Is the Federation communist?

[Praetor]

and IIRC the original reference was Federation Council President, a subtle but IMO rather important distinction.

No, it was not. The President in Star Trek IV clearly identified himself in dialogue as the President of the United Federation of Planets, not the President of the Federation Council. "Council President" was how he was listed in the credits, but, there again, they also listed Uhura as "Uhuru." So the credits are obviously unreliable, especially when dialogue contradicts them.

You're right there, I'd forgotten he did identify himself as the President in the distress/warning call.

I posted once about the US vs. UN inspirations for the UFP. Suffice it to say that the Federation possesses all of the legal traits of a state -- a mere intergovernmental organization such as the UN could not do all of the things we've seen the UFP do.

I think that the fairest thing to say is that the exact nature that the writers have intended for the UFP to have has evolved over time.

When TOS first started, in fact, the writers hadn't invented the Federation yet. The Enterprise was described as being a "United Earth" starship in "The Corbomite Maneuver;" clearly, United Earth was the state that our heroes originally were envisioned as serving. The Federation and its Starfleet were first established in "Court Martial."

In "Journey to Babel," we hear reference to tensions amongst the Federation's Members over whether or not Coridan will be added -- tension so high that it could apparently lead to war. The people making the decision over whether Coridan will be added are called "Ambassadors" -- suggesting that the Federation is now to be seen as a parallel to the United Nations.

Throughout the course of TOS and the early TOS movies, however, we very clearly see that Starfleet is now regarded as a Federation organization -- setting the Federation apart from the United Nations, in spite of the intended allegory, by giving it an armed force and, thus, a legitimate authority to use violence, one of the primary characteristics of a state. So the allegory of "UFP = UN" is starting to bend here, and now the UFP is starting to resemble an interstellar state. The allegory is made all the more statist, so to speak, when we encounter non-Starfleet individuals who have the legal authority to place McCoy under arrest in Star Trek III, calling themselves "Federation Security," implying a Federation-level law enforcement organization. We further hear of a "Federation Council," but we hear very little of it.

So, as with United Earth before it, no substancial information about the Federation that we might use to link it to any one particular modern state for allegorical purposes exists... until Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. Here, we encounter for the first time an individual identified as the President of the United Federation of Planets. We see the President giving orders to the Federation Starfleet, and we see the Federation Council and President holding Admiral Kirk's court-martial. This starts to suggest the United States, at least insofar as they use both the American concept of a "president" and most of the characters retain American Midwestern accents. That the Federation Council has the authority to stand as jury in a Starfleet court-martial also suggests that the Starfleet exists because the Council has raised it -- in the same way that the armed forces of the United States exist because Congress has raised them. Still, we don't hear about the President or the Council making binding laws on Federation Members, or determining all foreign policy, and Star Trek IV also suggests that Kirk and Company were able to avoid being apprehended by the Federation simply by virtue of being on Vulcan -- a planet that is supposedly a Federation Member. This seems inconsistent with the idea of the Federation as a state, since, after all, one could not very well avoid capture by US Federal authorities just by hanging out in Massachusets.

In Star Trek VI, however, the depiction of the Federation takes another step in the direction of "interstellar state," and starts to suggest a pseduo-American allegory. We see the Federation President conducting foreign policy towards the Klingon Empire on behalf of all Federation Member worlds, even negotiating and signing a binding peace treaty. The President is also the target of an assassination plot that the conspirators believe will lead to a war, in parallel with the assassination of the Klingon Chancellor, who is clearly the Klingon head of government. So the implication seems to be that the Federation President is both head of government and head of state.

We also see the President more explicitly being depicted as having complete authority over Starfleet -- proposals are made to the President and not the full Council, further suggesting an American model (since, after all, the US armed forces are under the operation control of the US President and not the US Congress). Still, by this point, there have also been several examples of Starfleet taking orders from the full Council in TNG; this may be seen as contradicting an American model, or, at the very least, as complicating it.

TNG, however, brings us a step further in the direction of "Federation as interstellar state" model when we see that the Federation Council, in "Forces of Nature," has declared a Federation-wide "speed limit" of Warp 5. We have previously seen the Council making decisions that are binding on Starfleet, but, if I recall correctly, this is the first time we see that the Council can make laws that are binding on everyone within the Federation. The legislative nature of the Federation Council is re-enforced with references to the Council debating over whether or not to ratify the Federation-Cardassian Treaty in TNG's "Journey's End;" treaty ratification, in addition to once again establishing the Federation's authority to conduct foreign affairs and making binding law over its Member worlds, treaty ratification is a clear trait of a state's legislature. With these episodes, then, it becomes clear that the Federation Council is a legislature.

