TEC History, Organization, Politics, Culture

cool

Well, let's start with government.

The problem with mass governments is the tax levels.  This would mean that the TEC and TO would be streamlined to allow for minimum layers of government.

Obviously, at the top would be the TEC capital planet from which the legislative body of the TEC would write laws.  This Trader Congress would have likely have three houses:

Senate: The upper house and carries the longest terms.  All bills regarding war, peace, and the like must begin here.  When government officials are impeached, they are tried here.  All planets send three members to this.  All members of this house must have a doctorate in political science.

House of Represenatives: The middle house which has the authority to impeach the highest ranking officials.  All taxes imposed upon the people directly must begin here.  Members are sent based on population.  1 member per .5 billion on a planet, rounding up.

House of Treasury: the lower house where all taxes imposed upon goods must begin.  All members of this house must have doctorates in economics.  Members are sent based on the economic influence of a planet.  The annual budget must be passed by this house.

Now, as new planets are discovered, they must be addressed.  I will use a similar system to the one in my book.  I will call this the Colonial Union.

Planets with a population of less than .5 million are considered to be the property of the planet that founded the colony there.

Once above half a million people, a planet may petition the CU for membership.  At this point, CU officials will aid in the drafting of a planetary constitution.  The CU is a one house legislature.  All members must abide by its laws, but the CU must also abide by the laws of the TEC Congress unless a majority of 80% is achieved at which it may "veto" the law from affecting its members for three years.  After that time, they must re-vote to keep up the veto effect.

At a population of .5 billion, the planet may apply for membership in the TECC.  If accepted, a committee from the TECC will aid in revision of the planetary constitution.  Upon completion, the planet may begin sending members to the TECC.

In the way of executives and judicial branches, someone else can come up with that...

the executive branch is headed by one person nominated by an electoral college (each planet provide 1 representive per 1 billion population, with minimum being 1) who has a collection of advisors and staff workers to help with decision making in the times of crisis

answerable only to the Senate, the position is theoretically powerful, with power over the armed forces and the ability to propose laws and taxes of ones own ideas, but over time much has been stripped of its powers, only to be revitalized by the forming of the TEC

The highest ranking officer of the TEC (admiral?) is also the political extension of the TEC. The TEC is actually just the military force of the Trade Order, though the Order has been pushed to the back as the TEC deals with the war. But people in the TEC refer to the Trader worlds as a whole as part of the Trade Order, not the Trader Emergency Coalition. So what I'm saying is the TEC is just like a political party (one with really big guns) and the Trade Order is the actual group of people. Thoughts?

I'm with Ryat...  Let's call this leader the Regisor (from the latin regis meaning king; pronounced ree-gih-sor).  The Regisor may propose any law or treaty, but they must be passed the same way as any other law.  With laws that normally originate in a certain house, the respective house and may neutralize the Regisor's bill if they are more than 60% against it.

In the same way, the Regisor may veto any bill that is passed by Congress.  Congress may override this should each house re-vote and have an average over 67%.

@CI: No, the TO rebranded itself the TEC.  This is what the founding fathers did with the Articles of Confederation.  The Constitution was a completely different government than the AoC.  What happened is that the AoC may only be amended by a unanimous vote.  The C was technically an amendment, but since it threw out everything else and replaced it with itself, it is generally considered something else.

This is what I think happened to the TO.  When faced with destruction, it threw out the old bureaucratic system in favor of an emergency system.  For another example, think of Rome's ability to elect a dictator in times of distress.  Same idea.

actually i was thinking more along the lines of pre and post WWII US,

In pre WWII US, the presidency while of some importance did not have much impact on the domestic side and almost minimal impact on foreign relations. While the Great Depression brought more power to the executive branch, there was still very little impact on the foreign arena (at one point they were actually praising Hitler for what he did in turning Germany's economy around). Consequently the military was small and under equipped. Even after Hitler let loose, the US was still doddering around, worried about its economy and others things. After the Japanese attacked and gut punched the US forces not once but several times many powers were shifted back to the presidency to fight the war. Ironically after WWII, the Cold War began, and the presidency kept many of these powers changing what affected the US and the world. Initially this meant having one of the biggest armies of the world with a powerful industry to back it, which is how the TEC is now.

