Is the Federation communist?

[Praetor]

Yeah, I'd say the importance of first contact with an alien species almost immediately following a nuclear world war of almost annihilation-level destruction should not be understated.

One can't help but wonder if there wasn't a divide between humanity - one side that wanted to proactively rebuild and do better to prove themselves, and another that wanted to let the Vulcans basically 'take care of them' and do everything for them. I'm sure there were also those that resisted the global unification that took place.

 

[PhoenixIreland]

Keep in mind that it wasn't just 200 years of humanity developing on its' own that led to what we see, it also had several civilization-altering events like WWIII (Which likely wiped out most people who would oppose a United Earth), seeing we weren't alone in the universe (a good enough reason for the surviving humans to not want to repeat their silly past hatreds and work together better), and the interactions with said greater universe bringing forth more advanced technologies than anything we have today.

So it's fair to say Trek Humans had more of a quantum leap in development (or at least more drive to develop themselves) than just humans alone for 200 years.

The third world war is important, very important here.
Look at the change in mindset September 11th brought to the USA? and that was only 3000 people killed, imagine the effect on the whole world if 600 million people, nearly 1/6th of the world population, died in a nuclear war?

Theres a precident in history for a devastating war leading to more unity between countries and social solidarity. After WWII for example the British welfare state was set up (NHS etc), key industries were nationalised etc meanwhile before WWI even the notion of a public school was way off the radar.
Then what became the European Union gets started, which is bascially a European version of what United Earth would be...and it worked, no EU members have ever gone to war with each other.

So it's not difficult to imagine these twi things happening on a global scale after such an unprecidented and devestating conflict, add to that, as Anwar said, extraterrestrial contact..realizing were not alone in the universe would really make all our pissy little disputes over borders and oil seem small and insignifigant, take that a step further and imagine how quickly we'd unite if the extraterrestrials we came into contact with were hostile, Reagan even spoke about how quickly our diffrences would vanish in this scenario in a speech to the UN one time.

As for countries opting out or in of a United Earth scenario I don't think it would be a case of world leaders meeting one weekend and setting up a unitary world government then and there. I'd imagine something like United Earth would be a very very very loose federation only looking after truly global affairs like security, the environment and if we met alien life, exopolitics.
I'd think it would be a very gradually developing thing like the European Union was at the start, or the African Union is now, countries don't lurch suddenly into these massive changes.
European countries would probably find it easier to join than say Russia or the USA who have an...almost scary ....passionate nationalism.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Yeah, I'd say the importance of first contact with an alien species almost immediately following a nuclear world war of almost annihilation-level destruction should not be understated.

One can't help but wonder if there wasn't a divide between humanity - one side that wanted to proactively rebuild and do better to prove themselves, and another that wanted to let the Vulcans basically 'take care of them' and do everything for them. I'm sure there were also those that resisted the global unification that took place.

Check out the Fan Fiction forum, it has the very excellent First Contact: The Iron Horse. It covers almost that very thing.

 

[Praetor]

Why, thanks.

 

[Lynx]

As for the question about the Federation being Communist, I don't think so. I do think that narrow-minded political systems like Communism and Capitalism are something of the past in the Star Trek universe, regarded as systems of the Dark Ages which in most cases caused oppression, diseases, poverty and conflicts.

I would rather think that what we see in Star Trek is a futuristic system where all the negative aspects of Communism and Capitalism have vanished due to advanced technology and a new way of thinking among the citizens of the Federation.

 

[kv1at3485]

I think the Federation is "butcher-lobotomist".

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

If people still smoke, maybe the Federation can be said to be "tobacconist".

 

[indranee]

huh? how can "communism" be a failed society when it hasn't even been tried yet?

 

[kv1at3485]

I know! The Feds can also be "anachronists" under which are many submovements, such as "tobacconism" and "classicalmusicism" and "humanwavism".

 

[Myasishchev]

They do love their friggin' classical music.

I guess even in the communist future you have to negotiate the rights to songs produced in the 20th century. Or in the 24th.

Alternatively, music is dead--hey, Star Trek is prophetic.

 

[Anwar]

Well, if you want a straight answer the real reason we mostly saw classical music in TNG+ was because they figured using music from the time the show was made would date it (and seeing how it was the 80s and early 90s, they'd be right).

