9/11 is over, a new world emerges

[Marat]

The general mistake most commentators are making is the assumption that for a state to have legitimacy under international law it must be democratic. But this is completely untrue. International law recognizes each state as sovereign over its domestic affairs, and this sovereignty extends to control of its mode of selecting a leader. If states had to be democratic to have legitimacy under international law, and could be invaded whenever other states decided that one of their number was not democratic or was insufficiently democratic, then the world would be in a perpetual state of chaos and war and there would be no international law, no state sovereignty, and no comity among nations. For example, from the perspective of a state which insisted that the only form of democracy worth the name was a system of one-man-one-vote, the United States would be a non-democratic state, since the electoral college does not equally represent all voting citizens in the way it apportions its ballots in electing the President. Libya, according to the innovative system of direct democracy introduced in its 'Green Book,' used to insist that the only democracy worthy of the name was one where people met in local councils to discuss issues, and then the decisions of these councils would be referred upwards to a central committee to generate a consensus. Some political scientists might argue that that is a more democratic system than the American plutocracy, where money is officially allowed to buy elections. The general point is, however, that given the wide variety of notions of what constitutes a 'democratic' system or a legitimate system of government, state sovereignty cannot depend on conformity to any one definition of legitimacy.

 

If some people might like to disagree whether America's decision to kill/let die 45,000 citizens a year by deliberately adopting a private healthcare system which is sure to have that lethal result is murder or not, they can at least agree that it is criminal by common law standards if those standards were applied to judge the morality of the United States as though it were a person. Under the common law principle stated in the case of R. v. Instan, if you are in a position of authority and control over a vulnerable person dependent on you, you have a legal duty to care for them to the best of your ability, and if you don't you are guilty of manslaughter. So if you take America's population of impoverished sick people as the vulnerable people under the authority of the U.S. government, then the government's refusal to take care of them by providing a public health care system without user fees for them amounts to manslaughter under the Instan principle.

 

So can other states invade the U.S. for that immorality in committing manslaughter against its own population?

[Mr Skeptic]

The general mistake most commentators are making is the assumption that for a state to have legitimacy under international law it must be democratic. But this is completely untrue. International law recognizes each state as sovereign over its domestic affairs, and this sovereignty extends to control of its mode of selecting a leader. If states had to be democratic to have legitimacy under international law, and could be invaded whenever other states decided that one of their number was not democratic or was insufficiently democratic, then the world would be in a perpetual state of chaos and war and there would be no international law, no state sovereignty, and no comity among nations. For example, from the perspective of a state which insisted that the only form of democracy worth the name was a system of one-man-one-vote, the United States would be a non-democratic state, since the electoral college does not equally represent all voting citizens in the way it apportions its ballots in electing the President. Libya, according to the innovative system of direct democracy introduced in its 'Green Book,' used to insist that the only democracy worthy of the name was one where people met in local councils to discuss issues, and then the decisions of these councils would be referred upwards to a central committee to generate a consensus. Some political scientists might argue that that is a more democratic system than the American plutocracy, where money is officially allowed to buy elections. The general point is, however, that given the wide variety of notions of what constitutes a 'democratic' system or a legitimate system of government, state sovereignty cannot depend on conformity to any one definition of legitimacy.

 

I'm not aware of anyone making " the assumption that for a state to have legitimacy under international law it must be democratic". That would in fact be a violation of what I said, since you would be forcing a system of government on a people without their consent. Even though almost all countries now choose their leaders via elections, there's no reason a people should not accept the rule of a monarch, especially a good monarch. I think a benevolent autocracy would be superior to a democracy because it would not need all the political bullshit that democracies need, but the trouble is that the autocratic system does not in any way guarantee a decent ruler whereas a functional democracy limits the damage any poor ruler could do.

 

If some people might like to disagree whether America's decision to kill/let die 45,000 citizens a year by deliberately adopting a private healthcare system which is sure to have that lethal result is murder or not, they can at least agree that it is criminal by common law standards if those standards were applied to judge the morality of the United States as though it were a person. Under the common law principle stated in the case of R. v. Instan, if you are in a position of authority and control over a vulnerable person dependent on you, you have a legal duty to care for them to the best of your ability, and if you don't you are guilty of manslaughter. So if you take America's population of impoverished sick people as the vulnerable people under the authority of the U.S. government, then the government's refusal to take care of them by providing a public health care system without user fees for them amounts to manslaughter under the Instan principle.

