# Revolutionary States, Cults of Personality, and their eventual demise. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 14, 2009, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029 "2009-07-14T20:14:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/21 "2009-07-15T22:27:15Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > But the point is not a world government that would **supplant** the United States, the point is an American Empire. Yes, but an American Empire would supplant an American Nation-State no? And if the Empire were ultimately global the effect would be the same right? ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/22 "2009-07-15T22:29:38Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Yes, but an American Empire would supplant an American Nation-State no? And if the Empire were ultimately global the effect would be the same right? No more than the inclusion of Hawaii caused the end of the United States as a nation. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/23 "2009-07-15T22:30:34Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > No more than the inclusion of Hawaii caused the end of the United States as a nation. Different by orders of magnitude. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/24 "2009-07-15T22:39:16Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Different by orders of magnitude. The Louisiana purchase was also different by orders of magnitude. Let’s be quite succinct; the United States of America was once 13 states. Now it is 50, most of them larger than any of the original 13. All this purchasing, conquering, and annexing didn’t in the slightest supplant the American Nation-State with something other. Neither would the annexation of Canada. Nor would conquering Mexico. Nor would the entire EU getting wildly drunk one night and selling itself to the states. This is simply not how nation-states end - unless you’re the one sold, conquered, or annexed, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/25 "2009-07-15T22:52:50Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > The Louisiana purchase was also different by orders of magnitude. > > Let’s be quite succinct; the United States of America was once 13 states. Now it is 50, most of them larger than any of the original 13. All this purchasing, conquering, and annexing didn’t in the slightest supplant the American Nation-State with something other. Neither would the annexation of Canada. Nor would conquering Mexico. Nor would the entire EU getting wildly drunk one night and selling itself to the states. > > This is simply not how nation-states end - unless you’re the one sold, conquered, or annexed, anyway. A single world empire wouldn’t just end one nation state, it would end them all. That is the road we are travelling, the nation-state as a concept is about half a millenium old and it is in the throes of its demise as it is supplanted by economic cooperation zones as the primary mode of political discourse between large groups of people. Transnational corporations with a tenuous loyalty to a nation are also working from below to supplant the nation-state as the primary political sovereign corporation. Ultimately to maintain an empire a state must compromise its old idea of itself to the new one. Just as the Civil War ended the sovereignty of the states, the success of empire would supplant the sovereignty of the nation-state to something greater. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2009, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/26 "2009-07-15T23:04:52Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > A single world empire wouldn’t just end one nation state, it would end them all. That is the road we are travelling, the nation-state as a concept is about half a millenium old and it is in the throes of its demise as it is supplanted by economic cooperation zones as the primary mode of political discourse between large groups of people. Transnational corporations with a tenuous loyalty to a nation are also working from below to supplant the nation-state as the primary political sovereign corporation. Ultimately to maintain an empire a state must compromise its old idea of itself to the new one. > > Just as the Civil War ended the sovereignty of the states, the success of empire would supplant the sovereignty of the nation-state to something greater. I disagree. As I think this is nothing more than a semantic argument about what a “nation state” is, I think that simple disagreement is a fair response. In my opinion there is no criteria for being a “nation state” that excludes one that happens to include every land mass and person on the planet. Sure, with a single world empire you’d only have _one_ nation-state, but as far as I know, the existience of other nation-states isn’t a criteria for being a nation-state either. And the American Civil War didn’t end the sovereignty of the states; it ended the sovereignty of the _confederate_ states. The USA trucked along just fine. So yeah, I think this supports _my_ position; in cases like this, only the loser vanishes. So, only a world government that _consumed_ all the former nation states would end them all, not one that consumed all _other_ nation-states while retaining its own coninuity of existence. And eitehr way, _however_ it gets created, by my definition the new world government is itself a nation-state. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2009, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/27 "2009-07-16T01:08:48Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Yes, but an American Empire would supplant an American Nation-State no? And if the Empire were ultimately global the effect would be the same right? Britain’s acquisition of an empire did not put an end to Britain as a nation-state. In any case, PNAC’s vision seems to be not an actual empire in the old sense, but, rather, America acquiring permanent global military-political hegemony and calling all the shots – not a world of American colonies, but a world of American client states or puppet states. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2009, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/28 "2009-07-16T14:40:25Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Britain’s acquisition of an empire did not put an end to Britain as a nation-state. In any case, PNAC’s vision seems to be not an actual empire in the old sense, but, rather, America acquiring permanent global military-political hegemony and calling all the shots – not a world of American colonies, but a world of American client states or puppet states. Well, America is not a nation-state, although another one could work. I gues that’s semi-off-topic, but America is the quintessential anti-nation/state; it’s united primarily by shared values and the Constitution but not by any ethnic kinship. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2009, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/29 "2009-07-16T18:17:33Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > Well, America is not a nation-state. Yes, America is a nation-state like France, not an idea-state like the Soviet Union. The American nation, though of diverse origin, is a real ethnocultural entity and existed before independence and will still exist if our government and Constitution fall. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/30 "2009-07-17T01:33:24Z")
Wouldn’t say it would, as a single entity, to be honest. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/31 "2009-07-17T14:51:33Z")
> [@E-Sabbath](#): > > Wouldn’t say it would, as a single entity, to be honest. The American nation would still exist as a nation even if it were not united politically. China has been through many periods of political fragmentation in its long history, but throughout all that China has remained at all times China, a single nation and civilization. Poland was partitioned in the late 18th Century, but the Polish **nation** survived under decades of foreign rule, ready to re-emerge as a nation- **state** in 1918. Nations are not immortal, but they are much longer-lived than states or constitutions or political systems or borders. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/32 "2009-07-17T14:55:52Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > We’re going to have to agree to disagree on this issue. I’ve predicted all along that the United States will be subjugated by a race of froglike aliens and your space weasel theory hasn’t convinced me otherwise. I’m holding out for Sentient Plants, who will come gunning for our Vegans. ---
**Author:** ![tagos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@tagos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tagos)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/33 "2009-07-17T15:36:54Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > No in hindsight we made the right decision. The covert war in Afghanistan is one of the few things the American government got right in the cold war. Yes it lead to increased terrorism, but Al Qaeda is a fly on the ass of the Soviet juggernaut. > > Taraki was a Soviet puppet who had very little actual control over Afghanistan and was eventually supplanted. After he was supplanted Massoud had to convince the Afghani military NOT to defect because they were more useful to him as spies. Often when a battle would go Massoud’s way the Afghan military would turn its guns on the Soviets and support Massoud. > > Communism is evil because it is a faith based ideology with the pretense of being rational. It’s a religion without God. Capitalism is more moral than Communism because it is more honest in its dealings. Soviet juggernaut? The one bought low by a polish shipworker? That juggernaut? Have you ever considered not getting your history from comic books? ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/34 "2009-07-17T16:41:37Z")
> [@tagos](#): > > Soviet juggernaut? The one bought low by a polish shipworker? That juggernaut? > > Have you ever considered not getting your history from comic books? :rolleyes: If you think Afghanistan was not highly significant to the end of the Soviet Union, then it is not _I_ who is ignorant of history. Anyone who thinks that one person ended the Soviet Union has no right whatsoever to lecture anyone else on its demise. Here’s a book for you to read: [Ghost Wars](http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Wars-Afghanistan-Invasion-September/dp/1594200076) ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/35 "2009-07-17T16:49:16Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > I disagree. > > As I think this is nothing more than a semantic argument about what a “nation state” is, I think that simple disagreement is a fair response. In my opinion there is no criteria for being a “nation state” that excludes one that happens to include every land mass and person on the planet. Sure, with a single world empire you’d only have _one_ nation-state, but as far as I know, the existience of other nation-states isn’t a criteria for being a nation-state either. It is actually a criteria as a Nation state’s sovereignty exists through a lateral hierarchy