This post will analyse the building blocks of Sci-Fi governments!
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This week’s post is a continuation of sorts from last week’s post. I left a lot of things under-explored last post – purposefully – so that I could begin this new series, having an in-depth look at politics in a Sci-Fi world. This post (and the series as a whole) is especially targeted at those who want to go really detailed with their approach to Sci-Fi politics, though if your story involves any politics at all, I’m sure you will find what I have to say useful.
During this series, I am going to be creating my own Sci-Fi government simply to serve as an example. Feel free to use my example however you please. We’ll keep things small and simple: the government is a quasi-democratic government known as the United Human Alliance and covers the territories of Earth and Mars. In this first instalment, we will be looking at the structure of your government’s legislative branch (referred to interchangeably simply as “the legislature”). Before beginning this series, I would recommend you at least have a basic idea of what the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government are.
The first question to ask is this:
How Is Legislation Scrutinised and Passed?
To many of you, this may be the only question you need look at: it is the fundamental basics of your legislative branch. How your legislation goes from vague policy directive, to bill, to law is critical to the building of your legislative system – and the political system as a whole. It determines some of the fundamental strengths of your legislature, and its weaknesses. In this section, we will only be looking at normal legislation, not constitutional amendments (building your own constitution will be something for another post).
For instance, if legislature must pass through a bicameral system with two chambers, then your legislation is likely to be well-scrutinised, though you are unlikely to get much passed (just look at the US and the Senate-House gridlock). Alternatively, you may employ a unicameral system, where legislative scrutiny is poor but legislative output is high (the UK is a bicameral system in name only and has all the trappings of the unicameral system I have just described).
Additionally, these basic building blocks also highlight where your legislative branch is vulnerable to external influence – and to what extent certain areas may be vulnerable to influence. Having a large legislative branch might make individual legislators more susceptible to outside influence (for various reasons or another), though the extent of the influence, due to the size of the branch, may be small. For a smaller legislative branch, it is likely to be the inverse: difficult to exert influence, but once you get a foothold, you can exert a lot of influence.
To develop this aspect of your legislative branch, follow the following steps.
- How is a bill first presented?
This step is particularly focussed on who can present bills – and who can present what bills – as well as where these bills are presented. Different legislative chambers or groups may hold different powers in regard to presenting bills. For instance, during the French Revolution, there was a brief span where France was run by a bicameral system known as the Directory. Only one of the legislative bodies – the Council of Five-Hundred – could propose legislation, though. If we look at the US again, we also see an example of different types of bills being proposed by different legislative bodies: the House holds the exclusive power to initiate revenue bills. Of course, bills don’t exclusively have to be presented in the legislative branch. Indeed, you may opt for a system where legislative power is also given to the executive and judicial branches
In the United Humanity Alliance, I will adopt a system of bill proposal similar to the US system. Both the House of Mars and the House of Earth will hold power to propose legislation – however, only the House of Earth will have power to propose money bills. Money bills (also referred to as “green bills”) will be presented to both the House of Mars and the House of Earth simultaneously. However, money bills will be exclusively presented to the House of Earth – at first.
This is because the House of Earth (as representative of humanity’s homeworld) is deemed as the higher legislative body. As such, it has increased power – especially over crucially important money bills.
- How are bills scrutinised?
This part refers to the middle section of passing legislature – that which probably takes the most time in reality. It’s that middle bit of discussion, debate, and arguing, where a bill is shaped from an idea into a law that people can agree on. In a typical democratic system, this section may necessitate compromise and mutual agreement between representatives; in an autocratic system, this section may be more streamlined, as typically only one or a handful of people must agree for a bill to become law. I will focus especially on democratic systems for this section, because (as I said before), this section may be shorter or more unimportant for an autocratic government.
For a democratic government, scrutiny of bills can come in a number of forms, including but not exempt to:
- Committees of representatives (or of people external to the government) who may make binding or non-binding amendments and recommendations to bills.
- Other legislative bodies, who may hold various legislature-stopping powers. Many modern democracies are bicameral, as it is a good method of bill scrutiny, though your legislature may be unicameral, tricameral, or more. These bodies can have different powers and roles in the legislative branch and in legislative scrutiny.
- Powerful ministers, who can strike down legislation or provide feedback on it. For example, you could assign a leader of a certain committee or legislative body the power to delay or amend legislation as they see fit.
- Interference from the judicial and/or executive branches, which not only scrutinises legislation, but keeps the legislative branch accountable. For instance, the UK Supreme Court can make non-binding recommendations towards the UK Parliament on bills that may deemed “incompatible” with the 1998 Human Rights Act.
The final aspect of this section is determining how it all fits together. Do bills go to committee first – like in the US – or does the committee stage come later – like in the UK?
