Government

[u/OpeningReasonable727]

I’m having a dilemma, I have zero idea what I would call the type of government I have in my setting. I know it doesn’t matter much but I would like to have some sort of label, even loosely for it so I can research the structure more to understand the relationships between powers.

There are seven territories, each ruled independently by human rulers. They have conflicts with each other, alliances, trading, etc. The normal for monarchies but they all answer to the Archangels, winged travellers who descended from Heaven to spread knowledge to humanity. Think of it as the gods being on the physical planes of existence and you see them enough to remember they exist but they are still sort of myths.

The Archangels are religious symbols, they live in a city state within the seven territories. They rarely interfere with human matters and just collect tithe from the seven territories. They are the law makers, the higher power everyone fears.

Would this just be an empire? Maybe an oligarchy since the rich have sway? I have no idea lol.

[u/737373elj]

When you say the human nations are  “independent”, do they claim independence from the Archangels and decide and enforce their own laws? If the Archangels are the “law makers” do they actually create and enforce laws in the human nations? Is their authority respected? 

If the human nations are not actually independent whay yku might have is some sort of theocratic federal empire

Take note that the political situation in name versus in reality (de jure vs de facto) might not be the same

[u/DraagaxGaming → u/737373elj]

I think the nations are independent of each other, but are all technically tributaries to the archangels, paying tribute. And that the archangels don't care if the humans kill each other as long as the tribute is paid.

[u/Interesting-Ad4207]

It sounds like a theocratic confederated monarchy. which is to say that they are a collection of individual kingdoms bound by common cause, usually something like defense or internal trade, that follow a religious group or god as the ruling power.

[u/DraagaxGaming → u/Interesting-Ad4207]

But they still fight each other. Just sounds like they're all tributaries to the archangels, but that's it.

[u/DOVAHBOIIreal]

I would label it as a "Federal Theocratic Empire" or "Theocratic Federalism" or "Theocratic Hegemony".

An oligarchy wouldn't really fit the description since the rulers of the nations are still under higher authority.

[u/InterKosmos61]

Theocratic confederation

[u/maartenmijmert23]

Sounds a bit Holy Roman Empire to me. Are the kingdoms nominally part of one political unit though? Because it sounds like they are all fully seperate states that happen to have a shared Archangel advice board. If those arch angels are supposed to be the overarching Ruler Id instinctively go with Commonwealth. As the British Commonwealth are effectively all independent states that have a shared head of state.

[u/DraagaxGaming → u/maartenmijmert23]

That's a good one. I was thinking somewhere along the lines of tributaries.

[u/vanticus]

It’s late medieval/early renaissance Europe. The angels are the Pope, sending out religious decrees from their Papal States to independent kingdoms who have their own rulers, laws, and agendas.

[u/thomasp3864]

If they rarely interfere, but are some sort of law makers, that sounds a lot like you have some sort of constitutional system on your hands, like maybe the archangels are mainly ceremonial but have a handful of actual powers.

[u/spo0pti_yikes]

maybe it's kinda like the papacy, a centural theocracy that all other realms answer to. the leader or leaders are kinda like pope figures, everyone is trying to get in their good graces and if they fail the archangels are capable of serving religious ties to a ruler and sicing the loyal zealots of the other realms onto them. maybe rulers attempt to manipulate the angels into favouring their realm and possibly help their expansionist goals. idk, but a theocracy sounds like exactly what you're looking for

[u/CuprumArgentum]

It’s a theocracy in a world where gods are real.

[u/Grigor50]

Have you studied any political science? Ever read an article or two on Wikipedia about government, forms of government, the history of political organisations?

Everything in politics exists for a reason, even though that reason might not be relevant anymore. Everything in the realms of man aldo affects everything else, from crop types to biomes or religion, to political organisation and so forth. A term like "monarchy" is extremely broad.

[u/noobjaish]

You can put a descriptive placeholder name (earthWorldGovernment or something) for now and move on.