M.A.R. Barker, author of Tekumel, also author of Neo-Nazi book?

[Snarf Zagyg]

I will say that this discussion has gotten me curious. Has anyone ever made a list of the various D&D states and their government types in order to look at how many are e.g. autocracies vs. have some kind of democratic or representative system?

I haven't done a systemic check, but it wouldn't be that difficult if you were doing, inter alia, just the Greyhawk '83 set.

My recollection (in accord with what I posted in the other thread on this topic) is that while Greyhawk has a fair number of autocracies, Gygax put in almost every type of government in there that he could think of.

That said, even though there were a number of different "selection types," you often ended up with a single leader. It was relatively uncommon to have serious checks on the power (such as in the Yeomanry) or regular elections (such as in Hightown).

 

[Voadam]

Most fantasy setting government is left vague. A lot of what is specified will be a leader, usually a lord or monarch or whatever. When specifics of government get detailed they can vary widely as to whether they are thinly veneered modernisms, based off of some historical model, or created as a fantasy creation. I have seen a lot of modernisms in D&D settings from police force city watch to full modern judicial system trials and jails to universal schooling.

A fantasy monarchy could be a modern Queen of England and house of lords type setup with a liberal western democracy base with full rights. It could be a Queen Elizabeth setup where the monarchy is hugely strong. The gnomish monarchy and nobility titles may be jokes. The dragonborn monarchy may have a completely different setup.

The exact rights of people are not usually spelled out. It could be a romanticized Disney medieval backdrop. It could be a grimdark peasant slave situation. It could be a familiar liberal western democracy base with a thin fantasy veneer.

There can be slaves or no slaves. There can be racism and sexism and homophobia and religious persecution or none of that.

Mostly specifics are left vague or undefined and a DM has room to include what issues or backdrop they want in many ways for most fantasy settings.

This is a very different issue from siloing military acumen appreciation from historical horrors and context of individuals and militaries.

Fantasy settings can reasonably be divorced from historical context and implications. Using real-world historical contexts and implications along specific dimensions in fantasy is a specific choice, not a universal.

 

[pemerton]

A fantasy monarchy could be a modern Queen of England and house of lords type setup with a liberal western democracy base with full rights.

The contemporary UK is a first-past-the-post unicameral electoral democracy. The bicameralism is an illusion - as per the Parliament Acts of 1911 and 1949 the role of the House of Lords is ultimately procedural. The concession by the monarch that underpinned the enactment of the first of the Parliament Acts reveals that the monarchy is ultimately a matter of form, not substance: the Prime Minister has the constitutional power to lead a "revolution" simply by majority vote in the House of Commons.

I've never heard of a fantasy monarchy, in a D&D-type world, that resembles the contemporary UK, and for my part would find it anachronistic unless the goal was some sort of urban or modern fantasy. Off the top of my head I can't think of a fantasy monarchy even that looks like 18th century Britain or contemporary Morocco, but I'm not that widely read in the genre, and such a thing would to me be a bit less anachronistic.

 

[Jer]

I've never heard of a fantasy monarchy, in a D&D-type world, that resembles the contemporary UK, and for my part would find it anachronistic unless the goal was some sort of urban or modern fantasy. Off the top of my head I can't think of a fantasy monarchy even that looks like 18th century Britain or contemporary Morocco, but I'm not that widely read in the genre, and such a thing would to me be a bit less anachronistic.

Breland in Eberron is fairly close to a UK-style parliamentary monarchy, though not the contemporary one. The Nobles Chamber holds most of the power while the Commons Chamber is less so (or at least I think that's how it works - I might be confusing my own Eberron for the official one in the books in that respect).

 

[pemerton]

Breland in Eberron is fairly close to a UK-style parliamentary monarchy, though not the contemporary one. The Nobles Chamber holds most of the power while the Commons Chamber is less so (or at least I think that's how it works - I might be confusing my own Eberron for the official one in the books in that respect).

OK. In the contemporary UK, the House of Lords has no power except to impose a one-year delay on the passage of legislation, or a one-month delay for money bills.

In 1688, the Parliament of the UK exercised its power to stage a revolution that was in formal terms presented as an abdication.

The Eberron Wiki tells me that

While Boranel is the head of state, the Brelish Parliament handles much of the day to day legislation. The Nobles Chamber is made of 27 land-holding families, while the Commons chamber consists of officials elected in two-year cycles. The ir'Clarn family is the most influential out of the 27 making up the Nobles Chamber.​

From this I can't tell who enjoys the franchise, how the executive is established, how taxes are imposed, if there is a consolidated revenue fund and if so who controls it, and what legislative power the monarch enjoys. But on its face, it looks less liberal democratic than Britain in 1688, let alone the contemporary UK.

 

[Jer]

OK. In the contemporary UK, the House of Lords has no power except to impose a one-year delay on the passage of legislation, or a one-month delay for money bills.
...

From this I can't tell who enjoys the franchise, how the executive is established, how taxes are imposed, if there is a consolidated revenue fund and if so who controls it, and what legislative power the monarch enjoys. But on its face, it looks less liberal democratic than Britain in 1688, let alone the contemporary UK.

As far as the franchise goes (and again I'm away from my books) IIRC everyone who is a citizen of Breland over the age of 16 gets to vote for a representative in the Commons chamber. Noble Chamber is by land ownership and inheritance of title. King has authority but Nobles Chamber has the real power and the Commons chamber is as of the date of the setting maneuvering to try to get more power for themselves.

