How Would a World Government Actually Form? Crisis, Conquest, or the Long Treaty

By O.C. Wanderer · November 4, 2026

world government, state formation, articles of confederation, swiss federation, european union, gran colombia, universal postal union, qin dynasty, sovereignty

Written by OC Wanderer, author of Destiny Among the Stars, a LitRPG sci-fi series set in the real stellar neighborhood. Published November 4, 2026.

Imagine receiving a message addressed to humanity and having to decide who gets to answer. The 1989 declaration on detection recommends international consultations before anyone replies to an alien signal, while leaving the procedures to a separate agreement. That raises a fascinating question: how could any body earn the standing to speak for the whole planet?

That question sits inside a bigger one I ask as a science fiction author. What would humanity need to do to actually expand beyond Sol? That’s a herculean task, and I assume it would take a united world government. Then I wonder what that government would look like, and what sort of conflicts it would spark. I majored in political science with a focus on Latin American studies, and this has always been an interest of mine. How would the world, with all its different nationalisms, deal with being united, with its wealth disparity on one side and the ingenuity of the human spirit on the other? Are humans inherently good, or are we inherently selfish? And how does that play out when every country on Earth is asked to share one government?

My own characters ask who has that standing. In Book 2 of Destiny Among the Stars, the seven-person crew of the Triumph faces a choice far bigger than the survey they were sent to do, and Emily says, “But maybe we’re not the ones who should make this decision.”

Emily’s hesitation is where this gets interesting for me. A crew can act together; a planet has to agree on who gets to act for everyone. No world government has ever existed, so the clues come from smaller unions: states, cantons or countries that accepted a government above themselves. Crisis, conquest and slow treaty-making all offer possible roads. I want to know what gets the members onto those roads, and what persuades them to keep traveling together afterward.

What pushes countries to put a government above themselves?

The early United States gives us a union that wanted cooperation while guarding independence. Its Articles of Confederation called the arrangement “a firm league of friendship” and said each state “retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence.”¹ That sounds comfortable until the common government needs money: Congress could not tax.² I can imagine the same argument over an interstellar fleet. Everyone wants the ships; who can make everyone pay?

The strain became frighteningly concrete in Massachusetts. Farmers facing heavy taxes and debt lawsuits began closing courts by force in August 1786, and on January 25, 1787 they marched on the Springfield arsenal, where the defenders killed four. Reports of anarchy helped move national leaders toward a convention in Philadelphia.³ By September 17 they had finished a new constitution, though it took effect only in 1789.⁴ The rebellion was one pressure among the league’s wider troubles, but the pace catches my attention: a loose union could become a proposal for a much stronger government in a matter of months.

Europe tried a wonderfully concrete way of making peace: share the materials needed to wage war. On May 9, 1950, five years after the Second World War ended, Robert Schuman proposed putting French and German coal and steel under one authority, making war between them “not merely unthinkable, but materially impossible.” France, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg signed the founding treaty in 1951.⁵ It is an intriguing place to start a planetary union too: with something countries urgently need to manage together, before asking them to agree on everything else.

Political scientist William Riker saw a recurring bargain in how federations begin: leaders want a larger territory, while a military threat or opportunity gives the members a reason to accept.⁶ That helps explain the attraction of a crisis in science fiction. Suddenly a country’s familiar independence has a price, and joining a bigger government starts to look useful. The harder question is what that bargain feels like once the danger recedes.

Gran Colombia makes that question uncomfortable. In 1819, during the struggle against Spain, leaders from what are now Venezuela, Colombia and Panama agreed to unite in one republic; Ecuador later joined. The battle that effectively ended Spanish rule in South America came in December 1824, and Venezuela and Ecuador seceded in 1830.⁷ The sequence gives me pause: a union made during war survived the victory by only about six years. Political rivalries and regional jealousies mattered to its breakup, so the vanished enemy cannot explain it alone. What would keep an emergency world republic together after humanity survived its emergency?

The alien-reply question brings us back to the machinery of cooperation. The 1989 declaration recommended consultations before any response, with the procedures to be set out in a separate agreement, declaration or arrangement.⁸ I wonder how quickly countries could agree on a process if an actual message arrived. It would be an extraordinary moment to discover that everyone expected someone else to organize the meeting.