 

So can other states invade the U.S. for that immorality in committing manslaughter against its own population?

 

States can invade any other state for whatever reason they damn well please (this is part of their sovereignty). If the international community chooses to interfere with that, they can only directly interfere by violating the sovereignty of one or both of those states. If something disgusts the world community to the point they feel an invasion is justified, the countries' leaders who speak on behalf of said peoples are likely to formally encourage said invasion. This is an arbitrary choice between supporting of the inherent rights we consider people to have and the sovereignty of a nation, and there really isn't any way to decide other than by popular opinion.

[lemur]

there really isn't any way to decide other than by popular opinion.

What about courts of law, open critical reasoning/discourse, elite ideological regimes, and divine revelation?

[Marat]

Sceptic: Of course states 'can' invade or attack other states for any reason, whether it is to seize territory, natural resources, to gain strategic bases, etc. But I mean 'can' more in the sense of 'may,' which more directly relates to the nature of the debate now going on in international politics. Many countries are now saying that since Libya is so immoral by some standard of international law it deserves to have its foreign assets frozen, a no-fly zone imposed over its sovereign territory (legally an act of war), or an outright declaration of war. No one is arguing, so far as I know, that Libya should be attacked or invaded so that other countries can gain control of its oil reserves or so that Italy can regain the territory it was able to colonize after its 1911 War with the Ottoman Empire.

 

But the legal argument, in terms of international law, simply fails. All that is happening in terms of international law is that a state which was a few weeks ago recognized as sovereign by the community of nations is now suppressing with lethal force an illegal domestic uprising by some groups in its population. All sovereign states claim the right to use lethal force to resist their violent take-over by rebels, because otherwise they would not be sovereign, since without that legal right the first gunman to come along and hold the legally-constituted government at gunpoint would be the new government. But now when Libya does this it somehow magically loses its right to sovereignty on supposed legal/moral grounds, when it was exactly the same sort of state and government just a few weeks ago when Prime Ministers and Presidents from Western democracies were visiting Libya, shaking hands with its leader, signing trade treaties, and begging for commercial deals. One Canadian company was even building a prison for Gadaffy and was glad to get the contract, as was the Canadian government. But what happened so suddently to delegitimize the government? It fired back at people illegally attempting to overthrow the government by force?

[lemur]

But what happened so suddently to delegitimize the government? It fired back at people illegally attempting to overthrow the government by force?

This is the problem with sovereignty, imo. Supposedly, everyone in the world within Libyan citizenship is supposed to not interfere, but in the mean time people express solidarity with the rebellion and/or comment on Gaddafi's (il)legitimacy without due process according to ANY legal or otherwise accountable reason. Indeed people have the right to defend against the use of force against them, but in what sense is a government "overthrown by force" anyway? It's not like people have to invade a state building to begin governing. They can just do so without assaulting anyone else. So the question becomes who's assaulting whom and for what purpose EXACTLY. Vague political rhetoric isn't sufficient. There needs to be direct accountability, imo, of who is doing what exactly and why (at the ground level).

[Mr Skeptic]

What about courts of law, open critical reasoning/discourse, elite ideological regimes, and divine revelation?

 

Popular opinion of jury/judges, popular opinion of intellectuals, popular opinion of leaders, popular opinion of religious people. Nope, it still looks like popular opinion to me. Absent a logical proof of your morals/values without any premises to go from (hint: that's not possible to do), morals and values are nothing more than popular opinion.

 

All sovereign states claim the right to use lethal force to resist their violent take-over by rebels, because otherwise they would not be sovereign, since without that legal right the first gunman to come along and hold the legally-constituted government at gunpoint would be the new government.

 

Put up or shut up. You're repeated that nonsense multiple times already and ignored all the evidence I've offered to the contrary. You've yet to offer any support for that disproven claim, yet persist in repeating it. Nor have you made a case as to why sovereign states must bow down to Libya and accommodate it's every desire, when the citizens on who's behalf they're acting on view Gaddafi's government with disgust.

