Poll: Countries are just lines drawn in the sand with a stick

[MiskWisk]

While I do see a global democracy as the ultimate end point with the dissolution of countries, I do not see it happening at any point in the near future. I hope we reach that point sooner rather than later and I pray we reach it before humanity figures out how to settle planets outside the solar system (if it is possible) because I have no faith that people will hold off on WMDs when the limit of "If I launch this, I'm going to end up being ruler of a slag pile" no longer applies.

Although as previously stated, it definitely shouldn't be forced, or at least forced too quickly. My friends already know my opinion on the EU.

 

[Carpenter]

You realize that makes no sense right? You can't say the leadership will be "rigid at the top" but people below will have freedom to govern themselves. If that was true, we would have no need for leadership at the top.

Interesting, between this and the following comments you seem to think totalitarian governments always intrude into everything below them. Given that historically, dictators have usually been forced to micromanage their populus in order to keep their power, this is an understandable mistake, but it is still a mistake.

It is a little late where I am to correct this myself, go look up the term hegemony, that should get you started. A look into the original distinction between federal and state government in the USA would also help, but that line has been... blurred in recent years.

That's not at all what I said, you can say I "seem to think" whatever you want, you seem to be ignoring what I am actually saying.

Look you seem to now be in that stage of "you have a different point of view than me so you are ignorant and no nothing about these things, go research this simple concepts to get you started" which is very disrespectful and presumptuous.

 

[Sigmund Av Volsung]

My country's culture is already getting 'lost', our language is dying.

I don't want my homeland nor my heritage to dissapear in a one-world government.

So no.

 

[Carpenter]

snip

I love how you're arguing against things I've never said. Where did I say I will never change my beliefs to accomodate others? I'm pretty sure "comprimise" implys actions on both sides to support the betterment of both parties

But go ahead and continue your tirade against "my" viewpoint. Clearly what I actually say doesn't actually matter.

So you would compromise? Then answer the question, would you be willing to allow a law that would require women to have a male escort whenever they leave the home?

Yes I continued as if you said no because that is the rational response, I made the unfair assumption that you are rational and wouldn't sacrifice the rights of women as if it was your right to do so, I apologize for making such a wild assumption.

So would you?

Oh dear, your in the "poor me" victim mode. Maybe we should call it off if you can't handle a little aggressive conversation.

 

[Carpenter]

Lines on a map, that's all turf countries is.
Take away those lines and you'll see the possibilities.
The profit.

The power

So many people say that "most, if not all video games based on movies are horrible" and nobody ever seems to remember or bring up that game.

Freaking masterpiece, another thought provoking work of art from Rockstar, forgotten and labeled "juvenile pointless fun" by those that choose not to dig deeper.

That game has a special place with me, I played it (more like obsessed over it) at a young age and it really got me to rethink the world around me. I would argue that the game was far more complete than the movie it was based on.

 

[Ulquiorra4sama]

It would be nice for the world to be just one country, and believe me i've thought that several times on my travels between Europe and the United States. Ultimately that particular restriction seems awfully limiting and pointless, but i don't suppose it'll actually be possible until people really learn to accept one another despite what religious affiliation or skin colour they have...

As much as i hate the phrase "i'm a citizen of the world" it does seem like an ideal identitiy. As for system of government why not just go with traditional anarchy? One top summit with one representative from each country, the representatives being chosen by the people living within that particular "zone" of the world before each summit. Or something along those lines.

 

[verdant monkai]

We all (should) know what happens when one organisation tries to control everything, the soviet unions collapse beautifully demonstrates why the government controlling everything doesn't work. One organisation doing everything will fail at everything, businesses and services need privatisation. Privatisation is more efficient and much more lucrative to the economy. Because its a group of people concentrating on one task, whereas the alternative is one group of people telling thousands of other groups exactly how to work. Its a shambles.

