United States of Greater Austria

One of four dominant powers of Sector 13, as all of them set up by various self proclaimed monarchs hailing - in most cases - from formerly Earth-bound oligarchs and corporate leaders. Many of such billionaires decided to flee to space from increasingly oppresive and unstable government of late Solar Commonwealth, seeking solitude and safety in a controlled environment of autonomous planets.
Overtime this movement grew, and descendants of these exiles no longer remembered how life looked on Earth, instead converting overtime into a 'proper' aristocrats. United States of Greater Austria remains a part of Res Publica Christiana , counted among its primary members. It is, however, mostly bound in an eternal cicle of backstabs and intrigues for something as fleeting as dominant position within the Sector 13.

Structure

United States of Greater Austria was created by a several smaller local monarchist states that banded together under the strongest one (Austrian Empire) to survive an onslaught of French Empire and Scandinavian Monarchy during the Unification Wars. They succeeded, but overtime this temporary alliance grew stronger and stronger, soon after changing into one, decentralized state.
Today United States of Greater Austria remains an union of several autonomous areas varied in size and exact level of autonomy, all according to many various bilateral agreements signed between central government (formerly Austrian Empire government) and various member states and autonomous regions (formerly allies of Austrian Empire). Trying to describe the entirety of the member states in details would require a much longer and dedicated text, thus it will be omitted here.
Central government operates as an extension of the power of an Austrian emperor. Its power is limited to personal domain of an emperor - meaning the central Austrian Empire - while at least trying to oversee the rest, with its many autonomous regions self-governing themselves. This dualism is visible even in emperor's personal titulature - he is both king and emperor, the first one of Austria itself while the second of entirety of empire.
There is also an imperial parliament, known simply as Reichsrat. It is divided into two houses. Upper - called House of Lords (Herrenhaus) is composed of representatives of member-states and autonomous regions. Lower - House of Deputies (Abgeordnetenhaus) includes democratically elected representatives of entire population of United States of Greater Austria.
The exact number of said democratic representatives is 203 - as it once was in Austria-Hungary. Each of the member-states and autonomous regions has a set number of representatives that depends on their population number.

Public Agenda

Sector 13 is divided between four states that dislike each other. They are playing eternal dance of short term alliances, backstabs and wars - each of them hoping to one day outsmart others and being the one to finally 'liberate' the entire star sector. Ultimately, however, a stalemate occurs. Whenever one side achieves termporary hegemony, the three others unite against it.
Thus, USGA is mostly busy existing and safeguarding its continuous existence. While regularly sending sizeable detachments of their forces for another Catholic Neocrusades.

History

Sector 13 was initially a refugee for many wealthy inhabitants of Earth (especially Europe) that decided to leave their increasingly volatile homeland during the post-War of Purity period of decline of the Solar Commonwealth. USGA is no exception in that part. It was created by various oligarchs (and some descendants of actual aristocrats) from the territories of the Visehrad Alliance.
It is unique in the fact that it was a monarchy right from the start. While most other colonies in the Sector 13 began as oligarchies and only later on moved into aristocracy-based monarchies, the ancestors of the USGA was a colonization mission spearheaded by Karl von Habsburg, head of House Habsburg (Habsburg-Lorraine in Austria, as the official title and family name was forbidden there). Karl spare no time to proclaim himself an emperor of the renewed Habsburg monarchy.
Of course, it was pretty much one more case of cultural and political revivalism that went a bit too far. Within two decades nobody remembered that it began as a 'slightly' monarchic democracy. The heir of emperor Karl expanded his power. The culture went deeper and deeper back in time to the age of the 'old' Austria-Hungary. As Unification Wars raged, the USGA expanded. Of course, it was the Austrian Empire back then.
Soon, however, a number of smaller monarchies (and oligarchies at the edge of transfering towards aristocracies) banded together under the Austrian Empire, all of that to stop the onslaught of the Scandinavian Monarchy and French Empire. In a way, the still unconquered parts of the sector were split between the Austrian Empire and the Imperial Federation. This created the four-way split of the Sector and paved the way for the current concert of backstabs.

Demography and Population

Demography

General Description

USGA population is estimated to be around 24 billion, spread throughout a cluster of worlds on the edge of the Sector 13. It's a relatively low population, both due to constant warfare and due to the fact that the USGA's favourite population centers are villages and small towns (up to 15 000 inhabitants). This changes their planets into pastoral utopias, roughly divided between the untamed wilds and the almost self-sustainable settlements surrounded by agriculture.
USGA is also known for its limited love towards technology, especially cybernetic enhancements. Implants are almost unheard of, save for military, police and rescue units (such as firefighters). Therefore it's counted among the countries prefering pure human form, untainted by technology.

Humans and Variants

Humans are the baseline of the population, making up for 82% of the population. Due to the visehradian origin almost entire population is caucasian. The remaining 18% is almost uniformly Variants, including 8% of aquahumans, 5% of dwarfhumans, 3% of cathumans and 2% of fairyhumans.

