I believe it means self government. If I remember right from that book, there was basically no government, so that means they had to take care of themselves because of no food, water, etc (until the end of course). I hope this helped. I wasn't too sure about this question, so hopefully its right!
Answer:
Explanation:An author's attitude, or tone, is simply his or her feelings about the subject he or she is writing about. Writers express their attitudes through their word choice, sentence structure, and figurative language.
Rising action, I’m pretty sure