Intergalactic Summit

I think your basic premise is not too wrong pilot Jenneth. However I would add that the Caldari State was also a patron of the young newly established Minmatar Republic, something due to current alignments some people forget. I never will.

Matari ship design in the rebellion and young Republic era had never had the luxury to include elements that were not absolutely essential to complete the design goal of the vessel, both funds and materials to construct the fleets had to be stretched to their limits and then a little further.

Early clashes with slavery cult fleets in the rebellion demonstrated that they were not invulnerable and that Matari pilots and crews willing to risk using faster deadly ships that used a bare bones design could find success in combat operations. That was the priority being able to prevail in the fight, as combat pilots we all know the planners/ strategists of warfare concern themselves with kill/death ratios. Minmatar vessels early on had an emphasis on being able to rack up the highest number of kills before their eventual death. They were operating in desperate times, but their cause was just, and countless pilots and crews made the ultimate sacrifice in combat to help establish and then stabilize the young Republic.

I would not say hit and run was the core doctrine, it seems looking back it was more hit fast and hard before the bigger more powerful fleets can effectively respond and crush us. Each pilot knew that his/her ship was harder for the rebellion or the young Republic to replace then their counterparts across the field of combat so they were intent upon punching above their weight to compensate for that fact. They knew that they needed to inflict losses greater than their numbers on the field in every engagement to have the possibility of success. In a slow grinding war of attrition they could not hope for victory, the resource base of the slavery cult empire given enough time to regain it's balance would have overwhelmed them.

Juxtapose the designs of the Elder Fleet that was sent to emancipate planets and hold systems while taking on the fleets of the slavery cultists head on. Different goals from those earlier designs but just as effective tactically. Had it not been for a secret weapon, that had not been seen prior to it's use against the Elder fleet the maps of empire space might be very very different today.

A very interesting analysis, thank you!

I agree that some of the more exotic financial products that might come out of Garoun Investment and other banks could disastrous as we move away from a Gallente-style government structure, and in fact, I think some people have already taken a bath here and there. Isolated cases, though, so no one's really taken notice.

The big problem that you face though is that the administrative decentralization between Republic, tribe, and clan in terms of financial practices would create a significant arbitrage opportunity that I imagine investment bankers, fund managers, and financial lobbyists couldn't wait to exploit. There are a million places to transfer risk at different levels in ways that could remain hidden in the language and informal connections between these entities until a meltdown is upon everyone. I think most Vherokior clans might be able to suss out the obvious grifters, but I would imagine that no one would get out unscathed.

I suppose that same decentralization might work to mitigate any fallout from a collapsing bubble in one tribe or another, but with the economic activity between tribes heating up (and due to heat up more under the Tribal Council), everyone would feel the shockwaves eventually. I think those shockwaves would be felt in Gallente as well given how much international business activity there is between Matari in both nations.

As far as drivers of financing, I worry about those involved in the military industrial complex of the Republic. While they may be loyal to tribe and clan, there is also a significant drive towards capital intensive military projects based on a certain hawkish wind that has blown in behind Shakor. So far, the Sanmatar has kept real spending towards that within reason, but I can see an attack or international incident with the Amarr forcing the military to expand at a rate faster than tax receipts, leading eyes towards investment bankers and high risk loans from opportunistic bankers. So far it hasn't been a problem, but it could be.

What are your thoughts about the future of central banking in the Republic post Tribal Council?

You mean the Amarr? Even Kim calls us Gallente

Actually I have been lately trying to call Gallente as occupants, as frogs, as fascists. Because when I was referencing to Federal lapdogs simply as Gallente, some not very smart persons were blubbering about me being "genocidist", just because Gallente is a name not only of their criminal Federation, but also of a bloodline.

I believe there is an important lesson to be learned from the recent practices of Caldari banks such as Sukuuvestaa, Nugoeihuvei, and CBD. Their ever increasing leveraging of capital against existing assets such as shares and property in speculation led to an inversion of a Golden Rule of Caldari capitalism: Finance serves Business.

