Union of Sol

The Union of Sol is an old state, tracing its heritage back to the succession of Solar governments all the way back to the first unification of humanity, and continuing to control the home of humanity. Despite being small in size, having only four systems, but is extremely wealthy and powerful with three of its systems being highly developed. This combined with its enormous, though heavily automated, fleet of powerful Sol Sector warships has allowed the Union of Sol to become something of a grey eminence, a powerful influence despite its small size. The Union of Sol is fanatically Solist, with its primary long term goal being to restore Earth to its natural state, and reclaiming the primacy of Sol as the center of human civilization.

Culture

The Union of Sol maintains strict standards for the preservation of traditional culture. Its study is mandated in education, and the strict cultural standards are enforced in all the arts. This has led to something of a cultural stagnation, as no major cultural shifts have happened since the formation of the Union. Interestingly, artists who do follow the party line are richly rewarded, and many indeed are allowed to make their homes on Barnard with other favored citizens. Generally, the art of film and trideo is the most influential in Solar culture, though other forms of expression are also quite popular. The Union of Sol is neither a major exporter or importer of culture, with products generally consumed by Solar citizens, and foreign cultural products prevented from leaving starports, or at least the SEZs.

History

The earliest predecessor to the Union of Sol was the United Nations Emergency Mandate, the earliest attempt to unify the human race during the Old Earth climate emergency. This government, formed for the express purposes of controlling the progression of global climate change and the depletion of resources took action quickly, and crushed resistance to its rule. What followed as a number of laws and technical developments that did eventually, put Old Earth on course to halt any further degeneration of its biosphere. When the Climate Emergency, and therefore the Emergency Mandate came to an end, there was considerable pressure for the continued unified governance of Earth, and the United Nations of Earth was founded, with all member states becoming governates. This new government embarked on an early project of space colonization, which moved slowly at first, with the sublight Project Exodus. The discovery of jump drives, Project Valeria, and the successful miniaturization of fusion reactors combined finally allowed humanity to enter the interstellar age. During the first expansion, settlements popped up throughout the home region, the Hawker region, and the Line systems. These initial colonization attempts were relatively limited in scope, with only a few million colonists being sent to establishing mining outposts, and begin terraforming their new colony worlds using archaic, slow moving methods. Over two centuries, a thriving, if crude interstellar civilization was born, with these early colonies becoming interconnected, and indeed interdependent as the colonies depended on food shipments, and certain technological components that couldn't be produced by the Standard Build Template, and Sol become dependent on shipments of raw materials. This relationship broke down in AU 403, as a number of the colonies became increasingly restless and rebellious, triggering the Troubles, a century long period of strife between the Sol System, and its colonies. The Troubles, starting with the Centauri Rebellion, and eventually culminating in the Line Worlds insurrection threatened to break up human civilization. However, military might and political maneuvering allowed the UNE to survive the conflict. However, the conflict demonstrated the need to change the relationship between Sol's colonies, and Sol itself. The signing of the Solar Charter in 2570 and the advent of the Transolar Federation marked a sea change in relations, and the real start of the Opulence, a time regarded as being especially prosperous. During the Opulence, the Eridani worlds, and the Home region were developed rapidly into successful industrialized or garden worlds. Though colonization efforts would be slowed fairly dramatically during this period, settlements would spring up in the Gemini region, and the Coreward Frontier, with exploration of the Chani system proving most consequential. When Pardian ruins were discovered in the Chani System, the start of the Second Expansion began, when much of the rest of what is now civilized space was charted and colonized. As time continued and no signs of living intelligent life were found however, many began to fall into a despair, which had ripple effects on the stability of the Transolar Federation. The assassination of Nyota Akende after a period of growing unrest sparked the beginning of the Third Great Human Civil War. This conflict, lasting seventy five years, nearly threatened to destroy interstellar civilization, and even Sol was not unaffected by the fighting. It ended with the establishment of a new Government, the Stellar Union, which was tasked with reconstruction. However, the fallout from the war meant that the Home region began to depopulate as more people fled, in a prelude to the Third Expansion, to the frontier regions. Reconstruction, and the later establishment of the somewhat less restrictive Stellar League marked the beginning of humanity's last golden age, the Third Expansion and the Stabilization. During this period the Frontier regions, especially the Rimward frontier, and the Lost worlds were colonized thoroughly by the Stellar League. The discovery of the Jred however, changed everything. Initially a curiosity, the Jred became increasingly dangerous, attacking scientific outposts, culminating in the destruction of Umbria, and the appearance of spaceborne Jred. These escalating attacks marked the start of the Jred Scourge, which saw the deaths of countless billions of people, and the loss of scores, perhaps more than a hundred systems. Sol itself was not spared, as the Jred Scourge spread even to Earth itself, which appeared to have been targeted in an event known as the Scourging of Earth, Jred spaceborne organisms appeared in orbit of the planet, and utterly swept it in the space of weeks, killing off ninety-five percent of the population, and leaving the world a husk before the spacebornes were finally pushed out of the system by the Home fleet. It was at Junction however, that the human civilization would be dealt its most critical blow. There the destruction of the higher galactic scale mind of the Jred resulted in the Great Cataclysm, which shattered the worlds of Junction, and severed most of human civilization from interstellar travel. In the aftermath of the Cataclysm, the surviving elements of the Sol Sector government that can still travel met on Mars. This council, after much deliberation agreed to establish the Union of Sol, an emergency government that, at least in theory would maintain the status of Sol as the center of interstellar civilization. The reality of the situation however, was that said civilization was crumbling rapidly in the face of the chaos in Jump Space. Even in its foundation, the Union of Sol would see a retreat in territory, losing Alpha Centauri, and later Fracana. It wouldn't be until the establishment of the Galactic Surveyor's Guild, that Sol would begin to reestablish itself as a major influence. The Union of Sol fought a number of wars to assert its hegemony, as well as binding the other states to the Union with various trade deals, and diplomatic maneuvers. These efforts were met with various degrees of success, and as a result, the Union of Sol has remained a powerful, but far from hegemonic power on the galactic stage.

