NationStates

About Nation Creation and Categories **SPOILER ALERT**

The following is the full versions of two popular, well-used and well-known articles from when the Official NS forums was hosted by Jolt or older. These articles outline some useful and basic tidbits of knowledge that players have discovered over the years regarding the mysterious system that determines a nation's category/government type. After the Jolt forums collapsed, some of this information was partially lost or at-least made unaccessible to many players, so I found that is would be desirable to have copies of these useful texts made accessible on the current Official Forums. The first text is Nation Creation For Dummies, it was originally posted (and as far as I know, authored) by Qaaolchoura on the Jolt Forums. The purpose of Nation Creation For Dummies is to (1) explain how to easily create a new nation in a certain category, and (2) explore the effects of the introductory quiz (e.g., "Marijuana should be legal"), and the effects of selecting each government type (e.g., liberal, conservative, evil). It should be noted that the 'History' feature is a much more recent addition to the Nation Creation process, and predates this article. Nonetheless, the "History" feature does not seem to have any effect on the category/freedoms of a nation ^[1], which ultimately, Nation Creation For Dummies was more concerned with.

The second text that I've included is Categories of Government Types and Freedoms, which was reproduced by Euroslavia on the Jolt forums, but was written and posted by Aelenti on the original NationStates forum that predates the Jolt forum. The purpose of Categories of Government Types and Freedoms was to explain how a nation's freedom rankings (e.g., Frightening, Good, Unheard of) determined a nation's government category (e.g., Left-wing Utopia). Euroslavia's reproduction cut out some seemingly irrelevant introductory discussion by Aelenti to Angelika, which I found to be somewhat useful because it establishes what the author perceives as the meaning of each freedom. It should be noted that when Aelenti wrote about "Economic Freedom", it has been suggested by many that the statistic that appears on a nation's spotlight page represents something entirely differently than Economic Freedom, such as "Economic Strength". Therefore, your spotlight page and your subsequent government type may not align with the teachings of Categories of Government Types and Freedoms. I've also included a chart of how to quantitatively rank the qualitative freedom rankings, which Euroslavia included in his reproduction of the text.

If you find these articles interesting, I suggest you also read, "Deconstructing the Ideocube" and some of Professor Hell's later works, which have set the groundwork for a more scientific and analytical approach to discovering the inner workings of NationStates.

INDEX

• Nation Creation For Dummies
  
  • The Effects of Each Government Type
  • The Effects of the Questions
  • The Simplest Way to Start off With Each WA Ranking
• Categories of Government Types and Freedoms
  
  • Freedom Requirements for Categories
  • A Scale of Categories
  • Rankings of Freedoms

The Effects of Each Government Type

1. Sensible --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   
2. Liberal --> Category: Scandinavian Liberal Paradise, Civil Rights: Superb, Economy: Developing, Political Freedoms: Good
   
3. Conservative --> Category: Free-Market Paradise, Civil Rights: Few, Economy: Very Strong, Political Freedoms: Superb
   
4. Compassionate --> Category: Tyranny by Majority, Civil Rights: Few, Economy: Developing, Political Freedoms: Superb
   
5. Oppressive --> Category: Psychotic Dictatorship, Civil Rights: Few, Economy: Developing, Political Freedoms: Few
   
6. Corrupt --> Category: Psychotic Dictatorship, Civil Rights: Rare, Economy: Weak, Political Freedoms: Unheard Of
   
7. Libertarian --> Category: Anarchy, Civil Rights: World Benchmark, Economy: Thriving, Political Freedoms: World Benchmark
   
8. Anarchaic --> Category: Anarchy, Civil Rights: Frightening, Economy: Strong, Political Freedoms: Corrupted
   
9. Evil --> Category: Psychotic Dictatorship, Civil Rights: Outlawed, Economy: Imploded, Political Freedoms: Outlawed
   
10. Psychotic --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good

The Effects of the Questions

1. A country should be judged by how it treats its worst-off citizens.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Democratic Socialists, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Developing, Political Freedoms: Good
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Capitalist Paradise, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Very Strong, Political Freedoms: Good
   
   
2. Corporations do more good for society than harm.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Capitalist Paradise, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Thriving, Political Freedoms: Good
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Democratic Socialists, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Weak, Political Freedoms: Good
   
   
3. Marijuana should be legal.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Very Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Below Average, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   
   
4. The world needs to rediscover its spirituality.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   
   
5. A lot of what's wrong with youth today could be fixed by a year's military service.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Father Knows Best State, Civil Rights: Some, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Few
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms:Very Good
   
   
6. Capitalism is on the way out.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Democratic Socialists, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Weak, Political Freedoms: Good
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Strong, Political Freedoms: Good
   
   
7. Without democracy, a country has nothing.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: New York Times Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Superb
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   
   
8. It's more important to deter criminals than try to rehabilitate them.
   
   Strongly Agree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Some, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good
   Strongly Disagree --> Category: Inoffensive Centrist Democracy, Civil Rights: Very Good, Economy: Good, Political Freedoms: Good

The Simplest Way to Start off With Each WA Ranking

This works very simply.

