It is possible to defend the nation-state, despite its history of oppression, persecution, tyranny, and war. Note that before this recent creation, life was not always a piece of cake for everybody either.
For a more affirmative defense, suppose that all individuals and families on earth were offered an air ticket to move anywhere they want to live, no question asked. Those who like self-reliance and private guns could move to the United States. Those who like wine and sensuality could move to France. Those who like friendly, smiling people like in the Prisoner’s Village could move to the United Kingdom. Those who like wide uninhabited spaces with no guns and wall-to-wall Medicare could move to Canada. Those who like strict social norms and a sense of belonging might choose India or Afghanistan. Those who like the environment and poverty could move to Bhutan or Burundi. Those who like to be liberated from choice (except about where to queue and how to survive) would move to Venezuela or North Korea. These are just illustrations; please choose your own according to your preferences and values. (I take values to mean preferences for states of the world, as opposed to preferences for personal consumption and activities.)
Once the new borders are drawn, the world would be composed of nation-states based on real common preferences and values as nationalists now imagine them, as opposed to the current reality of largely artificial assemblages in which coercive authorities impose arbitrary identities on most of their subjects. If one of these new nation-states did impose a common identity, it would correspond to what all its subjects want anyway. Even the woke could arguably carve out their own nation-state where they would live among themselves under secular theocracies. The uniformity of individual preferences and values would prevent the voting irrationality predicated on the Condorcet paradox and Arrow’s theorem. Instead, the median voter would rule all the time but, all individuals being similar, every voter would be the median voter and everybody would revel in the resulting mediocrity.
They are however many problems with this simple model of perfect nation-states. The self-selection of individuals according to their own preferences would be difficult to start, for how would current rulers and their clienteles find in their interests to dismantle their exploitation playgrounds? But let’s disregard this obstacle.
As the relocations proceed and new nation-state configurations emerge, many individuals would need to relocate again. Before reaching an equilibrium, where all individuals or a large proportion of them are satisfied and stop moving, assuming such an equilibrium exists, the process would need many rounds. This can be seen with simple computer simulations built on the famous Thomas Schelling model of segregation. Perhaps a very large number of plane tickets would be required—conceivably consuming all GDP. A mechanism would have to be devised to solve the problem of individuals attracted mainly by the welfare states of the (forecasted) richest countries, because parasites without hosts is not a stable solution.
Still, if we respect “national sovereignty,” many individuals are bound to remain discontented. There are only about 200 countries in the word while barely two individuals among the billions alive have exactly the same preferences and values.
Ultimately, every individual or family would need its own country, but the jury is still out on whether anarchy, even if desirable, is feasible. Even in our ideal self-selected nations, then, there would still be majorities exploiting minorities. The latter may be smaller, but this can make them more exploitable. The only solution for perfect “nationalism,” it seems, is that each country have some form of minimal or classical liberal state. The whole relocation exercise would have only demonstrated that the peaceful coexistence of different individuals requires either subjection of some individuals to others or else minimal states. As I indicated before, the president of Syldavia can only be president of all Syldavians if he drastically limits his interventions in Syldavians’ lives.
If the foregoing is correct, the practical goal to pursue would be for each of us under his own more or less tyrannical nation-state, to try to push it toward a minimal state. This is, together with independent relocation (when possible) and a cosmopolitan outlook, the only way to increase the number of individuals whose preferences are not constantly overruled. The possibility of creating and maintaining geographical spaces in which to pursue this goal without foreign tyrants’ interference appears to be the only good defense of the nation-state system, although both “nation” and “state” then require scare quotes.
READER COMMENTS
Andrew_FL
Nov 1 2022 at 12:12pm
The larger problem with the thought experiment of everyone moving to the country which matches their preferences is means-ends inconsistency. The simplest example is that people want to live in a rich country, but they hate capitalism.
robc
Nov 1 2022 at 1:47pm
You can remove one problem with this thought experiment by removing the concept of land from nation-states.
Allow me to “move” to France or Canada or wherever, without moving at all. The land I own goes with me when I change nations.
nobody.really
Nov 1 2022 at 1:47pm
Huh–I did not see that coming.
I can’t recall having encountered this hypothetical before. It’s kind of eloquent.
nobody.really
Nov 1 2022 at 2:25pm
In 1555 the Peace of Augsburg resolved a period of armed conflict between Roman Catholic and Protestant forces within the Holy Roman Empire by establishing the principle of Cuius regio, eius religio: Each monarch could declare his own state religion, but must grant subjects (and their possessions) free passage to emigrate to a state of their choosing.
