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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Olgar Shiverstone" data-source="post: 6280467" data-attributes="member: 5868">I struggle to try to imagine a fantasy society where there's magic sufficient to create and control undead that would bother with slaves.  Undead don't need feeding, upkeep, or security, and aren't going to conspire to overthrow you. (I'm listening to Brandon Sanderson's Warbreaker at the moment, which has a morally-neutral take on undead.)That said, if you want an alternate model ... how about a society where citizenship (and thus political power) is only earned via service as a slave? Everyone becomes a slave, and stays a slave for life or eventually earns citizenship.  Alternately, you can be a member of society without political rights (e.g no vote, no property ownership), but to earn those political rights you have to earn citizenship by volunteering to serve as a slave for a fixed or indefinite period.  There might be complex legal structures built around the service as a slave, or not, depending upon how involved you want the relationship to be.</blockquote>