[lemur]

Popular opinion of jury/judges, popular opinion of intellectuals, popular opinion of leaders, popular opinion of religious people. Nope, it still looks like popular opinion to me. Absent a logical proof of your morals/values without any premises to go from (hint: that's not possible to do), morals and values are nothing more than popular opinion.

Then you can get into an analysis of the path opinions take from the individuals where they originate to popularity. Truth and reason tend to be resisted when they conflict with vested interests, but eventually they become popular because of the will the power that is served by applying them in an irresistible way. However, once ideas become popular they tend to evolve into increasingly dogmatic forms and become empty vehicles of vested interests until they become vulnerable to new ideas that re-emerge from authentic discourses of truth and reason, imho.

[Marat]

Sceptic: My point is so obviously true, I'm not even sure what you're objecting to? Take the contrary position from my statement for an indirect proof. Suppose a sovereign state says that while it claims legal sovereignty, it also promises that it will never use lethal force to support that claim of soverignty. That would have to mean that the very first person who did not want to pay taxes to that state, who did not like the way the state imposed land use restrictions, or who did not like the way it attempted to conscript people into military service, could simply seize a pistol, walk unhindered (no force, remember?) into the government offices, shoot everyone there, and name himself as the new head of state. Are you saying that claims of sovereignty do not ultimately rest on the state's claim to use lethal force to sustain that claim? You learn this is not true on the first day of a public law course: The 19th century legal theorist John Austin said that the state is defined as that agency which lays a claim to monopolize the use of force, since all "law is just the command of a sovereign backed by a sanction."

 

The notion that the ultimate subjects of international law (hint: 'inter-NATION-al') are states and that mutual recognition of state sovereignty is the basis of comity among nations is hardly controversial. Just check any source on international law if you have doubts about this. Consider this quote from a leading source on international law today, H. M. Kindred, et al, "International Law" (Toronto: Emond Montgomery, 2006), p. 13: "International law applies to certain entities as 'subjects' of international law. ... Until the 20th century, the prevailing view was that only states could possess international legal personality. ... [but now] non-state actors such as international organizations and even individuals have attained some measure of international legal personality. It must be stressed, however, that they do not possess the same rights and duties as states. ... states, not individuals, are still the dominant feature of international relations."

Edited March 5, 2011 by Marat

[lemur]

That would have to mean that the very first person who did not want to pay taxes to that state, who did not like the way the state imposed land use restrictions, or who did not like the way it attempted to conscript people into military service, could simply seize a pistol, walk unhindered (no force, remember?) into the government offices, shoot everyone there, and name himself as the new head of state. Are you saying that claims of sovereignty do not ultimately rest on the state's claim to use lethal force to sustain that claim?

This is how royal sovereignty originally emerged, in my understanding. Kings were people who were the most victorious in subjugating others by violent force and maybe hegemony to some extent. This is where I understood the ritual originates of bowing one's head to the king while the king withholds the right/power to cut off the head by touching the sword on the shoulders mercifully. This is also resonant with the political logic of, I think it's Locke but not sure at this moment, who argued that the only way to avert total war of all against all is for people to submit their power to the sovereign in exchange for mercy and order provided by the sovereign. Authoritarianism emerges when people learn to submit to authority out of fear of violence, etc. Republican democracy is what occurs when no one wants to make anyone else king and submit to them but they also don't want to persistently engage in violence to the point of eliciting submission. This is when individual sovereignty to self-govern by reason emerges along with checking and balancing of power where social-power is exercised instead of self-governance.

 

 

The notion that the ultimate subjects of international law (hint: 'inter-NATION-al') are states and that mutual recognition of state sovereignty is the basis of comity among nations is hardly controversial.

