Starfleet, The Federation and civilian space exploration

[Timo]

Pretty much so. Except here it would be an issue with the rights of the victim, as stopping the perpetrator from perpetuating would just be infringing on the victims's right to be in discussions with whomever he pleases.

There's no time window for the authorities to intervene to prevent the crime from proceeding from "victimed" to "victimless": once the existence of space aliens is revealed, the revelation in practice ceases to be a crime-in-the-crimes-are-harmful-sense as the party now brought into the know is no longer getting harmed by this in itself harmless knowledge. All that can be done is accusing the perp afterwards of a thing that the party-briefly-considered-victim now in all likelihood considers an act of benevolence.

Modern law would no doubt find ways to cope: for example, it is quite possible to prosecute one half of a consensual sex act but not the other over the fact that the act took place, regardless of the protestations of that other half. And the prosecution of victimless crimes is a crucial glue in holding societies together. It is just that the first contact thing is an intriguingly extreme example where the supposed victim is highly unlikely to feel victimized at all, except by the prosecution.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Tenacity]

I wonder who are the legal authorities?

The jurisdiction that has authority over the spacecraft, or maybe the planet that Mudd is a citizen of?

 

[XCV330]

Starfleet isn't the only group exploring space in the UFP. The Vulcan Expeditionary group or whatever they are called, are still out there, for instance. but it may be at a point that solitary or private exploration by a certain point is just too large of an undertaking without major governmental backing.

There's not necessarily a law stating you can't do your own high energy quantum physics research, but owning your own private particle accelerator could be problematic.

As far as Musk goes, It is fair to point out, and if anyone advocates private spaceflight, it's me, Musk's goal is to settle mars. He isn't proposing being an explorer. Private space exploration remains extremely rare. Obviously there would be exploration by people on the ground on Mars simply because no one has lived there before, but technically that would be Mars exploration, and not space exploration. Exploration remains a governmental concern, and historically that has almost always been the case.

 

[The Old Mixer]

Pretty much so. Except here it would be an issue with the rights of the victim, as stopping the perpetrator from perpetuating would just be infringing on the victims's right to be in discussions with whomever he pleases.

There's no time window for the authorities to intervene to prevent the crime from proceeding from "victimed" to "victimless": once the existence of space aliens is revealed, the revelation in practice ceases to be a crime-in-the-crimes-are-harmful-sense as the party now brought into the know is no longer getting harmed by this in itself harmless knowledge. All that can be done is accusing the perp afterwards of a thing that the party-briefly-considered-victim now in all likelihood considers an act of benevolence.

Modern law would no doubt find ways to cope: for example, it is quite possible to prosecute one half of a consensual sex act but not the other over the fact that the act took place, regardless of the protestations of that other half. And the prosecution of victimless crimes is a crucial glue in holding societies together. It is just that the first contact thing is an intriguingly extreme example where the supposed victim is highly unlikely to feel victimized at all, except by the prosecution.

Timo Saloniemi

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[Tenacity]

Starfleet isn't the only group exploring space in the UFP. The Vulcan Expeditionary group or whatever they are called, are still out there

The ship that crashed in The Cage sounded private.

 

[Kor]

Timo, the only times I can think of where your example would apply is if one party is legally considered unable to give consent, due to age or perhaps learning disability. There is good reason for considering that party to be a victim in that case, even if they are adamant that it's what they wanted. But that might be a topic better suited to TNZ.

Federation law has determined that planetary cultures shouldn't have their normal societal development messed with. In the case of a primitive culture suddenly being exposed to advanced space travel and extraterrestrials, they basically are not ready for it.

Humans, for instance:

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Of course, not every situation is cut and dry. VOY said the PD has forty-something subsections. There are probably countless volumes written on this stuff. Captains likely have to sit through endless hours of PhD-level seminars and debate on case law, hypothetical scenarios, how and when the Prime Directive may or may not apply, etc., etc. as part of their command training.

Kor

 

[Prax]

Picard probably has it memorized. He probably keeps a fancy codex with leather binding of the PD with all 40 subsections, and all the commentaries on an alter in his quarters, next to his flute box.

Janeway probably does as well, but she prefers the digital app version on her p.a.d.d.

 

[Tallguy]

Picard probably has it memorized. He probably keeps a fancy codex with leather binding of the PD with all 40 subsections, and all the commentaries on an alter in his quarters, next to his flute box.

