Democracy made simple: creating a one-party state in 7 easy steps
Have you ever felt frustrated that the people foolishly disagree with your obviously correct course of action? Then I have the solution for you! By following this easy guide, you too can crush all dissent maintain your benevolent stewardship of the state.
Step One, choose your ethics: Not all parties are equally easy to please. Some, like xenophobes, demand nothing more that whatever you were probably doing anyway. And of course, having three ethics will only subdivide the voting public further. As such, choose a fanatic ethic that aligns strongly with your intended course of action; if you expect many wars, pick militarism; if you only care about technology, perhaps materialist is the best choice.
Step Two, know your voters: Each government will have a preferred leader class, based on the civics chosen. Usually this is fairly obvious; militarists want commanders, technocracies want scientists, and most others generally prefer officials. Make sure your starting leader is of the correct type, and they will have a multiplicative bonus to votes.
Step Three, pick your traits: After picking your leader, be sure to set them up with either the politician or charismatic traits, which will ensure an easy victory in the first elections.
Step Four, pick your party: Obviously it is key to pick one party and stick to it for this plan. Whichever you find easier to please given your chosen playstyle, you will promote – however, do not suppress the other group, at least not at first. Instead you must choose leaders, especially on the council, who are of that party, even above and beyond their competence.
Step Five, allow no rivals: Avoid picking the aforementioned charismatic or politician traits on any other leader, particularly in the preferred leader class.
Step Six, slow and steady: Push your preferred party in every way possible, keeping leaders of that ethic on the council and governing planets, using edicts, and building ethics monuments, especially on planets that have too much disagreement. You can check this in the faction screen; by hovering over the number of pops in a faction, you will see the colonies with the most of that faction. Assign the correct governor and build more monuments on those colonies to curb any unwise impulse by the voting public.
Step Seven, go for the kill: Once you have reached at least 70-75% pops in your faction, and have the hearts and minds edict, suppress the other faction, and do everything you can to destroy them. Place governors of the party on any planet with a hint of dissent, no matter how incompetent, and remove any who are not of the party, no matter how capable.
By following these steps, you should be able to ensure your president will never change as long as they live. You can keep them in power longer by extending their lifespan, and especially by creating backup clones. Once they are of high level, and with the right traits, reelection will be child's play, and removing any small group of dissenters will prove straightforward.
Signed, 26-term president of Khar, Montgomery Belvedere
(That's not a joke by the way, in a recent playthrough I had a leader that was in office long enough to die of old age, twice. This is how I've worked out to keep the president the same person as much as possible, because it really ticks me off when a leader I had use for suddenly gets into office and can't do jack shit anymore. Check out the wiki for more granular information on what effects voting weight and ethics attraction if you're interested.)