kilemall
SOC-14 5K
I'm well aware of all that LBB5+ stuff, not to mention the same in LBB7. Just an option for a different take on CT-type chargen, and making it a front and center aspect of the characters, for the OP's consideration.
Imperial Citizenship: Rights and Responsibilities
- Thread starter Lord Iron Wolf
- Start date
I'm well aware of all that LBB5+ stuff, not to mention the same in LBB7. Just an option for a different take on CT-type chargen, and making it a front and center aspect of the characters, for the OP's consideration.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
Is this somewhere in the canon?
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
There is a very good discussion of what constitutes "sentience" in H. Beam Piper's novel, Little Fuzzy. It can be found on Project Gutenberg. It is definitely worth the read.
The Oz
SOC-14 1K
Perhaps there was supposed to be a difference between an Imperial subject and an Imperial citizen and GDW lost track of what word they used when?
That might make an interesting Imperium: Everybody is an Imperial subject, which is what Cleon I meant, but not everyone is an Imperial citizen. Two separate sets of rights and responsibilities.
That might make an interesting Imperium: Everybody is an Imperial subject, which is what Cleon I meant, but not everyone is an Imperial citizen. Two separate sets of rights and responsibilities.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
That's a distinction I'm getting at.
More or less like in Starship Troopers? If so, what is needed to become an Imperial Citizen? by birth? by service?
This aside, see that changing the word "citizens" for "subjects", the mean of the sentence is fully cahnged: from giving rights to any sentient life form inside the Imperial borders, it converts them to subjects (so probably taking rights away from them)...
While in the first case, the Imperium can be seen as a refuge for those living in totalitarian regímenes outside the Imperium, in the second one it might even make foreign merchants weary to cross the border.
pendragonman
Absent Friends Margrave
I like that. Then right out of the Starship Troopers movie "Service guarantees citizenship."
It's not so much "in canon" as "drawn from canon by reading the implications"...
And explicitly decanonised in T4.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Eh?
The Citizen/subject distinction was explicitly destroyed in T4's Milieu Zero setting materials.
It introduces another interesting twist, tho'... Since every sophont inside the Imperium's space is a Citizen (per T4)... Spies and saboteurs can be handled as civil criminals - and tried for treason, sedition, murder...
... and Zhodani (noble/intendent) infiltrators can be tried locally for the prohibited status of being trained in psionics...
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Ok, isn't that the same material McPerth is quoting?
And may I point out to all canonmeisters, that the OP is looking specifically for a layered/dual citizenship of some kind and therefore canon may not be his endpoint?
OP, maybe it would help to clarify what end effect you are looking for in this OTU/ATU citizenship background?
Given the order of history, I think it's possible that the Milieu 0 foundation of the Imperum had no distinction, but over a thousand years the distinction was added, slowly. The aftermath of the Pacification campaigns or Civil war seem like an ideal time to make a change like that.
This makes sense to me:
When Cleon founds the "Third Imperium" the Slyean empire is a dozen or so system. During the Pacification Campaigns, now the "Third Imperium" is 10 to 100 times larger.
Cleon's original intention was (I think) to give all the Bureaucrats knighthoods. But at the size of the Imperium, this isn't possible.
The start of the problem is a petty dictator TEDs, attempting to assert their manhood after having the Third Imperium roll over them, would block the entrance or exit of some of these important individuals, and their ability to do their job.
If you give the Deputy Assistant Undersecretary for Ziadd Affaris (Dagudashaag) a knighthood, you can't one to everyone in their office a knighthood too. This is mostly a political problem. There would be a limit to the number of Knighhoods floating around. Too many and some of the knights start demanding promotions into slots that don't exist.
This leaves a difficult choice of increasing the number of levels of nobility or adding a new level below "Knight" but above the normal level of citizen. Simply to allow the impeial bureaucracy to function. And once you do that, you get a number of other people (e.g. Naval personnel) want the same privileges.
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At that point, Thom, one just declares Soc a as Non-gentry, and soc A as gentry...
It's canonical that to even function as an attorney in Imperial Courts requires Soc A.
The Warrant of Restoration is cited in GT sources as well, and mirrors the lack of distinction between citizen and subject, but unlike the original T4 version, doesn't make the alien (foreigner) a citizen, too.
The following always uses alien for non-subject, not for non-human.
The current majority of nations have 5 tiers alread, in declining order
Most have had at least three more tiers which have gone away, from the following:
The modern ideal of "One class of citizen" and "One almost identical class of non-citizen" does not actually exist in practice anywhere. The few with equality under the law still give distinctions under the law to agents of the government on duty and still have a bunch of crimes that are evidence of the "unauthorized entrant" class - an alien is a different class practically, in that they can be expelled for very different things (including minor ones) that citizens cannot be.
