family (who usually had the strongest claim and approval by the nobles). Mongols Great Khans like Genghis were elected as well. The mongol empire is an interesting beast since it was not quite settled yet not quite fully nomadic either and they functioned in a very interesting way since they were like a confederacy of clans who formed the backbone of the leaderships who were everything from nomadic warlords to clan leaders becoming Khans who ruled a settled kingdom for the great Khan. The great Khan was an elected theocratic monarch since he was choosen by Tengri the great heaven to rule all of the land and the kurultai (The assembly of Khans only called after a great Khans death this system was also used on a smaller scale for the other Khans) this was one of the reasons they were so fervent in their conquering even after securing the resources they needed to not only live comfortable but extremely wealthy since simply believed that everything that the sky saw belonged to the great Khan and Tengri.
One of the few clear examples of an empire forming from a Republic was Rome (although it devolved into a chaotic semi-monarchial system of military tyrants after Augustus Caesar). The US could also be an example of a democratic empire (although the US built on the foundation of the British Constitutional Monarchial social system).
If you’re an emperor, you’re like the kings of king. You’ve vast amount of territory, multiple nations, cultures and countries within one overarching state. If Germany and France United as well as the countries in between… that would be an empire.. however calling yourself an emperor also signaliez to the broader world that may have vast power, but it can also put a target on your back. And holding a huge empire usually have its own major issues, like it’s hard to communicate from border to border, which can fester corruption more easily. Already the difference culture can created tension and division. If you’ve multiple border and they’re also far apart and you get invaded by a collation, fighting in multiple fronts is never adventurous. There’s many thing that can go wrong. One thing that drove Rome to keep expanding was war United the people as well as bringing in bountiful of ressources and opportunity. One of the key cornerstone to Rome also fell were the loss of Egypt where their main food supply for the whole empire came from. So food supply is also something instrumental to think about when thinking countries and country size. And you’d also realize that food is the basis of all economics besides ‘Time itself’
Another common combination is monarchy supported by aristocracy like in early feudal states. This usually develops into monarchy backed by oligarchy over time. But the concept of first among equals is not unheard of in early monarchies. And then there is Rome which was very oligarchal with a bit of a Republican system
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” CS Lewis (yes I am aware of the irony of him not realizing that this also describes the Christian God)
Ah yes, because the nomadic Golden Horde definitely had limited central authority and had no laws governing succession and therefore cannot be a state. Whereas the settled mountain tribes of Indochina, definitely must have had a clear centralized authority backed by a legal code to perpetuate governmental power, they definitely couldn't have been stateless societies. /s
Great video! This was very helpful. Nice that you mentioned The sovereignty of Texas. But some things I want to tell you. I’ve been researching this. You see The thing about states is a monarch can’t properly rule over a large country or empire. So that’s why The country or empire is divided into states. The states sort of act as their own country inside of a country except with limited freedom which Can vary so that one ruler don’t have to rule the whole country by his/her self or their selfs if it’s multiple rules. Since states act almost like a whole Nother country except with limited freedom they have their own capital their own flag and their own military and much more! And governors are Second in command when it comes to their state. This makes states much more interesting. Their freedom can vary a lot! In fact A long time ago The American states had so much freedom they could basically be their own countries and invade other states! Even though they’re all part of the country. So there’s much more political stuff happening in states then you would’ve thought. Also The human colonies unless they come from other planets The major powers on earth would be The United States and China so the colonies would likely be Chinese and American. So the human colonies would probably not be monarchies. Instead they would likely be Either democracy or communism. Also the thing about your cool intelligent alien life is that empires pretty much completely corresponded with there climate. For example The tropical areas in Asia became India The temperature zone in Asia became china The desert zone became the Mongol empire The Mediterranean zone in Europe became the Roman empire and so on. Basically climate unites people through culture. The Roman empire probably failed because of Invaders from the north from a different climate zone. Also another thing is Eurasia is wider than it is tall so it has roughly the same climate types throughout allowing for large empires and cultures to diffuse and develop. But the reason Continents like Africa North and South America did not develop and were conquered by Europeans. It’s because they were longer than they are tall so they pass through many climate zones and are very diverse so that cultures cannot diffuse together like they can in Eurasia. Because of this unfortunately your world may not work. The main continent is taller than it is wide so the climate zones are small and it’s very diverse. As a result the alien life on your planet will not be able to develop and would be conquered by humans that have benefited from a unifying geography as historically happened. Sorry that this was very long.
