Caphiria: Difference between revisions

Magistrates are afforded personal Lictors (imperial bodyguards) from a special department of the IPF according to the degree of political power possessed by their office. For example, an Imperator has 24 lictors and a Censor has 18 but a city prefect has 2. Wielding the fasces to indicate their civil authority, lictors have the power to arrest suspected criminals and kill anyone they deem a threat to their assigned magistrate.

   

The coat of arms for the Imperial Armed Forces.

The Imperial Armed Forces has three main branches:

In addition to the three main service branches, the Imperial Armed Forces contains three additional sub-branches: the National Guard (itself a function of the Department of Civilian Defense), which is the primary military reserve force, the Imperial Police Force tasked with being the principal law enforcement agency and domestic security service, and the Praetorian Guard which has two distinct and critical national security missions: protecting the nation's leaders and safeguarding the financial and critical infrastructure of the Imperium. The Praetorian Guard is also unique in that it maintains a division that reports directly to the Imperator with no oversight.

Caphiria's military is backed by a large stockpile of nuclear weapons. About 2,500 ICBMs are stored in facilities across the empire, either underwater, underground and on battleships. The majority of atomic warheads use a single-stage fusion design, while the rest are neutron bombs or dual-stage H-bombs. A great deal of these rockets will open in the atmosphere releasing multiple independent reentry vehicles (MIRVs) for a maximum spread of destruction. Each of the rest detonate as a single massive explosion.

Caphiria maintains an internal military intelligence agency, the Ministry of Intelligence. The Ministry of Intelligence consists of several departments and agencies that work separately and together to conduct intelligence activities to support the foreign policy and national security of Caphiria. This serves as the foundation of the Caphirian Intelligence Community (CIC), a collection of intelligence agencies that operate within and external to the military. The Department of Military Intelligence (DMI) contains agencies such as the Office of Naval Intelligence, Office of Reconnaissance, Office of Geospatial Intelligence, Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, Office of Analysis, Research, and Intelligence, and the Intelligence and Security Command. The DMI also includes the Imperial Police Force, Praetorian Guard, and the Office of Security Affairs.

The Senate makes no secret of its military intentions to the national and foreign press. Statements to the public freely admit: restraining foreign powers, overthrowing threatening regimes, and destabilizing national foes. The central strategic goals of the Legion and Navy are defense of the Imperium at all costs and pursuance of Caphiria's policies by non-political means. These constitute the heart of Caphiria's armed forces.

Supplementing the national defense of the Legion and Navy is the National Guard of the Imperium (Castellanae Imperiae). Its primary instrument is the web of forts (castrum) dotting the Imperium. At least one operates in each province, supplying between 1,000 and 5,000 Castellanara to its protection. A single castrum is administered by a base commander (Praefectus Castrorum) of the same rank as centurions. His authority over his assigned base is typically respected by higher rank officers (like Duces) but can be overridden if necessary.

Besides the guardsmen based in a castrum, new legionary recruits (tirones) and reserve legionaries (adscripticii) reside there to prepare for deployment to replace fallen legionaries. Legionaries themselves are based in special castra specific to each legion. One particular base, the Castrum Arzercavalli, is tucked away in the mountains of the Xalen Province administered jointly by the Generalissimus of the Legion and the Rector Indicius of Caphirian Intelligence.

Main article: Economy of Caphiria

   

A recession of sorts was entered in 1998 but unemployment has yet to exceed 4%. Subtract cyclical unemployment to see that Caphiria's natural rate of unemployment fluctuates around 1-3.90%. However, unemployment protection is almost non-existent. The federal government only assists in the search for new jobs, by facilitating communication. General unemployment benefits have never been offered in the modern history of the Imperium. Also, unlike former platonic socialist countries, workers unions are absolutely illegal. There are federal regulations that force guilds to provide a high minimum wage and a safe, non abusive work environment for their workers, but there is nothing in the way of health benefits or of allowances for worker strikes. However, severance pay is very large by government law and every Caphirian worker can expect no less than 35 days of paid vacation. Certain institutions such as federal buildings and schools are not allowed to offer so many holidays but still offer about 20 days. With low regulation, no unions, high minimum wage, and no unemployment benefits, Caphirian voluntary unemployment rate is almost the lowest in the world.