The debate of whether ontological/political primacy should be attributed to states or individuals is an endless and rather senseless one, imo. The point of state-power is to exercise social control in favor of at least some individuals and at the expense of at least some. So the conflicts that emerge from social-control and its discontents are enacted as struggles between individuals and states, struggles among individuals to achieve state-recognition as an independent nation, struggles between people representing themselves as state-interests, and struggles of individuals to deconstruct statism and interact without collectivism. Why does it seem so unimaginable that people with different national identities could interact as individuals the same as people who have the same citizenship? Do people have to contextualize every interaction between two or more individuals with different national citizenship as "international relations?" Does everyone have to be treated as a representative of national interests? If people treated each other like this on the basis of racial identity, it would be bizarre - claiming that you are a member of a sovereign race and viewing inter-racial interactions as negotiations between autonomous collective entities.

 

 

[Mr Skeptic]

Sceptic: My point is so obviously true, I'm not even sure what you're objecting to? Take the contrary position from my statement for an indirect proof. Suppose a sovereign state says that while it claims legal sovereignty, it also promises that it will never use lethal force to support that claim of soverignty. That would have to mean that the very first person who did not want to pay taxes to that state, who did not like the way the state imposed land use restrictions, or who did not like the way it attempted to conscript people into military service, could simply seize a pistol, walk unhindered (no force, remember?) into the government offices, shoot everyone there, and name himself as the new head of state. Are you saying that claims of sovereignty do not ultimately rest on the state's claim to use lethal force to sustain that claim? You learn this is not true on the first day of a public law course: The 19th century legal theorist John Austin said that the state is defined as that agency which lays a claim to monopolize the use of force, since all "law is just the command of a sovereign backed by a sanction."

 

Your "obvious logic" is nothing but a strawman. A rebellion is not when one person disagrees with the government, it is when a large portion of the population disagrees with the government and stops obeying them. What government claims the right to use lethal force against ~50% of its population should they join together to oppose the government? That would be the antithesis of almost every current government, since almost all of them grant the right to their people to choose their government, either explicitly by granting them the right to revolution: right_of_revolution

or by actually implementing that right by holding elections so the people may periodically depose the old government and choose a new one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government

 

Feel free to either show a specific government that claims the right to kill off half its population should they rebel, or to show logically why that would be in any way beneficial.

 

The notion that the ultimate subjects of international law (hint: 'inter-NATION-al') are states and that mutual recognition of state sovereignty is the basis of comity among nations is hardly controversial. Just check any source on international law if you have doubts about this. Consider this quote from a leading source on international law today, H. M. Kindred, et al, "International Law" (Toronto: Emond Montgomery, 2006), p. 13: "International law applies to certain entities as 'subjects' of international law. ... Until the 20th century, the prevailing view was that only states could possess international legal personality. ... [but now] non-state actors such as international organizations and even individuals have attained some measure of international legal personality. It must be stressed, however, that they do not possess the same rights and duties as states. ... states, not individuals, are still the dominant feature of international relations."

 

No, the controversy happens when two states disagree on something and choose to act on that disagreement. When there is conflict between the sovereign wishes of two states, which must submit to the other's wishes and why? When the Libyan government threatens the nations of the international community, why should they not be allowed to respond?

[lemur]

What government claims the right to use lethal force against ~50% of its population should they join together to oppose the government?

Nazism was a majoritarian movement and still people decided globally to intervene with force. Don't governments almost have a responsibility to intervene by force when some majoritarian movement is resulting in oppression? E.g. if mafia economics grew to majoritarian levels, wouldn't the government need to intervene if laws and due process were being ignored?

[Marat]

By current international law, states don't have the right to invade each other, even though on occasion they do so, but when they do, they act illegally and without moral right in terms of U.N. conventions and jus cogens, the list of basic principles governing state interactions. If one state actually harms another by attacking it in some way, international law requires the injured state in the first instance to turn to the Security Council of the U.N. for help; on its own, it can defend its own people and its own borders against the attack pending U.N. intervention, but it can't just take off and invade a foreign country because it doesn't like that country's domestic policies, which by definition cannot constitute an injury against a foreign sovereign.

 

There is also an international law principle of proportionate retaliation, in which one nation which has been injured by another can impose an equal or lesser injury on the attacker that the attacker imposed on it.

 

Finally, there is an area of developing international law, which suggests that international law may evolve to allow 'a right to protect,' so that when a foreign state commits genocide against a distinct ethnic minority within its borders other states may intervene to protect those people. This was invoked in the former Yugoslavia.

