AHC; Create a country with the most amount of capital cities

WorstOfHumanity

As the challenge states, your challenge is to create a situation/scenario in which a nation of your choosing, real or fictitious, has the most capital cities functioning at the same time.

Some good places to look may be countries like South Africa, which has 3 capitals.
 

Pera

Did the Roman empire not have 4 temporarely (the tetraarchy) ?

A good candidate would be Yugoslavia, which struggled with an arrangement which kept everything in balance after the death of Tito. They annually changed the President, from each of its six constituent parts. So six capitals is also something which they could realistically try. Pristina and Novi Sad thrown in to make 8 is a bit too much for the Serbs which lose a lot with Belgrade having to share.
 

garabik

Yugoslavia was also my first thought.

Reformed Soviet Union is a possibility - complains about the dominance of the RSFSR lead to all the 12 (because no way the Baltic states remain in the Union) republic capitals declared de iure to be equal. Though Moscow remains the hub and the seat of most (weak) all-Union structures, for obvious practical reasons.
 
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Minchandre

I wonder if you could get something like in the United States.

The Federal Circuit Court system was established in 1789, which predates Washington DC. Maybe instead of establishing DC, it could be decided that the Federal government could also travel between locations, to ensure equality between all parts of the country. In theory, they could even travel around the district like the circuit judges themselves did, but that seems a stretch.

The whole apparatus could relocate every 2 years or so; in some sense, that would only mean one capital at a time, but in another, it would mean 6+.

Note that when first established, each Circuit had 2 Supreme Court justices permanently assigned to it, and they were expected to spend a decent amount of time hearing cases in these circuits, so there is some precedent for the idea of directly involving the Federal government in this system.
 

PGSBHurricane

Until 1854, the US state of Rhode Island had five capitals as the legislature rotated between each of its five county seats. Perhaps they don’t decide to rotate between two cities and eventually settle for Providence as the permanent state capital in the early twentieth century?
 

Blyatnik

Confederation USSR with 17 Capitols? Each Republic capital be internationally recognized as one and then Moscow (or Leningrad) would be the center of it all. Larger still, EU with all national capitals recognized or USA as a confederation with all 50 capitals as official hubs. Although I'm not sure of the logistics of having so many national-level capitals, unless each one houses a separate government agency for compartmentalization purposes.
 

fastmongrel

Great Britain has 8 capitals with varying degrees of autonomy. The United Kingdom is different and has 4 capitals.

United Kingdom capitals
London England but controls foreign affairs, defence and Westminster has a veto over the other 3 countries parliaments acts.
Edinburgh Scotland
Cardiff Wales
Belfast Northern Ireland ( currently has no working parliament due to political difficulties)

Great Britain is the above 4 but includes the Island nations
Douglas Isle of Man
St Helier Jersey
St Peter port Guernsey
Saint Anne Alderney
Which are independent but the King is head of state and they defer to the authority of Westminster on defense and foreign affairs. The United Kingdom has no authority over the parliaments of the 4 island countries.
 

Analytical Engine

fastmongrel said:
Great Britain has 8 capitals with varying degrees of autonomy. The United Kingdom is different and has 4 capitals.

United Kingdom capitals
London England but controls foreign affairs, defence and Westminster has a veto over the other 3 countries parliaments acts.
Edinburgh Scotland
Cardiff Wales
Belfast Northern Ireland ( currently has no working parliament due to political difficulties)

Great Britain is the above 4 but includes the Island nations
Douglas Isle of Man
St Helier Jersey
St Peter port Guernsey
Saint Anne Alderney
Which are independent but the King is head of state and they defer to the authority of Westminster on defense and foreign affairs. The United Kingdom has no authority over the parliaments of the 4 island countries.
Click to expand...
The UK has one capital*. Everything you've described includes three subnational capitals, and the capitals of crown dependencies (as well as Alderney which is part of Guernsey), which are not part of the UK in any way shape or form.


*parliament is in the City of Westminster, which is in the city of London. Not to be confused with the City of London, which is not actually in the city of London, administratively speaking.
 

oberdada

The Holy Roman Empire goes full absolutism and lasts until the present day.
But instead of building a castle like Versailles, the court keeps on moving constantly from Pfalz to Pfalz.
Everyone acting as Capital as long as the Kaiser is present.

en.wikipedia.org

Kaiserpfalz - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 

CaesarKhan

The issue with the confederations of multiple countries that people are mentioning, is that each of those capitals would largely just serve their region, rather than being part of the greater whole.

I think the most capitals a unified nation could have, with each of them having their own purpose, is 6. They would each hold a different branch of the government, as shown below;

Imperial - The Monarch/Royal-Family
Ecclesiastical - The Pontiff/Clergy
Executive - The President/Prime-Minister
Legislative - The Parliament/Congress
Judicial - The High-Court/Tribune
Financial - The National-Bank/Treasury

I struggle to think of any more that could realistically deserve their own designation?
 
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sarahz

WorstOfHumanity said:
As the challenge states, your challenge is to create a situation/scenario in which a nation of your choosing, real or fictitious, has the most capital cities functioning at the same time.

Some good places to look may be countries like South Africa, which has 3 capitals.
Click to expand...
hmm well all at once is hard, but in rotation possibly less so. Malaysia has a rotating Monarchy, perhaps the capital could move with the Crown?
 
SealTheRealDeal

SealTheRealDeal

From 1689 to 1806 he HRE had 4, Vienna (Auric Council and home of the Habsburgs), Wetzlar (Imperial Chamber Court), Regensburg (Imperial Diet), and Frankfurt (where the Emperor is elected and crowned). Somehow unifying the HRE at this late point would yield a very interesting nation.
 

jsb

WorstOfHumanity said:
As the challenge states, your challenge is to create a situation/scenario in which a nation of your choosing, real or fictitious, has the most capital cities functioning at the same time.
Click to expand...
Do you not need to try with the Swiss and simply have some rules that the capital has to be in all the 26 cantons... so you get 26 cities (OK towns/villages in some case....Appenzell pop 5,750 would get to be a recognized national capital, at least for a few days a year?) Or have some functions in all of them at the same time.... Ministry of something small and unimportant we can put in Appenzell etc so split civil services by head count of cantons population roughly to not take over the village?
 
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