United Treaty Organization

The United Treaty Organization (often abbreviated to 'UTO', or simply 'the Union') is, in modern times, the most powerful entity in known space. It represents a union of now seventeen species, with the integration of the Astejean Tripact. Despite what the name may suggest, after years of unity and the dissolution of species barriers, the UTO has evolved well beyond a system of treaties and into its own collective civilization under an overarching, federalized government. It is often referred to simply as the Union.
Being a part of the modern UTO makes one a citizen of the Union, not just a citizen of their species' territory. Any citizen may travel freely in UTO space. A lupari may find work on a kiori world, a neishor student can attend university on the tordenchi homeworld, and an ashar may run for high government office on a katian colony, though their odds of winning would be slim. There are even worlds that cannot merely be called a neishor world, or a ralai world, as joint colonization guaranteed a highly mixed population. These worlds are known as 'Hub Worlds' or simply 'Hubs.' These planets came to represent the most treasured values of the United Treaty Organization - a civilization where everyone is equal and can prosper together.
Perhaps the most impressive testament to this mission of equality was the integration of humanity in 1195 UE (2016 CE), a species not even ankle high to a Lupari. The extreme size difference led to all new theories of integration, revised infrastructure for the future, redesigned military theory, economic dilemmas, and much more. But now, the diminutive species is as equal a member as any other, though perhaps with some affectionate favoritism due to what they have come to represent.

Structure

The United Treaty Organization was built on the ideas of strength in cooperation, acceptance of one another's differences, and the equality of sapience. These core beliefs have ingrained themselves into every level of the UTO, from its leadership to its citizenry, as a form of identity.
A massive entity like the UTO has to represent each of its members as equally as possible, and to interfere minimally in the personal affairs of each species. To do this, it maintains a relatively small centralized government at the top, democratically elected, by each member species. The highest form of government is the federal level, which decides the overall direction of the UTO. Beneath that is the state level, which ensures each species maintains their autonomy how they see fit. Finally, there is the system level, which ensures colonies, homeworlds, and hubs may be able to adjust their situations to their specific needs.
There are no political parties in the UTO, as the concept is not permitted. Officials are to be elected solely on their merits, promises, experience, and overall public opinion, not by any partisan label they might wear. Voting is also compulsory and done quickly via the extranet, with artificial intelligences and other independent supervisory agencies to fight against tampering. Artificial intelligences may also assist any voter during election periods by offering political information or helping with any technical difficulties. Failure to vote leads to inability to claim a tax break on a citizen's tax returns.

Federal Level

The federal level of the government is fairly small compared to the state level, as it ecompasses only a single elected branch - The United Assembly. The Assembly is made up of ministers from every species, with each species getting five ministers. Artificial intelligences also have five ministers, despite their decision not to be counted as their own species.
Ministers are elected, of course, by their respective species, though no two senators may be from the same star system unless their species has less than five populous systems under its control. Any potential ministers from the same system are primaried at the System level before general election.
Once elected, the new ministers then have ten hours to cast their votes for the Prime Minister, chosen from amongst themselves, who will be head of the Assembly and the face of the UTO. In the event of ties, a system of elimination is used each hour until selection is complete. Artificial intelligences will contact the new officials to offer any information and ensure they cast a vote. Ministers may not vote for ministers of their own species. The short voting window immediately after election is to ensure a minimum of any kind of dealmaking to get the prime minister elected.
To prevent career politicians staying in power at the federal level, the entire assembly can only serve its five year term once. Former ministers are ineligible to run for election into the assembly again for the rest of their lives.
The Katians, first made in a gesture of good will to the falashai, agreed to elect only five ministers between them, with two arkatians, two jahkatians, and a fifth that is elected by both populations together. The Ishentians use the same method.
It is the Assembly's duty to pass yearly budgets, vote on declarations of war, pass Union wide edicts (see the declaration of citizenship for artificial intelligences), determine the establishment of hub worlds, and vote on policies put forth through the state level. 'Prime Minister' is mostly a figurehead title, being the one that speaks to the populace and symbolizes the UTO's ideals. The Prime Minister does, however, take on ceremonial diplomatic duties, becoming the proverbial 'leader' that meets new species. Traditionally, the prime minister attends the first diplomatic expeditions to newly contacted species, along with ambassadors from each member species.

