Nation-State Scale Debate

The cluster discusses the optimal size and structure of political entities, debating pros and cons of large nation-states, smaller city-states, federations like the US or EU, and possibilities like world government or resource-pooling among multiple nations.

➡️ Stable 0.6x Politics & Society
2,768
Comments
19
Years Active
5
Top Authors
#7159
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Keywords

NATO US DIVIDE WTO UNITING historyfiles.co USSR USA FeaturesFarEast EU states nations countries world city nation government colonialism eu state

Sample Comments

wlievens • Nov 1, 2009 • View on HN

The idea of countries is not taken far enough?

Jensson • Nov 20, 2021 • View on HN

Dunbar number works for countries as well. A hundred countries can talk to each other, trade and make agreements. Much more than that and it becomes a mess. So we get another layer of governance, called unions. You see USA being a union of 50 states, or EU being a union of 28 states. Expanding such a union to the whole world defeats the point.

allendoerfer • Mar 4, 2018 • View on HN

You can still have a federated world-government.

EMCymatics • Nov 14, 2023 • View on HN

Why does it have to be only one nation state? Couldn't it be multiple pooling resources?

tudborg • Feb 8, 2014 • View on HN

wouldn't fewer countries make government _more_ centralized? ;)

rayiner • May 24, 2021 • View on HN

Sounds like a step toward world government.

jessaustin • Jan 4, 2019 • View on HN

This sounds like an argument for smaller nations?

fulafel • Nov 10, 2017 • View on HN

Countries are known to do this on big issues, see eg. NATO.

iafrikan • Feb 2, 2018 • View on HN

Can't we break down governance to city states rather?

wav-part • Oct 2, 2017 • View on HN

As you say, the threat of invasion was the only reason people banded together physically. Now the the threat is gone, we should see more (as small as possible) city-states because everyone loves freedom and more control over their lives. There would not be a world government. Instead multilateralism is how the world would coordinate/cooperate.