Zeng

The Principality of Zeng is the largest Member in the Confederated Peoples although its lead over the second largest Member, Farinor is small one. Like Farinor, Zeng has 58 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and three seats in the Confederal Senate. This makes Zeng one of the most politically important Members in the Confederated Peoples.

Elections in Zeng are contested by all the major Confederal political parties although Democratic Concordance, the Conservative Democratic Party, the Progressive Democratic Party and the Labour Party dominate. The Communist Party is also influential locally and is represented in the legislature. The current government is a coalition between the Progressive Democrats and Labour.

Zeng is of great economic significance to the nation. The economy is rapidly growing and this growth is especially strong in the high-tech sector. However, Zeng also maintains a strong manufacturing base. It is a leading consumer of steel, concrete and oil and a leading producer of manufactured goods, information technology and agricultural products.

History

In 1982, the Danaan High Kingdom officially claimed a large island located to the south of Dana and outside the Islands of Mists. Aboriginal Danaan navigators had referred to the island as Zeng for reasons which are not now known and this was the name the Danaans used. The island was discovered to be hospitable for settlement and early settlements were established.

The first settlements were fairly representative of the Danaan population but settlement soon came to be dominated by people of Chinese extraction and Confucians both from the Danaan High Kingdom and from elsewhere. This was likely because the land reminded them of their ancestral lands and because they, like many other human groups, felt alientated during the period of the Fae.

In 1990, I Ma-huan, a Danaan nobleman, was created Prince of Zeng and the Principality was admitted the the Danaan High Kingdom as a principality in its own right and not just a claimed territory. That year, Zeng created its own constitution providing for a system of constitutional monarchy. With some amendment, that constitution still governs Zeng today.

Politics

Although the political executive in Zeng is led by the First Minister and is accountable to the legislature, a great deal of importance is attached to the roles of the Prince and of the High King. The system of constitutional monarchy is extremely popular and the role of the monarchy is revered and taken seriously by the people. It is unclear to what extent politicians familiar with the inner workings of the system share this view, but all must at least affirm it in their public statements.

Zeng has a parliamentary system. It has a unicameral Principality Popular Congress. The leader of the party or coalition commanding a majority in the Congress receive a mandate from the Prince to form a Government. If the government receives the confidence of Congress, the leader is formally appointed First Minister and the government ministers are admitted to the Council of State. The Council of State is formally chaired by the Prince who has the right to be consulted, the right to encourage and the right to warn. These rights, in Zeng, include the right to chair the meetings of the Council of State in person if and when he feels is necessary. However, this right is rarely exercised and the First Minister is normally the acting chair. The Council of State is collectively accountable to the Congress which can withdraw its confidence from the entire Council or from any individual minister. If the government receives a vote of no confidence, it is customary for the First Minister to sitting Congress to have some time to attempt to work out the issue of government and either for the First Minister to be able to form a new government capable of receiving the confidence of the Congress or for a new leader capable of doing so to emerge through the renegotiation of coalitions. If this does not happen, Congress is dissolved and new elections are scheduled. Regardless of political circumstances, elections are held at least once every eight years. Members of Congress are elected through a system of proportional representation.

Family planning policy

Family planning receives extensive state support in Zeng with tax dollars going to make contraceptives widely available and fund ads about sexual responsibility. The public schools have an extensive and well-funded sex education program that focuses on teaching safe and responsible sexual behaviors. Abortion laws are generally liberal although sex-selective abortion is strictly illegal and, when it can be proven, is subject to harsh penalties.

The government's policies are very controversial with many social conservatives arguing that they promote abortion, promiscuity, adolescent sexuality and homosexuality, all of which social conservatives consider undesirable and immoral. Others argue that it is patriotic to have families as large as possible to as to expand the nation and the community and that large, traditional families are the building blocks of any civilized society. Other, more liberal, critics argue that the policies attempt to pressure people to live their lives a certain way in a manner not befitting a liberal democratic government. Instead, they say schools should provice a balanced perspective on different family choices and government should neither sponsor nor forbid contraceptives, sexual responsibility campaigns and abortions of all kinds.

Human rights

Zeng has been criticized for being one of the Confederal Members which still retain the death penalty for particularly heinous crimes such as aggravated murder in the first degree and aggravated rape of a minor. The number of executions is relatively low. For example, only three people were executed in all of 2006, two for aggravated first degree murder and one for aggravated rape of a minor. However, many consider this to be a human rights violation.

The abolition of the death penalty at the Confederal level led some activists to hope for the Confederal Supreme Court to declare it unconstitutional. As a result, Mah Ai-de, a man sentenced to death for the first degree murder of a police officer, is appealing his sentence on the grounds that it violates the Confederal Constitution. The case is still pending. Many anti-capital punishment activists have been actively supporting Mah's appeal through demonstrations and petitiions to various officials. The primary petition to overturn the death sentence has been signed by a number of prominent actors, musicians and other celebrities.

Political divisions

Zeng is made up of 34 parishes. Each parish has its own elected local government. The exact organization of the local government varies from parish to parish but most local government elections are non-partisan. Identity in Zeng tends to be layered with most people identifying strongly not only with Zeng, the Danaan High Kingdom and the Confederated Peoples but also with their local parish.

Geography and climate

Zeng is an island and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on all sides. It is geographically diverse and contains alluvial plains, mountains, grasslands, hill country and river deltas. The principality is densely populated and there are relatively few places where the landscape can be viewed in any sort of pristine condition.

One major problem where recent progress has been made is in the area of desertification. From settlement until fairly recently, poor agricultural practices caused the steady expansion of the Agitrean Desert. However, improved agricultural practices and the planting of lengthy barrier tree lines has substantially reduced this problem and contained the Agitrean Desert at its current size.

The most troublesome current environmental problem is that of water pollution. While some regulations exist, they are widely ignored and enforcement is poor. Some companies also get around regulations by dilluting pollutants in water from the very rivers they intend to empty them into until the mix is no longer legally classified as a pollutant and then emptying it back into the river. This, in effect, is the same as dumping the pollutants directly but it effectively takes advantage of a provision of Zeng's environmental laws which uses concentration as a primary factor in defining illegal dumping.

Economy

Zeng is a leading producer of manufactured goods such as toys, apparel, textiles and footwear. Many important Confederal steel plants are also located in Zeng and a few ironworks have even been constructed following the Shattering and the end of Fae mandated laws banning the industry. Zeng also produces coal, machinery, armaments, petroleum, cement, chemicals, processed foods, automobiles, consumer electronics and telecommunications as well as containing strong local branches of the three dominant Confederal industries of book-publishing, information technology and beef-based agriculture.

Zeng has a strongly regulated mixed economy with a large public sector. The coastal areas of the principality tend to be much more prosperous than the central areas and thus the largest social program now underway in Zeng is the Central Zeng Development Strategy, undertaken in cooperation with the Confederal Department of Infrastructure. The Strategy includes the development of better infrastructure, promotion of education, retention of talent and enticement of private investment. So far it has had moderate sucess.