CONCEPT
The following section is presented with credit given to Dr. John H. Bodley of Washington State University.
Spoiler for CONCEPT:
USEFUL DEFINITIONS
Spoiler:
Society: a human population with territorial boundaries which exhibits consistent interaction, intermarries within itself, and shares similar language and culture.
Culture: the socially patterned and learned thoughts, behaviors, and constructs that guide human interactions and that is the unique way humans adapt to natural and social environments.
Social Power: the ability of an individual to obtain or achieve what they want despite the objections of others.
Imperia / Imperium: the self-centered power network of a given individual, including all other persons that might be commanded or called upon for assistance, and any institutional structure that one might direct.
The chief utilization of culture within a society is its use in exercising social power. There are four kinds of social power: ideological, or control over how and what people know; economic, or control over the labor of others to produce material gain; political, or control over the institutions of government; and military, or the use or threat of use of violence. An arbitrary individual in a society is given to use his or her imperium to exercise social power for the benefit of themselves and their household. The method in which these imperia are organized is a function of the cultural world in which the society in question finds itself.
There are three successive and distinct cultural worlds: the Tribal, the Imperial, and the Commercial. These are so named for their organization of social power. These so-called cultural worlds are overlapping and non-exclusive entities built upon each other, and each continues the exhibition of traits of its predecessors, albeit in a modified form. A given cultural world is composed of intermarrying societies in which culture is used to organize society in broadly similar ways. People within the same cultural world may represent different societies and languages and may have different lifestyles and manners of providing for themselves, but they share similar views as to the overall purpose of their cultures and what tools can be employed for human ends.
Although the specifics of each cultural world are effects of history and its events, their generalized patterns may be extrapolated and applied to any given human society. For the purposes of this game, they will be used to indicate the relative complexity, development, and organization of a given society and its culture. Since culture is herein referring not only to the mental constructs of a society, but also to its material constructs, this will also be indicative of relative technological development.
In the Tribal World, all forms of social power are available to a given individual via kin and marriage, virtually all individuals in the accompanying society are treated as family, and the household is the central social institution. In the Imperial World, political rulers have achieved a monopoly on military, economic, and ideological sources of institutionalized power and are its sole legal executors. In the Commercial World, business elites have utilized unequal exchanges to amass both tangible and intangible wealth and income while utilizing economic power to gain political and ideological power.
The cultural processes exhibited and emphasized by a given culture is dependent upon the cultural world in which that given culture resides:
CULTURAL PROCESSES AND SUBPROCESSES BY CULTURAL WORLD
Spoiler:
Tribal World
Humanization: the production, maintenance, and reproduction of human beings and culture.
Conceptualization: producing abstract concepts and symbols that shape behavior
Materialization: giving physical form to concepts
Verbalization: producing speech
Socialization: producing human societies by exogamy
Cultural Transmission: reproducing culture
Imperial World
Politicization: the production and maintenance of centralize political power by co-opting the humanization process.
Taxation: extracting surplus production to support government
Conquest: extracting booty, slaves, and tribute
Specialization: government employment
Militarization: development of professional military
Bureaucratization: hierarchical command structures
Urbanization: development of cities
Commercial World
Commercialization: the production and maintenance of private profit-making business enterprise as a means of accumulating capital, by co-opting the humanization and politicization processes.
Commodification: market for land, labor, money, basic goods and services
Industrialization: mass production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services
Capitalization: ownership of means of production separated from labor
Corporatization: business enterprise becomes suprahuman
Externalization: costs of commercial growth are socialized
Supralocalization: business enterprise is detached from community
Financialization: finance institutionalized, separated from production
In addition to the existence of the cultural worlds themselves, it is useful to understand the fundamentally connected components of any given culture within its culture world: Infrastructure, Structure, and Superstructure, corresponding to the material, behavioral, and mental attributes of a culture. Below is a table illustrating the constituent parts of these components, and (not necessarily wholly inclusive, nor exhaustive and comprehensive) some of their manifestations in real life, by cultural world.
