Victoria's (19th Century) liberal bias

[ashandresash]

(...)

Regarding your point about German dissatisfaction, perhaps losing a war should trigger a large loss of support for the current ruling party and perhaps the government type as well.

Maybe there'll be a feature for things like these (internal consequences of losing international status): as it was said in IGN's preview of Victoria2,

If you are perceived to be one of the top eight countries in the world, you're able to influence additional countries to do your will, you also appease your citizens at the same time, filling them with a sense of national pride. However, falling out of this specialized club can lead to political and economic unrest as your citizenry chooses to disregard your policies or move from your country to a better land.

We don't know how that 'national pride' will work, but good for including a game mechanic to handle partially the imperialist/nationalist and even romantic forces in the era...

In general terms, Vicky2 should be as liberal/socialist/conservative-romantic biased as it was actually this era. Vicky2 will be great if it achieves to get succesfully these three 'sprit du temps' in global game experience (social issues, economy, diplomacy...).

 

[Earl Uhtred]

V:R advertised a condition of 'national trauma' that would rile up your pops but I don't recall ever seeing it in action. Or if it was, I wasn't aware of it.

You can think of plenty of examples when a country was humiliated and clearly not punching its weight - late 19th century China, interwar Germany.

 

[Praetonia]

Victoria 1 really had a sort of socialist/marxist bias, ie. "regulated" industries were advances on free industries, Keynesianism was the best economic tech, a great depression was a hard coded event, people would always tend to turn socialist over time, if the state didn't fund education, there would simply be no education, despite near-universal private education in the US and UK in this time period, etc.

The big problem Vicky had was lack of clear demarcation of what the player controlled and what "happened anyway". Was the player the government? A vague national Zeitgeist? Some sort of God? It was never clear. For example, IRL, more free economies had better economic growth. In Vicky, there isn't a GDP number that grows by a % each year, rather the player originally had total control over the economic system, which was simplistic enough to be centrally managed well. Later the Ricky capitalist system fixed this somewhat, though the choices of the capitalists actually tended to be worse than a "centrally planned" player-controlled economy and the only advantage was ability to spam factories cheaply: IRL, this was the other way around.

Without knowing clearly what the player is 'meant' to control, it's difficult to decide what should and shouldn't be hard-coded to some extent.

 

[Buladelu]

It happened once to the company I worked for - some Chinese company forged a license agreement and started publishing our games in China without our knowledge.

There's a factory in my city that produced Intel processes at the end of eighties. It's good to live in a socialist state! Too bad we are capitalists now and I can't make my own Europa Universalis for NES and cellphones.

It would make sense if liberalisation makes ruling more difficult, like unpredictable free market, criminals, foreign influence etc. There were chaotic capitalists in Vicky 1, but that's just not enough.

 

[Buladelu]

Without knowing clearly what the player is 'meant' to control, it's difficult to decide what should and shouldn't be hard-coded to some extent.

The same the problem with Rome. F.e. we control republic so there're many parties, consuls etc. So it seems that we are the senate, but the senate has it's own will (which we can influence or laugh at). Are we consul? No, they change all the time and we don't care if he dies. In Crusader Kings we played as a dynasty, in EU we're some sort of backstage goverment (or national elite maybe), but it's hard to imagine that the same power that ruled Russian Empire rules Soviet Russia.

Oh well, gameplay abstraction. Although it would make sense if you could chose your side in civil war and secure your power that way. There were such events in Vicky 1, weren't they?

 

[Quarto]

The same the problem with Rome. F.e. we control republic so there're many parties, consuls etc. So it seems that we are the senate, but the senate has it's own will (which we can influence or laugh at). Are we consul? No, they change all the time and we don't care if he dies. In Crusader Kings we played as a dynasty, in EU we're some sort of backstage goverment (or national elite maybe), but it's hard to imagine that the same power that ruled Russian Empire rules Soviet Russia.

Well, you're simply the player guiding a particular country. I would say the problem isn't the fact that the player who guided the Russian Empire now rules Soviet Russia. Instead, the problem is that you, as the player, actually guided it towards Soviet Russia in elections. I mean, communism did partially occur by itself as a consequence of the player's actions, and that's great - but those election events where you chose what views will win in the debate, thus steering the direction your population's ideology would develop, spoiled this to some degree (fortunately, there weren't that many of those events).

 

[unmerged(28220)]

One thing we all gotta remember is that liberalism in the Victorian Age meant a very different thing than liberalism today... I think it would be safe to say that aside from a few we are ALL bleeding heart hippies compared to even the most liberal scholars from the 1830's-1900 and also that liberalism meant more trying new things vs the status quo as opposed to the modern viewpoint of lots of govn't involvement vs govn't providing essential services...

