I’ve been obsessing over anarchy for not the first time over the last few weeks. It’s just one of those topics that’s as puzzling as it is important. *Can* we organize without a rigid hierarchy? Is hierarchy of some sort of organizational necessity? Do humans like giving up power (nsfw) as a general principle? In any case, here’s a tiny setup of story that may grow in the future to explore a future anarchic civilization.
Moltenous Musings
Colmar wasn’t happy. People got hurt when Colmar wasn’t happy. Colmar not being happy was a leading cause of death amongst his populace. And it had been three straight weeks of nothing but misery for his troops. They had the greatest forces assembled since the conquering of Antioch by Colmar’s Great Grandfodder. He had hoped to snuff out the meager resistance expected out of the free cities of Sinnovia. Get in, put on a show of force the world had never seen, get out with enough plunder to keep his troops going for a lifetime. More importantly, Colmar needed to put these damn free cities in their place. Who did they think they are? No leader? No standing army? Their way of life was foreign to him. And if there was one group of people Colmar could not stand, it was foreigners.
Much was not known of the mysterious Sinnovians. They were spread out across three massive volcanic structures built during the first climate crisis. Whether these were actual terraformed volcanoes or merely man-made superstructures in a volcanic shape was much debated amongst present day anthropologists. Their population numbered close to 5 million citizens per dome, with each dome measuring nearly 4km tall and 30km wide1. It was suspected that most of the population were housed underground. His scientists had found that the entire structure was kept at a temperate climate by meticulously controlling humidity levels and allowing the perfect amount of sunlight to come through the caldera.
More strange than their living conditions however, was their way of life. They had no clear leader, or at least, nobody willing to show themselves to Colmar to attend his “peace” talks. Nobody knew who ran the place. This was a most comical fact. Everyone knew there must be something or someone who knew more about a particular facet of running society but nobody could pinpoint who was running the show! His Royal economists had theorized it was a dense layer of overlapping competencies that worked for everyone. His Royal theologists assumed it was a grand cabal of religious fanatics that had overthrown the government years ago. Either way, the population seemed happy the fountains stayed filled with beautiful spring water (and perfectly carbonated water on Saturdays).
The population of Sinnovia held deeply that a person’s area of concern must expand steadily from the time of birth to the time of death. Children were trusted to take care of themselves. Mature adults were expected to care for their greater community and the elderly were generally involved in civilization-wide improvement projects until gradually fading to obscurity.
They held such peasant beliefs as the fruits of the earth were common property. While Sinnovians stewarded areas of the domes and surrounding lands, they did not actually consider themselves the owner. They possessed a highly advanced power and water grid. It was a technological marvel. His scientists assured him it was highly resistant to power outages and had been hardened by generations of overly precautious engineers. It now served as a source of income for many who contributed and ran at optimal capacity year-round. Luckily, their greatest weakness though was their policy of allowing anyone who wanted food, water or shelter to ask for it and receive aid. This had likely turned the entire population soft and had allowed for numerous spies to infiltrate the free cities’ defenses.
As Colmar mulled over his bad luck and contemplated who in his ministry was most resistant to torture, his assistant whispered the words he had hoped for since setting eyes on the cursed cupolas. A spy had returned.
We don’t know what happens next but stay tuned and we’ll hopefully revisit this topic periodically.
Getting to 5 million people in a volcano-shaped structure like this was an interesting calculation. I looked up the height (10km) and diameter (50km) of Mauna Kea and assumed that people need as much space as residents of Manhattan (100 m2 according to http://urbancalc.com/post/NYC-Residential-Density/) with a ceiling height of 10m.