I love these sorts of discussions. It's one of the reasons I spend so much time here.
Whereas other Typhon Pact leaders such as Tzenkethi Autarch Korzenten Rej Tov-AA may pursue limited hostile action against the Federation for substantive gain of some sort, they still act rationally and do not pursue overt warfare, which they view as not in their national interests.
Given that the Tzenkethi leader holds his or her post on merit, having tested highest on whatever criteria the Tzenkethi use to judge leadership potential, it makes sense that Korzenten, for all his antagonism toward the Federation, would be a rational player. Cultural biases and ideological baggage aside, a test for leadership potential surely weeds out those prone to psychological instability or megalomania, whatever the culture.
I think that may be an overly optimistic assertion. I certainly agree that Korzenten is a rational political actor, but I'm very skeptical of the idea that you can design a test capable of objectively determining who is a good leader and of weeding out megalomania. I mean, you are literally talking about a society where everyone is indoctrinated to worship the Autarch as a virtual god -- seems to me that megalomania of sorts is almost a job
requirement.
The Tzenkethi value order and fear chaos, apparently on a very primal level. It seems likely to me that a measured and self-correcting thought process is inherent to their concept of correct leadership, and that a tendency to rash or obsessive thinking would render one illegitimate for a leadership post. It's a system in which the overall leader has complete freedom (and is near-worshipped) entirely because he or she is judged psychologically suited to leading - and given the translated title, perhaps more accurately embodying? - the Coalition and Tzenkethi society. Not that they're good enough to somehow eliminate those troublesome traits; as you say elsewhere, they're not as completely in control of their own genetic destiny as they like to claim or think, so I'm certain that lapses occur, but as a general template of personality I can't see a Tzenkethi leader behaving irrationally in a manner that might harm the Coalition as it stands. Unlike the Breen, who are possibly taking the Confederacy down a path to ruin. There can be error - Korzenten definitely made a few, all stemming in my mind from one fundamental underlying flaw in his thinking - but the self-destructive behaviours shown by Brex seem completely alien to the Tzenkethi character as I read it. As I'll get to in a bit, though, it depends in large part what a given reader wants from the Tzenkethi and their depiction.
(And that's to say nothing of my general skepticism towards the Tzenkethi genetic caste system -- I think Corazame's arc in Brinkmanship/The Missing is a good refutation of its supposed infallibility in determining both personal potential.)
I enjoyed the Corazame arc, too, and it's a valid and intriguing critical analysis, so to speak, of the Tzenkethi system. I wouldn't say it's the only angle on it, merely an important one, a necessary voice in the chorus.
Brinkmanship and
The Missing have an interesting and compelling take on the Tzenkethi, but there are other perspectives on how they might work. Indeed, the books in question take pains to present the situation as lending itself to at least some measure of plurality, with the obsessive focus on the ills of their system, displayed by Peter Alden, presented as unhealthy. McCormack and George seem to have different takes on the Tzenkethi - as well they should, as it leads to a richer experience for readers. A sense of who these people are...understanding is a three-edged sword.
Does it? I mean, that's a very subjective concept, isn't it, a "sense of perspective?" A good sense of perspective might be for them to recognize their relative power, and the fact that Federation expansionism only ever occurs either consensually or in unclaimed territories, and to therefore decide it's in their best interests to ally with the Federation rather than to be antagonistic towards them. A good sense of perspective might be to recognize the fallibility of their attempts to create a genetic caste system and to instead use their genetic engineering skills to embrace an orderly egalitarianism. Even if they cannot embrace egalitarian democracy, a good sense of perspective might simply mean rejecting the idea of absolute monarchy in favor of a more generalized aristocracy.
Ah, but those perspectives are at odds with the current package of ideas and assumptions upon which the Coalition and the Tzenkethi social order as a whole are founded. Like all societies, the Tzenkethi are inherently conservative. A sense of perspective, in the sense that I used it there (and you're quite right to note that I should have qualified such a subjective term), is to understand what is likely to place stress on the existing system, what might undermine it or threaten its cohesion, and thus undermine the role in which the autarch finds him/herself. A sense of perspective places the shape of the society and its existing balance above the personal desires of the individual leader.
That said, it's entirely possible - I would even say likely - that the Tzenkethi system and the perspective of its leaders is functional so long as the Tzenkethi are an insular and isolated society, but lose relevance and slide increasingly to the dysfunctional when the Tzenkethi Coalition is taken as part of a larger system into which it has become incorporated. And they have recently taken that step...