Basically this would be a MultiSystem Marshal Law. Any planets (even if they are facing destruction some will still oppose violence) that oppose military taking control or action against the Vasari would probably be crushed by the surrounding planets defensive forces.

disagree with the MSML. TO and to continue to the TEC was the allowance of conscientious objector so if planets as a whole wish to not use violence then that is their choice, flipside is they have to sign off the right to be defended by the TEC.

though if they attempt to stop the TEC in its quest to defend against the Vasari and Advent, well then the Marzas and Kols will be brought about.

I dont think they TEC would allow the individual worlds to just fend for themselves. If they did, The Vasari would easily get the upper hand by crushing these systems that refused to be defended and and the Vasari would get Footholds inbetween the TEC worlds that actually do want to fight. This would give the Vasari the upperhand in the fight as theyll be able to cut the TEC lines in half, basically divide and conquer. Im sure the TEC would rather just crush the worlds that refuse to aid in the effort then serve it up on a silver platter to the Vasari

TO is still around. Its not the TEC, the TEC is a seperate entity from the TO.

Ok, so here is some thoughts:

The Trade Order(TO) is as we most likely will all agree a congress of some kind. Each planet/goverment/buisness whatever gets a say in this massive congress. The congress is governed by the Regisor (Like that work Volt ^^) He/she is like the house of speaker in today term. Runs and organizes the TO sessions. How each faction within the TO gets a vote is something we can discuss after we finalize the TO since it is the key to the whole TEC.

 Like it was mentioned in the Vasari post that the TO is like the UN now a days here are the what I think what is they share:
-Each member must follow the guidlines and rules made by the TO. But are not limited to just those rules, each faction can in turn have their own goverment.
-Each member must contribute to the TO in some way. Pre-war Im sure it was cash and goods. But now its supplies, troops and ships for the TEC. Like current times where countries send troops and suppies for peacekeeping missions.

Im not sure how the current UN allows for new members.(To be honest, I dont keep up with it.) But Im sure its a simple vote or something. And going with this thought membership into the TO is simple. Maybe along the lines like Volt suggested population based. But remember that we are not counting planets as members. We are counting factions. A faction could control 1 planet or 10's of planets. So the voting could become complicated if we decide to outline that. (I say its not super super importaint for lore)

Now the TEC is a military base group created from the TO for the TO. They act for the TO yet defend any planet in Trader Space that request it. Funded by the TO for the most part but non TO members if there are any can support them also.. Those planets who refuse to join the TO or help the TEC are Marshal Lawed into cooperation (Destroying the milita).

 Im thinking its safe to say that these border worlds are alot like the worlds in the Firefly universe. With the central planets secured and the border world still a bit untamed and wild.

Those are my thoughts on yall thoughts.

Ok, so I know we havent established how the Government works yet. But Ive got this idea in my head about a Intelligence Agency for the TEC.

My opinion is, that with 1,000 years of realitive peace. The TO had no real need for intelligence. So whatever they did have to give the TO a heads up would be almost useless.  But their would be a way to gather intel on the Vasari movements and tactics.

The Terrans have Broadcast Centers....Which I would think are like Giant TV network stations (prior to the war). Once the TEC come into play the Company that owns these Broadcast Centers, Or the multiple companies come under control of the TEC and would be intergrated together to form a Intelligence Agency which also doubles as a culture control. Maybe call them TOIN, TRADE ORDER INTELLIGENCE NETWORK. As well, these Broadcast Centers would have a link up with any scout ships, CIVIC and MILITARY Bases, TRADE Posts, And Planetary Communications devices planetside. As every bit of information would be vital to combating the Vasari and eventually the Advent this TOIN would be massive and influential to how the TEC operate.

Does no one read my posts!?!?!

It says in the intro movie that the TO rebranded itself as the TEC!  That means it changed the government from the ground up!  Even if only temporarily, its still the same idea!