In Destiny the push is a disaster. An alien System arrives, a solar flare knocks out Earth’s power grids, and monsters come through portals. Book 1, Chapter 1 says what followed: “People died until humanity got organized and started fighting back.”

How fast can a crisis build a union, and how long does a conquest hold?

Switzerland shows how quickly the machinery can change. Seven cantons formed a separate alliance within the existing league, and in November 1847 the two sides went to war. The fighting lasted 25 days; less than ten months after the last canton surrendered, a federal constitution had replaced the old treaty.⁹ The Americans also moved quickly toward a new design: under eight months from Springfield to a finished constitution, followed by ratification and its taking effect in 1789. Those are different endpoints, but both cases make me wonder how much political change people would attempt if Earth suddenly faced a shared emergency.

Conquest offers speed with a very different bargain. By 221 BCE Qin had conquered the other states in China and replaced them with provinces governed by the emperor’s appointees. Its dynasty lasted about fifteen years and collapsed after the first emperor’s death, but its administrative model outlived it.¹⁰ A planetary conqueror could redraw the map quickly. Qin leaves me wary of predicting what happens next: a ruler can fall while the institutions created by force survive.

That survival problem also haunts the crisis road. In 1973 a United States Senate committee reported that the country had been under a declared national emergency for forty years, since March 9, 1933.¹¹ Imagine living an entire adult life under powers introduced for an emergency. A force raised to meet the danger could outlast it too, leaving the question of who commands it afterward. For a world republic, the day after survival might be the beginning of a much longer struggle over authority.

In Book 1, Chapter 20 of Destiny, President Anderson of the United Earth Republic takes a call from one of his directors about the newest country to come in: “We have Bangladesh. Provisional elections are underway in Dhaka. The insurrection in the Chittagong corridor was contained with minimal casualties.” Anderson asks how minimal, and the book goes on:

“Forty-three dead, sir. Mostly militia.” The line went quiet. “One child.”

Treaties united the world’s mail, and Europe’s armies stayed national

The world has already made one surprisingly durable union around a familiar task: getting a letter across a border. In 1874 representatives of 22 countries signed a treaty creating “a single postal territory for the reciprocal exchange of letters.” The Universal Postal Union now has 192 member countries.¹² I love the modesty of that beginning. Humanity could agree to carry one another’s mail without agreeing on one government, which makes a patient, practical route toward closer cooperation worth taking seriously.

Europe shows both the possibilities and the limits of that route. After 75 years, the six countries that pooled coal and steel have become a union of 27 members.¹³ Yet its long-term budget is about 1 percent of their combined economic output, roughly a penny of every dollar they produce, and the rules for raising that money still require unanimous government agreement and national ratification.¹⁴ Picture a planetary project negotiating its funding through every member capital. Cooperation can grow impressively while the members keep a firm grip on the purse.

The army is where the grip becomes especially clear. France’s National Assembly refused to ratify the proposed European army treaty in 1954, and the union’s treaty now says national security “remains the sole responsibility of each Member State.” Integration scholars described the pattern: governments shared control of trade and farming while keeping foreign policy, security and force for themselves.¹⁵ That is a fascinating hurdle for my imagined interstellar civilization. Countries might cooperate on the ships and still argue fiercely over who commands them.

In Book 1, Chapter 12 of Destiny, Director Okonjo tells Anderson’s cabinet about two countries that came in by vote: “Guyana and Pakistan voted to join last week. Administrative harmonization is underway. It will require a phased rollback of national laws over the next few years, as usual.”

Are the countries still there once the union is built?

Would joining a planetary government mean losing the country you recognize? Madison offered the American states a reassuring answer during ratification: “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.”¹⁶ I can imagine a prospective member of a world republic asking for that same reassurance, and then reading every word of the federal powers list.

The defeated Swiss cantons offer a striking example of surviving inside the new order. They are still cantons today: Switzerland’s constitution names all 26 and leaves them sovereign wherever federal authority does not limit them.¹⁷ The European Union also reserves powers outside its treaties to the member states.¹⁸ These arrangements make a world republic easier for me to picture. A country could join a larger political structure while keeping much of its own daily government.