• Government Type: self explanatory.
  
• Questions: -None is self explanatory [do not answer any questions -- leave them all unanswered, and submit the quiz]
  -SA = Strongly Agree
  -SD = Strongly Disagree
  --- 0 = Ignore Question

• Left-Wing Utopia
  
  • Government Type: Liberal
  • Questions:0 0 0 0 0 0 SA 0
    OR
  • Government Type: Libertarian, Anarchic
  • Questions: SA SD 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Civil Rights Lovefest
  
  • Government Type: Libertarian, Anarchic
  • Questions: SA 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Anarchy
  
  • Government Types: Libertarian, Anarchic
  • Questions: None
• Scandinavian Liberal Paradise
  
  • Government Types: Liberal
  • Questions: None
• Left-Leaning College State
  
  • Government Type: Liberal
  • Questions: SD 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Capitalizt
  
  • Government Type: Libertarian, Anarchic
  • Questions: 0 0 0 0 SA 0 0 0
    OR
  • Government Type: Liberal
  • Questions: SD SA 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Iron-Fist Socialists
  
  • Government Type: Liberal
  • Questions: 0 0 SA 0 SA 0 0 SD
• Libertarian Police State
  
  • Government Type: Liberal
  • Questions: SD 0 SA 0 SA 0 0 SD
• Benevolent Dictatorship
  
  • Government Type: Liberal
  • Questions: SD SA SA 0 SA 0 0 SD
• Liberal Democratic Socialists
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: SA 0 0 0 0 0 SA 0
• New York Times Democracy
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: 0 0 0 0 SD 0 SA 0
• Corporate Bordello
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: SD SA 0 0 SD 0 SA
• Democratic Socialists
  
  • Government Types: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: SA 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Inoffensive Centrist Democracy
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: None
• Capitalist Paradise
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: SD 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Corrupt Dictatorship
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: SA 0 0 0 SA 0 0 0
• Father Knows Best State
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: 0 0 0 0 SA 0 0 0
• Compulsory Consumerist State
  
  • Government Type: Sensible, Psychotic
  • Questions: SD 0 0 0 SA 0 0 0
• Tyranny by Majority
  
  • Government Type: Compassionate
  • Questions: None
• Conservative Democracy
  
  • Government Type: Conservative
  • Questions: SA 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
    OR
  • Government Type: Compassionate
  • Questions: SD 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Free Market Paradise
  
  • Government Types: Conservative
  • Questions: None
• Authoritarian Democracy
  
  • Government Type: Oppressive
  • Questions: 0 0 0 0 0 0 SA 0
• Moralistic Democracy
  
  • Government Type: Oppressive
  • Questions: SD 0 0 0 0 0 SA 0
• Right-Wing Utopia
  
  • Government Type: Conservative
  • Questions: 0 0 0 0 SA 0 0 0
• Psychotic Dictatorship
  
  • Government Types: Oppressive, Corrupt, Evil
  • Questions: None
• Iron-Fist Consumerists
  
  • Government Type: Oppressive
  • Questions: SD 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
• Corporate Police State
  
  • Government Type: Oppressive
  • Questions: SD SA 0 0 0 0 0 0

OK. I shall endeavor to organise these categories for the benefit of all and sundry. Given the popular definitions of "right-wing" and "left-wing", I would define, for your purposes, "right-wing" as a combination of high economic and low social freedoms, with the left obviously being the converse. Political freedoms are essentially irrelevant to the "left/right" divide, with there being highly democratic and highly despotic examples of either. "Civil rights", as defined in this game, are *not* a matter of what you, Angelika, would define as "economic justice" (which is more a function of lack of economic freedom, in many ways), but rather as a matter of actual freedoms afforded to people in social matters. One hopes you find this of use.

