Polity Atlas

How each model solves the same problems

Instead of “democracy versus anarchism”, compare the concrete ways collective problems get solved.

Question✕✕✕
How are decisions made?Informal consensus within each harbour gang; formally, zone councils elected by licence holders propose trap limits and fishing hours, some subject to a two-thirds referendum.Grand Council of 50 chiefs chosen by clan mothers; questions pass between groups of nations, each seeking unanimity, with the Onondaga Firekeepers confirming or resolving disagreement.Kings of small kingdoms (túatha) under over-kings; assemblies (óenach); customary law expounded by hereditary jurists rather than legislated.
How are conflicts resolved?Warnings and covert trap cutting enforce territories; state marine patrol enforces size limits, trap tags and zone rules.The Confederacy describes the Grand Council as resolving disputes among the nations and planning for the welfare of all the people.Brehon judges; sureties (naidm, ráth, aitire); distraint of livestock; ritual fasting against higher-ranking defendants; body-fines and honour-price compensation.Arbitration
How are public goods funded?Conservation of breeding stock (egg-bearing females, V-notching, maximum size), monitoring and enforcement.UnknownRules on shared grazing, co-operative ploughing, mills and fencing; obligatory hospitality; churches and monasteries; few public works.
How is AI used?None. Trap tags and licence databases are administrative, not AI-based.No documented AI role.None; a medieval legal order.
What are the main risks?Exclusion of newcomers, violent 'cut wars', dependence on one species, ocean warming and federal whale-protection rules.CLM-0510Operates alongside US and Canadian governments, which limits its practical jurisdiction; its rule of unanimity within and between blocs requires broad agreement.CLM-0117CLM-0118Status-graded and unequal protection, unfree labour, endemic raiding and dynastic war, and vulnerability to a centralising conqueror.CLM-0385

This illustrates differences in design; it is not a universal claim about outcomes. Each cell links to mechanisms and the claims behind them.