Also, read my first post for information regarding legislative power.

Carbon commented on it. And here's what the lore says on the Sins website

"The Trade Order could not fulfill this role because its mandate forbade interference with the sovereign rights of the member planets.  Thus, the Trader Emergency Coalition (TEC) formed despite strong opposition to the loss of planetary autonomy."

So the Trade Order never really left, it just created a powerful military force that has free reign in its actions to combat the Vasari and Advent. So in my understanding of the situation now, the TO is dealing with issues between member planets, and the TEC is dealing with the war effort. And Carbon, I don't think the TEC would help non-member planets, because the TEC is not exactly a separate entity. It's more a government program/military force that can do anything it wants (kinda like Cheney's death squads ).

Yes but I was going on the manual lore. As stated in the OP. They created the TEC.

And I think your first post is going on the base that their are sepreate legislative, executive and judical brances of the TO. Not what I was thinking. There is only one. Because every member is allowed to have their seperate goverment. There is no need to create more polictical red tape by adding lots of different branches and sections to each branch. Simplicity is the key to the TO. Streamline everything. 1 congress =less red tape. Easier to pass codes etc etc.

I like that. Anyone not agree? We could add this to the top.

My thoughts on how the Trade Order originated (as they had to come from humanity somehow). Also the creation of the Advent, but I don't go into them much.

So of course this has to be staged on Earth. This is perhaps 50-100 years before the creation of the Trade Order, instead, this is the creation of the Endeavors Party. This political party had radical new expansionist policies it wanted enacted, and it was based in the North American Union (that being the country the U.S., Mexica, and Canada combined to form a long time ago). Its ideas were appealing to a lot of people, and it quickly grew in strength. The two other major opposing parties (no names yet) joined together to form the Originals (trying to discredit the Endeavors in the minds of the voters as being crooked or liers). Quickly these became the two major parties of the world (like democrat and republican on a HUGE scale). The two parties entered a political stalemate, and so war erupted on Earth and its surrounding colony-planets. This is the first Worlds War, or WsW1 (pronounced "W"-"S"-"W" 1). During the war a radical faction of the Originals took control of the party and rebranded themselves the Optimus Terrans, meaning noble Earth. The Endeavors, now known almost exclusively as the Traders, an insult given by the Originals that went back to the old debate before WsW1 between the two parties, where the Originals accused the Endeavor Party of being willing to deal with the Enemy, to trade and bargain with them, although who this "enemy" exactly was they never said, made a truce with the OP Terrans, as they called themselves, and settled on a peace treaty. (wow long sentence) The Traders were to abandon Earth and live only in Mars and the various moon outposts in our solar system, while the OP Terrans would have Earth and would gratefully never leave it. Simply put, the Traders were forced to abandon humanity and the OP Terrans made space flight illegal, and neither side looked back on the other. Earth was now in truth a single-party system, run by radical Originals-made-OP Terrans.

Now the Traders lived content on mostly Mars for the next few years, and any lingering contact between the two parties finally trickled to a complete stop. For all the OP Terrans know, the Traders could very well be still living on Mars and the several moon outposts orbiting around the solar system. But that's not what actually happened. The Traders discovered a planet that could, with some infrastructure and terraforming processes, support human life. They left the Milky Way then, and never looked back. Unfortunately, during the next 20 or so years, the Trader party (as even they now called themselves) split into three factions. There were the Traders, who kept the original ideas of expanding a solar empire throughout the universe, there were the Illumis, a deeply religious sect that broke from the Traders to find their own planet where they could meditate and find spiritual release, and the last group, which consisted of mostly the scum of the Traders. Whatever name this group once had was lost to history, and now they are known simply as pirates, and they have spread out to almost every corner of the universe where there is human life.

The Traders stuck to their original beliefs, and went about colonizing as many planets as they could get their hands on. At first, in the rush of expansionism, only a few million people actually lived on each planet, but as the distances between these planets grew, colonization slowed down and population began. Each planet, one by one, split off from the Trader Party to pursue their own desires without having to confirm them with a higher government that never really had anything to do with them in the first place. The Trader Party split into a hundred different smaller parties, and even smaller ones as different factions formed in every planet, and the unified Trade Order was far off. But this was a start.

