The CoDominium (CD) is a political alliance and union between the United States and the Soviet Union in Pournelle's fictional history. Formed to maintain planetary stability, the CD becomes a de facto planetary government and later an interstellar empire, though it halts scientific and political evolution. The U.S. during the CD era is a welfare state with distinct social classes: Citizens and Taxpayers. The empire is organized by sectors, ruled by a Viceroy, and governed by various ministries.
Colonies in the CoDominium are established on habitable planets, founded by various groups such as ethnic minorities, religious groups, and businesses. Elite colonies have advanced technology and fleets, allowing them some independence from the CD. The Outies, systems that retained enough technology to pose a threat, serve as a constant challenge for the Imperial Navy. Jennifer R. Pournelle's novel Outies is a sequel that explores themes of alienation and the impact of biology on destiny.
Series
Short stories, novels and compilations featuring CoDominium content
The point of departure of Pournelle's history is the establishment of the CoDominium (CD), a political alliance and later union between the United States of America and a revitalized Soviet Union. This union, achieved in the name of planetary stability, reigns over the Earth for over a hundred years. In that time, it achieves peace of a sort, as well as interstellar colonization, but at the price of a complete halt in both scientific and political evolution.
The CoDominium (CD) is a supranational alliance of the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. This alliance eventually becomes a de factoplanetary government, and later, an interstellar empire. Despite this, no other nations on Earth are given representation or membership. Other major powers become mere client states. It is governed by a "Grand Senate", which is composed of Senators chosen from the two superpowers. A CoDominium Council exists and appears to function as a judicial branch. The CD did not unify the United States and the USSR, who appear to retain their separate identities and mutual distrust. The CD was only created for the shared benefit of the two member states. It does not govern either nation, and each state has been allowed to retain their government structures, nationalities, military forces, and to run their own internal affairs.
The United States of the CoDominium Era is a welfare state divided into two social classes: Citizens and Taxpayers. "Citizens" are welfare dependents who are required to live in walled sections of cities called "Welfare Islands." People are given whatever they need, including the drugs like Borloi to keep them pacified. There are no limits to welfare if they want it, except that they must live on a Welfare Island. Although people are free to gain an education and work or become a colonist, many citizens did not, preferring to live their whole lives supported by the government. Generally, citizens are uneducated and illiterate. Some BuReLoc involuntary colonists are Citizens. By the late CD era, the Welfare Islands were three generations old. "Taxpayers" are the working, educated, and privileged middle to the upper class. They carry identification cards to separate them from Citizens.
The Empire is organized by sectors, ruled by a Viceroy who serves as a representative of the Crown. Each sector has its own Council, headed by a Lord President, and its own Parliament. The Imperial government is divided into several ministries, including External Affairs, War, and Science. Some planets are governed by an aristocracy, although at least one member world is a republic.
For the most part, the stars with inhabitable planets in the CoDominium are obscure and unnamed on current star charts. For instance, the world of New Washington and its sister planet Franklin orbit a red dwarf at some distance from the Solar System. Such stars are very common in the galaxy but even the closest ones are too dim to observe without equipment, Proxima Centauri being the obvious example. Other habitable systems in the CoDominium have stars in the stellar classes F, G and K, which are common but dim compared to the named stars in the night sky. One of the few stars explicitly named in the CoDominium stories is 82 Eridani, containing the Meiji colony. Viewed from Earth, 82 Eridani is a star of the fourth magnitude at 20 light-years distance. Beyond 50 light-years such stars are below sixth magnitude and therefore invisible to the naked eye, so they are unnamed and largely unrecorded, except in astronomical sky surveys. These are the stars likely to host colonies of the CoDominium. There is no mention in the canon of closer candidate systems such as Tau Ceti and Epsilon Indi.
During the CoDominium era, instantaneous interstellar travel as a result of the Alderson Drive gave humanity the ability to explore, colonize, and exploit various star systems. As a result, many of the space settlements are on planets that are similar to Earth. At the very least, a colony world was barely inhabitable for human life without technological support. Many colonies were founded by ethnic minorities, religious groups, or political groups. Some are started by businesses, for commercial reasons. Most lack an industrial base and have little advanced technology as a result. The elite, more technologically advanced colonies are ones settled and supported by the Earth countries. These elite worlds have their own fleets and enjoy some independence from the CD.
These are apparently systems that retained enough technology after the Secession Wars to present a threat to the Second Empire, by resisting takeover and mounting raids against Empire systems. The presence or threat of Outies is mentioned in all the Second Empire stories as a reason for the Imperial Navy having to deal with events in the most expeditious way possible, rather than allowing time to achieve ideal solutions.
Jerry Eugene Pournelle was an American scientist in the area of operations research and human factors research, a science fiction writer, essayist, journalist, and one of the first bloggers. In the 1960s and early 1970s, he worked in the aerospace industry, but eventually focused on his writing career. In an obituary in Gizmodo, he is described as "a tireless ambassador for the future."
Galactic empires are a common trope used in science fantasy and science fiction, particularly in works known as 'space operas'. Many authors have either used a galaxy-spanning empire as background or written about the growth and/or decline of such an empire. The capital of a galactic empire is frequently a core world, such as a planet relatively close to a galaxy's supermassive black hole, which has advanced considerably in science and technology compared to current human civilization. Characterizations can vary wildly from malevolent forces attacking sympathetic victims to apathetic bureaucracies to more reasonable entities focused on social progress and anywhere in between.