DS9 brings us back to a more explicitly American model. In "Homefront"/"Paradise Lost," the Federation Starfleet is once again depicted as answering primarily to the Federation President. When Sisko and Leyton propose an upgrade in Starfleet security and in security on Earth, they propose it to President Jaresh-Inyo, not the full Council. The President is also referred to as being Starfleet's "commander-in-chief," further suggesting an American model. Jaresh-Inyo is also referred to as the "elected President;" this would seem to clearly establish an American model, at least for the Federation Presidency, since the head of government in a parliamentary system is usually appointed from the parliament. (The State of Israel was a brief exception to this rule in the early 21st Century, when the Prime Minister was popularly elected.)

On top of this, the Federation President -- in spite of his not being from Earth -- is clearly depicted as having the authority to place Earth, a Federation Member world, under martial law. This would seem to solidify the Federation-as-interstellar-state model, as opposed to a Federation-as-UN or Federation-as-alliance model; confederations and alliances do not have the authority to place their members under martial law and direct central control, but states do. NATO cannot place France under martial law -- but Great Britain can certainly place England under martial law, and apparently the Federation can place its Members under it, too.

A later DS9 episode, "Extreme Measures," further establishes the existence of a Federation Cabinet. This would seem to be the final nail in the coffin of any view other than that of the Federation as an interstellar state; states have cabinets, alliances do not. This would be compatible with both a parliamentary or American-style presidential system of government, but previous evidence, as I outlined above, indicates an American-influenced model.

One of the primary traits of a state is that all politics references or flows back to the state itself; authority is derived from the state. We've already seen other state-like traits by the time of TNG/DS9 -- it controls a specific territory, it has the monopoly on the legitimate use of violence, it is recognized by other interstellar states such as the Klingon Empire, etc. The state nature of the Federation is further driven home in TNG/DS9 through numerous references to authoritative Federation governmental bodies:


Archaeological Council
Astronomical Committee
Bureau of Agricultural Affairs
Bureau of Industrialization
Bureau of Planetary Treaties
Central Bureau of Penology
Department of Cartography
Department of Temporal Investigations
Naval Patrol
Science Council
Science Bureau

Clearly, all relevant bureaucracy is built around the Federation by this point -- another clear trait of a state.

Several episodes of TNG, DS9, and VOY also make reference to a Federation Constitution and a Federation Charter. The Federation Constitution is referenced in "The Drumhead" and "The Perfect Mate" (TNG); in "The Drumhead," it is established that the Constitution contains twelve "Gurantees" ensuring individual rights. The Seventh Guarantee is referenced, and it is clearly based on the United States Constitution's Fifth Amendment protecting suspects from being forced to give self-incriminating testimony. "Author, Author" (VOY) also refers to a Guarantee relating to artists' intellectual property rights. DS9's "Accession" establishes that the Federation Charter bans caste-based discrimination. Clearly, then, the Federation Charter/Constitution is at least in part inspired by the US Constitution.

The Federation is also established to have a judicial system with ultimate power of judicial review in DS9's "Doctor Bashir, I Presume?". In that episode, Julian Bashir's father vows to fight the Federation-wide ban on genetic engineering "all the way to the Federation Supreme Court," further implying a US-style government.

So over time, the depiction of the Federation changed from that of a UN-style organization to that of an American-style interstellar state. However, even in later films and series, the Federation is not strictly US-based. Why? The Federation Council is consistently depicted as having far more authority over the operations of Starfleet than the US Congress does over the American armed forces, and more influence over foreign affairs. In "Valiant (DS9)," the Federation Council sends a message to Ferengi Grand Nagus Zek proposing an alliance during the Dominion War; they have the power to serve as jury on court-martials in ST4; they give operational orders to the Enterprise crew in "The Defector" (TNG); they determine that the Founders will not be given the cure to the morphogenic virus in "The Dogs of War" (DS9). The US Congress, while active with oversight, does not have the kind of operational authority over the US armed forces that the Federation Council does over Starfleet (as current history is no doubt demonstrating). In the US system, there is a clear separation of powers, and operational control of the armed forces falls to the President (though Congress retains oversight rights). The lack of a clear separation of powers between the legislative and executive branches, and the increased involvement of the legislature over Starfleet, suggets parliamentary influences.

