The First 5 Things Palpatine Did as Emperor

well other friends welcome back to another episode of generation tech my name is alan when the republic fell and turned into the empire overnight daily life didn't change all that much for most people in the galaxy if your outer rim homestead was in ruins because of the clone wars it was probably still in ruins as palpatine danced on the graves of his jedi enemies if you were rich and living the high life in the upper levels of coruscant things were still great and your problems were mostly trivial as you watch masamita conduct a lightsaber burning ceremony on the steps of the jedi temple and if you lived in the lower levels of the coruscant well you might not have even known about the clone wars let alone the fall of the republic and the rise of the empire neither sun nor news from the surface can find its way through all those cracks and crevices so what made the empire so different from the republic well today we're going to take a look at five major policy moves that palpatine implemented in the first year of the empire many of these decisions and policies were actually building on things that palpatine pushed for during the clone wars in the last years of the republic and they would greatly change how the galaxy was running when we think about the galactic empire's effect on the civilian population we usually picture stormtroopers kicking down doors and pregnant alien women in the stomach these things happened of course but how did the stormtroopers get called in for their stomach kicking appointment in the first place well you had the local police and you had the imperial security borough who watched the population closely but they were all controlled by a massive organization known as kopnor or the commission for the preservation of the new order this was an all-encompassing government agency that was in charge of all internal affairs within the galactic empire now in a non-autocratic government such organizations would have been split up into many different bureaus but palpatine liked large government and complete control over the populace on top of that individuals who worked in copnor were extremely devoted to him individually it was almost like a mass populist movement as well as a bureaucratic entity this is where palpatine's political base was located now kopp noor was heavily involved with creating the image of the perfect imperial citizen and dictating what imperial culture was through massive propaganda campaigns and rallies although kotner was not technically a political party or her belief system its members were mainly responsible for keeping other imperial citizens in check when they weren't on duty in this way members of kofner were not that different from nazi party members or chinese communist party members who perpetrated some of the worst crimes dictated by their own autocratic leaders now continour also carried out a campaign to increase public support for the government and military and also drummed up fear and xenophobia against aliens living in the empire at the same time the organization also played up humanity's role in the galaxy and its superiority to other species through supporting specific works of art and literature compnor made sure that no matter how terrible things were in the empire the civilian support for the emperor would not wane the biggest visual change that occurs during the runs of the new order takes place on coruscant the famed senate district home of the galactic senate and much of the republic's bureaucratic offices became known as the federal district the galactic senate would continue to serve as a rubber stamp congress for a few more years but the true center of power would be located at the imperial palace which of course was built on the ruins of the jedi temple velveteen followed the classic tactic of taking your enemies main place of worship and power and then transforming it into his own center of power and belief system once the jedi were all kicked out and massacred and their treasure either destroyed or catalogued for the emperor's own enjoyment the jedi temple was completely gutted and turned into a mess of an empty hall in which the emperor would hold court for his subjects and foreign dignitaries the jedi temple also was reportedly built on top of an ancient sith thrine which itself was built on top of a forced nexus that it had corrupted deeply emperor palpatine would spend many nights down in this ancient sith thrine meditating and trying to figure out what his next move would be at the center of the empire's massive military industrial complex federal military and civil service branches was its imperial academy system in my opinion it's one of the best things that palpatine's government accomplished in his earlier years prior to the empire's rise the republic's federal government was relatively small most people in the galaxy were employed at the local level and so mid-range and core worlds with developed economies had high rates of employment but in sparsely populated outer rim territories the lack of development led to higher amounts of poverty and unemployment the imperial academy system standardized the existing republic education system and created a pipeline for skilled and talented individuals from all across the galaxy that joined the galactic empire this gave individuals who otherwise would have had no prospects like luke skywalker away off of their backwards planet the empire utilized all of this untapped manpower and resources and gave purpose to billions of people who were left behind by the republic now this system wasn't perfect of course corruption and personal interest often meant that core world applicants had higher chances of attending prestigious schools but still there were resources flowing into parts of the galaxy that had been neglected for centuries the imperial academy system also had a culture of ruthless competition and it was very effective at finding the most talented pilots and officers to fill in positions within the galactic empire military the rebel alliance might have had better snub fighters but their pilots were trashed compared to the empire's finest thai fighter pilots the empire wasn't just about propaganda and militarization it was also about complete control of its civilian populace individuals who become dictators often fear and distrust their own populace which is why chain codes were created by emperor palpatine in order to keep track of everyone in the galaxy during one of the first episodes of the bad match when clone force 99 finds refuge on the world of salika mai they noticed that the galactic empire is signing up everyone for chain codes this is sort of like the equivalent of a driver's license or social security number the chain code had all sorts of biographical data on it like your age your height your physical appearance and so on this would all be placed in a central imperial database and made it very easy for the empire to track you decades later we would see chain codes be used as main identifiers for bounty hunters just one example of how giving your information to others can go wrong now during the same scene on salah my we also see that the galactic empire is offering to exchange people's galactic republic credits for the new galactic empire credits one of the major steps palpatine took at the end of the republic era to solidify control was the nationalization of the galactic banking system this allowed the republic and the empire later on to basically print its own currency this was an extremely important thing because the republic's tax structure was never designed to support a massive military force and as the clone wars dragged on into its third year the republican was on the verge of bankruptcy for the empire to continue expanding its military force and navy it required even more credits palpatine managed this by nationalizing many industries and resources but also by printing a huge amount of credits from his own federal banking system for all of you future dictators out there no matter what your ideology or political system is going to be when you create your own little fiefdom you gotta make sure you're in control of the capital before you control everything else well guys i hope you enjoyed today's episode don't forget to subscribe and hit that notification button down below so you don't miss out on the rest of our awesome content as usual thanks for joining us today if you're watching this you are generation tech

Channel: Generation Tech

Views: 222,689

Keywords: generation tech, star wars

Id: d322ACQtv4s

Length: 8min 8sec (488 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 02 2021