The Empire of Beriwen is a gargantuan, genial nation, ruled by Cordelia Scott with an even hand, and notable for its smutty television, irreverence towards religion, and punitive income tax rates. The compassionate, cheerful population of 15.571 billion Beriwenians are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The government — a sprawling, bureaucracy-choked, socially-minded morass — juggles the competing demands of Education, Administration, and Environment. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Siville. The income tax rate is 100%.

The frighteningly efficient Beriwenian economy, worth a remarkable 3,549 trillion Beriens a year, is highly specialized and mostly made up of the Tourism industry, with significant contributions from Information Technology, Book Publishing, and Basket Weaving. State-owned companies are reasonably common. Average income is an amazing 227,982 Beriens, and evenly distributed, with the richest citizens earning only 2.1 times as much as the poorest.

Hidden bedroom-cams are installed to catch mothers doing their kids' homework, antique comic book collectors are disappointed to hear that their treasures are worth exactly as little as their mothers said they were, the BBI Channel Tunnel project is plagued by delays, and it ain't easy to be green enough to be imported into Beriwen. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a very well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Beriwen's national animal is the Moose, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, and its national religion is Lutheran Christianity.

Beriwen is ranked 8,921^st in the world and 86^th in Europeia for Most Scientifically Advanced, scoring 422.54 on the Kurzweil Singularity Index.