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Author Topic: Arundhati Roy's "Imperial Democracy"
Beren One Hand
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If you do, that just might tip the balance in favor of your country. [Smile]
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Noemon
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Fiendishly clever, mister boy.
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rubble
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mister boy,

Sorry to take so long to get back to your point, but yesterday was quite busy.

Looking back I'm not surprised that you chose to investigate "national identity" as a criterion for national greatness. I think that I didn't answer the original question directly with any of my criteria, but perhaps this criteria is most clouded by the way I did answer.

For clarity I'll restate your question:

quote:
What qualities in the present make a country great
I immediately make a jump from "country" to "nation". This may not be appropriate, so feel free to dispute that leap. I then attempted to answer the question was by listing the criteria tha I thought were required for nationhood, with the expectation that you could evaluate any nation for "greatness" based on the strength of tha particular nation's claim to "nationhood". Implicit in this evaluation is a decision about if the nation is "appropriately" or "morally" executing the requirements of nationhood.

So, under that framework, let me re-evaluate my previous post.

Criterion #1:
quote:
The rule of law and the equal protection of all its citizens under that law.
Upon further reflection this is not a requisite for nationhood, but rather a partucular manifistation of the bond that is required for nationhood. A better definition of nation would be
quote:
an image of a community or a gruop of people who ahare a common sense of identity
http://www2.sunysuffolk.edu/westn/nations.html
What I'm stating in criterion #1 is that I think that a nation that is politiclally liberal is preferred to a nation that is autocratic.

Criterion #2:
quote:
Property rights under that law.
This criterion, too, is not a requirement for nationhood. It is my value judgement that for a nation must provide stability for its citizens in the area of personal property. In the US these laws take the form of a market economy. This is only one form that this set of laws might take, and I do think that a nation can be rated upon its ability to provide "stability" in this arena, which ever set of laws it chooses to use.

Criterion #3:
quote:
Security of citizes from domestic and international violence.
Again, not a requisite for nationhood, but rather my value judgement of what members of a society should expect from their nation. However, I do believe that a nation's ability to provide this stability is a way to evaluate that nation's exercising of its responsibilities.

Criterion #4:
quote:
National cultural identity
This is an actual criterion for "nationhood" and not a value judgement. The cultural identity can be based on ethnicity, geography, common history etc. As above I've referenced West for these definitions.

Criterion #5:
quote:
Ability to generate new knowledge.
This is not a necessity for "nationhood" but is my value judgement of if a nation is properly executing its mandate.

So, overall I didn't attack the question the way I intended. I thought I was enumerating necessary qualities for nationhood, but was in reality answering the question based on my personal opinion of how a nation exercises its resonsibilities well, which is what you asked in the first place. [Smile] Item 4 is out of place, because it is not a similar value judgement. In its place I would like to propose the following:

4. A great nation should use the identity that binds it in a functional way to further the goals of its citizens in the domestic and inernational arena.

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Dagonee
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quote:
n some other democracies, more value is arguably given to personal freedoms (less efforts to impose morals flowing from religion beliefs, less restrictions on private behavior, less use of imprisonment, etc).
It's a mistake to lump these types of personal freedom together. For example, the US has stronger protections of free exercise of religion and free speech than most nations. Easy examples are anti-Nazi laws in Germany, the head-scarf ban in French schools, the guy imprisoned in Sweden for his anti-homosexual sermon (if that happened, still little proof in a language I can read), the teacher fired in Canada for a letter to the editor about homosexuality, etc. Libel laws are much stricter in most of Europe than America; they're weakening here was done on free speech grounds.

Dagonee

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rubble
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mister boy keyed in on my remarks about free market economies, but I'd like to state for the record that I'm not convinced that either a free market economy nor democracy are prerequisites for great nation status. Although those are he forms of government and economy that I'm most familiar with, as long as the other criteria I posed of rule of law, personal and property rights, and promotion of scientific learing are met I think that a nation has the potential to be great.

Now I can't give you a good example to illustrate that off the top of my head. However, the US desire to make all governments and economic systems in our own image may be the reason that the US is having as much trouble as it is in nation building in Iraq and many other nations that it are trying to help stabilize.

[edit to accomodate fallow's reasonable comment below]

[ August 14, 2004, 06:47 PM: Message edited by: rubble ]

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fallow
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rubble,

rather a discontentious use of the word "we" in the sentiments you expouse, no?

fallow

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rubble
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hmmm

I actually like the definition for now. Let me brainstorm with you.

