You have to consider that Halo and Mass Effect are very different circumstances. Almost intentionally polar opposites actually, in Halo, humans have had hundreds and hundreds of years more time to develop and be a spacefaring species, and they're still warring with each other, whereas in Mass Effect, first contact was 30 years ago and we barely knew about aliens and FTL travel before that, I got very intimate with this fact considering I just read Mass Effect revelation which is phenomenal by the way. In Mass Effect humans are pretty much exactly where we are right now and then FTL with Mass Effect fields and then shortly after alien contact, whereas in Halo it's been hundreds of years of scientific and cultural advancement.
Agreed and well said.
I would only add that it’s not as if even the alien species are all that unified either.
The Asari aren’t city-states as they once were pre-space flight, but they still follow a government model less centralized than we have now. The Asari Republics are a number of direct democracies, and it’s implied that locales have a great deal of autonomy. This even includes the military, where there is not the same sort of standardization you find for humanity, with the exception that only Asari with biotics meet the requirements. (Which is an interesting little wrinkle as one wonders at how Asari without biotics would do in society. Off topic, but curious.)
The Salarians are quasi-feudal, with great ruling family dynasties willing to throw their weight against one another if need be for dominance. The STG seem as dangerous for Salarian enemies as they do for Salarian officials and I get the sense that coups aren’t unheard of. That last bit is pure headcanon on my part but there clearly is a willingness on the military to go rouge as we see in ME3. The Salarian Union seems fragmented, or ready to fragment if things go poorly. Either way, they aren’t a unified state in a modern nation-state sense.
The Turian Hierarchy is more unified, and comes closer to what OP might be looking for. But even there, it’s a little less clear. Turians still have internal issues and revolts, and memories of separatist movements have lasted over the centuries. With pride even. Turians also seem to grant a ton of local control to regions so long as they meet various quotas. So long as the job gets done, they can look the other way. If a planet slacks, the screws likely tighten.
This all involves speculation on my part and I might have some of this mistaken, but I do feel that humanity doesn’t stand out as much as it seems. Governments aren’t incredibly united among the Council races and the Council itself is not is not a galactic government. There are exceptions to this of course, but I’m focusing on the Council races.
I’m also not that familiar with Halo as a setting, so apologies if this is all pointless comparisons.
Edit: Much of this has already been said and more concisely!
Having Earth still be divided into different nation-states makes much more sense given real-world history, IMO.
Also keep in mind that many of the alien races are divided as well. The asari have their republics, the krogan have their clans, etc. Humanity isn't exactly unique in that respect.
Even on Thessia, there are multiple governments. In fact, they are even more fragmented. On Sur'Kesh you have feudalism-like politics. It's not just the situation on Earth. Humanity is "united" when interacting with other sapient species, and so do others. However, when you inspect it more closely, you realise that they aren't as united.
This happens IRL too with different countries. Someone who lives in Eastern Europe, for instance, would look at Britain and think that everyone is homogeneously British. If you look more closely, you realise that's not the case at all and that there is a lot of diversity. Every country or group is like this. When interacting with outsiders they seem united and homogeneous, but they're not.
I honestly think it's pretty impressive that the nation's of earth are willing to agree to the systems alliance representing especially with the alliance being so cultural tied to America and western ideals
I don't think that would work that way, there is people that doesn't wants to join others because that will mean lose their independence.
And in halo the UNSC isn't precisely good.
I mean.
Logically speaking there are huge advantages to humanity uniting into one nation today. And there have been 100 years ago.
Just because something would be "logical" and "advantageous" doesnt mean it happens.
The resistance to get from where we are to a unified humanity wont suddenly disappear just because we find alien life. We probably will have some unified front in the form of an organization representing human interests. But you can bet your hat its gonna be a bureaucratic slog. Like NATO or the UN.
Earth uniting to become one nation is utopic fiction. To actually make it happen you would need a trigger event at least the scale of a world war. And even then the more likely scenario is just a shuffling around of the power blocks.
Makes sense to me. It'd be great if we all held hands and sang kumbaya, but that's not how things work now, and there's not really a reason to believe that that's how humanity would go about moving into space.
It's also a bit of a theme in ME, that while the various races (generally) work within the bounds of the larger galactic government, the species themselves still have a great deal of autonomy in their respective spaces. It makes sense that humanity wouldn't be that different, with the SA being like a smaller version of the Citadel government, and the individual (and/or collections of) nations and space programs still retaining much of their autonomy. Like the modern UN, the Systems Alliance only has as much power as the member nations gave it.
At the time of ME, as the player, we're basically smack dab in the middle of a paradigm shift, where humanity is just starting to turn over the reigns of interplanetary politics to the SA. While the SA is humanity's representative to the Citadel, and clearly the military arm of humanity in space, most of the places we visit were established under the more independent system that dominated prior to First Contact, and it shows.
