>if you look at how states are generally organized in the old world, its generally by ethnicity, language or some other very strong form of strong shared identi

>if you look at how states are generally organized in the old world, its generally by ethnicity, language or some other very strong form of strong shared identity. While true, it is important to remember that this is a 19th/20th century type thing. Germany became unified around cultural/ethnic lines in 1871 (in France! so much of world war one was about the fallout from the wars of german unification, just like so much of the wars of german unification were fallout from the Napoleonic wars.) Italy became unified around cultural/ethnic lines in like 1860. Before this, the individual "german" states were not politically unified in any sort of way; they all belonged to whatever multi-ethnic empire invaded them last, and they were more likely to war with oneanother than, say, with France. My point here is that ethnic nationalism looks like the old-world default today, but this is a fairly recent thing.