I think what C.I has is a good foundation to a beginning history for the TO but it definitely needs to be more defined in certian areas to better fit what we already know about the TEC.

As well heres an online copy of the SoaSE manual:

http://issuu.com/pparas/docs/sins_of_a_solar_empire_manual  Also as I mentioned in the Advent Thread, We should post the lore established already in the manuals about the ships as they hint to some lore.

Yeah, Carbon, post the TEC ship summaries on your thread here. Me and Allegiance are doing that for our threads too

Will work on that tonight.

Let's think about the prehistory of the Trade Order. As we know from the manual, the Trade Order was founded some 1000 years ago after some sort of ancient war. What could of brought the likely systems of warring nations to a standstill?

What I'm thinking is that the Trade Order came into existance directly because of the great wars of anquity. For what we know, these wars brought enormous devastation to the planets and people. This is why multiple religious groups, including the original practicions of the Unity, left what is now Trader Space. So let's say the warring systems were devastated by war. I'm thinking that a number of neutral worlds would have started trade routes with the wrecked worlds, in order to help restore them... at a price, of course. So in more time, these trading worlds would have extended into the Trade Order, who's sheer amount of commercial worlds would of been able to attract new clients by their wealth.

@Swordsalmon - Definitely something to consider. Here's my opinion though.

Maybe another 20-30 years after what I mentioned above, maybe longer, some individual Trader worlds are attacked by large groups of pirates, intent on carving out a base in a nearby asteroid. Unable to hold back the pirates, the Traders on those planets retreat to the safety of the surface, as pirates don't have siege frigates yet. The other Trader worlds, outraged at this incident, send a joint military force to wipe out the pirate base. And so starts a long, arduous war between the Traders and the pirates. Maybe the war forced the Traders together, and they found that they liked it better that way, so a simple Trade Order was set up (not called that), and after many years and countless revisions to the original document, the Trade Order is born with the Victan Tabellen (part latin, part honoring Victor something who did numerous heroic things during the Great Pirate War. we can work on that later), the Trader's constitution.

Or maybe long ago the People of Earth expanded out into space shortly after discovering phase space technology. Because of the great distances between these star systems. The original countries of Earth that controlled these colonies lost their control maybe 30-50 years after their initial settlements were established. Eventually Earth fell to a single government.  And of course the notion that planets held many nations of many cultures fell to the wayside. At first these planets would have been independant with little contact other then trade between other planets for atleast the first 100 years. But eventually as populations grew and the needs for more resources became prevailant. The individual planets began wars between themselves and other planets of their system, only looking to further their own agenda through out the system they inhabitated. This would have caused countless wars. Some of which that lasted decades and even found themselves spanning a number of star systems as the fight for control expanded.

At some point, multiple star systems would come under control of an one government using their military might to enforce themselves. To keep these planets under their control they would be governed by individuals from the Home planet of the government that ruled that sector.

Within 1,000 years so many wars would be waged over unclaimed systems that it would be hard for anyone to count them. But at the end of this 1,000 years the multisystem factions would begin to use politics and trade as a way to influence their neighbors. As each faction would be strong and large enough to fend off any invasions. After years of mistrust and paranoia the different groups began creating alliances and treaties.

But it wouldnt be long before war was on the horizon. Near the edge of the cluster of factions came reports of a faction much larger then the factions alone. Ill call this super faction the Confederate Planets of Avidan. The factions homeworld was Avidan Prime.  A planet that prides itself on war, these people pushed out looking to bring everyone into the fold. Their leader a dictator that passed down his place as ruler of Avidan Prime to his first born child. This would ensure that politics didnt get in the way of the vast empire the first dictator imagined for Avidan Prime.

