What is your favorite form of fantasy government?

I enjoy playing around with necocracy, where a council of the spirits of ancestors or honored dead rules.

In my D&D campaign, I have an independent city ruled by a "Council of Elders" that gain magic from their position together, almost like a coven of Hags.

USA sure does feel like a gerontocracy sometimes. Been talking about 70 and 80 year old options for a LONG time now.

You can also have the tension of the de facto government vs the de jure government. Like a republic vs the underlying the corporate plutocracy

I tried to incorporate some form of Kritocracy in one of my regions during worldbuilding. Loved the aspect of roaming judges that could judge cases as they travel around and instantaneously rule on cases that were brought to them. Examples that I probably took inspiration from would be judge dredd, Tyranny (video game), and judges during biblical times in israel. Though working on the government operations and higher echelons of government might turn it into a different form of government. So, working on making it stick to Kritocracy.

Another word you can go with an AI driven Society use the Wizard of Oz Truck the computer says I'm in charge

In a world I'm working on status is determined by service to the empire conferred by those of higher status. People have long chains of titles and honorifics on their names usually denoted by the greatest single status in casual encounters. They can be for various types of service, one character joined the army to gain citizenship, another is a priest knight who has authority over him, and another inherited it from his ancestors

The best example of anarchy I can think of is The Abyss from D&D, the plane of Chaotic Evil, which is somehow more Anarchical than Limbo (Chaotic Neutal), which is too hostile a place for life beyond the equivalent of space colonies or Pandemonium (Between Chaotic Evil and Chaotic Neutral), which embodies insanity. There's also the Chaotic Good plane of Arborea/Olympus and the plane between that and Limbo, Ysguard/Gladsheim, but the latter is too Norse-inspired to be "anarchy", a home for valliant warriors/vikings, and the former is spiritual in a way that makes it difficult to compare to human politics, with the plane emanating goodness and being inhabited by petitioners (people who've died and gone to their afterlife) of only Chaotic Good alignment, so it would be my second guess for closest to true anarchy.

Unrelated to the topic but, taking a moment to say… I listen to your videos while I work, and I just wanted to say thank you for these videos and providing so much deep insight into world building. I very much appreciate the long form videos as well, your channel is a gem!

I'd like to see more diarchies. There are many kingdoms and types of monarchial empires in my world, but there are also biarchies/diarchies as well as some federations and confederacies where each subpolity is it's own kingdom and all the monarchs meet for foreign policies. Think of something like the UAE, but it's more like an oligarchy where each member is a king with a kingdom rather than one of them being above the others. Another type that people forget about is the elected monarchy such as the Vatican. A monarch is elected by nobles from candidates, which are sometimes among the nobles. It is a monarchy where the position of king or queen is no inherited in any way. Imagine if there was an empire where the emperor is elected. We don't see that often in fiction but it was done before in real life. Something I tried to think about was how to show governments that are not linked to a territory. This would be like stateless tribes. Another version I've added to my world are "convoy societies" which are their own tribes. Instead of being a traveling group attached to a larger faction, the convoy itself is the whole faction, basically nomadic tribes travelling using animals, motor vehicles or both. They often take protection or transport jobs where they agree to carry expensive or important goods like firearms and autombiles. These are both rare and expensive goods in my world which could be stolen by bandits. I'm also wondering how to represent stateless tribes and clans on a map. As for meritocracy, I remember hearing that such tests used in China or the modern exams filter out certain subjective qualities needed in rulership resulting in leaders who don't care as much about how the citizens feel. My memory is rusty though so don't quote me on that.

One thing I think is often forgotten is that de-facto you often have a big mixture of a variety of these on different levels and that your ideals don't need to match with your actions or de-facto situation. A good example would be the stratification of societies that de-facto you can have an almost aristocracy/inherited rule situation on some level with the same family lines often ending up in important positions and/or the extreme power of big corporations. You can also have things like libertarian ideals mixed with the intense desire to police others around you (Homeowners associations...) and such. These also tend to be my favourites, what would society be without some degree of clashing ideals and idiosyncracies? Personally I have: Heartlands: Technocracy/direct democracy; De-facto lead by a council of experts, but every decision is presented to and can be challenged by the public at large (if you're there that is...) in what amounts to a cross between a debate and theater. Being good at these is also one way to get into the council, aside from being an extremely acclaimed expert. If you get in through consistently good debates you'd esentially be considered a "expert at debate". Scholar’s Coalition: Confederalism/oligarchy (Magocracy); Grew out of a guild system of mages that gained enough power to become a de-facto secondary leadership, now a generally recognized international power that's slowly been strongarming nations (Varying from Monarchies constitutional or not over confederations to young democracies) outside it into joining and nations inside it into giving them more and more leeway to rule. (While the individuals magic aptitude is not directly related to how high they are in the hierarchy it does help to be good at magic and their power is very much maintained by the collective promise/threat of magic defense/retribution.) Glora forest: Anarchy with some leanings of Technocracy. Held together by mutual agreement, tradition and mythology, the closest thing you get to leaders being experts in a variety of fields.

