Unrest — Wiki — Atomic Rivals

Unrest is the population's discontent: strikes, protests, riots and, at its worst, open revolt. Every land province has its own unrest, from 0% to 100%, shown in the province view. A country's unrest is the population-weighted average of its provinces, measured once a month. That monthly figure is what the AI, Events, Flashpoints and Crises and the country view all use. Clicking the country statistic opens its monthly history and a list of provinces ordered by unrest.

Growth against expectations

The biggest driver of unrest is economic performance compared with what people expect. Every province expects the growth that is normal for its level of development. Poor provinces, which can catch up quickly, expect fast growth. Rich provinces expect little.

For every percentage point of annual growth below expectations, a province gains 2 points of unrest a month.
For every point above expectations, it loses 2 points a month.

Policies that boost growth (Economic Growth) therefore calm a country, while stagnation, recession and obsolete equipment inflame it (see Provincial Economy and Equipment & Modernization). A wealthy country is not safe from this. Its people simply expect less growth.

Other pressures

Pressure	Monthly effect at its strongest
Taxation, relative to the country's maximum tax rate	up to +1 point
Military spending, relative to its cap	up to +0.4
Social spending, relative to its cap	down to −1.2
Government support	down to −0.4 at full support
War exhaustion	up to +0.8 at full exhaustion
Agitated Factions	rises with the country's faction instability (influence times agitation)
An order without consent, when Stability exceeds Legitimacy and the state does not repress	2% of the gap

Laws, national and regional modifiers, International Organizations and province archetypes add their own unrest (Unrest Gain). An oil field breeds unrest, and Devastation adds it every month while it lasts.

Unrest settles

Each month, 3% of a province's current unrest fades on its own. A steady pressure therefore levels off instead of building forever. A province settles at roughly 33 times its net monthly pressure: a constant +1 point a month settles near 33%, and +3 a month saturates at 100%. A peaceful, moderately governed country does not drift toward revolt. Lasting grievances such as missed growth, a long war or agitated factions still push unrest high.

The province's Unrest tooltip lists every part of this: the growth gap, each political pressure, faction instability, every unrest modifier by source, and garrison suppression.

What unrest costs

Lost output: every point of unrest removes a point of the province's economic output. 30% unrest means 30% less GDP there, and so less tax base and budget (see Economic Output).
Weaker government: country unrest pulls government support down each month.
Political realignment: unrest changes which parties do well in a province (see Politics).
Crises: high unrest drives up the tension of power struggles, and when unrest runs very high a defeated contender may refuse the result and start a civil war (see Flashpoints and Crises).

Calming it

Policy

Social spending, growth-friendly laws and moderate taxes work slowly but last. Civil Policing reduces unrest a little each month.

Garrisons

Idle brigades of the owning country stationed in a province suppress unrest. Each brigade removes 0.5 points a month per 100,000 residents. This stacks, up to 2 points a month per province. The reduction is multiplied by unrest suppression (Unrest Suppression) and by the armed forces' backing for the government. Political Police add 25% suppression, Secret Police 60%, Mass Surveillance 100% and Martial Law 50%. Disaffected troops keep order poorly. See Brigades.

Force

A government whose armed forces give it at least 50% backing can put down unrest in a province by force with the troops stationed there. This costs 20 political capital and immediately removes 25 points of unrest. It also causes local devastation, some civilian deaths and more agitation among the opposition. It can only be used where unrest is at least 5%. AI governments do this when a province reaches 45% unrest and they can afford it.

Martial law

Martial law holds unrest down nationwide at a cost in legitimacy (see Policies). The AI declares it when unrest runs high and lifts it once unrest falls.