Political expansion limits of the Federation

yet it was stated that the Bajoran Militia was to be incorporated into Starfleet. Betazed also had a Starfleet contingent, which is how Will Riker initially met Deanna Troi. Either they are sovereign entities or they are not, it doesn't go both ways.

 

Well, from what we know the minimum of Federation required participation is joined military forces (Bajoran example), shared knowledge and technology (Memory Alpha) and shared resources.

Population is not drafted into Starfleet, there is a clear majority of founder and core member worlds providing voluntary forces..
But existing military has to switch uniforms.

Requirements to join the Federation in the first place are a minimum technological level (warp capable) and social development level.
Global unity is important (Kes-Pritt).

Any member world can provide a presidential candidate, we have seen 2 aliens doing the job.

We know the Federation counsel has a say in overall Starfleet matters but I don't remember the council overruling a particular world goverment (with the possible exception of Earth, which seems to have become the Federation capital in a similar way as Washington DC or Berlin are their nation's capitals without belonging to a single federal state.

 

Earth does have its own government, it's called United Earth.

We were supposed to see Jaresh-Inyo "federalizing" UE forces in that DS9 two-parter but it got cut for time.

 

The Membership never apparently universally adopted Vulcan emotional control, so whether or not they adopt "utopian values" would be up to them.

Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations

I believe the term used was absorbed (e.g. to accommodate, or take in).

This might be like when a new member nation in NATO alters their military command and support structures so as that they can co-ordinate joint operations with other NATO members . But the member retains direct control over their military.

I think that was a case of Deanna choosing to join Starfleet. If she had joined the Betazed Defense Forces, she wouldn't have been a Starfleet officer.

I would agree. But I see the Federation as more a multination organization of some sort, and not a state entity in of itself.

A collection of completely sovereign interstellar nations, and not subserviant subdivisions.

It's interesting that while the President did once referred to himself as the commander in chief, it very obvious that Starfleet gets it instructions from the Council ... and not the President.

Where the various Federation buildings stand, the real estate might in some ways be "extraterritorial." Not officially on the surface of Earth.

 

The argument over whether or not the Federation itself constitutes a sovereign state is a function of the fact that the writers' ideas about what the Federation is supposed to be have evolved over time.

I would argue that the preponderance of evidence would indicate that the Federation is a sovereign state, albeit one which delegates greater autonomy to its constituent polities than modern sovereigns do. I outline my thoughts here.

 

Assuming the Federation President is also the Commander in Chief of Starfleet, then what is the "C-in-C" (Admiral Smillie) from ST VI supposed to be?

 

"Commander-in-chief" is not a term solely reserved for the person in command of a state's entire military services. It can also be used for persons in charge of segments of a service. For instance, up until the Bush Administration, the commanding officers of the Unified Combatant Commands (the U.S. Defense Department's operating theaters for its forces in different parts of the globe) were known as the commanders-in-chief of their UCC. So you could have, say, the Commander-in-Chief of United States European Command, serving alongside the Commander-in-Chief of United States Central Command, and both serving under the Secretary of Defense, and the Secretary of Defense serving under the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces (the President). (In 2002, the Bush Administration changed their titles to "Unified Combatant Commanders," in order to preserve the title "commander-in-chief" for the sitting president.)

So the C-in-C in ST6 (called Admiral William Smilie in the novels) may have, for instance, had a more limited command brief. Maybe Admiral Smilie was commander-in-chief of Starfleet, and the President is commander-in-chief of all UFP armed forces including Starfleet.

 

I'm OK with that.

If that's so, I wonder if any of those other people at the table were, to use an example I just made up, the Commandant of the SFMC. Sure, they all wore the same uniform design, but that's just nitpicking at its finest.

 

While the Federation appears to be based on a form of American government, lets not forget that while the US government has looked the same from the outside since it was created (President and his cabinet, Congress) that the power of the Federal government was limited compared to today. It evolved into what it is today, and while the Federation government is probably doing the same in the Star Trek verse, we can still have a limited government with what we saw.

The member worlds can still have a lot of power, and the Federation may provide support to these worlds power. Todays example is taxes. Wealthier US states pay more taxes and are a ble to self sustain in a lot of areas, while poorer US states don't pay as much and receive Federal aid to help the states stay equal with the others.

So for example, a planet like Bajor is receiving a lot of Federation aid to build the planet up. On the other hand, Vulcan probably receives little aid since it doesn't require it. As long as the Federation has a large amount of resources in its control, it can redistribute these resources to the poorer planets to help encourage development. If this can be sustained (the poorer planets building up and becoming suppliers themselves) then the Federation can continue to expand.

 

I always see the European Union as the best real-life comparison to the Federation. The member worlds remain independent although part of a wider family with certain obligations on membership.

In this case, assimilation of a military into Starfleet and probably rules relating to anti-protectionism, free trade, and establishing a legal framework to ensure no discrimination in favour or against other Federation species!

In any arrangement like this there has to be a central administration monitoring the level playing field and doing the legal legwork. Someone somewhere has to intervene when the Betazoids are using telepathy to skew their wins in the annual Orion Poker festival.

Planets at a certain distance from this are too far away to communicate with effectively, from the centre, and this skews the level playing field. This probably offers a practical expansion limit to the Federation as suggested by the OP.