Thanks for the detailed comment! To clarify, because I think there's been some confusion, the humans on Locus do not come from earth, have never evolved on earth, and therefore are not American or Chinese. Locus is a planet in an entirely fictional universe. You're absolutely right about empires being more likely to form successfully across the same latitudes, which is why on Locus the Kathochushian empire was so short lived; it tried unsuccessfully to branch out into another climate band. Also, you're right, a monarchy can rule over a monarchy! This was actually very common throughout history, with kings answering to other kings. In fact, a government can have other types of government above and below it. However, a king ruling underneath another king is not sovereign, even though they are still a monarch.
@@Me-yq1fl your second one wrong. The reason the Europeans even have all that stuff is because of THEIR UNIFYING GEOGRAPHY. And no. There were barely any real societies in America or Africa. Egypt was only able to form only because of the Nile river. Mali was locked to the Sahel which was bigger at the time. The Inca were only able to form because of the Andes mountains with vertical unifying geography. There are meny other examples. Of features that allowed em to exist. Eurasia had a huge amount of empires but Africa and the Americas had very few. Meny of em that you my consider civilizations ain’t actually civilizations at all. They were just tribes. and even the civilizations that did form they ain’t nearly as advanced as Eurasian civilizations.
9:30 Democracies didn't vote for leaders had direct votes for decisions, the reason Democracies evolved into republics is because this simply doesn't work on a larger scale and why we switched to voting for representatives and leaders
There is a societal organization that could expand to a governmental structure, that I think, is worth mentioning: the caste system. While it is only softcoded in some of our societies until today, it is dominant in the second most powerful civilization on Earth after mankind. The idea of collective societies has been explored in fiction before. But usually to the independent thinking, individualist human audience, hiveminds are usually the bad guys.
is it empire when territory holdings are fully, or not entrigated into the state? Or does it stop being an Empire when all holdings are fully settled by a single ethinic identity?
Well... the main government in my worldbuilding project is a nightmare - in a fun and interesting way. It comprises: a Confederation of no less than 5 largely independent Theocracies, each governed in their own way, with dual Monarch and Emperor at the helm; additionally, there are 15 entirely independent feudal systems who can - mostly - overrule anything they please if it is found to be within their remit and not against the dogma of the Theocracy they operate within; Every one of the many systems of rule are also highly complex, and ruled by different principles - including the Confederacy at the centre of it all.
Lindale would be very disruptive to the status quo if they were to make a sudden attempt to seize power. And the Na'quil are increasingly similar to Daleks.
How would you bulid a antagonist mysterious esoteric faction who controls mutiple nations which your protagonists must face in their lifetimes? Like a powerful elitists secret society that is ancient and old but also divided and morphs doctrines overtime in their concealment? And they use cults like low level pawns at the end of the day.