INFRASTRUCTURE, STRUCTURE, AND SUPERSTRUCTURE IN THREE CULTURAL WORLDS
Code:
Tribal World Imperial World Commercial World
Infrastructure: Material Basis of Society and Culture
Human Population 6-84 million 100+ million billions
Nature, Energy natural resources natural resources natural resources and
and Materials and services and services services, fossil fuels
Technology tools of foraging tools of intensive industrial tools, factory
gardening, herding agriculture, farming, mechanized
irrigation, plows, transport, electronic
metal, writing information systems
Structure: Organization of Society
Economy domestic subsistence, tribute, tax, global markets, commodities,
feasting, reciprocal plunder, conquest, money, factories, financial
exchange slavery, coins institutions, public debt,
specialization, corporations, capital
unequal exchange, accumulation, unequal
limited markets, exchange
long-distance
luxury trade
Society low density rural high density rural, high density rural, cities
bands of 50, tribes cities of 100000, of millions, capitalists,
and villages of 500, social class: royalty laborers, consumers, race
family, kin, affines, nobles, commoners, ethnicity, nationality,
young, old, males, slaves, castes, social classes, community,
females, language ethnicity commonwealth
Polity / Government autonomous bands chiefdoms of 5000, constitutional nation
and villages of 500, city-states of 50000, states of 100+ million,
descent groups kingdoms of 5 million, courts, police, professional
empires of 50 million, military, democracy,
armies, tyranny, universities
bureaucracy
Superstructure: Empirical Knowledge, Noumenal Beliefs and Practices
Ideology animism, shamanism mana, high gods, nationalism, patriotism
ancestor cults, myth polytheism, divine monotheism, knowledge
magic, ritual, taboo, kings, priests, sacred advertising, economic
spirits, divination, texts, human sacrifice growth, progress, free
animal sacrifice market
For the purposes of this game, these different components will be broken down and distributed into a more familiar statistics table.
STATISTICS
So what does all of that mean? Its fairly simple: when the systems of culture are viewed in the appropriate way, many of the by now familiar statistics a given player is likely to be acquainted with are derived, and are produced in such a way as to enable the desired pace and level of detail to be prosecuted.
NAME / Player
Progression: Cultural World / assorted details
Development: Human Development Rating / Nature, Energy listing
Government: Population / Polity / Government
Military: Army Rating / Navy Rating
Vitality: Economy / Cultural Health
Society: Society (Details)
Values: Society (Behaviors)
Tenets: Ideology
Overview: Summation and Miscellaneous
As can be seen, many of the aspects demonstrated in the Conceptual Exposition can be neatly dropped into more familiar trappings. Further details are provided below.
Spoiler for PROGRESSION:
A societys progression is its degree of advancement through the cultural worlds, as well as any outstanding technological developments or deficiencies not to be expected of it given that cultural world. For the purposes of precision, different tiers (Low, Middle, and High) may be recognized as corresponding to increasingly advanced development within each cultural world. These prefixes will be appendaged to a societys progression entry as a means of more precisely pinpointing its complexity. Examples are provided below for the purposes of illustration, but are not to be taken as gospel:
Low Tribal World: Tasmanian Aborigines to Australian Aborigines
Middle Tribal World: Modern Amazonian Tribes
High Tribal World: African Cattle Herders to Tonga Chiefdoms
Low Imperial World: Hawaiian Kingdom to Sumerian Empires
Middle Imperial World: Persian Empires
High Imperial World: Post-Han Chinese Empires
Low Commercial World: Spanish Empire
Middle Commercial World: British Empire
High Commercial World: United States of America
Spoiler for DEVELOPMENT:
A societys development is both a listing of the major natural resources under its control (flora, fauna, and mineralogical) and a descriptor of its human development rating (life expectancy, literacy, education, standard of living, infrastructure) relative to its cultural world. These values are incompatible across separate cultural worlds (for example, an average person in a Middle Tribal culture will probably be happier and better off than anything up to a Middle Commercial inhabitant) and only vaguely illustrative versus other divisions within the same cultural world. They serve chiefly to illustrate how good life is in a given society. The available human development ratings are as follows:
Least Developed / Less Developed / Developing / Developed / Advanced
Spoiler for GOVERNMENT:
A societys government is a description of its upper tier of leadership, on whatever scale that leadership might rule. For most societies this will include a brief (sentence long) description of government organization and any pertinent, outstanding features of government. Also included is a rough accounting of the population of a given society.
Spoiler for MILITARY:
A societys military are the forces it may call upon during times of conflict, whether for offensive or defensive purposes. A military is divided between an Army and a Navy, for those at least capable of possessing both, and the entry for both will consist of a strength index relative to its cultural world. These values are again incompatible across separate cultural worlds (it is to be generally assumed that, short of a large and tangible advantage, a vastly technologically inferior opponent will lose). That index is as follows:
Pathetic / Weak / Average / Strong / Colossal
In addition, a brief (sentence long) overview of forces utilized, training, and doctrine will be included to add some character to this description. Further details may be included in an appendix, if necessary.
