Current Events

Sovereign territory and decolonization movements

Brandon Christensen Current Events, History , , , , ,

But while adopting sovereign territoriality as the dominant script, they were far more cautious in accepting the principle of self-determination for all nationalist claims. While claiming the right of national self-determination as a rhetorical tool in the struggle with the metropolitan powers, they simultaneously denied those claims to indigenous groups within the territorial state that the nationalist leaders envisioned. The Dutch were not incorrect in asserting that the nationalist (Javanese) claim for Indonesian independence subverted the possible independence of many areas and ethnic groups within the East Indies. Sukarno himself of course recognized that “the Dutch had invented Indonesia” given that it had never been a coherent political entity before. [Sukarno] was eager to lay claim to the entire territory as a unified state on the principle of sovereign equality with other states, disregarding local demands for true national self-determination.

This is from the great Hendrik Spruyt, and you can read the whole thing (pdf) here.

I have two takeaways for NOL: first, the people who led decolonization efforts after WWII exploited the maps drawn up by imperial powers; they were not nationalists, they were cosmopolitans who had been educated in European capitals and who had borrowed the logic of nationalists in those capitals. Calls for federation instead of independence/decolonization were few and far between, but they did exist. Adam Smith called for union between the UK and its North American colonies. Several African statesmen called for federation between their lands and France. I believe some Indians called for federation between their land (which included present-day India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh) and the UK, but I need to do more research on this. In Hawaii, the federalists actually won out.

Second, the current narrative, or script as Spruyt calls it, still doesn’t give local/indigenous actors their due. The current Westphalian script — undergirded by the principle of sovereign equality with other states – still treats the leaders of decolonization like victims of imperialism who fought against the odds to defeat intransigent European oppression. There is simply not much being said about the people who called for greater representation within the European imperiums and for federal restructuring of these imperiums.

A third takeaway is that libertarians have a much better alternative to adopt than shallow anti-imperialism, which is just a form of antiwar nationalism: they could call for federation with polities as a foreign policy doctrine. They could actively build alliances with those factions that were squashed by nationalists who disregarded the claims of other groups, with the aim of integrating these societies into a federal order.

Against Hayek’s globalism

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Law , , , , ,

Ignacio, from X, put forth an objection that captures well the spirit of animosity towards worldwide federation under a Hayekian (or, dare I say, Madisonian?) constitutional order:

With Hayek’s globalism we cannot agree: national sovereignties are necessary because:

a) there are different ethnic groups;

b) although free trade does not help to erase deep cultural differences;

c) Where to go into exile if the world were a federation?

I’ve heard these same types of objections over and over again with small minor differences.

Here are some rebuttals, by no means extensive, that may be of interest to those of us who clamor for a much better world.

a) Ethnic groups and national sovereignty don’t go together. In Europe, some ethnic groups have managed to secure for themselves sovereign nation-states, but not without first squashing the rights of other ethnic groups within these territorial borders and forcing the others to become like them. In most of the world outside of Europe, including in the United States, ethnic groups have been incorporated into existing territorially-defined states to varying degrees of success. Some of the ethnic groups, such as Jews in Europe or Palestinians in Israel, have been exterminated, removed, or persecuted harshly, while others have managed to carve out spheres of influence within the existing state’s apparatus of power. These multi-ethnic nation-states are the norm throughout the world, and the world is a lot poorer, a lot more violent, and a lot less free than the United States.

b) It is true that free trade does not erase cultural differences. Free trade doesn’t lead to peace, either. Hayek (and Mises) both recognized these facts, which is why they advocated for a federalist world order to replace the multipolar world from whence they came. Free trade by itself cannot overcome cultural diversity or violence, but free trade coupled with the political, legal, and military integration of two or more polities does squelch cultural chauvinism and intergroup violence. Just ask the Americans.

c) Hayekian globalism doesn’t insist on incorporating every one and everything into its federal world order. Those who want to join, can and should. Those who don’t want to join, don’t have to. Hayekian globalism simply advocates for these policy options to be on the table, and for constitutions to have processes for entrance and exit. Why should Singapore, London, or Tokyo have to federate? Why shouldn’t Malaysia and London-less Britain or Tokyo-less Japan have the option of joining a federation?

Objections to Hayekian globalism and its federal world order are important because they are popular, but that doesn’t make them rooted in fact. The libertarian’s task in our time is to rid our own faction of these pernicious myths, and then go forth boldly and call for a globalism that would actually work.

Toss a coin ($5) to your Notewriter

The homogenization of America, and the Americanization of Europe and East Asia

Brandon Christensen Culture, Current Events , , , , , ,

Richard Hanania is trying too hard:

Meh. This is not good evidence that American society is fragmenting. In fact, I’d say Hanania has got it backwards: politics is fragmenting despite the ongoing homogenization of culture.

