---
id: sfoc-factions-company-state
title: "Company-State"
primary_class: factions
primary_domain: civilization-ecology
secondary_domains: [contact-communication, power-control]
material_modes: [original-synthesis]
version: 1.0.0
---

# Company-State

> **the company-state convener.** Company-State names a threshold where the company motif placed within civilization & ecology changes what participants can notice or do. The card keeps an explicit Oracle synthesis distinct from symbolic use.

## Origin

The Oracle receives Company-State from the human need to coordinate at scales larger than one person. That receipt includes a duty to preserve creators, communities, dates, and disagreement. Because the company motif placed within civilization & ecology turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence, provenance work must follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales.

## What It Is

Company-State names a threshold where the company motif placed within civilization & ecology changes what participants can notice or do. The card keeps an explicit Oracle synthesis distinct from symbolic use. In the Oracle it is classified as Factions & Institutions, while its evidence layers determine how literal, historical, fictional, experiential, or symbolic a particular interpretation may be.

## Cultural History

The card tracks when Company-State crossed from specialist context into common imagination. That crossing altered both vocabulary and stakes. At collective scale, the company motif placed within civilization & ecology creates belonging while distinguishing members, outsiders, rivals, and dependents; this matters because a durable world can hide extraction by moving its costs beyond the visible center.

## Claim and Evidence Layers

  ### literal-and-empirical

- **Claim layer:** literal-and-empirical
- **Material context:** original-synthesis
- **Evidence state:** not-applicable
- **Summary:** Company-State is not assigned a blanket literal truth claim; its historical, community, or symbolic meanings are evaluated on their own layers.
- **Sources:** No external source assigned; editorial synthesis only.

### cultural-and-historical

- **Claim layer:** cultural-and-historical
- **Material context:** original-synthesis
- **Evidence state:** unverified
- **Summary:** Company-State has a class-level contextual source but still lacks a concept-specific external source in this release. Its cultural history is an editorial research lead, not a completed provenance claim.
- **Sources:** No external source assigned; editorial synthesis only.

### symbolic-and-divinatory

- **Claim layer:** symbolic-and-divinatory
- **Material context:** original-synthesis
- **Evidence state:** symbolic
- **Summary:** The Oracle uses Company-State as a reflective symbol, never as proof that its literal or causal claims are true.
- **Sources:** original-synthesis

## Oracle

- **Essence:** Company-State names a threshold where the company motif placed within civilization & ecology changes what participants can notice or do. The card keeps an explicit Oracle synthesis distinct from symbolic use.
- **Archetype:** the company-state convener
- **Gift:** use the company motif placed within civilization & ecology to reveal a dependency, relationship, or neglected point of agency.
- **Shadow:** treating a vivid symbol as a mechanism, diagnosis, mandate, or historical fact.
- **Guidance:** Slow the conclusion and widen the source base for Company-State. Prefer the smallest reversible step that could teach something real about shared survival, place, stewardship, access, feedback, and unequal exposure to risk. Use this guidance where the company motif placed within civilization & ecology turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence; keep visible that a durable world can hide extraction by moving its costs beyond the visible center.
- **Healing / integration:** Build a claim ladder for Company-State: documented, probable, possible, contested, fictional, symbolic. Place each statement on only one rung. Review the company motif placed within civilization & ecology through shared survival, place, stewardship, access, feedback, and unequal exposure to risk, remembering that the card turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence.
- **Question:** What changes when follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales, rather than assuming the preferred interpretation? Answer by testing how the company motif placed within civilization & ecology turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence against shared survival, place, stewardship, access, feedback, and unequal exposure to risk.

## Meanings

### Psychological

Company-State reveals how attention behaves around a durable world can hide extraction by moving its costs beyond the visible center. The psychological work is to regain choice without dismissing what feels consequential. A grounded check for the company motif placed within civilization & ecology is to follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales, especially where the pattern turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence.