So, to me, the implication would seem to be a primarily American-based model, with some parliamentary influences. Clearly, the President is popularly-elected, but, clearly, he must share more power with the Council -- and the Council with him -- than is typical in American presidentialism. It's obviously strongly influenced by the American government, but there's a distinct suggestion of parliamentary influences. Either way, though, the depiction of the Federation has generally remained consistent with the characteristics of constitutional liberal democracy (though, interestingly enough, it has never been established how members of the Federation Council are determined).

A very good assessment, Sci.

I might suggest, however, that the Federation must have a relatively loose central government if the member worlds have ambassadors to each other's planets. I might also suggest, to better fit the changing depiction of the UFP, that it grew from a loose (presumably military-based) alliance after its founding into the Federation you describe.

 

[Sci]

Oh I completely agree with you that it is in fact a federal state, something which has been shown time and time again onscreen. My point is merely that even if one saw it as an NGO or UN-type alliance the name "Federation president" need not be a problem.

I gotcha. Yeah, the title itself wouldn't necessarily be a problem -- but the authorities we've already seen ascribed to the title do.

A very good assessment, Sci.

Thankee.

I might suggest, however, that the Federation must have a relatively loose central government if the member worlds have ambassadors to each other's planets.

Well, you know, the thing is that I'm not sure if the Federation Member States have ambassadors to one-another or not.

That does seem to be the case in "Journey to Babel" -- but that same episode makes it clear that the political situation surrounding the admission of Coridan to the Federation is a very unusual situation. Kirk describes multiple Federation Member worlds as having mining interests on Coridan, which has apparently become so depopulated that the rule of law is almost nonexistent in certain parts of it. Orion privateers are also a problem, and apparently at least a few Federation Members had tried to annex Coridan into their territory (including, if I'm remembering correctly, Tellar). Kirk seems to be implying that there's the possibility of a Federation civil war going on.

All this is by way of saving that even though the intent during TOS seems to have been that the Federation would be a sort of UN in space, the situation in "Journey to Babel" is unusual enough that we might argue that it does not constitute evidence that Federation Members normally have ambassadors to one-another.

Setting that question aside, though, it's probably fair to say that the Federation is a looser central government than most federations today, simply by virtue of its sheer size. It's a government with 150 or so (155, if you go by the novels -- at least, before the events of the Destiny trilogy, anyway) Member governments, and with many of those governments presumably authority over multiple worlds, too. So the sheer size of the thing pretty logically demands that Federation Members would have more autonomy than most federation members today.

I might also suggest, to better fit the changing depiction of the UFP, that it grew from a loose (presumably military-based) alliance after its founding into the Federation you describe.

Possibly? Maybe the Coalition of Planets failed, and this led to the Earth-Romulan War, but, later on, the former Coalition members realized that they needed an actual interstellar state, and it grew from there. Sorta like how the thirteen states were still independent countries under the Articles of Confederation, but that simply didn't work, so later they passed the Constitution and created the United States as a state in its own right.

It could be an EU type entity, not as loose as the UN but not as unitary as the USA, a mix of intergovernmentalism and supernationalism,

The European Union is still too lose to really adequately compare it to the Federation. The EU's unity is most economic in nature (the one area of policy we're suppose to pretend the Federation doesn't have! ); when it comes to things like foreign policy, which we have definitively seen the Federation possessing exclusive authority over, the EU has little real authority and its Member States retain their own foreign policies -- hence the Britain participating in the Iraq War whilst the France and Germany try to stop it.

because the fed members seem to have far far more autonomy than a US state or German state for example, you can see why they'd have to have more autonomy.

I mean, sort of? Like I said above, the sheer distance between worlds and size of the Federation demands that such a state give its member polities a lot of autonomy, because it's just not possible to concentrate power with so many people over so vast of a distance. On the other hand, though, I don't think we've really seen Federation Member States exercise all that many exclusive powers independently of the Federation government itself. Though I think we all agree that the Federation probably practices something akin to what in the US is called "states' rights," I honestly can't think of many instances where we saw a Federation Member government possessing authority over an area that the Federation government itself had no authority.