Demography and Population

The Union of Sol has a comparatively small population, largely on account of the few worlds held in its possession. Thanks to the rigorous note taking of the Union, an exact population, at least as recently counted as ten years ago, stands at 16,355,740,425. This population is densely concentrated on three planets, with Luna, Mars, and Ross being by far the largest colonies with populations in the billions. Other smaller colonies with populations in the millions or the hundreds of thousands exist throughout the territory of the Union, with smaller manufacturing facilities, laboratories, military bases, and penal colonies scattered throughout the systems of the Union. The Union of Sol is perhaps the most diverse nation in the charted galaxy with ancestries tracing back to all areas of Old Earth.

Territories

Spanning just eight parsecs of claimed space, the Union of Sol maintains a compact, but highly developed territory, which in the current era can be found exclusively in the Sol Sector. Most of the space within Solar territory consists of empty void, with only three star systems left within the Union. The systems of the Union of Sol however, are extremely well developed with every one except the Junction forbidden zone having populations in the hundreds of millions, including the heavily industrialized and economically powerful Sol System and Ross system. This has been partially responsible for guaranteeing the security of the Union despite its small size.

Military

The Union of Sol has a potent military force. This is despite frequent manpower shortages that have plagued the union for over two centuries. The Union of Sol makes up for this weakness with heavy use of automation, and extremely advanced technology. Being in possession of the bulk of the Sol Sector Fleet before the Cataclysm, and having, since the Long Night, been able to improve on its naval capability means that the heavily automated warships of the Solar Navy are some of the more dangerous in civilized space. Union maintains a small marine corps, and a modest interplanetary army, though it struggles to meet the manpower needs of its terrestrial defense forces. This has meant that the Union of Sol seeks quick campaigns over long grinding wars in order to use its technical edge and preserve its numbers.