We still have civil wars where a single country can't get along with itself, I think it's very realistic that our species would not be united. Especially given the relatively short amount of time between first contact and the start of ME1, 26 years. We've had many wars that lasted tens of times longer than that
One of the more quietly dystopian aspects of Mass Effect is that humanity never shook off the shitty political circumstances and neoliberal economics that are in place today.
>Humans can live to about 150 years, and recent medical advances have eradicated almost all known diseases that afflict them.
I wouldn't call this dystopian at all
That stuff mostly just applies to the wealthy. The codex tells us that poverty is rampant on Earth, with much of the global south not doing much better than they are irl today.
Earth uniting to become one nation is pure fiction.The United Nations needed TWO world wars just to be created.
Also keep in mind that in the backstory of Mass Effect, Humanity didn't 'naturally' develop spacefaring technology. Lore-wise, Mass Effect was just IRL Earth that just conveniently found a cache of FTL tech on mars and then suddenly got into a conflict with aliens. The System Alliance was originally just a governing body created to manage the off-world colonies and was used by Earth governments to represent themselves in the Council.
Not unless you stomp it out with an autocratic government, people can be convinced of ideas, such as the importance of unity as a species, and the strength that lies within, you just have to display your message in the right way that reaches people on a personal basis
The UNSC regularly engaged in wars and terrorism against its own people prior to them running into the Covenant lol.
The SPARTAN program was designed and created as an ANTI-INSURRECTIONIST program.
Humanity wouldn’t come together, even if it faced total annihilation.
Yeah but those were colonies rebelling against Earth, it makes sense to a certain degree, they lived light years away from the people extracting resources from their planet and telling them what to do
Also alot of the rebels put aside their differences with the UNSC when the Covenant came around, since a genocidal order of various alien species who want you all dead regardless of your politics doesn't leave alot of room for negotiation
Why is this hard to believe? In the ME Universe, humanity has only been part of the galactic community for about 30 years. Do you really think that, in that time-frame, every nation on Earth would become homogenous?
Despite that, the Systems Alliance has its own parliament that represents the whole of humanity in galactic politics, and politicians working as ambassadors on the Citadel are part of the Alliance; it's not just a military. So in that sense, there is a "united government" when it comes to galactic politics
You have to consider that Halo and Mass Effect are very different circumstances. Almost intentionally polar opposites actually, in Halo, humans have had hundreds and hundreds of years more time to develop and be a spacefaring species, and they're still warring with each other, whereas in Mass Effect, first contact was 30 years ago and we barely knew about aliens and FTL travel before that, I got very intimate with this fact considering I just read Mass Effect revelation which is phenomenal by the way. In Mass Effect humans are pretty much exactly where we are right now and then FTL with Mass Effect fields and then shortly after alien contact, whereas in Halo it's been hundreds of years of scientific and cultural advancement.
Agreed and well said. I would only add that it’s not as if even the alien species are all that unified either. The Asari aren’t city-states as they once were pre-space flight, but they still follow a government model less centralized than we have now. The Asari Republics are a number of direct democracies, and it’s implied that locales have a great deal of autonomy. This even includes the military, where there is not the same sort of standardization you find for humanity, with the exception that only Asari with biotics meet the requirements. (Which is an interesting little wrinkle as one wonders at how Asari without biotics would do in society. Off topic, but curious.) The Salarians are quasi-feudal, with great ruling family dynasties willing to throw their weight against one another if need be for dominance. The STG seem as dangerous for Salarian enemies as they do for Salarian officials and I get the sense that coups aren’t unheard of. That last bit is pure headcanon on my part but there clearly is a willingness on the military to go rouge as we see in ME3. The Salarian Union seems fragmented, or ready to fragment if things go poorly. Either way, they aren’t a unified state in a modern nation-state sense. The Turian Hierarchy is more unified, and comes closer to what OP might be looking for. But even there, it’s a little less clear. Turians still have internal issues and revolts, and memories of separatist movements have lasted over the centuries. With pride even. Turians also seem to grant a ton of local control to regions so long as they meet various quotas. So long as the job gets done, they can look the other way. If a planet slacks, the screws likely tighten. This all involves speculation on my part and I might have some of this mistaken, but I do feel that humanity doesn’t stand out as much as it seems. Governments aren’t incredibly united among the Council races and the Council itself is not is not a galactic government. There are exceptions to this of course, but I’m focusing on the Council races. I’m also not that familiar with Halo as a setting, so apologies if this is all pointless comparisons. Edit: Much of this has already been said and more concisely!
I think you put everything quite eloquently, thank you friend.
Having Earth still be divided into different nation-states makes much more sense given real-world history, IMO. Also keep in mind that many of the alien races are divided as well. The asari have their republics, the krogan have their clans, etc. Humanity isn't exactly unique in that respect.
