Did Democracy Fail?

[Lord Revan]

Also the "Death Star" novel says

Her "crime" had been simply to back the wrong political candidate in a planetwide election on her world. The Emperor had decided that the man running for office was a traitor, as were his most influential supporters

the bolding is mine, this talkin why a mirialan architect called Teela Kaarz got herself convicted to Despayre (a planet that's essentially a gulag/consentration camp).

So while the mechanisms might have been officially free, in truth backing the wrong candidate could cause you to end up into a prison planet where basically no one would go out of their free will.

So while the empire might have not changed the mechanisms of the elections or the structure of the goverment, but it's highly likely that the allowed candidates were mostly "yes-men" who would do what ever Palpatine told them.

[Darth Fanboy]

Keep in mind, I didn't say it would respond within hours. Merely that it's conceivable that the committee might have fairly investigated the evidence and got on with it. It's also conceivable that they might have taken so long that Amidala ended up signing the treaty.

I see where you're coming from now, my bad.

So while the empire might have not changed the mechanisms of the elections or the structure of the goverment, but it's highly likely that the allowed candidates were mostly "yes-men" who would do what ever Palpatine told them.

They don't all have to be yes-men or a card carrying member of COMPNOR or even Palpatines favorite choice, merely candidates who would not oppose the New Order. There's too many systems in the Empire for even Palpatine to manipulate every planetary government.

[Lord Revan]

how did you get all from "mostly"?

ofc there will people who get in by not opposing the "party line" (aka the New Order), but why you think Palpatine personally had to do all this task.


The way I've figured it the local governors were emperor's repesentives, so a command from them would akin to command from the emperor himself.

also if the general amtosphare was highly unfriendly for critical thinking (which Palpatine already seemed to have build during the clone wars), it's not hard to build a pseudo democracy in democratic systems with mere threat of punishment (the Tarkin doctrine), especially if you add examples if those punishments were carried out (the destruction of Alderaan being the most visible one)

[Darth Wong]

Rather than wrangle over EU sources, I think it's important to point out that in the original ANH novelization, Biggs referred to how glorious it was when the Empire first came to power. It really seems as if the population at large considered it to be a major improvement, which would certainly support the notion that the Republic was a failure. Indeed, it seems almost silly to debate this at all when the beginning of the ANH novelization explicitly states that the Republic had become rotten and corrupt over time, hence ripe for the rise of an Emperor. That is pretty much the definition of failure.