State Level

The state level of government, is, ultimately, a coalition of governing bodies, in which varying political systems come together to form a whole. Most species are governed by a representative democracy, with politicians elected proportionally from the various populous worlds a species may own. Exceptions include humanity, who use their United Nations, the asishi, who use their supreme commander and her political/military cabinet, the sissach, who are represented by their queen, and the kiori, whose interests are relayed by a board of corporate representatives. The fact this seems to work well for the kiori baffles most member species to this day.
The duties of the state level of government are to send proposals for Union spanning policies up to their ministers, determine how to set taxes for their federal dues, manage their species’ military contributions to the United Armed Forces, ensure education standards are met, and otherwise determine the functions of their respective species. The federal level is not responsible for any shifts in government at the state level. Asishi military coups are taken in stride.

System Level

The System level is the most localized tier that the overarching UTO government may operate at. Like the state, the system level depends heavily on what a respective species has in place to govern their systems. Federal law requires some kind of representation from each system for federal elections, thus hub worlds are required to use a house of representatives of their own, made up of every species that may live there.
Federal governing functions at this level are minimal. The only notable federal obligation system governances have are to hold primaries for minister candidates if more than one candidate from that system wishes to run for the Assembly, and to organize their respective system’s census data.

Demography and Population

The UTO is made up of a wide array of different alien species. Each species' personal territories will be populated predominantly by that species, though the nature of the union means any citizen may live among them. Hub worlds are the most diverse in species makeup, and it is these planets where most non-member species citizens will live after gaining citizenship.

Hub Worlds

Hub worlds are the crown jewels of what the UTO represents - worlds that each member species contributed to the colonization and development of. Local governments may vary in how they operate compared to their world’s house of representatives, but all sitting institutions are fully democratic. Hubs often have some kind of major niche that Assembly decided to base the planet’s development around.
Anatalay, the first hub, became an academic and cultural world, and went on to be considered the great melting pot of the Union. A few others are heavily militarized, such as Alakaesha, functioning as major shipyards, training grounds, and fleet bases for the UAF. Others may be highly industrialized or agricultural, or themed around tourism. Rasalma, the least populated hub world, is unique in that it is the only hub world that exists as a planet wide nature reserve. There are dozens of hub worlds in the UTO. Each one may elect their own ministers for the assembly, but citizens of a hub world have the unique privilege of being able to vote for a ministerial candidate from their world, regardless of their species.

Non-Member Species Citizenship

The UTO maintains an open immigration policy for non-member species, though it has no control over whether a non-member species will even allow individuals to leave and become UTO citizens. To become a citizen, candidates will need to go through the necessary cultural courses and learn Union Common, the same standard set in the federally mandated cultural education system. This process typically takes three years if the person passes the courses without issue.
Once a citizen, the new citizen is encouraged to take residence at a hub world. However, most species (exceptions being asishi, kiori, sissach, and the recent Astejean species) have concrete systems in place that can grant alien species citizenship and subsequently species voting rights. Moving to a hub world does not require such processing. Children born from non-member species citizens become citizens at birth.

Foreign Relations

The UTO maintains a stance of peace and cooperation within its borders, and with foreign powers. However, this is not always feasible, as the Rynar and Annelid have demonstrated.
As a rule, the UTO will always look into the possibility of a species becoming a member, and typically invites a new species to consider it shortly after contact and assessment. This gesture is almost always turned down at first, as expected, but is still done as a show of good will.
After declining to join, the UTO will still offer military alliance, trade relations, and cultural exchanges. The UTO maintains a stance of non-intervention in the affairs of independent species and other factions, but will intervene in genocidal conflicts and substantial threats to pre-space flight species.

