Non-Aligned Polities
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Non-Aligned Polities |
It is not always necessary to be a part of a larger sephirotic empire or meta-empire. Many non-aligned and only nominally aligned polities exist, in the borders between the larger hyperpowers. These small states guarantee the same sentient rights and adhere to the same standards of civilization as their larger brethren.
Such polities are sovereign states, ruled by sapient or transapient government. It may be as small as a single individual (a so called Sovereignty of One) or as large as a vast interstellar empire. It may be a democracy, a theocracy, an autocracy, an anarchy, an aicracy, a panocracy, an aristocracy, a plutocracy, a meritocracy, or any other of the innumerable forms of government found throughout the civilized galaxy. But whatever the form of government, there will be sapient or transapient sentients at the head - whether the entire populace (as in extreme democracy) or a single autocrat (as in extreme monocracy). These beings then decide the foreign, economic, military, educational, legal, industrial, cultural, entertainment, and ideological stance of the polity as a whole.
The number and diversity of such polities in the galaxy is as great as the number and diversity of clades, cultures, and memetic-complexes. There are estimated to be almost a trillion polities incorporated in the Civilized Galaxy, only a tiny proportion of which are heavily memed, angelnetted, and governed aicracies in which the Archailects have established their hold securely and with no fear of defection or subversion. A much larger number consist of the many of nominally aligned or neutral worlds, habitats, and polities, with populations ranging from the thousands to (in a few cases) the billions. But far more numerous again, and making up the vast majority of sovereign states, are the huge number of Sovereignties of Ones and of micropolities with only a few dozen or a few hundred citizens. Especially in the case of trader empires - like the FAS and the Orion Federation - there is, in addition to the large and powerful core of central federated worlds and superpolities, millions of relativistic ship-states; each trader vessel being a sovereign nation unto itself. Individually these traders have very little power. Collectively they are a force to be reckoned with. And almost all empires have to contend with - in the less regulated and developed regions - the phenomenon of individual, family, and clan homesteaders declaring their own little piece of rock or ice a sovereign nation. Finally there are the Free Zones, which are polities that specifically swear allegiance to no Archailect or, in the case of the NoCoZo, to an archailect so abstract that some doubt whether it even exists at all!
Because of the tendency of individual, family, clan, and small clade
and subculture sapients and powers to declare autonomy, the AI empires
have no choice but to rule by memetic and noetic principles. If their
religion, ideology, philosophy, esoteric, spirituality, and toposophy,
is attractive enough, then the homesteaders, nomads, colonists, and
traders will automatically align with them, as the most reasonable and
beneficial option. If their memetic is weak, and their noetic does not
promise much, then they will find these innumerable small polities
defecting to the opposition or remaining independent.
The intrigues and stratagems required to keep these smaller polities happy and aligned with one or another of the sephirotics, or even with a more minor local god, can at times be so convoluted that many sapients - and even many transapients - choose simply to ignore them. For them it is enough that they get a good deal from a local god or hyperturing, that they be allowed to trade in information, creativity, and materials, or if they choose, to not trade, and to express their ideology and lifestyle without interference. When pirates or barbarian raiders or blights come their way, these small polities are quick to cry for help to the big powers. Sometimes, in the interests of encouraging diversity, the big powers and AIs will protect the small polities from such dangers without asking for anything obvious in return. For them, simply nurturing of diversity is apparently motivation enough.
