Civic Combination Possibility

Have you ever thought of how weird some of the combined civics would work in reality?

Could a nation be operate on Police State and Free Speech?

Enginseer said:

Could a nation be operate on Police State and Free Speech?

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Nope. Also some of the Econ civics wouldn't work with most Religion civics. State Prop and/or Police State with Free Religion (or Free Speech)?

There's also a few in the same category that aren't mutually exclusive. Univ Suff and Representation, for instance. Slavery, Serfdom, and Caste could probably all be implemented at the same time. And it seems like Nationhood could go with just about anything.

My 2. Now I'll observe and possibly join the political debates to follow...

Universal Suffrage + Free Speech + Slavery + State Property + Free Religion
Everyone can vote for same government and choose any religion (with 1 religion allowed - "believe in government"), speak free about it and enjoy life being slave forever now thats paradise...

/still in civ this combination actually works really nice.../

Well, do you consider the civics by their names, by their effects, or by what they're intended to represent? The Confederacy had Slavery, but it wasn't the "slap anybody you can in chains for forced labor" type, and neither was Roman slavery. In Byzantium, the Emperor owned everything, but it wasn't Communist State Property.

I mean this here:

elmurcis said:

Universal Suffrage + Free Speech + Slavery + State Property + Free Religion

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Sounds a whole lot like the Roman Republic, modernized. People can worship any gods they like, so long as the state is respected. There's no major private business or corporations. There's a large slave class, but all citizens can vote/create art/etc/etc.

Honestly, the only strictly logical incompatibilities I ever saw would be Free Speech with either Police State or Theocracy, both of which would seem to preclude the open exchange of ideas. But I think most of the others could be rationalized as existing in varying degrees.

State Property could represent everything from a Police State controlling every aspect of economic life, to a democratic society which chose to nationalize major industries to guard against undue influence from foreign corporations.

Slavery/Serfdom could represent the bondage of a particular race or class in a society where the majority enjoyed representative democracy, as was the case in the CSA.

Etc.

What's stopping a police state from having free speech? I would consider the current state of militarized local police via the 1033 program a near police state (which simply means that the military provides law enforcement) yet we have free speech for the most part. Even in the flawed so-called communist state of USSR, everyone was allowed to vote (albeit more locally than nationally) in the 1 party system. But our 2 party system doesn't provide much more diversity than that of soviet Russia lol.

So, IMO, you can have a Police State with Universal Suffrage and Free Speech. Representation with Universal Suffrage and State Property and many other combinations that would seem impossible if taken at face value.

Actually, I think the best take on this conflict (in terms of gameplay) is implemented in certain mods, like RevDCM and C2C. There, certain civic combinations will encourage instability -- your cities may start having revolts and in the worst case you'll descend into civil war. Which is exactly what you'd expect in the real world if you suddenly loosened restrictions on the press in an authoritarian state, or tried to impose martial law on a people with long-established traditions of personal liberty.

I'm interested in how you come to that conclusion, duckstab. If we think in the rigid terms of the early 20th century, then perhaps you are correct. The world is completely different, however. Research has shown that highly funded marketing that is rooted in psychology has a measurable impact on people which goes way beyond simple consumerism. You don't even need restrictions on the press if that press is already in alignment with your authoritarian goals. You don't need martial law if you can militarize local police departments and minimize the conscious understanding of the general populace with your press that is in alignment with your authoritarian goals. A perfect example? The US. Don't even get me started on personal liberties which have been degraded and diminished for the last 15-20 years (much more so in the last 13).

Yet, we still have a degree of free speech and we still (legally) have universal suffrage & representation.

Universal Suffrage and Representation are in the same civic column, a civ can't be both in Civ4.

For my part, I tend to think of Representation being more elitist, like the old republics of Rome, Northern Italy, even America when it was founded. "Must own property to vote" and all that.

Why can't you have free speech and theocracy? Theocracy just means that a religious organization controls the government; you could have a theocracy that allowed free speech. Sure, some people might say things that went against the government, but if you had a population that was sufficiently supportive of the religion, and the government was sufficiently effective, it could work.

Same with State Property and Free Religion. You could have the state own all the houses of worship, but still allow all different religions to be practiced. The religions might not all be thrilled with this, but it could be done.