I can think of the following examples:

- Scotty was facing the death penalty on Argelius II in TOS's "Wolf in the Fold." Memory Alpha doesn't say that Argelius was a Federation Member world, but that seems to be a common assumption. "Wolf in the Fold" makes it clear that the Argelian death penalty is an arcane law that originated from before a major social revolution which had simply not bee removed from the books because there had been no acts of violent murder after their "Great Awakening" two hundred years beforehand. An earlier episode, "The Menagerie," had established that there was no death penalty in the Federation other than the one for violating Starfleet General Order Seven (though whether Kirk was ignoring the Argelian death penalty as arcane is debatable).

- Vulcan legalizes homicide during the fal tor pan challenges that some undergo during pon farr.

- Kirk and Co. hid from the Federation at the Vulcan monastery on Mount Seleya, though whether the Vulcan government was refusing to extradite them to the UFP. It's possible that the Vulcan government didn't know that they were there and/or that Sarek was using his influence with the Vulcan government to get them to refuse to admit that they knew Kirk and Co. were on Vulcan.

- Betazed has its own marriage ceremonies. (Even in the future, marriage is a "state issue?")

- There was no talk of Bajor needing to abolish its state religion in DS9's "Rapture."

It is clear that Quark essentially operates rent and utility free on DS9 per dialogue in "Bar Association".

I don't know that that's a useful example, though. Deep Space 9 was Bajoran territory during the series -- the Bajoran government allowed Starfleet to administer it as a Starfleet Starbase, but it was still Bajoran territory where Bajoran law applied. (Presumably, most of Quark's customers were paying in Bajoran litas.)

 

[Praetor]

Well, you know, the thing is that I'm not sure if the Federation Member States have ambassadors to one-another or not.

That does seem to be the case in "Journey to Babel" -- but that same episode makes it clear that the political situation surrounding the admission of Coridan to the Federation is a very unusual situation. Kirk describes multiple Federation Member worlds as having mining interests on Coridan, which has apparently become so depopulated that the rule of law is almost nonexistent in certain parts of it. Orion privateers are also a problem, and apparently at least a few Federation Members had tried to annex Coridan into their territory (including, if I'm remembering correctly, Tellar). Kirk seems to be implying that there's the possibility of a Federation civil war going on.

All this is by way of saving that even though the intent during TOS seems to have been that the Federation would be a sort of UN in space, the situation in "Journey to Babel" is unusual enough that we might argue that it does not constitute evidence that Federation Members normally have ambassadors to one-another.

Setting that question aside, though, it's probably fair to say that the Federation is a looser central government than most federations today, simply by virtue of its sheer size. It's a government with 150 or so (155, if you go by the novels -- at least, before the events of the Destiny trilogy, anyway) Member governments, and with many of those governments presumably authority over multiple worlds, too. So the sheer size of the thing pretty logically demands that Federation Members would have more autonomy than most federation members today.

A very good point - perhaps 'Journey to Babel' can be best interpreted as a 'unique situation.' I think, though, that the fanon has ran with the idea that there are ambassadors between worlds - but that might have been based on false assumptions to start with.

Possibly? Maybe the Coalition of Planets failed, and this led to the Earth-Romulan War, but, later on, the former Coalition members realized that they needed an actual interstellar state, and it grew from there. Sorta like how the thirteen states were still independent countries under the Articles of Confederation, but that simply didn't work, so later they passed the Constitution and created the United States as a state in its own right.

I once wondered if the Federation might have been a relatively loose organization until the 2250s even - perhaps with each planet maintaining it's own fleet and thus explaining why Kirk's ship seemed to have dual Earth/UFP loyalties and was seen to have mostly human crew.

Overall, I agree with your interpretations and observations.

 

[Myasishchev]

This brings up the topic of currency and the fact that Picard clearly stated in First Contact (and was reiterated in In the Cards) that the Federation has no money. The lack of “money” in my view is not necessarily exclusive of business and trade. “Money” as we now perceive it, is either a scarce precious material or a promissory note which represents such material (more or less). In the future with Replicators able to create most precious materials out of thin air, clearly a currency based on some sort of physical material would not stand up to muster. However, there is something that cannot be replicated and that is time and labor. In my view a “credit” is simply a quantifiable unit expressing how much effort you have put into “bettering yourself and the rest of humanity”. For example say you spend one hour scrubbing pans in Sisko’s restaurant you might get 1 “credit”, if you spend two hours picking grapes at the Picard Vineyard you might get 2 “credits”, if you help develop a new Runabout class for Stafleet you might get 100 “credits” which while technically not “money” still works as currency easily recognizable by any current human. Now this graded remuneration scale might seem to some as recapitulating the very same problems that we have with our current financial institutions with “the few” (rich) exploiting “the many” (poor), however, the current inequality is based on the scarcity of resources available which is not a factor in the Star Trek universe.

