Bokelskere.no

One thing was obvious, however: the closest human parallel to the Council's internal dynamics would probably have been a meeting of the Italian Mafia, in Moscow, chaired by the Yakuza. It was all about complex and constantly shifting alliances and power blocks, and the fact that a councilor might sit for as long as three or four Terran centuries at a time gave each of them enormous scope for maneuvers and countermaneuvers that left the odd dagger planted in a colleague's back . . . sometimes literally.