Is it basically just a republic, but one where only mages can vote, only mages can be senators, and only mages can be in the council of six / leaders?
Voting in WoW is rarely a thing. Senators even less so. And given that Dalaran is a magocratic nation that thrives on magic and specializes pretty much entirely in mages, I’d imagine it’d be silly to put anything but a mage in the Council of Six.
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That’s not what he asked though. I imagine a vote would be needed to decide who becomes part of the Council of Six.
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It’s never really been elaborated upon just how the Council of Six is populated. Rhonin’s and Jaina’s membership came across as having been decided by the rest of the Council at that time, but there’s no real explanation for how it was initially established, before there was an existing Council to admit new replacement members to their ranks.
We also don’t know why there are always six of them. It might be some arbitrary tradition derived from just maintaining the first Council’s composition. Or perhaps there’s some reason that having six powerful mages is necessary for some forms of unique spellcraft that are exclusively reserved for use by the rulers of the city. Or it could even be some form of centralized representation of six different magecraft “guilds” or “schools” within Dalaran society.
One supposes that the Council itself might have originated from some form of vote among the Kirin Tor - i.e. the city’s government of the most accomplished and powerful mages - but then even the Kirin Tor’s terms of overall membership are unclear as well. It might be somehow democratically decided, or it may be a simpler matter of anyone who successfully passes certain high-level performance qualifications upon concluding their apprenticeship is automatically granted membership. Or there might be some set of tests and endorsements that any “graduated” adult mage can choose to pursue for the express purpose of joining the Kirin Tor.
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That’s called a Magocracy. And yes, Dalaran is one.
While Dalaran is a magocracy, I believe it is also a meritocracy. So, the Council of Six would probably be the strongest/wisest/most-learned of the kingdom. As for how it works, it seems that, unless there is a state of emergency, the Council reaches a consensus as a group to make decisions. In a state of emergency the Head of the Council of Six seems able to make decisions independently for the safety of the nation.
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