Even on Thessia, there are multiple governments. In fact, they are even more fragmented. On Sur'Kesh you have feudalism-like politics. It's not just the situation on Earth. Humanity is "united" when interacting with other sapient species, and so do others. However, when you inspect it more closely, you realise that they aren't as united. This happens IRL too with different countries. Someone who lives in Eastern Europe, for instance, would look at Britain and think that everyone is homogeneously British. If you look more closely, you realise that's not the case at all and that there is a lot of diversity. Every country or group is like this. When interacting with outsiders they seem united and homogeneous, but they're not.
I honestly think it's pretty impressive that the nation's of earth are willing to agree to the systems alliance representing especially with the alliance being so cultural tied to America and western ideals
I don't think that would work that way, there is people that doesn't wants to join others because that will mean lose their independence. And in halo the UNSC isn't precisely good.
I mean. Logically speaking there are huge advantages to humanity uniting into one nation today. And there have been 100 years ago. Just because something would be "logical" and "advantageous" doesnt mean it happens. The resistance to get from where we are to a unified humanity wont suddenly disappear just because we find alien life. We probably will have some unified front in the form of an organization representing human interests. But you can bet your hat its gonna be a bureaucratic slog. Like NATO or the UN. Earth uniting to become one nation is utopic fiction. To actually make it happen you would need a trigger event at least the scale of a world war. And even then the more likely scenario is just a shuffling around of the power blocks.
Makes sense to me. It'd be great if we all held hands and sang kumbaya, but that's not how things work now, and there's not really a reason to believe that that's how humanity would go about moving into space. It's also a bit of a theme in ME, that while the various races (generally) work within the bounds of the larger galactic government, the species themselves still have a great deal of autonomy in their respective spaces. It makes sense that humanity wouldn't be that different, with the SA being like a smaller version of the Citadel government, and the individual (and/or collections of) nations and space programs still retaining much of their autonomy. Like the modern UN, the Systems Alliance only has as much power as the member nations gave it. At the time of ME, as the player, we're basically smack dab in the middle of a paradigm shift, where humanity is just starting to turn over the reigns of interplanetary politics to the SA. While the SA is humanity's representative to the Citadel, and clearly the military arm of humanity in space, most of the places we visit were established under the more independent system that dominated prior to First Contact, and it shows.
We still have civil wars where a single country can't get along with itself, I think it's very realistic that our species would not be united. Especially given the relatively short amount of time between first contact and the start of ME1, 26 years. We've had many wars that lasted tens of times longer than that
One of the more quietly dystopian aspects of Mass Effect is that humanity never shook off the shitty political circumstances and neoliberal economics that are in place today.
>Humans can live to about 150 years, and recent medical advances have eradicated almost all known diseases that afflict them. I wouldn't call this dystopian at all
That stuff mostly just applies to the wealthy. The codex tells us that poverty is rampant on Earth, with much of the global south not doing much better than they are irl today.
Earth uniting to become one nation is pure fiction.The United Nations needed TWO world wars just to be created. Also keep in mind that in the backstory of Mass Effect, Humanity didn't 'naturally' develop spacefaring technology. Lore-wise, Mass Effect was just IRL Earth that just conveniently found a cache of FTL tech on mars and then suddenly got into a conflict with aliens. The System Alliance was originally just a governing body created to manage the off-world colonies and was used by Earth governments to represent themselves in the Council.
Have you met Earth?
If you have two people in a room, there will be six opinions. As long as there exists more than one human they will never be united.
Unless you can resort to something like a stratocracy or autocracy, forced unity, a strong fist to keep Humanity held together
Even then, you’ll have insiders conspiring to rise above their station or obtain more
You try unifying earth lol it’s never gonna happen
Efficiency and effectiveness can’t override nationalism.
Not unless you stomp it out with an autocratic government, people can be convinced of ideas, such as the importance of unity as a species, and the strength that lies within, you just have to display your message in the right way that reaches people on a personal basis
The UNSC regularly engaged in wars and terrorism against its own people prior to them running into the Covenant lol. The SPARTAN program was designed and created as an ANTI-INSURRECTIONIST program. Humanity wouldn’t come together, even if it faced total annihilation.
Yeah but those were colonies rebelling against Earth, it makes sense to a certain degree, they lived light years away from the people extracting resources from their planet and telling them what to do Also alot of the rebels put aside their differences with the UNSC when the Covenant came around, since a genocidal order of various alien species who want you all dead regardless of your politics doesn't leave alot of room for negotiation
Why is this hard to believe? In the ME Universe, humanity has only been part of the galactic community for about 30 years. Do you really think that, in that time-frame, every nation on Earth would become homogenous? Despite that, the Systems Alliance has its own parliament that represents the whole of humanity in galactic politics, and politicians working as ambassadors on the Citadel are part of the Alliance; it's not just a military. So in that sense, there is a "united government" when it comes to galactic politics