Location: The Grid

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Reassurance of Silent Partner is a massive, safe nation, ruled by Silas Silent III with a fair hand, and remarkable for its strong anti-business politics. Its compassionate, intelligent population of 2.935 billion love a good election, and the government gives them plenty of them. Universities tend to be full of students debating the merits of various civil and political rights, while businesses are tightly regulated and the wealthy viewed with suspicion.

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent, socially-minded government stops and the rest of society begins, but it juggles the competing demands of the Environment, Education, and Social Welfare. It meets every day to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Silenttown. The average income tax rate is 68%, and even higher for the wealthy. Private enterprise is illegal, but for those in the know there is a slick and highly efficient black market in Book Publishing.

The words 'private' and 'enterprise' must never appear in the same sentence, high-income earners pay a 100% tax rate, vanity is considered the eighth cardinal virtue, and refugees from other nations are flocking to Silent Partner's border. Crime is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Silent Partner's national animal is the mouse, which is also the nation's favorite main course, its national religion is La Silence, and its currency is the Quiet.

Silent Partner is ranked 1st in The Grid and 15,388th in the world for Most Eco-Friendly Governments, scoring 50 on the Dolphin Recycling Awareness Index.

NationStates by Max Barry, author of and