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> If you believe in the rule of law and human rights, then globalism seems like a natural consequence, as does policing the world. You might ask, what problem

> If you believe in the rule of law and human rights, then globalism seems like a natural consequence, as does policing the world. You might ask, what problems is globalism going to solve that treaties and national cooperation can't today? More importantly, what will those mechanisms be and will they be just as vulnerable to the problems of corruption and interconnection that plague the meaningful enforcement of treaties and agreements today? I haven't heard an actual appeal for structural "globalism" that answers these basic challenges.. as such, I mostly see it as a grift designed to remove democratic and republican control from the hands of individuals and cede them entirely to the technocratic machinations of the "new world order." Recently, we did have a very globally similar response to a world wide event, and I'm not at all surprised that during that time the rich managed to make themselves much richer and the middle class has mostly taken the hit. If that's a hint to what "globalism" has to offer, you can keep it. We'll have to figure out the fishing problem some other way.

b112 4y ago
You might ask, what problems is globalism going to solve that treaties and national cooperation can't today? More importantly, what will those mechanisms be and will they be just as vulnerable to the problems of corruption and interconnection that plague the meaningful enforcement of treaties and agreements today? The difference is, much as the same with a democratic nation. In a democratic nation, citizens collectively elect representatives, and then laws are passed. Once in place, citizens are bound by those laws, and will be encouraged by various means ; fines, jail, etc, to obey that collective decision. Now imagine if our democracy was "treaties are made with all citizens of the nation, but you don't have to agree or sign the treaty." Succinctly put, treaties aren't something you can make another nation sign, and if signed due to force, really force them to comply with in their local area. A global government however, could punish citizens of any country, should they fail to follow global laws passed. That said, I am highly uncomfortable with the idea of a global government, because there is such a wide range of belief systems out there, some of them totalitarian, many of them non-democratic, many of them tied deeply to religion, and I don't think the outcome could last, or be pretty.
- FpUser 4y ago
  >"...encouraged by various means ; fines, jail, etc, to obey that collective decision" Encouraged my ass. I would call it what it is - threat of violence by governments.
  - mikeyouse 4y ago
    Sure, in response to equally violent acts by fishing boats.
    - FpUser 4y ago
      People's actions do not need to be violent in order for the governments to respond with violence. Disobedience is enough. You know it very well. This is just how it works.
      - b112 4y ago
        Violence takes many forms, from gentle to deadly. What the key difference here is, between a democracy and a totalitarian government, is just who decides when violence will be employed. In democratic states, violence is allowed by specific actors, such as the police, in specific situations, such as when other forms of mediation fail, under specific guidelines. This means that democracy attempts to replace the mob (anarchy), and the totalitarian (no law, power vested in one), with a more structured form of violence. Note that absolutely no system will work perfectly, at all. There will be flaws, issues, but from where I sit, most western democracies do a fairly good job of this. That's because the truth is, violence absolutely will occur, no matter what, no matter the form of government (or lack of) in place. Humanity always has individuals which will prey upon itself, and the only response in such cases is violence of some sort. So how do you want your violence? The anarchistic mob? Emotionally run, able to fly out of control, meting out punishment on emotion and adrenaline? The totalitarian, deciding rule of law on whim, then meting out punishment in any way chosen? Or the democratic approach, with laws debated, considered, and meted out by democratic choice, in a controlled way? Again, democracy is not perfect, but it is the best we currently have. And yes, it is violent at times, for humanity is violent at times. We always have been, and will be, else we will no longer be