>>62631Heinlein's setting indeed isn't a perfect equivalent of any political system seen as of now. Nonetheless, the book has similarities to Roman republicanism in the sense that military service is a duty of citizens (even if, in this case, citizenship is voluntarily applied for and so are the duties, which only makes the overall process less coercive) while social standing and political success is largely linked to performance in warfare. Originally, the various centuries that composed Roman class society in the Republic were divided on the basis of how many resources they could devote to warfare, with the lowest century being reserved for the proletarii, or those unable to pay for their own equipment. In a similar light, officeholders were expected to have accrued military victories (gloria) so as to make a winning bid for most positions. It is correct that Roman leadership positions lacked many prerogatives in the city of Rome (civilian life), most notably the capacity to indiscriminately command and issue death sentences, but that feature is also present in Starship Troopers. The armed forces are ruled by a code much stricter and with fewer guarantees than that which applies to civilians, further reflecting the separation between civil and military life.
On the other side, and in sharp contrast with fascism, the federation described in Starship Troopers operates a small government domestically—it is indicated that taxes are lower than in any other period of recent history—and maintains a clear-cut division between military and civil life. The latter is relevant since civil organizations do not seek to replicate their military counterparts unlike is the case in fascist régimes. Similarly to the Romans, the government maintains a military not because of a romantic exaltation of violence, but in response to factual threats to Earth that warrant a prepared military. The book even notes that the Mobile Infantry is the smallest army in proportion to the population it defends in human history and that unfit recruits are routinely discouraged from entering military service without a clear vocation in an attempt to earn their citizenship fast. Additionally, the federation lacks any staples of fascism such as cross-class state corporatism, a desire to eliminate or overhaul organized religion and functionally replace it with vitalism, or the presence of a cult of personality around a visible “guide”.