The Free Confederation of Allied Worlds, commonly called "the Allied Worlds," or "the alliance," is an interstellar federal republic active in the Ten Worlds' connected space. It has a President, who is a primarily ceremonial head of state with reserve powers, a Prime Minister who heads the controlling government or coalition in the Confederate Parliament, and a unicameral parliament, the Interplanetary Assembly. The ability of this parliament to pass legislation directly affecting planetary affairs is severely limited by the Constitution, but it has considerable power to regulate trade, set standards for safety and commerce, and levy taxes to pay for infrastructure and defence.
Representatives to the Assembly are selected partly by their planetary or regional governments and partly by direct popular election. Many planets choose to select all their representatives by direct elections, others use indirect elections or other means to fill their "uncommitted" seats.
The Alliance requires member states to forbid cruel punishments and torture, to respect diplomatic customs, to govern transparently by the rule of law, to refrain from hindering interstellar commerce between third parties, to provide certain rights and services to travellers from other member states, to protect the wormhole system and contribute to common security needs, and to submit to the jurisdiction of Interplanetary Courts in order to enforce the other requirements and to resolve inter-state disputes. Apart from the degree of democracy implicit in the requirement to have some Interplanetary Assembly members selected by popular vote, there is technically no requirement that a member state be a democracy. Nonetheless, most are some form of democracy or republic.
States are allowed to leave the alliance. This has occasionally happened, with them usually returning after a change in government. In the case of multistate planets without a planetary supranational union, it is possible for only one state to leave (or join) the Alliance, which has also sometimes happened. The economic benefits of interstellar trade have tended to favor Allied states, but the situations are often complex.