Had any alien society ben completly Federationalised?

[Timo]

Does the federation export democracy?

We have never seen it happen - but Kirk, in a bout of righteous patrioticsm in "Errand of Mercy", claims that democracy is what separates the UFP from the Klingon Empire. And the context is one of deciding who gets to rule over Organia, the democrats or the imperialists, so it is basically a sales pitch for UFP exports.

Kirk: "We're nothing like you. We're a democratic body."
Kor: "Come now. I'm not referring to minor ideological differences."

That's the only time democracy is quoted as a UFP value, AFAIK. To be sure, Kirk wouldn't let facts come in the way of his praise of the UFP system on this occasion, but OTOH there is no pressing need to assume he was telling the exact opposite of truth, either. So we might just as well assume that the UFP (at least at the time of TOS) meets the 23rd century human criteria for democracy, but doesn't make much noise about it and has nothing particular against authoritarian or incompletely representative types of rule.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

At the end of Omega Glory, Kirk does try to tell the Yangs that they have something special that they can base a society on. The Constitution, the framework for a democratic government.

 

[plynch]

Okay, I was reading "export" as "impose" which is what the Klingons, Romulans, and later Cardassians and Dominion all do with their style of governance.

Those earlier posts do show a couple of Kirk posts advocating democracy as good, I'll grant. But we certainly have other examples of his leaving cultures alone.

If we take "export" to include advocacy and promotion, then my earlier assertion about TNG is reversed. Picard strongly advocated the fed way, didn't he? Interesting.

 

[Deckerd]

alien culture

...................................

Wait just a cotton-pickin' minute. Isn't the Federation cross-species? Humans are as much 'aliens' as anyone else in that world, unless the 'Federation' you are talking about is actually 'human society'. Is that what you mean?

 

[T'Girl]

Wait just a cotton-pickin' minute. Isn't the Federation cross-species? Humans are as much 'aliens' as anyone else in that world, unless the 'Federation' you are talking about is actually 'human society'. Is that what you mean?

Alien could mean a society that is outside the current federation, the barbarians. The people who are not part of "our" group. Surely Deckerd you remember this from High School?

There have been suggestions that after the first half dozen species formed the federation, that they would then vet all new applicants for membership to ensure that they met the standards of the existing members. Entry into the federation carries advantages, it wouldn't be to hard to imagine cultures altering themselves (at least on the surface) to achieve membership. This would be your "Had any alien society been completely Federationalised?" Debatable, given their practice of Pon Farr, if Vulcan had not been a founding member of the federation, they might not have been allowed to join subsequently.

To the federation's detriment.

Another example of what I'm referring to is Bajor's consideration of returning to a societal caste system, which they possessed historically up until the time of the Cardassian occupation. They were informed that this act alone would rendered them "unacceptable."

 

[Arpy]

Part of the problem of alien cultures for me is that all their ideologies are human. They're all conceived by human writers and producers and actors. By make-up people and costume designers. I sometimes wonder that if a real alien was writing an episode we'd shit ourselves how foreign the ideas might be.

 

[plynch]

Part of the problem of alien cultures for me is that all their ideologies are human. They're all conceived by human writers and producers and actors. By make-up people and costume designers. I sometimes wonder that if a real alien was writing an episode we'd shit ourselves how foreign the ideas might be.

I'd welcome it. The Horta was cool. Species 8675309 or whatever. The Hirogen? Kinda. The novels are better at this. How about a sentient species who experiences time differently, like the ents in LOTR?

 

[T'Girl]

How about a sentient species who experiences time differently, like the ents in LOTR?

The Prophets?

 

[JarodRussell]

A very good scene from DS9 about this:

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TREQGl54BU8[/yt]

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Had any alien culture had completly accepted the Starfleet Gospel?

Yes. Humans.

(A classic case of "not seeing the forest for the trees")

Think about it: Humans in the TNG era do not behave like humans. (The nonexistence-of-money thing is the most obvious spring-to-mind symptom, and that's just the start)

They've been drinking Vulcan koolaid for 200 years, and it shows.

It does seem most likely that the big change in human society sprang from the influence of Vulcans. The Vulcans realized the futility of transferring principles of logic to humans - and since humans are not so violently emotional as Vulcans, such drastic measures are unnecessary - and helped them adopt a version of Surak's teachings adapted to their specific problem of disunity and fratricidal behavior caused by such elements as religious and national identity. Remove the sources of the problem, and the problem goes away.

The economic aspect of the change might be explained in two phases: greater prosperity caused by establishing trade with a larger galactic community, combined with the eventual development of the replicator.

It's possible that other species went through variations of this process, depending on how un-utopian and fratricidal they were to begin with.

I was expecting (hoping) to see the process by which this happened in ENT, but instead the Vulcans were depicted as dicks...

Kirk: "We're nothing like you. We're a democratic body."
Kor: "Come now. I'm not referring to minor ideological differences."

That's the only time democracy is quoted as a UFP value, AFAIK.

In other series (especially DS9), this viewpoint is implicit. The Federation's enemies are never depicted as being democratic. You could make the case that the Romulans may have an internally democratic system, but their outward view is too xenophobic for that to count. The Klingons are a militaristic oligarchy (who regardless, can be dealt with on a detente-like level). The Dominion are beyond the democratic pale; the Borg even moreso.

It all comes down to "respect for the individual." Klingons respect the individual more than the Dominion, which respect the individual more than the Borg. That tells you the likelihood that the Federation can get along with each entity.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

A very good scene from DS9 about this:

I don't even need to click that. Root beer.

 

[MacLeod]

How about a sentient species who experiences time differently, like the ents in LOTR?

The Prophets?

They had no concept of time.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

How about a sentient species who experiences time differently, like the ents in LOTR?

The Prophets?

They had no concept of time.

Well that's "experiencing time differently," isn't it?

 

[USS Excelsior]

I've wanted to write a follow up to "Action" for years. Has somebody already written one?

One of the ideas for the DS9 30th anniversary episode was to visit that planet and see the Iotians acting like TOS era Star Trek characters. Probably following up on leaving that device behind for them to get a piece of their action.

They settled with that Tribbles thing instead.