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10 Worst Science Fiction Governments

#7
Snow Crash: Burbclaves, Franchulates, the USA and the Raft

Snow Crash: Burbclaves, Franchulates, the USA and the Raft

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#7
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#7
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#5
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I haven't read Snow Crash in a while (which is to say that I have read it multiple times), so I'll let LAWeekly describe the major branches of government in Neal Stephenson's breakout cypberpunk hit:

They are franchised semiautonomous nation-states, the Burbclaves and Franchulates, or distributed world governments like Mr. Lee's Greater Hong Kong, a metastasized fast-food chain whose global strip-mall franchises compose a sovereign nation. Above all there is the Raft, a sprawling, lawless, ad hoc island nation, the Sargasso Sea of shantytowns, created by accretion in the middle of the North Pacific, as refugee craft of all shapes and sizes organize spontaneously around the rusted hulk of the junked aircraft carrier Enterprise

And of the USA?  The Federal government is largely irrelevant, yet obsessed with security.  One character does in fact work there, and is required to submit to frequent polygraph tests and mandatory truth serum applications, only to hold down a job that requires employees to bring their own toilet paper (and informs them of this via an enormous memo that she is expected to take 15.62 minutes to read). 

To survive Stephenson's near anarchy of a future, your best bet is to ally yourself immediately with a burbclave or franchulate and then keep your head down, so as not to attract attention from the Mafia or less organized bands of violent folk (you know, like religions).  Otherwise, make it big in the Metaverse (aka the Internet).  You're going to have to be a lot more clever than a skateboarding dog.

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