To many races in the Star Trek universe, humanity, Starfleet and the Federation are all interchangeable
words for the same thing.
However this is not the case and the differences between these organisations are monumentally
important for other species to deal with one of the Alpha Quadrant’s biggest political
powers.
Hello, Ric here and this Video is a brief overview of what the Federation is along with
what differentiates it from Starfleet and the government of Earth.
Put simply, the United Federation of Planets is the interplanetary governmental structure
that unifies and oversees all of its member planets and species.
Established in the year 2161, the UFoP was an expansion of the Coalition of Planets that
had formed to unify a handful of races in spite of Romulan efforts to destabilise the
powers of the Alpha Quadrant.
The Coalition was signed in 2155 by United Earth Government, the Andorians, Tellerites
and the Vulcan High Command.
This established an alliance between these powers and a number of other participating
species such as the Denobulans and acted as the ground work for what would come 6 years
later.
Prior to this however, Starfleet was already an established presence on Earth in being
the unified space exploration agency incorporating multiple country’s space programs as well
as entities such as the Space Probe Agency.
Starfleet was led by Starfleet Command which in turn operated exclusively under the command
of the United Earth Government.
With more and more effort focused towards developing interstellar travel now that warp
drive had been achieved and first contact with the Vulcans had proved the existence
of alien life, the United Earth Government managed to remove poverty, pollution and many
other ills left over from the 3rd world war.
Early Starfleet despite the importance placed upon it, had little in the way of an interstellar
presence, relying on the Vulcan’s for aid and star-charts but striving to develop technologies
to elevate humanity to the next level of exploration.
To this end the NX programme was developed and in 2151, 20 years after Starfleet’s
founding, the U.S.S Enterprise NX-01 was launched, Earth’s first warp 5 vessel with the goal
of establishing first contact with alien races and mapping out unexplored areas space.
Despite a bumpy start, humanity continued to churn out incrementally advancing starships,
the Columbia NX-02, the NX-03 and 04 and so on.
After 10 years of establishing itself, the United Earth Government and the Coalition
of Planets reorganized into the United Federation of Planets.
A Charter was drawn up between the founding races as a guiding doctrine of exploration
and defence.
The Human MACOs, the Andorian Imperial Guard, Tellerite forces and the Vulcan’s military
were folded into Starfleet, giving the exploratory organization an effective military presence.
This was a necessary move due to opposing powers such as the Romulan Empire and Klingon
Raiders who had in the past proved to be formidable opponents for humanity and many other races.
The United Federation of Planets became the greater government of humanity; although Earth
itself retained a single government that itself was a member of the Federation, the United
Earth headed by a Prime Minister.
The same autonomy was granted with all other races that joined.
Many policies that shaped the United Earth are reflected in those of the federation therefore
the two share many characteristics although with humanity now having established a galactic
presence, the Federation is effectively its primary governing body.
Earth, as the instrumental founding race that had done much to unify the Vulcans, Andorians
and Tellerites was made the capital of the Federation further cementing the unison between
the United Earth Government and the Federation.
By 2373, its territory covered over 8,000 lightyears and consisted of over 150 fully
incorporated species and over 7,000 affiliated races, by that I mean races who remained apart
from the UFoP but were still involved in trade, politics, or had a substantial presence in
Starfleet.
The entire organization is overseen by an elected president who answers to the Federation
Council and Federation Supreme Court.
The Headquaters for the Federation was located in Paris while Starfleet command was in San
Francisco.
The Federation also oversaw a huge number of institutions and agencies aside from Starfleet
ranging from scientific, to agricultural and broadcasting.
Starfleet meanwhile continues to operate under the control of the Federation President who
sits above Starfleet Command, although for practical reasons the President seldom took
direct control of the organisation.
Starfleet’s responsibilities are essentially upholding the Federation’s interests and
values throughout Federation space as well as its ongoing mission to explore, chart,
establish relations and represent the Federation’s member species on a galactic scale.
In times of crisis, Starfleet is mobilised as the Federation’s primary military force
switching from peaceful pathfinding to a naval armada.
This militarisation of Starfleet is often met with mixed reactions of the Federation
members many of whom hold true to its ideals of exploration.
One can chart the flow of conflict in the federation by following the technologies of
Starfleet, especially ship design and observers will note that more heavily armed vessels
appear around the time of conflict before sinking back into the fold during peaceful
times.
It’s during these times where vessels such as the Galaxy class come to the fore with
a focus on diplomatic ventures.
Throughout Starfleet’s history, there’s a definite ebb and flow of militarisation
but it says a lot the organisation continues to return to its founding principles, knowing
when to lay down its phaser and pick up its tricorder again.
So to sum up, Earth is governed by the United Earth Government headed by the Prime Minister.
The UE is a founding member of the United Federation of Planets whose headquarters are
located on Earth.
Despite its local position to humanity, the Federation oversees the galactic policies
of all its member races.
Starfleet is the joint military and exploratory arm of the UFoP and therefore consists of
individuals of all the Federation’s member planets.
Each of these three has its own governing charter, although the Federation holds sway
over the other two as it’s policies by nature have to operate on a much grander scale.
Thanks for watching, this was the first part in a series of Videos I’m going to be doing
covering the Federation and a couple of Different aspects so if you’re a trek fan, you may
have known a lot of this already but it’s kind of a necessary set up for the subsequent
videos so stay tuned!
Please look forwards to it, and thanks for watching.
Goodbye.