human. You may be thinking, "No! Democracy let thing $x happen to person/group $y. It has failed us!" The thing is, most democracies attempt to constantly improve upon this. Take the US, for example. Compare racism in the 50s, to now. If you think racism, and police brutality connected to it is bad now, your head would spin, and probably explode, if transported to the 50s. What you really need to consider, is what happens under alternative forms of governement. Do you believe a totalitarian would do better at the above? Anarchy? Hardly. So how do you want your violence? Pick carefully. If you pick democracy, as I have, then the next step is to work on improving how that violence is meted out. Help steer it, to make it as fair, as gentle as possible.
int_19h 4y ago
The problem with our current approach to globalism is that it is built on top of a political system - representative democracy - that doesn't really scale well. Or rather it does on paper, but it's hard to see how one person "representing" literally millions of people can be effectively held to account by any of them. And a single world government - even a proto-government with just enough teeth to enforce the basics - would require even worse ratios. But there are other systems. E.g. in a council democracy, on every level, every delegate is personally responsible to few enough people from the level below that accountability can be near-instant. You can't add levels indefinitely, either, but I think that the breakdown (of democratic governance) there still happens at scales much larger than with representative democracy.
ryandrake 4y ago
> Recently, we did have a very globally similar response to a world wide event, and I'm not at all surprised that during that time the rich managed to make themselves much richer and the middle class has mostly taken the hit. If that's a hint to what "globalism" has to offer, you can keep it. We'll have to figure out the fishing problem some other way. You're probably talking about the world wide COVID response, and yes, it was an utter failure. But it was not because of globalism... it was a failure because every country tried to tackle it themselves, incompetently, in their own little vacuum, and the sum total across the world ended up uncoordinated and half-assed. If ever there was an ideal time for "technocracy" and letting the experts take charge worldwide, it was during a global deadly pandemic, but we all blew it.
- bruce511 4y ago
  I think maybe you have the benefit of hindsight, but even so your argument is perhaps unfounded. First, I think it's worth pointing out that, for the most part [1],politicians operated in good faith, trying to balance multiple factors. There were a variety of strategies persued by different countries [2],and its somewhat unclear which was actually best in the long run. Social scientists will be dissecting the long term effects for decades. Finally, the overall outcomes have been exceptionally mild. Globally a very large absolute number of people died. But as a fraction of total population it was tiny. A vaccine was developed, and distributed, such that everyone who wants to be vaccinated has been, probably many times. Finally I don't think people would have responded any better to technocrats than politicians. Technocrats are not good at guiding large population groups, and are mistrusted by many. In truth we still don't know which approach was (long term) the best, or even what the "best" ultimately means. [1] the event itself was unprecedented in living memory, and there was no relevant historical data to lean on. Experts were consulted, only to get lots of speculation and varying opinions. In truth experts had very limited data to work with and most would have preferred a lot more data before making recommendations. [2] Some countries had simple border structures (new Zealand) and could persure a total-close approach. Some had national lock downs, some had no lockdown (Sweden). Overall though it seems outcomes were better in places where populations had a high degree of trust in their authority structures. Places like the USA with high volumes of distrust fared the worst. Changing the authority would not have changed that mistrust. In some countries politicians erred on the side of safety - at the expense of the economy, in others maintaining personal freedoms, at the expense of a few deaths, was the primary goal. Which makes sense. Personal freedom advocates have never minded other people dying to maintain those freedoms. And the overall death rate was low enough that there was no real mass-fear of death coming to me.