 

[Voadam]

I've never heard of a fantasy monarchy, in a D&D-type world, that resembles the contemporary UK, and for my part would find it anachronistic unless the goal was some sort of urban or modern fantasy.

You can't tell exactly what most fantasy monarchies resemble, they are left undefined on the specifics of their government for the most part and are open to individual DMs defining or characterizing them. Some go in depth on describing these types of things, but most do not.

Most fantasy settings have a light flavor which can be implemented in a number of ways.

Mostly you get that the ruler has the title of king or queen or baron or lord or whatever.

How do Chaotic Good elves set up their monarchies and their relationship for rulers and ruled? Goblin kings? How does the Queen of Air and Darkness hold power versus her court of dark fey?

Anachronisms are rife in fantasy settings. Sometimes these are intentional, sometimes these are blindspots or based on a lack of knowledge.

I expect many D&D fantasy settings in practice are generally modern perspective people in a D&D world to some extent. If you are a 5e peasant hero background you journey with the party and are not bound to the land in a feudal social contract. The same for some institutions such as businesses or governments or cultures. Lots of stuff is undefined and open to doing a lot of different ways. The details published may go in depth or be top level view and vague on details.

Someone taking the post WWI noir era theme of Eberron and basing one of the big kingdoms on modern UK as a baseline generally for filling in gaps and characterization would not seem amiss to me. I do not know enough of the specifics on Breland or Audair or destroyed Cyre to say how much that would clash with their full world lore though.

 

[pemerton]

How do Chaotic Good elves set up their monarchies and their relationship for rulers and ruled?

The immediate fictional model seems to be Lorien, with a dash of Rivendell. Lorien is a benevolent despotism, complicated by the fact that it has no economy (at least as far as the reader can tell) and no apparent social or economic conflicts of interest, and hence (again, as far as the reader can tell) no politics.

One could ask, what would the story of Lorien look like if written from a subaltern point of view? But that would be to subvert the genre so thoroughly that I don't even know if it makes sense. I certainly don't think the concept of CG monarchy would survive the change in perspective.

 

[Baron Opal II]

Ok, let's try this one last time, because the pedantry is getting too annoying.

Any form of government that is not fully enfranchised, democratic and ruled by law is, IMO, evil.

Okay

That anyone would actually defend any state that isn't fully enfranchised, democratic and ruled by law boggles my mind. It's actually rather frightening to be honest.

In the real world, of course not.

But, yeah, I'm done here. This was a minor point that was meant to reference how wargames elide (see, I can learn, I didn't use lampshade) the horror of what's being made into a game. I didn't quite realize that people actually believe that undemocratic systems of government without universal enfranchisement and basic human rights was a good thing. Who knew?

The horror of... Tsolyani Empire? Barony of Yan Kor, Theocracy of Livyanu? Free City of Greyhawk, City-States of the Dune Sea, The Scarlet Brotherhood, Kingdom of Cormyr, Kingdom of Mulhorand, Kingdom of Karrnath?

Yeah, none of them are awesome places to live. They aren't "fully enfranchised, democratic and ruled by law". But, they're not real.

Importantly, some of them exist to be decent places within a semi-medieval / Renaissance milieu. Some of them are meant to be interesting places to scout out. And some of them are meant to be overthrown or changed. Yes, terrible things are elided. To a childish level, in fact. I would be horrified to actually fireball a group of people, even if they meant me harm. But that's not actually happening. There are a lot of things that we ignore to play, because the real world is rough enough.

 

[Voadam]

The Eberron Wiki tells me that

While Boranel is the head of state, the Brelish Parliament handles much of the day to day legislation. The Nobles Chamber is made of 27 land-holding families, while the Commons chamber consists of officials elected in two-year cycles. The ir'Clarn family is the most influential out of the 27 making up the Nobles Chamber.

From this I can't tell who enjoys the franchise, how the executive is established, how taxes are imposed, if there is a consolidated revenue fund and if so who controls it, and what legislative power the monarch enjoys.

Agreed. It gives no indication one way or the other on those issues. It could be liberal democratic or not in different ways.

But on its face, it looks less liberal democratic than Britain in 1688, let alone the contemporary UK.

On the face of it I see no basis for saying it appears more or less liberal democratic.

It seems completely consistent with a similarly worded and focused description of the UK.

While Boranel Queen Elizabeth is the head of state, the Brelish UK Parliament handles much of the day to day legislation. The Nobles Chamber House of Lords is made of 767 sitting members whose seats are hereditary, by appointment, or by official function27 land-holding families, while the Commons chamber House of Commons consists of elected officials who hold office until parliament is dissolved. elected in two-year cycles. The ir'Clarn family is the most influential out of the 27 making up the Nobles Chamber.

It could easily be less democratic, but I don't see a basis from the cited description to conclude so.

Using the modern UK as your model for portraying that cited Breland lore seems consistent on the face of it.

One option among many.

Other lore about Breland might or might not be much more inconsistent with using such a model.

The monarch of Breland could be a complete autocrat who rules absolutely but delegates most of the boring day to day legislative duties to parliament while despotically asserting his power personally and through executive actions in running foreign policy, the military, spy networks, secret police, and so on.

Lots of options in interpreting or portraying most fantasy settings as written.