So, for example, if you do not have any particular motivation or driving desire to do anything dramatic with your life you could simply wake up in a Federation provided bed in a Federation provided apartment. You could go to a Federation provided Replicator and make breakfast with Federation provided energy. You could then take some Federation provided public transportation and go to a Federation provided public recreation area and kick back with no one thinking any less of you. However, if you want to live in a house overlooking San Francisco Bay, or have you own spaceship, or to sample Joseph Sisko’s delectable cuisine, then you better brush off the old resume and actually start “bettering” something in society. This also handily explains why Ferengi and other material based economies are not easily compatible because there is no reason why they should care about something that does not directly benefit them and does not provide any material benefit. A bigger question is why Ferengi society is so acquisitive and capitalistic granted that they too have access to Replicator technology.

Now, there would probably be some aspect of barter involved as well, as a system entirely based on your contribution to society would by definition limit those who could not contribute as much and once again unequal socioeconomic stratification would occur, this time based on intelligence and merit but still undesirable. So I think that there would be a lot of points awarded for effort. Additionally, if material gain is not the primary motivation most things would be had at cost which would make things much more accessible to Joe Federation. So, both “communist” and “capitalist”.

Well to everyone who actually got through my post thank you for taking the time to read it and hopefully I have made some good points and garnered some converts to my point of view ☺

Good post.

I left out the 23d century bits as I agree with them--Kirk's assertion in TVH notwithstanding, TOS almost definitely had a significant capitalist economy operating alongside the Federation welfare state (if at that time it existed), if for no other reason than prior to the advent of the replicator, the state would have had to have been involved in the production and distribution of a huge spectrum of consumer goods. In the 24th century, of course, widespread adoption of replicators would have allowed the production and distribution of most goods in the home or at convenient local stations. This means the Federation need not have gotten itself in the quagmire that, say, the Soviet Union faced, of attempting to satisfy demand through inflexible and corrupt state-controlled markets.

Now, I do have issue with the notion that the credits of which you speak aren't money. If they may function as a medium of exchange, then they're money.

Further, if the 24thC Federation system really did operate as such, outside of state involvement tantamount to the command economy I've posited, the real estate market on Federation worlds would become as capitalistic as the one on Ferenginar. By bettering society and being paid in credits, one may not stop merely at buying the house overlooking San Fran bay--one might buy other houses, selling or renting them at profit in credits, and buying further more houses, until the bettering-society-rich control large sectors or the entirety of real property. In order to own any real property, then, Joe Federation must compete with the bettering-society-rich, forming a middle class with enough credits to purchase real property outright (or by mortaging their real property in exchange for credit loans from investors who have bettered themselves--perhaps by forming a bank!). Those unable or unwilling to particulary better society will form an underclass incapable of purchasing their own property from the upper classes, and either eke by (cleaning dishes in Sisko's kitchen) or will perhaps be provided it by the state through taxation of the bettering-society-rich.

In other words, the Federation economy's real property sector would look almost exactly like our own... just with replicators instead of refrigerators in the five hundred thousand credit McMansions.

That said, it's still a perfectly valid way of looking at it--the actual semantics of money aside, people have been known to make claims based on their ideological bent, and Picard is definitely not immune to that.

And for what it's worth, I'd take the modern Western economy with replicators without hesitation. It'd still be a hell of an improvement.

By the way, Sci, excellent exegesis of the Federation governmental structure. I think your conclusions are totally correct.

It bugs me that we've never seen an election in the Federation, or even heard of one, though. I'd like to have seen somewhat more politically involved characters.

 

[Anwar]

I think the reason they made allusions to money in TOS is because TOS was really just taking the 60s and dressing it up with the future, it wasn't much more than that (same 60s attitudes in most cases as well..). With TNG they just decided to do something different rather than just ape the modern day.

 

[32JaX]

Social credit economics with libertarian politics. And by Federation I figure you mean all of the member planets (mostly Earth), not just the military.