As for ideological spread I like the idea of different pops having different ideological drifts like Farmers/laborers being aligned to conservative and etc... I'd like to see maybe a 'pushback' effect that in effect the more a pop group converts the harder it is to convert so if you get 50% of Farmers to go liberal it is much harder to get the remaining 50% while if 100% of farmers are conservative to start it is easy to get 10% to convert to liberalism... I think if modeled well it could really allow for a nice realistic spread of ideologies in a region or country and it could force the player to make some interesting choices...

 

[Boblof]

Victoria revolutions definitly had a strong economic liberal bias, and it hard as hell to go thru the whole game as a dictatorship. I hope that will not carry over into Victoria 2. It shouldn't be impossible, or even that very hard, to be a succsessful economically interventionist conservative state as there are many examples of such states.

 

[Zelvik]

One thing we all gotta remember is that liberalism in the Victorian Age meant a very different thing than liberalism today... I think it would be safe to say that aside from a few we are ALL bleeding heart hippies compared to even the most liberal scholars from the 1830's-1900 and also that liberalism meant more trying new things vs the status quo as opposed to the modern viewpoint of lots of govn't involvement vs govn't providing essential services...

As for ideological spread I like the idea of different pops having different ideological drifts like Farmers/laborers being aligned to conservative and etc... I'd like to see maybe a 'pushback' effect that in effect the more a pop group converts the harder it is to convert so if you get 50% of Farmers to go liberal it is much harder to get the remaining 50% while if 100% of farmers are conservative to start it is easy to get 10% to convert to liberalism... I think if modeled well it could really allow for a nice realistic spread of ideologies in a region or country and it could force the player to make some interesting choices...

As stated before, that discrepancy is only due to the confusion of liberalism and progressive/socialist ideologies in the US. Liberalism (at least economic liberalism or right liberalism) to this day in Europe is associated with the same principles of 19th century liberalism. That part of Liberalism though nowadays is associated with conservativism in the US while in Europe conservativism is mainly associated with societal issues (like family policies) while the economic aspect is divided between market liberal conservatives like in the US and social conservatives which mainly promote christian social ideals (like Bismarkian type Social systems in continental Europe).

 

[Phalanxia]

The same the problem with Rome. F.e. we control republic so there're many parties, consuls etc. So it seems that we are the senate, but the senate has it's own will (which we can influence or laugh at). Are we consul? No, they change all the time and we don't care if he dies. In Crusader Kings we played as a dynasty, in EU we're some sort of backstage goverment (or national elite maybe), but it's hard to imagine that the same power that ruled Russian Empire rules Soviet Russia.

I always thought of myself in that situation as the personification of that country (E.g. Mother Russia), just like in the old satirical cartoons.

 

[Buladelu]

I always thought of myself in that situation as the personification of that country (E.g. Mother Russia), just like in the old satirical cartoons.

Sooo, mother Russia wants you to kill many russian people to conquer Novgorod, Lithuania (Belorussians counted as Russians till not-so-long-ago), make it people suffer through wars to revolts and such? Eh, than you are a part of some schyzophrenical design: your country generally wants peace and calmness while you build a better future for it with guns and diplomacy.

Ah, everything is so simple in Crusader Kings.

 

[Garak]

There's a factory in my city that produced Intel processes at the end of eighties. It's good to live in a socialist state! Too bad we are capitalists now and I can't make my own Europa Universalis for NES and cellphones.

It would make sense if liberalisation makes ruling more difficult, like unpredictable free market, criminals, foreign influence etc. There were chaotic capitalists in Vicky 1, but that's just not enough.

I agree. Liberalization should definately come with important advantages and disadvantages which actually have a big impact. Liberalizing may make your society more innovative, competitive, etc, but also makes it harder to maintain stability.

 

[unmerged(48056)]

One thing we all gotta remember is that liberalism in the Victorian Age meant a very different thing than liberalism today... I think it would be safe to say that aside from a few we are ALL bleeding heart hippies compared to even the most liberal scholars from the 1830's-1900 and also that liberalism meant more trying new things vs the status quo as opposed to the modern viewpoint of lots of govn't involvement vs govn't providing essential services...

Liberalism sprung up as an egalitarian-nationalist-model (French Revolution) and in opposition of privileged elite.
It was a radical thing to propose that every man in the nation was equal (nationalist / egalitarian). Much like it was very radical to have something called class mobility, no income taxes, et al.




