I have a couple of half finished stories set in the distant future.  To make this a legitimate post:

One of the major power blocs calls itself an Empire... actually 'The Empire', as culturally they don't recognize foriegn soverenities.  

However, in structure it's a corporate fuedal state of sorts, the Emperor is the only Bank by law, the various nobles are in charge of economic areas, ranging from a single 'trade fleet' to being responsible for the economic output of an entire planet.  

There is a twist in that the nobilty is not hereditary but raised up through a meritocracy. The huge middle class of 'Free Men', who are not taxed or restricted legally, but have no say in governance, are tapped to fill noble slots based on their ability to put together business plans, or succeed in private industry. Nobles will put their backing behind candidates (which helps a lot with business plans), especially when the job opening is part of a multi-noble conglomerate plan (a House), where it is in the interest of the involved parties to keep the House intact, and an outsider might not be so willing to come into an established group as a junior party.

There are few laws, particularly among the Free Men, what legal system exists is enforced entirely by private contractors.  You hire someone to research who commited a crime, you hire someone else to enforce the sentance you purchace from an Imperial Magistrate.   Nobles essentially 'buy into' the government system and fall directly under the Emperor.  

There is more too it, but I think I covered the basics enough for this.

Quote from: flyingmiceGovernmental forms do not always reflect the reality of power flow is my point. For example, any Democracy which limits it's franchise can be viewed as something else - if it's limited to the wealthy it's also a Plutocracy, if it limits it to the old, it's also a Gerontocracy, etc.

Sorry Clash, I have to disagree. If a government restricts membership to the wealthy, it is a plutocracy. How it determines its governmental body is just mechanics. I would say, if you wish to be clear, you might distinguish between a Putocratic Democracy and a Plutocratic Monarchy but at the heart of it, you have the rule of the wealthy.

Bill

I have a couple of suggestions - military dictatorship; feudalism.

Personally, I don't see why you have to limit yourself to one particular government type. Why don't you have different power blocs with different government types? Or maybe I'm missing the point. Probably. Never mind, then.

You could have societies where most of the power is tied into the economy, and switch around with what that economy is based on. (And depending on the scarcity of that element, you could end up with a Corporate/Feudal/Plutocratic state, or you may have an anarchic/market-ish state, or something else.)

The economy could be based on:
- mining of a base metal
- some rare starfuel
- access to space
- attention / popularity / advertising space
- experiences (if you have some cyberpunky "chip into other folks' personalities" stuff)
- weaponry

If I was going for harder SF, I'd avoid monarchies and maybe even formal "empires" that go by that name. (Even if there's imperialism in practice.) I don't feel like explicit heredity lines are going to be in vogue in the future.

However, if I was doing space pulp, that's different. I don't care about tedious micronational direct-democratic wired adhocracies with a reputation economy. No, I want to PUNCH THE DUKE IN THE FACE and steal his ship.

QuoteYep! The Chinese bureaucracy ran itself. It existed in parallel to the Imperial power structure, and was much more stable. It's an excellent example.

It's this quality, as well as the Roman structure, combined with a sort of meritocracy that I'm going with for the antagonists in ASID.  

It's all very heirarchical, you have governors, and regional governors, and so forth, in a sort of pyramid scheme, up to the top, which is ruled by a council that is a combination of the top governor for each continental region, and appointed ministers from various fields of society (health, agriculture, military, etc.), who're selected based on their work in the field.

In a way, it's all run more like a corporation than a formal government, in that the prime mechanism for advancement is, at least ideally, based on merit.  Various metrics of performance are applied to the various governors, with advancement based on availability of position and meeting goal standards.  In a perfect implementation, the head council is simply the best of all the governers and advisors available, and they sit for as long as they remain superior.

Power however, is not micromanaged.  Individual regions or cities are effectively autonomous, and capable of issuing decisions regarding their local area of command independently of higher authority.  Essentially, the further up the chain you go, the more macro your managing skills must become, as while the higher ups are expected to issue overall goals for the state, the individual governors are by and large expected to handle the finer details themselves.  

Incompetence is not tolerated, because generally in any position there's potentially dozens or hundreds of individuals on the next rung down from you, and if annual report says your efficiency is down, you're easily replaced.  

Even the lowliest mayors are only selected from the heads of the most successful family houses in the city, and they're always there ready to seize your position if you fail.