"Ahhh, here we are. Subsection 47: The advantages of allowing extinction."

 

[Kor]

The ship that crashed in The Cage sounded private.

It was from the American Continent Institute, but the way the guy said it, it sound like "American Incontinent Instute."

Picard probably has it memorized. He probably keeps a fancy codex with leather binding of the PD with all 40 subsections, and all the commentaries on an alter in his quarters, next to his flute box.

Janeway probably does as well, but she prefers the digital app version on her p.a.d.d.

Or with individual references on a bunch of padds scattered across her desk, if prior depictions are any indication of how this tech works.

Kor

 

[Prax]

Well, those things only hold 360 KB yaknow

 

[XCV330]

It was from the American Continent Institute, but the way the guy said it, it sound like "American Incontinent Instute."

What the A.I.I. tests requires that they be far from civilization. But they have had successes.

"everything works" -Vina

 

[Sgt_G]

A good story for you writers out there, could be any era..
Have a civilian ship either.....

I wrote a story with one of these. It's called So Clever and the link is in my signature block below.

 

[matthunter]

That's like saying that once a person is dead, their killer can't be charged for murder, because a dead person can't be killed.

Alternatively, it's like blaming the serpent for tempting Eve because - prior to eating the apple - she had no idea anyone might have evil intent. And then punishing Eve for gaining the knowledge that good and evil do exist, thus proving that "good" is, in fact, often a twatwaffle.

 

[WinterSoldier]

I imagine so long as they didn't break Federation law, it would be fine.
As far as the exploration part, I imagine they would have to follow the same non-contact orders that Starfleet has for pre-Warp civilisations etc.

 

[dswynne1]

IMO, there are three laws at work: Starfleet regulations, Federation law and installer treaties. I presume that if you are a Fed citizen, you fall under the jurisdiction of the Feds. However, members of Starfleet may have to abide by specific regulations pertaining to their membership in Starfleet. We do not know if there is a Prime Directive for Fed citizens; that's the key.

 

[Timo]

We still yearn for examples of anybody breaking a "Federation law", apart from Mudd's petty traffic offenses in his inaugural episode, Cyrano Jones' rather absurd twenty-year jail sentence for breaking animal quarantine rules, and Richard Bashir's Augmenting his son. It seems you literally can do no wrong if you are a Federation citizen!

That is, yes, murder is a no-no. But all murderers get medical care rather than sentences, which sort of obscures the point of law here. Plenty of baddies in Trek; few references to them being criminals.

Timo, the only times I can think of where your example would apply is if one party is legally considered unable to give consent, due to age or perhaps learning disability. There is good reason for considering that party to be a victim in that case, even if they are adamant that it's what they wanted. But that might be a topic better suited to TNZ.

Well, if we keep with the theme of slapping rules on sexual practices, by far the most popular and no doubt also the oldest means of regularing a society, the example I was sorta thinking of is "Yes, Mistress, please hit me!". Giving that consent is typically not criminal; acting on it typically is.

But prosecution on victimless crimes isn't just harmless or titillating fun or a mild annoyance. It plays a crucial preemptive role in making people behave, both specifically on issues where the practical significance is not obvious to the people, and generally in convincing folks that it's best to just nod when the leaders say "we know better".

In TOS, the fun thing is that crime management seems to be steering away from frightening the potential perps with the threat of punishment, and towards healing those madmen whose insanity drives them to jaywalk. Prosecution of crimes where nobody specifically gets hurt is at odds with Dr Adams' work, which is supposed to countermand specific crimes rather than somehow drive general criminality out of the patient (see Mudd, who never performs a repeat offense but never ceases to come up with novel ones, either).

But Adams apparently did know how to stop people from (re)committing specific crimes. Picard ominously refers to screening for tendencies in "Justice". Perhaps the one and only working way to enforce the Prime Directive within the Federation has indeed been adopted, and everybody is brainwashed of this one crime in their youth?

Federation law has determined that planetary cultures shouldn't have their normal societal development messed with.

...By Starfleet. We never quite learn that e.g. private citizens, profit-making corporations or the UFP government could not mess with said. Indeed, "Angel One" suggests everybody but Starfleet is allowed, while only "Bread and Circuses" says that a man not in known Starfleet employ could be obligated to honor the PD on the pain of being dragged away in chains.