A ship prefix is a combination of letters, usually abbreviations, used in front of the name of a civilian or naval ship that has historically served numerous purposes, such as identifying the vessel's mode of propulsion, purpose, or ownership/nationality. In the modern environment, prefixes are cited inconsistently in civilian service, whereas in government service a vessel's prefix is seldom omitted due to government regulations dictating that a certain prefix be used. Today the common practice is to use a single prefix for all warships of a nation's navy, and other prefixes for auxiliaries and ships of allied services, such as coast guards. For example, the modern navy of Japan adopts the prefix "JS" – Japanese Ship. However, not all navies use prefixes. Among the blue-water navies, those of France, Brazil, China, Russia, Germany, and Spain do not use ship prefixes. NATO designations such as FS, FGS, and SPS can be used if needed.
Epsilon Eridani, proper name Ran, is a star in the southern constellation of Eridanus. At a declination of −9.46°, it is visible from most of Earth's surface. Located at a distance 10.5 light-years from the Sun, it has an apparent magnitude of 3.73, making it the third-closest individual star visible to the naked eye.
The Mote in God's Eye is a science fiction novel by American writers Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, first published in 1974. The story is set in the distant future of Pournelle's CoDominium universe, and charts the first contact between humanity and an alien species. The title of the novel is a reference to the Biblical "The Mote and the Beam" parable and is the nickname of a star. The Mote in God's Eye was nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and Locus Awards in 1975.
The Gripping Hand is a science fiction novel by American writers Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, published in 1993. A sequel to their 1974 work The Mote in God's Eye, The Gripping Hand is, chronologically, the last novel to be set in the CoDominium universe. In the United Kingdom, it was released as The Moat around Murcheson's Eye.
40 Eridani is a triple star system in the constellation of Eridanus, abbreviated 40 Eri. It has the Bayer designation Omicron2 Eridani, which is Latinized from ο2 Eridani and abbreviated Omicron2 Eri or ο2 Eri. Based on parallax measurements taken by the Gaia mission, it is about 16.3 light-years from the Sun.
82 G. Eridani is a star 19.7 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Eridanus. It is a main-sequence star with a stellar classification of G6 V, and it hosts a system of at least three planets and a dust disk.
The Prince is a science fiction compilation by Jerry Pournelle and S. M. Stirling. It is part of the CoDominium future history series. The Prince is a compilation of four previously published novels: Falkenberg's Legion, Prince of Mercenaries, Go Tell The Spartans, and Prince of Sparta. Of the original novels, the first two were written by Pournelle alone; the last two were cowritten with Stirling. Pages 174–176 of the printed edition are new to the compilation. The Prince was published by Baen Books in hardcover (ISBN 0-7434-3556-7) in September 2002.
In both science fiction and utopia/dystopian fiction, authors have made frequent use of the age-old idea of a global state and, accordingly, of world government.
The Alliance–Union universe is a fictional universe created by American writer C. J. Cherryh. It is the setting for a future history series extending from the 21st century into the far future.
King David's Spaceship is a science fiction novel by American writer Jerry Pournelle. It was originally published in 1980. Another version appeared as three-part serial in Analog as A Spaceship for the King from December 1971 to February 1972.
Exiles to Glory is a science fiction novella by American writer Jerry Pournelle, published in 1978. It is a sequel to the stories in the collection High Justice. As with those stories, it weaves the story of pioneering individuals in space with considerations of the technical and financial challenges facing them. It was republished in an omnibus edition with High Justice in 2009 as Exile—and Glory.
The planetary systems of stars other than the Sun and the Solar System are a staple element in many works of the science fiction genre.
Janissaries is a science fiction novel by American author Jerry Pournelle. Originally published in 1979, and illustrated by comic artist Luis Bermejo, it is the first book of Pournelle's Janissaries series. The following books are Janissaries: Clan and Crown, Janissaries III: Storms of Victory and Janissaries IV: Mamelukes.
"He Fell into a Dark Hole" is a science fiction short story by American writer Jerry Pournelle. Set in his CoDominium future alternative history, it was originally published in the magazine Analog Science Fiction and Fact issue of March 1973. The story was reprinted in Warrior: There will be War, Volume V, edited by Pournelle and John F. Carr.
War World is a series of collaborative science fiction books set in the CoDominium universe of Jerry Pournelle, some novels being co-authored by John F. Carr and Don Hawthorne, as well as Larry Niven and S. M. Stirling. It consists of ten short story anthologies by various authors as well as six novels. Most stories take place on a single world, Haven, and many involve battles between Haven's people and the ruthless, genetically engineered race of supersoldiers called Saurons.
The Viagens Interplanetarias series is a sequence of science fiction stories by L. Sprague de Camp, begun in the late 1940s and written under the influence of contemporary space opera and sword and planet stories, particularly Edgar Rice Burroughs's Martian novels. Set in the future in the 21st and 22nd centuries, the series is named for the quasi-public Terran agency portrayed as monopolizing interstellar travel, the Brazilian-dominated Viagens Interplanetarias. It is also known as the Krishna series, as the majority of the stories belong to a sequence set on a fictional planet of that name. While de Camp started out as a science fiction writer and his early reputation was based on his short stories in the genre, the Viagens tales represent his only extended science fiction series.
The history of scientific thought about the formation and evolution of the Solar System began with the Copernican Revolution. The first recorded use of the term "Solar System" dates from 1704. Since the seventeenth century, philosophers and scientists have been forming hypotheses concerning the origins of our Solar System and the Moon and attempting to predict how the Solar System would change in the future. René Descartes was the first to hypothesize on the beginning of the Solar System; however, more scientists joined the discussion in the eighteenth century, forming the groundwork for later hypotheses on the topic. Later, particularly in the twentieth century, a variety of hypotheses began to build up, including the now-commonly accepted nebular hypothesis.
References
↑ "It Takes Two". Clarion-Ledger (Newspapers.com). Retrieved June 8, 2022.
↑ Lloyd, David (February 23, 1978). "It's in the stars". The Charlotte Observer (Newspapers.com). Retrieved June 8, 2022.
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