President Weismuller of the Aelentin Jurisdictional Corporation;
riding the lightning of an anarchy while attempting to keep crime down




Freedom Requirements for Categories

NATIONS OF THREE HIGH FREEDOMS
• Anarchy (All freedoms high)
NATIONS OF TWO HIGH FREEDOMS, ONE MEDIUM FREEDOM
• Corporate Bordello (Medium Social, High Economic, High Political)
• Civil Rights Lovefest (High Social, Medium Economic, High Political)
• Capitalizt (High Social, High Economic, Medium Political)
NATIONS OF ONE HIGH FREEDOM, TWO MEDIUM FREEDOMS
• Left-Leaning College State (High Social, Medium Economic, Medium Political)
• Capitalist Paradise (Medium Social, High Economic, Medium Political)
• New York Times Democracy (Medium Social, Medium Economic, High Political)
NATIONS OF THREE MEDIUM FREEDOMS
• Inoffensive Centrist Democracy (All freedoms medium)
NATIONS OF TWO HIGH FREEDOMS, ONE LOW FREEDOM
• Free Market Paradise (Low Social, High Economic, High Political)
• Left-Wing Utopia (High Social, Low Economic, High Political)
• Benevolent Dictatorship (High Social, High Economic, Low Political)
NATIONS OF ONE HIGH, ONE MEDIUM, AND ONE LOW FREEDOM
• Libertarian Police State (High Social, Medium Economic, Low Political)
• Scandinavian Liberal Paradise (High Social, Low Economic, Medium Political)
• Compulsory Consumerist State (Medium Social, High Economic, Low Political)
• Right-Wing Utopia (Low Social, High Economic, Medium Political)
• Liberal Democratic Socialists (Medium Social, Low Economic, High Political)
• Conservative Democracy (Low Social, Medium Economic, High Political)
NATIONS OF TWO MEDIUM FREEDOMS, ONE LOW FREEDOM
• Moralistic Democracy (Low Social, Medium Economic, Medium Political)
• Democratic Socialists (Medium Social, Low Economic, Medium Political)
• Father Knows Best State / Mother Knows Best State (Medium Social, Medium Economic, Low Political)
NATIONS OF ONE HIGH FREEDOM, TWO LOW FREEDOMS
• Iron Fist Socialists (High Social, Low Economic, Low Political)
• Corporate Police State (Low Social, High Economic, Low Political)
• Tyranny By Majority (Low Social, Low Economic, High Political)
NATIONS OF ONE MEDIUM FREEDOM, TWO LOW FREEDOMS
• Corrupt Dictatorship (Medium Social, Low Economic, Low Political)
• Iron Fist Consumerists (Low Social, Medium Economic, Low Political)
• Authoritarian Democracy (Low Social, Low Economic, Medium Political)
NATIONS OF THREE LOW FREEDOMS
• Psychotic Dictatorship (All freedoms low)

A Scale of Categories

Since you wanted a scale from left to right, I'll attempt to assemble one, based upon the working definitions I created, although many government types shall be equally "left" or "right". As such, within each broad category (Left-Wing, Left-Leaning, Balanced, Right-Leaning, Right-Wing), I shall arrange the types in descending order of overall liberty, by simple summation of the values of the three categories of freedom (low counted as worth one point, medium worth two, and high worth three). In the event of two countries tying for overall liberty, I shall count political freedoms as more important than economic or social. Once again, I hope this is of use.

LEFT-WING
• Left-Wing Utopia
• Scandinavian Liberal Paradise
• Iron Fist Socialists
LEFT-LEANING
• Civil Rights Lovefest
• Left-Leaning College State
• Liberal Democratic Socialists
• Libertarian Police State
• Democratic Socialists
• Corrupt Dictatorship
BALANCED
• Anarchy
• Capitalizt
• New York Times Democracy
• Benevolent Dictatorship
• Inoffensive Centrist Democracy
• Tyranny By Majority
• Father Knows Best State / Mother Knows Best State
• Authoritarian Democracy
• Psychotic Dictatorship
RIGHT-LEANING
• Corporate Bordello
• Capitalist Paradise
• Conservative Democracy
• Compulsory Consumerist State
• Moralistic Democracy
• Iron Fist Consumerists
RIGHT-WING
• Free Market Paradise
• Right-Wing Utopia
• Corporate Police State

Rankings of Freedoms

--Saved for Possible Expansion--

--Saved for possible expansion--

Okay, it's cool to post now. I hope you enjoy it.

Unibot II wrote:Okay, it's cool to post now. I hope you enjoy it.

Thanks. This is great info!

I've never seen a "Widely Abused" civil rights ranking.

Anarchy
Government Types: Libertarian, Anarchic
Questions: None
2. SA
6. SD

---

In my experiences at least.

Frenequesta wrote:I've never seen a "Widely Abused" civil rights ranking.

That's what I have. (And I'm very proud.)

Thanks, Unibot.

Oviabshe wrote:

Frenequesta wrote:I've never seen a "Widely Abused" civil rights ranking.

That's what I have. (And I'm very proud.)

Thanks, Unibot.

