NationStates Jolt Archive

Done

This is a bit about the Commonalitarianism, an ecotopian worker capitalist society.

The Modern Era:

Territory: The Commonalitarianism claims travel and ownership rights to all of the Paxarific Ocean covering 15.57 million square kilometers. It claims all the Paxarific ocean to the edge of 300 nautical miles from land. It also claims many small uninhabited islands, volcanos, and coral reefs in the Paxarific ocean. The Commonalitarianism is claiming mining rights to the ocean floor for polymetallic nodules and methane hydrates. The entire ocean floor in the Pacific region is claimed for building cities. An area of space between Mars and the Moon 10,000 square kilometers around the space junk fortress is claimed.

Environmental Problems: Marine habitat preservation, foreign environmental dumping, space junk.

Environmental Hazards: Typhoons, earthquakes, tidal waves, storms, volcanic eruptions

Resources: Polymetallic Nodules-- Cobalt, iron, copper, manganese. Aquaculture-- fish, Shrimp, kelp, kelp ethanol, cultured pearls, cultured coral, gravel, sand, pet fish. Some small jungle islands have uranium deposits which are being enriched. Recycled steel, metals and titanium from sunken ships. Magnesium extracted from seawater. We currently have access to undersea oil and methyl hydrate gas deposits but have not developed them. Iron, nickel, iridium, platinum, copper, oxygen, and hydrogen from asteroid mining. Uranium, beryllium, iron, steel from recycled space junk. Multistory integrated organic farms provide excess food capacity.

Exports: Multifuel hybrid electric automobiles, motorcycles, and boats. Submersibles, sea salvage and diving equipment, sonofusion generators, wind farms, solar farms, small river generators, wave generators, ethanol, solar electric windows, bioplastics, space salvage ships and equipment, turbo fan hover tanks. This represents sales in nation states.

Imports: Cattle, wood, fertilizers, industrial diamonds, botanicals, aircraft, and electronics.

Education: Mandatory education to high school. Three year military conscription service includes equivalent training to two year Associate of Arts Degree or a 2 year technical degree. (All citizens) There is a military academy at Liberty Arcology. There is also the Marianis Engineering College and Technical School in Trenchtown in the Marianis Trench. School of Media studies opened in Beauty Arcology covers politics, media, communications, political spin, and broadcasting over internet, radio, and television. Most citizens finish two years more in college education after conscription.

Politics: The Commonalitarianism is a direct democracy. Referenda can be put in place by a vote of 1/3 of the populace. All citizens must vote or face jail time. Issues are voted for directly in a public forum. There is complete freedom of the press. Issues are debated both in the electronic commons and the Citizens Assembly. They both can interact through video and audio channels. All non-classified government information is available through an electronic commons on issues. Voters have the choice of registering their votes either through the electronic commons or at the Citizens Assembly. The electronic commons is a massive Virtual Private Network which is readily available in many areas of the Commonalitariarnism. It is hardened against attack and only available to citizens. It is not connected to the internet and has a different set of protocols. Citizens in addition to voting can be called up to serve on government committees by either partition if no specialty is needed, or by technical knowledge. This is generally done through the electronic commons with some meetings in the assembly. There are two major parties in the Commonalitarianism; The Green Oceans liberal party, and the Blue Seas conservative party.

National Anthem
Based on Columbia, The Gem of the Ocean

O Commonalitarianism, the gem of the ocean,
The home of the brave and the free,
The shrine of each patriot's devotion,
A world offers homage to thee.
Thy mandate makes heroes assemble
When Liberty's form stands in view;
Thy Banner Makes Tyranny Tremble

When born by the tortoise
When born by the tortoise
Thy banners make tyranny tremble
When born by the tortoise

The wine cup, the wine cup bring hither,
And fill you it true to the brim!
May the wreaths they have won never wither,
Nor the star of their glory grow dim!
May the civil assembly united never sever,
Their honor prove true,
The militia and navy forever.

Three cheers for the tortoise
Three cheers for the tortoise
Freedom and truth forever.

Commonalitarianism, the pride of the ocean,
And so of a truth shall she be.
While true in her loyal devotion,
To all that is noble and free:
The fire that glows in her story,
Still burns in the hearts of her sons,
And her flag shall still lead her to glory,
When duty shall march with her guns.

Three cheers for the tortoise
Three cheers for the tortoise
Freedom and truth forever.




