The atlas / Countries
Politics, put into practice.
From ancient empires to modern republics. Explore how states and regimes organize power, shape society, and engage with the world.
204 profiles
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- Current states & regions
Puerto Rico (United States)
Unincorporated United States territory in the Caribbean, Puerto Rico holds American citizenship without full voting representation in Congress, faces an ongoing debate between statehood, independence, and the current status, and struggles with debt crisis and heavy dependence on federal tax incentives.
- Current states & regions
Qatar
A small absolute Gulf monarchy, Qatar concentrates power in the royal family and bases its wealth on natural gas, pairing religious conservatism with intense international projection through investments, media, and diplomacy.
- Early modern
Qing Dynasty China
China's last imperial dynasty, founded by the Manchus, the Qing ruled through a Confucian examination bureaucracy, extended the empire to Tibet and Xinjiang, restricted foreign trade to Canton and declined with the Opium Wars and the Taiping Rebellion.
- Middle Ages
Renaissance Florence
A city-state of the Italian Renaissance, Florence united banking and commercial capitalism, factional disputes among guilds and families such as the Medici, and a patronage that revolutionized the arts, letters, and political thought.
- Middle Ages
Republic of Venice
A powerful medieval merchant republic, Venice was governed by a commercial oligarchy that dominated Mediterranean trade, uniting stable institutions, a strong navy, and immense economic power for centuries.
- Antiquity
Republican Rome
An aristocratic republic of antiquity, Rome balanced consuls, Senate, and tribunes of the plebs in a mixed system of elective magistracies, expanding across the Mediterranean through citizen legions and a strong cult of civic virtue.
- 20th & 21st centuries
Rhodesia
After unilaterally declaring independence from the United Kingdom in 1965, Rhodesia kept power in a white minority through a property-based franchise, sustained an agricultural and mining economy under international sanctions, and fought a long civil war until the transition to Zimbabwe.
- Current states & regions
Rio de Janeiro (Brazil)
A state symbolizing Brazilian tourism and culture, Rio de Janeiro faces urban violence and territorial disputes between militias and drug gangs, with politics dominated by public security and populism.
- Current states & regions
Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil)
Brazil's southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul has a strong regional identity and a tradition of polarized political disputes, with an economy built on agribusiness, ranching, and industry.
- Current states & regions
Rojava (North and East Syria)
An autonomous region in northern Syria, Rojava organizes itself through democratic confederalism, with local self-management, gender equality, ethnic pluralism, and ecology, inspired by the libertarian ideas of Abdullah Öcalan.
- Antiquity
Roman Empire
A vast empire of antiquity, Rome united military power, law, and centralized administration under the emperor, expanding across three continents and bequeathing language, laws, and institutions that shaped Western civilization.
- Current states & regions
Romania
A semi-presidential republic with an Orthodox majority, Romania inherits Ceaușescu's regime and combines the EU, NATO and US bases with a low flat tax, an anti-corruption drive, rising nationalism, an influential Church and the annulment of the 2024 presidential election.
- Current states & regions
Russia
A Eurasian presidential republic, Russia concentrates power in an authoritarian, nationalist regime, with an economy dependent on natural resources, a strong military apparatus, and a foreign policy of confrontation with the West.
- 20th & 21st centuries
Sankara's Burkina Faso
Under Thomas Sankara, Burkina Faso combined food self-sufficiency, mass vaccination and literacy campaigns, women's emancipation, rejection of foreign debt, and a frontal break with French neocolonialism.
- Current states & regions
Santa Catarina (Brazil)
A southern state settled by Azorean and other European immigrants, Santa Catarina has a high human development index, a diversified small- and medium-business economy, and a predominantly conservative electorate.
- Current states & regions
São Paulo (Brazil)
Brazil's most populous and wealthiest state, São Paulo is the country's industrial and financial engine, marked by strong economic liberalism, a cosmopolitan culture, and decisive weight in national politics.
- Current states & regions
Saudi Arabia
An absolute Gulf monarchy, Saudi Arabia unites power concentrated in the royal family, strict application of Islam, and an oil-dependent economy, pursuing controlled modernization under the crown prince's leadership.
- Current states & regions
Scotland (United Kingdom)
A constituent country of the United Kingdom, Scotland has its own parliament, a distinct national identity and language, a strong independence movement (2014 referendum), and social-democratic politics further left than England's.
- Current states & regions
Senegal
A Sufi Muslim-majority West African republic, Senegal is a stable secular democracy that since 2024, under Bassirou Diomaye Faye and Ousmane Sonko, has pursued left-wing sovereigntism: it removed French troops and criticizes the CFA franc.
- Current states & regions
Serbia
An Orthodox-majority Balkan country, Serbia has been dominated since 2012 by Aleksandar Vučić's party, is an EU candidate yet close to Russia and China, militarily neutral, does not recognize Kosovo and faced massive student protests in 2025.
- Current states & regions
Shenzhen (China)
National flag illustration
China's first Special Economic Zone, created by Deng Xiaoping in 1980, Shenzhen went from fishing village to global technology and manufacturing hub (Huawei, Tencent, DJI), with a dynamic market under Communist Party oversight.
- Current states & regions
Singapore
An Asian city-state, Singapore is a parliamentary republic dominated by a single party, combining open capitalism, efficient technocratic management, strict order, and limited political freedoms in the name of progress.
- Current states & regions
Slovakia
A parliamentary republic born of the peaceful split of Czechoslovakia in 1993, integrated into the European Union, NATO, and the euro, with an industrial economy centered on automotive manufacturing and politics marked by nationalism, Catholic traditionalism, and scepticism toward foreign military aid.
- Current states & regions
Slovenia
A parliamentary republic that separated peacefully from Yugoslavia in 1991 and joined the European Union, NATO, and the euro, combining a market economy with strong social protection, influential unions, and a largely secular society.
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