A government is imo not bottom-up by my definition. There is no formal “citizens of Rojava” , they are just members of their communes. There is no federal police force.
Just looked that up. It’s absolutely suffering from the things I mentioned, including military conflict with their neighbors.
It’s a place with borders, that hopes to set internal law , and maintain itself. That’s a nation state. It is defined as a “federated semi direct democracy” and has a legislature “Syrian democratic council”
Or maybe there’s a dozen alternatives that could work better and both of us are staring at this from the bottom of a pro-hierarchy well that we’ve been stuck in ever since one guy convinced another one he should be in charge.
I don’t have a full solution, I just want us to be flexible enough to figure one (or more) out.
One guy will always convince another of that. If the other guy disagrees, well, time for sticks and stones.
My point is you either go small, and groups self assemble however you want, but you’ll have many neighbors who might not see it your way.
Or you go big, and everyone’s efforts go to one shared goal, and everyone is a equal “citizen”. Ideally with collective shared goals folks are doing ok.
Or you go medium, which is what we have now. Some groups are positioned and prepared to do good stuff, and others are fighting with and nail just to hold it together. There’s gonna be friction with neighbors, like with “small” but the problem is “mediums” got some real big sticks and stones.
There’s no right answer and I obviously didn’t cover everything. But without groups of some kind, people will get picked off. There’s no period of human history that disagrees with me.
Provide a single example of anything aside from what I described, in any period of human history that both:
did not maintain power through economic or just militaristic dominance of their local region
did not experience conflict with their neighbors.
They either had cohesive, hegemonic domination within their borders and geographic separation from rivals, or had challenges with bordering nation states.
Is this like a sound scientific theory that has some relevance to modern times? I could list off a myriad of “this thing has never existed in human history” making current times unique and possibly different when looking at cultural nuances. I get what you’re saying totally, but this is a new era of history with the formation of Alliances like NATO and the EU that has really just started in regards to our span of time. Also, we tend to only hear about the “bloody” years of a society. One war can outshine hundreds or thousands of years with prosperity and peace so the whole doom thing seems like fear mongering.
Alternatives?
I see 2:
full hegemonic domination of one nation state where everyone gets their basics met. Star trek style.
intense local tribalism where you’re doing a whole lot more defending your land than you are now
anarchism, i.e. bottom-up democracy and federal structures. Read up on Rojava for example.
That’s still a nation state
That’s just plain wrong
How is a bottom up democracy with federal features not a government? All governments have borders, unless you’re suggesting* a global system
Edit all governments with borders are effectively nation states.
A government is imo not bottom-up by my definition. There is no formal “citizens of Rojava” , they are just members of their communes. There is no federal police force.
Just looked that up. It’s absolutely suffering from the things I mentioned, including military conflict with their neighbors.
It’s a place with borders, that hopes to set internal law , and maintain itself. That’s a nation state. It is defined as a “federated semi direct democracy” and has a legislature “Syrian democratic council”
That’s a new, embattled nation
Or maybe there’s a dozen alternatives that could work better and both of us are staring at this from the bottom of a pro-hierarchy well that we’ve been stuck in ever since one guy convinced another one he should be in charge.
I don’t have a full solution, I just want us to be flexible enough to figure one (or more) out.
“The international ideal unites the human race”
One guy will always convince another of that. If the other guy disagrees, well, time for sticks and stones.
My point is you either go small, and groups self assemble however you want, but you’ll have many neighbors who might not see it your way.
Or you go big, and everyone’s efforts go to one shared goal, and everyone is a equal “citizen”. Ideally with collective shared goals folks are doing ok.
Or you go medium, which is what we have now. Some groups are positioned and prepared to do good stuff, and others are fighting with and nail just to hold it together. There’s gonna be friction with neighbors, like with “small” but the problem is “mediums” got some real big sticks and stones.
There’s no right answer and I obviously didn’t cover everything. But without groups of some kind, people will get picked off. There’s no period of human history that disagrees with me.
People like you make me sad.
Realists?
Provide a single example of anything aside from what I described, in any period of human history that both:
did not maintain power through economic or just militaristic dominance of their local region
did not experience conflict with their neighbors.
They either had cohesive, hegemonic domination within their borders and geographic separation from rivals, or had challenges with bordering nation states.
I personally hope for a star trek future
Is this like a sound scientific theory that has some relevance to modern times? I could list off a myriad of “this thing has never existed in human history” making current times unique and possibly different when looking at cultural nuances. I get what you’re saying totally, but this is a new era of history with the formation of Alliances like NATO and the EU that has really just started in regards to our span of time. Also, we tend to only hear about the “bloody” years of a society. One war can outshine hundreds or thousands of years with prosperity and peace so the whole doom thing seems like fear mongering.
I’d go for the second, with pleasure. Better spend my time fighting for hometown than working for a big profit-driven company.
You’d be fighting a whole lot. Think Afghanistan hamlets