Location: Lazarus

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Peoples Democratic Republic of Zaze is a colossal, environmentally stunning nation, ruled by Choi Hyun-Su with an iron fist, and remarkable for its sprawling nuclear power plants. Its hard-nosed, cynical population of 5.814 billion are ruled without fear or favor by a psychotic dictator, who outlaws just about everything and refers to the populace as "my little playthings."

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent, corrupt, moralistic, socially-minded government stops and the rest of society begins, but it juggles the competing demands of Defence, Law & Order, and the Environment. It meets every day to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Seyeo. The average income tax rate is 99%. The private sector is almost wholly made up of enterprising ten-year-olds selling lemonade on the sidewalk, although the government is looking at stamping this out.

The police have been swamped with requests to stay up past bedtime, the words 'private' and 'enterprise' must never appear in the same sentence, people take government jobs for the frequent flier miles, and conductors wield diamond-encrusted batons to fit in with their freshly gilded surroundings. Crime -- especially youth-related -- is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force. Zaze's national animal is the orangutan , which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, its national religion is Buddhism, and its currency is the Zazean Won.

Zaze is ranked 2,599th in Lazarus and 83,249th in the world for Most Compassionate Citizens, scoring -32 on the Kitten Softness Rating.

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NationStates by Max Barry, author of and