Technological Level

The Union of Sol is, without a doubt the singular most technologically advanced interstellar state in known space, with every single system in the Union processing a level of technological development similar, if not marginally better, than the Stellar League possessed before the Jred Scourge. Even many of the isolated minor colonies possess a late stellar level of development. The Union has, in certain fields started to explore beyond the abilities of their forebears, though progress, especially with more limited access to resources, has been slow.

Religion

The Union of Sol, though nominally a secular state, discourages the practice of religion within its territory, though it is far from the most extreme in this regard, state pressure on religion has had an impact on the religiosity of the population. The overwhelming majority of the population is either atheist or agnostic, with only comparatively small openly religious populations. This has had a major chilling effect on new religious movements, meaning that Opus Dei, star faiths, and revivalist traditions have struggled to find purchase in the Union. Religious people can be observed following any traditional faith with a comparatively even spread amongst them as survivors of the Scourging of Earth came from all over the planet.

Foreign Relations

As a direct successor to the Stellar League the Union of Sol claims to be the rightful government of all of humanity, and very rarely engages in what it calls foreign relations. Rather, the Union of Sol typically "allows" foreign governments to continue governing as autonomous extensions of the Union of Sol, a relation it maintains with most interstellar states under the name "Autonomy Agreement". It has separate relations with the Fracana League, the Centauri Republic, and the Democratic Republic of Yuanjing, as well as a handful of independent systems, most of which forced the Union to recognize their independence at gunpoint. The Union of Sol is interested first in maintaining and growing its geopolitical influence, second in restoring Earth, and third in crushing the Stelsoc movement, which it views as a threat to its own project.

Laws

The Union of Sol is a totalitarian Solist state, with near complete control over the overwhelming majority of its population. Arms, and armor are outright banned, and communications technology and computers are strictly controlled by the government, alongside medical technology, with routine state surveillance of the citizenry being the norm. Foreigners are allowed only in the special economic zones (SEZs), where controls are lighter and freer commerce is tolerated, and immigration is tightly controlled virtually everywhere else. The Union of Sol maintains its extensive and strict laws through an enormous, highly automated state bureaucracy, and being in possession of one of the few subspace ansibles in the galaxy.

Agriculture & Industry

The Union of Sol is currently struggling to feed its population, as its massively industrialized core worlds maintain vast populations, with comparatively few agricultural industries to go around. While it can be self-sufficient with proper rationing, the Union relies on foreign trade to keep nutritional variety and availability up. Conversely, the Union of Sol is very productive industrially, as all of its worlds maintain high technology manufacturing, and some worlds are expressly dedicated to it. This allows the Union to produce extremely advanced goods in surprisingly large quantities, and even allows the Union of Sol to produce a good number of Jumpgates and maintain one of the few active ansibles in the galaxy. The Union doesn't import much, with strict protectionist controls, and trade limited only to Special Economic Zones, but is a major exporter of advanced technology. Tertiary services, beyond those which meet the needs of its citizenry are virtually nonexistent.

Education

The Union of Sol maintains a state controlled, regularized, mandatory education for all citizens under 18 years of age. In addition to basic courses in literacy, the sciences, and maths. Theere is is also a rigorous education in arts and culture, with a focus on preserving ancient traditions, as well as inculcating Solar values in young citizens in order to garner loyalty. Schooling takes place on every major world of the Union, though most minor colonies go without local schools. Provisions for remote education are, surprisingly for such an advanced state, relatively minimal.

Infrastructure

The Union of Sol is one of the most well connected states in the galaxy, with only a handful of other similarly small states having the same or higher level of interconnectedness. Every single one of its inhabited systems is connected by Jumpgate to one another. The only exception is the Junction system, which is itself a forbidden zone. Both the Union of Sol, and the Galactic Surveyor's Guild assist in the maintenance of the network. The Union of Sol also maintains high speed communications, at least at the governmental level, with one of the only working ansibles in the galaxy, which is a massive aid in the state planning that maintains the economy.