Solarian League
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| Solarian League | |
| Form of Government | Confederation |
| Official language | Standard English |
| Home Planet | Earth |
| Capital | Chicago |
| Head of State | President of the League |
| Executive Branch | Executive Council |
| Legislative Branch | League Assembly |
| Military | Solarian League Navy, Solarian League Marine Corps, Solarian Gendarmerie, Office of Frontier Security |
| Founded | circa 925 Post Diaspora (3028 AD) |
The Solarian League is a fictional star nation in David Weber's Honorverse.
Contents |
[edit] Overview
The League is a huge, politically "neutral" superpower (if not in reality the galaxy's sole hyperpower) that consists of the oldest worlds settled by humanity. It is also by far the most powerful and influential star nation in the known galaxy. Officially, a total of 1,784 worlds are members of the Solarian League, plus hundreds more considered "protectorates" of the League.
An estimated total of two-thirds of the human population live in League-controlled worlds; the exact total population is not known and it is said no one has ever seriously considered conducting an exhaustive census or claim to know the number of inhabitants. The older systems — the "Old League" — have a registered population of three trillion inhabitants — a number considered to be an understatement — while the population of the outer worlds and artificial habitats is considered to be many times larger. There is no star nation or alliance that can match the League in terms of military or economic power. Almost all of the major media services in human space, such as Reuters, United Faxes International and others, are based in League worlds.
The worlds of the Solarian League can be grouped into two categories:
- The inner systems, which contain Earth and the oldest colony worlds settled by mankind. These are known as the "Old League", and are the most advanced and developed worlds in human space. Their economic wealth makes them the powerhouse of the League.
- The outer systems, known as the "Shell systems"; newer, less stable and developed than the Old League, with a more precarious economy and smaller population. These systems are often administered by specialized agencies of the Solarian League, which exercise tremendous influence.
In addition to these worlds, the League has also influence over hundreds of poor worlds near its borders, often called the Verge worlds, and League officials tend to consider these worlds as the League's backyard.
The Solarian League has something of a "Manifest Destiny" mentality, which states that every world should be included in the League, and that eventually foreign worlds should see the benefits of League membership and voluntarily join. Some within the League have gone to extreme lengths to make sure that these worlds join the League, using measures such as rigged referenda and plebiscites, fostering violence which can be used as grounds for intervention, and enforcing League commercial dominance over these worlds.
Beowulf, the oldest human colony, is a prominent member of the League and a major trading partner of the Star Kingdom of Manticore.
A popular nickname for a native of the Solarian League is "Solly" (plural "Sollies").
[edit] Government and Politics
Earth (known throughout the Honorverse as "Old Earth" or "Terra") serves as the League's capital; however, the League is rather loosely bound, and all planets have distinct governments. This comes from the fact that most of the League's original signatories were worlds with an independent history that spanned centuries, and were unwilling to submit to a new centralized authority. There have been references to a League President, who is presumably the League's chief executive, although how much power and influence the post actually carries is probably limited.
The League's decision-making body is the Executive Council, where every League world is represented. To add to the enormous number of member worlds, each world has a veto right over proposed measures, forcing the League to seek compromises among competing interests rather than risk a veto. The Council has the power to expel a world from the League — a provision that has been hinted as a threat against planets that abuse the veto power.
Below the Executive Council and the few centralized agencies of the League, member worlds are completely free to organize themselves as they choose, and their governments have a considerable degree of autonomy from the central power. Despite this nominal autonomy, the outer sectors of the League — the Shell — enjoy less freedom from the League, as they are more in contact with the bureaucratic agencies and League security forces.
The loose nature of the Solarian League, coupled with its extreme confidence on its military and economic superiority over the rest of the galaxy combined, have prevented the development of an effective foreign and military policy — the League feels threatened by no one. The competing political and business interests also conspire to make any coherent policy impossible. In fact, the League's only official tenet in foreign policy, uncompromised enforcement of the Eridani Edict — which prohibits indiscriminate bombardment of an inhabited world under penalty of loss of sovereignty — has had to be specifically written into the League's Constitution to ensure its effective enforcement.
A major flaw of the League is the lack of government or civilian control over the bureaucracy, specifically that which deals with non-League nations. The most important agencies of the bureaucracy, such as the Office of Frontier Security and the Solarian Gendarmerie, are known for conducting their own foreign policy — absorption of underdeveloped worlds near Solarian space and preservation of the League's influence over border territories.
[edit] Military
The Solarian League Navy is the largest naval force in the Honorverse — four times larger than the People's Navy at the peak of its power. Solarian medium vessels (battlecruisers, heavy and light cruisers and destroyers) are usually state-of-the-art warships, as they are needed to police the League's vast space; conversely, Solarian ships of the wall are less advanced (fifty years behind the Manticoran state of the art as of War of Honor) when compared to Manticore and Havenite designs, since the League doesn't see the need to keep up with "lesser" naval powers. The Solarian Marines act as the rapid intervention force of the League, maintaining order throughout the League in concert with the Navy.
Besides the League's regular military, member worlds also have their own defensive military forces, known as the Defense Fleets. These forces are responsible for the immediate defense of their home systems, acting with and without the backup of the Solarian League Navy.
Other agencies, such as the Gendarmerie and the Office of Frontier Security, operate their own warships and have their own troops to maintain order and further the League's (and its corporations') interests in the frontier.
[edit] Future developments
Up until the later novels of the Honorverse, little was known or mentioned about the League, besides mentions of its power and sheer size. Lately, more and more of its structure and society became known, and it is hinted that the League is increasingly unstable as the bureaucracy becomes more independent from the central authority and some member worlds resent League (and bureaucratic) dominance. Unrest and dissatisfaction with the government is also said to be growing among the citizenry of the older worlds, such as Earth. Members of newer, OFS-controlled worlds, are "citizens" in name only and are forced to stand by while their world's resources are sucked dry. It is believed that, in future novels, the League will break up or fall into a civil war — a contingency for which some star nations and some Solarian sector governors are said to be preparing - as noted in the novel Crown of Slaves.
Mesa is an independent nation entirely surrounded by the Solarian League, and whose large, wealthy, and utterly amoral corporations exert an unhealthy degree of influence in Solarian politics.
