It was chilly on this early winter day in Baghdad, six degrees by the mercury thermometer by your window. The Council was going into session today, to argue about funding priorities, debate questions affecting the world, argue more about funding priorities, showcase achievements, and argue some more about funding priorities. The Council session would go on for roughly a month, but the part you needed to be present for would last only a week, and then it would be back to Mogadishu for you.
The Council was taking place in an old palace complex, being one of the few extant areas where the number of people who needed to gather could. Thousands of representatives milled about, separated by committee or region or however they wished to be. It was chaotic and it almost seemed like it couldn't work… but.
It did. Because everyone involved knew it had to.
Though there had been an incident between the Social Democratic League and the United Workers' Front before the Council session started properly. Again. Apparently two UWF Councilors had confronted a party of SDL Councilors, an argument ensued, a fight broke out, and both UWF Councilors and three of the SDL's had to be sent to the hospital.
Meanwhile, the Free Workers of the World were arguing with seemingly the entire Internationale...
Active Major Parties
The Internationale (Marxist-Leninist) - (The Internationale's Marxist-Leninist wing, primarily formed from the former Soviet Union. They lean more authoritarian than most of the other major factions, given their ideological bent, but are also heavily pro-industrialization and trending towards shedding the -Leninist side of their ideology.
The Internationale (Debsist) - The Internationale's Debsist wing, primarily popular in Anglosphere regions and particularly in America. Less authoritarian than the M-L wing, they are also somewhat reserved on the topic of transitioning to a fully non-hierarchical society due to their roots as a socialist movement.
The Internationale (Councilist) - The Councilists are the largest faction of the Internationale by a small but significant margin, advocating for the devolution of power into the hands of locally- and trades-based councils, thus their name. This is the faction most comfortable with non-hierarchical society and anarchist teachings.
United Workers' Front - The UWF is something of a vanguard party, regularly getting into brawls with SDL members. Their numbers include many of the people fighting to keep the forces of capital and authoritarianism from rising again, and as such their main focus is maintaining enough security funding to allow local community defense organizations to fend off guerrillas and partisans, which are still active in much of the world. They are relatively non-hierachical in bent, but tend also to be somewhat more socially conservative. They are the smallest of the major parties, but they are not without weight.
Free Workers of the World - The FWW formed from the Industrial Workers of the World following the end of the Revolution. Growing to encompass all trades and occupations, from steelworkers to chemists to prostitutes, the FWW relentlessly campaigns for greater rights and protections for anyone performing work that society values.
Social Democratic League - Having the middlemost numbers of the major parties, the SDL draws under its banners everyone who wants a seat at the table but isn't aboard with either a transition to full communism or socialism, wishing to see a limited return of capitalist thought. Some members are considerably more extreme, to include monarchists and populist authoritarians.
Colonized Peoples' Advancement League - The CPAL is another middleweight party focused on providing restitution and assistance to those peoples crushed by the weight of Imperial (and imperial) oppression across the world. Their major foci are on building equality of opportunity, infrastructure and industry in places that had been extracted from by the world's powers.
Total Councilors: 5000
Stances on IEC (Strongly Favor/Somewhat Favor/Somewhat Oppose/Strongly Oppose)
Int(M-L): 0/458/400/0
Int(D): 0/250/200/0
Int(C): 0/800/250/0
UWF: 5/300/50/20
FWW: 20/377/300/0
SDL: 0/412/400/13
CPAL: 11/414/200/0
Minor: 5/20/32/43
Objectives of the World Communal Council
Complete Post-War Reconstruction (5000/200000)
Defeat Partisan Forces
State of the World
Mediterranean/Saharan Africa
Education: 4
Electrification: 2
Industry: 1
Infrastructure: 2
Security: 1
Partisan Activity: 4
Sub-Saharan Africa
Education: 3
Electrification: 2
Industry: 2
Infrastructure: 2
Security: 3
Partisan Activity: 9
Eastern Asia
Education: 7
Electrification: 5
Industry: 8
Infrastructure: 6
Security: 6
Partisan Activity: 11
Western Asia
Education: 8
Electrification: 10
Industry: 10
Infrastructure: 9
Security: 5
Partisan Activity: 12
Australia and New Zealand
Education: 5
Electrification: 5
Industry: 4
Infrastructure: 4
Security: 2
Partisan Activity: 6
Europe
Education: 8
Electrification: 10
Industry: 7
Infrastructure: 10
Security: 5
Partisan Activity: 9
North America
Education: 7
Electrification: 11
Industry: 11
Infrastructure: 8
Security: 6
Partisan Activity: 14
South America
Education: 5
Electrification: 5
Industry: 3
Infrastructure: 3
Security: 4
Partisan Activity: 4
Pacific Islands
Education: 2
Electrification: 2
Industry: 1
Infrastructure: 1
Security: 1
Partisan Activity: 4
Here you can spend and gain PS advocating for policies, pursuing programs, and performing tasks for the WCC.
