When will the UFP crumble?

[c0rnedfr0g]

We know it apparently exists into the 29th Century. How big do you speculate it is by then? What other major powers still challenge the UFP in the Milky Way? Is the UFP in other galaxies?

When will the UFP fall? All great powers die eventually. Will the galaxy fall into chaos, or evolve past the UFP?

Just speculation....

 

[Finn]

^I'm willing to wager that the UFP in the 29th Century is quite different from the one we know in the first half of this millennium. I mean, the United States has changed a lot in the past 230 years so imagine twice that for the Federation, not just in size, but in politics, values, and technology...

They may consider the 24th Century humans as not so enlightened, humanity's view of space travel would be very different from today. By then, Humans would have been going to space for 900 years, warp capable for 8 centuries, all the places we saw Picard and Kirk explore as familiar to the 29th Century Federation as our hometowns are to us. Change would be tremendous especially if the Romulans and Klingons joined. It would mean the Federation political landscape would be completely alien to Picard, Sisko and Janeway. They would be dealing with powers beyond what was Romulan and Klingon space.

Not to mention all those pre-industrial societies we saw in TNG. Imagine a region of Federation whose stability is threatened by a centuries-long war between the Malcorians and Barkonians, border disputes with the Devore who had finally expanded into the Beta Quadrant, and an tense alliance with a race that toppled the Dominion in the Gamma Quadrant.

 

[Sci]

I think the most probable scenario is that the UFP may itself have become a member of a larger interstellar republic, perhaps something that encompasses the entire galaxy.

 

[The Wormhole]

Thanks to Enterprise, we know the Federation will exist into the 31st century. So, it ain't crumbling until sometime in the foruth millenium at least.

 

[Sci]

Thanks to Enterprise, we know the Federation will exist into the 31st century. So, it ain't crumbling until sometime in the foruth millenium at least.

Actually, we have no data on what political entity Crewman Daniels was working for. The absolute latest date we have for the Federation's existence is VOY's reference to Federation timeships from the 29th Century. It's entirely possible that the Federation fell in the two hundred years between then.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I don't think the Federation will crumble, but I do think it will eventually evolve into something else in the distant future that may or may not retain "Federation" in its name. Either way it won't be the UFP as we know it today, IMO, but it could trace its origins back to it...

 

[Red Ranger]

I see the Federation becoming the basis for an intergalactic alliance. A United Federation of Galaxies, perhaps. But that would happen thousands of years in the future. And who knows what kind of menaces such an aliiance would face -- or what wonders it would encompass. -- RR

 

[captcalhoun]

The Federation fell after a thousand generations when the Federation became corrupt and elected a President who was secretly manipulating events.

One Starfleet officer tried to convince the Admiralty to remove the President from power, to end the corruption, but he failed.

Then, the President engineered a crisis, causing a civil war, which he used to gain extraordinary powers...

before anyone knew it, the Federation was gone, replaced by the Galactic Monarchy, with the President now King-for-life...

 

[All Seeing Eye]

Even by the 2390's the federation was aware of multiple technologies to do with Transwarp and Voyager brought back most of that knowledge with it's info on Borg Transwarp coils, Slipstream drive and subspace corridors. There's even info on that Tetryon Slingshot they used. I see it as very likely that by the 25th century the Federation utilises transwarp making the entire Galaxy open for exploration. I feel by the 26th century at the most, that the Galaxy will have been explored, a couple of wars will have been fought but Federation expansion will have won and continued it's expansion at a relatively fast pace. I think by the 26th/27th centuries that the Klingon empire, Cardassia and the new Ferenginar will have become UFP members and the Romulans having many new closer relationship treatys but never quite fully joining.

I don't think the Federation would completely crumble but I can see a Federation in the 29th or 31st centuries breaking up into smaller organisations. Planets on one side of the Galaxy will probably consider Earth too far away and would form a Federation closer to home with a new capital planet.

 

[Balthier the Great]

Most democracies don't last longer than 300 years. so if the Fed was founded in the 23 century, it should be a lot like us in the 26th century. By the 30th I would imagine a fingurehead senate and a very strong president, and a nation that spans the galaxy. Eventually, say like 35'th century, the economy collapses and the entire thing fractures into smaller independant nations.

 

[Red Ranger]

Even by the 2390's the federation was aware of multiple technologies to do with Transwarp and Voyager brought back most of that knowledge with it's info on Borg Transwarp coils, Slipstream drive and subspace corridors. There's even info on that Tetryon Slingshot they used. I see it as very likely that by the 25th century the Federation utilises transwarp making the entire Galaxy open for exploration. I feel by the 26th century at the most, that the Galaxy will have been explored, a couple of wars will have been fought but Federation expansion will have won and continued it's expansion at a relatively fast pace. I think by the 26th/27th centuries that the Klingon empire, Cardassia and the new Ferenginar will have become UFP members and the Romulans having many new closer relationship treatys but never quite fully joining.

