OK, let's see if this new-format forum lets me do this easily.
So here are the tables. First, the total number of factions:
| Federation | Empire | Alliance | Independent | | TOTAL | Percentage |
Democracy | 4430 | 2 | 124 | 5008 | | 9564 | 12.6 |
Confederacy | 1934 | 0 | 14 | 676 | | 2624 | 3.5 |
Corporate | 6011 | 3666 | 234 | 13470 | | 23381 | 30.9 |
Patronage | 0 | 2930 | 169 | 363 | | 3462 | 4.6 |
Dictatorship | 0 | 1399 | 120 | 10198 | | 11717 | 15.5 |
Feudal | 0 | 563 | 69 | 3487 | | 4119 | 5.4 |
Communist | 0 | 0 | 34 | 2364 | | 2398 | 3.2 |
Cooperative | 0 | 0 | 56 | 3362 | | 3418 | 4.5 |
Prison colony | 0 | 47 | 0 | 138 | | 185 | 0.2 |
Theocracy | 8 | 0 | 6 | 131 | | 145 | 0.2 |
Anarchy | 11 | 13 | 38 | 15560 | | 15622 | 20.6 |
| | | | | | | |
TOTAL | 12394 | 8620 | 864 | 54757 | | 76635 | |
Percentage | 16.2 | 11.2 | 1.1 | 71.5 | | | |
Second, the numbers of systems controlled by each faction type:
| Federation | Empire | Alliance | Independent | | TOTAL | Percentage |
Democracy | 1773 | 0 | 201 | 1175 | | 3149 | 15.4 |
Confederacy | 778 | 0 | 34 | 508 | | 1320 | 6.4 |
Corporate | 2534 | 1466 | 397 | 2153 | | 6550 | 32.0 |
Patronage | 0 | 2191 | 97 | 235 | | 2523 | 12.3 |
Dictatorship | 0 | 718 | 47 | 1098 | | 1863 | 9.1 |
Feudal | 0 | 405 | 23 | 871 | | 1299 | 6.3 |
Communist | 0 | 0 | 47 | 1120 | | 1167 | 5.7 |
Cooperative | 0 | 0 | 78 | 1243 | | 1321 | 6.4 |
Prison colony | 0 | 26 | 0 | 61 | | 87 | 0.4 |
Theocracy | 23 | 0 | 14 | 168 | | 205 | 1.0 |
Anarchy | 4 | 13 | 24 | 937 | | 978 | 4.8 |
| | | | | Uncertain | 118 | |
TOTAL | 5112 | 4819 | 962 | 9569 | 118 | 20580 | |
Percentage | 25.0 | 23.6 | 4.7 | 46.8 | | | |
Next, the changes in numbers of factions since last quarter:
| Federation | Empire | Alliance | Independent | | TOTAL |
Democracy | 11 | 0 | 0 | 20 | | 31 |
Confederacy | 2 | -5 | 1 | 3 | | 1 |
Corporate | 8 | 7 | 2 | 23 | | 40 |
Patronage | 0 | 7 | 0 | 2 | | 9 |
Dictatorship | 0 | 3 | 0 | 4 | | 7 |
Feudal | 0 | 1 | 0 | 3 | | 4 |
Communist | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | | 2 |
Cooperative | 0 | 0 | 1 | 5 | | 6 |
Prison colony | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | | 0 |
Theocracy | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | | 0 |
Anarchy | 0 | 1 | 0 | 9 | | 10 |
| | | | | | |
TOTAL | 21 | 14 | 4 | 71 | | 110 |
Percentage | 19.1 | 12.7 | 3.6 | 64.5 | | |
And finally, the changes in system control for the quarter:
| Federation | Empire | Alliance | Independent | | TOTAL |
Democracy | 8 | 0 | 21 | 124 | | 153 |
Confederacy | -19 | -3 | 4 | 73 | | 55 |
Corporate | -64 | -32 | 23 | 30 | | -43 |
Patronage | 0 | 102 | 1 | 23 | | 126 |
Dictatorship | 0 | -15 | 4 | 20 | | 9 |
Feudal | 0 | 40 | -5 | 16 | | 51 |
Communist | 0 | 0 | 1 | 81 | | 82 |
Cooperative | 0 | 0 | -3 | 88 | | 85 |
Prison colony | 0 | 3 | 0 | -1 | | 2 |
Theocracy | 2 | 0 | 0 | 30 | | 32 |
Anarchy | 0 | 6 | 2 | -116 | | -108 |
| | | | | Uncertain | -438 |
TOTAL | -73 | 101 | 48 | 368 | -438 | 6 |
Analysis:
For the first time since records began, and perhaps for the first time since the expungement of the one and only Alliance Prison Colony, an entire faction class has been reassigned: Imperial Confederacies no longer exist. As near as I can tell, every single one of them has been converted into an Imperial Corporation. Only one of them has changed names, however, meaning that if you do a search, one "still exists" in the EDSM database: the Intergalactic Starship Pilots Confederacy, which has changed names to become the Intergalactic Starship Pilots Corp, but the old name is still on the EDSM and Inara databases. The transition seems to have happened in early February, shortly after the last report in this thread.
