Third Imperium Government organization

[Condottiere]

You want to control education, if only to ensure the students learn the correct lessons about the Imperium.

 

[mike wightman]

From Library Data:
"The Duke of Regina,* speaking for the Marches, proposed that the Marches fund one additional ship from its own resources, on the condition that the Marches receive a contract to produce a portion of the total run...
the sector government came up with the idea, and implemented it at the highest levels**. Given a population of 783 billion in the Marches (under direct Imperial rule)...
The bureaucracy simply deducted this sum from funds budgeted to education...
Aside from the initial notification from sector government..****."

*subsector level government, petitioning the Imperium on behalf of the sector, so it goes up the chain to the sector duke and their administration.
**the sector level government, the (sector)duke and the sector level bureaucracy
***the sector level bureaucracy has a department that has funds allocated to world education systems
****so how I think it works -

subsector level - duke, ducal houshold, ducal appointments to individual worlds, works with the sector level Imperial bureaucracy
sector level - (sector)duke, ducal houshold, ducal appointments to individual worlds (within subsector), oversight of sector level Imperial bureaucracy. Does the (sector)duke spy on the subsector dukes via the bureaucracy... that is for the individual referee to decide.

I think the Ministries are a tier above the sector level in that they coordinate activities via local sector bureaucracy and nobles for the benefit of the Imperium as a whole - Ministry of Colonisation and Ministry of Conservation are named in the fluff text of S:3

Checking the Bureaucrat career in S:4, the perfect individual has a Str of 8 or less, an Int of 9+, Edu of 8+/10+, and Soc 9+ and has access to an interesting skill mix...

 

[McPerth]

You want to control education

Sure, you want, but can you?

The 3I is too varied for this, and the lessons a dictator in a TL6 will want people to know are quite different than a democracy in a TL13 planet, as are the education resources.

I guess in not a few planets the Imperial presence is not felt by the people (more so on the most totalitarian or low tech), and for most of them life is as if Imperium did not exist.

 

[whartung]

The 3I is too varied for this, and the lessons a dictator in a TL6 will want people to know are quite different than a democracy in a TL13 planet, as are the education resources.

I dunno.

I mean, for example, we (i.e. the West, in general) don't have Free Trade with North Korea, mostly because of local politics.

But the Imperium, while it may allow an NK dictatorship to exist, only so far as it doesn't interfere with Free Trade. The Imperium, likely, would only let it cocoon so far. This makes outside contact a real issue for governments like that.

Another contrived example, can the Imperium make a Vegan (as in pure herbivores, not the star Vega) society take meat products? I dunno. No reason to send goods for which there is no market, but that's different from saying that traders can't bring meat at all.

 

[McPerth]

I dunno.

I mean, for example, we (i.e. the West, in general) don't have Free Trade with North Korea, mostly because of local politics.

But the Imperium, while it may allow an NK dictatorship to exist, only so far as it doesn't interfere with Free Trade. The Imperium, likely, would only let it cocoon so far. This makes outside contact a real issue for governments like that.

Another contrived example, can the Imperium make a Vegan (as in pure herbivores, not the star Vega) society take meat products? I dunno. No reason to send goods for which there is no market, but that's different from saying that traders can't bring meat at all.

I agree, but I don't see the relation with the post of mine you quoted...

 

[whartung]

I agree, but I don't see the relation with the post of mine you quoted...

Simply that whatever lessons the TL6 dictator may want to share with his people may come in conflict with the accessibility and contact with the traders due to the Imperiums impact.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Another contrived example, can the Imperium make a Vegan (as in pure herbivores, not the star Vega) society take meat products? I dunno. No reason to send goods for which there is no market, but that's different from saying that traders can't bring meat at all.

I answered this earlier upthread, but I'll repeat my point with respect to this specific example.

To be clear, I'm "multiplexing" the answer(s) to this question through a variety of conditionals, which is why there is no "singular, ONE" answer to the question.