Absolute monarchies are terribly unstable systems of government, since they thwart the ambitions of many while only celebrating the one, leading to constant coup attempts.
In human societies. With a human tribalist psychology (which doesn't describe all humans, though apparently a vast majority). Maybe the Tzenkethi are different. Who's to say they would favour ambition in the sense alluded to here? Absolute monarchies are unstable among tribal humans because a) they frustrate and illegitimate tribal human social instincts (not necessarily or inherently a bad thing; any form of society encompassing more than a hundred related people in a village tends to do that to some degree, at least in some ways) and b) to be blunt, and somewhat paradoxical to my last argument, all tribal human societies are unstable anyway. If Tzenkethi - the majority of them, at least - are geared toward a different psychological/social framework, their system with its resemblance to absolute monarchy might be very stable.
On the other hand, I'm led to ponder that their system might also be
not what is naturally the default for them, or stemming from their psychological foundation, but something that's embraced because it's the exact opposite. The fluid Tzenkethi and their obsession with order is a most intriguing scenario. (As I said above, the scene between Odo and Corazame in
The Missing is a favourite, like the Devna/Noar scene in
A Choice of Futures, one of those "take two of the established races/cultures and play them against each other" scenes - Tzenkethi and Changeling, both fluid in form but rigid in thought).
I participate in a role-playing forum set in the
Mass Effect universe, where one of my characters is a hanar, another "naturally fluid but culturally rigid" people. I'll copy something I wrote in a post there, some musing on the hanar that seems relevant. (Tzenkethi are even more relevant when it's considered that service grade Tzenkethi refer to themselves impersonally as a show of humility, like hanar do). This isn't a perfect match of course - for one thing Tzenkethi prefer tight places and physical confines, whereas hanar are creatures of the ocean, so one of the arguments made here is not applicable to Tzenkethi at all. Still:
"The most important concept in understanding relations between these ones and their neighbours, it has come to believe, is fluidity. These ones are fluid by definition; they immerse in it, make their home in it, and their interiors lack the internal mineral support network of the other Enkindled races. These ones are free and unrestricted in movement, save by the deepest, most crushing depths. These ones can explore in multiple directions, take in stimulus from multiple planes without confusion. Other peoples can not. They seek freedom from their confines, from their lack of access to the vertical axis. One might argue that they are propelled, inspired,
pushed into motion, by the desire to escape their restrictive awareness, their closed circles. These ones, as the most honourable Nothinyssis wrote in
Essays On The Essential Singularity of Form, are a reverse of this model. These ones are fluid; thus they seek the security of structure. They form sects and cults to provide them with a mooring. These ones construct a frame of language and courtesy, as the Enkindlers permitted them to.
Did the other know that the humans have many myths regarding renegade deities or other beings gifting their race with such boons as fire? The others were gifted the means to break free of natural restraint, to alter their surroundings. They speak of "doors opening"; new directions made accessible. These ones do not yearn for that freedom; these ones inherited it at birth! These ones are compelled by restraint, by the closing of doors that might otherwise allow danger to strike. When
these ones were Enkindled, the Enkindlers - in their most generous wisdom - bestowed upon these ones structure; the means to order thought and communicate it through Word. These ones, then, may be said to be the antithesis of the other races! These ones crave a framework of certainty, and the Enkindlers ensured that these ones might have the means to create it".
Indeed, I've wondered - ever since the novels fleshed out the Tzenkethi - why Sisko and co believed as credible the idea of a
coup on the Tzenkethi homeworld. Tzenkethi? A
coup? Taking the "absolute monarchies are unstable" argument, it makes sense. Taken in terms of how the Tzenkethi were interpreted in the novels and - equally importantly - how I interpret that interpretation, I now view that incident as the Founders playing to Federation biases. The Federation
needs the Tzenkethi to be unstable and non-functional, just as the Tzenkethi need (though to a more extreme and unhealthy extent) the Federation way to be an inevitable path to societal collapse and horror. They are strongly inclined to believe that the other's way is dysfunctional. They'll happily believe it even when they shouldn't.
Clever Founders.
I'm not so convinced that the Tzenkethi system must necessarily produce rational Autarchs. I simply think that it has at this current time.