That is the possibility I explore with the United Earth Republic: countries join one at a time and continue to exist within it. The American, Swiss and European examples give that design something to build on, though they cannot prove it would work for an entire planet. Late in Book 4, the joining is still unfinished: “The unification tracker was at 98% when they left Tel Aviv. Two more nations still considering.” Even at that scale, someone is weighing the bargain.

So how would a world government actually form?

I still suspect a crisis is the likeliest way to get a planetary government built quickly. The postal union gives the slower treaty road a real worldwide achievement, but agreeing to exchange letters leaves much more independence intact than agreeing to a common government. Leaving Sol is the herculean task I started from, and I picture countries accepting another level above them while continuing to argue over what it can demand. I still wonder whether they would join because people are good or because staying out had come to cost too much. Perhaps the hopeful part is that either motive could get them to the same negotiating table.

If the countries are still there, what does the government above them look like? What Would a World Government Actually Look Like? Federal, Parliamentary, Unitary, or Something Entirely New?

If you want to watch a world government being put together one country at a time, start Destiny Among the Stars.

Endnotes

1. National Archives, “Articles of Confederation (1777)”, Articles II and III. The Articles were adopted by the Continental Congress on November 15, 1777 and came into force on March 1, 1781, when the last of the thirteen states ratified them. ↩

2. National Archives, “Constitution of the United States: A History”: the central government “could not tax and was generally impotent in setting commercial policy,” and Congress was working with a depleted treasury. ↩

3. Mass Humanities, “Rebels Attack Springfield Arsenal,” Mass Moments: an armed group of farmers closed the Hampshire County Court of Common Pleas in Northampton on August 29, 1786, and other courts were closed after it; on January 25, 1787 the farmers led by Daniel Shays assaulted the arsenal, and the defenders’ fire killed four men and wounded twenty. Massachusetts Historical Society, “Object of the Month,” May 2013: the grievances (taxation, personal debt and the resulting lawsuits); the force under General Benjamin Lincoln “recruited in the eastern part of Massachusetts and funded by wealthy eastern merchants”; and the “exaggerated reports of anarchy in Massachusetts” that “moved national leaders to call for a constitutional convention in Philadelphia.” The rising is known as Shays’ Rebellion. For a full account that treats the rebellion as critical to the making of the Constitution, see Michael J. Klarman, The Framers’ Coup: The Making of the United States Constitution (Oxford University Press, 2016). ↩

4. National Archives (note 2): the convention met from May 25 to September 17, 1787. In effect in 1789: U.S. Department of State, Office of the Historian, “Constitutional Convention and Ratification, 1787–1789”. ↩

5. European Union, “Schuman declaration, May 1950”, for the date and the quotation. European Parliament, “The First Treaties,” Fact Sheets on the European Union, May 2026: the Treaty of Paris establishing the European Coal and Steel Community was signed on April 18, 1951 and entered into force on July 23, 1952. “Germany” in 1951 was the Federal Republic, West Germany. Author calculation: the war in Europe ended in May 1945, five years before the declaration. ↩

6. William H. Riker, Federalism: Origin, Operation, Significance (Little, Brown, 1964). The summary follows Craig Volden, “Riker, William H.,” Center for the Study of Federalism: Riker “posited that most federal systems are founded based on political ambitions of territorial expansion coupled with military opportunities or threats that solidified the federal bargain.” ↩

7. Library of Congress, Federal Research Division, Colombia: A Country Study, section “Gran Colombia”: the congress at Angostura in February 1819, Ecuador joining on its liberation in 1822, the revolt against the union led by the Venezuelan general José Antonio Páez in 1826, and the secession of the Venezuelan and Ecuadorian portions in 1830. Peru: A Country Study, section “Independence Imposed from Without”: the battle of Ayacucho on December 9, 1824 “effectively ended the long era of Spanish colonial rule in South America.” The U.S. Department of State’s country guide for Colombia gives the same 1830 date for Ecuador and Venezuela leaving. Author calculation: December 1824 to 1830 is about six years; 1819 to 1830 is eleven. The Colombia study puts the breakup down to political rivalries and regional jealousies; the text reports only the order of events. ↩