Spoiler for VITALITY:
A societys vitality is a description of its health as a functioning entity. This includes both the physical, its economy (analogous to its heart) and the immaterial, its culture (analogous to a soul, if you will). It is possible for a country in poor economic straits to undergo a renaissance in its cultural output, and for a rich country to become culturally bankrupt. Both are evaluated along the following scale:
Weak / Declining / Stagnant / Growing / Strong
Spoiler for SOCIETY:
A societys society entry is a description of outstanding details of that society, chiefly as regards its physical construction. Information such as the presence of castes and stratification or division, types of inheritance, language, writing, and other notable societal characteristics will be listed.
Spoiler for VALUES:
A societys long term behavior is influenced by the values that society embraces. Values represent the perceptive matrix through which a society is likely to view its choices and interactions in a given scenario. The chief function of values is to give their societies methods of generating coherent and characteristic responses to events not calculated for in orders, whatever those events might be.
Each value is allocated an entry ranging from 0 to 3, with 0 corresponding to the left-hand stance and 3 corresponding to the right-hand stance. The in-between values of 1 and 2 are the equivalent of adding somewhat to the description of the value they are nearest to; for example, a society with an Individualist / Collectivist rating of 2 would best be described as somewhat individualist.
A given individual value represents a simple (first order) response to a given topic. More complex (higher order) behavior involves the computation of a stance using several values. As an example, the third order behavior of a nation having the Naval (3), Conductive (3), and Somewhat Defensive (1) values would likely be an inclination towards blockades to strangle its enemies in wartime.
There are a total of sixteen (16) values available. Not all values are initially available, nor will all values be available at any given time. The values available to a given society depend strongly upon its cultural progression. The values list has been color-coded to represent the given cultural world (and its corresponding subdivisions) in which the value is applicable. Red corresponds to the Tribal World, yellow corresponds to the Imperial World, and green corresponds to the Commercial World. Left to right progresses through each cultural world in the order of Low, Medium, and High. If an indicator is lit, the value is available for that given stage of progression.
Sedentary / Migratory - The measure to which a society is mobile or static in overall geographic positioning.
Offensive / Defensive - The measure in which a society is inclined to respond to threats, either by defending itself or attacking to defend its interests.
Militant / Pacifist - The measure in which a society is inclined to persuasion of others, either through negotiation or action.
Terrestrial / Aquatic - The measure by which a society is inclined to focus its power and prowess, either upon the sea or upon the land.
Constructive / Destructive - The measure by which a society constructs itself based on its neighbors, either peacefully or hostilely taking from them.
Cooperative / Autonomous - The measure by which a society is inclined to achieve its goals, either by working with others or operating by itself.
Individualist / Collectivist - The measure to which a society is willing or unwilling to subvert an individual to the will of the group.
Hedonistic / Ascetic - The measure to which members of a society seek material pleasure in the course of their existence.
Idealistic / Pragmatic - The measure by which a society is willing to evaluate problems and define solutions to them.
Productive / Conductive - The measure by which a society obtains necessary goods, either by chiefly producing them or exchanging with others for them.
Urban / Rural - The measure to which a society's people inhabit dense, urbanized areas.
Centralized / Decentralized - The measure to which a society is willing to concentrate the power of its leadership in an arbitrarily defined setting or endeavor.
Vertical / Horizontal - The measure in which a society is inclined to develop, either outward through acquisition of new resources, or upward through improvement of existing ones.
Open Society / Closed Society - The measure to which a society's leadership is responsive and accountable to its citizens in an arbitrarily defined setting or endeavor.
Secular / Pious - The measure to which a society places importance in its spiritual beliefs.
Quantitative / Qualitative - The measure to which a society is willing to impose quality control on its produced effects despite potential detriments to cost and output.
For values which a society has not yet matured enough to diversify its opinions in, a pragmatic, ad hoc opinion focused chiefly on survival, stability, and security which is logical within the confines of the local environment is to be assumed.
Spoiler for TENETS:
The tenets of a society are the ideas and concepts it embraces as being integral to the overarching mental construct behind its culture. These typically include more abstract values the society might embrace, such as charity, honor, duty, freedom, power, and so forth, and the manner in which these values are taught and conveyed, such as through religion or philosophy.
Major religions and philosophies, as well as certain notable ideological constructs of a society, will be listed under this statistic, with more complete entries in a reference index, if necessary.
Spoiler for OVERVIEW:
A societys overview is a summary of its traits coupled with a brief historical overview.
Thank you for participating in this Aperture Science computer-aided enrichment activity.
If only because most of those are universal; I suppose there is some difference in priorities and exact forms, but still, this is going to be largely useless for your purposes and definitely not worth wasting space on in the stats.
