In the most basic sense the levels of government in the Antarctic Revolutionary Commonwealths are rooted in the structure of the Antarctic Economic Territories under Macondo Technologies. The most obvious, of course, is the fact that the eight Regional Commonwealths of the ARC were reconstructed from the eight labor districts established by the company, though equally important is the actual physical requirements of living in the southern continent. Although the climate has stabilized somewhat in recent decades, the simple fact is that for the entire twenty-first century the ecosystem was in drastic and often apocalyptic tumult.
It would be this reality of extreme climate events that would see the interlinked arcology model become the standard across the continent. Although there are of course towns and independent settlements throughout the ARC, the overwhelming majority of the nation's population remains concentrated in the eight megalopolises that form the core of the member Commonwealths. Divided into separate
Boroughs based on local identity, each Commonwealth arcology serves as a "laboratory of Eternity", given wide latitude to construct the most effective government possible within the Cosmicist framework.
Despite this wide latitude toward local policy, there are certain commonalities rooted in Sutter's dogma. For example, the Commonwealths favor larger and more representative legislatures, and to prevent individual concentration of power in the executive branch the power of the office is divided between three
Kurfursts* to encourage thoughtful decision making. Each Commonwealth has its own judiciary and Supreme Court, though of course their ruling are open to review at the continental level. Political donations are allowed, but transparency is strictly enforced, with the rules written to better incentivize donations by the individual producers and small cooperatives that make up the largest share of the ARC economy while the more lucrative
hypercorps** are subjected to closer scrutiny.
At the continental level the ARC government is the product of a nested democracy, with the citizens standing as and voting for local representatives to each Borough legislature, which in turn appoints members to each Regional Commonwealth. It is the legislatures of the eight Commonwealths which appoint members of the ARC legislature in turn. To ensure robust citizen confidence in the government the Kurfürsts of the member Commonwealths are directly elected by their constituents, with the executive organs of the ARC proper governed by this committee of equals. Offset elections between Commonwealths sees regular churn in the makeup of the ARC legislature and executive committee, and social pressure against careerism in politics tends to restrict longstanding members of the institutions to people who are considered unusually skilled or exceptional in their work.
In keeping with the concept of vanguard pluralism it is entirely possible to run and win election as an independent politician, although legally the Antarctic Cosmicist Party is the only recognized political faction, and as such Cosmicist partisans are able to benefit from a deep bench of popular and institutional support within the government. A broad consensus on Cosmicist goals and practices is of course a prerequisite for membership in the Party but the actual implementation allows a bit of breathing room, and as a result two large and distinct fractions have evolved under the aegis of the Antarctic Cosmicist Party, each firmly rooting their policies in separate Articles of the Antarctic Basic Law.
- The Steward Fraction favors deepening and preserving distinct Antarctic cultural mores and new ecosystems, opposing expansion in favor of making the existing arcologies more efficient and allowing the newly developed ecosystem to solidify without interference. They oppose allowing climate refugees to seek asylum, viewing them as a dilutive influence on post-Revolutionary culture, and favor using localized and targeted grants to boost the growth of new and distinct culture variants and experimental communities.
- The Populist Fraction, meanwhile, seeks to expand out into the new wilderness before it becomes fully entrenched, hoping to create a compromise between future growth potential and ecological sustainability through architectural and ecological engineering. The Populists are far more likely to believe in the ability of climate refugees to assimilate to the political culture, and favor allowing them in both on humanitarian grounds and to spite the United Nations.
Aside from these two fractions, there are also loose coalitions of independent socialists and conservatives in the ARC government, though they have been thoroughly de-fanged and are forced to offer solutions based around tinkering on the edges of the Cosmicist consensus. The more restive faction of Antarctic Regressives has been driven underground, however, metastasizing into a radical collection of terrorists and ideologues attempting to carve a living out of the wilderness.
*Yes I know the plural is technically Kurfürsten but English is the majority language in the ARC so you get what you get. The fact that the executive committee members are named after prince-electors but Cosmicism despises power concentrated in an individual is a deliberate juxtaposition, meant to represent prestige and draw attention to the fact that there is no single individual at the top of the governing hierarchy in the country.
**The tabletop game Eclipse Phase inspired the hypercorps. Basically, Macondo's whole deal naturally produced a backlash against monopolistic businesses at the same time that advances in automation made individuals and small groups more productive. Hence the hypercorp, essentially a cooperative of a few dozen people able to produce at a large enough scale to have a significant presence in markets across the continent. Though co-ops are the norm in Antarctica the sheer scale of the hypercorps warrants extra scrutiny.
in the meantime questions about the ARC society and economy more generally are welcome.