Apart from the abovementioned reallocation, there have been 110 new factions added to the game (up slightly from the previous quarter) and as usual, the Indies have claimed the lion's share of new faction admissions. Corporations still remain a surprisingly strong choice, presumably for PowerPlay reasons.
As for system control, the good news is the number of "Uncertain" systems has been drastically reduced, down from 566 to 118. Given that about 30 of those "Uncertain" systems are actually the detention megaships, that means the true number of mysteries is down to around 80 systems. So this quarter's statistics are much more likely to represent the true state of the galaxy.
Six new star systems have been colonized this quarter. Once again, I reiterate that this rate of colonization is totally inadequate, given the number of new factions that keep getting added to the game. Players are eventually going to run out of space to put new factions. Of these six systems, one will be the new Guardians Region outpost, and another will be the new base near Sag A; I'm not entirely certain where the other four are.
Now, for galactic political swings. The big news is that the sudden boost in popularity for Anarchies last quarter has now reversed, as
@FrogsFriend predicted; over half of their gains from the previous quarter have been lost. We are also seeing something of a fightback from the Superpowers. The Empire is the runaway leader this quarter, with a net gain of 102 star systems. A massive rise in Patronages and Feudals, with other Imperial factions remaining in decline, sees the Empire move significantly further towards the "true Imperial governance" model, and a reduction in influence of Imperial Corporations.
The Federation's story isn't quite as rosy, but the news is still an improvement over last quarter: the rate of decline seems to have fallen, with the Federation showing a net loss of 79 systems. And for the first time, Federation Democracies are bouncing back, with a net gain of eight systems for the quarter. It seems both major superpowers are shifting away from Corporate influence and "getting back to their roots". But with the Empire rising (now controlling 23.6% of Human space) and Federation slowing but not reversing its decline (down to 25.0%), it seems inevitable that the Empire will soon surpass the Federation in size - perhaps within the year - unless the Federation-aligned players suddenly get more organized, or the Hand of FD intervenes.
The Alliance has resumed it's overall rise, with only Feudal and Cooperative members showing a decline. They now control 4.6% of Human space. The Alliance has bucked the trend seen in the other two superpowers and has increased it's proportion of Corporate states.
To the Indies. Anarchies, as mentioned previously, are the big losers, the only significant losers in the Indie sphere. Communism continues its rise, but for once has been outshone by parallel rises in all other Indie Social-ethos governments, with Democracies coming out on top as the strongest growing faction type for the quarter. Which is surprising, given that all PowerPlay powers remain either neutral or belligerent towards Democracies.
Finally, the word from the Fringe is that Theocracies have seen a revivial, gaining 32 new systems across all alignments (though mostly with the Indies); they now have a clear lead over their Prison Colony rivals in the race away from the title of "least popular government type", with Theocracies now outnumbering Prison Colonies by more than 2:1.