Editing Welcome to Freedom (section)

=== The Gates ===
Gates are Strands that approve or accredit a nation as being acceptable for entrance into the Hegemony.  Gates periodically re-examine nations both inside and outside the Hegemony to see if their CCHR should be revised.  Different Gates have different methods for evaluating a polity.  For example, the Combine of Clouds begins its analysis with the indigenous beliefs and ideals of the polity, how they acted upon, and how these ideals may or may not lead toward a higher and more sustainable CCHR.  Wellspring, on the otherhand, focuses on the polity's political economy and its consequences on the lower classes as the starting point for its CCHR.  Gates are constantly surrounded by ideological conflicts over the best way to operationalize CCHR, and political conflicts over which Gates are assigned to evaluate which polities.  A shift to a radically different Gate will have dramatic consequences for a polity.