Editing Legend of the Galactic Heroes (section)

==Allegory==

Both the Alliance and the Empire, as odd as it seems, represented the same thing: 80s Japan as seen by someone who lived through and was influenced by the left-leaning social protests of the 60s.

On one hand, you have a gerontocratic oligarchy led by a party that have been in power for 30 years by the time the novels were written, ignoring many social issues in favor of corporate elite, and the only serious opposition, the loose alliance of left-leaning protest groups responsible for social upheaval that shook the nation during the 60s, petered out due to infighting and government suppression (The Alliance). On the other hand, they kept the power because the Japanese voters valued stability above else and did not want to rock the boat, and this seemingly paid off in 80s when the economy was booming to heaven, apparently justifying the authoritarian methods (The Empire).

Of course, this was all before the economic bubble popped two years after the novels were finished, leading to a crash that left an entire generation constantly trying to make ends meet in contrast to their parents being set for life, followed by as of this moment three "Lost Decades" of extremely slow economic recovery. 

Which rather puts a damper on a key thesis of the series; that the militarized, stratified authoritarianism the Empire represents has advantages over the decadent, crumbling democracy it dismantles and supplants.

Alternatively, the history of the Alliance taken on its own terms could be taken as a prophetic condemnation of the 80s Japanese government, where the corrupt old conservatives of the LDP stubbornly resisted even the mildest hints of reform to their crumbling and decaying system, crushing and destroying those trying to save the country, to the ultimate ruin of their country. Thankfully, at least it hasn't resulted in an authoritarian military dictatorship supplanting democracy (yet).

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