I’m going to return to my example now – the United Humanity Alliance – though I won’t go into too much detail. This is an especially long and detailed section; if needed, I could probably write tens of thousands of words on all the minutiae of bill scrutiny for the Alliance.
The United Humanity Alliance will use all of the above methods of scrutiny. For each major policy area, there will be a committee, which can make non-binding legislative recommendations to each of the Houses. Obviously, the Alliance uses a bicameral system with the House of Earth and the House of Mars, though it isn’t a perfectly bicameral system: the House of Earth is a higher legislative body than the House of Mars. The two also have different powers of scrutiny. The House of Earth has two forms of veto: a suspensory veto of two years (used if a bill is rejected by over half of representatives) and an absolute veto, which supersedes the suspensory veto and is employed when a bill is rejected by over two-thirds of representatives. The House of Mars only has a suspensory veto of one year – which cannot be used for green bills/money bills. Both Houses can alter bills as they like, and legislative procedure occurs as a typical bicameral “ping-pong” affair. However, the Earth Delegate – a member of the House of Earth – has power to add additional clauses to any bill pertaining to Earth, and as long as the clauses pass with a majority through the House of Earth, the clauses cannot be amended by the House of Mars. Finally, there are various ways in which the Executive Council and the Alliance Supreme Court can interfere in legislative procedure. For example, the Court can strike down any legislation it sees as interfering with the constitution – excluding any clauses proposed by the Earth Delegate.
As you can see, we are building a legislative branch in the Alliance weighted heavily towards the House of Earth – with an especial focal point of influence in the Earth Delegate. Naturally, the system is a bit more complex than I have illustrated above, but out of fear of writing an entire book on the stuff, I have cut it short.
- How are bills passed or rejected?
This bit is focussed on how legislation becomes law – or fails to. It is very much a continuation of the second part – and indeed, has significant overlap – but there are still some things to note. The first part, about passing bills, is important. In an autocratic regime, a bill may pass with only the support of a few people; in democratic regimes, you may need majorities or super-majorities. There may also be a difference as to which legislative bodies can pass bills – and which types of bills these bodies can pass. I mentioned before about the Directory and the Council of Five-Hundred, which was the legislative body with the sole power of legislative proposal. The other half of that bicameral system was the Council of Ancients, who were the only legislative body who could pass legislation.
For the second part of this subheading, rejecting bills, we must consider vetoes. Suspensory vetoes – such as what the UK’s House of Lords has – only temporarily suspend bills, while absolute vetoes permanently reject them (typically). Determining vetoes is especially important in figuring out the comparative power of each legislative body: a body with an absolute veto will typically have more power than a body with a suspensory veto. Often, vetoes are less of a rejection of legislation but more a failure to pass legislation. If a bill fails to make it through the legislative branch, this is often effectively a veto. However, not everywhere has this system, hence why I have separated discussion of vetoes from discussion of passing legislation. For instance, you could divide powers by giving one legislative body the power to pass legislation and the other the power to veto it; it would make for a highly inefficient system (in my opinion), but it is still a valid option to you if you want to build your own Sci-Fi government.
Returning to the United Humanity Alliance, we further see how vetoes and the power to pass legislation grant more power to the House of Earth as opposed to the House of Mars. I have already discussed their vetoes, but in addition, it is important to note that not only can the House of Mars not propose money bills, it cannot veto or pass them either. Both Houses are able to pass legislation as they like; in order to become law and effective on both Earth and Mars, legislation must pass with a majority in both Houses.
This continues the theme of the lesser powers of the House of Mars. In your Sci-Fi world, it is always important to consider themes – especially in your political system – in order to make your syste coherent and your story flow (alternatively, you can do whatever the fancy takes you, but adding a focus on certain themes can help for certain stories). In the United Humanity Alliance, I have opted away from creating a system of bureaucracy that is ineffective and slow; I could have made a system like this, but I opted to focus on the misrepresentation of the Martians to drive my point about democratic misrepresentation.
I think that’s this instalment done. It’s certainly a start to building your Sci-Fi government. The legislative branch is one of the most visible aspects of political Sci-Fi – from the Galactic Senate in Star Wars to the Landsraad in Dune – and ensuring you have fully mapped out its primary legislative function (especially for those looking to write “hard” political Sci-Fi) is very important. Stay tuned next week for a look at the members of the legislative branch, featuring writing elections, elected representatives, and revolution.
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MORE TYPING GALAXIES BLOG POSTS:
- (Previous) 5 Steps To Making Your Own Sci-Fi Government!
- (Next) Structure Of A Sci-Fi Government Pt II: The Legislative Branch Pt II
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