# The death of the Nation-State **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 10, 2007, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596 "2007-05-10T21:18:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2007, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/21 "2007-05-10T23:02:26Z")
Corporate supply chains != state. Robb uses the Wal Mart distribution system as a good example of decentralized hierarchical organization. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2007, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/22 "2007-05-10T23:08:46Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] Corporate supply chains != state. Robb uses the Wal Mart distribution system as a good example of decentralized hierarchical organization. [/QUOTE] What do you think makes up a State? A state is just a parcel of land with defined, internationally accepted borders, internal legitimacy, and external legitimacy. For a State to “collapse” it has to 1) lose its land, 2) lose its internal or external legitimacy. A state without internal legitimacy isn’t supported by the people who live within the State. You see this in places like Sudan and Iraq. For a state to lose internal legitimacy, tons of things have to happen. People have to feel that the State no longer represents their interests, and the people need to suffer drastic decreases in quality of life. Look at the Great Depression, that was a drastic decrease in QoL for many Americans, yet it didn’t destroy the internal legitimacy of the state. We’d have to have mass starvation, loss of electricity, loss of communications infrastructure and et cetera to have a State lose its legitimacy. And this would have to be ongoing for YEARS. There are many examples of Nation-States going through long periods like that, but weathering the storm. Corporate supply chains are exactly why States are so successful. Corporations create them on their own, they are incredibly decentralized because there are tons of competing corporations. I’m not really sure what point you or these authors you’re linking to are trying to make. If the Nation-State system can be destroyed by attacks at key infrastructure points then what ARE those key infrastructure points? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2007, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/23 "2007-05-10T23:24:47Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] Corporate supply chains != state. Robb uses the Wal Mart distribution system as a good example of decentralized hierarchical organization. [/QUOTE] But then why is the military hiring a caterer to provide food an example of centralized decision making? Outsourcing of things like catering make the military DECENTRALIZED, not centralized. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2007, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/24 "2007-05-10T23:35:26Z")
**Martin Hyde** I will use part of the Preface to “Rise and Decline of the State” by Martin van Creveld to answer your questions. I’m not going to address your individual points, please resubmit them. I am hoping that this will more eloquently address my point. > [@](#): > > The state which since the middle of the seventeenth century has been the most important and most characteristic of all modern institutions, is in decline. From Western Europe to Africa, either voluntarily or involuntarily, many existing states are either combining into larger communities or falling apart. Regardless of whether they fall apart or combine, already now many of their functions are being taken over by a variety of organizations which, whatever their precise nature, are not states. > Globally speaking, the international system is moving away from an assembly of distinct, territorial, sovereign, legally equal states toward different, more hierarchical, and in many ways more complicated structures. As far as individual states are concerned, there are good reasons to think that many of them will soon no longer be either willing or able to control and protect the political, military, economic, social, and cultural lives of their citizens to the extent that they used to. Needless to say, these developments affect each and every individual now living on this planet. In some places they will proceed peacefully, but in others they are likely to result in - indeed are already leading to - upheavals as profound, and possibly as bloody, as those that propelled humanity out of the Middle Ages and into the modern world. Whether the direction of change is desirable, as some hope, or undesirable, as others fear, remains to be seen. Here is a definition he uses from Chapter 1 > [@](#): > > Definitions of the state have varied widely. The one adopted here makes no claim to being exclusive; it is merely the most convenient for our purpose. The state, then, is an _abstract_ entity which can be neither seen, nor heard, nor touched. This entity is not identical with either the rulers or the ruled; neither President Clinton, nor citizen Smith, nor even and assembly of all the citizens acting in common can claim that they _are_ the state. On the other hand, it includes them both and claims to stand over them both. > This is as much to say that the state, being separate from both its members and its rulers, is a corporation, just as universities, trade unions, and churches _inter alia_ are. Much like any corporation, it too has directors, employees, and shareholders. Above all, it is a corporation in the sense that it possesses a legal _persona_ of its own, which means that it has rights and duties and may engage in various activities _as if_ it were a real, flesh-and-blood, living individual. The points where the state differs from other corporations are, first, the fact that it authorizes them all but is itself authorized (recognized) solely by others of its kind; secondly, that certain functions (known collectively as the attributes of sovereignty) are reserved for it alone; and, thirdly, that it exercises those functions over a certain territory inside which its jurisdiction is both exclusive and