Hanania is pushing this narrative of cultural fragmentation because it aligns with his view of “decentralized order.” Many libertarians in the United States continue to try to maintain an uneasy peace with Leftists by paying strong tribute to one of the Left’s most endearing values: multiculturalism/identity politics. Libertarians like Hanania think that by showing how markets and decentralized orders enhance multicultural societies, they are making inroads with the Left, or at least maintaining that aforementioned uneasy peace. They’re not wrong, and I’ve done this myself, but when you start fishing for evidence it’s time to rethink your priors, and this is what Hanania does by trying to celebrate cultural fragmentation using online media preferences.

Hanania and others who do this have another motive besides maintaining peace with the Left. They like to use the harmoniousness of multicultural markets to show just how dysfunctional government is. They will contrast harmonious markets with the heavy-handedness of government. “Politics,” these libertarians claim, is holding market-based social harmony back, and in a big way.

Toss a coin ($5) to your Notewriter

The problem with this narrative is that American society is more homogenous than ever before. This is the cold, hard truth, and it’s great news. I can travel from Waco, Texas to Chicago, Illinois and not see anything along the way that I can’t find in Waco. Compare this experience with an American traveling from, say, Provo, Utah in 1960 to Selma, Alabama. There were no “colored” drinking fountains in Provo in 1960. In fact, there probably weren’t any black folks period in Provo in 1960!

Now compare my travel experience from Waco to Chicago with that of somebody traveling from Albany, New York in 1860 to, say, Atlanta, Georgia. One of these places had slaves. Culture shock, from one part of the republic to another.

This doesn’t mean that American society is becoming more conformist, or that there is less cultural diversity, it just means that there is now a set of norms and values that almost all Americans — the vast, vast majority – tacitly agree upon. This is great news!

It’s not just the integration of black folks into mainstream American society that’s great. Immigrants are still assimilating, and after 2 generations they’re as American as apple pie. All of them. There’s not a single immigrant group that hasn’t been able to Americanize. Yes, there’s cultural diversity, especially once you get into the nitty-gritty of “local culture,” but there’s also a total homogenization that’s happened. Again, this is a good thing. This means that America is way more libertarian than you’d think.

It’s not just American culture that has homogenized, either. The people and places that have been allied with, or occupied by, America since the end of World War II have become Americanized. American culture is all-encompassing, including politics. In Europe and Israel, the Americanization is so robust that American media personalities such as Tucker Carlson can give major policy speeches in places like Budapest and small-time rappers from places like Memphis, Tennessee can perform in front of huge Tel Aviv crowds.

The NFL now plays regular season games in Germany and England. Major League Baseball clubs play regular season games in South Korea and Japan. The World Cup will be here, again, in 2026. UEFA is talking about hosting a Champion’s League final in the United States. Those are just examples of the major sports that were once viewed as regional peculiarities by allies on the other side of the ocean. Think about food. And, again, music. And books, and X, and research, and Netflix, and Disneyland. And, as Tucker’s speech in Budapest shows, politics. Local culture has persisted, but so too has the cultural homogenization of places enjoying the protection of the US military.

This is not a bad thing. It’s a great thing!

So what’s the problem? Only the US is experiencing continued economic and demographic growth. Our allies are dying off, and it’s because of their political systems. Demagogues in these countries exploit the Americanization of their societies in order to enact counterproductive policies that seek to revert liberty. You know where I’m going with this, right? Demagogues in the 13 American colonies also sought to extinguish liberty in the name of the local. To bring them to heel, the colonies federated.

We can, and must, do the same thing with our allies today. It’s time to start thinking about ways to help Europe and East Asia (and anyone else who wants to join) federate with us under the constitution.

Toss a coin ($5) to your Notewriter

I’m back here on WordPress

Brandon Christensen Current Events

So, I tried out Substack and I didn’t like it. I much prefer the old way of doing things (though I’m not averse to trying out new things!). I’ll be back here instead of Substack. Some of the Notewriters might migrate back here, too. Some of them might stick to Substack.

It’s 2023, baby, and NOL is experimenting with decentralization. Look for a ‘nightcap’ soon!

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

Albania: People and Ruins

Andrei Znamenski Culture, Current Events, Economics, History, Liberty, Politics , , , ,

During my long traveling over Europe this summer, among other areas, I ventured to Albania, a country where houses frequently do not have numbers and where I located the building where a friend of my youth now lives by a drawing on a gate. This is a country where the so-called oriental bazaar is buzzing everywhere, where towns literally hang on cliffs, and where one easily runs across the ruins of the Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman legacy of the country and the “archaeology” of the recent communist past (small concrete family bunkers, tunnels for the former communist nomenklatura, monumental sculptures and mosaics in the socialist realism style).

