Utopia

Utopia usually refers to an idealized perfection of society. It is an extremely important aspect of the genre of science fiction represented most famously by works like 1984 and Brave new world. Contained within Utopia there is the idea of harmony and peace among all people and forces. Usually this peace is achieved through the recognition of a uniting force. In Brave new world this uniting force is the government and socially endorsed drug "Soma" which is how all people relax. In many other examples the uniting force is a supra government. A government that transcends conventional geographic borders and cultural boundaries. To do this the government must control or regulate very diverse groups of people or attempt to make a singular group of people. The means to do this is to educate people on why they need the government. Most often in the genre these systems are imperfect. People see who is pulling the strings and usually find something wrong with the reason why or the methods used to achieve control. Thus the protagonist (usually) tries to stop the process through which the government maintains power (the education and conditioning of people). In other instances however, this supragovernments are not such a bad thing. The most popular example of this is found in the Star Trek series with the "Federation of Planets." The Federation sends missions to remote parts of the universe to discover what is out there and that is all the missions are supposed to do. The missions are supposed to follow "Prime Directive One" which is to not not interfere with any species development. The implications of this are vast. This standing order simultaneously prevents the atrocities of imperialism as well as attempting to preserve the natural process by which ecosystems/species/cultures form. The conflict in the series usually comes from not obeying this order thereby forcing the crew to deal with the consequences according to the context of their situation.