I created a nation that was an absolute monarchy that was deposed to a democratic republic that devolved into a centralized dictatorship due to lack of strong institutions or democratic history
It could be worth looking at Greek political theory what has a good system of explanation on how government transforms through early history. There are three basic types of rule - rule of a single leader (monarchy), of a group or class (aristocracy), or of "the people" as a whole (a polity or republic). Each of these has a degenerate version where the rulers selfishly only look enrich or aggrandize themselves. These versions are tyranny, oligarchy and democracy (ironically, this is the name of degenerate form in Aristotle). So the progression is the first governments tend to be monarchies, but eventually become tyrannies. A group of nobles overthrow the tyrant and form an aristocracy to return to virtuous rule. It in turn degenerates into oligarchy and is overthrown by the people in a republic. The republic degenerates into something that divides against itself, refuses to spend enough to defend itself, the majority oppresses the minority who eventually rise up against this, or some other form of degeneracy, and is eventually overthrown by a new king that will rule virtuously and starts the cycle over again. This is obviously stylized and theoretical, but it creates a nice view of how governments can and did transform through the ancient and classical eras
I actually made a map with them for this video but was unhappy with how it looked and took them out. I felt it made the map too difficult to read, but I'm going to spend some time working with it and come up with a visual style I feel works :)
You need to work on your Scholars' Cradles. Randomly cutting to yourself making the same hand motions over and over feels distracting. You did seem to do a few different motions in this video as opposed to the past ones so you're getting better.
Most famous empires are republics hell the poster boy rome conquered nearly everything as a republic and as an empire wasnt nearly as conquering aggressive as in the republic time
Not really. As a republic they only conquered Italy, Greece, most of Spain, and a bit of North Africa and west Turkey. Caesar conquered Gaul (France) without permission from the Senate, Egypt was conquered at the dawn of Augustus' reign, and the Empire would go on to conquer southern Britain, Turkey, large portions of the near east, the rest of Spain and North Africa, and some parts of Southern Europe. The Roman Empire was just as aggressive as the republic, if not more.
Can you show me the tribal etc. society where a person could declare himself the "ruler" of the society without support ? Ever heard of Federationized states like swiss, germany, the US? Bands are AFAIK a military etc "organisation" from the holy band of thebes, the calssic tribal war band to hunting bands btw Tyranny was an ancient greek invention
Civilizations dont often reform into Democracies. More often it evolves into some other representative federation. due to slight shift of power. absolute Monarchy into Constitutional monarchy. (nobilty rise in power) Constitutional Monarchy into Representative Parliament (Peasents become wealtheir)
@@baneofbanes My point being that there's a transition period before a democracy can be established. Constitutional Monarchy is not automatically democratic. They can evolve into Democracies.
so in my fictional world there is a grand chiefdom and half-setlled empire but some of their vassals are fully settled the country is clanocracy ( there are clans ruling ) there is elective monarch must be male from one of 15 main clans ( often son of previous ruler if their reing was good) and at least 12 which is adult age in their culture . monarch shares his rule with council of elder made from oldests person from each clan that want to take place and is healthy on mind ( only males) there is no real capital as grand chief almost always changes his location there are some building used for housing important event like corronation or marriages ( thery allow having lovers) country is agrresive but not stupidly there are some villages and cities ( mostly conquested ones) but about 80% of population still uses hunting and gathering to live in left 20% around 10% lives from raving other countries, 4% lives from merchandise, 2% leaves from production , and only 1.5% lives from farming and 2.5% lives from other things
The definition of empire you used us wrong. Its a title that reffere to the heritage of Rome exclusively. The modern misdefinition is based on unofficial empires and the assumption that inorialism us connected to enpure, which it technically isnt.
I'm sorry but so much wrong in this. You really need to do better research instead of just giving "common sense" answers you think are right or whatever.
Actually you can categuraise goverments by state form (Monarchy or republic) it is every time a republic wen the ruler is elected in any from. And the other part of the catigusation is how power is distribruted and actet so we in germany are a republic with a representiv democracy. The peopels republic of china is a republic with a party Dictaturship. And the Stratocraty you disriped woud actually be a republic be couse the title is not inerhended but elected.
Tyranny is more when a ruler or even ruling party (when elected) become overly cruel, controlling and terrorise their own people and break the laws of the land and protections of the people from the Government. This is often done by a tyrant king/queen but can and has happened under democratic leadership as well, just look at some African and Asian states or those communist block nations after WW2. You on the other hand can have very competent and none tyrannical kings as well.
