The news media, with an eye to power and profit, stirred it up all the more.įor the colonists themselves, this process was not always miserable. Desperate to avoid being caught in the dragnet, voters struggled to keep their favoured faction in power and politics became all the more polarised and febrile. At the same time, political factions sought to protect their own constituents from resettlement and hunger but could do so only by inflicting it on others. As the years went on, resettlement became a punishment for more and more crimes, while more and more crimes were added to the statute book. As the crisis failed to abate, and the political sphere fell prey to populism, measures to expand Babylonia's food supply, and reduce competition for it, became ever more extreme. Some went willingly, others out of desperation and as the century wore on, more and more were simply sent. At the same time, ever-growing numbers of metropolitan Babylonians were settled in the colonies. Food production quotas were increased, and failure to meet them was met with subsidy cuts, or restriction of development aid. Out in the colonies, this was a grim time. A vote to remove the protections and extend agriculture into the Wilderness zones was narrowly defeated forcing the Diet to adopt the former two options. The latter proved deeply controversial, as the wilderness zones were protected regions, either for their natural beauty or their importance to biodiversity. As for solutions, only three were remotely viable transfer more of the population to the colonies, import more food from the colonies, or extend food production to the Wilderness Zones. What followed was political and social turmoil, as different factions of the Babylonian public demanded different - and irreconcilable - solutions to these problems.
With food prices rising, lower-income Babylonians were forced to spend more and more of their income on food cutting their disposable income, and causing a broader economic downturn. Though the Diet acted quickly to prevent an immediate famine, the underlying problem remained Babylonia could no longer be fed by its agricultural zones alone. The initial issue was food supply, as Babylonia's ever-growing population stretched the planet's food production capacity to the limit.
At its worst, it was ruthless to the point of psychosis, or else gridlocked to the point of inaction.ĭuring the last century pre-GC, Babylonia endured a series of political and economic crises remembered as the Last Century Crisis. At its best, it was efficient and responsive responding quickly and effectively to the public will and the necessities of government. All other branches of government, including the Judiciary, served at its pleasure, and were bound to obey. Its vote alone could make or unmake law, enact bills, and even condemn a person to death. Though presided-over by an elected Speaker, whose task was to maintain order in the chamber, there was no other body or authority capable of balancing or countering the Diet. At that time, the government of Babylonia consisted almost entirely of the Diet a unicameral legislature elected by all adult citizens, which met in the capital city of Uruk. Precisely why this happened can be traced to the very structure of Babylonian government. But on Babylonia they became deep-rooted and intractable, with the citizenry dividing themselves into entrenched, mutually-hostile factions between which rational debate, or even basic civility, had become impossible. Such divides were, and are, nothing new in the history of human civilisations. Its people were divided along any number of lines including religion, public morals, identity, the distribution of wealth, and the distribution of political authority. By the last century pre-GC, Babylonia was a sophisticated and well-developed world, at the centre of a small but growing empire of extrasolar colonies which would later be recognised as the Babylonia Sector.īut for all this apparent success, Babylonia was a society in crisis. Though a relative backwater compared to the likes of Earth or Zeon, Babylonia had a relatively pleasant climate, and was well-endowed with raw materials allowing it to develop rapidly. Cosmo Babylonia began its life as a single inhabited solar system, located on the outer edge of the galaxy.