 

Now of these three grounds for the 'ius ad bello' (the right to go to war), the first two are clearly lacking in the case of Libya. Libya has not attacked or injured the U.S., Britain, or any other state now imposing sanctions on it or contemplating an invasion of it. The third ground, the 'right to protect,' is still an unclear area of international law so the right is a very shakey basis for going to war with or imposing sanctions on anyone. What seals the deal is the fact that those being attacked in Libya do not constitute a discrete ethnic minority being subjected to genocide, but are instead the same people as constitute the legal sovereign power in Libya who are not attempting genocide against them, but just attacking armed bands of rebels who voluntarily choose to attack the legally constituted government.

 

People may ask what right Libya has to attack '50% of the population,' but no one has performed any sort of objective count of the number of rebels as opposed to the number of loyalists. More than half the population of Libya lives in areas controlled by Gadaffy, so it would seem that even if you just innovate an international law principle of 'majority rule,' there is no legitimacy in attacking the Libyan government.

[dragonstar57]

By current international law, states don't have the right to invade each other, even though on occasion they do so, but when they do, they act illegally and without moral right in terms of U.N. conventions and jus cogens, the list of basic principles governing state interactions. If one state actually harms another by attacking it in some way, international law requires the injured state in the first instance to turn to the Security Council of the U.N. for help; on its own, it can defend its own people and its own borders against the attack pending U.N. intervention, but it can't just take off and invade a foreign country because it doesn't like that country's domestic policies, which by definition cannot constitute an injury against a foreign sovereign.

 

There is also an international law principle of proportionate retaliation, in which one nation which has been injured by another can impose an equal or lesser injury on the attacker that the attacker imposed on it.

 

Finally, there is an area of developing international law, which suggests that international law may evolve to allow 'a right to protect,' so that when a foreign state commits genocide against a distinct ethnic minority within its borders other states may intervene to protect those people. This was invoked in the former Yugoslavia.

 

Now of these three grounds for the 'ius ad bello' (the right to go to war), the first two are clearly lacking in the case of Libya. Libya has not attacked or injured the U.S., Britain, or any other state now imposing sanctions on it or contemplating an invasion of it. The third ground, the 'right to protect,' is still an unclear area of international law so the right is a very shakey basis for going to war with or imposing sanctions on anyone. What seals the deal is the fact that those being attacked in Libya do not constitute a discrete ethnic minority being subjected to genocide, but are instead the same people as constitute the legal sovereign power in Libya who are not attempting genocide against them, but just attacking armed bands of rebels who voluntarily choose to attack the legally constituted government.

 

People may ask what right Libya has to attack '50% of the population,' but no one has performed any sort of objective count of the number of rebels as opposed to the number of loyalists. More than half the population of Libya lives in areas controlled by Gadaffy, so it would seem that even if you just innovate an international law principle of 'majority rule,' there is no legitimacy in attacking the Libyan government.

by most international standards Colonel Paul Tibbets (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Tibbets) was a war criminal however sometimes all that international law comes down to who wants what and right now a lot of western nations want Gadaffy gone

[lemur]

By current international law, states don't have the right to invade each other, even though on occasion they do so, but when they do, they act illegally and without moral right in terms of U.N. conventions and jus cogens, the list of basic principles governing state interactions.

Suppose that during Hurricane Katrina, the US had prevented any interstate migration and prevented anyone outside Louisiana from intervening to mitigate the disaster. If some other state government or private individuals had acted to intervene according to their own "law" and "moral right," what basis would there be for claiming that US federal law was morally right and theirs morally wrong and illegal? In the same light, what basis is there for legitimating UN conventions of non-interference except majoritarianism among an elite club of sovereign governments? Since that club is made up of people with an interest in territorial autonomy within their designated regions, doesn't it seem a little biased that they support an organization that makes it illegal and immoral for them to intervene "in each other's affairs?" After all, as "sovereigns" aren't they intervening in the affairs of governed individuals by definition?