of mutual recognition. To call a world government a nation-state is to stretch the meaning of the word beyond meaninglessness. But as I said the interim state of economic cooperation zones will help to cement the difference between a nation-state and a Global Federalism comprised of nation-states. Yes, it’s semantic, but that doesn’t dismiss a thing. All things are semantic. That’s why cat, astronaut and nation state have different meanings, it’s all semantics. Is there a fallacy for the way he’s using semantics? I see this all the time where people think that saying something is semantic that it dismisses the point being made. > [@](#): > > And the American Civil War didn’t end the sovereignty of the states; it ended the sovereignty of the _confederate_ states. The USA trucked along just fine. So yeah, I think this supports _my_ position; in cases like this, only the loser vanishes. So, only a world government that _consumed_ all the former nation states would end them all, not one that consumed all _other_ nation-states while retaining its own coninuity of existence. It ended the sovereignty of ALL states. If a state doesn’t have the right to secede it is not sovereign. Also the 14th amendment put down strict limits on a state’s ability to govern itself which affected all states not just the southern ones. If Vermont doesn’t have the right to secede its sovereignty is just as impacted as South Carolina’s. > [@](#): > > And eitehr way, _however_ it gets created, by my definition the new world government is itself a nation-state. By your definition yes, but you should recognize that it’s an idiosyncratic one. Maybe it will win out in the long-run, but pushing it will only lead to useless semantic quibbles when you could just choose not to make a semantic quibble, or just keep it as an aside, when you fully understand the point the other is making. Reading on this subject: [On Power](http://www.amazon.com/POWER-BERTRAND-JOUVENEL/dp/0865971137) by Bertrand de Jouvenel [The Rise and Decline of the State](http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Decline-State-Martin-Creveld/dp/052165629X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1247849329&sr=1-1) by Martin van Creveld ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/36 "2009-07-17T16:51:20Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Britain’s acquisition of an empire did not put an end to Britain as a nation-state. In any case, PNAC’s vision seems to be not an actual empire in the old sense, but, rather, America acquiring permanent global military-political hegemony and calling all the shots – not a world of American colonies, but a world of American client states or puppet states. No, but Britain didn’t succeed in a lasting and enduring global government either so the point is moot. As for America acquiring a global military-political hegemony to compliment the economic one it already has, I’d like to point to Caesar’s Rome and direct you to the upheavals of power that occurred as representatives of the conquered lands were enfranchised. Do you think America could maintain such a hegemony without enfranchising its client states in the long run? ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2009, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/37 "2009-07-17T16:55:21Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > The American nation would still exist as a nation even if it were not united politically. China has been through many periods of political fragmentation in its long history, but throughout all that China has remained at all times China, a single nation and civilization. Poland was partitioned in the late 18th Century, but the Polish **nation** survived under decades of foreign rule, ready to re-emerge as a nation- **state** in 1918. Nations are not immortal, but they are much longer-lived than states or constitutions or political systems or borders. I agree with this. Comparing America to China is an apt description because America’s deracinated null-ethnic culture is in a way a socio-cultural ethnicity of its own. Certainly it’s not genetic but Americans as a whole are separated from their Mother cultures and have a more distinct identity that is American. The collapse of the American Nation-State (And it certainly is a Nation-State) would have such dramatic political upheaval that the great suck it creates as it goes down the drain would bring with it a great many of the states of the rest of the world. America as a Nation-State has crafted itself as the keystone in the arch of the global economic order. Some drastic shift in power would have to occur first for America to be able to fall and for it not to bring everything down with it. Unlike the Soviet Union America’s reach is not localized to contiguous border states. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2009, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/38 "2009-07-20T23:14:45Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > It is actually a criteria as a Nation state’s sovereignty exists through a lateral hierarchy of mutual recognition. To call a world government a nation-state is to stretch the meaning of the word beyond meaninglessness. But as I said the interim state of economic cooperation zones will help to cement the difference between a nation-state and a Global Federalism comprised of nation-states. > > Yes, it’s semantic, but that doesn’t dismiss a thing. All things are semantic. That’s why cat, astronaut and nation state have different meanings, it’s all semantics. > > Is there a fallacy for the way he’s using semantics? I see this all the time where people think that saying something is semantic that it dismisses the point being made. Did you just refer to me as “he” in a response to me? How odd. It’s like one of those deliberate audible asides, only in plain, un-tone-differentiated text. I disagree with your bald unsopported assertion that “To call a world government a nation-state is to stretch the meaning of the word beyond meaninglessness.” So from where I stand, your position lack legs upon which to stand. > [@mswas](#): > > It ended the sovereignty of ALL states. If a state doesn’t have the right to secede it is not sovereign. Also the 14th amendment put down strict limits on a state’s ability to govern itself which affected all states not just the southern ones. If Vermont doesn’t have the right to secede its sovereignty is just as impacted as South Carolina’s. I agree with this completely. However, we’re not _talking_ about if america, britian, and austrailia each give up soverignty to a **separate** higher authority that they formed on the spot without dissolving themselves as subordinate entities. We are talking about if Rhode Island had rolled out the armies and conquered the other states, and declared them subordinate colonies of itself. Which is not _quite_ what happened. Clearly one of us doesn’t understand what the discussion is. Based on this clarification of your already dodgy analogy, it’s you. > [@mswas](#): > > By your definition yes, but you should recognize that it’s an idiosyncratic one. Maybe it will win out in the long-run, but pushing it will only lead to useless semantic quibbles when you could just choose not to make a semantic quibble, or just keep it as an aside, when you fully understand the point the other is making. Idiosyncratic my ass. You just don’t want to admit that you’re wrong, despite there being an **obvious** difference between the US, Canada, and Mexico joining together as separate subentities of the new United States of North America, and America breaking out the guns and conquering everything else that moves without ceding sovereignty in the slightest. > [@mswas](#): > > Reading on this subject: > > [On Power](http://www.amazon.com/POWER-BERTRAND-JOUVENEL/dp/0865971137) by Bertrand de Jouvenel > > [The Rise and Decline of the State](http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Decline-State-Martin-Creveld/dp/052165629X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1247849329&sr=1-1) by Martin van Creveld Reading on the subject: any dictionary. See “cede” and “conquer”. Not that they’re not synonyms. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2009, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029/39 "2009-07-20T23:27:17Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > Did you just refer to me as “he” in a response to me? How odd. It’s like one of those deliberate audible asides, only in plain, un-tone-differentiated text. I dunno, frankly I am uninterested in parsing through what was said to figure it out. > [@](#): > > I disagree with your bald unsopported assertion that “To call a world government a nation-state is to stretch the meaning of the word beyond meaninglessness.” So from where I stand, your position lack legs upon which to stand. Whatever you say, it’s just an usage that doesn’t fit the criteria that I have heard for nation-state in the past. Sure it’s a state, but I think calling it a nation strains credulity. > [@](#): > > I agree with this completely. However, we’re not _talking_ about if america, britian, and austrailia each give up soverignty to a **separate** higher authority that they formed on the spot without dissolving themselves as subordinate entities. We are talking about if Rhode Island had rolled out the armies and conquered the other states, and declared them subordinate colonies of itself. Which is not _quite_ what happened. Of course, but what I am arguing is an assimilation of power where the conquered becomes simply part of the state that does the conquering. IE, eventually giving statehood to the Iraqi province, etc.. Likely Iraq would be three states, but I hope you understand what I am getting at. > [@](#): > > Clearly one of us doesn’t understand what the discussion is. Based on this clarification of your already dodgy analogy, it’s you. blah > [@](#): > > Idiosyncratic my ass. You just don’t want to admit that you’re wrong, despite there being an **obvious** difference between the US, Canada, and Mexico joining together as separate subentities of the new United States of North America, and America breaking out the guns and conquering everything else that moves without ceding sovereignty in the slightest. Nationalism is quite often in sociological or political treatises differentiated from global universalizing ideals. Which is why Bolivia’s socialism might be considered a nationalist movement, but the global communist revolution of the mid-twentieth century would not, even though Communism was trying to bring about a global worker’s state. It’s why Reza Aslan makes a differentiation between Jihadism as a global universalist political ideology and Islamism as political nationalism based on existing national-boundaries. Nasser was for Pan-Arab nationalism, but that had specific territorial boundaries, IE, where Arabs were the predominant ethnic group. I generally hear France and Germany referred to as Nations but not the European Union. Though people refer to all three entities as states. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revolutionary-states-cults-of-personality-and-their-eventual-demise/503029.md?page=1)