The Free Land of Meraud is a mammoth, cultured nation, ruled by Prime Administrator Alexandersson with an iron fist, and notable for its barren, inhospitable landscape, flagrant waste-dumping, and absence of drug laws. The hard-nosed, hard-working, cynical, humorless, devout population of 5.079 billion Meraudians enjoy great individual freedoms in everything except elections, which, where they exist at all, are populist shams for a dictatorship government that has no intention of ever giving up power.

The minute, corrupt, pro-business, well-organized government, or what there is of one, is primarily concerned with Industry, although Law & Order and Administration are also considered important, while Welfare and Social Policy are ignored. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Mercan. Income tax is unheard of.

The frighteningly efficient Meraudian economy, worth a remarkable 1,080 trillion Pallas a year, is driven almost entirely by the private sector, which is broadly diversified and led by the Retail industry, with significant contributions from Gambling, Uranium Mining, and Information Technology. Average income is an amazing 212,783 Pallas, with the richest citizens earning 7.6 times as much as the poorest.

Citizens who leave the country are officially classed as traitors, commuters and their desktops both bemoan their hard drives, petitions to the government are being used to insulate politicians' office walls, and companies are literally blowing their competition out of the water. Crime, especially youth-related, is all-pervasive, with the police force struggling against a lack of funding and a high mortality rate. Meraud's national animal is the Plesiosaur, which is also the nation's favorite main course, and its national religion is Parva Christi.

Meraud is ranked 303,689^th in the world and 5^th in Anti Discord Alliance for Nicest Citizens, with 0.19 average smiles per day.