Exotic Governmental/Legal Systems

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Icelander

You mean a dictatorship of a living crown with zero controls or limits on its rule and a terrified hostage functioning as their chief administrative officer.

One might say that, except that it's too dumb to actually run things. It just judges its victims motives.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Once might say that, except that it's too dumb to actually run things. It just judges it's victims motives.

Doesn't seem to stop most politicians.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

One might say that, except that it's too dumb to actually run things. It just judges its victims motives.

In that case, it just requires the person wearing the crown to be delusional, and, well, self-deception is hardly a rare trait.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

A constitutional republic in which the elected executive is ritually sacrificed at the end of his term in office. (And yes the Fallout vault in question only lasted 18 years before destroying itself.)

Going with that, one can have a symbolic sacrifice at any time, simiilar to the "sacrifice" done when the first Sikh army was raised.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

A constitutional republic in which the elected executive is ritually sacrificed at the end of his term in office. (And yes the Fallout vault in question only lasted 18 years before destroying itself.)

The trick to making this sort of thing a stable system is convincing the candidates being sacrificed is a good thing for them, or at least a necessary duty that will produce a benefit for someone or something they really care about. The truth is most human sacrifices are something approaching willing - maybe not always exactly volunteers, but not struggling too hard.

[David Johnston2]

An oligarchy run as a secret society. Everyone knows the secret society exists but the membership is a secret from the public at large and only the Inner Circle know who the other Inner Circle members are.

A cybernetic democracy where decisions are made by a distributed artificial intelligence consisting of everyone's networked brain implants. And yes there's a minority who refuse the implants and are therefore unrepresented.

Family democracy. Each extended family only gets one vote cast by the registered head of a property-owning family. The position of "head of the family" (and ownership of the property) is bequeathed by the head to whichever member of the family they see fit. You must both own property and have a large enough family to qualify.

Franchise restrictions

Only men have the vote

Only women have the vote

Only people younger than retirement age have the vote

Only people who have volunteered for at least one term in the military have the vote.

Only an ethnic minority has the vote

Only tax payers have the vote

Only declared members of the state religion have the vote.

Only married people have the vote

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Franchise restrictions

Only those over a certain age can vote. Set this high for strongest effect.

Only those who own a specific piece of property (a mode of transport or an amount of land is historically attested) have the vote

Only those with a certain level of education can vote

Only those born in a certain location can vote

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Split franchise can be combined with these in myriad ways, with different powers assigned to each body.

[ericthered]

Separating the branch that makes laws from the branch that grants funding and raises taxes might make for an interesting system. I suspect the power ends up in the hands of the taxers, and possibly in the hands of the judiciary, as there are more conflicts to arbitrate.

[Irish Wolf]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

An oligarchy run as a secret society. Everyone knows the secret society exists but the membership is a secret from the public at large and only the Inner Circle know who the other Inner Circle members are.

Even the other Inner Circle members don't know who's who. Their identities are concealed during meetings; the summons to meet is entirely anonymous.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by Irish Wolf

Even the other Inner Circle members don't know who's who. Their identities are concealed during meetings; the summons to meet is entirely anonymous.

Well someone belonging to the inner circle has to know who they invited to join and when there's a vacancy.