Chapter 94:

Section 31 met. Luna said, "The path forward has become clearer, with only a few nexus's that I can see.

We will need to deal with the Borg. Win or lose is a nexus. We will need to deal with the Dominion. Again, win or lose is a nexus. Finally we will have to avoid internal splitting of the Federation, or the Federation becoming something we do not want. Two more potential nexuses.

If we succeed in all four of these challenges, the way is clear for the Federation encompassing the entire galaxy. What then?"

Theo added, "We would assume that by then we would master transwarp and other faster transportation methods, so that a galaxy wide civilization could exist. If transport and communication were mastered, then the sheer numbers of civilizations would be a challenge."

Pythia added, "Do we want to avoid a monoculture? But then, if a million civilizations flourish, what unites them? How do they work together?"

Cleo added, "Getting back to the four challenges. The later two are not single nexuses, they are repeating. Also, we heard from the Supervisors earlier that the fight against the Dominion will chiefly be a challenge of Federation unity."

Amyah added, "Humans need to become Q. That does not necessarily mean the rest of the Federation can or should. A stage of being like the Organians does not need to be exactly following them, but would be suitable for all of the Federation, although not required."

Calchas added, "Just because we can list a small number of challenges, does not mean that they are easily solvable, or that we will win these challenges."

I added, "Perhaps the internal issues of the Federation are due to its nature, versus that of the Federation in canon. Our Federation is functional, and accepted due to its benefits. It provides firstly security, against other civilizations, against potential super-enemies such as the Alliance of Synthetic Life, against the future threats of the Borg and the Dominion, and against something similar to the Borg arising from within the Federation. After that the Federation provides prosperity, health, and magic.

If you look at Maslow's hierarchy of needs, we are only covering the first 2 out of 5. The canon Federation tried at least to fulfill all of the Maslow's needs.

However, the previous decades have shown us that ideals quickly fracture, and it is difficult to bring about a stable set of ideals. The only exception we found was security, which helps bring about unity.

If you look at the canon's Federation, and the canon's mirror universe's Terran Empire, we are somewhere between the two. We are not human-centric, like the Terran Empire was, although we act like we humans have the right to be leading the Federation, and think that we have a unique destiny of joining the Q. We are anti-empire, clearly different than the Terran Empire, but are far from the sentient rights that the canon Federation required. We are more accepting of different civilizations and histories, but do insist that sentients can leave their communities if they want to, and insist on free will being upheld.

In summary, if we want Federation unity in the far future, we should give them ideals to believe in, besides the functional ones of security and prosperity."

Luna added, "What we have seen in the decades since adding the Romulans to the Federation are generational changes. People born at different times acquire different perspectives, sometimes in oppositions to their elders."

Theo answered, "And yet many traditional societies did not have this phenomena. You would see stable belief systems over centuries. While some younger members do rebel against the culture, they are ruthlessly suppressed and either brought into the culture's belief system or expelled from it."

Amyah added, "I cannot picture the Federation having a ruthless enforcement of some sort of orthodoxy. It is built on a diversity of cultures working together for mutual security and prosperity. Maybe that should be the orthodoxy enforced."

Theo added, "We have already seen that a generation born and raised under security and prosperity can rebel against it, or at least some of them did. They never experienced anything else, so weren't so appreciative of it. What would the effect of centuries of peace and prosperity?"

Luna added, "Simple ideals that can be chanted. Schools can be assigned to debate them, with answers given for every objection to convince all that the ideals should be kept universal and long term."

Cora said, "There are civilizations besides the Borg and the Dominion that will be threats. Species 8472 will be a threat."

I said, "I reviewed canon about the Dominion, and the challenge of fighting them is remarkably similar to that of fighting the Voldemort and the Death Eaters. Like them, they can infiltrate organizations. Like them, that infiltration can easily be detected, but was not during the 1970's war in Wizarding Britain.

Like Voldemort, the Dominion promises civilizations power, but then turns them into slaves. In canon, the Cardassians joined on that basis, and then found that the Dominion would easily sacrifice them for convenience. Like Voldemort the Dominion found existing grievances to exploit to gain followers."

Meanwhile in the 2090's the Federation was expanding with little patience for the civilizations around them. They weren't requiring them to join the Federation, but they were establishing control and then announcing that piracy, slavery, colonial control, and forbidden technologies would not be tolerated.

