People's Government of China

The People's Government of China is a state centered around the Yellow and Yangtze river systems in China. The state is organized democratically and has a political system designed at ensuring internal stability and economic prosperity for its peasantry and growing urban working class.

History

The People's Government of China was founded in 2968 BC after a slave and peasant revolt toppled the Emperor of Luoyang, who ruled the city and the area surrounding it at the time. Due to worsening weather conditions and a colder climate in China civil unrest across the Yellow River valley was common and the early People's Government of China took advantage of this to expand by provoking revolt against unfriendly rulers and providing famine relief in exchange for annexation and integration. Despite the sometimes heavy handed tactics of the expanding empire, the PGC is generally not regarded as tyrannical or imperialistic because it provided significant quality of life improvements and political liberties.

It was the policy of handing out free farming equipment that would ultimately cause a great deal of conflict within the PGC only a few years into its existence however. Villages and smaller towns surrendered their autonomy and provided grain to the PGC in exchange for famine relief if their crops failed and iron tools. However, China interpreted this arrangement as allowing the state to collect grain regardless of conditions in the village while the villages and towns interpreted the agreement as allowing them to frequently withhold grain while continuing to receive famine relief and tools. This lead to often violent confrontations between provincial militias and villages which culminated in a series of revolts in the rural areas farther away from the more prosperous Yellow River.

For approximately two years these revolts were common and central government armies were frequently dispatched to handle them, so much so that the Central Government's army was nearly three times the size it had been at the start of the revolts and had absorbed several parts of provincial militias. The revolts also prompted a centralization of military and political power in Luoyang and turned Provincial Governors from partly independent warlords into administrators for the state after a series of military defections to rebels degraded the power of governors.

China, despite its stated benevolent aims, frequently massacred rebel villages and terrorized the countryside into submission as much as it did actually fight real rebels. The impression of the Central Government Army as hardened killers is one that will be common in much of the countryside for a long time. The decay of that view isn't helped by the PGC's system of labor camps which are used to punish rebels, traitors, criminals, and sometimes innocents. The People's Government of China is very much a state centered around the needs of the urban population as opposed to the rural peasantry. Reflective of this is the PGC's 'consolidation' policies that force multiple small villages together to form towns which are easier to administrate and integrate that while producing less headaches for government bureaucrats often produces extremely violent sectarian conflicts and destroys the history of villages to make way for China's new history.

The Emperor's foreign appearance and the unfamiliar flags of the PGC make the government seem alien and strange to many of the less urban citizens of the empire, but at the same time present an image of neutrality between the ethic and religious groups that are scattered around China. Rival clan leaders understand that if they begin fighting the Provinces will only take the side of the law, and that the law is more than happy to get rid of them both if they cause trouble.

Authoritarian policy towards the rural population is contrasted with extremely liberal policies towards the urban population which is more free to criticize the government and even produce their own news outlets and literature free of the state's control. In the countryside a bamboo book criticizing the Emperor for being a foreigner might be considered illegal and rebel propaganda while in the cities the same book would be considered part of normal political discourse. The more liberal attitude towards the cities is compounded by the easier access to technology and education as well as the state's literacy campaigns which are overwhelmingly targeted at the urban populations. The rural settlements are less of a priority to the provincial assemblies and the central government's people's assembly - they often aren't even represented properly in the provinces, much less in Luoyang. The problems of the PGC, which is still a very new government to most of China, is generally hidden by the economic and technological benefits of it. The old city states and small empires treated the rural population worse in general than the PGC did and couldn't provide the iron tools and plows that most of that population relies on to avoid starving in the worsening climate in China. The urban population has experienced unprecedented growth and prosperity even if some of their young men have been taken to fight rebels and not returned.

Government Structure

The lowest organ of the PGC's government is composed of what are essentially labor unions, with local assemblies being made up of elected representatives from various industries in their area.

For example, the Dongying local assembly is dominated by representatives from various maritime industries who are allocated ten seats in the city government based on proportion of the working population. Other cities have similar arrangements, however the exact form a local assembly takes is very different between provinces despite being relatively uniform within a province.

