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Many people in Afghanistan have a long, specific religious and cultural history supporting, among other things, patriarchal organization. We shouldn't think of

Many people in Afghanistan have a long, specific religious and cultural history supporting, among other things, patriarchal organization. We shouldn't think of the current situation in Afghanistan as the natural outcome of any random large group of people existing outside a modern nation-state.

TulliusCicero 4y ago
> Many people in Afghanistan have a long, specific religious and cultural history supporting, among other things, patriarchal organization. Right, this is the kind of thing that tends to emerge in the absence of a formal state. You get a proto-state supported by the local culture and traditions.
- sky-kedge0749 4y ago
  That's a little backwards: something like the modern state might emerge from groups of people living in any number of ways. Clans/tribes don't emerge from the lack of a state. The state as we think of it is very recent in human history, after all. Also you originally referred to the "problems of governance in Afghanistan" which I took to mean the warlordism, violence, suppression of women and so on. I was pointing out that these problems are more tied to the specific cultural and religious history of that area. If by governance problems you were instead referring to the strictly administrative or bureaucratic challenges you might encounter trying to, for example, organize a collection of peaceful worker communes, then I misunderstood.
  - TulliusCicero 4y ago
    > Clans/tribes don't emerge from the lack of a state. The state as we think of it is very recent in human history, after all. Might wanna reread what you wrote there. If it's from a lack of a state, why would states being recent be an issue? Though I would phrase it as, "in the absence of a state."
    - sky-kedge0749 4y ago
      I don't totally understand your response. "Clans/tribes", which I think you originally used as a catch-all for the many and varied forms of local government over the past ten+ millennia of human history, predate the modern state. They don't emerge from the lack or absence of a state any more than freedom arises from the lack or absence of a jail. All of my comments have been, I hope respectfully, pushing back on the implication that the modern nation-state is the natural form of government and that in its absence people will necessarily find themselves members of small, violently feuding patriarchal groups.

TulliusCicero 4y ago

> Many people in Afghanistan have a long, specific religious and cultural history supporting, among other things, patriarchal organization. Right, this is the kind of thing that tends to emerge in the absence of a formal state. You get a proto-state supported by the local culture and traditions.

sky-kedge0749 4y ago
That's a little backwards: something like the modern state might emerge from groups of people living in any number of ways. Clans/tribes don't emerge from the lack of a state. The state as we think of it is very recent in human history, after all. Also you originally referred to the "problems of governance in Afghanistan" which I took to mean the warlordism, violence, suppression of women and so on. I was pointing out that these problems are more tied to the specific cultural and religious history of that area. If by governance problems you were instead referring to the strictly administrative or bureaucratic challenges you might encounter trying to, for example, organize a collection of peaceful worker communes, then I misunderstood.
- TulliusCicero 4y ago
  > Clans/tribes don't emerge from the lack of a state. The state as we think of it is very recent in human history, after all. Might wanna reread what you wrote there. If it's from a lack of a state, why would states being recent be an issue? Though I would phrase it as, "in the absence of a state."
  - sky-kedge0749 4y ago
    I don't totally understand your response. "Clans/tribes", which I think you originally used as a catch-all for the many and varied forms of local government over the past ten+ millennia of human history, predate the modern state. They don't emerge from the lack or absence of a state any more than freedom arises from the lack or absence of a jail. All of my comments have been, I hope respectfully, pushing back on the implication that the modern nation-state is the natural form of government and that in its absence people will necessarily find themselves members of small, violently feuding patriarchal groups.