If you're talking about "forcing" a world population to import meat products into that world's domestic market ... my answer would be NO. To be clear, we're talking about moving the meat products from the starport's jurisdiction (Imperial controlled) into the domestic market (local world authorities controlled) here. The local authorities would be within their rights to BAN the importation of meat products from the starport (or any other space/star craft) into their domestic markets.

If you're talking about the "world of pure herbivores" planet being a stopover/pass through destination on route to somewhere else ... the meat products could enter the starport, be stored at the starport (frozen?), and then eventually loaded onto a different starship bound to a different star system ... that would be permissible (and possibly even commonplace). The reason why this is acceptable is because the meat products never move from an Imperial controlled jurisdiction (starport, etc.) into a jurisdiction in which the meat products are banned and illegal.

Therefore, traders COULD bring meat products to this specific pure herbivores world ... but the market for those meat products at this location are basically "nil to none" outside the starport. INSIDE the starport, you could have a "Salt Lick Steakhouse" ... no problem ... but they would only be able to serve customers inside the starport (and take out would be banned, if you want to exit the starport with your meat products). So meat products could be served/sold inside the starport, but not outside the starport. This means that demand for such meat products would be "miniscule" relative to the world's population, but since those meat products are only going to be served to people IN the starport (including interstellar visitors) the demand will actually be above zero.

The local world authorities could implement something akin to a quarantine on people who have eaten meat ... something like must wait 96 hours after most recent meat consumption before being eligible to leave the starport and venture out into the world's population. Starships delivering passengers who intend to mix with the world population outside the starport would need to submit to a medical exam to verify compliance with the quarantine time requirement, which could have been completed while onboard ship during jump (need to switch to a herbivore diet during jump) so there are minimal delays getting through border control when exiting the starport.



Depending on how ... fanatical ... the stance against the consumption (or even presence) of meat products is, I can easily envision a circumstance where meat products are banned/forbidden in a downport (to avoid upsetting the local population) but ARE allowed in a highport (so they don't ever "touch" the world itself). All of the customs/border controls would therefore be put onto the orbital interface between the highport and downport. The downport would serve herbivore foods only, while the high port could cater to omnivore diets (of travellers passing through the star system to other destinations).

A lot of the subtleties and nuances here come down to questions of government type (code) and law level (code) along with local attitudes concerning the question. The causes for the society to behave this way could be anything from religious (unclean meats) to biological (evolutionary adaptation to herbivorous diet, meats cannot be digested properly) to even something akin to virtue signaling ("I'm not a vegitarian because I love animals, but because I REALLY HATE PLANTS!!!" ). Another possibility could be that some of the local flora are carnivorous ... so don't bring in meat products that could "feed the plants that will eat us" (if we aren't careful), we don't want to have another Kudzu War (that we lose, again).



This kind of ... nuanced interpretation ... leaves a lot more scale and scope for a "varied texture" of world population and attitudes about their relationship to their interstellar neighbors and trading partners. You wind up with a lot more possibilities to be aware of (as Travellers) and YTU doesn't have to be "the same here, there and everywhere" because all products are obtainable everywhere due to the fact that there are no trade barriers to imports into local world markets.



Note that we already HAVE something in the UWP codes that points to this interpretation I'm advancing being correct ... Law Levels.

UWP code law levels dictate what is forbidden on various worlds. That presumably includes import controls on a variety of arms and armaments (which law levels address very specifically). Things like ... law level code: 2+, laser weapons are banned ... so presumably there would be no "civilian market" for laser weaponry on such a world (outside the starport). There might be a military market for such arms, but in that case you're dealing with government contracts as an authorized supplier, rather than as a Traveller who "just so happened" to arrive in the past week or so with no idea that laser weapons are banned on planet outside the downport (but you've got a "mercenary buddy" who's looking to buy).

Just do a Mad Libs remove/replace of weapons from the law level codes and substitute in other goods (such as meat products on herbivore world) that can ALSO be banned by local world government authorities and various puzzle pieces will start falling into place in a somewhat predictable/repeatable pattern of understanding.