By surrendering the drive to impose a uniform religion on all subjects, this treaty took an important step in the evolution of liberalism.
And with Lemieux’s hypothetical, everything old is new again….
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 1 2022 at 3:24pm
Nobody: Interesting historical parallel! In my model, though, nobody is forced to choose between his religion and where he lives; the ideal is that nobody be forced to move. One thing we have (hopefully) learned since the 16th century, is that people can have different religions or buy their widgets wherever they want without endangering social peace, quite the contrary.
Mactoul
Nov 2 2022 at 2:12am
Not on all subjects. The Jews were already free to practice their religion.
The wars of religion had much more to do with the property of the Catholic Church that was seized by local princes that had converted to the new religion.
Craig
Nov 1 2022 at 10:53pm
One of the benefits of social interaction is mutual defense whether from predators or other people. If individuals fight there will be some tendency to form gangs/clans to defeat individuals. In the face of clans, well, maybe tribes turn out to be steonger than clans. What happens if you’re in a tribe of farmers needing to protect against a tribe of nomadic horsemen? Perhaps a city state will work? What if then another city state attacks? Maybe then a league of city states.
The problem with agriculture is that the cultivated fields are known, fixed locations. Much of human history is filled with stories of the Goths, Huns and Mongols ravaging Europe and the Middle East, even against large political entities.
There is a cultural evolution at play
Craig
Nov 1 2022 at 11:15pm
To expound on this concept a bit see the evolution of Rome and in particular the Roman response to the Gallic sack of Rome in 390BC by Brennus. The Romans tell the story that a relief arny came to the rescue. Probably not. The Romans promised a certain weight of gold and when the Romans complained the Gauls were cheating scale Brennus is saod to have thrown his sword onto the pile to weigh it down further saying, “Vae victis” — woe be to the vanquished. And apparently Romans told their kids bedtime stories of Gauls for some time. Say what you want about nation states, indeed would the Roman state around the time of Julius Caesar be properly called a nation state? Well, whatever it was, the Roman state subdued the tribes of Gaul.
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 2 2022 at 11:31am
Craig: Interesting points in what you said, but many historically contentious ones too. In his Escape from Rome, Walter Sheidel persuasively argues that the modern world was born out of West’s political anarchy around year 1000 or, as Jean Baechler previously argued, that “the expansion of capitalism owes its origins and its raison d’être to political anarchy.” Quoting from my review (but it is the whole book that must be read):
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 2 2022 at 11:33am
Craig: And no, the Roman empire was not a nation-state, the latter being a modern creation.
Craig
Nov 2 2022 at 4:27pm
““the expansion of capitalism owes its origins and its raison d’être to political anarchy.”
Of course this was after it had imploded after the fall of the Western Roman Empire where one might say that trade flourished under the Pax Romana, the Roman roads, Roman coins are found in trade as far away as India. The latifundia, specialized plantations producing crops for ‘export’ gave way to the post-Roman manor.
And the Romans turned out to be fairly resilient too.
Though its common knowledge that your great, great, great…….great grandfather, Petrus Melius, was the head of the secession movement in Massiliensis 😉
Mactoul
Nov 2 2022 at 2:19am
This thought experiment is yet another reductio absurdum of attempts to do without political nature of man and thereby derive existing state of affairs from individual preferences alone.
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 2 2022 at 11:13am
Mactoul: It seems you wanted to say the opposite of what you wrote: that my model is a reductio ad absurdum of attempts to establish “the political nature of man” (at least if you are using the logical concept of reductio ad absurdum). One does not direct this form of argument against one’s own thesis, except to show that one’s previous hypothesis was false, as Bertrand Russel and Kenneth Arrow ended up doing. But is that your only argument?
Mactoul
Nov 3 2022 at 5:15am
It is an inadvertent reductio ad absurdum.
Jon Murphy
Nov 2 2022 at 12:20pm
I have an honest question: what is a nation-state?
The idea is difficult for me to grasp, like a snowflake in a firey grip: just as soon as I think I have it, it melts away.
For example, what makes, say, the US a nation-state but the Roman Empire not?
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 2 2022 at 3:16pm
Jon: Good question! I understand that defenders of the nation-state define it as an overlapping nation and state. A nation is defined by Yoram Hazony as an association “with a common language or religion, and a past history of acting as a body for the common defense and other large-scale enterprises.” The last bit basically defines the nation in terms of the state, that is, the adventures the “nation” has been brought in, or conscripted in, by the state. The rest of his definition refers to the gist of what the nation is for its believers, that is, common preferences, which they often are at a loss to find. Indeed, by Hazony’s definition, Switzerland is not a “nation” and the US is barely is. When you realize that individuals have few common preferences among all their divergent ones, you get my model of the nation-state.