8. “Declaration of Principles Concerning Activities Following the Detection of Extraterrestrial Intelligence” (1989), principle 8. Text hosted by the IAA SETI Permanent Committee. The declaration recommends international consultations before a response and leaves their procedures to a separate agreement, declaration or arrangement. ↩

9. René Roca, “Sonderbund,” Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz (Historical Dictionary of Switzerland): the seven cantons were Lucerne, Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, Zug, Fribourg and Valais; the war ran from November 3 to November 29, 1847, and the new constitution dissolved the federal treaty of 1815; 93 soldiers were killed and 510 wounded on the two sides together. Andreas Kley, “Bundesverfassung (BV),” same dictionary: the Diet declared the federal constitution adopted on September 12, 1848, after 15½ cantons approved it and 6½ rejected it. Author calculations: November 29, 1847 to September 12, 1848 is nine and a half months; January 25 to September 17, 1787 (notes 3 and 4) is under eight months. ↩

10. Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art, “Qin dynasty (221–206 BCE)”: the state of Qin “conquered all other states”; the first emperor “divided the state into provinces and prefectures governed by appointed officials”; the dynasty “lasted only about fifteen years” and collapsed after his death, and China was reunited under the Han in 206 BCE. ↩

11. U.S. Senate, Special Committee on the Termination of the National Emergency, Emergency Powers Statutes, Senate Report 93-549, November 19, 1973. The foreword opens: “Since March 9, 1933, the United States has been in a state of declared national emergency.” The report counted four proclaimed emergencies still in effect (1933, 1950, 1970 and 1971). Author calculation: 1973 − 1933 = 40 years. ↩

12. Universal Postal Union, “History”: the Treaty of Bern was signed on October 9, 1874 at a conference attended by representatives of 22 nations; the body was first called the General Postal Union. Universal Postal Union, “Member countries”: 192 member countries. Author calculation: 2026 − 1874 = 152 years. ↩

13. European Parliament, “The First Treaties” (note 5): the six widened the arrangement with the Treaties of Rome, signed on March 25, 1957, which created the European Economic Community. European Union, “EU countries”: 27 member countries. Author calculation: 2026 − 1951 = 75 years. ↩

14. European Commission, “Europe’s budget”: the long-term budget “amounts to €1.2 trillion, around 1% of the EU’s gross domestic product.” European Parliament, “The Union’s Revenue,” Fact Sheets on the European Union, May 2026: the system of revenue “is decided in the Council by unanimity” and “needs to be ratified by each Member State,” the revenue that can be called on in a year is capped at 1.4 percent of the members’ gross national income; and the contribution based on each member’s gross national income makes up around 60 to 70 percent of that revenue, with customs duties, a share of value-added tax and a levy on plastic packaging waste supplying most of the rest. ↩

15. The European army: European Parliament, “The First Treaties” (note 5), on the European Defence Community. The quotation: Treaty on European Union, Article 4(2). The pattern: Stanley Hoffmann, “Obstinate or Obsolete? The Fate of the Nation-State and the Case of Western Europe,” Daedalus 95, no. 3 (1966): 862–915, JSTOR. Andrew Moravcsik, The Choice for Europe: Social Purpose and State Power from Messina to Maastricht (Cornell University Press, 1998), argues that governments chose integration to serve their countries’ economic interests. The opposite expectation, that cooperation on practical tasks would spread from one field to the next, goes back to David Mitrany, A Working Peace System (1943), and Ernst B. Haas, The Uniting of Europe: Political, Social, and Economic Forces, 1950–1957 (Stanford University Press, 1958). I describe Hoffmann’s and Moravcsik’s arguments from published summaries of them. ↩

16. James Madison, The Federalist No. 45, text at Yale Law School’s Avalon Project. The essay first appeared in a New York newspaper during the ratification debate. ↩

17. Federal Constitution of the Swiss Confederation of April 18, 1999, Articles 1 and 3, English text at the Constitute Project. Article 1 lists 26 cantons, among them Lucerne, Uri, Schwyz, Obwalden and Nidwalden (the two halves of Unterwalden), Zug, Fribourg and Valais. Kley (note 9) describes the same rule in the constitution of 1848: the federal level needed express authority, and the rest stayed with the cantons. ↩

18. Treaty on European Union, Article 4(1). ↩

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