The Fourth Interstellar (defunct as of 2380)

NeoTokyo breeds factions like dogs breed fleas. Nobody’s heard of most of them. That said, the 4I has been around for ages, maybe as long as NeoTokyo itself. Generally, they’re known as folks you can go to for help if you’ve been targeted by fashies, if you’ve got word of a corp doing something egregious, or for muscle to back up a picket line.

The 4I is a loose organization of political parties on Human worlds – and particularly stations and commercial vessels – both within and outside the Federation. They have a long history of being anti-fascist, beginning with Trotsky’s break with Stalin over the Nazi-Soviet Pact as the Fourth International, through opposition to the Optimates and other neo-fascist groups of the Third World War. In the hundred years of human starflight prior to the founding of the Federation, they were the main labor movement for off-planet workers, but have fallen into obscurity in the Federation, particularly with the decline of capitalism on United Earth.

History

On NeoTokyo, the Party was an active force from the colony’s founding in 2077. While technically an umbrella organization of dozens of micro-parties, it’s generally referred to as “the Party.”

The Party’s fortunes have waxed and waned over time, and the current organization has little continuity with the heroic workers’ movement that terraformed the planet, built the arcologies, and pushed back against the power of the corps.

The 4I had a large resurgence in the 2330s, when a corp alliance overthrew the Charter of Responsibilities, a negotiated minimum code of behavior, labor laws, and environmental protections, that had held for 72 years. It took the corps six years to crush the uprisings, but they succeeded (in a move the corporate junta branded as The Liberation), and the 4I faded back underground.

In 2362, in the aftermath of a corp coup resulting in a widespread banking crash, organizers and Medias with no ties to the historical organization took up the banner, bringing the Party a level of recognition and support it hadn’t seen in a generation. After a few seasons of revolutionary optimism, however, things got back to business as usual, and the mass Party declined again.

2376 saw the Party's greatest moments since the 2330's, when they led a general strike against the Temporary Committee, the corporate junta that had ruled NeoTokyo since the Liberation. The general strike was crushed, and much of the leadership killed at a rally, some say by Starfleet Security, which had been called in to "restore order in the face of civil unrest."

The corporate crackdown against dissidents was thorough: if anyone with a Party card remains alive, they're deep underground. For all intents and purposes, as of 2380, the Party is defunct.

Structure (defunct)

There's a twelve-person Secretariat elected by the consitutent parties. Chance is the only younger member.

The first General Secretary since the Thirtes was a woman named Night, who led the general strike of 2377, and was assassinated in the attack on the Party leadership.

The Old Thirties

Veterans of the "Emancipation," the successful Corp war against oversight. Thirty years ago they were street punks and activists who went up against incredibly powerful enemies, and lost gloriously. No few of them are still trading on their cred from the bad old days, or are reluctant to acknowledge the world has moved on. Whether "The Old Thirties" as the younger generation dismissively calls them are seasoned street veterans with decades of experience or belligerent and verbose middle-aged pub-drunks still trading on their heroic lost youth is in the eye of the beholder.

Red Star Cyborgs (defunct)

The Party's shock troops. Not a lot of them at all, but fearless, and ready to take on anything.

Onboarding (defunct)

Party membership is NB25/month.

You can take that NB25 right off the cost of your Trauma Team subscription. It also gets you 10% off drinks and cover at a range of clubs and pubs. You also can scream for backup - if you're up against a registered adversary of the Party. Luck of the draw whether your defense shows up in time, and whether it's a half-dozen Red Star Cyborgs or three middle-aged data-pushers with lead pipes.

The People's Flag

The Party theme for centuries.

ReSCaN (Night's Faction) (defunct)

The Revolutionary Soviet of Cyberpeasants and NetWorkers. One of the many little factions making up the Party.

A core group of Chance, Friction, and Night, determined to revitalize the Party. They're going to need cash, connections, credibility.

Chance and her team of young minions are all over the political Netboards and the quality of their stuff is excellent: clearly they’ve got people who’re galactic-level masters of political theory and history. Argue with them, and you’re likely to find your Agent stuffed with open-source versions of 20th Century glosses on 18th Century Russian agrarian anarchist manifestoes, annotated to explain their relevance to the current sociotechnical milieu. Participate at your own risk.

Friction has high hopes for a huge social media campaign, and revitalizing the music and fashion scenes as a site of revolutionary energy, but that's a ways down the line yet.

Night... well, that's where you come in.