Worldbuilding Series I

Part I: Power, Control, and Governance

Here’s a (leading) question: How does power shape a novel’s world?

A storm of tropes and archetypes

Pick a random fantasy or science fiction book from your TBR list - even the one you weren’t sure about adding, but you did anyway. Inside it, well, you’re bound to encounter the efforts of the author’s labour with the classic tropes of power structure. The author will have deliberated on, planned for, selected from, and tweaked many ways in which power can run through a fictional world.

Perhaps they went with the all-powerful ‘epic’ kingdom that rules over its subjects; mystical and magical councils ruling through abilities that bend society to their whim; corporations pulling the strings of governments and furthering their agendas through back-channelling deals and buying the voice of those elected by the people. These, among others, are just a few that frame how a story’s world functions and the bounds within which characters move and interact. Or…maybe they didn’t really do any of that, winged it, and that’s why the book barely made your list.

BUT. Without any sort of power, there is no consequence to the actions of characters and those around them. As readers, we see tropes about power (really, all tropes) used in roughly three ways:

1. Surface level

2. Explored

3. Subverted

Surface level

If an author uses power in their worldbuilding at the surface level, they’re likely either:

• Not wanting it to be a key part of the world, and instead more of a background component.

  • For example, the queen rules a country and then towns and cities have guards that monitor and enforce law and order. Power just IS, and characters fall on the right and wrong side of it.

• Not thinking about it enough, and so the reader is constantly questioning and/or doubting the way the story’s world works. At worst case, the story falls flat or comes across as generic. At this point, you should probably axe it from your TBR.

  • For example, a magical caste system separates society and through a main character’s actions alone and often within a single novel, that system is brought down without any friction or ramification.

Exploring

Exploring power in worldbuilding is often the level closest to real life. The factors that make up power, like scale, legitimacy, bureaucracy, challenge, coordination and compliance - basically the warts-and-all mechanics that allow a world to function - the author pulls on these threads and embeds them deeply into the story. 

• For example, the logistics and operational planning needed to maintain a vast and powerful empire and outfit its armies. Bureaucracy might meaningfully impact a character or plot due to its web of systems and processes - a gun with no bullets in a siege because the correct form didn’t get stamped by the correct sub-clerk tests the idea of an all-powerful empire.

Subverting

From personal experience, the word ‘subvert’ gets a good hammering. Everyone seems fired up on the subversion of tropes and how authors should aim to write something ‘new’. This, in reality, is pretty challenging for most authors, including myself. Not doing this well can often lead to more shock value than an engrossing story. 

If an author can pull it off successfully, it can be a thoroughly engaging hook: even if you hate The Lord of the Rings, the trope of the hero resisting the final temptation of power being shattered by Frodo claiming the ring in the end and failing is pretty damn cool. Spoilers, yes, but you’ve had 70 years to read it. You also had 23 years to watch the 3rd movie.

For subversion to work, there are a couple of things to think about:

• For example, the trope has to be recognisable to readers to begin with - you can’t meaningfully subvert the heroic bearer of ultimate power if that power isn’t clearly established from the outset. In The Lord of the Rings, the Ring is introduced early, its corrupting influence is demonstrated repeatedly, and Frodo is framed - both by other characters and by the narrative itself - as the one most suited to carry it.

• The way the trope is overturned also has to say something and be earned. Technically, Frodo failing at Mount Doom and claiming the Ring for himself is a subversion of the expectation that the virtuous hero will resist temptation at the final moment. But this works precisely because it isn’t random: Tolkien spent three books showing us the Ring’s escalating psychological and physical toll on Frodo (and long-suffering old mate Sam). The subversion lands because it reveals a truth about power - that no one, however well-intentioned, can wield or even endure absolute power indefinitely.

  • A weaker version of this would have been Frodo just keeping the ring at the end randomly. Instead, Tolkien offers a more meaningful outcome: yes, Frodo completes the quest, but he’s absolutely done in by it. He saves the world, yet cannot remain in it, ultimately leaving Middle-earth altogether. Power doesn’t give Frodo influence, status, or fulfilment - it costs him his place among the world he tried to protect.

• Closely related to shock value and attempts at edgy cynicism is the pitfall of authors undermining their own premise. The Lord of the Rings never does this. It does not have its characters abandon the quest halfway through because they realise it’s too dangerous, nor does it sneer at the idea of heroism. The quest matters, sacrifice matters, and victory is real - but it is not clean or triumphant.

My approach

I like my worlds to have examples of longstanding power that guide and shape the cultures my characters come from and interact with, the places they live and travel to, and the lives they lead inside the constraints of power. Usually, as an author, I deliberately try to complicate my world’s power structure through exploring certain tropes. 

Megacity ML of Alkaline Dawn is run by megacorporations that slowly developed control and power because of the collective failure of government and people to take action: in the beginning, they had solutions and half-measures for sale when needed, and as the climate deteriorated, people became more and more reliant until brand allegiance equalled lifespan. Dissent against this sort of overwhelming control becomes increasingly violent to make any sort of change, and so law and order must escalate their actions against the public. The escalation and desperation of control lead to…unsavoury options.

In my fantasy novel, The Dreadlord’s Accountant, the deserts of The Timeless Sands are ruled by a system of demonic houses that rule by force and magical legitimacy, but the main character, Abigail Ashhurst, works for the Treasury department, fighting daily to fund the wild spending and logistical nightmare that a predatory and cruel system demands. While not an explicit subversion, in the same book, I test the limits of power in its world by layering a disease afflicting the main region of food production - something that the demons in charge can’t magic away, and instead need to work with those they might find undesirable.

More power, baby

Power matters. It matters if an author wants to create a world that feels complicated, realistic, and has enough depth that a decent story can exist within it. BUT - power is one element of worldbuilding. There are others that I’ll cover, including the next one: magic, technology, and limits.