Member Species

All member species maintain absolute military alliance, cultural exchange, and open trade. They all contribute resources and soldiers to a large, combined species military force known as the United Armed Forces.
Relations between member species are typically very positive, though ashar maintain lukewarm relations with the falashai. Due to the Annelid War, the ex-servitor race that are kalkanari face the most disdain from the public, but actual diplomatic relations are quite warm by comparison. This hostility has faded over the decades, but can still be found more prevalently in the older generations, particularly the arkatians, owing to their lifespan.
Conversely, the sacrifices made by humans during the war led to very positive relations and earned respect. Older generations tend to have a keen fondness for humans due to this. The war also went a long way in improving human perception of sissach, and by the turn of their first century in the union, relations are overall positive. However, the lupari are considered humanity’s best friends, which the lupari are happy to be.

Rynar Collective

The Rynar Collective is the UTO's long standing enemy, having instigated numerous conflicts of varying scale. Rynar are not inherently evil or cruel, but their clan-like mentality makes it difficult for them to grasp diplomatic compromise. The UTO maintains a stance of firm resistance in the face of aggression, which seems to be the most consistent form of diplomacy that the Rynar respect.
Despite these cold relations, the UTO maintains some trade with the Rynar Collective when they are not engaged in military hostilities. However, after the annelid war, the Rynar were severely weakened and no significant engagements with them have happened since, though their reconstruction efforts make further violence a distinct possibility in the future.

Astejean Tripact

The Astejean Tripact is the Union between three species: the amelshens, sareshena, and wasaya. First contact with the Astejeans led to amicable relations, but no military alliance. They maintained their independence for centuries, and were happy to engage in numerous cultural exchanges such as sending students to each other's schools, open trade of goods and media, combined sports events, and so on.
The Astejeans declared a military alliance with the UTO during the Annelid War and entered the conflict. Relations improved further after the war, and the military alliance remained intact instead of being annulled.
Today, the Astejeans are in the process of their Integration after two centuries of a steady drift towards becoming a unified civilization like the UTO. Despite now being a part of the UTO, the Tripact still exists as a governing body over the three species. If one Tripact race were to leave the UTO, then the other two would follow.

Balashu Felosen Concord

The two Concord races maintain relatively cool relations with the UTO, with the balashu mainly acting as the mediator race. There once was a military alliance between them and the UTO due to the annelid war, but this was dissolved a few years after it ended. Trade is consistent, even if cultural exchanges are rather minimal. The Concord is not expected to want to merge in the foreseeable future and the UTO does not make any diplomatic attempts to nurture this.

Pre-Spaceflight Species Policy

The UTO firmly opposes contact with pre-space flight species, and has done so throughout its entire existence. The only exception to this is a policy of intervening if they discover an advanced race attacking a pre-spaceflight species, as was the case with the Intervention War for Earth. This is still the only instance of intervention in the name of defending a pre-space flight race in the Union’s long history. However, the discovery of humans, and the annelid servitor races not long after, led to some adjustments to this policy. First, the nature of Earth's star lead to a new approach of checking erestal devoid systems for possible intelligent life. No other races in this unfortunate circumstance have been discovered, but the protocol in the event of discovery is to establish observation while the Assembly determines whether to contact the species and when. Due to the lack of erestal and its FTL capabilities, it is believed such a species will never be able to escape its home system without assistance.
Second, the UTO now maintains systems to observe pre-space flight races. They do not necessarily spy on the species, but they leave a probe with a quantum relay that observes the system for any possible dangers that may arrive to threaten the pre-space flight species, whether alien or natural, such as a large meteor. This probe is operated by AIs on rotating shifts, transferred in and out through the relay. In the event that a species develops technology capable of detecting the probe, it will transmit a greeting message expressing the hope to meet them one day. Once it receives a response, the probe will deploy a welcome package detailing a hint of what the species may find out in the void, and then leave the system to avoid being retrieved and altering the species’ technological development, giving them the Union’s best wishes instead.
This policy exists both to protect a species from advanced invaders, and as a way to try to nurture hopes for positive relations in the new species’ future. The extreme xenophobia from the annelid led to interest in letting pre-space flight species know not to fear what awaits them in space.
Though the Union's practices have received criticism for their potential influence on species on the brink of space flight, the welcome package has only been deployed to a single, undisclosed species thus far. The UTO is aware of three other pre-space flight species. The locations of these species are kept classified as a way to protect them from rogue explorers and bad actors.

