The historical and archaeological records are quite clear that tribes became nations and nations became subsumed into larger nations and empires.
A mature nation consists of tribes that have, over time, largely merged their cultures so that there is a single national culture. Nations where the tribes are still culturally separate tend to fly apart into entities based on the tribe.
An empire is a combination of nations that may or may not be forced to share a single culture. The early Islamic Empires and Christian Empires often enforced a common religion and hence culture (sometimes at the point of a sword and sometimes through excess taxation and exclusion). In contrast the trading empires run by the eighteenth and nineteenth century French and British tended to allow nations within the empires to keep their cultures. The dystopian Communist empires of the twentieth century forced the subject nations to share a common culture. The passing or weakening of an empire results in the re-appearance of those separate nations within it that have managed to preserve their cultures.
The reason that nations are the natural unit of diversity is that culture governs the behaviour of the people. When people share a culture they share behaviour and will accept a common set of governing principles.
The way to destroy a nation is to impose multiculturalism, either by importing tribes from elsewhere or by forcibly or otherwise changing the religion of a segment of the population. This multiculturalism is not the imposition of a variety of restaurants but the true imposition of a divided, segregated society (see Multiculturalism). The British Empire did this in various places such as Sri Lanka and Northern Ireland, the Chinese are doing it in Tibet and the Russians are also at it. The Nation is then returned to a set of tribes and loses any sense of national purpose or suffers civil war.
Globalization is an imperial fad that will pass and nations absorbed by it will largely re-emerge when it has gone. Those nations, such as the UK, that have been tribalised by the globalizers will need to go through a new period of maturation that could last centuries.
The only stable world is a world where nations interact according to an international law yet preserve their cultural identities and sovereignty. This preserves the essential diversity that is required to deal with unexpected events, whether these are environmental, political, biological or economic. Economists and post-modernists do not understand this need for many nations and are storing up problems for the future.
The maverick nation in this discussion is the USA. It has imported large numbers of people who are committed to its national culture so that, despite being composed of people from all over the world, it is a true nation rather than an empire. The only danger for the USA as a nation is that the people who share a common origin within it will coalesce into tribes. The USA has always tackled this possibility by carefully indoctrinating the population with national values, if, in this post-modern world, it neglects to do this then it will lose cohesion.
The EU was a stable coalition of nations until it introduced a single currency. The Eurozone is now in the process of becoming an empire.
We can only have freedom within national units, these units can differ dramatically and hence one nation can tolerate a subculture that would cause another to explode.
See also:
Multiculturalism
A mature nation consists of tribes that have, over time, largely merged their cultures so that there is a single national culture. Nations where the tribes are still culturally separate tend to fly apart into entities based on the tribe.
An empire is a combination of nations that may or may not be forced to share a single culture. The early Islamic Empires and Christian Empires often enforced a common religion and hence culture (sometimes at the point of a sword and sometimes through excess taxation and exclusion). In contrast the trading empires run by the eighteenth and nineteenth century French and British tended to allow nations within the empires to keep their cultures. The dystopian Communist empires of the twentieth century forced the subject nations to share a common culture. The passing or weakening of an empire results in the re-appearance of those separate nations within it that have managed to preserve their cultures.
The reason that nations are the natural unit of diversity is that culture governs the behaviour of the people. When people share a culture they share behaviour and will accept a common set of governing principles.
The way to destroy a nation is to impose multiculturalism, either by importing tribes from elsewhere or by forcibly or otherwise changing the religion of a segment of the population. This multiculturalism is not the imposition of a variety of restaurants but the true imposition of a divided, segregated society (see Multiculturalism). The British Empire did this in various places such as Sri Lanka and Northern Ireland, the Chinese are doing it in Tibet and the Russians are also at it. The Nation is then returned to a set of tribes and loses any sense of national purpose or suffers civil war.
Globalization is an imperial fad that will pass and nations absorbed by it will largely re-emerge when it has gone. Those nations, such as the UK, that have been tribalised by the globalizers will need to go through a new period of maturation that could last centuries.
The only stable world is a world where nations interact according to an international law yet preserve their cultural identities and sovereignty. This preserves the essential diversity that is required to deal with unexpected events, whether these are environmental, political, biological or economic. Economists and post-modernists do not understand this need for many nations and are storing up problems for the future.
The maverick nation in this discussion is the USA. It has imported large numbers of people who are committed to its national culture so that, despite being composed of people from all over the world, it is a true nation rather than an empire. The only danger for the USA as a nation is that the people who share a common origin within it will coalesce into tribes. The USA has always tackled this possibility by carefully indoctrinating the population with national values, if, in this post-modern world, it neglects to do this then it will lose cohesion.
The EU was a stable coalition of nations until it introduced a single currency. The Eurozone is now in the process of becoming an empire.
We can only have freedom within national units, these units can differ dramatically and hence one nation can tolerate a subculture that would cause another to explode.
See also:
Multiculturalism
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