Vulcan Central Directorate

The Vulcan Central Directorate is the dominant Vulcan government and one of the Core Four founding members of the United Federation of Planets

Government Structure
Note: If the below seems abstruse, overly convoluted, and with failure points that could impair a less logical and unified species, it should be remembered it is the result of centuries of gradual evolution.

Executive Branch
The Executive branch of Vulcan government is divided into "Ministries" and their subdivisions called "Directorates" that handle various areas of public policy and interest. Ministries represent extremely broad areas of authority under which directorates are grouped. In modern times Ministries have little power other than as mediating forces between the Directorates under their jurisdiction, though this has not always been the case. The Central Directorate (falling under the Ministry of State) is therefore the "directorate of directorates", possessing overall authority over other directorates in order to ensure the overall Vulcan state is moving in the same direction and overriding local concerns when required by the national interest. As far as interstellar political relations go virtually everything is a matter of national interest, and therefore the Central Directorate is "the government of Vulcan and its colonies" for practical purposes as far as other interstellar nations are concerned.

Vulcans have relatively few executive positions filled by direct election, preferring to have most governmental offices run by professional bureaucrats. This should not be interpreted as a deficit of democracy, however. Instead directorates are expected to place broad questions of policy up for public referendum. Differing positions have logical arguments meticulously detailed by competing experts, and citizens are granted specific time set aside to read the arguments before deciding their vote. Much emphasis is placed on ensuring that these referendums are not questions of competing facts (which would be illogical) but rather of competing values, as values are not a question of logic.

Despite this, the seven Directors of the Central Directorate are directly elected by the population due to the importance of having someone take personal accountability for government actions. One of them takes on the title of "Minister of State" and is the de facto head of government, while the others become heads of the other six Ministries.

Legislative Branch
The Confederated Legislature once had a much larger role in government, but in modern times is a sedentary institution that mostly writes broad enabling legislation granting the executive branch authority to deal with various issues. As most policy debate has been subcontracted out to the directorates, the Legislature concentrates on more meta-governmental supervisory functions such as judicial appointments and independent audits of the various directorates. The Legislature's theoretical power remains enormous, but government by experts is what people seem to want so that's what the Legislature gives them.

From an outsider's perspective the most interesting thing about the Legislature is that due to its proportional representation rules, one to two members typically represent Vulcan's small anti-Surakian population. They get to address the legislature like any other member.