Economy: This is a worker ownership society. Most companies are organized around direct stock ownership, or cooperative ownership of companies either by families, unions, or individuals. There are three large registered family syndicates-- Cruon, Ming, and Bonanni. Cruon is focused on energy and aquaculture. Ming Commercial House produces most of the small arms and police supplies in the Commonalitarianism, supports mercenary companies, funds freebooting and privateering, and is involved in corporate espionage. It does not yet sell outside the Commonalitarianism. Bonanni is focused on durable goods and construction. Companies are not given a huge amount of "rights" like modern corporations. They are viewed suspiciously as businesses not people. This is due to the experience of many of the citizens with the corporate slave state of Begone, especially the hippy communes of Ohyayians. There are two exceptions to this.

The government is a civil service meritocracy with standardized testing. Many essential industries are PPCs-- Private Public Consortiums a mix of government, family, union or cooperative ownership. This includes the automobile industry, pharmacies, and hospitals so far. Many companies are focused on very efficient uses of resources and lean manufacturing because of the limited supplies of land based goods like wood and fertilizer. There is also a strong environmental movement which forces companies to use green technology. The energy base of the economy is completely renewable. There is an emphasis on trading for raw materials which the Commonalitarianism has a lack of wood, gold, cattle, crops, gems and other land based resources. The Commonalitarianism also trades for technology.

Public Transportation: There are rolling elevated covered walkways in most cities. They are good for quick trips. In addition, elevated super fast hover trains have been built in the cities for public transportation. Some of the trains have car trains where you can drive a car into a cubicle then drive off at your destination. This is to reduce traffic congestion.

There is freedom of Religion: The Commonalitarianism has developed some changes in religion. The First Universal Church of Deism makes up 10% of the population, Also the New Harmonites have gained a foothold here as well 5% of the population. A dangerous sect has come up it is called The Church of Human Uplift with a charismatic prophet. She proposes uplifting man to enlightenment through genetic engineering 1% and is prepared to use violence to do it. The main religious grouping is an even split between buddhism 30%, and christianity 30%. There are a few other groups as well, islam 5%, atheist 5%, other 4%.

The Cities: Each city is designed to hold 4 million people very comfortably. They are floating ocean geodesic domes. Liberty Arcology is a conglomeration of 5 cities linked together or 20 million people. All cities use sound ecological principals with lots of green space, bioshelter sewage treatment, and alternative energy sources. A number of deep sea geodesic domes around the Mariana trench have been built as well. A space colony between the moon and mars has been constructed recently.

Police and crime: There are a number of problems with road piracy or carjackings late at night. This has caused the Commonalitarianism to develop high speed armored night patrol police cars and patrol boats as well as the antipiracy brigades. There is a well developed nonlethal arsenal in the Commonalitarianism to deal with protesters and pirates. Tariffs are high so there is also some smuggling. Some crime has become institutionalized. There is a decent amount of government corruption with bribery and payoffs. The government also hires hackers to attack enemy nations and is directly involved in supporting both corporate and military espionage against foreign powers. This is idolized on television and in the media. Also the drug trade is partially legal and export to foreign countries is covertly supported by the government. The government hires freebooters and privateers to take enemy nations vessels. A frightening new agency has come into being called the “Department of Mental Hygiene” which people can be reported to for forced “counseling” and “rehabilitation”.

During the VODAIS plague drastic measures were taken to restructure the prisons. Many prisoners were conscripted to fight the “infected”, this created a form of fighting prison brigade. Prisoners were conscripted and trained by the Ming Commercial House. They formed many of the prisons into a kind of boot camp. Now that the war is over, prisoners are being reassigned to a tripartite system, prison boot camp, followed by a term of hard labor or conscription, and continuous psychological reeducation by the Department of Mental Hygiene. It is a tough regimen voted in by the Blue Oceans Party in the Commonalitarianism which also voted in the death penalty.


Culture: The Commonalitarianism has had limited contact with the outside world until recently. They have spent a bit too much time on the high seas. Therefore many aspects of culture have varied wildly from other nations. The Commonalitarianism values its botanic gardens, flower gardens, public vegetable gardens, and public parks highly. These are designed both for beautification, and an ecosystem to maintain the Commonalitarianism without having to import food and water. These are very carefully cultivated and tended. Much of the material has to be imported.

There are bicycle paths and small artificial lagoons for boating. Several of the Commonalitarianism cities have artificial hunting for ducks and deer. Martial arts are often practiced by the Ming and Ohyayian communities in the parks. Fishing is very popular in the parks as well on the boating lagoons. There is a system of cafes and small restaurants which serve a wide variety of aquaculture and green house products. It is possible to buy mild "over the counter pharmaceuticals" in the cafes.

Paper is an expensive imported product so most literature is disseminated online. Poetry is extremely popular in the Commonalitarianism, so is History, Crime Literature, Mysteries and Military Literature.