 

What seals the deal is the fact that those being attacked in Libya do not constitute a discrete ethnic minority being subjected to genocide, but are instead the same people as constitute the legal sovereign power in Libya who are not attempting genocide against them, but just attacking armed bands of rebels who voluntarily choose to attack the legally constituted government.

What are you saying here, that it's legitimate to attack random individuals if you're not targeting them on the basis of ethnic identity?

 

People may ask what right Libya has to attack '50% of the population,' but no one has performed any sort of objective count of the number of rebels as opposed to the number of loyalists. More than half the population of Libya lives in areas controlled by Gadaffy, so it would seem that even if you just innovate an international law principle of 'majority rule,' there is no legitimacy in attacking the Libyan government.

"Majority rule" is only a valid principle of democracy when combined with other checks and balances. Unilateral majoritarianism is not democratic. However, it's also not democratic to prevent people from expressing themselves and representing their interests, so that is what is going on by force now. The question is whether the rebels are going too far by wanting to achieve some form of total domination over state power. Once they shift to being the repressors of the previous ruling class, what does their responsibility become for respecting their rights as a minority? Can a previously oppressed class claim retaliatory rights toward the previous ruling class? Isn't that what happened in the case of the Rwanda genocide?

 

 

[Marat]

I notice now that Bahrain is firing on its own people protesting against their government the United States is doing absolutely nothing to oppose this action. This is no doubt because Bahrain is a much closer petroleum-ally of the U.S. than Libya ever was. Also, Iran has always tried to destablize the government of Bahrain, so the U.S. feels bound to oppose thus destabilization effort (based on Iran's historic claims to Bahrain's territory), regardless of what Bahrain's government does to its people.

 

In short, everything being said about the middle East conflict is exposed as pure 'Realpolitik' in which all the syrupy, American-style moralizing about human rights and democracy can be junked in a New York minute if there are practical advantages for U.S. geopolitical interests opposing them.

[lemur]

I notice now that Bahrain is firing on its own people protesting against their government the United States is doing absolutely nothing to oppose this action. This is no doubt because Bahrain is a much closer petroleum-ally of the U.S. than Libya ever was. Also, Iran has always tried to destablize the government of Bahrain, so the U.S. feels bound to oppose thus destabilization effort (based on Iran's historic claims to Bahrain's territory), regardless of what Bahrain's government does to its people.

 

In short, everything being said about the middle East conflict is exposed as pure 'Realpolitik' in which all the syrupy, American-style moralizing about human rights and democracy can be junked in a New York minute if there are practical advantages for U.S. geopolitical interests opposing them.

During a global recession where so many people are crying about money, my first concern with any political upheaval would be that it has been provoked/incited as an attempt to draw military intervention as a means of stimulating economic activity. Obviously no one wants to promote the idea that creating outbursts is a constructive approach to address economic problems. So while it may be as simple as interest-alignments, I would like to believe that intelligence people are wise enough to consider the historical precedents of crisis-driven GDP growth through military and other interventionary spending and attempt to encourage other routes to economic stimulus by resisting reacting to crises except in the most rational way. Is it your impression that these political uprisings going on lately are more politically motivated or are they more a result of economic disenchantment? My sense is that it's more economic disenchantment, but even if it's not I don't understand why there is practically no reporting of the underlying issues either way - it all seems to be about the crisis with only subtle suggestions about the causes and reasons.

[Marat]

Even Hegel leaves some room for contingency in his philosophy of history! I think that the rebellions in the Middle East and North Africa may just have originated in local democratic protests against corrupt regimes, supported in part by new communication technology and its democratizing effects, rather than by any more carefully thought through conspiracy. However, once these protests arose from contingent factors, the West was ready to spin them to its own best advantage, leaning hard on Gaddafy for daring to attack his own people (in armed rebellion against the legitimately constituted authority -- how Lincolnesque!), but then going lightly on Bahrain, since the former was regarded as a gadfly who should be replaced by a more compliant puppet, while the latter was an important chess piece to mobilize against Iran.

[dragonstar57]

why are people so critical of America? i think all democratic nations can agree that ALL nations should have a democratic un-corrupt government but what do you expect the us to do attack everyone of the countries in the whole middle east?

