Civics

Civilization 4 has 25 civics in five categories (Government, Legal, Labor, Economy and Religion), and you run exactly one from each category at a time. New civics come with technologies, each has an upkeep in gold, and changing them usually costs turns of anarchy unless your leader is Spiritual.

Civilization 4 has 25 civics in five categories, Government, Legal, Labor, Economy and Religion, and your civilization always runs exactly one civic from each: Slavery or Caste System for labor, Bureaucracy or Free Speech for law, and so on, mixed as you like. You start as what Firaxis's developer blog called "a barbaric, decentralized despotism with tribal labor and practicing paganism", unlock the other 20 through research, pay a gold upkeep for each, and usually suffer a few turns of anarchy whenever you change, unless your leader is Spiritual. The system replaced the single "government" of earlier Civilization games and, Soren Johnson writes in the manual's afterword (p. 180), was inspired by Alpha Centauri's social engineering.

Quick facts

Civics	25
Categories	5: Government, Legal, Labor, Economy, Religion
Active at once	One per category
Starting civics	Despotism, Barbarism, Tribalism, Decentralization, Paganism
Upkeep levels	None, Low, Medium, High, scaled by cities and population
Civics screen	F3
No anarchy	Spiritual leaders
Half upkeep	Organized leaders (-50%)
Unlocks every Government civic	The Pyramids

How civics work

You always run five civics, one per category, and changing one category leaves the others alone (manual, p. 83). New civics become available with technologies: Hereditary Rule with Monarchy, Mercantilism with Banking and so on, and the Pyramids wonder makes every Government civic available at once. When you learn a tech that unlocks a civic, a screen asks whether to switch; at any other time you open the Civics screen (F3), pick the new civics and press "Revolution".

Every civic has an upkeep. The manual's four levels are no upkeep, low, medium and high, and the gold each costs per turn grows with the number of cities and the population of your civilization (manual, p. 83). The manual's rule of thumb is that "the more useful a civic is, the higher its upkeep", and it advises checking the Financial Advisor before switching; Organized leaders pay half (manual, p. 159; see Leader Traits). Higher difficulty levels raise civic costs too (pp. 166-167). Economy covers the treasury it comes out of.

Changing civics usually means anarchy. For a number of turns your cities gather no food, gold or production, though units still obey orders; the Civics screen's "Turns for Revolution" shows how long it will last, and changing several civics at once is harder on your people (manual, p. 84). After any change there is a delay of a few turns before the next. Spiritual leaders skip all of it: GameSpot's guide notes they suffer "no anarchy penalty from switching civics or state religions", which let them switch to Organized Religion for building or Vassalage for training "all in the span of several turns".

Rendered scene of a bronze statue with a raised arm tilting as ropes pull it, people below with fists in the air, paper scraps in the blue sky and a glass tower at left. — A scene from 2K's Civilization IV page: a crowd raises its arms as ropes pull down a statue of a saluting figure beside a tall office building, with papers flying in the air. Firaxis Games and 2K