A giant automotive theme park sits in the middle of the Paxarific Ocean called the Mystery Mobile, Herbie The Love Bug, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Automotive Superpark. An addition with a Thomas the Tank Engine themed train has been added to the park purchased from the Lionel Train company, a foreign company from the nation of United Delta.

Trench Town in the Mariana Trench has a Museum of Recovered Sea Objects that includes ships from many different eras. It has some ancient ships from ancient Scandinvan residing there.

People: The Commonalitarianism is a multiracial nation. The three main groups are the Ming: A mix of Pacific rim Asians, Cantonese, Singaporean, and Indonesian peoples, Cruonians: A mix of Greek and eastern european cultures, Ohyayians: American style ecologically minded business hippies. Smaller minorities include Paxarific Islanders-- Pacific Islanders, Americonies-- 1920's style Americans, and others.

Military: The Commonalitarianism intervenes to change things. They are zealous of their borders which are basically undefinable according to current international law. They have problems with piracy. Sometimes unknowingly nuclear submarines approach their cities too closely because they are operating in "international" waters. They will attack countries which use nuclear weapons near them. They use high altitude airships and underwater drones to track this problem. They have orbital defense weapons, anti-material weapons, and psychopharmalogical weapons to counter this problem. They have mostly kept silent on this problem. It may lead to a deadly international incident. The nuclear submarine problem has led them to recently build several state of the art submarine carriers. Their military has become a varied force. Until recently there was no central command, each allied city state armed itself. They have been purchasing large amounts of aircraft. They are also buying amphibious armor. They have lots of armored trucks which Dynamic Motors, PPC produces.

Conscription Structure: The Commonalitarianism uses both military and non-military conscription. The conscription structure consists of three years. The first year is intensive military training in the armed forces. Then the conscriptee have a choice, either stay in the military or join one of the semi-military brigades which are often not paid for by the military. The first year is also remedial. Everyone is forced to learn up through high school equivalency.
The military Structure is:
Citizen Militia-- Infantry
Citizen Surface-- Navy--
Citizen Submarine
Citizen Air Corps-- Air Force
Citizen Mechanized Corps-- Tanks
Citizen Chemistry Corps-- Psychopharmological Warfare and Chemical Warfare.
Department of Economic Warfare-- Covers espionage, psychological, political,
and economic warfare.

The brigades are:
Construction Brigade: Responsible for military engineering and civil maintenance of cities and public structures. This includes keeping up the domes and fortifications of the floating cities. One year intensive training and 1 year apprenticeship.
Civil Police Corps: 1 year intensive police academy training, then 1 year apprenticeship. There is also a paramilitary arm of the police which covers piracy-- road and ship, port security, and anti-terrorism. These police are very heavily armed, and some say more patriotic and dangerous than the regular troops.
Hospital Brigade: 1 year intensive hospital training, then 1 year apprenticeship in hospitals. Equivalent to LPN.
Relief Corps: 1 year training, plus 1 year apprenticeship in disaster help and planning. Combines several different services—fire, flood, and other disaster services.
Civil Defense: 1 year training, 1 year apprenticeship, civil defense functions. Lightly armed. Preparing for chemical, biological, and nuclear defenes. Handles city defense drills, gas masks, nuclear attack, etc.

The Weapons Available To the Commonalitarianism

Airforce:
The Commonalitarianism has bought and rebuilt Yak 38s into a new kind of fighter, The Yak Lightning. They also have large numbers of siege choppers purchased from Raven Corps as well as a smattering of attack helicopters. In addition, they have high altitude air defense balloons capable of shooting down aircraft and satellites—these balloons build a radar network. A new heavy bomber which is a copy of the B-52 has just rolled off the production line. 5 new AN-2 submersible aircraft carriers were recently brought off the assembly line. These contain 8 SUF-8 SVTOL advanced jet fighters.

Space Force: There are three flying triangle X-Delta 2 attack craft. The junk space station is heavily defended with various satellite and weapons systems. About one hundred rebuilt satellites are in orbit. Two old tungsten missile platforms have been rebuilt, these are not completely reliable.

Infantry: A new 7.62 MM bullpup rifle has been designed called the Shellshock rifle. AA-12 semiautomatic shotguns are also used extensively . The soldier is outfitted with what is called the Sea Force Warrior system, an integrated body armor which contains various electronics, targeting, range finding, and communications equipment. The standard platoon is a 10 person unit with a communications officer, commander and two heavy weapons officers which can carry a variety of lethal weapons. They are trained intensely in mobile fast attack methods. Many have learned boarding attack methods for entering ships quickly. They have a variety of boarding methods they can use, shoulder launched grapple, foldable scaling ladders, magnetic pads for hands and feet to climb hulls.