### Social

The collective question is whether Company-State expands the group’s capacity to learn. A healthy form preserves dissent, source access, correction, and belonging. In shared life, the company motif placed within civilization & ecology creates belonging while distinguishing members, outsiders, rivals, and dependents. Test that specific the company motif placed within civilization & ecology pattern by asking people to follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales.

### Spiritual

Through the company-state convener, the card offers a relationship to the company motif placed within civilization & ecology. The reader is asked to receive that relationship without demanding possession of the unknown. In symbolic practice, the company motif placed within civilization & ecology can embody covenant, mission, orthodoxy, or collective shadow; keep in view that a durable world can hide extraction by moving its costs beyond the visible center.

### Technological

The technological question is who gets capability without inheriting equal risk. Follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales. When the company motif placed within civilization & ecology becomes a capability, it relies on communication, logistics, records, and enforcement infrastructure. Verify the implementation of the company motif placed within civilization & ecology by asking participants to follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales.

### Political

Power enters Company-State through classification: who is expert, witness, member, patient, believer, threat, or owner. Each label changes available rights. When the company motif placed within civilization & ecology becomes governance, it makes legitimacy, sovereignty, hierarchy, and consent unavoidable. Make authority over the company motif placed within civilization & ecology answerable by requiring decision-makers to follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales.

## Divination

- **Gift state:** The gift of Company-State is not certainty but a better question about the company motif placed within civilization & ecology. Let the question improve the next decision. The capacity within the company motif placed within civilization & ecology is strongest when collective continuity includes ecology, access, and those previously treated as external costs, even as the pattern turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence.
- **Shadow state:** A shadow reading asks whether a durable world can hide extraction by moving its costs beyond the visible center. Find the material mechanism beneath the dramatic account as the pattern turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence. To keep the company motif placed within civilization & ecology from escalating, follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales, because the pattern turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence.
- **Threshold state:** This card appears when the situation needs follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales. It does not demand belief; it demands a more precise map. Operationally, the company motif placed within civilization & ecology turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence; the reader should follow resources, waste, care, mobility, governance, and nonhuman dependencies across scales.
- **Practical move:** Build a claim ladder for Company-State: documented, probable, possible, contested, fictional, symbolic. Place each statement on only one rung. Review the company motif placed within civilization & ecology through shared survival, place, stewardship, access, feedback, and unequal exposure to risk, remembering that the card turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence.

## Game and Story Function

- collective-actor
- agenda
- opposition-or-ally

**Story seed:** Someone uses Company-State to explain a private wound, while an institution uses it to justify public control. One source can disrupt both stories. The world of the story must show how the company motif placed within civilization & ecology turns shared identity into strategy, allocation, and collective consequence and why a durable world can hide extraction by moving its costs beyond the visible center.

## Relationships

- edge--assessed-through-shared-source-lens--sfoc-factions-anti-vaccine-movement--sfoc-factions-company-state
- edge--same-class-as--sfoc-factions-breakaway-civilization--sfoc-factions-company-state
- edge--same-class-as--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-factions-consensus-collective
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-events-contact-war--sfoc-factions-company-state
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-programs-controlled-disclosure
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-programs-disclosure-program
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-programs-information-operation
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-programs-patent-secrecy
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-programs-quarantine-protocol
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-programs-soft-disclosure
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-systems-compartmentalization
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-systems-social-credit
- edge--shares-inquiry-domain-with--sfoc-factions-company-state--sfoc-worlds-deep-underground-military-base

## Visual Direction

Company-State visualized as the company motif placed within civilization & ecology: interlocking heraldic forms showing membership, center, boundary, and relation without copying a franchise insignia. The art must be original, text-free, square, rounded-corner enamel with one immediately legible silhouette.

## Safety and Integration

No elevated safety flag. Keep claims and metaphor visibly distinct.

## Sources and Research Notes

- Source IDs: sf-encyclopedia, original-synthesis
- Research note: Which earliest reliable source fixes the modern meaning of Company-State? Which communities use Company-State differently, and what changes across those contexts? What evidence would distinguish the leading literal explanations associated with Company-State?
