The United Socialist States of Stern Foreks is a tiny, genial nation, renowned for its state-planned economy, irreverence towards religion, and stringent health and safety legislation. The compassionate, cynical population of 9 million Stern Foreksians are ruled with an iron fist by the dictatorship government, which ensures that no-one outside the party gets too rich. In their personal lives, however, citizens are relatively unoppressed; it remains to be seen whether this is because the government genuinely cares about its people, or if it hasn't gotten around to stamping out civil rights yet.

The enormous, socially-minded government juggles the competing demands of Welfare, Education, and Administration. The average income tax rate is 70.5%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The basket case Stern Foreksian economy, worth 110 billion pounds a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. The industrial sector, which is quite specialized, is mostly made up of the Trout Farming industry, with significant contributions from Information Technology and Uranium Mining. Average income is 12,230 pounds, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

100-year-old politicians are now a thing of the past, visitors often mistake the toiletplex at music festivals for the main stage, men are finding 'she spots' more easily but they can't use them, and community organizers have given up going door to door because nobody is home. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Stern Foreks's national animal is the eagle, which soars majestically through the nation's famously clear skies.

Stern Foreks is ranked 276,390^th in the world and 745^th in The Leftist Assembly for Most Extensive Public Healthcare, scoring 615.8 on the Theresa-Nightingale Rating.