Its a bit of a complicated question honestly Over the years Lazarus has had a number of forms of government, the most prominant being the 'Mandates', which could in a way be described as a constitutional government. There were seven of them from between the early days of Lazarus up until the start of the PRL. Generally change came about when it became apparent that the previous mandate was no longer effective, or the region had gone through some major change. Different mandates typically had a different structure of government which changed over the years. You can see Mandates Five, Six, and Seven one one of our previous forums here. However, in between or simultaneously with some of the mandates, there were various invader or coup delegacies which maintained a government, sometimes for only a brief time, sometimes for months in the case of New Omnivaro after the First Mandate was established way back when. Various symbols came in and out of use over the course of different Mandates, for instance the Phoenix and the color Green only became official during Harmoneia's time as Delegate during Mandate Five back in late 2006