I don't think the Federation would completely crumble but I can see a Federation in the 29th or 31st centuries breaking up into smaller organisations. Planets on one side of the Galaxy will probably consider Earth too far away and would form a Federation closer to home with a new capital planet.

Tachyon Shield:

Good point about the advanced propulsion methods seen in VOY, TNG, and other ST shows. We know there is likely to be a Federation in the 29th century. What other advances are likely in 500 years that would make travel across the galaxy much faster than in the 24th century? Maybe even portable, mobile wormholes, generated by an advanced starship's engines.

And an interesting idea that the Federation might become, because of the size of the Milky Way Galaxy, more decentralized. Maybe an Alpha Quadrant Federation, Beta Quadrant Federation, Gamma Quadrant Federation, and Delta Quadrant Federation, just to slice it into the four quadrants of the galaxy. And probably within each quadrant, you'd have decentralized sectors as well. Like when the Roman Empire split into the Eastern and Western Roman Empires.

Red Ranger

 

[Deks]

Since we got an indication that the Federation exists in the 29th century ... and if you are REALLY so keen on having the Federation 'crumble' ... perhaps it won't exist in the 31st century.

To my knowledge ... or what I was able to gather from Daniels, the time frame he comes from is very different.
There may not be UFP in existence at all.
At one point in 'Shockwave' I think, he mentioned that a Federation monument was missing.
Now that could point into numerous directions, but it also points to the possibility that the Federation as we know it dissolved by the 31st century and was replaced with something else that was conjured up to accommodate a combination of galactic organizations in a unified alliance (something agreed upon by everybody).

Also ... distances wouldn't present a problem in the 31st century at all.
The Feds would be able to travel from one end of the galaxy to the other using Slipstream in 10 minutes in early 25th century (provided that SF researches the technology Voyager used in Timeless and improves on it).
By the 31st century, quite a large number of galaxies could have been explored and also possibly unified in an alliance perhaps ... or even formed formal relations that would lead to potential alliances.

There are numerous possibilities to consider.

But if the Federation expanded to large proportions in the 29th century alone ... there's a possibility it would be fairly difficult to crumble it (which is why there would be a Temporal Cold war in the first place ... if you can't do something in the present time frame, do it centuries earlier).

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

At one point in 'Shockwave' I think, he mentioned that a Federation monument was missing.

That was because they were in an alternate timeline where the Federation was never formed.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

In 2005.

 

[Sci]

Most democracies don't last longer than 300 years.

I always wonder how anyone can reasonably claim to know this, considering that there were never any true democracies in the modern sense of the term -- that is, representative republics whose first-class citizenship and suffrage extended to 100% or nearly 100% of the population, not just one particular gender, class, and/or ethnicity -- until the mid-20th Century.

so if the Fed was founded in the 23 century, it should be a lot like us in the 26th century.

The United Federation of Planets was founded in 2161, the 22nd Century, according to both TNG and ENT.

By the 30th I would imagine a fingurehead senate and a very strong president, and a nation that spans the galaxy. Eventually, say like 35'th century, the economy collapses and the entire thing fractures into smaller independant nations.

1) The Federation's legislature is called the Federation Council, not the Federation Senate.

2) The Federation's economy is post-scarcity. It's impossible to predict economic behavior because its economy wouldn't resemble anything we've ever seen in real life.

 

[Red Ranger]

. . . The Federation's economy is post-scarcity. It's impossible to predict economic behavior because its economy wouldn't resemble anything we've ever seen in real life.

This is the thing people who holler and gnash their teeth about statements that the Federation has no money. The reason the writers kept it vague is because we simply don't know what will replace capitalism, which is nearly as flawed a system as societies run on the principle of divine right of kings. It will be something we don't expect, a post-capitalist system, for lack of a better word. -- RR

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

The Federation will crumble when it gets all dry and flaky.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Or when it gets baked into a peach cobbler.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Mmm... 150 member species would make for a declicious cobbler.
Not sure about those starships though, duranium isn't exactly one of my favorite ingredients.

 

[Deks]

At one point in 'Shockwave' I think, he mentioned that a Federation monument was missing.

That was because they were in an alternate timeline where the Federation was never formed.

I'm aware of that, but that wasn't the point of why I wrote it in my post.
Daniels was aware of the fact that with the time-line intact the monument would exist ... and the existence of such a monument could point to a direction ... read on in my post.