When it does not and capital is shifted from business lending to trading between banks, investment funds, insurances, etc. it leads to a contraction of the real economy, decreases in wages, job and pension insecurity, and especially a reduction in the job creation of entrepreneurs, small-medium business and technological startups as their only source of securing capital would have to be through incorporation/IPO releases which might not suit their particular models or products. Especially if full commercialization and/or service model profitability is measured in months or years and not in the next quarter.

There is a reason why the most widespread support for the Caldari Providence Directorate was to be found in SuVee, NOH, and CBD. It was the workers and employees in those companies that experienced decreases in wages, work conditions, and standards of living as the upper echelons of management were proud to report record profits due to their speculative adventurism as they glossed over the signs of impending recession made manifest when Karsoth-era Imperial trade negotiations fell through. A recession that negatively impacted the entire State economy and provided the populist support for a man such as Tibus Heth, whom drew upon a widespread disaffection of those wishing to change a status quo they believe had failed them to his nationalist and military agenda.

You have already identified a, "Hawkish wind," In the Republic. As such, I will say a critical role of any reserve/central bank within the Republic at present should be preventing the economic instability that, as seen in the State and throughout history prior, breeds support for bellicose populists with simple answers for complex issues and which blow hawkish winds into infernos that all too often burn their own as much as the intended targets of those deemed internal or external threats and enemies.

Against the advice of Gallentean economists and NGO's I just don't see the Republic as being able to support an advanced market economy except on a fraction of its worlds. In the old parlance of the Kaalakiota Colonial Development Index a lot of Republic worlds would probably be classifed as Phase II or Phase III -- requiring directed --

...apologies.

Requiring directed investments in the areas of agriculture, infrastructure, construction, manufacturing and industry. This would also be the best means to put the Republic labour pool to work -- especially its unemployed refugee population. Individual clans being able to issue long-term bonds backed by a central Republic bank would be a way to secure capital from the remittances of the Minmatar expatriate population in the Federation and decouple their debt loading from foreign banks to those who would have an actual stake in their community beyond interest derived profits.

Now, this might be Kaalakiota style economics in me speaking, but the Tribes and a central Republic bank should not be afraid to implement protectionist measures to secure itself from the worst vagaries and predations of a Gallentean liberal free-market. As on old Caldari patriot once said:

"...A free market is never free. Our policies of protection serves as a bulwark of Caldari industrial independence, our development, and our prosperity. This true Caldari policy protects the Caldari market for Caldari industries. It protects the Caldari standard of wages for the Caldari worker. We will never abandon the goals of self-sufficiency."

The Gallente might disagree with such a sentiment, but almost eight hundred years of Caldari corporate self-sufficiency and prosperity is enough proof in the pudding, I think.

@fakeveik

We also must not forget about the Starkmanir and Nefantar. Both tribes do not get enough spotlight. The Starkmanir, as I understand it, are still sorting out the scraps of their former identities to figure out how they fit into the Minmatar ecosystem. The Nefantar still act somewhat like the Amarr: Patronising, big-headed and irritatingly holier-than-thou.

How should the Starkmanir and the Nefantar be helped to integrate into becoming truly one of us?

Although the current state of political alignments do not reflect this the Minmatar and Caldari would gain the most from implementing the "Best Practices" from each other.

The success of the Caldari education system to rapidly uplift their populace is a model that would be beneficial in the modern Minmatar Republic.

To avoid the inevitable racist rant of a certain Caldari soldier who trolls the IGS I will skip making an example of a Minmatar best practice that would have a beneficial effect on the State.

I do not feel qualified to answer this question. I am neither Starkmanir nor Nefantar. I am Brutor. I do not know whatthey need. Only they know that.

What I can say however is that this is their task. We cannot hand them an identity. We cannot impose onto them what we think they should be. All we can do is provide them with what ever help they ask.

The Caldari education system works for us due to our culture of discipline and collectivism. I'm not sure such a system would work well with the individualistic nature of the Minmatar.

Hmm well said, perhaps it isn't due to any cultural factors but more to do with the lack of the specialties needed. In the State, our children are monitored from birth with games and activities designed to determine their strengths and weaknesses before being placed in a school that nurtures their abilities to best serve the State.

As I understand it, your Tribes have "Circles" that serve a similar function? Perhaps the Republic could contract some Caldari child psychologists to help design a similar system?