A united world may be a nice idea guys. But it would all turn to shit almost immediately. It may stop some conflict but violence would become more common on a local scale. People wouldn't die on a battle field for orders and honour. They would die in their homes for a loaf of bread.

 

[Phrozenflame500]

So you would compromise? Then answer the question, would you be willing to allow a law that would require women to have a male escort whenever they leave the home?


Probably not no, but I'm not a world leader. And if you read my first post, I said that it would only work if we did agree on a universal set of laws, and went on to say that we aren't able to now which is why it wouldn't work at the moment. We're barely able to compromise on basic issues like "does the oil under my land belong to me or not", much less complex morale and religious issues.

Also, this assumes that this hypothetical global state worked on a federal government with universal laws. It could have a state system with individual laws decided by the individual states and a constitution that all states must follow. This could lead to the same political state we have today, just with countries renamed states, but I also acknowledged this in my original post.

Yes I continued as if you said no because that is the rational response, I made the unfair assumption that you are rational and wouldn't sacrifice the rights of women as if it was your right to do so, I apologize for making such a wild assumption.

So you basically just contradicted yourself by saying the viewpoint of most Middle Eastern societies is irrational.

Also, you assume that people are rational on the internet?

Oh dear, your in the "poor me" victim mode. Maybe we should call it off if you can't handle a little aggressive conversation.

lol

 

[Heronblade]

You realize that makes no sense right? You can't say the leadership will be "rigid at the top" but people below will have freedom to govern themselves. If that was true, we would have no need for leadership at the top.

Interesting, between this and the following comments you seem to think totalitarian governments always intrude into everything below them. Given that historically, dictators have usually been forced to micromanage their populus in order to keep their power, this is an understandable mistake, but it is still a mistake.

It is a little late where I am to correct this myself, go look up the term hegemony, that should get you started. A look into the original distinction between federal and state government in the USA would also help, but that line has been... blurred in recent years.

That's not at all what I said, you can say I "seem to think" whatever you want, you seem to be ignoring what I am actually saying.

Look you seem to now be in that stage of "you have a different point of view than me so you are ignorant and no nothing about these things, go research this simple concepts to get you started" which is very disrespectful and presumptuous.

How precisely am I to interpret this then? There are plenty of examples of governments with differing levels of control over different aspects of society out there. But your post indicates a fair bit of confusion on that point. Either you misunderstand the concept itself, or you misunderstand what I am trying to say.

Let's try to deal with both. Prime examples of a hegemony include the old Greek city-states, and the modern USA (although as mentioned before, the USA has been slipping away from this structure lately). The EU also appears to be evolving into a hegemony as well, but isn't there quite yet. Basic concept is this, a central government has power over decisions that affect the nation as a whole, but more localized governments are responsible for just about everything else.

A world government of the type I was talking about would have some laws and standards that are universal. It might for instance require that regional governments be led by democratically elected representatives, or prohibit dumping radioactive waste into a water supply that the next region over uses. It would also act as an intermediary between these regions. But on a day to day basis, the amount of HFoG a citizen feels is up to a governmental body specifically in charge of where they live, which can vary widely in structure and attitude from region to region. This indeed can, and in my opinion should be, a very light level of control.

 

[Vivi22]

One government would be a bureaucratic nightmare and would be completely incapable of adequately addressing the concerns of all of it's constituents. National governments, even at their best, are poorly run and barely able to meet the needs of their people with any level of efficiency.

I'm actually more in favour of having national governments that do nothing but collect taxes, maintain things which are to the benefit of the nation as a whole (ie: military, interstate/provincial highways, etc.), transfer payments, and preventing lower levels of government from passing laws which violate the rights of citizens. Everything else would be better left handled by state, or even municipal governments, and can be far more representative.