 

[Praetor]

Maybe the Federation is Federationist, then?

 

[miraclefan]

huh? how can "communism" be a failed society when it hasn't even been tried yet?

weren't the russians ''commie''? and aren't the chinese?

 

[miraclefan]

Maybe the Federation is Federationist, then?

Sounds about right!

 

[PhoenixIreland]

Remember in DS9 when Jake needed the money for the baseball card and was tryina scab money off Nog because he didn't have any himself?

Nog: "It's not my fault your species decided to abandon currency based economics in favor of some philosophy of self enhancement"

Jake(enthusiastically): "We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity"

Nog(finally saying what the audience was always wondering):"what does that mean exactly?"

Jake(exasperated): "it means we don't need money!"

Nog(smug): "well then...you don't need mine"

huh? how can "communism" be a failed society when it hasn't even been tried yet?

weren't the russians ''commie''? and aren't the chinese?

No. They were/are one party states with a centrally planed economy. Neither ever had the word communist in their name (they had communist parties whos eventual goal was supposildy communism but they were too comfortable with their power monopoly to do anything to get there).

There are many examples of people/countries calling themselves things even though they are the exact opposate:

-President Bush going on and on about "freedom" then illegally wiretapping his own citizens and having a creepy obsession with restricting the rights of gay people.

-The "peoples republic" of North Korea which is no such thing.

-The "worlds series"

-Our last Prime Minister called himself "the only socialist left in Irish politics", when he was easily the most right wing PM we've ever had economically.

Take an example from the show, the Klingons always going on and on about honor yet they were corrupt to the core.

Communism is basically a community or series of communities who operate on cooperation rather than market based pricing and competition etc there have been a tiny number of examples of it in practice all of them short lived, the paris commune being the most famous example.
They "worked" in the sense that people got what they needed in terms of goods and services but they've all been on a small scale (city or town) nothing like it has ever been tried on a national scale and indeed that would probably be impossible with globalized trade (how would they pay their trading partners when they don't use money?) so the whole planet would literally have to switch to it at the same time.

 

[Praetor]

PhoenixIreland, I don't think I'm clear on what you're trying to say.

 

[kissthestar]

Socialist anarchy? On the one hand, they say they've outgrown money. On the other hand, they do have "credits," which are what? Traveler's checks? Intergalactic money orders?

 

[Deks]

Socialist anarchy? On the one hand, they say they've outgrown money. On the other hand, they do have "credits," which are what? Traveler's checks? Intergalactic money orders?

Probably resources that allow SF officers to trade with species that use a currency based economy ... nothing else.
Credits were only mentioned in TNG first episode and never referred to again.
They can mean virtually anything, and given the fact Federation has no currency, these 'credits' can easily be described as resources which SF deduces from the individual ... such as replicator rations for example?
Crusher may have lost the ability to replicate some extra material goods for personal use (let's say for 24 or 48 hours) when she got the fabric material at the fake Farpoint star-base.

 

[Triskelion]

"It's just a show, I should really just relax..."

The TV show, in the tradition of good storytelling, "black boxed" the Federation and Earth in order to show a somewhat utopian side to humanity - egalitarian, abundant, advanced, diverse, and elevated - without claiming to know exactly how we got there. Had they tried to explain it we would still be discussing it forty years later, and - oh.

If there's one thing time has taught me, it's that there are many, many people in this world who want to operate in secret and steal every advantage, even at the cost of lives - while maintaining an unblemished facade. To those kinds of people, any economic system is merely a set of expectations used to set up "suckers". Such people place money at the top of the pyramid - and not surprisingly, find only scarcity.

By Star Trek's era, humanity in general will have moved beyond materialism in general. Maybe that's why we can't see it. We're too steeped in it. We're still caught up in models of limited resource distribution and political ideologies. We're still dependent on rule enforcement and paradigms of authority. We really have no idea what it would be like to live a life directed by personal enrichment, cultivation of intelligence, and voluntary social enlightenment, as Roddenberry's TNG expressed so well.

 

[Praetor]

That's a very,very well-thought-out way of putting that, Triskelion. The Great Bird would approve.