Law and order in Equestria

[Divine plywood 1,239]

 

In Equestria there is no shortage of evil individuals who spread mischief and mayheam where ever they roam. Were it brainwashing and cutie mark stealing ponywizard, notorious conman brothers or hungry pack of timberwolfs, you name it, ponies have suffered from that scourge. On the contrary, law enforcement are much more rarely seen fenomenom.

 

Even though we have seen royal guards from the very first episode of the show and quite impressive war efforts against King Sombra in one of Starlight's alternative futures in season 5 finale, ultimately saving the day seems always depend on certain alicorn and her friends. Kindom of Equestria have serious lacks on its armed forces, police corps and justice department, all which are needed to guarantee and maintain order and society's civil peace. Military presence can only be seen in capital Canterlot. City is under attack so regular basis that defending crown and it's subjects should be rather familiar concept for Celestia's soldiers? Nope. As it turns out, wooden spears aren't that effective against magical beasts...

Polices patrol in busy streets of Manehattan and ponies of Appleloosa have local sheriff and his deputys watching over their settlement. But how about poor Ponyville and it's citizens? Whenever Beebear or GREAT AND POVERFUL TRIXIE appears, peasants are left on their own. "Where is justice?!", frightened and angry mares and stallions cry. Clad you asked.

Ponies don't have justice department that would punish wrongdoers. They are either banished to the moon or gently lectured. Simple! 

Equestria's form of goverment is autocracy and absolute monarchy. However, capital have representavive democracy in form of town hall. Smaller communities such as Ponyville have only ceremonial occupation of city mayor. She mostly hosts openings of new hospital wards and another festivitys. (But since she is so ravishing looking bird, I ignore her uselessness for townfolks wellbeing.)

 

Equestria: functional, fair and fantastic?  

[Denim&Venöm 19,016]

What good would a police force or a military for that matter be in a world filled with reality warping deities, magic stealing demons and possessed demigods? For that matter, why would they be necessary when magical mcguffins, sun and moon raising royalty and proper negotiation save the day? 

The royal guard are more of a ceremonial secret service for the noble houses, so they don't count. 

The crown does rule over Equestria, but local governments seem to have the most day to day rule. And those systems appear to be social anarchy. Ponies form their own laws independent of an over arching government, with Celestia as a mutually agreed upon figurehead.  The towns and cities act with their own governments, provide their own civil services and maintain their own law and order. Hence why most disasters and enemy threats are dealt with by volunteers and civilian militias. Even Canterlot in the comics has dealt with invasion through civilian defense. 

[The Kaeya Simp 13,988]

1 hour ago, Divine plywood said:

 

In Equestria there is no shortage of evil individuals who spread mischief and mayheam where ever they roam. Were it brainwashing and cutie mark stealing ponywizard, notorious conman brothers or hungry pack of timberwolfs, you name it, ponies have suffered from that scourge. On the contrary, law enforcement are much more rarely seen fenomenom.

 

Equestria: functional, fair and fantastic?  

1. **raises hoofs up** i surrender for that thing i apparently did,

2. Yes, Join the revolution that makes the human world like Equestria

[Rhythm Red 6,484]

In a world of magical talking ponies, nothing has to be fully explained. I think they do have a police force, especially in modern cities like Manehattan. But we technically don't know for sure, and crime is likely much rarer in equestria.

[The Kaeya Simp 13,988]

2 minutes ago, Rhythm Red said:

In a world of magical talking ponies, nothing has to be fully explained. I think they do have a police force, especially in modern cities like Manehattan. But we technically don't know for sure, and crime is likely much rarer in equestria.

I think there isn't a police force, because there's no crime, because there's no humans...

Seems more like paradise everytime I think about it

[King of Canterlot 9,603]

I would agree with that the common consensus is that Equestria is mainly ruled nationally by Celestia/Luna, through a total monarchy. Though the daily government functions of the smaller cities within Equestria are representative democracy's, because the citizens of that particular town would elect the mayor to lead the town locally. 

As for the law and order in the lands of Equestria, it has been shown that police officers DO exist in Equestria, however we only seem to see them in the very big city of Manehatten, leading to the assumption that Manehatten has to have some crime if they have police officers, though considering how friendly and nice Equestria is in general, its probably not a very big crime problem in the first place even though it is a large city. If a large city in Equestria is assumed to have a low crime rate, then one can also assume that in even smaller places such as Ponyville, the crime rate would be practically be non-existent. 

There are however, ponies in official offices of power in Ponyville, such as the judge we see standing by Mayor Mare in the photo shown below. While this could point to crime in Ponyville if they have a judge, I think it more than likely points to Ponyville having more civil disputes and other such things rather than crime. The judge may also be a "Traveling judge" where he travels around to multiple small towns in that region of Equestria and hears cases (still probably more civil cases more than anything), which means that besides having a Mayor, Ponyvilles government would be pretty small and pretty powerless to stop any huge uprising or invasion by outside forces from beyond Equestria (demonstrated by the fact that the town may not even have its own judge). 

Overall I would say that Equestria has a very loose and weak system of local representative democracy governments in the small towns/cities, while the more powerful national government based in Canterlot actually has the ability to be able to put up a fight against foreign invaders due to the much more actually powerful alicorns, Celestia and Luna. 

   

 

[Divine plywood 1,239]

35 minutes ago, Denim&Venom said:

The royal guard are more of a ceremonial secret service for the noble houses, so they don't count

They sure are more ceremonial than useful  I always had issues with that war scene in "Cutie Re-Mark" where earth pony armys clash together in the battlefield. Unicorns -being op "master race"- would have wiped them off with ease, guess same goes with pegasi. Physical strenght would clearly be useless against creatures with magical abilitys. Yet writers wanted to include this rather weak pony army in the series. It's an interesting idea, but not flesh out as well as it could have. Now guardsmen are just silly supporting character that only get in trouble. For story standpoint their role is basically just be stereotypical high school jocks or alternatively "damsels in distress", to show audience how desperate situation is before mane six rushes to save the day. .

With minor changes guards could actually  have been kinda cool, somewhat like wonderbolts. Also, I can't understand why they are all male. Show does excellent job speaking behalf of equality, but then starts to divide occupations for gender basis.Guards had potential, but they are maybe my least favourite faction. If they aren't even remote useful or interesting, why they had to be added to show in the first place. Well, this is just my bit exaggerated opinion of course, feel free to disagree.

When it comes to princesess and them being demigods able to control heavenly bodies, two sisters (sadly Luna particularly because of her limited screen time) don't always feel that powerful to me. Of course Twilight is protagonist and saving Equestria is her task, but I would love to see other princesess being victorious for change. Especially in the movie these wonderful characters were neglected completely. Hopefully in upcomig season/s our monarch's role is something more interesting than being captured time after time.

2 hours ago, Denim&Venom said:

Even Canterlot in the comics has dealt with invasion through civilian defense. 

By the way, are these comics something I should invest? I have long been curious about them.

[Denim&Venöm 19,016]

22 minutes ago, Divine plywood said:

By the way, are these comics something I should invest? I have long been curious about them.

They do manage to expand upon the series in characters, locations and themes, in ways that the show can't. 

There are actually 3 types of comics. the main series, the micro series and friends forever. Mosty fans agree that the latter two are the best, while the former is hit or miss on it's comic arcs and stand alone issues. 

That snippet abut Canterlot's defense? Came from a micro issue about Celestia. 

Edited January 21, 2018 by Denim&Venom

[EpicEnergy 23,218]

I don't think they have much of a problem with law enforcement since ponies are all about friendship and harmony.