Funding Wars, Episode I: The Partisan Menace
Current WCC Budget: 20,000R
Current IEC Budget (without extras): 50R (0.25%)
Current PS: 45
[ ] [FUND] 0.25% - Keeping your funding at its current level is doable, if only barely. It might somewhat help your political chances though. (+5 PS)
[ ] [FUND] 0.5% - Doubling your current funding is a relatively harmless ask, now that the IEC has shown that it can in fact do things. It won't win you any friends, but it comes with few risks. (+50R/turn)
[ ] [FUND] 0.75% - Tripling your current funding might be a bigger ask, but it would definitely help you expand your efforts more rapidly. (+100R/turn, -10PS)
[ ] [FUND] 1% - The big leagues. You shoot for the moon by asking the Council to quadruple your budget in order to fund a wide-ranging program of science and engineering - and, of course, putting highly-skilled, prestigious jobs in as many places as you can. (+150R/turn, -20PS)
[ ] [FUND] 1.5% - The IEC requests truly major funding in order to crash build a whole lot of infrastructure, employ lots of scientists and engineers, and generally throw its utmost at Space Access. (+250R/turn, -40PS, all parties move 1d20 steps towards Oppose)
Promises
All promises are intended to be kept within the year - from Q1 to Q1.
Must take at least two.
[ ] Complete Weather Studies (Phase 3) (+5 PS) (All parties move +1d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Complete Materials Research (Phase 2) (+5 PS) (Int(C), Int(D), Int(M-L), FWW move 2d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Complete Exploratory Propellant Research (Phase 2) (+5 PS) (CPAL, UWF, FWW move 2d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Complete All-Sky Survey (Phase 1) (+10 PS) (All Internationale factions move 1d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Build Computational Research Facility (+5 PS) (All parties but UWF move 1d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Complete Rocket Boxes (Phase 3) (+5 PS, CPAL moves 2d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Do not expand to more than 2 Facilities Dice (+5PS, CPAL moves 2d5 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Do not pursue Spaceplane research (+5 PS, SDL moves 2d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Do not pursue Rocketry research (+5 PS, SDL moves 2d10 steps towards Favor)
[ ] Do not acquire nuclear technology (+10 PS, all parties but UWF move 2d10 towards Favor)
Requests
[ ] Nuclear Infrastructure (-30PS) (CPAL, SDL move 2d20 steps towards Oppose; all other parties move 2d10) (Gain Basic Nuclear Technology, 1 Refinement Facility)
[ ] Dark Sky Development Regulations (-5 PS) - Work with the local councils to draft a set of regulations regarding keeping dark sky sites dark for astronomical use.
[ ] Broadcast Regulations (-5 PS) - Work with the local councils to draft a set of regulations regarding keeping certain radio frequencies unused for radio astronomy.
[ ] Additional Construction Union Support (-5 PS, all parties but CPAL move 1d10 steps towards Favor, CPAL moves 1d10 steps towards Oppose) (Gain 1 Facilities dice, +5 to Facilities rolls)
The Nuclear Option
"Director Carter, it has come to our attention that your Cooperative has come into possession of an atomic weapon." The man who held the floor was older and spoke with an accent that you could place as Russian, his unevenly graying beard making him look somewhat like Marx. He rapped his fingers against the table he stood by and stood straight again. "Why is it not in a disarmament locker?"
I'm not entirely sure myself. "It was given to us by the caretaker committee for the locker it was located at, when we asked for certain materials that are advantageous to rocketry research. I'm not entirely certain why it is they thought we needed an atomic bomb, however."
"And what do you plan to do with it?"
[ ] [BOMB] Return it to the demil locker, of course. (+10PS)
[ ] [BOMB] Return it to the demil locker, in exchange for additional funding this year. (+10R/turn)
[ ] [BOMB] Use it in an experiment on radioactivity in space - when we can get a rocket big enough to put it there. (-5 PS, all parties take steps towards Oppose based on results)
[ ] [BOMB] We can theoretically use them to power or propel spacecraft; we would like to become the custodian for all the remaining bombs.(-10 PS, gain… a lot more bombs.)