 

[Collin Stewart]

Unification never helps, having the earth as 1 massive "nation of terra", would simply lead to the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few.
I would actually go for further separation in powers, give more power to cities and provincial areas, the more targeted a government the better it serves its people. I say this as someone from a smaller city, every law that my federal government makes is for major population centers, whereas my city counsel and mayor (obviously) make new laws and decisions to help the good of the city, and even then its mostly for downtown, my neighborhood association helps me the most directly. I would thus argue that a world government would help me very little and mostly benefit the largest and most productive/rich population groups, while alienating groups who are not as productive or rich but who still have a right to live how they see fit according to their culture.
Off the topic of practicality there is also the great pride I take in being a citizen of my country (even tho it does not help me much, funny how the mind works) and I would never stand to loose that national identity and pride.
Peace would also not be attained, Arab extremists would still want to kill Jews in the former Israel, Jews would still hang onto their sacred right to have a nation of Israel, anti semites would still bring about their message of hate, and what would happen when a group disagrees with the form of government?

 

[TWRule]

To expand the metaphor in the title - a world controlled by a single centralized government is not one with no more lines in the sand, it's one where one set of those lines is stretched to encompass the whole world. It just replaces a multitude of arbitrary political entities with a single one. It's the difference between belonging to 'the brotherhood of man' and being a 'citizen of the world'.

I'm no fan of the current sovereignty system, but I don't think further centralization is the answer, even from an economic perspective, much less a political one. It would be even less efficient, more bureaucratic than now.

 

[The_Echo]

I think in order for a single-nation world to work properly, it'd be exactly the same as it is now, only with a new group of people pulling all the strings.

It's certainly a nice idea, but in practice I don't see it changing much. And if it did, it might not be for the best.

 

[TallanKhan]

I opted for the "Rich cultural heritage blah blah" option but my opinion is more complex than that. A country is more than a boarder or a flag, more than a mere identity, it is like a living thing that shapes the values and ideas of its people. This gives people from different countries different viewpoints and perspectives and this diversity is important for human beings to understand and have perspective on themselves. In addition many successful policies and ideas that have been implemented by governments, like initiatives on crime, or welfare, have come from one country successfully running a pilot scheme, it working well, and other countries seeing this, comparing it to their own system and adopting a different approach. If you had a single unified world with a single government there would be no comparison, it would be impossible to judge whether polcies were truly effective as you would have no alternative to compare it to.

In addition i believe in many ways smaller is better when it comes to countries. Smaller countries typically have a muich higher level of buy-in to the polictical process, with higher voter turn outs and a population that have a greater understanding and awareness of current issues. If you unified 7 billion people under a single government then individual people would have far less impact on the political process and the government itself would become less accountable as a result.

 

[Old Father Eternity]

Homo sapiens sapiens, allegedly an intelligent and civilized species.
I do not claim to be the sharpest tool in the shed but aside from the fact that a unified ruling system could not work, to put it lightly, for many, many generations to come (least in a way that satisfies everyone), it would also be unnecessary if people actually started to act like they were members of an intelligent and civilized species. Ethnic, cultural, etc differences are irrelevant (does not mean they are not important and should be eliminated) to realizing that we as a species need to work on long term sustainability.

The mind, a chaos, bits and pieces constantly removed and added.
The rules of the game, no constant, always changing

Ah but what do the ravings of a nutter matter ... we all lost in the twisting currents of the void, eh?
*trails off into mumbling with occasional mad laughter*

 

[Cazza]

No it's the reason we have states, territories & local councils within countries. If you have no one sticking up for the rights of the local area they are forgotten. We already have the UN and then there is even the EU etc. Even that doesn't work very well. I live in Western Australia which is the resource centre of Australia. Our state government is complaining that the Eastern states take our resources to help the them and give little to nothing back. A lot of people go on and on about the distribution of wealth/resources. The needs of the many so to speak but it's not ethically right to not give the same opportunity to the few.

If you unified 7 billion people under a single government then individual people would have far less impact on the political process and the government itself would become less accountable as a result.

There is 1 bright side to this point. If everyone had a vote with the same weight as everyone else. I'm not sure about the stats on say poverty but I'm sure it's enough to say get someone in with a policy to eliminate it.