In the case of a primitive culture suddenly being exposed to advanced space travel and extraterrestrials, they basically are not ready for it. Humans, for instance:

Yup. But apparently ("First Contact") the UFP then starts working on making them ready, that is, messing with said. And Starfleet gets that assignment, even if only after its hands are carefully tied behind its back.

Of course, not every situation is cut and dry. VOY said the PD has forty-something subsections. There are probably countless volumes written on this stuff. Captains likely have to sit through endless hours of PhD-level seminars and debate on case law, hypothetical scenarios, how and when the Prime Directive may or may not apply, etc., etc. as part of their command training.

And still the general gist of the rule no doubt is "better safe than sorry", and skippers are putting their careers on the chopping block whenever they decide to act on the finer points and sub-clauses. Which allows Kirk to survive all his antics, and might have allowed Tracey to do that, too - but the risk is immense, and Tracey didn't want to take it, while the camera followed the one man who always rolled sevens.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Tallguy]

I think this underlines the fact that even though there have been six TV shows and ten movies covering two hundred years and almost our entire experience of this utopian post-scarcity (for most of it) utopian society has been through the lens of an armed strictly hierarchical and heavily regulated organization.

 

[Shawnster]

It keeps being mentioned about private citizens, but nobody has mentioned other species. Nothing prevents the Ferengi from contaminating any culture they want, even if it's a culture the Federation/Starfleet just met or just left.

Plenty of non-Federation members that are allowed to tool around in Federation territory or in the great unexplored frontier where all those first contacts tak place. No amount of Starfleet or Federation law will prevent these species from interfering in the natural development of pre-warp civilizations.

 

[matthunter]

Here's another frightening thought - the Marcuses were working WITH Starfleet but explicitly weren't part of it - in fact, the notion that Starfleet might commandeer their research was something David found abhorrent. Yet they were (albeit unintentionally) creating a weapon that could destroy an entire inhabited planet. The only thing Starfleet seemed to be doing was acting as Carol's flunkies scanning planets for a decent test site - there wasn't a single Starfleet science or intel liason on Regula 1.

Our militaries and governments keep VERY close tabs on anything that could be a bioweapon or other WMD... what does the Federation have in place?

 

[Roundabout]

And to allow fundamentalist Christians or any other group access to pre-warp civilisations to spread their beliefs would be catastrophic for the locals.

Starfleet MUST have some safety net in place to prevent it from happening.

You might not need to worry about space faring Christians evangelizing, because it appears as though the Son of God (not to be mistaken for the sun up in the sky, as Uhuru pointed out) himself can deliver the Word and offer salvation directly to all those alien worlds, as Kirk discovered in "Bread and Circuses".

The Federation is eight thousand light year across and "only" has 150 members, likely the majority of Federation space is just open space with countless non-Federation warp civilizations claiming portions of the same volume.

Can the Federation or Starfleet prevent citizens from various member worlds from exploring, settling, mining, etc. on non-warp inhabited worlds?

Probably not. Starfleet didn't even know that human colonists had settled on the planets in DS9 "Paradise" or TNG "The Ensigns of Command".

As a practical matter, I doubt Starfleet can keep track of every explorer/colonist that set out to explore/colonize. Starfleet probably doesn't have the resources to police every corner of their territory anyway. If there are Federation or Starfleet laws or regulations regarding civilian exploration and colonization, it probably works on an honor system.

Of course, there are probably plenty of explorers/colonizers who wouldn't bother to register with Starfleet, even if it was indeed a requirement to do so.

Granted, in neither episode, was the planet already inhabited. If colonists did decide to settle on a planet that was already inhabited, Starfleet probably wouldn't know, unless I guess the inhabitants of the planet make a protest to the Federation, or the colonists send an SOS to Starfleet for help because they are facing hostility from the natives.

Also, in "Journey's End", those native American colonists settled on that planet which was in disputed space, even though Starfleet warned them not to. I don't think Starfleet likes to use force against its own people, unless they are the Maquis (then Starfleet uses brutal force).

Interestingly, rogue colonists could drag Starfleet into a conflict when those colonists settle on planets that are claimed by other powers, like the Cardassians in "Journey's End" and the Sheliak in "The Ensigns of Command".