Hi All,
I've been discussing various science fiction 'tropes' recently and of course we'll eventually have to have the big one on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the controversies of robot marriage / robot- human marriage and transgendered robots, who were built in the 'wrong' body. Then there is another interesting, but more overlooked one (unless done in a 'Nazi' eugenics type way ) of transhumanism. Also I also wonder why humans are portrayed as the diverse ones and yet aliens are always monoculture, with one government and one religion or characteristic which would fall foul of our discrimination laws (e.g. Ferengi as being greedy capitalists, Klingons as warriors ).
Before we look into those, there is another facet of tropes which never really gets discussed and that is the forms of government that we find in the science fiction world. In space opera in particular you have the space empire verses the democratic federation trope or alternatively you have the space empire verses the terrorists , freedom fighting rebels. You see the dichotomy here , which is empires and evil and federation democratic republics are good. The most well known examples of this are of course star wars and even the enemies of the star trek universe .
The criticism one seems to get of this situation is not to ask whether empires are automatically 'evil' and democaries automatically 'good' , but that with the ability to space travel, how could an evil empire sustain itself ? For example people often carp at the Klingons and ask 'how could such a backward culture develop the abilities of space flight and warp drives, given its otherwise corrupt and basically feudal structure ?
Well let us deal with the notion that all empires are automatically evil. This to my mind comes from the dominant culture on our planet of today and that is of course America, a country whose origins began in a colonial revolt against an empire -in this case the British Empire. Except that unlike other Empires of the time , France , Russia, Spain, Austria , Ottoman etc , Britain actually allowed colonial America to have representative legislatures and assemblies. It was not as if there was zero representation or any elections (the franchise is of course a different matter, but at the time time no country was democratic in the sense of today and most franchises were based upon ownership of land or property ). Indeed Britain itself had a parliamentary system of government and was not in itself an evil empire. True it was greedy, capitalist and people on the make, could make a fortune via exploration, to wit the east India Company. True the Empire contained slaves. Then the Empire got rid of the trade and then slavery itself, but did more and started a one nation mission to stop the trade around the world, before and without a massive civil war that the USA had to face. For all the wrongdoings of the empire there was a positive legacy in the end. Roads, railways, ports, an uplifting from bronze age civilisations , medical advancement and English as an international language. Oh and cricket. But look at other empires: The Roman Empire was both brutal and advanced. It could wipe out even the children of Carthage burn Jerusalem and the Temple, commit Jews to crucifixion and slavery, but give to other subjects a common language, public baths, aqueducts and roads. It could bring peace to a quarter of the globe , but still crucify thousands who dared defied Rome. The Spanish Empire exploited and converted the native Americans. But it also got rid of barbaric Aztec human sacrifices. Oh and Spain in 1492 was still a feudal monarchy, just as it began its conquests of the new world.
So the record of empire is mixed: not completely evil and not exactly benign. But it is certainly no worse or not much better than a democracy or liberal democracy. Colonisation still occurred by democratic states (America and its colonisation of the west) and today despite what the neo conservatives say, democracies can and still will go to war with each other if they feel that the stakes are high enough, but there's just a higher threshold for that to happen. Also do not forget that democratic countries can be pushed, manipulated or feel compelled to go to war. An example is the events which triggered the 1898 Spanish- American war and the consequent conquest of Cuba, Philippines and Puerto Rico or the constant US interventions, coups and military invasions in South American countries .
But what of the question regarding evil empires and space travel? Well I've already answered this I think. The Klingons could, like the British or the Romans (or Mongolians) have the technology to space travel and be brutal colonisers because it is clearly a false premise to assume that technology and space travel can only develop within a liberal democracy or a democracy of any kind. The colonisation outside of Europe was not undertaken by a united continent. It occurred because the continent was divided among national and religious lines, which fuelled competition. Likewise the space exploration of last century was not achieved by a liberal democratic one world government, but by two competing states, Americans and the Soviets, who did so because they were in competition to lead the rest of humanity and be top dog.
Even if this is not a satisfactory answer the other way is to look at monarchy as Prince Philip once described our royal family as 'the firm'. Indeed in many ways this is a good summary of the origin aristocracy. It is merely the formalisation of noting the dynastic power brokers of a land, the recognition of the oligarchy and the elite. The Kennedy family as the Dukes of Massachusetts , or the Bush clan as Earls of Texas /Florida, the Clintons as Barons of New York and Counts of Arkansas or the Obamas as the Marquesses of Chicago.
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