The Republic of Stesley is a massive, safe nation, remarkable for its ban on automobiles, prohibition of alcohol, and irreverence towards religion. The hard-nosed, cynical population of 1.628 billion Stesleyians 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 large government juggles the competing demands of Education, Defense, and Industry. The average income tax rate is 75.5%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The frighteningly efficient Stesleyian economy, worth 187 trillion winding keys 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 Information Technology industry, with significant contributions from Arms Manufacturing and Tourism. Average income is an impressive 114,698 winding keys, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Any citizen who cries is immediately assigned a psychiatrist, 'The Anti-Government Hour' is a popular programme on many of Stesley's radio stations, a shipwreck is everyone's fault but the captain's, and Leader makes and breaks shaky peace deals in 140 characters or less. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Stesley's national animal is the automaton owl, which soars majestically through the nation's famously clear skies.

Stesley is ranked 10,112^th in the world and 1^st in CARON for Most Developed, scoring 90.69 on the Human Development Index.