Jon Murphy
Nov 3 2022 at 6:35am
Is a state, then, just the political side? The “monopoly of legitimate force”?
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 3 2022 at 12:13pm
Jon: I would say yes to your first question. Isn’t that how you see it? To the second, yes also, although it is indeterminate until you have defined “legitimate,” but perhaps there is no way around this Weberian way. Complex institutions are not easy to define.
Jon Murphy
Nov 3 2022 at 3:17pm
Fantastic. And yes, I do see the state as the political side. I just wanted to make sure I was on the same page as you
Mactoul
Nov 2 2022 at 7:42pm
I may offer a definition:
A nation is a people that believes itself to be a nation.
A nation-state is a nation with trappings of a state viz a national territory (most essentially).
Jon Murphy
Nov 3 2022 at 6:31am
That’s not a very good definition. It’s a circular.
Grant Gould
Nov 2 2022 at 9:08pm
Contra the original post, pretty much by definition a nation is defined by birth — that’s the “nat” root. A state that owns you on account of the circumstances of your birth (location, race, whatever, it’s all just astrology) is a nation-state, as simple as that.
Jon Murphy
Nov 3 2022 at 6:33am
I’m not sure that is a very good definition for two reasons:
1) because it is not clear what “owns” means in this situation.
2) It’s not obvious what the difference between “nation” and “state” is. It seems to me you are saying both are territorial entities
Craig
Nov 3 2022 at 1:49pm
In the backdrop, our society is actually contemplating the question, “What is a woman?”
To give some credit where credit is due, lawyers do this all day long attempting to shelter distinctions based on casting a doubting an eye on an objective definition. Its our specialty.
Of course this age old lawyer’s dodge, and make no mistake about it, that is what this is, its a lawyer’s dodge, is an inquiry to nowhere, asking questions nobody is genuinely asking anymore than the typical person truly asks himself, or zheshelf as the case may be, “What is a woman?”
Indeed one of the more interesting I Amendment cases out there trying to define the line between protected speech and unprotected obscenity attempts to define pornography. What EXACTLY is pornography? The famous judicial quip in the opinion is, paraphrasing, “I’ll know it when I see it”
Perhaps Madison’s letter to Rives back in 1833 might be of some use, excerpting: ”
So we know from this writing and many others that the Framers propounding the 1787 Constitution intended on creating a nation, indeed Madison, the Father of the Constitution suggests its preposterous to suggest otherwise. Indeed, the language employed with “war & peace, treaties, commerce” which is shortened a bit because he is writing a letter are four terms of art that come from Vattel and which are also in the DoI: “as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.” — https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/99-02-02-2703
Of course you’re not genuinely confused, you’re rhetorically confused, unless of course you aren’t actually filing your 1040 and are instead questioning the general taxing authority of the US? I’m an unabashed secessionist, the US shouldn’t exist, but fact is, it does.
I would suggest to spend little time contemplating such semantics. What is a nation-state? What is pornography? What is….does a tree make a sound if nobody is around to hear it? What is a woman?
To truly delve into it with any vigor will inevitably lead to a quagmire of academic nonsense.
Pierre Lemieux
Nov 5 2022 at 3:36pm
Craig: It depends in which sense you take the question “what is?”. In an essentialist sense, your are asking about the nature or essence of the thing. In a nominalist sense, you are trying to find a useful label to understand how things (here, society) works. Science does not use the first approach and nor does most modern economics.
At least if you don’t adhere to legal positivism (or marxist/socialist legal theory), the legal “what is” looks much closer to the nominalist sense (although there are normative issues that make everything more complicated). Hayek’s anti-positivist legal theory is, it seems to me, unavoidable in this sort of interrogation. What lawyers and judges do–at least those in the common-law tradition if not in all systems of rule-based law–is to ask whether or not a given rule or definition is compatible or not with the system of rules that law is. Hayek’s Law, Legislation, and Liberty is enlightening. I have reviewed the first volume in “Between Classical Liberalism and Conservatism?” 50th-anniversary review of Rules and Order, Econlib, March 7, 2022; and the second volume in “Social Justice as a Tribal Remainder,” review of The Mirage of Social Justice, Econlib, October 1, 2022.
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