Carthian Movement

The **Carthian Movement** is a covenant of Kindred reformers. Although the exact goals of the Carthians vary from city to city and from person to person, the covenant's ideals generally encompass tolerance (within reason), equality, and fair representation of individuals' rights and needs. The Movement is an agent of change, and its members tend to have a reputation as firebrands, if not revolutionaries — a reputation that is often well-deserved.

The Carthians tend to adopt ideas (and to Embrace childer) from libertarian, liberal or leftist mortal institutions, and to a lesser extent from disenfranchised minority groups. As such, Carthians tend to favor philosophical ideals such as democracy, collective action, diversity, secularism, and individual rights, although exceptions to each of these can be found among the members and factions of the Movement. Although the Movement is the youngest of the covenants (it's less than two centuries old), its members aren't simply drawn from the ranks of neonates: Carthian ancillae and even elders are just as committed to the ideals of the Movement as the more modern Kindred in the covenant.

## History

It is hard to pinpoint a central date for the foundation of the Carthian Movement. Various Carthians in domains all across the world claim to have been the first Movement that had set off the spark across the Danse Macabre. What is known is that the Carthians are a modern phenomenon. The earliest movement that could be classified as "Carthian" appears in the early 19th century. Since then, movements in New York, Paris and Amsterdam grew around mortal institutions that tried new approaches to government. Over the course of the century, more and more Kindred left their traditional Covenants in order to try out what the Carthians had to offer. Some Carthian Movements even gained legal representation before the Prince. A common story is that the name "Carthians" originates from Emmanuel Baptiste Carth, the pseudonym of an apostate Lancea et Sanctum scribe who first formulated and spread ideals that would later be accepted by the Movement.

Most of these Movements had nothing in common save their adoption of mortal ideology. The Carthians of Moscow were violent "freedom fighters" against the other Covenants, while the Carthians of Paris managed to insinuate themselves quite well into the local domain. The rigors of the 20th century split these Movements into those that supported the capitalistic democratic model and those that supported the socialistic democratic model. Since the end of the Cold War, post-modernism has crept into the Covenant, causing it to become more focused on ideology and the reasons for the necessity of the revolutionary struggle than direct action.

## Organization

Carthians appear to be a chaotic lot. Carthians themselves prefer the term "diverse". It is difficult to find commonalities across all Carthian domains, but several core tenets have crystallized themselves to define what constitutes a Carthian Movement.

* **Tolerance, Within Reason**: The Carthians have multiple religions in their ranks, from followers of Longinus to militant atheists. Free market defenders clash with collectivists. To accomodate all these different ideologies, the Carthians give each of them a voice and hope that they will cooperate. Most of the internal factions will cooperate against outside threats, like Belial's Brood or threats to the Masquerade.
* **Collective Action**: Carthians are against isolationism, preferring to include Kindred of every Requiem into their activities. In doing so, they can avoid the nightly horrors of the Requiem and build a network for mutual comfort.
* **Individual Rights**: As a rule, all Carthians believe that each vampire has certain inaliable rights. They don’t much care about any individual interests, obsessions and crusades its members pursue.
* **The Duty to be a Complete Being**: Carthians accept that their condition is limiting and that each vampire has to find a way to make it bearable. What way it can be made bearable is up to individual debate.

Ultimately, the majority of Carthian domains are populist, and will tolerate dissent and deviation from their political norm only if either the argument or the Kindred presenting the argument is respected by the majority.

Offices within a Carthian domain often vary according to the needs of the domain. Below are those most common.

* **Magistrate**: The Magistrate acts as the arbiter of Carthian Law, codifying it and settling disputes over its application.
* **Myrmidon**: The Myrmidon acts as an impartial figure of authority to settle disputes about ideology.
* **Sheriff**: Unlike other Sheriffs, Carthian Sheriffs enforce Carthian Law within the domain, not only the edicts of the Prince.
* **Bailiffs**: Bailiffs act as the strong hand of Carthian officials, restraining vampires that have offended Carthian Law and keeping the peace during tribunals.
* **Clerk**: Clerks work in the administration of Carthian offices, keeping the bureaucracy going.

## Culture

Individual coteries of Carthians have individual political outlooks. They can rank from hardcore Maoism to socialism to humanism to fascism or even esoteric branches like a fusion of Zen Buddhism with Carthian ideology. Elders of the Covenants still believe in the ideals of the French Revolution, the National Fascist Party, the Soviet Union or similar passed revolutions. At its core, it is populistic, seeking legitimation from a large group of Kindred within the domain, sometimes even outside of their own Covenant.

Unique among most Kindred factions, the Carthians embrace the Internet as a means of enhancing their Covenant. Prefects, committees and even ruckand- run Carthian Kindred keep in touch with each other across the globe, and they’ve been doing so for almost 100 years. Many Carthian operations all over the world are funded by byzantine connections to front organizations such as drug cartels, import/export firms, mercenary companies, art thieves, smuggling rings and even securities traders, all supported by or connected somehow to Carthians. Some hope to establish the first multi-domain government since the Camarilla with this technology, but find themselves denied mass media due to the need of the Masquerade.

## Factions

Again, there are many factions within each Carthian Movement all across the globe. Some of the more prominent are presented below.

* Individualists
* Collectivists
* Moderates
* Bodhisatcracy
* Carthian Atheists
* Sabotage Artists
* Anti-Obstructionists
* Oppositionists
* Paranormal Phenomena Investigation Cadres