all-embracing. > Understood in this way, the state - like the corporation of which it is a subspecies - is a comparatively recent invention. During most of history, and especially prehistory, there existed government but not states; indeed the idea of the state as a corporation (as opposed to a mere group, assembly, or community of people coming together and living under a set of common laws) was itself unknown. Arising in different civilizations as far apart as Europe and the Middle-East, Meso- and South America, Africa and East Asia, these pre-state political communities where immensely varied - all the more so since they often developed out of each other, interacted with each other, conquered each other, and merged with each other to produce an endless variety of forms, most of them hybrid. Nevertheless, speaking very roughly and skipping over many intermediate types, they may be classified into: (1) tribes without rulers; (2) tribes with rulers (chiefdoms); (3) city-states; and (4) empires, strong and weak. The point not being that global-guerillas will take the state down, but that the state as an entity is becoming less relevant. One of the points made in Brave New War is about how the state derives its purpose from state vs state conflict, and that WMDs make state vs state conflict too costly to really be contemplated. Also: State != Civilization ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2007, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/25 "2007-05-10T23:37:57Z")
[QUOTE=Lemur866] But then why is the military hiring a caterer to provide food an example of centralized decision making? Outsourcing of things like catering make the military DECENTRALIZED, not centralized. [/QUOTE] It’s an example of systems disruption. Catering is an example of decentralization in a strict sense certainly, but it’s hardly the same as a cellular insurgency. ---
**Author:** ![lokij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/5e9695/32.png) [@lokij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lokij)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/26 "2007-05-11T00:44:41Z")
There has been, within the last news cycle, a perfect… PERFECT example of William Lind’s theories about the fall of the state. The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta recently attacked an oil pipeline terminal, they’re making demands and I heard a Nigerian NGO official state that in his opinion the group could totally shut down all of Nigeria’s oil output in three days. The infrastructure is too spread out and indefensible and vulnerable at too many points for it to be safe in the current environment. Nigeria is the world’s 8th largest oil exporter. That kind of attack affects not only Nigeria, but the rest of the world as well. Everybody focused on how this sort of thing could NEVER happen here in the US is missing the point, state boundries and allegiences are losing their meaning the fastest where the state has the least to offer, right now the so called ‘failed states’. It’s now spreading to the third world, for example in Brazil you have prison gangs like the PCC virtually governing huge populations in shanty towns openly in defiance of state authority. I could easily foresee a time when people identify more closely with a trans-national culture or movement than their own national governments even in the first world… look at the rhetoric after the last election in regard to the ‘blue state vs. red state’ grumbling… with the internet and the tools of the global economy it becomes easier for that to be made reality. The very things that are making the world so small are letting previously isolated but like minded groups connect up and organize, eroding the relative value of the state. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/27 "2007-05-11T00:58:21Z")
[QUOTE=mswas] Does everything have to be a Hollywood disaster movie to make an impression? [/quote] I’m guessing a Hollywood disaster movie about gradually shifting economics away from governments to multinational corporations wouldn’t be a big hit, though it might be more realistic than some notion about the “death of modernity”. Actually, Stephenson’s _The Diamond Age_ describes a 22nd-century in which electronic communication and nanotech-based economics have reached such a level that the nation-states _do_ fade away, because they’re no longer needed. > [@](#): > > Most of the examples in the book are in Iraq where systems disruption has been used very effectively. > > One of my favorite examples in Iraq was talking about how they were killing and kidnapping employees of catering services that were providing food to American troops forcing American troops to live on MREs for a while. Other examples he uses are attacks on pipelines that cost hundreds of millions in lost revenue for the Iraqi government. The whole country of Iraq is one big system disruption right about now. It’s no more indicative of future trends in the stable liberal democraces than trying to predict the weather in China based on a hurricane in Kansas. > [@](#): > > The example of the blackout is an example of _systempunkt_ not an example of the collapse of the state. Isn’t der systempunktifeineneisterrgangenlolanzenfin a major part of the collapse of the state? I’m confused. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/28 "2007-05-11T01:01:56Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] How could you contaminate an entire food distribution center without it becoming obvious to the hundreds of people who work there? You could attack and destroy such a center, but I think it’s all but impossible to poison all the food secretly. And unless you could do that secretly, the food wouldn’t be sent around. And the thing is, in any given area there isn’t one food distribution center. My uncle’s family owns several supermarket. The regional supermarket franchises (Foodland/SuperValu, Giant Eagle, Kroger) and then the big chains like Wal-Mart and K-Mart all have their own distribution centers. SuperValu for example doesn’t share a distribution center with Giant Eagle, yet you can find both stores in the same neighborhood. For you average supermarket like Giant Eagle or Kroger, you get in a shipment from the corporate distribution center which usually contains all canned goods, boxed cereals, dry pre-packaged foods (Hamburger Helper type stuff) and et cetera. But dairy products are delivered by a different method, as are bread and meat. If somehow you destroyed the food source of all the regional distribution centers, all the dairy distribution centers, the bread sources, the meat distribution companies and et cetera you’d still have all the inventory on hand that wasn’t destroyed. People would probably get by fine for the 2-3 days it would take for food to start coming in from the rest of the country. [/QUOTE] No need for it to be secret. A few men with guns to briefly scatter the workmen (minimum wage don’t buy suicide), then contaminate. The food is unusable. Afterwards, circulate Web rumors that secret contamionation has happened as well, & watch the panic begin. ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/29 "2007-05-11T01:33:50Z")
> [@](#): > > No need for it to be secret. > > A few men with guns to briefly scatter the workmen (minimum wage don’t buy suicide), then contaminate. > > The food is unusable. > > Afterwards, circulate Web rumors that secret contamionation has happened as well, & watch the panic begin. I remember foot and mouth a few years ago, and how thousands of pigs were burned as a result in a culling, this is pretty typical of what you’re describing, just added with Human intention, yet I still ate bacon for breakfast and civilisation didn’t collapse. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/30 "2007-05-11T03:31:00Z")
[QUOTE=Ryan\_Liam] I remember foot and mouth a few years ago, and how thousands of pigs were burned as a result in a culling, this is pretty typical of what you’re describing, just added with Human intention, yet I still ate bacon for breakfast and civilisation didn’t collapse. [/QUOTE] Yep. And there’s no real point to openly contaminate, better to just destroy the food in that case. Plus, you’d have to hit every major food distribution center across the country to actually case real starvation. Even if you just hit half of them, people would still be able to cope. Most Americans have enough food in their cupboards to last for a 7 day period if they really need to, and by that time the government would be distributing food “certified uncontaminated.” The food distribution system is just way too decentralized for this to be anything other than fantasy. In response to **mswas** let’s just suffice to say I’ve found nothing you’ve said to be persuasive. I understand for whatever reason people are really willing to get married to the idea of the Nation-State collapsing, but everything you’ve talked about exaggerates how easily disruptions are to implement against a stable state and exaggerates how grave an impact those disruptions have. History shows we can take serious disruption and the underlying state-system doesn’t collapse. Nation-States have been around for like 500 years, I’ve seen little evidence during all that time that even the most serious disruptions you can imagine can undermine the system itself. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/31 "2007-05-11T03:34:41Z")
Suddenly I feel like dusting off a copy of my Cyberpunk 2020 role playing game and playing some Friday Night Firefight scenarios! Ya with me, chummers? Marc ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/32 "2007-05-11T04:36:25Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Actually, Stephenson’s _The Diamond Age_ describes a 22nd-century in which electronic communication and nanotech-based economics have reached such a level that the nation-states _do_ fade away, because they’re no longer needed. [/QUOTE] Also worthy of mention is Stephenson’s _Snow Crash_, which basically takes place in the same universe but 100 years earlier. After the fall of the nation-states and the rise of tribalism, but before magic nanotechnology is invented. One of the main causes of the failure of the nation-states is that the tax system collapses when people move their bank accounts into untouchable “off-shore” accounts protected by unbreakable encryption and opt out of the old government regulated economic system. Stephenson would later revisit this universe in the 20th century in _Cryptonomicon_, where the first data haven is constructed. I enjoyed the universe Stephenson created but the idea of unbreakable encryption leading to the downfall of governments via tax starvation is a bit of reach. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2007, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596/33 "2007-05-11T16:53:07Z")
Well I’m not talking about the collapse of civilization. I am talking about the end of the state. **lokij** described what I am talking about rather admirably. We’re talking about social cohesion, not some apocalyptic Mad Max scenario. While we are referencing cyberpunk novels, all of the above mentioned I have read, Bruce Sterling’s ‘Distraction’ is probably the closest to what I am describing in the near term. I see it as happening in a graduated fashion. “Decline” more than collapse. A slow geriatric aging rather than a bullet in the brain. Corporations will still exist, civilization will still exist, there will still be roads, power, infrastructure, but the state as an apparatus will be considerably weakened. As per my cites to Martin van Creveld, in his model the EU and NAFTA would be examples of the organizations that for whatever reason cannot be called ‘states’. Much of the world exists in a system that can only loosely be considered states. The Colombian narco-traffickers are the most powerful groups in Colombia, as it is with Mexico. As for the US, do you feel that the CIA really represents you? Is the DEA fighting for you? Who benefits from the NSA’s info? Who is more likely to see an NSA report, Osama bin Laden, or you? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-death-of-the-nation-state/403596.md?page=1)