Police state + free speech really depends on how you define police state. If you allow for a state with a heavy police and surveillance presence, but which does not consider free speech to be a crime (just other actions that it monitors for heavily), then it's possible, as blitzkrieg1980 is arguing. And indeed the U.S. has moved considerable towards that since 2001, with not too many additional restrictions on free speech (although you see a lot of stories about people being arrested for things posted on Facebook these days), but a much larger law enforcement/surveillance presence. It's far from traditional police states, but it's not hard to see a possibility of, 20 years from now, it being exceptionally difficult to commit any crime and get away with it for any appreciable length of time, yet still having more or less free speech.

Free speech works fine with police state. You speaking freely does not mean the state is going to listen or care what you say. I'm not first to say this in this thread, but I agree with it.

A free speech police state could be something like the Enlightened Despotism/benevolent dictatorship ideal, too. A single leader controls the state completely, but allows free speech due to his personal beliefs, or to shore up legitimacy.

Kind of a "I don't have to oppress my people, they'll agree with my rule" thing.

HeliosDisciple said:

A free speech police state could be something like the Enlightened Despotism/benevolent dictatorship ideal, too. A single leader controls the state completely, but allows free speech due to his personal beliefs, or to shore up legitimacy.

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Sounds like Despotism/Free Speech; according to Police State in game: "Civil liberties are denied and those who voice opinions contrary to the government are subject to punishments ranging from imprisonment to death".
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Robo-Star said:

Sounds like Despotism/Free Speech; according to Police State in game: "Civil liberties are denied and those who voice opinions contrary to the government are subject to punishments ranging from imprisonment to death".
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Depends on what you define as 'contrary to the government'. Take a government that allows debate about some or even most of its policies, but cracks down heavily on any direct challenge to its authority. Is that a police state by this definition? Does it allow free speech?

Timsup2nothin said:

Depends on what you define as 'contrary to the government'. Take a government that allows debate about some or even most of its policies, but cracks down heavily on any direct challenge to its authority. Is that a police state by this definition? Does it allow free speech?

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Yes that is a Police State and no it doesn't allow Free Speech. It is a Bureaucracy.
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Robo-Star said:

Yes that is a Police State and no it doesn't allow Free Speech. It is a Bureaucracy.
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Hmmmm. Maybe. Or maybe running Nationalism. Begs the question though...is there anyone in the real world actually running Free Speech?

Timsup2nothin said:

Hmmmm. Maybe. Or maybe running Nationalism. Begs the question though...is there anyone in the real world actually running Free Speech?

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It's the only Legal civic that applies to the current US.

HeliosDisciple said:

It's the only Legal civic that applies to the current US.

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I thought we just determined that bureaucracy or nationalism is a better fit. Maybe even vassalage.

Timsup2nothin said:

I thought we just determined that bureaucracy or nationalism is a better fit. Maybe even vassalage.

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There is no possible way that the US is more of a feudal Vassalage system than Free Speech, come on now.

Bureaucracy is right out, too. Washington DC isn't swelling with production and commerce.

Nationalism, if we are doing it, we're doing it badly, since the draft was removed in 1980.

Although I suppose you could say we keep flipping between Nationalism and Free Speech...it seems overly harsh. Americans aren't being rounded into camps for criticizing the government or anything.

HeliosDisciple said:

There is no possible way that the US is more of a feudal Vassalage system than Free Speech, come on now.

Bureaucracy is right out, too. Washington DC isn't swelling with production and commerce.

Nationalism, if we are doing it, we're doing it badly, since the draft was removed in 1980.

Although I suppose you could say we keep flipping between Nationalism and Free Speech...it seems overly harsh. Americans aren't being rounded into camps for criticizing the government or anything.

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We might not be drafting, but large cities do produce military units at the expense of happiness. (It's not just a job, it's an adventure...and also the only job available) I mentioned Vassalage because it really doesn't have any effects that can be pointed out as not happening (our military units do get good training), and it describes our foreign policy pretty well.

There is a large number of high paying jobs in Washington generating tax revenues, but as far as hammers you are absolutely right...none of those jobs seem to produce much of anything.