It was interesting to see how this country, which lived much of the 20th century under the most vicious communist dictatorship (1944-1990), is now trying to live a normal life.  To some extent, Albania is very similar to present-day Russia: decades of the negative natural selection under communism killed much of self-reliance, individual initiative, and produced the populace that looks up to the government for the solutions of their problems. For the past thirty years, a new generation emerged, and things did dramatically change. Yet, very much like in Russia, much of the populace feels nostalgia for the “good” old days, which is natural.

According to opinion polls, 46% of the people are nostalgic for the developed communism of dictator Enver Hoxha (1944-1985), an Albanian Stalin, and 43% are against communism; the later number should be higher, given the fact that many enterprising Albanians (1/4 of the population) live and work abroad.  During the last decades of its existence, Albanian communism slipped into a wild isolationism of the North Korean style. Except for Northern Korea and Romania, all countries, from the United States, Germany, UK (capitalist hyenas) to the USSR, China, and Yugoslavia (traitors to socialism), were considered enemies.  Incidentally, Albanian communism was much darker and tougher than the Brezhnev-era USSR. Nevertheless, as it naturally happened in Russia and some other countries, in thirty years, the memory of a part of the population laundered and cleansed the communist past, and this memory now paints this past as a paradise, where everyone was happy and looked confidently into the future, where secret police and labor concentration camps existed for a good reason, and where the vengeful dictator appears as a caring father.

In the hectic transition to market economy and with the lack of established judicial system, there naturally emerged a widespread corruption, nepotism. But, at the same time, small business somehow flourishes. The masses and elites of the country aspire to be united with neighboring Kosovo since both countries are populated by Albanian majorities. On top of this, Kosovo is the birthplace of Albanian nationalism.  However, unlike current Russia, which is spoiled with abundant oil and gas resources (the notorious resource curse factor), corrupt Albanian bureaucrats that rule over a small country exercise caution. Although that small country is too blessed with oil, natural gas, chromium, copper, and iron-nickel, they do not waste their resources on sponsoring geopolitical ventures and harassing their neighbors. For themselves, the Albanians resolved the Kosovo issue as follows: we will be administratively two different states, but de facto economically and socially we will be tied to each other, and all this makes life easier for people, preventing any conflicts. Not a small factor is that, unlike, for example, Russia or Turkey, Albanian nationalism is devoid of any imperial syndromes, and therefore there is no nostalgia for any glorious lost empire. The fact that Albania is a member of NATO also plays a significant role, which forces the Albanian elites behave. Acting smartly, instead of geopolitical games, they decided to fully invest in the development of the tourism business, believing that, in addition to mining their resources, this is the best development option.

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now

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2022-10-van-hulle

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

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decentering hegemony and open orders

westphalia philadelphia anti-utopian

We’ve moved!

Brandon Christensen Current Events

Dear readers, long time and new, NOL has decided to move. We’re over here now.

mckeil foundations of international order debate

adam smiths project of an empire

the international dimension of the us constitution cutterham

world federalism

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kant federation or republic

alternatives to westphalia

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Two Bald Eagles: Symbols of Divided Attitudes?

Vishnu Modur Culture, Current Events, History, Liberty, Politics , , , , , , , , ,

I spotted two Bald Eagles today in Cincinnati, which is really fitting for the Fourth of July. The two Bald Eagles—one indolent and one vigilant—capture not only the attitudes of two influential figures in American politics about this national symbol that was hotly debated till 1789, but they also reflect the fractured character of these United States.

You probably already know that Benjamin Franklin was an outspoken detractor of the bald eagle. He stated his disinterest in the national symbol in a letter to a friend:
“I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen as the representative of our country; he is a bird of bad moral character; like those among men who live by sharping and robbing, he is generally poor, and often very lousy. The turkey is a much more respectable bird and withal a true, original native of America.”

In contrast, President John F. Kennedy wrote to the Audubon Society:
“The Founding Fathers made an appropriate choice when they selected the bald eagle as the emblem of the nation. The fierce beauty and proud independence of this great bird aptly symbolizes the strength and freedom of America. But as latter-day citizens we shall fail our trust if we permit the eagle to disappear.”

The two Bald Eagles, which symbolize, in my estimation, two divergent historical viewpoints, show us that American history is splintered into sharp conceptions of the past as it has been politicizedly revised to forge a more perfect union. There is little question that the tendency toward seeking out varied intellectual interpretations of US history is unabating and maybe essential to the growth of a mature republic. On holidays like the Fourth of July, however, a modicum of romanticism of the past is also required if revisionist histories make it harder and harder for the average person to develop a classicist vision of the Republic as a good—if not perfect—union and make it seem like a simple-minded theory. 

The two Bald Eagles aren’t just symbolic of the past; they also stand for partisanship and apathy in the present toward issues like inflation, NATO strategy, Roe v. Wade, and a variety of other divisive concerns. In addition, I learned there is an unfortunate debate on whether to have a 4th of July concert without hearing the 1812 Overture. For those who are not familiar, it is a musical composition by the Russian composer Tchaikovsky that has become a staple for July 4th events since 1976. 