All 25 civics

Category	Civic	Tech	Upkeep at launch	Upkeep later	Effect
Government	Despotism	None	Low	Low	None
Government	Hereditary Rule	Monarchy	Medium	Low	+1 happiness per military unit in a city
Government	Representation	Constitution	Low	Medium	+3 research per specialist; +3 happiness in the five largest cities (+2 from patch 1.61)
Government	Police State	Fascism	High	High	+25% military unit production; -50% war weariness
Government	Universal Suffrage	Democracy	Medium	Medium	+1 production from Towns; spend gold to finish production
Legal	Barbarism	None	Low	Low	None
Legal	Vassalage	Feudalism	High	High	New military units +2 experience; lower unit support costs
Legal	Bureaucracy	Civil Service	Medium	Medium	+50% production and gold in the capital
Legal	Nationhood	Nationalism	Low	None	Draft 3 units per turn; Barracks +2 happiness; Beyond the Sword: +25% espionage points
Legal	Free Speech	Liberalism	None	Low	+2 gold from Towns; +100% culture in every city
Labor	Tribalism	None	Low	Low	None
Labor	Slavery	Bronze Working	Low	None; Medium in Beyond the Sword	Sacrifice population to finish production
Labor	Serfdom	Feudalism	Low	Low	Workers build improvements 50% faster
Labor	Caste System	Code of Laws	Medium	Medium	Unlimited Artists, Merchants and Scientists; Beyond the Sword: food from Workshops
Labor	Emancipation	Democracy	None	Low	Cottages grow twice as fast; unhappiness for civilizations without it
Economy	Decentralization	None	Low	Low	None
Economy	Mercantilism	Banking	Medium	Medium	+1 free specialist per city; no foreign trade routes; Beyond the Sword: foreign corporations have no effect
Economy	Free Market	Economics	Low	Medium	+1 trade route per city
Economy	State Property	Communism	None	Low	No distance maintenance; +1 food from Workshops and Watermills (Beyond the Sword: +25% production instead, and no corporations work)
Economy	Environmentalism	Ecology (Medicine from patch 1.61)	High	Medium	+5 health (+6 in the manual's chart); +1 happiness from forest and jungle; Beyond the Sword: food from Forest Preserves, Windmills and Watermills
Religion	Paganism	None	Low	Low	None
Religion	Organized Religion	Monotheism	High	High	Missionaries without a Monastery; +25% building speed in cities with the State Religion
Religion	Theocracy	Theology	Medium	Medium	+2 experience for units built in State Religion cities; no spread of other religions
Religion	Pacifism	Philosophy	None	None	+100% Great Person birth in State Religion cities; +1 gold support per military unit
Religion	Free Religion	Liberalism	Low	Low	No State Religion; +1 happiness per religion in a city; +10% research

Source: effects and launch upkeep from the Civilization 4 manual, pp. 85-90 and charts pp. 196-199; later upkeep from the Warlords manual, p. 104 and charts pp. 114-118 and the v1.61 patch notes; Beyond the Sword changes from the Beyond the Sword manual, p. 47. Beyond the Sword's manual lists Slavery as its only upkeep change; for every other civic the Warlords figures are the latest printed.

Government

Government civics shape happiness and production across the empire. Hereditary Rule turns garrisons into happiness, which GameSpot's guide called "a decent civic in the early game" for a defensive player. Representation gives +3 research per specialist, Police State serves a long war, and Universal Suffrage adds production to Towns and lets you buy buildings and units with gold, which GameSpot advised against adopting early, "when the medium upkeep can't really be offset" by few Towns.

Legal

Legal civics decide armies, capitals and culture. Vassalage gives new units +2 experience and, with Theocracy, was GameSpot's pairing for training veteran armies; Bureaucracy's +50% production and gold in the capital made it, in GameSpot's words, "strong for smaller civilizations where the capital is your primary focus" (GameSpot, Jan 18, 2006). Nationhood drafts units, and Free Speech doubles culture and adds gold to Towns, which makes it a staple of the Culture Victory Guide.

Labor

Labor civics decide how cities grow and build. Slavery lets a city sacrifice population to finish what it is building, the subject of Slavery and Chopping; its upkeep went from Low at launch to none after the Warlords-era patches and to Medium in Beyond the Sword, per the Beyond the Sword manual (p. 47). Caste System removes the cap on Artists, Merchants and Scientists in a city, and Emancipation halves the time Cottages take to become Hamlets, Villages and Towns while making civilizations without it unhappy; Cottages and Specialists weighs the two economies.

Economy

Economy civics trade off trade, specialists and upkeep. Mercantilism gives a free specialist in every city but cuts foreign trade routes, Free Market adds a trade route per city, and State Property removes the distance part of city maintenance, the cost that grows with each city's distance from your capital (manual, p. 156). Beyond the Sword tied this category to Corporations: Mercantilism stops foreign corporations working in your cities, and State Property switches off every corporation until you leave it.

Religion

Religion civics set how your faith works. Organized Religion lets any city with your State Religion train missionaries and build faster, Theocracy trains veterans and blocks other faiths, Pacifism doubles Great Person births at the cost of military support, and Free Religion drops the State Religion for happiness and research (manual, p. 90). Religions explains the State Religion itself.