The CPA was ruthless and wouldnt even waste time enslaving the people of any planets. These were the first people to use bombardment to annihialate entire populations. And the first to use colonists from planets already under their control to colonize newly conquered planets.  For the first 4 years of the war only the planets sharing a border with the CPA threw their militaries at the CPA in a desperate attempt to push back the invaders. But this did nothing to stop the CPA from gaining control of these smaller factions. After a number of diplomats had been sent by each faction and had died at the hands of the CPA, they decided to send delegates to an emergency convention to discuss a unified front against the Confederates. After the terms were hashed out the individual planets sent the majority of their Military forces to serve under the newly formed United Planets Defense Force. A strictly military organization that had a strict code of laws that only allowed them to use their forces against the CPA.

The CPA for the first time now faced a force equal to their own. The war would last 100 years, with entire star systems changing hands multiple times. Some star systems were abandoned entirely by both sides after planetoids were sucked dry of any resources needed for the conflict. Individual planets populations up and left disappearing into the vastness of space never to be heard from again.

Eventually the CPA fell under its own pressure unable to continue funding the war as well keep their planets from rebelling. This came to be known as the 1st Great Phase War. or GPW1

With the fall of the CPA the UPDF should have shut down all operations and the individual factions fleets should have returned home. But after 100 years of fighting the UPDF had become its own faction. Holding a number of systems, a size that rivaled even the largest of the remaining factions.

Again war came to the factions when the UPDF didnt relinquish their control over the fleets that were now manned by UPDF loyal troops. But by this time the factions had built up large enough defensive fleets to hold off the UPDF. This would become the 2nd Great Phase War. It would last another 10 years. Finally ending when the different factions focused their operations on the UPDF and overwhelming them from all sides.

 With the fall of both the CPA and UPDF the factions went back to realitive peace. And decided that they would only deal with outside factions on the means of trade.

After 150 years of peace a faction known as the Terra Corporation, A multi star system controlled by a corporation instead of a political government began sending envoys to other systems in the hopes of uniting the factions into a peaceful empire that would lay down their weapons and begin trading with each other.

This would be the start of the Trade Order. Which wouldnt come about for another 100 years.

Out of all this discussion, there is no mention of the Aluxite Dynasty?

The Opening Cinematic does mention this era of humanity's existence, though briefly. The reference goes along the lines of: "When the Aluxite Dynasty fell, the Trade Order suspended its agenda and rebranded itself as the Trader Emergency Coalition."

In fact, if you pay attention to the faction names of neutral militia, one of them is called the Aluxian Refugees.

and a faction in the game is called Aluxian Resurgence

the TO has to be a monarchy. something along the lines of Asimov's Galactic Empire in the Foundation series. though there would be almost complete autonomy on the part of indivdual planets. just a few laws that they had to follow.

the TEC is a complete restructuring. i'm guessing that the TO would have had to create a unified military relatively quickly, though it would be utterly disorganized, and units from different planets wouldnt fight very well together, with five different commanders giving orders. a bunch of admirals probably got together with some members of the legislative body (why does everyone assume a Congress? Parliamentary-type legislatives are much more common today) and launched a coup. thus, martial law was probably put into effect, and although it might not be completely enforced on every planet, its still rule by the military. thats the only way it would make sense for the entire industrial output to be converted to war production.

to be perfectly honest, there is very little actual history here. how it was founded, really, and how it ended. the only thing in between you would care about would be the expulsion of the advent. unless you enjoyed endless red tape and the minutae of the smallest, least important laws

@Allegiance86 - that could very well be what happened, excluding the first five sentences . It seemed like you were describing the next stage of what I had spoken about, after a separation from Earth and the foundation of new planets. But I didn't like how they just lost communication with Earth, and that's how they split. It just seemed too "easy." I'd like to think there was a falling out between two groups (doesn't hav to be my idea, just this general scenario ) and have that be the reason why they lost contact with Earth. Not because they just grew so far apart, but because they really didn't like each other, and for a good reason. Idk, neither of us can really say the other's idea is wrong, this is purely opinionated. (i cant get steamrolled like I was in the Vasari thread ) I guess its up to the community.