Cleon's "Every sophont is a Citizen" makes every alien, human or otherwise, subject to the laws... and expected to know them. And any violation of them is equally punishable as a simple criminal case. No separate status for Zhodani spies. No separate status for Ihaiti. No separate status for the Duke. (Marc has said recently that the 3I Nobles hold no separate rights for being Nobles, but those in specific offices {including fiefholders} have additional rights and duties by office. Only the Emperor has by 3I law in the classic era separate rights by heritable title instead of office.)
It's canonical that to even function as an attorney in Imperial Courts requires Soc A.
The Warrant of Restoration is cited in GT sources as well, and mirrors the lack of distinction between citizen and subject, but unlike the original T4 version, doesn't make the alien (foreigner) a citizen, too.
The following always uses alien for non-subject, not for non-human.
The current majority of nations have 5 tiers alread, in declining order
- Government Agents
- Full Citizens
- Resident aliens
- Non-resident aliens
- Unauthorized aliens
Most have had at least three more tiers which have gone away, from the following:
- Royals
- Nobles (can be either side of government agents)
- Subjects (can be either side of resident aliens)
- Serfs & Peons (Below Subjects; really a subclass of Subjects, but often below authorized aliens)
- Slaves (Usually above Unauthorized aliens)
- Criminals (Usually above Unauthorized aliens, but not always.)
The modern ideal of "One class of citizen" and "One almost identical class of non-citizen" does not actually exist in practice anywhere. The few with equality under the law still give distinctions under the law to agents of the government on duty and still have a bunch of crimes that are evidence of the "unauthorized entrant" class - an alien is a different class practically, in that they can be expelled for very different things (including minor ones) that citizens cannot be.
Cleon's "Every sophont is a Citizen" makes every alien, human or otherwise, subject to the laws... and expected to know them. And any violation of them is equally punishable as a simple criminal case. No separate status for Zhodani spies. No separate status for Ihaiti. No separate status for the Duke. (Marc has said recently that the 3I Nobles hold no separate rights for being Nobles, but those in specific offices {including fiefholders} have additional rights and duties by office. Only the Emperor has by 3I law in the classic era separate rights by heritable title instead of office.)
creativehum
SOC-14 1K
The Original Post:
So:
It isn't the OTU.
By definition in the thread at hand there are two tiers of citizenship.
Imperial Citizenship is granted to those who perform Imperial military service.
The question at hand is not if this is feasible, but brainstorming what sorts of rights and responsibilities fall upon an Imperial Citizen. Everything else is a given.
So:
It isn't the OTU.
By definition in the thread at hand there are two tiers of citizenship.
Imperial Citizenship is granted to those who perform Imperial military service.
The question at hand is not if this is feasible, but brainstorming what sorts of rights and responsibilities fall upon an Imperial Citizen. Everything else is a given.
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Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
Like Travellers' Aid Society, you could have rolled for Imperium citizenship.
You could assume that every human born on a planet that is within the Imperium is considered automatically a citizen, and can apply for documentation at the nearest starport, probably with the appropriate birth certificate and a DNA test.
You could assume that every human born on a planet that is within the Imperium is considered automatically a citizen, and can apply for documentation at the nearest starport, probably with the appropriate birth certificate and a DNA test.
[m;]Reasonable explorations inspired by it, if in a clearly tangential way, are permitted[/m;]
Likewise, given the intensely political element of discussing different classes of sophont.
[m;]Limited exception ot the no politics outside the pit granted with provisios below:[/m;]
- Real world examples are solely examples, not subjects of discussion themselves
- everything else is related to impacts in/upon an OTU-like or Traveller-rules-procedurally-applied setting of the changes.
- It remains on the general subject of classes of being as seen by the government.
Any staff member may revoke this if given justification to do so by misbehavior.
Keep it civil, keep it sane, keep it going.
And before anyone accuses me of motivated self-interest, I'll fess up to it. I've given the exception because I'm interested in the ongoing discussions (note the plural) in this thread.
Also note: Like the OP, in the CT days, I thought the implications of Supplement 4 were that those careers, like the Bk1 ones, were Citizen careers, and a separate class of subjects existed, based upon reads (misreads?) of Adv 1-4... And that a Noble class was a third stratum, and non-subjects (everyone not a noble, citizen, or subject) were a 4th. That latter is due to the way the Zhodani are written in CT adventures...
But those two tiers of citizenship are not mutually exclusive, ane even one can grant the other (again, like any EU country citizenship grants you EU citizenship).
Another matter is how much does really Imperial citizenship mean if you never leave your own planet (or country, in balkanized ones), where only local citizenry is important. In this sense, I can agree that only those interested in Imperial (or other interstellar) services are really aware and conscieus of their Imperial citizenry and considere themselves Imperial. Citizens.
Is there any reference in Traveller materials about subjects that are not citizens in the Imperium? If so I cannot recall it now.
The chippers are a good example of those arguments (that sure exist also for other species). ITTR having read that the Scouts declared them sentient, so hinting that they are the ones responsible to officially decide it.
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