Starfleet Jedi

First of all we have to understand that the UFP is pretty much a constitutional Republic or at least it started out that way before Socialist Bureaucrats slowly but surely took over. We know this because in the episode in which Picard is placed before a McCarthy type tribunal he quotes from the UFP constitution several times making special remark of the right to be protected against unwarranted search, seizure etc by the government to this day it remains one of my fave episodes even though it has been so long I do not recall it's name. We know that little by little Bureocrats eroded the freedoms the UFP enjoyed, we know they betrayed their own citizens quite a few occasions they left member colonies to their fate when order broke down as they did with Tasha Yar's homeworld, they left federation citizens at the mercy of the Cardassians when they gave up former Federation territory to them in hope of some peace that never materialized as well all know. Appeasement has never worked nor it will in the future.
In the case of the SW galactic republic corruption led to it's downfall as we also all know, but which one of this 2 at their height was the most free society in comparison to one another.I think that the federation was at it's height in the Kirk era while the SW republic seems to be at it's height in the Knights of the Old Republic era a 1000 years or more before the events in the movies.

Sorry for the lenght...

Question: how do we know the UFP freedoms have been eroded?

We've seen some attempts at this by isolated members of their military, sure, but they all ended up being resolved in the end. And none of them ended up being resolved in favor of the people who wanted to remove freedom.

Question 2: you are aware that socialism is not a political system but an economic one?

Which begs the question: suppose that the UFP has reached effective non-scarcity on a number of it's worlds (there are strong indications throughout the ST canon that Earth has reached exactly that).
What economic system would you suggest in that scenario (and why)?


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BTW, the planet Tasha Yar lived on broke away from the Federation when things spiraled out of control. They left the Federation by choice after their goverment fell. Not that they where ever full members to begin with - they where a protectorate.

What was the UFP supposed to do?
Enforce them to stay in line? Using the military? That would've been just as bad as letting them leave.

As to the Macquis, that was surely not the UFP's finest hour. But do remember that this style of negotiating happens/happened in the real world as well. Not good in that case either, but it does go to show that no one is perfect.

Which is, of course, the point. The UFP is by no means a bad place to live in. It's not perfect, their leaders make mistakes. But to see it as a completely corrupt bunch of dictators to be (which is what you are implying) is rather far from how it's actually portrayed.

Remember: the episodes of Startrek focus on things that go wrong (and then get fixed by ripped-shirt Kirk/Charismatic Picard/nuke-em (when I'm not having regilious moments) Sisko/set phasers on coffee Janeway), not on the things that go right.


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The SW republic is something I know less about, the movies make it seem like a modern version of todays republics, with all the good and bad that comes with being really big.

You can always check this thread and my speculation from page 2 about the weak balance of human/alien representation in the UFP.

Not this again. We've seen more mixed race forces in Trek than in most of SW. The 2009 movie even reinforces the idea by showing that even starships that are based out of Earth have a number of alien crew members on them, even as far back as the 2230's with the U.S.S. Kelvin having several notable non-human crew members, among them Alnschloss K'Bentayr, and the alien medical officer who attends to Winona Kirk during the evacuation.
-Mike

You're not thinking of "The Drumhead," are you Punkmaister? Because that episode concerns a paranoid admiral who sees enemies everywhere, who ruins a young man's career because of his Romulan heritage, who prizes defense above freedom.

I'll do you one better. Admiral Leyton tried to take over the Federation via military coup in the DS9 "Homefront/Paradise Lost" arc, as he also prized defense more than freedom.

How about this one, from TNG "The Pegasus." Admiral Pressman, who illegally developed the phase cloak, goes on a rant about how it would increase security, how the Treaty of Algernon places the Federation at a tactical disadvantage, blah blah.

Pressman: Can't you see the potential here? The phasing cloak could be the greatest breakthrough in weapons research in the last fifty years.

Picard: Except it's illegal... it's a violation of an agreement the Federation signed in good faith.

If you think Socialists are the only people capable of eroding freedom, you're dead wrong.

Now, on to the topic. Starfleet has no wage system, which is a hallmark of anarcho-syndicalism, which views wages as a form of slavery. There are certain post-scarcity models to consider with regards to the replicator, though we've heard from numerous sources how the replicator cannot match "real" food in many areas; presumably, this extends to other replicated goods as well, and so a system of money is still in effect, considering we've heard about Federation credits in many episodes. The government of the UFP provides, by means of high technology, basic services to all citizens including universal healthcare and others, and there's no indication that free enterprise has been impinged on. The key difference in the UFP is, as Picard stated in STFC, that the acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in people's lives.

As far as the Republic goes, Palpatine had his hands in everything from the get-go, and I know very little about the EU, so it's hard to form an impartial analysis of their system.

In any event, the Federation appears to be composed of an anarcho-syndicalist force wedded to a social-capitalist commune. The social-capitalist aspect of the Federation is evident in the eradication of poverty through government provision, government sponsorship of or assistance to certain developments (like Genesis), and a government program to maintain a baseline standard of living for all its citizens, powered by technology.

Cocytus wrote:...There are certain post-scarcity models to consider with regards to the replicator, though we've heard from numerous sources how the replicator cannot match "real" food in many areas...

