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Asskicking Equals Authority
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Vaarsuvius: Why, precisely, would you have any interest in assisting me in the first place?
What happens when the people of the Planet Of Hats believe Authority Equals Asskicking? They create a civilization, nation, or culture that bases its social hierarchy and governance on whosoever is strongest among them. Essentially, You Kill It You Bought It as a social value.
Usually, the base culture or organization is of the Darwinist and Chaotic Evil variety, though other less evil alignments are possible; like the Proud Warrior Race Guy. They will benefit from great strength and martial ability, but don't expect them to put much value on teamwork. Their main problem will usually be that they place such importance on personal power that they eschew not just The Power Of Friendship but tactical cooperation in favor of individual glory. This often plays to the heroes' advantage, since the relatively weaker heroes will usually be far better coordinated.
The leader of such a group is usually the Big Bad and (of course) has Authority Equals Asskicking up the wazoo. It's especially likely for there to be one or two Starscreams hovering near the main bad guy. Grunts will usually be sociopathic enough for the heroes not to feel bad about killing, but you can expect them to be especially easy to turn with displays of kindness because Machiavelli Was Wrong.
If they aren't evil, then expect them to swear everlasting fealty to the hero once he bests their leader in combat. (It's a good thing they don't usually switch to the villains side when the hero loses that second act skirmish.) These types will benefit both from their Darwinian upbringing and the Power Of Friendship to easily massacre most enemy mooks.
For an especially delicious twist, the leader of such a group will be an X hater (misogynist, racist, humanist, whatever) and of course, a person from said group will beat them sooner or later and earn control of the tribe.
Neatly satisfies the Sliding Scale Of Villain Threat and Sorting Algorithm Of Evil. Also avoids Villain Decay by having a logical reason for a bigger bad to replace the current one (although it better not be that Smug Snake Reliable Traitor). You can expect these groups to be easily divided by an Evil Power Vacuum or Enemy Civil War; it's often implied that should they ever get their act together or a strong enough leader to unify all of them, the heroes would lose handily.
Note: this can also be a positive thing. In organizations or cultures that are Lawful Good, The Hero might earn their cred once they've bested a number of enemies, thus proving their worth. Think of it as attaining their Awesome Moment Of Crowning through Crowning Moments of Awesome.
Not to be confused with Authority Equals Asskicking, despite the fact that the two have an annoying tendency to reinforce each other.
Examples:
Anime
- The Shinobi Villages in Naruto are led by the Kage, who is supposed to be the "strongest" one in the village. However, it's not entirely clear if "strongest" is intended to be an entirely physical attribute, or if it includes spiritual or psychological strength.
- It seems to be both, the Raikage however makes it very clear this trope is in full force with him.
- As ninja rank up, they are giving more leadership responsibilities. While the Chunin exam ends with a tournament, it begins with a near impossible written exam (that requires extreme genius or skills to secretly gather information in broad daylight without leaving your seat). And even the tournament is more a Secret Test Of Character seeing as how the decision of who ranks up is not based on who wins. The end result is well rounded ninjas... smart enough to get to the tournament, and strong enough to belong there. That philosophy of brain and brawn is carried through all the ranks, especially up to the Kage.
- The Soul Society that polices the afterlife in Bleach works like this. The Soul Reapers that act as the military for the Soul Society are divided into 13 divisions known as the Gotei 13. While captains for the divisions are usually trained and schooled for centuries, the single most important quality required to become a captain is raw strength - so much so that Kenpachi Zaraki was made the captain of the 11th division when he killed it's previous captain, despite the fact that he never attended the soul reaper academy.
- Raoh's goal in conquering the world in Fist Of The North Star is to bring about a society like this, albeit one that is much more united than the Crapsack World that exists after the nuclear war.
- The Three Kings arc in Yu Yu Hakusho plays with this. At first, there are three warring countries, each led by the strongest fighter. Eventually, everyone agrees to hold a tournament, and crown the winner ruler of all demon world (until the next tournament). The strangest thing is, it works perfectly, even though none of the protagonists made it into the finals.