b112 4y ago

You might ask, what problems is globalism going to solve that treaties and national cooperation can't today? More importantly, what will those mechanisms be and will they be just as vulnerable to the problems of corruption and interconnection that plague the meaningful enforcement of treaties and agreements today? The difference is, much as the same with a democratic nation. In a democratic nation, citizens collectively elect representatives, and then laws are passed. Once in place, citizens are bound by those laws, and will be encouraged by various means ; fines, jail, etc, to obey that collective decision. Now imagine if our democracy was "treaties are made with all citizens of the nation, but you don't have to agree or sign the treaty." Succinctly put, treaties aren't something you can make another nation sign, and if signed due to force, really force them to comply with in their local area. A global government however, could punish citizens of any country, should they fail to follow global laws passed. That said, I am highly uncomfortable with the idea of a global government, because there is such a wide range of belief systems out there, some of them totalitarian, many of them non-democratic, many of them tied deeply to religion, and I don't think the outcome could last, or be pretty.

FpUser 4y ago
>"...encouraged by various means ; fines, jail, etc, to obey that collective decision" Encouraged my ass. I would call it what it is - threat of violence by governments.
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  Sure, in response to equally violent acts by fishing boats.
  - FpUser 4y ago
    People's actions do not need to be violent in order for the governments to respond with violence. Disobedience is enough. You know it very well. This is just how it works.
    - b112 4y ago
      Violence takes many forms, from gentle to deadly. What the key difference here is, between a democracy and a totalitarian government, is just who decides when violence will be employed. In democratic states, violence is allowed by specific actors, such as the police, in specific situations, such as when other forms of mediation fail, under specific guidelines. This means that democracy attempts to replace the mob (anarchy), and the totalitarian (no law, power vested in one), with a more structured form of violence. Note that absolutely no system will work perfectly, at all. There will be flaws, issues, but from where I sit, most western democracies do a fairly good job of this. That's because the truth is, violence absolutely will occur, no matter what, no matter the form of government (or lack of) in place. Humanity always has individuals which will prey upon itself, and the only response in such cases is violence of some sort. So how do you want your violence? The anarchistic mob? Emotionally run, able to fly out of control, meting out punishment on emotion and adrenaline? The totalitarian, deciding rule of law on whim, then meting out punishment in any way chosen? Or the democratic approach, with laws debated, considered, and meted out by democratic choice, in a controlled way? Again, democracy is not perfect, but it is the best we currently have. And yes, it is violent at times, for humanity is violent at times. We always have been, and will be, else we will no longer be human. You may be thinking, "No! Democracy let thing $x happen to person/group $y. It has failed us!" The thing is, most democracies attempt to constantly improve upon this. Take the US, for example. Compare racism in the 50s, to now. If you think racism, and police brutality connected to it is bad now, your head would spin, and probably explode, if transported to the 50s. What you really need to consider, is what happens under alternative forms of governement. Do you believe a totalitarian would do better at the above? Anarchy? Hardly. So how do you want your violence? Pick carefully. If you pick democracy, as I have, then the next step is to work on improving how that violence is meted out. Help steer it, to make it as fair, as gentle as possible.

int_19h 4y ago

The problem with our current approach to globalism is that it is built on top of a political system - representative democracy - that doesn't really scale well. Or rather it does on paper, but it's hard to see how one person "representing" literally millions of people can be effectively held to account by any of them. And a single world government - even a proto-government with just enough teeth to enforce the basics - would require even worse ratios. But there are other systems. E.g. in a council democracy, on every level, every delegate is personally responsible to few enough people from the level below that accountability can be near-instant. You can't add levels indefinitely, either, but I think that the breakdown (of democratic governance) there still happens at scales much larger than with representative democracy.

ryandrake 4y ago

> Recently, we did have a very globally similar response to a world wide event, and I'm not at all surprised that during that time the rich managed to make themselves much richer and the middle class has mostly taken the hit. If that's a hint to what "globalism" has to offer, you can keep it. We'll have to figure out the fishing problem some other way. You're probably talking about the world wide COVID response, and yes, it was an utter failure. But it was not because of globalism... it was a failure because every country tried to tackle it themselves, incompetently, in their own little vacuum, and the sum total across the world ended up uncoordinated and half-assed. If ever there was an ideal time for "technocracy" and letting the experts take charge worldwide, it was during a global deadly pandemic, but we all blew it.

bruce511 4y ago
I think maybe you have the benefit of hindsight, but even so your argument is perhaps unfounded. First, I think it's worth pointing out that, for the most part [1],politicians operated in good faith, trying to balance multiple factors. There were a variety of strategies persued by different countries [2],and its somewhat unclear which was actually best in the long run. Social scientists will be dissecting the long term effects for decades. Finally, the overall outcomes have been exceptionally mild. Globally a very large absolute number of people died. But as a fraction of total population it was tiny. A vaccine was developed, and distributed, such that everyone who wants to be vaccinated has been, probably many times. Finally I don't think people would have responded any better to technocrats than politicians. Technocrats are not good at guiding large population groups, and are mistrusted by many. In truth we still don't know which approach was (long term) the best, or even what the "best" ultimately means. [1] the event itself was unprecedented in living memory, and there was no relevant historical data to lean on. Experts were consulted, only to get lots of speculation and varying opinions. In truth experts had very limited data to work with and most would have preferred a lot more data before making recommendations. [2] Some countries had simple border structures (new Zealand) and could persure a total-close approach. Some had national lock downs, some had no lockdown (Sweden). Overall though it seems outcomes were better in places where populations had a high degree of trust in their authority structures. Places like the USA with high volumes of distrust fared the worst. Changing the authority would not have changed that mistrust. In some countries politicians erred on the side of safety - at the expense of the economy, in others maintaining personal freedoms, at the expense of a few deaths, was the primary goal. Which makes sense. Personal freedom advocates have never minded other people dying to maintain those freedoms. And the overall death rate was low enough that there was no real mass-fear of death coming to me.