Transhumans and Aliens

United States of Greater Austria are fairly welcoming towards both transhumans and non-genocidal aliens, however very little of them decided to live in the USGA. Most of them can be encountered here, however their population is rarely greater than few thousands (or few dozen thousands) per subspecies.

Population

Gender and Relationships

USGA is stalwartly conservative, all according to the social teaching of the Catholic Church. It is visible throughout its entirety society, however just as in most other countries of the Res Publica Christiana, it's approach to breach of social mores is different among the commoners and nobility. Commoners are expected to follow the tenets, but nobles are required to follow it. And, in fact, will typically be punished if they break them.

Gender Roles

United States of Greater Austria are stalwartly conservative. While they believe that both genders are equal, this doesn't mean they believe them to be identical. Overwhelming majority of jobs in the USGA are considered to be a domain of men. The entire economy is tailored is mechanized in a level that makes it perfectly possible to maintain a healthy economy like that. This delegates women to becoming de facto housewives.
As many RPC countries, the USGA leaves a small loophole that allows sufficiently determined women to go against that. In its case its military service. Any woman can volunteer to join the Landsturm at any given moment (unlike men, who are automatically conscripted). If she refuses to yield during the training and successfully completes it, she receives all the rights that men had. It actually reaches almost absurd levels - for example while the USGA's crown is descended in a purely patrilineal way, on a few separate occasions when oldest children of the old emperor that happened to be a daughter went through military service, it was she who was made into a heir.
In fact, it is an established element of the culture to the point that there are two competing ideals of women in the USGA - a feminine housewife and woman who actually proved herself and decided to serve the country. While the former dominates in numbers, the latter carved their own (and rather substantial) niche.

Relationships

USGA is a proud member of the Res Publica Christiana. This means that no secular are recognized by the state. There are only the religious ones (namely Christian ones), and they are monogamous, for life and heterosexual only. Most people marry when they are 18 to 20 years old.

Personal Liberties

Slavery

No. Simple as that. United States of Greater Austria, like the Catholic Church, went so far in their denial of slavery that it opposes even the exploitation of bioroids as a modern form of slavery. And it's pretty zealous on that issue, as it sees it as a scourge on modern Mankind that has to be annihilated as soon as possible.

Drugs

Forbidden save for alcohol and smoking (which, at this point, is harmless due to advances in the field of medicine. Actively suppressed. Alcohol abuse is also actively suppressed in a multitude of ways, including alcohol-dissolving implants in stomach that prevent humans from getting drunk for habitual offenders.

Weaponry

Small arms ownership accepted. Automatic and anti-tank weaponry on the community level (no private ownership, but the settlement might possess it and 'lend it' to its inhabitants, under its own responsibility).

Military

Navy

Kaiserliche und Königliche Kriegsmarine known in short as K.u.K. Kriegsmarine is more or less an average space fleet, without any notable strengths. It is differentiated from average only by existence of K.u.K. Luftfahrtruppe that is in short an autonomous fragment of the fleet that can be described as system defence forces that also double as space police.
Despite lack of some notable strenghts, the K.u.K. Kriegsmarine is decently armed with modern equipment and is more than enough to hold other powers of the Sector 13 at bay.

Ground Forces

Army of the USGA - known as Kaiserliche und Königliche Armee is divided into two parts. Firstly, there is a regular army. It is divided between Landwehr that hails from the imperial domain and Honvédség, which are a combined regular army of member states and autonomous provinces that in case of a war are controlled by the one, unified command, made of officers assigned by the emperor (and high command).
The other part of the army is called Landsturm and is a common defence initiative, made mostly of simple infantry, conscripted from society when need arises.

Religion

USGA is dominantly Neocatholic - circa 82% of its inhabitants are at least officially a member of the Neocatholic Church. Most of them (72%) according to Roman Catholic liturgy, while the rest is divided between Eastern Orthodox and various protestant churches, with lutherans considered the most widespread. Next 8% are a variety of Paleocatholic Church sects, 7% are European Deists and 3% are various others.
While not considered the most zealous country of those that follow Neocatholic doctrine, the USGA is nevertheless considered a a part of Res Publica Christiana - and a loyal one. It also contributes quite a bit of its citizens to a variety of Neocrusades.

Agriculture & Industry

A free market, but one with certain degree of laws regulating what can be produced and transfer and what can't, plus quite a bit about work ethics. Just enough to keep the market more or less ethical but without forcing the government to control every bit of economy permanently.

Indivisibiliter ac Inseparabiliter (Indivisible and Inseparable)

United States of Greater Austria

Capital: Wienturm, on New Litavia
Official Languages: German
Religion: Neocatholic Church
Government: Constitutional Federated Monarchy
Faction: Res Publica Christiana
Membership: Standard/Secondary Power
Current ruler: Emperor Gustav III Habsburg
Population: Approx. 24 000 000 000.
Currency: Deutsches Krone

Type

Political, Federation

Alternative Names

Danubian Federation, Danubian State, Greater Austria, Austrian Federation, Union of Austrian States, Vereinigte Staaten von Groß-Österreich.

Demonym

Austrian.