Data collected by the Imperial Census Bureau has calculated a per capita GDP of $67,109, which makes it the second highest in the world. A more meaningful quantity, the median pre-tax income of a Caphirian citizen, is equal to $63,435. However, Caphirian society suffers from an income inequality deeply ingrained into its history and class system. The top 6% of the population control almost 75% of the empire's wealth - the top 1% alone control more than a third. Still, a Caphirian citizen has an incredibly high standard of living compared with residents of other states. Every one of them has access to liberal amounts of food, water, electricity, living space and can afford telescreens, cars, computers, books, entertainment, and vacations in the plural. Non-citizens are not so fortunate.

That being said, historically when citizens or corporations lacked the means to support themselves the Senate's first action for centuries has been to offer low-interest loans. This policy of micro-financing poverty is the government's attempt to reduce public dependence on hand-outs and bail-outs while still mitigating the short-term damage from widespread private bankruptcies.

The empire benefits from rapid infrastructural development that has not been marked by periods of decay or destruction. Roads built in the 8th century are still used today while protocols that have served for centuries continue to council policy-makers facing modern problems. The Senate is deeply involved in most large scale construction projects, providing commodities such as transportation and sewer access by directly paying large construction guilds (curatores) for their development.

Federal expenditure is largely allocated toward developing infrastructure that supports Caphirian citizens. Structures with which the Senate and Imperator are involved include viae (roads), aquae (aqueducts), cloacae (sewers), vehiculae (public transport), teleloquum (communications), and basilicae (public buildings). Caphirian highways are known for providing thousands of years of use with little maintenance. The empire's communication network is supported by 1,289 satellites and hundreds of thousands of miles of fiber optic cables.

Caphiria has been a leader in technological innovation throughout its history, particularly since the late 18th century and scientific research since the mid-20th century. Technology and science in Caphiria has a long history, producing many important figures and developments in the field. The Great War had a profound impact on the development of science and technology in Caphiria, leading to one of the most spectacular – and controversial – accomplishments of Caphirian technology: the harnessing of nuclear energy. The concepts that led to the splitting of the atom were developed by the scientists of many countries, but the conversion of these ideas into the reality of nuclear fission was accomplished in Caphiria and used to end the war.

As in physics and chemistry, Caphirians have dominated the Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine since the Great War. The private sector has been the focal point for biomedical research in Caphiria, and has played a key role in this achievement.

The development of the Internet in Caphiria happened in parallel across the world and while Caphiria does not claim to have developed it first, it does claim to have possessed the first fully-connected country. Early computers were limited to direct channels for communication, where data flowed continuously between connected computers, primarily for military application. In the late 1940's, a supercomputer in the Petramori Region in Xalen and a small terminal in Venceia were linked over existing telecommunication networks by exchanging data in packets. This connection became permanent was critical in coordinating the development of the first nuclear bomb. This was eventually supplemented by a similar inter-networking of hundreds of magisterial and military computers across the Caphiric world.

Unclaimed domain names can be created after purchasing the domain directly from the government for ₳10. Once purchased, the domain is owned by its buyer who may sell it as his own property. Such transactions are made through the Ministry of Communication.

Every watt of power generated in the public sector of the Imperium comes from either renewable or nuclear resources. The Census of 2030 calculated that the Imperium uses an annual total of 57,000 TW-h in electricity consumption, which translates to 51,803 kW per household. This is broken down as:

A major industrial energy cost is urban climate control, which has existed in major cities for the past twenty years. Cities with a population above 10 million make use of an extensive climate control system to regulate temperature, precipitation and air quality. Meanwhile, animal life is restricted by natural and artificial means to permit eagles, falcons and domesticated mammals and eliminate rodents, insects and unwanted birds. Urban temperature is kept from 0 to 25 degrees Celsius by powerful heating and cooling stations built seamlessly into the city and below its streets. The city of Venceia receives special treatment in this regard as there are satellites in tundra orbits above Sarpedon that reflect additional sunlight onto the city during the day, giving it warm Spring temperatures all year round. Weather control by cloud seeding keeps rainfall in the countryside and softens disasters like tornadoes and hurricanes to more manageable scales.