Local assemblies are charged with managing the economies of towns and cities and providing a stable flow of resources to the public stock of the province and to the Empire as a whole, as well as undertaking improvements to their areas. Local assemblies also nominate members of the Provincial assembly, which is responsible for electing the Governor and the well being of the entire province. The Governor is the leader of the Province's militia and responsible for keeping order in the province and ensuring the economic development of the area. He or she can be removed at any time by simple majority vote by the Provincial Assembly.

The People's Assembly is responsible for laws that apply to all of China and regulating the behavior of the Provinces towards each other. It also appoints generals to the Army of the Central Government to be approved by the Emperor. The People's Assembly in addition to making laws that apply to all provinces can accuse Provincial Governors of Crimes or demand their arrest before trial in the state courts. Because the PGC has no supreme court or similar body, when critical rulings are to be made in a dispute between the Emperor and the Assembly judges are selected randomly from the state court system, regardless of their location. The nomination of these judges is also under the control of the assembly, but they cannot remove judges as they see fit and must instead get approval from the Emperor to do so.

The People's Assembly, in addition to appointing generals also appoints Military Governors for provinces which are currently being integrated into the empire called Military Governorates. These Governorates do not have assemblies or the conventional structure of a province and are instead administered directly by the military. Every new province starts off as a military governorate and becomes a full province after its institutions are established and the province can be left to its own devices for the most part.

The People's Assembly last and most critical job is the administration of China's economy. The Assembly enjoys complete control over the Ministry of the Public Stock and the Prime Minister, or Speaker of the Assembly as he is officially known, is responsible for selecting the Minister of the Public Stock every five years. The Minister of the Public stock is unique in his job security as he cannot be removed by the People's Assembly unless found guilty of crime, while other ministers can be removed at any time for any reason by the People's Assembly.

The Emperor

The Emperor, or "Leader of the State" as he is supposed to be known, is elected by the People's Assembly and serves for life. He, however, can be removed by the Assembly if found guilty of tyranny and crimes against the state. This is unlikely to ever happen to the current and first Emperor, as he was one of the architects of the state in the first place.

The Emperor is responsible for the security of the empire and approves every law that the People's Assembly wants to pass. He is not usually directly engaged in writing laws and works through the Prime Minister, who will submit laws to the Assembly for him. The Emperor can remove ministers, governors, generals, or suspend provincial assemblies at any time and does not require the Assembly's approval to do so unless he has provided no legal justification. Even so, the Assembly can challenge the Emperor's justification for his actions although this is unlikely to ever happen as a challenge the Emperor loses will give the Assembly cause to remove him for violating the state's laws, which they can by a sixty percent vote.

The Emperor has the final voice on all long term economic policy as well and is present at the Ministry of the Public Stock's yearly planning meetings, where the Minister of the Public Stock must run the next year's plans by him. In times of war or exceptional crisis the Emperor can also be given absolute power by the People's Assembly or suspend the Assembly himself for the duration of five years, after which he is obligated to restore the assembly or be removed by the military.

The Emperor, despite being referred to as an Emperor by the people and by the state's legal system is not really an Emperor. His family enjoys little privileges from the position and the Emperor is not immune to the central government's laws, though he cannot be accused of violating provincial laws. His family is also incapable of drawing excessive resources from the Public Stock for themselves and follows the rules any citizen does when it comes to what they might take from the Public Stock of their city. The Emperor is also not succeeded by any members of his family officially, but the People's Assembly can appoint a new Emperor of the previous Emperor's family if they wish.

The Courts

The local court systems of China which mediate disputes between citizens and groups are administered by the Governor, who has the final say on all legal rulings in his province unless overruled by the Provincial Assembly. The local courts are responsible for upholding the central government's laws as well and if they are accused of failing to do this or doing it incorrectly a case may be brought to a state court. If the state court of a province can't make a decision it can hand the case to the Central Government court system in Luoyang, which is responsible for handling disputes between provinces and settling legal issues between the largest and most powerful organizations in China.

The Luoyang Central Government courts and the state courts both have judges appointed by the People's Assembly and approved by the Emperor. The People's Assembly very much appoints judges for the Emperor as only he or the Prime Minister is capable of nominating a judge for a position in the state or central government courts.