Part of the issue is that the Imperium operates at (at least) two scales
and, often, two (or more) social paradigms.  There's THE IMPERIUM, a
sector-spanning feudal state; and there's individual systems and worlds,
which can be thoroughly modern societies.  And so we're stuck
considering how the latter set of attitudes and social behaviors slot
into the former.  It's not really plausible (IMO) for the leader(s) of a
TL12+ HiPop world to act and think like Iron Age chieftains when dealing
with their peers on the interstellar stage, just because that's their
place in the larger social order.

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Kelly St. Clair
xxxxxx@efn.org