Cars (Autokinetici), or autoki, are class-oriented possessions, with specific designs common to certain strata of society. Most lower class Plebeians do not own a personal vehicle, using the empire's extensive public transit system. On the opposite end of the spectrum, patricians may own multiple luxury vehicles powered by autonomy . Cars are powered almost exclusively by onboard batteries that last days. Since vehicles larger than a bicycle are not allowed in city limits from 7 am to 9 pm, the state has always had a way to store cars while their owners visit a city. Recently, the government built massive storage towers a few kilometers from major cities to replace the public parking lots that were used in centuries past that themselves replaced massive public stables. These parking towers are reachable by public transit from nearby cities and can usually hold between 10,000 to a million cars at 10,000 per tower. The towers are very efficient in regards to space, extending several hundred meters underground (or above-ground) and using lifts to arrange the cars in racks.

The entire system, over the centuries, has an estimated cumulative construction cost over $700 billion and has needed minimal maintenance making it one of the largest construction projects in human history before the mega-projects of modern Caphiria.

In the last century, Caphiria has proved its prowess as a civilization by engaging in monumental, even astronomical scale construction projects that dwarf anything else in its history. Without even including Caphiria's renovations of the skyline of Venceia or of the Athenaeum, a large list of costly programs can be made:

The empire had rapid population growth over the last two centuries. However, immigration is severely limited by the Constitution. Numerous bureaucratic hoops stand between a peregrini (foreigner) and entry into the Imperium to live. Citizenship is even more difficult and costly to acquire. Therefore, most of the country's growth is natural, with 26 million new births per yer. The distribution of the population is widely uneven. The most densely populated areas are the metropolitan areas of Venceia and Augsustanis, while vast regions such as the Lacio Mountains are very sparsely populated.

Main article: Caphiric Latin

Caphiria has two official languages: Latin and English. With regards to Latin, the Imperium recognizes two distinct versions, Classical Latin and Caphiric Latin. The former referrers to the classical and outdated language of antiquity; Caphiric Latin is a modern adaptation of the classical language, infusing it with an updated vocabulary. It's estimated that close to 96% of the population speaks Caphiric Latin as their primary language, followed by English as their strong backup. Caphiria has numerous regional dialects, however, the establishment of a national education system has led to decrease in variation in the languages spoken across the country during the 20th century. Standardization was further expanded in the 1950s and 1960s thanks to economic growth and the rise of mass media and television.

Several minority languages are legally recognized: Cartadanian, Kiravic Coscivian, Istroyan, Cronan, Julian Ænglish, and Lebhan.

Main article: Religion in Caphiria

In modern times, Caphirians take great pride in their religious faith, openly discussing it in casual conversation. There is no stigma in professing one's belief or - in today's culture - non-belief at leisure. The majority of the irreligious are wealthy intellectuals who have personal qualms with the Church or who became disillusioned with the rigidity of religious faith. Despite their intelligent base and success at organizing, atheists have failed to challenge the two thousand years of theological hypotheses put forward by the Church. As well, silence in the face of their occasional attacks against religious institutions has dominated ecclesiastical policy for centuries.

Main article: Education in Caphiria

The Ministry of Education sets overall educational standards, though private schools are generally free to determine their own curriculum and staffing policies, with mandatory accreditation and regulation from the Ministry. This allows for more "creative" and "third wave" educational systems to have the chance to develop on top of the already established educational standards. By law, education is compulsory over the age of 3 and ends at 16. The public education system in Caphiria is highly complex and segmented, operated jointly by provincial and local governments. The educational stages are: Children's School (discatorium), Core Education (regulatorium), University (universalis), and Academy (Academiae).