- Tenchi Muyo Word Of God states that this is how becoming Emperor of Jurai works. Ordinary Earthling Seina Yamada from Tenchi Muyo GXP learns that stumbling across a Humongous Mecha with a seed for one of Jurai's space trees catapulted him near the top of the list of potential heirs.
- It's a specific type of power, directly related to the Jurai space trees, that puts you in contention for the throne; just being able to kick ass in a fight isn't enough. Normally it's kept within the the royal family because no one else is given access to the trees (which are specifically named "Royal Trees" for this reason), and the trees (having a will of their own) usually support this policy. But since the trees do have a will of their own, sometimes they'll make an exception like they did in Seina's case.
- More specifically, whoever has a first generation seed, which gives them a kickass spaceship. And the 'light-hawk wings', which are nigh-indestructable.
- Basically it boils down to the one phrase: "Because Tsunami says so", simple as that. So, given just whose (quite thrilled at the fact, that is) wife she now is, it's really doubtful that Jurai will have any succession crises (or for that matter, succession at all) anymore.
- Due to general Feudal Future feel in The Five Star Stories, this trope is at full power there. Only Headdliners could manage the Humongous Mecha of their world, and because of this all who exhibit such abilities generally happen to become nobility. All in all, given the general belligerence of the Joker society, it is to be expected.
- While Dynastical Council in Crest Of The Stars evaluates not only the martial prowess of the potential candidates to the Jade Throne, it's still one of their major consideration, and to ascend to the title of Crown Prince, successful aspirant should rise in the military ranks to the position of Commander in Chief — with the Council constantly judging his or her performance and vetting the promotions accordingly.
Literature
- The Star Wars Expanded Universe makes it pretty clear that the Sith have generally operated on this principle whenever they have had a structure involving enough of them to do so- the Rule of Two just compresses it, so that one proves one's strength and becomes the Master by killing one's own Master.
- On a less malevolent scale, the Mandalorians also have a tradition of following their leaders based upon this trope. Whenever Mandalore dies (given the nature of their culture, this usually happens in battle), the strongest remaining warrior becomes the new Mandalore. This has been happening for over twenty thousand years.
- The Lensman series by E. E. "Doc" Smith had multiple cultures which followed this method (though this is usually explained by the fact that all of the subject cultures consciously patterned themselves after the primary culture). The Eddorians, the Ploor, the Eich, possibly the Delgonians, and the entire Council of Boskone, fit this trope perfectly. Kim Kinnison even uses this to take over the entire bad guy's empire and become the Overlord of Thrale by assassinating the previous Overlord of Thrale, which was the accepted way of moving up in the world. It was stated that all of these cultures were fairly stable, in that underlings would not try for promotion until they were fairly certain that they could succeed, and in the meantime they had to produce for their superiors or they would be replaced, either by their superiors for not producing or by their own underlings for failure to protect themselves.
- The wizards of the Discworld were originally like this, with wizards rising through the ranks at the Unseen University by filling the recently vacated pointy shoes of their higher-ups. This state of affairs ended when the wizards ended up appointing Mustum Ridcully to the post of Arch-Chancellor; not only did he come down like a ton of bricks on anyone trying it in his faculty, but he was also nigh impossible to kill. The wizards mellowed down shortly after.
- The urgals of the Inheritance Cycle. Their entirely social structure is based on feats of combat, meaning that if you don't win duels and raid enemies' villages, you'll never advance in society.
- In A Song Of Ice And Fire, this is the logic which places Robert Baratheon on the throne after he deposes Aerys Targaryen. This doesn't go well.
- The Segueleh in the Malazan Book Of The Fallen have their social hierarchy based entirely on martial skill. They were founded by an army of the First Empire after the Empire was destroyed.