There is a reason we have laws prohibiting monopolization (though I reckon they exist only in name these days). And there were reasons why the U.S. Government auctioned farmland off in the Midwest in the 1860's for peanuts. Otherwise we would have entire tracts of the Midwest empty like... now... oh wait...


In a true Orwellian fashion, Liberals are no longer Liberals, but privileged egoistic elites who pretend to be liberals, socialists and progressives, but in reality are probably more economic reactionary than anything else (aspiring to own vast estates of land, downward view on lower classes, lack of class mobility, nanny state in a very atheistic-clerical manner, et al)

 

[von_Manstein11]

I agree. Liberalization should definately come with important advantages and disadvantages which actually have a big impact. Liberalizing may make your society more innovative, competitive, etc, but also makes it harder to maintain stability.

there should indeed be massive penalties for Liberal nations that are only eased through lower taxation and lower unemployment. If taxes are even moderately high (30%+) and unemployment is moderate, there should be immense upheaval to deal with.

 

[unmerged(48056)]

there should indeed be massive penalties for Liberal nations that are only eased through lower taxation and lower unemployment. If taxes are even moderately high (30%+) and unemployment is moderate, there should be immense upheaval to deal with.

Or just declare war on a random country, sneak in the personal income tax and pretend that it always existed... :rofl: (Looking at you Lincoin and Wildrow Wilson )

 

[von_Manstein11]

Or just declare war on a random country, sneak in the personal income tax and pretend that it always existed... :rofl: (Looking at you Lincoin and Wildrow Wilson )

that sounds strangely like the Liberal party here lol, they reach out with one hand to shake your hand while smiling, then the other hand reaches around and grab's your wallet.

 

[telesien]

The biggest problem of realistic model of liberal state is this: IRL the state is the one who doesn't know and can't effectively run economy. In game the player is the one who knows and the capitalists are the ones who don't know and make stupid decisions. That is why it was impossible to achieve good results in Vicky 1 with total implementation of laissez-faire. Just face it. Is here anyone who never closed and demolished factory which wasn't even finished yet? Glass factory anyone?

Unless the AI won't improve drastically, we don't have to artificially limit liberal governments. Just making laissez-faire policy more accurate (no control over factories production/demolition what so ever) will limit it enough

 

[unmerged(10262)]

the long 19th Century (1792-1914) is the triumph of liberalism. So from that point of view Victoria 2 will have a stronger bias towards liberalism than Victroia 1 (which I feel was strongly weighted towards socialism). However we are aiming for more blocks on you simply marching towards liberalism. some places will find it harder than others.

This is very debatable, most governments in Europe for most of the period ran very protectionist states. Towards the later half of the 19th century it was quite obvious for everyone that the more protectionist governments did way better as well (Germany and the US, both were running ahead of the UK in virtually every way you can think off). Even a country like Russia started to industrialise first with heavy tariffs. What you could argue is that the consumers in the UK gained enormously from free trade liberalism and that is partly true, that is however exactly the kind of "success" that not in any way is represented in Victoria.

It is true that Victoria was the opposite of a laissez faire economy however (like well all computer games more or less, but Victoria was if anything worse than average). It was more or less like doing 5-years plans in a planned economy. Any steps away from that is very welcome. And something a little closer to a real world market is a nice step.

 

[lila-laune-bär]

The biggest problem of realistic model of liberal state is this: IRL the state is the one who doesn't know and can't effectively run economy. In game the player is the one who knows and the capitalists are the ones who don't know and make stupid decisions. That is why it was impossible to achieve good results in Vicky 1 with total implementation of laissez-faire. Just face it. Is here anyone who never closed and demolished factory which wasn't even finished yet? Glass factory anyone?

Unless the AI won't improve drastically, we don't have to artificially limit liberal governments. Just making laissez-faire policy more accurate (no control over factories production/demolition what so ever) will limit it enough

Interesting point, I think you quite nailed it in about a paragraph. In Victoria we've got something that is impossible in real life: A central authority (the player) aware of the economy as a whole.

 

[Celdur]

Interesting point, I think you quite nailed it in about a paragraph. In Victoria we've got something that is impossible in real life: A central authority (the player) aware of the economy as a whole.

Right, we are the eternal gods of our countries that know what works best and will labor to make and perpetuate the best posible way to run our country.

Religious jokes anybody?

I think economically liberal countries should be so in game, the player has actually less control over the economy, period. Just make it work fairly well and we only have the tax to control some growth of certain industries and "military priorities" to build things in strategic places, in TOTAL war we can take more specific control of the country and that's all.
Anyway apart from GB was there other country so Laissez-faire?

Of course we have complete control over the army.