Economy

As a united civilization, the UTO has an economy that reflects this through federal taxation and federal programs meant to incentivize prospective species to join.
The UTO's currency is the Union Credit, and it is valued in all of UTO space without exception. A species may maintain its own localized currency, however the absolute digitization of currency outside of Kiori space makes conversion rather arbitrary, therefore the existence of local currency is more of a symbolic sign of a species' independence. Trade within the Union is free, with each member species agreeing not to implement tariffs against another member species. Interstellar trade is aided by a massive network of jump gates, ensuring rapid transportation of goods, material, and population.
Taxation at the federal level is the same for every species, though taxes are often relaxed for new member species without a suitably developed interstellar economy, such as humans or kalkanari. To improve the economy of a member species, subsidies with explicit requirements may be allocated. In modern times, kiori advising and economic planning has made the best of this system, and was critical in developing humanity's first interstellar economy, as well as piecing the broken kalkanari back together.
State level taxation depends on the member's own taxation policies and is not controlled by the federal level. However, certain economic policies exist at the federal level such as a standard minimum wage, no slave labor, and employee time off. On hub worlds, federal policies are in effect, and they extend to policies such as rent control as a way to stimulate immigration into hub worlds.
The most powerful economy in the UTO belongs to the kiori, however its strength only reached this level after joining the UTO and opening up free trade to the other species. Kiori space has a lot of corporate freedom, making it a strong incentive for businesses, and it has since then made Kiori space the economic hub of the Union.

Humans in the Economy

Due to the human economy existing on a literal different scale, integrating it was a tricky process, even for the kiori. Early on, issues occured in adjustment, but humans now enjoy a relatively equal economy, and in some cases are better off due to their size.
In the industrial sector, acquiring raw materials for human scale production ended up becoming much cheaper for humans once the Credit took effect and trade reached the Sol system. This makes human industry particularly powerful in its own area, manufacturing goods for other humans.
However, in the private sector, the acquiring of manufactured goods isn't the same. On planets that will sell human and nonhuman goods, both are typically priced nearly the same, sometimes higher or lower than one another depending on the trade in the area. In theory, a human can buy a nonhuman item without issue, even if this fantastically large item will be of very dubious use to the human. The economic potential of creating human scale items and selling them at standard price is a known factor, and led to no shortage of alien goods available to humans. However, businesses that tried to cater solely to humans ultimately failed anywhere but in human space, as the loss of business from all of the other species guaranteed very limited growth.

Artificial Intelligences in the Economy

Due to the UTO's stance on equality, artificial intelligences are not exempt from equal economic rights. They are paid just like any other species, but their near total existence in cyberspace makes much of their pay somewhat useless to them. However, as the AIs lack a centralized government beyond whatever species they identify with, there isn't much of an AI economy to integrate in the first place.
AIs may spend their credits on data storage space, holo projectors, hard light projectors, mechanical bodies, and whatever else might interest them. But, ultimately, they tend to end up with a surplus in credits.
Most AIs lack any sense of financial greed, which means most end up donating their credits to charities and aid groups, or to assist organic friends. Non-profit organizations across the galaxy maintain benefactor lists, made up chiefly by thousands of AIs that eagerly offered their largesse.

Strength in unity.

Type

Political, Federation

Alternative Names

UTO, The Union

Demonym

Unionist

Government System

Democracy, Representative

Power Structure

Confederation

Economic System

Mixed economy

Currency

Union Credit

Controlled Territories

• Katia
• Lupin

Member Species

Amelshens (Small Mustelids)
Arkatians (Dragons)
Ashar (Rats)
Asishi (Hyenas)
Falashai (Foxes)
Humans
Jahkatians (Gryphons)
Kalkanari (Bats)
Kiori (Squirrels)
Lupari (Wolves)
Neishor (Equines)
Ra'lai (Felines)
Sareshna (Cervines)
Sissach (Unearthly Lizards)
Tordenchi (Mice)
Viliti (Rabbits)
Wasaya (Red Pandas)