This has been one of the most interesting videos I have seen among your lessons. thank you! Regarding geocracy, the only example I can think of is the movie Avatar (the one with the blue aliens) because of that scene in which a floating seed lands on the tip of the arrow just before Neytiri shoots it at Jake Sully, she sees that as a sign from her deity which is also the planet itself. The only example of kakistrocacy that I can think of are the skaven that I saw in the Gotrek and Felix saga because those wererats are very treacherous towards each other and they know it perfectly well. Although their society has traits of being mageocracy because magic users can easily become leaders, but there are different types of leaders and it is also something of gerontocracy as the elderly are revered with great respect because skaven who has become old means that they had to survive many betrayals.

I think a geocratic republic would be interesting. The land xhooses emissaries who deliberate with their constituents snd arrange a system. A good example of a geocracy is the Avatar in the Last Airbender

I have a pretty interesting form of government. Not sure what to call it but there are two people who share power over a kingdom. The King who is a descendent of "The Man" who built the kingdom, and the Primary Adviser who is voted into power by the Tax Payers. Citizens of this kingdom are allowed to choose weather or not they want to pay taxes, and those who do get voting power to choose who will be the next Primary Advisor and other such laws. In this system, the higher you pay the more voting power you get, but a massive amount of poor people still have the power to out vote the few rich people. The Primary Advisor also has the power to choose between which of the Kings children will become the heir. Edit: Another government in my world is an Theocracy where the state is rule by an archpriest/priestess who is chosen DIRECTLY by the god they all worship.

A good example of a confederacy government being part of a plot is from a videogame called "Project Wingman," in the form of the Pacific Federation. They call themselves that but from the way its structured and how the member states have their own militaries it sounds like in theiry they are supposed to be a confederation since there are republics and monarchies in the Pacific Federation, as well as the presence of tariffs within the Federation. Problem is that the Federation is incredibly grasping and in large part run by bureaucrats that mainly come from the "Core States." One member country, Cascadia, wants to leave. But the Core States and Federation's whole hegemony is based on a resource called cordium (think uranium but spicier) and Cascadia has a large amount of it. So to preseve their pride and economic stranglehold on the world the Federation's "Crystal Kingdom" dedicates a lot to holding onto Cascadia, and commits a lot of war crimes in the attempt

You did leave out one real life form of government. Nekocracy! It's where the town votes in a house cat as the mayor, and have to get the house cat mayor to sign off on anything they want to change. There's at least 2 examples in the USA.

I think a Demarcus Madea perfect setting for a rogue administrative state

Surprise surprise 😂 I have heard of a kakistocracy before. I saw it in an Oxford Student's Companion from the 1930s

Kakistrocy is literally every government

Would kakistocracy technically be what Zaphod Beeblebrox is? Or no, that's just figurehead isn't it (in the books anyway). Back to jokes about the US senate I guess 😅

You forgot the Hive-mind, such as the Borg in Star Trek.

Hi, is there a video where you talk about how you did end up living in Finland? :)

for the synthocracy plotline watch the tv series by Albert Barillé : "Once upon a time in space" where the galaxy in threatened by the planet Yama in which a computer, created by a great scientist desapointed by humans'corruption, controles a militaro-industrial complex worked by robots... A "great computer" created to rule all nations of the galaxy by rationalism only... against the free will of all.

Geocracy can be found in examples of the Fisher King or the story of Buddha/Siddhārtha.

I need the AI governance Society it's pretty interesting but what would a civil war look like in that Society

I almost spit out my water when you made that joke about the US senate 😂😂 we don't like it either trust me

You should pronounce Aristocracy like you pronounce the other 'ocracy's Aris(stock)racy

You could say that Autonomous Ukraine under the Makhnovists was a libertarian state. Also, "Anarchist state" is a contradiction of terms.

Aristocracies can be Tricky, Depending on the Worldbuilding of the Aristocratic Houses or Dynasties in Question in a Given Fantasy or Sci Fi Setting. Problems Aside, it is a Good Hereditary Rule Based Version of Oligarchy, where the Politics can Affect many people that call the Same Lands as their Aristocratic Dynasties call home I'm working on one Such Aristocratic System that has a Theocratic Flare to it, in a Post-Apocalyptic Future Setting that has arisen during the Reconstruction of Much of Post-WWIII Queensland in Australia, where the only Remaining Dry Land is Islands that are Few and Far Between and the Priests of the Setting's Past, and their Present Day Successors and their Families, eventually Established a Noble Class of Priests, Bishops, and if their Local Community allows it, Witches and Wizards (Though in this Setting, Magic is Minor at best and differs in Practice from Religion to Religion) any thoughts?

Kakistocracy sounds very much like what we currently have in the West, aprticularely Brussles, Canada and USA.