Senate Factions
While political parties are expressly forbidden under the Republic's constitution, factionalism within the Senate can and does occur, taking a number of different forms. The two most common are the grouping of senators in support of a specific policy or proposal and Triumvir-centric influence groups.
The first form of factionalism is found in specific issue advocacy. This occurs when a significant number of senators reject the prevailing decisions of the Senate or Triumvirate regarding the direction of the Republic or the actions the government is taking to meet those objectives.
These groups are seen as purer, more idealistic iterations of political factionalism. The goal of their members is to convince the populace of the rightness of their cause, and therefore to influence those Senators who do not agree through public pressure or outright replacement.
These special issue parties are rarely effective in completely obtaining their goals. However, they continue to be a force in Umbrian politics, largely through their ability to moderate opinion on controversial or disputed topics.
This can best be seen in the rise and rapid decline of the Peace Party, whose desire to negotiate with the Ascomanni ultimately proved unfeasible. However, the group was successful in sidelining several of the more hawkish members of the Senate, and they proved frustrating to Triumvir Decius's attempts to place the Republic on a more aggressive war footing.
The second form this takes is those senators who align themselves broadly with a specific Triumvir, whose interests and objectives mirror their own. This is considered a soft form of political coordination, as there are no barriers to either entry or exit from these so-called blocs.
Therefore, their success or failure in making policy will depend heavily on the popularity of the Triumvir, to whom the senators give their support in exchange for raising their profiles in the broader Republic and leveraging the Triumvir's image and reputation to enhance their own with their constituents.
The growing conflict between Triumvirs Sestius and Decius will likely only further exacerbate the problem, as those senators who are believed to fall firmly in one or the other's camps are increasingly brazen in showing their affiliation. Making matters worse, these factions are increasingly seen as in-groups by other non-aligned senators, creating animus between parties and alienating those who refuse to take a side.
Eventually, an alternative political polarization will need to emerge, or the Triumvir-centric form of factionalism may become too entrenched to dislodge, to the detriment of the Republic as a whole.