There certainly is a large chunk of science fiction that could be accurately described as medieval fantasy moved to a superficially futuristic setting.
There is also the legitimate question of how fragile our liberal norms and economy are—do they depend on population density? on the ratio between the reach of weapons and the reach of communications? on the dominance of a particular set of subcultures that attained to industrial hegemony through what amounts to chance and might not be repeated?
If egalitarianism is not robust to changes in the sociological environment, then there might simply be many more possible futures with feudal regimes than with capitalist or democratic regimes.
Yes, but how often do they bother to explain this rise other than in some very vague way? And it isn’t just feudalism. Look for example at Dune where not only is there a feudal system but the technology conveniently makes sword fighting once again a reasonable melee tactic. Additional evidence for the romantic nature is that almost invariably the stories are about people who happen to be nobles. So there’s less thinking and focusing on how unpleasant feudalism is for the lower classes.
The only individual I’ve ever seen give a plausible set of explanations for the presence of feudal cultures is Bujold in her Vorkosigan books. But it is important to note that there there are many different governmental systems including dictatorships and anarcho-capitalist worlds and lots of other things. And she’s very aware that feudalism absolutely sucks for the serfs.
I don’t think that most of these writers are arriving at their societies by probabilistic extrapolation. Rather, they are just writing what they want their societies to have. (Incidentally, I suspect that many of these cultural and political norms are much more fragile than we like to think. There are likely large swaths of the space of political systems that we haven’t even thought about. There might well be very stable systems that we haven’t conceived of yet. Or there might be Markov chains of what systems are likely to transfer to other systems).
I don’t think that most of these writers are arriving at their societies by probabilistic extrapolation. Rather, they are just writing what they want their societies to have.
Those aren’t the only possibilities—much more likely is the Rule of Cool. Wielding a sword is cooler than wielding a gun, and swordfights are more interesting than gunfights.
I don’t think that most of these writers are arriving at their societies by probabilistic extrapolation.
Granted. Some are, though. Two more counter-examples, besides Bujold:
Asimov’s Foundation, e.g. the planet of Anacreon. Feudalism is portrayed as the result of a security dilemma and the stagnation of science, as reducing the access of ordinary people to effective medicine and nuclear power, and as producing a variety of sham nobles who deserve mockery.
Brave New World. Feudalism is portrayed as a logical outgrowth of an endless drive toward bureaucratic/administrative efficiency in a world where personal freedom has been subordinated to personal pleasure. Regionally-based bureaucrat-lords with concentrically overlapping territories ‘earn’ their authority not by protecting ordinary serfs from the danger of death but from the danger of momentary boredom or discomfort. Huxler doesn’t seem overly fond of this feudalism; the question of whether a romantic would prefer this sort of system is, at worst, left as an exercise for the reader.
Huh. I had not really thought Brave New World as using a feudal system but that really is what it is. It might be more accurate to then make the point that the vast majority of the other cases have systems that aren’t just feudal but are ones in which the positions are inherited.
I agree that some of these writers are extrapolating. Since Asimov is explicitly writing in a world where the running theme is the ability to reliably predict social changes it shouldn’t be that surprising that he’d actually try to do so. (Note also that Asimov also avoids here the standard trap of having protagonists who are nobles).
There certainly is a large chunk of science fiction that could be accurately described as medieval fantasy moved to a superficially futuristic setting.
There is also the legitimate question of how fragile our liberal norms and economy are—do they depend on population density? on the ratio between the reach of weapons and the reach of communications? on the dominance of a particular set of subcultures that attained to industrial hegemony through what amounts to chance and might not be repeated?
If egalitarianism is not robust to changes in the sociological environment, then there might simply be many more possible futures with feudal regimes than with capitalist or democratic regimes.
Yes, but how often do they bother to explain this rise other than in some very vague way? And it isn’t just feudalism. Look for example at Dune where not only is there a feudal system but the technology conveniently makes sword fighting once again a reasonable melee tactic. Additional evidence for the romantic nature is that almost invariably the stories are about people who happen to be nobles. So there’s less thinking and focusing on how unpleasant feudalism is for the lower classes.
The only individual I’ve ever seen give a plausible set of explanations for the presence of feudal cultures is Bujold in her Vorkosigan books. But it is important to note that there there are many different governmental systems including dictatorships and anarcho-capitalist worlds and lots of other things. And she’s very aware that feudalism absolutely sucks for the serfs.
I don’t think that most of these writers are arriving at their societies by probabilistic extrapolation. Rather, they are just writing what they want their societies to have. (Incidentally, I suspect that many of these cultural and political norms are much more fragile than we like to think. There are likely large swaths of the space of political systems that we haven’t even thought about. There might well be very stable systems that we haven’t conceived of yet. Or there might be Markov chains of what systems are likely to transfer to other systems).
Those aren’t the only possibilities—much more likely is the Rule of Cool. Wielding a sword is cooler than wielding a gun, and swordfights are more interesting than gunfights.
Granted. Some are, though. Two more counter-examples, besides Bujold:
Asimov’s Foundation, e.g. the planet of Anacreon. Feudalism is portrayed as the result of a security dilemma and the stagnation of science, as reducing the access of ordinary people to effective medicine and nuclear power, and as producing a variety of sham nobles who deserve mockery.
Brave New World. Feudalism is portrayed as a logical outgrowth of an endless drive toward bureaucratic/administrative efficiency in a world where personal freedom has been subordinated to personal pleasure. Regionally-based bureaucrat-lords with concentrically overlapping territories ‘earn’ their authority not by protecting ordinary serfs from the danger of death but from the danger of momentary boredom or discomfort. Huxler doesn’t seem overly fond of this feudalism; the question of whether a romantic would prefer this sort of system is, at worst, left as an exercise for the reader.
Huh. I had not really thought Brave New World as using a feudal system but that really is what it is. It might be more accurate to then make the point that the vast majority of the other cases have systems that aren’t just feudal but are ones in which the positions are inherited.
I agree that some of these writers are extrapolating. Since Asimov is explicitly writing in a world where the running theme is the ability to reliably predict social changes it shouldn’t be that surprising that he’d actually try to do so. (Note also that Asimov also avoids here the standard trap of having protagonists who are nobles).