Except, apperantly, chocolate based icecream and cheesecake* :P

*) Just look at Diana's complete and utter enjoyement at eating the chocolate stuff and the utter bliss the-doctor-in-sevens-mind and that alien-of-the-week have when they eat some cheesecake

In reality, it poses a small problem for us to assume that the replicator is no good at creating food. We've seen it replicate functioning electronic devices. That requires a great deal more precision that the average cheesecake I'd wager.

Personally I always took it to be more of a philosophical element: you know it's not the real thing, so you value it less. Though it also might be that the replicators create their meals to the exact same standard every time - meaning every steak would taste exactly alike. That could get a bit offputting in the end I suppose?

Or perhaps that the replicator doesn't have very good 'patterns' for everything. Maybe the electronics are stored at a much higher precision, but that uses more energy so they don't do that for food. Or something like that anyway.

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On the topic, I think your analysis is quite good. Especially the bit where they use their technological edge to provide a baseline. This would make perfect sense if enough resources where available. Kind of like how some european states used the income from their natural resources (such as gas or coal) to power social programs to reduce poverty. With the minor difference that the tech-edge of the UFP makes quite a bit more possible than selling some gas ever could ;)

That said, Jake Sisko does confirm that humans no longer use money. Which ties in with my statements about Earth - if Earth is post scarcity it would no longer need money and it would also explain why we see so many people doing stuff they really, really want to do rather than need to do (such as Sisko's dad, who's passion -cooking- he turned into his life or the Picards vineyards).

It's a bit of a pitty, all things considered, that we don't see more of 'life on Earth' or specifically, 'life outside the military' in ST. An election would have been great fun (backstabbing Romulans trying to force the UFP to adopt a very bad person as president by using propaganda, subterfuge, etc - Picard/Sisko fix the problem just in time to see that the new president is elected fairly instead).

Roondar wrote:Personally, I always took it to be more of a philosophical element: you know it's not the real thing, so you value it less.

Well, even if it is psychosomatic, the "value it less" part is what matters.

Roondar wrote:Or perhaps that the replicator doesn't have very good "patterns" for everything. Maybe the electronics are stored at a much higher precision, but that uses more energy so they don't do that for food.

I have no trouble buying this. Food is what the replicators are called upon to produce more than anything else. They even called it a "food slot" in some early TNG episodes. It would make sense therefore to have food patterns be as simple as possible, while preserving more complex patterns, and the concordantly higher energy expenditures, for items like tricorders, weapons, medical tools, etc. Interestingly, the people who disdain the replicator tend to be older (Robert Picard, O'Brien's grandmother) ex-Federation (Michael Eddington) or non-Federation (Kira Nerys).

Roondar wrote:That said, Jake Sisko does confirm that humans no longer use money. Which ties in with my statements about Earth - if Earth is post scarcity it would no longer need money and it would also explain why we soo so many people doing stuff they really, really want to do rather that need to do (such as Sisko's dad, who's passion -cooking- he turned into his life or the Picards vineyards.

Makes sense if its just Earth we're talking about. Earth would be how the Federation represents itself to the galaxy as a perfect society. Earth is an experiment, the reality of the Federation is a little different, which would make Jake Sisko's statement a little propagandistic (which I think it is, but that's just me). The Federation has to have some sort of currency to deal with races which still use it. I see something like a system of credit accorded to Starfleet and others who have to deal with currency-using races. Remember Dr. Crusher charging a bolt of fabric at Farpoint? It makes sense if she had something like a company credit card on which she could place minor personal expenditures, which is accepted by Federation members and outlying territories. This explains why she didn't have to barter for it, the Federation would remunerate the vendor. By contrast, someone far outside the Federation would have to barter, as Voyager did on numerous occasions (like Janeway buying the isokinetic cannon for 125 isolinear chips)

Another thing that need to be considered about replicators is that is not just energy that they use, they obviously have the raw elements from which to compose whatever food item at the molecular level so the question is where do they obtain the raw materials that at a molecular level would a Tuna Sandwich for example or as close a faccsimile as possible anyway. The point is they need to obtain this materials from somewhere meaning someone still needs to procure those materials somehow to then load into the replicators along with the patterns to recreate whatever food item. Maybe they get the materials from Earth offworld colonies. it would explain the no scarcity problem but it also means Earth has become largely dependent of it's own human colonies to get those materials. And yes the plot of the Romulans trying to rig an UFP election a la the Manchurian candidate would have made an awesome episode.

On a starship (be it Starfleet or otherwise), obtaining raw materials for the replicators would be a sinch since all they have to do is fly in through a nebula or skim the cloudtops of a gas giant on their way to wherever.
-Mike

Technically speaking (and assuming waste-extraction facilities are up to it) you never lose matter when eating. If you can collect the waste (and dust, admittedly) effeciently enough, you'll never need new raw materials.

Naturally, if replicators can handle any-old-carbon source for it's carbon, any-old-hydrogen source for it's hydrogen (etc), then it becomes a lot easier as you can use the rather impressive amounts of that stuff available on Earth and in the solar system itself.

I see no reason why, given the incredible amounts of base material you'd have in the solar system, why you'd need any imports from elsewhere to supply your citizens with food/etc almost indefinitely. Especially since you can recycle most of the stuff as well.

(Though this does put a whole new spin on the 'human waste' factor aboard starships :P)