Navy: The navy has a large number of submersibles. Many of which are 500 ton stealthed transport submersibles to carry men, armor, and equipment anywhere in the world. They use non-nuclear biodiesel air independent propulsion submarines to reduce costs. They currently have ten submarines capable of launching ICBM missiles. There are also rumors of two submarine carrier mother ships. The standard ship of the line is a rebuilt civilian 120 meter armored catamaran which has modular designs, transport, stealth attack boat, missile boat, and drone torpedo. There are also some very slender vessel railgun ships . The Commonalitarianism recently purchased 5 Kiev class aircraft carriers which are being upgraded. As part of a naval initiative ten DDX destroyers have been built.

Armor: The Commonalitarianism has rebuilt the Type 63A Chinese Amphibious tank combining it with technology from the United States marine Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle creating an ultramodern amphibious medium tank. A clamshell mecha is being built designed to function in multiple environments. It is built to carry heavy infantry weapons like smaws, stingers, and 40 MM grenade launcher, or a single high power sonofusion flamethrower. There is a small amount of production of a heavy lift hover tank called a slammer which is very expensive.

Office of Economic Warfare: The army has specialists at its disposal which can design blockades, do light cyber warfare, and perform economic and military espionage. They have recently acquired Dragonware Suite Software, and IBM Websphere Intrusion Software. They currently operate commerce raider frigates, and fishing boat style privateers.

Special Division: Black budget. There are at least two psychopharmological warfare laboratories in the Commonalitarianism which can produce both chemical weapons and pharmacological weapons. Agents are trained in their use. There is also a hidden facility making genetically engineered anti-material bacteria. The Commonalitarianism has access to nukes. They have recovered at least two nuclear warheads from the ocean. The nation, The Black Agents have trained a core of super spies for the Commonalitarianism. There are at least 20 such agents right now.

Cities: The cities have armored domes and have above water railgun and missile batteries with defensive weaponry. Underwater, they have supercavitation cannons, depth charge racks, and jet torpedo racks. They have high power microwave antihoming towers in the cities to protect against missiles and torpedos. An electric defense grid has been built using sonofusion technology to destroy incoming torpedos, artillery, and missiles. Each city has a Grange broken into several buildings to avoid being easily destroyed-- a kind of mutual military association and training grounds. There are also small arms depots built into the police buildings in case of invasion.


Military/Police: There is a military wing of the police department. It is called the Anti-Piracy Brigades. They deal with port security, anti-terrorism, and anti-piracy operations. Because of this they are very patriotic and heavily armed. They have large numbers of armed patrol boats, some interceptor craft, a few helicopters, and even have an anti-road piracy division for road incidents inside the cities. The anti-piracy police wear combat leathers and carry automatic combat shotguns. During the VODAIS plague, hunter killer swat teams were put together to track down and kill or capture small groups of “infected” in the cities which were not yet fully infected.

Industry:
These are some of the Industrial Companies in The Commonalitarianism that sell to the outside world.

Kai Commercial House—Air Transportation—Aeroscroft jet balloons capable of carrying 120 people comfortably by balloon. Hybrid electric commercial jets.

Ming Commercial House, RFS—Registered Family Syndicate. Prison labor and management. Mercenary management. Corporate espionage. Protective Services.

Cruon Commercial House-- RFS-- Registered Family Syndicate, Energy Production, Aquaculture

Dynamic Motors-- PPC-- Public Private Consortium, Automobiles including Alternative Fuel Vehicles, Police Vehicles, Armored Vehicles, Armored Mechs, Wide Variety of Boats, and a wide variety of motorized equipment. They also have a satellite launch business and are involved in manufacturing space equipment for the Commonalitarianism.

International Ownership Bank of Commonalitarianism-- Loans for Worker Owned Business and Technology Companies.

International Undersea Salvage Cooperative-- Salvage of undersea materials, includes military salvage of biological, nuclear, chemical materials. Recycling of salvaged material. Recycling of imported scrap material.

Marianis Industries, RUS-- Registered Union Syndicate-- Submarine Transport, Underwater Mining, and Underwater Construction. Also involved in building the monorails and rolling walkways for the public transportation system.

Ecotechnic Institute—Scientific Institute devoted to unifying science and ecology, organic farming, hydroponics, recycling, biospheric technologies, regenerative life support systems for space and deep ocean, biorefineries, biotechnology, and alternative energy.