There was a debate about the Federation paying to free enslaved sentients as a way to simplify dealing with them. The idea was decisively rejected so as not to reward those who enslaved others. However, universal assistance was approved to continue. Every civilization agreeing to follow Federation rules would be given assistance to they extent they wanted it. Those not agreeing would be attacked with the least force possible until they agreed.

The Federation arrived at the Breen Confederacy. This was an empire that in canon allied with the Dominion and successfully attacked Earth. At this time, they were a smaller empire and less advanced.

The Starfleet Admiral on the scene had little patience when the Breen didn't immediately agree to Federation demands. He was Human and had seen in canon how the Breen had attacked Earth. His fleet immediately started disabling energy weapons of the Breen and then removing suspected slaves to be interviewed.

Even after the Federation took over, the Breen were not cooperative. Starfleet separated out those who were not Breen and established protected planets for them. They were assured that the Federation would never go away and that the Breen will never be allowed to threaten them.

Among the Breen, some were willing to live under Federation rules. They were separated from those who were not and given protected location to live. The remainder were confined to their planets with drones making sure that they were not violating Federation rules and periodically asking individuals if they wanted to leave that community. They were treated in a similar way to some of the more extreme separatist communities in the Federation were.

At another Section 31 meeting, Theo said, "The trend over time is that more of the Federation will have been forcible, to some extent, incorporated at least to following the rules of the Federation. How will this effect unity of the Federation when it might be throughout the galaxy?"

Luna said, "They might not have helped found the Federation, but they should quickly find its benefits, and then teach younger generations its ideals."

Cora said, "That sounds too simple."

I added, "We need a scientific method of what could be called onboarding to the Federation. Try different strategies, adapted to the culture being onboarded, and then follow up by determining attitudes soon after and decades later. That would lead to fine tuning the approach.

As an initial approach to try, I still say to follow Maslow's hierarchy of needs. We handle safety and prosperity well, so can skip past those. We add the belonging level next. Your planet is joining a Federations that supports each other that has common goals while respecting different ways of achieving the next goals. Then we add the esteem level. You do your part to help the Federation achieve its goals. You'll be given the tools, technology, and training, to contribute. The the self-actualization level. You get the resources you need to be the best that you can be, in whatever ways you want."

Luna answered, "The one goal we cannot accommodate is those who want to have control over others or a planet over others. That is the weakness that the Dominion can exploit, or a local group on its own."

Amyah answered, "We might need more of a role for Starfleet Intelligence, to monitor and stop any such plots."

I added, "It is easy to start that type of initiative and have it become its own threat, trying to use its powers to control others. There might be screening needed, but it should be done above board and with transparent goals."

Another challenge that started to develop is that Federation expansion became steady, and civilizations beyond it could predict how long it would take for the Federation to reach them. Many wanted them to reach them, but some did not.

The Federation agreed to try out the new approach and the first example would be the Kzinti, a feline humanoid people. They were seen in the Animated Series and Lower Decks. They had been bypassed by Federation expansion earlier, with trade relations setup, and an agreement for them not to violate Federation rules. Now they were ready to join the Federation. They needed to change the status of Kzinti females in order to meet the standards to join the Federation.

By this point in Federation history, there was no longer a distinction between the Federation Alliance and the United Federation. The support that was once only part of the United Federation was now available to all, and the level of integration was left up to individual communities. The term, Federation, was now used, while the concept of Federation Protectorate still existed.

The Kzinti wanted the help with developing magic. They already had some telepathic abilities. Other motivations were material.

Trying to get the Kzinti to have a feeling of belonging with the Federation was difficult. They were matched with other civilizations that were hunters and also believed in honor and honor fighting. They at least had something in common.

Esteem was easier to bring about. They were invited to dueling circuits, which they were already good at, and had some species specific advantages. They were encouraged to excel with these abilities.

Finally, the self actualization. Many of them were interested in archaeology, others had other interests. They were shown that with the advantages of the Federation they were free to pursue these.

Other new members of the Federation often had several cultures, and approaches were made to customize the messages for each.

Another emphasis was to try to bring about a continuing influence on the education and culture of existing members of the Federation.