How?

I have begun playing on small maps and found the AI has some really severe advantages or cheats on smaller maps.

Here is an example. Latest game, small map 4 players including myself. Max number of CS. 1 civ has all the CS listed as allies, every turn. At 249 turns into the game, how is that possible? There is no way the civ can be generating that kind of gold with 3 cities. (That is all everyone has, 3 cities each).

Spamming religious units. IN another game, where it was on a tiny map, the other civ had 5 religious units that basically followed my 2 around and reconverted them back. Again, max number of CS on a tiny map.

It seems the smaller the map, the religions / civs ratios gets smaller exponentially.

to test a theory, I actually used the IGE and spawned 8 religous units and transformed the world to my religion (Judaism) and 5 turns later the world reverted back, even my allies....

My question is not does the AI cheat or such, but is the game weighted towards 1 AI becoming dominate? In the world's court or what ever you call it, it seems 1 AI alway has the CS as allies....

It's not hard to have all CS's as allies. Ideologies, in particular, make it very easy to gain allies en masse.

is there a way to tell which way they will lean in ideology?

Yeah, you get a notification when they pick one.

What difficulty are you playing on? Starting with King, the AI gains bonuses to literally all areas.

prince and king

Just advise:
1. Take Greece
2. Select tradition. Plend to protect all city states.
3. Build Stonehenge
4. Take pantheon to get some more faith. Found religion with gold belief.
5. Build several cities.
6. After tradition go merkantilism.
7. Ally all citi-states. Start from religious and martimire.
8. Before turn 200 you can ally all cs.