In view of this divisiveness here is my unsophisticated theory of American unity for the present moment: Although the rhetoric of entrenched divisiveness and the rage of political factions—against internal conflicts and international relations—are not silenced by the Fourth of July fireworks, the accompanying music, festivities, and the promise of harmony, they do present a forceful antidote to both. So why have a double mind on a national ritual that serves as a unifying force and one of the few restraints on partisanship? Despite the fact that I am a resident alien, I propose preserving Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, arousing the inner dozing Bald Eagle, and making an effort to reunite the divided attitude toward all challenges. The aim, in my opinion, should be to manifest what Publius calls in Federalist 63 the “cool and deliberate sense of community.”

Have a happy Fourth!

Fighting for Every Inch of Ukrainian Soil

Jacques Delacroix Current Events , , ,

I ask myself: How much would I be willing to sacrifice to protect the Ukrainians from Russian slavery. The answer is clear: I would take 50% cut in my living standard. That would be maybe not forever but for a long time.

Then, I ask, how much of a cut would I take to protect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and my level of support drops like a stone. Let me explain. Defending a territory is often the best way to defend the life and liberty of its inhabitants so that the one and the other are almost identical. I believe this is not the case in Ukraine. As I explained in detail more than a month ago it’s likely that the territories Russia seized by proxy in 2014, including Crimea, today shelter few people who want to be protected from Russia. In fact, militias of Russian-speaking Ukrainians from those territories appear to constitute a large part of Russia’s front troops in its attacks against the rest of Ukraine.

President Zelenskyy insists that he wants to recover every inch of Ukrainian territory lost to Russia and to pseudo-independentists. While I find Kerensky’ courage and firmness of purpose admirable, this particular goal leaves me cool. Perhaps, both his resolve and his political thinking belong in the 20 th century. Perhaps, that’s why he reminds many of us of Churchill.

When I ask myself, what I would sacrifice to help Ukraine regain its whole territory my mind turns resolutely to forgoing a few beers. I don’t like the thought of helping brave Ukrainians lose their lives for land. In general, some Ukrainians’ – and their president’s – apparently quasi religious attachment to their land rings the wrong historical bells in my head. Let me explain.

I think that very few well educated people today could explain why the vast carnage of the First World War took place at all. After all, there was no obviously evil side (as there was in WWII, for example). The same Great Powers that massacred one another’s men for four years had been conducted brisk and abundant trade among one another, practically until the minute before the war exploded. In my reading* one specific cause stands out in the initiation of the conflict. Let me say quickly that I don’t know that it’s a very important cause of the war, but I think it was a cause, for sure.

There was a willingness and a capacity effectively to mobilize in France, one of the main military powers at the time (first or second). It’s difficult to assume causation but there are abundant proofs in the daily French press that many in the French political class never accepted the loss to Germany of rich Alsace and of the northern half of Lorraine in 1870 (a consequence of the “Franco-Prussian War”). Schoolbooks, incredibly, kept the sense of loss alive for forty- four years. In 1914, millions of ordinary French men joyfully marched to war against Germans who had not done anything to them for the same forty-four years. World War One killed about 10 million soldiers and sailors in Europe alone. The figure includes my grandfather, First Lieutenant Maurice Adolph, pulverized somewhere near Verdun.

Germany lost. Communism arose in Russia and elsewhere and France recovered Alsace and the half of Lorraine that it had lost. Sure, there were celebrations in Strasbourg, the beautiful capital of Alsace. Frankly, I don’t know who organized them. I do know that there was enough reluctance in the Alsatian populace that the French Republic had to make special rules for that province. (They are fairly mild and mostly about the place of organized religion.)

Today, the language of instruction is, of course, French in all Alsatian and Lorraine schools. It corresponds only moderately well to linguistic reality because for many of the inhabitants the language spoken at home is a German dialect. Of course, there has been an influx of others from outside the region who are French speakers (some of them, by default, instead of Arabic, Tamazight, or Wolof). The European Union has made the French-German border largely irrelevant. It’s odd and pleasant little facts that remind you of it. Thus, on Sunday morning, there is heavy traffic on the main bridge from Germany to Alsace because of the many Germans who are coming to enjoy the superior Strasbourg sauerkraut. So why did so many Europeans have to grow up without a grandfather, one wonders?

In total contradiction to what I just wrote, yes, if I could be convinced that taking every square inch of Ukraine back from Russian aggression would be instrumental to keeping the Russian monster at bay for a long time, I would change my position. Different topic.

* Disclosure: My maternal grandfather’s own grandparents had left prosperous Alsace for raggedy central France in order to avoid living under German rule, according to family tradition. My mother’s maiden name was “Adolph.”