Combinations

The manual says there are no "best" civics: "all are potentially very useful in different situations" (manual, p. 82). Johnson's own example of a strong pairing is Representation, with its extra research from specialists, plus Mercantilism, with its free specialist in every city (afterword, p. 180).

GameSpot's guide (Jan 18, 2006) suggested combinations by goal:

Commerce: Universal Suffrage, Free Speech and Emancipation for an empire of Cottages growing into Towns, with Free Market for more trade.
War: Vassalage and Theocracy for experienced units, Police State once the war drags on; it also warned that a neighbor switching to Vassalage and Theocracy should make you "prepare for war".
Capital: Bureaucracy with Universal Suffrage and Serfdom.
Happiness: Free Religion with several religions spread through your cities, plus Free Speech and Mercantilism.
Great People: Pacifism with Caste System and Representation.
Research: Mercantilism and Representation for Scientists, plus Free Religion's +10%.

Leaders' favorite civics

Every leader has a favorite civic and may press you to adopt it, as Johnson describes Gandhi with Universal Suffrage and Mao with State Property (afterword, p. 182). Running a leader's favorite earns a diplomatic bonus with that leader, so GameSpot's guide suggested switching to one to keep an alliance or avoid a war (GameSpot); see Diplomacy and Leaders.

Favorite civic	Leaders (base game)
Hereditary Rule	Alexander, Catherine, Hatshepsut, Huayna Capac, Kublai Khan, Louis XIV
Representation	Bismarck, Cyrus, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, Victoria
Police State	Genghis Khan, Isabella, Montezuma, Peter, Qin Shi Huang
Universal Suffrage	Asoka, Frederick, Gandhi, Roosevelt, Washington
State Property	Mao Zedong
Mercantilism	Tokugawa
Free Market	Mansa Musa
Free Religion	Elizabeth
Theocracy	Saladin

Source: Civilization 4 manual, pp. 159-166, matching GameSpot's guide. The manuals do not list favorites for the leaders added by Warlords and Beyond the Sword; the in-game Civilopedia does.

Changes in patches and expansions

Patch 1.61 (2006) moved several upkeeps (Hereditary Rule down to Low; Representation, Free Market, Free Speech, Emancipation and State Property up; Nationhood down to none; Environmentalism down to Medium), moved Environmentalism to Medicine and cut Representation's happiness bonus from +3 to +2, per the v1.61 patch notes and the Warlords manual. Beyond the Sword made Slavery's upkeep Medium and gave Nationhood, Caste System, Mercantilism, State Property and Environmentalism the new effects shown in the table (Beyond the Sword manual, p. 47). The final patch, 3.19 (Jun 11, 2009), fixed "a few AI civic evaluation bugs" and has the AI change civics during Golden Ages.

Frequently asked questions

How many civics are there in Civ 4? Civilization 4 has 25 civics in five categories (Government, Legal, Labor, Economy and Religion), and you always run one civic from each category.

What are the best civics in Civ 4? Civilization 4's manual says there are no best civics, only ones suited to a situation; Soren Johnson's own example of a strong pair is Representation with Mercantilism, and GameSpot's guide recommends Vassalage with Theocracy for war and Universal Suffrage, Free Speech and Emancipation for a Cottage economy.

How do you avoid anarchy in Civ 4? In Civilization 4, leaders with the Spiritual trait change civics and State Religion with no anarchy; everyone else can only shorten it by changing fewer civics at once, and the Civics screen shows how many turns a change will take.

What does Slavery do in Civ 4? Slavery, a Labor civic unlocked by Bronze Working, lets a Civilization 4 city sacrifice population to finish a building or unit; its upkeep is Medium in Beyond the Sword.

What does Bureaucracy do in Civ 4? Bureaucracy, a Legal civic from Civil Service with Medium upkeep, gives a Civilization 4 capital +50% production and +50% gold.

What is civic upkeep in Civ 4? Civic upkeep is the gold each Civilization 4 civic costs per turn, rated none, low, medium or high and growing with your number of cities and population; Organized leaders pay half.

How do you unlock all government civics early in Civ 4? Building the Pyramids in Civilization 4 makes every Government civic available without the techs.