 

international law reflects the morals of western Democracies strongly and the core moral belief set into the ideology of western democracies is democracy.

why must one nation of the world take it upon it's self to take a side in every war that starts anywhere in the world with no leadership from the rest of the world?

with no intervention from the UN? is the us just the UN's pit bull now that attacks on command but is ridiculed for it later?

and is it really such a horrible thing to think of economics in this situation?

the us is in some economic hard times and every dollar that is spent on gasoline comes right out of the poor's ability to exist in the us (have a car, eat housing etc)

the international community needs decide what it thinks of dictators and weather a dictatorship if a form of government that we are going to recognize as legitimate.

people complain about the us talking about doing something and in the same breath they complain about the us not doing anything elsewhere.

has anyone forgotten how baddy things go when the us meddles to much in middle eastern affairs? the us is scared that whatever they will do will blow up in their face and seeing a global community that seems to want a perfect answer, it seems inevitable that what ever the us does it will become a stain upon the us for a long time

[lemur]

The problem is that everyone has settled into the economic model of increasing exports and limiting imports at the national level. This is why the US is prodded to stimulate global economic activity. The US government should start responding to all crises with population exchanges. That way, if people want to maintain national solidarity economies, they have to self-sustain. If they don't, they have to integrate by multi-ethnicizing their regions.

[imatfaal]

The problem is that everyone has settled into the economic model of increasing exports and limiting imports at the national level.

 

Erm how? Everyone is increasing exports and decreasing imports - so where is all this stuff going? Are they just throwing it overboard mid-ocean?

 

Forced population exchanges are technically war crimes under the remit of the ICC - but I guess you refer to voluntary, but what situation would lead to large groups being willing to move in both directions? One direction sure, but in both directions?

 

 

 

[lemur]

Erm how? Everyone is increasing exports and decreasing imports - so where is all this stuff going? Are they just throwing it overboard mid-ocean?

Sorry, I should have been clearer. What I mean is that governments create restrictions as to who can make money within the regional economy controlled by the government. Then the goal is to increase "exports," meaning any means of getting revenue from sources that are not entitled/licensed to make money within the region. That way, a system of entitlements is created that benefits citizens by excluding non-citizens economically. Thus, global GDP is harnessed as a means of protecting privileged national/regional entitlements and/by restricting access to jobs and business opportunities of "migrant" workers and businesses.

 

Forced population exchanges are technically war crimes under the remit of the ICC - but I guess you refer to voluntary, but what situation would lead to large groups being willing to move in both directions? One direction sure, but in both directions?

Economic recession and poverty cause people to want to migrate, along with other reasons. Economic prosperity or other forms of (perceived) prosperity, such as social and cultural 'prosperity' cause people to resist migration (i.e. they want to stay where they think it's better and they want to keep other people from coming there to share in what they consider to be good/better/superior. So, I think this creates great social-political pressure to raise global GDP to levels that maintain the status-quo of citizen-entitlements in controlled-structure regional economies.

 

Since popular fear tends to have the effect of stimulating various kinds of spending, including military, consumption, social, etc., there is an economic incentive to procuring terrorism or other fear-inspiring propaganda. Thus, I think a good way to discourage this would be to respond to

various global problems with population exchanges in the form of visa-printing (thus not forced). That way, no one would be able to think that relative pockets of sub-global prosperity could be protected by stimulating global GDP using various propaganda tactics. Of course, such tactics could still be used, but it would no longer be possible to use global GDP to maintain privileged regional strongholds. If governments wanted to maintain such strongholds against migration, they should do so by becoming economically independent of global trade (if at all).

 

I'm not 100% sure this would work, but the fact that I think there would be enormous popular resistance to it suggests that regional protectionism is too strong a political force globally to be ignored.

 

edit: if you offer visas to certain governments, they will welcome them as a chance to evict their least favored residents. But if you insist on a visa-exchange, where the same governments also have to accept and integrate the same number of non-citizens socially/economically/culturally, they will not like it as much. Ideally, they would see it as an opportunity to expand global multiculturalism, but I don't think many people hold this mentality (even though I suspect it will be the global cultural paradigm at some point, it's just a question of when).

Edited March 18, 2011 by lemur