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Topic: Economic realities of the SC universe (Read 7463 times)
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Draxas
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Draxas: How about the relationship between Thrall races? It seems obvious that the Ur-Quan doesn't encourage inter-thrall trade, but we do know they have a bit to do with each other. At the very least they can be stationed at the same places, like with the Ilwrath/Spathi fleet at Sol. I wonder if there'd be any illicit trade in goods through these channels under the noses of their Ur-Quan masters. As for the Thralls normal economic system, what happens if a Thrall economy simply fails? I agree that Ur-Quan hardly want to interfere more than they have to, but they'd have to watch their thralls quite cosesly to make sure no undue economic stress causes overheating, loss of production capacity and ultimately starvation. And in that case it seems much easier to just wipe a species out than try to go in and micromanage them.
As you say, relationships between thrall races are likely not encouraged, save for forming a joint fleet when Ur-Quan needs dictate. The thrall races don't really seem to have relations with each other in most cases according to the info in the game, and what relationships do exist tend to at least be cautiously non-agressive, if not downright hostile. I suspect (especially in the example you gave, where the Spathi would likely be too terrified to even be in the same system as the Ilwrath were it not for Ur-Quan commands) that the thralls likely do not even have trade relations even when they are stationed together. This is accentuated even more when you consider that more than half the thralls (Ilwrath, VUX, Mycon, Thraddash) would sooner kill their so-called allies as trade with them, were they not restrained by Ur-Quan slave laws (and the Umgah are hardly reliable in that regard, though for different reasons; death by practical joke among "friends" means you're just as dead).
I expect, as you say, that if a thrall economy collapses, the Ur-Quan would likely simply write them off as a liability if they can no longer meet their obligations to the Hierarchy. This almost certainly means slave shielding and the following indirect extermination, if not a quite literal extermination (though the Ur-Quan don't really seem inclined, that's more the specialty of the Kohr-Ah). Otherwise, they would be so busy micromanaging certain thrall economies that nothing would get done, and while the Kzer-Za were split with that sort of thing in mind, I'm sure it's not high on their list of priorities.
I also disagree on the socialist state of most races. Most races encountered aren't extremely advanced (according to SC standards anyway). Look at the Umgah for instance. They've colonised a few worlds, and they are great with bio stuff. While they probably wont have to worry about producing enough food with those leet bio skills of theirs, I wonder how good they are at more technical stuff. Their ships are slow and bulky, and obviously not biological. It doesn't seem to big a leap of faith to argue that their technical production facilities are probably of the same (or lower) standard, meaning that while they can add as many arms and legs as they want, they have more trouble mining minerals and building houses. I'd say most races are like this, not advanced enough for perfect communism and not quite disciplined enough for a heavy handed socialist system. Also apologies if I'm misinterpreting what you mean by socialism, it's a tricky definition to nail down.
Back in school, the definitions were presented to me as such:
Socialism is "each receives according to his need"
Communism is "each receives according to his work" (perhaps "merit" is a better stand-in for "work")
Granted, we don't know much about the inner workings of most alien societies. However, the degree of collective effort exhibited by most races towards common racial goals seems to indicate that one of these systems is in play in most cases. A capitalist society simply cannot focus their "attention" on goals that huge; more profit lies in areas that simply are not in the common interest, nor in line with those racial goals.
I'd say the only races that are probably completely removed from any economic development are Mycons and M:bots, since they are constructs. But I just watched WallE, and if the M:bots are as cute they've probably got an emotion based economy or something.
The Utwig might just be very good at waste management, I imagine the mask materials don't wary too much so you'd have very little material loss.
I can't imagine the Mycon having anything resembling an economy, as I've said before. Mmrn, on the other hand, are really a mystery in that regard. There simply isn't enough source material to make an educated guess; all we have is the SC1 manual and some quick bits of history from SC2. However, we do know that they always were very close with the Chenjesu, even before the war, and that alliance had to have been founded on something. Trade seems like a likely stepping stone, which implies some sort of economy.
I really can't help but see the Utwig as anything else but capitalist. There are too many opportunities for profit inherent in their mask system. An enterprising start-up could make a new mask for a subtle nuance of emotion not yet categorized, companies could compete on making their masks from more affordable or exotic source materials, etc. etc. etc. The possibilities there are endless, and I can't imagine that masks wouldn't need to be replaced frequently, never mind new ones crafted for new generations. Simply handing those out would be a terrible burden on any system that couldn't profit from it.
Thinking a bit more about the subject, my thoughts turned to the Thraddash and how they could possibly maintain a cohesive society for even a short time. I suspect that their political and economic systems are both social darwinist in nature, with the strong taking what they desire by force. However, in order to prevent mass die-offs from occurring any more frequently than they already do, a pecking order type hierarchy is established and obeyed in "business" dealings. Thus, since everyone already knows who is higher in the hierarchy than who, the taking by the strong from the weak goes relatively smoothly in many cases. Disputes only occur when someone feels they can move to a higher station (which is probably still fairly frequent), or when those of equal standing attempt to deal with each other (which would likely only happen among the lowest rungs of the ladder, otherwise why not find someone weaker?). In cases where it may not be beneficial to maim or kill your business partner (because then he can't really pacth up you ship, now can he?), I imagine barter would be grudgingly used in lieu of violence.
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Koowluh
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I can't imagine the Mycon having anything resembling an economy, as I've said before. Mmrn, on the other hand, are really a mystery in that regard. There simply isn't enough source material to make an educated guess; all we have is the SC1 manual and some quick bits of history from SC2. However, we do know that they always were very close with the Chenjesu, even before the war, and that alliance had to have been founded on something. Trade seems like a likely stepping stone, which implies some sort of economy.
I'm just exiting lurker mode to rip this one out of context a bit; you're suggesting trade as a stepping stone to an alliance, I suggest necessity; the m-bots can't reproduce and the Chenjesu found it a logical course of action to fuse together. My guess is that they met at one point and both saw a benefit in working together, to a common goal; "evolution"
the Chmmr might have been in planning stages for a while already, but just set back by an armada of Ur-Quan heading their direction.
Okay, back in my corner now...
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I hate drugs. Air is the worst one. Breathe it once and you're hooked for life.
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Draxas
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I tend to be more of the opinion that fusion was an option only considered by the Chejesu and Mmrn once they realized they had lost the war and would be able to be slave shielded together. Otherwise, I can only assume that both races would want to search for solutions to the Mmrn's reproduction problem while maintaining their own autonomy; fusion is more of a last ditch effort to ensure both races survive enslavement and emerge powerful enough to battle the Ur-Quan where they had failed in that regard once before.
Of course, I have no evidence either way. 
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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Yes, that seems reasonable. Do you mean a browser game, or a game about a Mario villain?
(do not reply in this thread)
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Son_of_Antares
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Arioch, I summon thee...
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Maybe Chenjesu as the "most logical and coherent" race of the genre had something akin to the eko-economy system like from the Mars Trilogy; I can't help but t see them as extremely rational and intelligent (wise?) beings. No proof for this, but sounds plausable .
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« Last Edit: December 19, 2008, 12:38:00 am by Son_of_Antares »
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RTyp06
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Economy means a currency system right?.. So what would the various races use as physical currency? (withstanding the Melenorme and Druuge of course)
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