That's for Political Freedoms not Civil Rights.

And thanks !

Seperate Vermont wrote:Anarchy
Government Types: Libertarian, Anarchic
Questions: None
2. SA
6. SD

---

In my experiences at least.

Err, the point is to have the easiest method of getting an Anarchy. Seems to me, selecting Anarchic as your government type and answering no questions is easier than answering two of them. *shrugs*

Unibot II wrote:

Oviabshe wrote:That's what I have. (And I'm very proud.)

Thanks, Unibot.

That's for Political Freedoms not Civil Rights.

That's odd. According to NSStatisics: http://nsdossier.texasregion.net/statistics.aspx no nation in the whole of NS has that ranking.

Ballotonia

Ballotonia wrote:

Unibot II wrote:
That's for Political Freedoms not Civil Rights.

That's odd. According to NSStatisics: http://nsdossier.texasregion.net/statistics.aspx no nation in the whole of NS has that ranking.

Ballotonia

Hhm, wasn't this an old debate? And solved by some older nation who managed to get this ranking? I don't have a problem taking liberty with the graph and stroking out and graying that ranking and explaining the lack of it as an experimental absence of it on the field.

Bump for all the newbies out there!

I think you need to recheck the "Libertarian" and "Anarchic" default statistics-- I think they are reversed.

Frenequesta wrote:I think you need to recheck the "Libertarian" and "Anarchic" default statistics-- I think they are reversed.

*nods* The transcript I have must have had a mistake. :/

This thread is simply a thingy of beauty. Finally, all the government info, all in one convenient place.

Excellent work.

Sticky

The Gameplay forum already has 6 stickies - that's too many. I'm considering de-stickying most of them, and linking to them all from one thread, similar to the one in NSG. If I get around to doing that, this'll be one of the ones it links to.

Unibot II wrote:Rankings of Freedoms

Economic	Political Freedoms	Civil Rights
Frightening	Corrupted	Widely Abused
All-Consuming	Widely Abused	Frightening
Powerhouse	Excessive	Excessive
Thriving	World Benchmark	World Benchmark
Very Strong	Superb	Superb
Strong	Excellent	Excellent
Good	Very good	Very Good
Fair	Good	Good
Reasonable	Average	Average
Developing	Below Average	Below Average
Struggling	Some	Some
Weak	Few	Few
Fragile	Rare	Rare
Basket Case	Unheard Of	Unheard Of
Imploded	Outlawed	Outlawed

Considering the new graphs which show the values for the rankings, I decided to pull the graphs of all nations in NS (over the past few days) and verify the accuracy of this table. Here's the results, turns out we've been living with a few mistakes for years (observe the lower rankings in the Economy scale):


Note that some values occur in the range for two or more rankings. This is an indication that the actual number is not integer and we're actually looking at a rounded value. Note specifically that the 'All-Consuming' Economy ranking only happens when the (rounded) value for that ranking is 96. That it still occurs fairly often (about 3% of all nations, according to NS Statistics) is probably because it's a high value, and strong economies are popular: a powerhouse economy occurs about 3 times as often.

Also notable is that some values do not occur at all: 31, 33, 37, 41, 45, 49, 53, 57, and 61. All these values do not occur for any of the three rankings, so it's not that some values just happen to be missing randomly. It's structural. I'm thinking some scaling is being done from a (smaller ranged) value which causes these particular numbers to drop out. As a consequence there are three question marks in the table, since I cannot presume to assign the missing values between two rankings to either range.

Ballotonia

I found this looking around, does it have any relevence?

Thanks Ballo, I'm considering putting the numbers in. On one hand, people are going to get more use to using the trend graphs from now on, on the other hand, newbies may be confused by them. I think I'll link them to your post.

Democratic Koyro wrote:I found this looking around, does it have any relevence?

Look at the first editor's note of Categories of Government Types and Freedoms.

Ballotonia wrote:Considering the new graphs which show the values for the rankings, I decided to pull the graphs of all nations in NS (over the past few days) and verify the accuracy of this table. Here's the results, turns out we've been living with a few mistakes for years (observe the lower rankings in the Economy scale)

Just the kind of thing I was hoping someone would do with the graphs, thank you very much.

Very good information in this thread, thank you very much.
I was wondering, though, I've noticed that, in NS issues, any decision that hurts the working class and lowers taxes improves the economy. Is that always the case?

Is there a way to protect the working class without forfeiting economic prosperity?
For that matter, for those true psychotic dictators out there, is there a way brutalize the working class without improving the economy?
And what about jacking taxes sky high without the usual accompanying improvement in heath care, education, etc.?

And again, great thread. Thanks.