//------------------------------// // Appendix: Alexis’ Guide to Equestrian Politics // Story: The Humans in Equestria Club // by billymorph //------------------------------// Welcome all to the magical pony kingdom; it turns out you can’t get away from the government wherever you go so please leave any wishful thinking about a benevolent theocracy at the door. This guide will serve as a brief introduction to the politics and government of Equestria, mostly so you can avoid running afoul of it. Equestria is a crazy mishmash of government types never really tried together on Earth. It exists as a semi-theocracy, blended with a noble republic, blended with an autocratic state and the three core branches are constantly jostling with each other for overall control. Overall the similarities tend to be more confusing than helpful so we’ll be going through each step by step. Most obvious is the executive, or Crown, branch of the government. This is the ruling body of Equestria and currently is a tetrarchy of the four alicorn Princesses, with Celestia as the senior partner. It controls the army, vast swathes of territory, dictates national policy and indirectly controls the bureaucratic apparatus of the state. In addition it also serves as the judicial branch, and every legal issue in Equestria not covered by common law or precedent is resolved with a direct ruling by Celestia. Overall the ruling princesses have huge personal and legal power, much as a divine monarch might have, and they have none of the constitutional limitations that you might expect from a European king. Celestia typically rules with a light touch, but her power is nominally boundless and there’s nothing technically stopping her having random ponies executed if it took her fancy, though it would probably start a second civil war. The Club, as a recent crisis mostly interacts with The Crown as opposed to any other branch of the government, so please watch your manners around royalty, even Princess Twilight. The most pervasive branch is the Imperial Bureaucracy. This is very much as you’d imagine, a large body of career bureaucrats who manage Equestria on Celestia’s behalf. It is vast, complicated, more than a little self serving and extremely powerful; currently the Bureaucracy is dominated by a large coalition of unicorn ministers, but mostly it’s staffed by earth ponies. The Bureaucracy manages pretty much every major policy in Equestria, collects taxes, raises armies, deals with public works and enforces the rule of law. The power of the Imperial Bureaucracy is matched by The Crown from above and The Municipalities below. Celestia and the tetrarchy hold enough vetoes and other forms of encouragement to ensure that only those favoured by The Crown rise to power, or at least in principle. Finally The Municipalities make up the final layer of Equestrian government. These Municipalities are large land grants that exist within Equestria, governing all the major town and cities, and most minor towns and villages. Municipalities are the democratic part of the Equestrian government, a mayor is elected by the people and runs the district on their behalf. They raise taxes for local issues, lay down regional laws and otherwise try and improve their hometown above and beyond any other in the region. While having the least power of all three branches on paper, The Municipalities govern very directly the lives of eighty percent of all Equestrians and are not a force to be underestimated; large coalitions of municipalities have historically dictated policy even to Celestia, though they unite rarely. The upshot for Club members is that Equestria’s government is complex, but more or less ordered around improving the lives of the citizens. It is however important to be aware whose sphere of influence you are working in though. In Ponyville alone you can walk through five different districts in under fifteen minutes. Starting at Sweet Apple Acres you are on privately owned Crown land, administered by the Imperial Bureaucracy; walking into Ponyville you enter the Ponyville municipality ruled currently by Mayor Scrolls; taking a shortcut you can skirt Twilight’s demesne around her castle; before crossing back over into Crown land as you approach Fluttershy’s cottage, though this is technically fallow land owned directly by the state and not managed land like Applejack’s; finally as you set foot into the Everfree you enter Celestia’s personal fief, though I understand she hasn’t done much with the land for sometime. As a final note, you’ll hear the use of various noble titles in Equestria. The feudal system is more or less defunct in Equestria, with only a few sporadic and fairly minor rights still observed. Nobles have no legal power over the common pony but the titles still carry a fair amount of status and tend to be owned by powerful magnates looking for a symbol of wealth. You don’t have to be polite to a noble therefore, but it’s generally best to keep a civil tongue, you never know what strings they can pull. --- Addendum: Viceroy of Human Affairs Right, a lot of people have been asking what exactly a Viceroy is and how this is going to affect us. Short answer, a Viceroy is Crown representative that directly manages a region or territory, before it can elect an official Municipal government. In Equestria most Viceroys govern newly established settlements on the Gryphon frontier and a Viceroy of a whole people is unusual to say the least. It’s not however, unprecedented but the last use dates back to the Cloudsdale integration, some three hundred years ago. The practical upshot is, I represent The Crown for the Club and the Club for The Crown. While in the interim I have legal authority over humans that end up in Equestria, I also am obliged to assist your integration into Equestrian life, much in the way I have been doing before. I understand a lot of people are worried about a loss of personal autonomy; that is happening and there is nothing I can do to stop it. I, and the rest of the Equestrian government, aim to keep our touch on the tiller as light as possible. With the Club now an official part of the government we can expect changes, but they’re going to be for the better. I promise.