- Subverted in Dune. Early on, Paul earns credibility among the Fremen by reluctantly killing one who challenged him to combat. The Fremen, like the Bedouin culture they loosely parallel, have a culture that values "honor," defended through bloodshed. Also, they expect their leaders to succeed by killing their predecessors. Though the Fremen take him for a Messiah and see his leadership as inevitable, he refuses to take the place of the tribe leader Stilgar by killing him. He takes power instead after an impassioned speech deploring the idea of sacrificing a loyal and talented soldier to such a brutal custom. This compels Stilgar to step down, and the Fremen accept Paul's leadership.
- In Gav Thorpe's Warhammer 40000 story "Renegades", when Gessert demands that the members of his company paint over their insignia, so they realize they are renegades and commit themselves, one says that he is no longer authorized by the Imperium as their captain. Gessert says that if he wants to fight him, go ahead.
Film
Live Action TV
- In an episode of Star Trek The Original Series, "Mirror Mirror", Kirk and a few of his bridge crew swap places with their counterparts in an alternate dimension where promotions are earned by killing your commanding officer. It's a wonder they managed to keep their Enterprise crewed by anything but a huge pile of corpses.
- The Klingons would've been right at home in that universe, as they actually want their worthy successors to prove their mettle by killing them to take their place.
- An example of the good kind of this trope, in Stargate SG 1 both Colonel Jack O'Neill and Colonel Sam Carter both got promotions as a reward for the many times they owned the bad guys and saved the Earth.
- They received promotions for saving the Earth. Meritorious service and all that. Their ability to kick ass was a means to an end.
- The Goa'uld, however, play it deadly straight, since the only way to become Supreme System Lord is to amass enough power to tell all the others to sit down and shut up. Since O'Neil(l) dealt Ra a nuclear sucker punch back in [Stargate the Movie]] the other System Lords have been squabbling over who gets to fill his gold-plated shoes; whenever one seems to be getting close it's generally regarded as a bad thing.
- The Narns of Babylon Five evidently follow this trope to some degree; if a Narn is really pissed off at a higher-up, said Narn can challenge him/her (OK, him) to single combat for the position. G'Kar was challenged by a young hothead leading attacks on Centauri on the station; despite the underhanded tactics (e.g. having one of his lieutenants try to get G'Kar with a poisoned dart), G'Kar wins and manages to get something of a handle on B5's Narn population.
- Drazi "elections" work this way. The population is randomly split into the purple and green factions, who then fight until a leader is found.
- In the episode "Wipe-Out" of the American TV series Raven
 , the titular character Jonathan Raven (who is secretly a ninja) decides to infiltrate a gang of surfers. The final test to join the gang is to fight every member, one by one. He defeats every single one except the boss. After losing this fight, he innocently remarks that he must've failed the test, but the boss replies that no, he's now the second in command. Later on, however, Raven (who is actually a ninja) admits to his pal that he lost the fight to the boss on purpose, because if he had defeated the boss he would have undermined his authority, and been unable to infiltrate the gang. The gang are playing the trope straight, and Raven uses Genre Savvy to take advantage of them.
- A little bit in Firefly. Jayne doesn't like Mal's wrench.
- Please Elaborate
- Mal keeps Jayne under control by his forceful presence and in that one episode by hitting him with a wrench and threatening to kill him when he tries to betray the Tams.
- In the seventh season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, when the group temporarily turns away from Buffy as their leader, they place Faith, who as the other Slayer is the team's second strongest member, in that role instead. This is in spite of the fact that Faith has no leadership experience whatsoever, and virtually every other character has a better claim to the leadership. (Willow and Giles are smarter, and Xander is the only member of the group with actual management experience.)
- The exact same things apply to Buffy, mind.
Tabletop Games
- Ork society in Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40000. "Da bigga an ork is, da more dat 'es da boss." It actually goes both ways-orks know who is their boss because the boss is bigger, but orks actually grow as a response to rising in the social hierarchy-the bosses really are bigger because you start growing when you become the boss.
- Other such societies in the two settings include, but is not limited to, Norsca, Chaos warbands (especially Beastmen), Skaven, Dark Elves and Dark Eldar.
