Dystopian Monetary Systems

From the title of this post, you might think that we are going to discuss rapacious financial systems that leave bleak and shattered worlds in their wake. However, there are libraries full of critiques of every economic system under the sun, from Marx to Hayek to Piketty. If you want to understanding why the modern world looks, acts and even smells like it does, then a complete understanding of our economic system (neo-liberal capitalism) is a must.

What we are discussing is fictional governments and the economic systems that power them. In the same way you shouldn't trust a work of fiction that lacks a political view (post on that later), you should never trust a work of speculative fiction that fails to have a coherent economic model.

There are a number of hard science fiction stories that detail the economic model of the universe they inhabit. The anachro-capitlaism post-scarcity of The Culture universe, to the Techno-liberalism of Peter Hamilton's Nights Dawn and Pandora Star series and the Ur-libertarianism of Snow Crash.

With the increasing interest (some might say "peak interest") in YA anti-utopian fiction, care should be made to create plausible economic models that support the oppressive government systems in your work.

As an example of a partially detailed economic system, take the Hunger Games series. The economic model of Hunger Games is never explicitly described. However, we do know that it features both low and high-tech manufacturing (and presumably some form of higher and advanced education), as well as massive resource extraction (see districts 12, 4, 3, and 7). Most of these resources appear to be earmarked for the use by the citizens of the capital. While there is some form of income and wealth generation in the Capital, the mechanisms of distribution, both in terms of employment and luxury end-products is murky. Clearly, Panem operates on an authoritarian command economy (equal parts oppressive communist in the districts, and some form of open / limited market in the Capital), but there is no clearly identified private firms or companies. It is possible that everyone in the Capital works for the Capital, at which point it forms a closed economy independent from the rest of the districts, but receives tribute as a form of "Dividend on oppression".

What's the point you ask? The Hunger Games is about a contest (and thinly veiled allegory) of teenagers forced to kill one another for entertainment value, who cares about economic models? Well, arm chair economists for one, but authors and readers who appreciate detailed world building for another.

Economic systems influence political systems, and you can't world build without a political system. You can try, but your characters ( more so if they are plucky teens rebelling against authority) need to have a platform for their views. Why is the Authoritarian government bad? Because it controls people. In the Hunger Games, one of the reasons the Government is so terrible is that it appears to run forced labor facilities all over the country (See District 11, 12 - forced farming and forced shaft coal mining). Forced labor camps only make political sense in certain economic systems. If your economic system does not prize competition and liberty, your political system will reflect that, not vice versa. So in truth, the economic model (cheap labor and resources) informs the political system (massive authoritarian repression), not the other way around.

Conflict, the lifeblood of good characterization, often stems from disparities in economic standing. As another example, the Lannisters of Game of Thrones are wealthy (or so they say ) patrons of the crown based, not on their knowledge of science or mathematics, but their ability to extract gold from the land under their feet. In contrast, the Iron Bank of Bravos yields capital in the form of interest bearing loans on prior loaned capital and merchant marine services. In both instances, their wealth and resources allows them to take political positions that lesser equipped houses and organizations could not implement.

When constructing a world for your characters to inhabit, look to the economic model to explain motivations of not only the government (if there is a government) but the people rebelling against the government.  When conducting analysis or reviewing the work of others, look to the naturalness of the political and economic systems. Is the world resource constrained? If so, the political system will seek to control individuals. If the individuals rebel, what will that rebellion do to the availability of resources? Does the author address the economic rational of the villains, and the economic downside of the protagonists goals? Working through these issues will leave less gaps that must be hand-waived through exposition or ball-hiding, resulting in a tighter work that focuses on plot.

2014 Moorsgate Media (www.moorsgatemedia.blogspot.com)

Urban planing as zombie defense

On a recent trip to Japan, I had the opportunity to stroll through some of Tokyo's residential districts. Through a combination of war, natural disasters and economics, modem Tokyo is a sprawling high tech megalopolis. However, within this city of skyscrapers and gleaming trains, vestiges of the older city remain.

Many temples, shrines and even single family houses in Tokyo take the form of small walled compounds. From a functional standpoint these walls are not really designed to deter a determined intruder, but they generally provide the boundaries of the particular homestead or site of importance.

 Importantly, whole communities exist with within arms length of these compounds and one another. Sometimes, the less then 7 feet separate one walled home compound from another.  

While the gate in the picture is not likely stopping a contingent of alien invaders, it might prevent the wandering, shuffling type of zombie featured in most fiction.

All of this leads this leads to an interesting thought experiment about the suitability of different cultural architectural styles to resist an encroaching disaster.

American architectural preferences led to wide suburban sprawl. Large homes are placed on large tracts of land, usually without significant walls or fences encircling the property. The same is true from churches is most of the western world.  Americans, it is often remarked, like their space. However this abundance might work to their detriment.

Isolated homesteads can be overrun or worse, subject to siege. Suburban occupants could easily be cut off from resources, eventually running dangerously close to starvation while an ever growing inhuman horde gathers outside. You can not eat bullets and gold bars. Eventually, by desperate act or carelessness, the hordes will eventually find entry through a broken window or a battered screen door.

In contrast, it is easy to imagine a network of makeshift bridges spanning the short distances between Japanese homesteads, temples and shrines. Resources and skills sets could be combined to colonize abandoned neighborhood homes. Eventually a network of homes, roof-top gardens, protected construction sites, fenced athletic fields, and sundry stores could be maintained, cultivated.

Eventually a new city would build itself over the infested ruins of the old, spreading itself out along ribbons of past density. The inhabitants of this new city would use and adapt the machinery of inherited urbanity; the sewers, canals, underground infrastructure, to short circuit the dangers and maintain living standards.
This new city and others like it would resemble Venetian cities crafted over zombie seas.

Most apocalyptic fiction focuses on a return to wilderness, man as an inherently rural being. This, I think, is a uniquely American fantasy. However,  it might be that cities, as they always have, retain their role as the epicenters of human civilization after the fall of man.

Moorsgate Media