What makes Slovakia a nation and not just a state? I would posit that it is the common cultural identity of the members of the state that make it a "nation state".

What was Chzechoslovakia (sp)? State? Nation? Empire? I think multi-ethnic nation state; however maybe based on recent history empire is more reasonable. The state was an autocratic central government as hegemon over various geographic regions with specific ethnicity and historical background.

What is it that makes the US a nation? It is also a state made of various geographical regions with specific cultural identities. Sometimes I think my uncle is a Texan first! [Smile] And I think that joke answers the question. US citizens are very unlikely to rely on their regional (state) cultural identity at the expense of their US national cultural identity.

Now, are you pointing out that there is a broad international "community" that is participating in a new "political liberalization" that includes an international set of laws, international individual rights, and further knowledge? I agree but caveat that you still cannot ignore the reaslist's claim that any state can still act in its own self interest in the face of that community. The international community is not strong enough that "rogue" states can be brought into line just because of the laws and processes in place.

So I think I understand your point but am not convinced that the world looks like that just yet.

Where have I missed the mark?

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Dagonee
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quote:
Point well taken. What about laws against(and level of punishment for) particular sexual behaviors between consenting adults, and other life style choices (substance use, etc)?
This is why they need to be separated. Obviously, many European countries and Canada allow greater freedem in these areas.

Although as of the Lawrence decision, sex in private between consenting adults is largely unregulable now, assuming adultery does not enter into it.

Dagonee

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Dagonee
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quote:
Of course, the same nations, being the contradictory things they are, might also be moving apart in other domains.
And I think even movement apart might be good. No matter how self-satisfied anyone is with the way they do things, there's always room to do better. Of course, not all movement is good...

Dagonee

[ August 15, 2004, 06:15 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]

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rubble
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Yes, I think it would be disastrous for the survival of the US as a nation if, in an extreme, groups of its citizens placed the values of their regional cultures above that of the nation as a whole. The US has a political mechanism whereby "states" can lobby the nation and have their "regional" voices heard; however in the end the states subject themselves to the national will. Without this there would be many nation-states, not just one.
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rubble
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Mr. Boy,

I think that proposition 1 is decent but I take exception to "maintains control" over diverse "regions". Because we're searching for the prescriptive "great" I think that it should be phrased:

quote:
...provides for the common needs of its diverse regions such that those regions are willing to divest sovereignty to the nation.
I think that as you phrase it proposition 2 is applicable to empire, not nation. Again, I take exception to "maintain control". I would rephrase:

quote:
...insofar as other nations voluntarily submit their sovereignty or portions theirof to the nation with the expectation that the empire nation-state will act in the best interest of all nation-states in his hegemony.
This is off the cuff so please help me narrow this down where it is unworkable.

[ August 17, 2004, 05:33 PM: Message edited by: rubble ]

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rubble
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This isn't really the right thread to post this but...

I'm currently in Las Vegas participating in an international large force live fly exercise at Nellis AFB. Tonight I flew in a mission with about 85 aircraft. The mission itself was about what you would expect of professional aviators from the approximately 15 nations represented. However getting to the mission proved to be spectacular as we couldn't seeand weren't warned about the top of a thunderstorm hat we flew into. I witnessed St. Elmos fire first hand in the cockpit for the first time in my life. It was like being on the inside of one of those Faraday globes that you can buy at a Spencer's novelty store! So CT, you'll have to forgive my lack of rigor beause I'm still just being thankful that it isn't rigor mortis. [Big Grin]

mb, I have a hard time reading online from my hotel room because of the poor resolution of the TV internet, so I've not gotten very far with your references. The big reason that I find this discussion so intriguing, though, is because I believe that at this period in history the US truly believes in its greatness and its right to manufacture that same greatness for any nation that it sees as failing in its responsibilities of basic nationhood.

I, however, am not yet convinced of the purity of the US' mandate nor its intentions.

For example, I am not tragically disappointed with the US decision to war with Iraq. However, I am very disappointed with the US' seeming incapability to help Iraq in any way that does not form its new identity in the US image of liberal democracy and market economy.

I am not convinced of the right nor necessity of every nation, with its own cultural and ethnic identiry, being made in the US image. I would really like to have the time to examine the US declaration of independence and constitution line by line and decide which items are "reqired" of a nation and which items are desired. Ultimately, I'm trying to get to which rights are fundamental, and which are normative based on culture but not fundamental. With that understanding, I think that I would be much better able to judge a fledgling nation's desires for differences in government and economic model without being predjudiced to the systems that I am most familiar with.