- In Battletech, this is pretty much how the Clans work. The warrior caste is very much in charge with everybody else ultimately working for them, martial skill determines rank and command privileges, and trial by combat is considered a legitimate way to air one's grievances or even overturn political decisions that didn't go your way.
- And most depictions of Dungeons and Dragons Devils work on a very orderly version of this.
- Basically the entire premise of the Queen's Blade series. In a nutshell: assorted bishoujo of various fetishes fight for the right to become queen for a year. Even has two spinoff series for more character and more fun.
Video Games
- In Halo, the Elite hierarchy is simple enough: the more you kill, the higher your rank.
- In World of Warcraft, Ogre heirarchy is based solely on asskicking. Basically, rank and gear go towards whoever can fight for it, since Ogres lack the mental capacity to elect someone democratically.
- Also, the now-abolished honor ranking system lived and breathed this trope: The Grand Marshal and High Warlord ranks were awarded to characters who week after week were the most lethal among their respective factions. In practice, this required nearly nonstop combat for several months.
- The Zuul from Sword Of The Stars operate on this mentality. They are a Hive Mind, so the strongest personality directs the collective... Until it shows weakness, at which point all the ones who can challenge it will do so.
- Overlords in the Nippon Ichiverse. The title of Overlord of a Netherworld will automatically pass from the defeated to the victor if its possessor is defeated; thus, only the strongest demons (or those who can fool their fellows into thinking they're far stronger than they really are) remain Overlords. Player Mooks are exempt from this, though.
- Humans who go Overlord-slaying, however, are NOT! Oops.
- The Reason of Yosuga in Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne.
- Fire Emblem mentions in Path of Radiance that the shapeshifting Laguz pick their kings based solely on physical strength.
- The Thraddash of Star Control 2 are willing to reshape their society along your very whims once you've killed about a third of their military. Their history is a series of numerically ordered Cultures, each one defeating the previous one in total war. They've nuked themselves back to the stone age five times, and each culture considers itself the strongest due to this tradition. Kick enough ass and you're in charge of everything.
Web Comics
- In The Adventures of Doctor McNinja one villain has a plan to take over the presidency by convincing Americans that it works this way.
- The arc ends with the good doctor pointing out all the many flaws in the plan.
- In Order Of The Stick, this is the reason the imp offers for trying to attach itself to V.
- There's also the quicker way to become the supreme leader of a rather large army.
- In Dan And Mabs Furry Adventures, this is the basis for most Creatures' system of (ahem) ethics. On the brighter side, it means revenge is pretty rare, since, by such logic, if you were defeated, you deserved to be.
Web Original
Western Animation
- Junko in Storm Hawks grew disappointed not that his people were obsessed with being strong, but that the leader of his people sided with the evil Cyclonians because he interpreted their mantra of "the strongest rule because strength brings power" into one that the Wallops should ally with the strongest faction out there rather than fight it. This was either Genre Savvy with how close the finale was, or pretty dumb considering the Storm Hawks consistently thwart them. Junko calls him on it twice, accusing him of being afraid of Cyclonia, and later denouncing that Strength without the will to use it for good is worthless.
- The Predacons in Beast Wars seem to operate on this principle - when Optimus Primal is kidnapped by the Vok, turncoat Dinobot insists that he should lead the Maximals because he's the strongest. Unfortunately for his ambitions, Maximals elect their leaders by secret ballot.
- Their ancestors (the normal evil faction), the Decepticons, make this policy very explicit. Since the entire faction is made up of vicious murderers, the only leader who'll survive is one strong and smart enough to terrify them into submission.
Real Life
- It is said that when Alexander the Great was asked to whom the succession would go, he replied "to the strongest." Of course no one ever figured out who was the strongest until the Romans came along and showed everyone, thus becoming The Empire.
- Along the Scottish Border that was pretty much how the clans worked too. 1
- Arnold Schwarzenegger
- A huge majority of Presidents of the United States have backgrounds in the military, federal law enforcement, or both. See Our Presidents Are Different.
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