SF universe series with unifield league of planets, some break away to go pastoral

Question

I'm trying to remember which series has that -- it's SF, spans multiple books and is set in a future where there are lots of planets working together in a common unity. Some of the planets vote to leave the union and revert to (usually) pastoral settings, abandoning the high-tec available (so no more teleporters, etc). They usually end up a mess and the union has to step in again to protect the population from their own choices.

It was all in English and it's been at least a year or 5 ago that I read it. The series had several volumes and the setting is used for several different stories. I think the viewpoint was from an agent of the union.

Any clue what series that could be? The concept of a unified galaxy isn't unique enough to search really effectively.

Answer 1

Culture series by Iain Banks

I have only read one book in this series, but the setting sounds familiar. To quote from the Wikipedia entry:

Some other civilizations hold less favourable views of the Culture. At the time of their war with the Culture, the Idirans and some of their allies regarded the control that the Minds exercised over the Culture as a form of idolatry. The Homomda regard the Culture as idealistic and hyper-active. Some members of the Culture have seceded to form related civilizations, known collectively as the Ulterior. These include the Peace Faction, the AhForgetIt Tendency and the Zetetic Elench. Others simply drop out temporarily or permanently.