/rant

Good night (morning for most). Got to be up again in the afternoon to attempt the same mission again, hopefully without the light show!

Rubble

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MrSquicky
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mister boy,
Oops, I thought I'd included a first name. I meant Erich Fromm. Some of the ways you've expressed yourself suggested to me that you may have.

Perahps I didn't get this right, but it seemed to me that you were painting the rest of the world's view of America and American goods as the equivilent to how people see Homer Simpson and that the main reason that people consume American cultural products is because of America's more favorable economic conditions. I was taking exception to both of these and the general idea that, unlike, the rest of the world, America acts very immaturely.

I'll grant you the immaturity in America, but I'm having major problems with the idea that the rest of the world doesn't suffer from the same problem. This manifests itself in different ways, but, as far as I can tell, there is no country mostly poplulated by people you could trust to, I don't know, watch your house for the weekend.

I'll admit it, I'm an elitist. I look down on a lot of American culture as crap lacking in quality. The thing is, I don't play the pseudo-intellectual game of pretending that most other people share my view. American cultural products (even, or maybe especially the crappy kind) flourish in the market of ideas in large part because they fit in well with what people want or into the ideas of "coolness" that a lot of people buy into. The people who buy this stuff, even those outside the US, don't view it as crap. They buy it because they want to buy it. In my elitist view, they buy it because they either can't recognize or don't value quality.

For me, I saw you proposing a cultural supremecy thing that the "civilized" parts of the world are people with people who only laugh at the products of American culture and are far too superior to want these sort of things. That's the idea that I was reacting strongly to. It's quite likely that I've read you wrong. I do that.

---

I got to tell you, I think that the quest to classify countries on a scale of greatness pretty much misses the point. For one thing, it's largely a values exercise. I value this and this country has it, so it is a "great" country. There are so many different value systems and structures out there that I think this exercise becomes somewhat pointless. If we use per capita income as a measure, how do we balance between socialist and capitalist countries. What's better, to be rich and unhappy or to be poor and happy? Personal freedom or social connectedness and responsibility? Econmoic and social mobility or a stable caste system? Enlightenment ideals or religious orthodoxy? I feel that each one of these, without a very rigorous analysis, comes down to deciding between values. Which is fine, but is a pretty poor basis for an objective determination.

Besides this, there is an air of ignoring the situational determinants in favor of the ideological ones. Sort of like how we attribute the pre-eminent place America has right now solely to the American character as opposed to acknowledging the incredibly reasource rich and geographically isolated situation America developed in. Compare Japan to America in terms of immigration and America comes out way ahead. Of course, while ideological factors play a part here, and big part of this is also that Japan doesn't have enough room to put the people they already have, let alone take in more (which in turn fuels ideological differences between the US and Japan).

All of that misses my main objection though, which is, it's lagely a mistake to rank countries comparatively. Both OSC and mister boy have recently talked about cultural stories, which, as a social dynamicist with a strong interest in mythology, I'm totally on board with. The problem I have is that people often use these terms (ie. cultural stories or mythology) dismissively. As in regarding myths as false ideas that poeple hold that are contradicted by the evidece. That's not how I approach them.

All people everywhere live by stories. Something happens, something else happens, and we make up a story to explain them. It's impossible to live by bottom-up perception alone. This is the conflict between Hume and Kant the precipitated the Critque of Pure Reason and resulting in the idea of a priori concepts. Any higher order organization that we see really comes down to it being a story that we accept.

Too often, we ignore these stories in favor of analyzable/quantifiable concepts and thus miss the gestalt (if I were in a spiritual mood, I'd say Tao) of things. Rather than ranking specific countries, I feel like we should be more interested in looking at the various stories they tell and the different ways the myths work themselves out based on both the environment they're expressed in and the other stories that a beleived alongside them. Like I said earlier, the individualism of America is different from the individualism of Canada which is different from the individualism of Australia. All three have strengths and all three have weaknesses. Trying to rank them ignores the fact that some of the strengths of one system would help to allieviate the weaknesses of another one.

People fall into the trap of better = good, where, in a very real sense, even the formulation of better is counterproductive. I'm much more interested in identifying weaknesses and examining other places to see why they don't have these weaknesses. Even if we could conclude that, say, America is better than every other country, that means nothing in terms of whether America could be better than itself, possibly by learning from some of those countries that it's "better" than.

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