I suppose a large part of it comes down to what a given reader finds the more interesting. I tend to think the Tzenkethi as a functional civilization is far more interesting at this juncture than repeating the Cardassia/Klingon/Romulan approach of having them be a inherently dysfunctional society poised to unravel. It's too easy to condemn a society when it's inherently unstable and therefore unable to realistically claim that it works without looking foolish and desperate. When its moral and social mores are alien or uncomfortable there's far more to get a grip on, in terms of story-telling, when they're thriving because of it. Actually, this may be in part why Peter Alden has his obsessive and unhealthy emphasis on the evils of the Tzenkethi system. He knows it (largely, not entirely, but largely) works for them; he
can't accept that.
Korzenten is a rational political actor insofar as he will pursue his goals as far as he can without intentionally risking a major destabilization, and insofar as he isn't literally out to conquer the entire quadrant. He is, however, subject to the same errors of judgment to which any rational being may be subject.
True. As I said, the Tzenkethi aren't always great at judging what action they should take on the wider board of galactic politics, because they're such a controlled, stable and xenophobic society. Amusingly, they're like Venetans themselves - needing to play catch up when they realize what it truly means that
others are not like them. Korzenten was playing the aliens - the Romulans, the Venetans, the Talarians - as he'd play the
Tzelnira, and that wasn't good judgement, because it's akin to hunting animals that have been trained to flop down at your feet as soon as you appear, only to then wander out into the bush and expect the same success.
It does make me wonder -- there's no way Tzenkethi genetic engineering is so good that there are not Tzenkethi dissidents, no Tzenkethi radicals or Tzenkethi democrats. Hell, we know from Articles of the Federation that at least some of the Tzelnira are disloyal enough to the Autarch and loyal enough to their families first that they'll smuggle their children out of Coalition space for Federation medical treatment. So where are the Tzenkethi dissidents? Where are the dissatisfied Tzelnira? The angry Tzenkethi workers? The Tzenkethi academics who like studying heretical Federation democracy just a little bit too
much?
I'm not entirely sure we know enough about how Tzenkethi concepts of individuality and individual space work. A society as ordered and divisive as theirs, and a racial psychology as drawn to enclosed space and used to making the most of it, potentially has room for considerable mental space in which to become comfortable with the self, alongside a tendency not to desire access to another's invisible world. (Consider Andorians, who draw lines internally and have little sense of territory or privacy outside of their own heads, though they guard those jealously). Perhaps there is ample space for a given Tzenkethi to let off its frustrations while, in terms of functioning as a piece within their society, they slot easily into position. Maybe it takes more repression to make a Tzenkethi snap - or indeed make a fuss - than it does a human.
Probably, of course, any real deviants - those who do act out - are reconditioned or disappeared, but then perhaps it depends where in Tzenkethi space you are. There were some intriguing suggestions of non-uniformity in the
Tzelnira scenes in
Plagues of Night.
I'm going to display my political bias here, but I think this makes sense for another reason: The Breen, as established in Zero Sum Game, are practitioners of a particularly all-encompassing brand of corporate capitalism. If there's anything the history of the British and American empires has shown, it's that capitalism has a historical pattern of driving its practitioners to conquer or to dominate new lands in order to find new markets or new resources to be exploited. This can, in particular, be a unifying imperial mission, as demonstrated by the way the imperial impulse unified the English and the Scots in service of the pound-sterling, or the way it brought together the Yankees, New Yorkers, Tidewaterers, and the Deep Southerners in North America both before and after the U.S. Civil War. So the Breen's imperial impulse, I suspect, has some very powerful economic forces driving it--forces that feed both their elite, and their need for intra-Breen unity.
Very good point,
Sci. That makes perfect sense to me, and I think the books greatly support it. I particularly liked the depictions in
Zero Sum Game of Breen citizens being identified by their commercial footprint; by the imprint they make and the reaction that ripples through the system, rather than by anything to do with their core self.
Do not forget that in The Struggle Within, Breen mercenaries were directly responsible for a massacre on the Kinshaya capital world that led to regime change there and condemnation even from Pact members.
The Breen have not had a good time of it.
Excellent point -- I had restricted my analysis to Breen/Federation encounters, but you're right to point out that intra-Pact backlash from the Brex government's interference in internal Kinshaya affairs would necessarily also come into play.
Which is why it wouldn't surprise me to see the Kinshaya tuck in under the wing of Romulus in the manner of the Gorn; they too have suffered from the Breens' interference and apparent unwillingness to view their supposed partners as anything other than tools.
. "God don't make no mistakes...that's how he got to be God" 
