demagogue on 1/4/2014 at 03:01
I don't really buy that. I mean it might end up being accurate descriptively, but I don't buy it normatively, as a good thing. Most countries have major political splits and periods of constitutional crisis that they muddle through. Having the split magically go away IMO is a cop out for countries growing up & coming to terms with the modern world, and at best it just encourages radicalism and childlike tantrum politics. Nobody should know that better than Russia, which is so ethnically diverse it's hard to take any claim that ethnic unity is best for a country very seriously.
Specter on 1/4/2014 at 03:34
Russia is ethnically diverse, that's true, but it is not a near even split between two. Russia works because it has many unique arrangements within the context of Federation. Many regions have higher levels of autonomy than others. While I understand the idea that splitting up the country is "too easy", at what point does the strife and lack of advancement become too high a cost? I do not think pre-Russian annexation Ukraine had any hope of working together, or advancing as a country, without a major change to the make up of the country and government.
Ostriig on 1/4/2014 at 08:55
I agree, I've said it before, with the Ukraine you have a roughly even split down the middle, and while ethnicity might be an underlying context, the relevant split is political. And on a fundamental level. Consolidation in supernational states and unions being a reality, with half the country wanting to pursue the EU and the other Moscow's Customs Union you've got a big problem. You could see one half of the country manage to drag the other kicking and screaming in a direction they don't want, or you could see it stay neutral, in the middle, missing out on opportunities on either side, or you can break it up. None of these are easy solutions.
The problem is that you can have an ethnically or culturally diverse state work while its demographic components coexist in relative harmony or even in apathy towards one another, but once they're in stark opposition on important matters it gets tricky.
Anyway, the latest I read on the news was that there was a slight deescalation on the border. Russia had reportedly begun massing tens of thousands of troops and putting supply lines together, but after the latest rounds of talk between Putin, Obama and Merkel, they've started pulling back and reducing their numbers.
Apparently, Lavrov's begun pitching Kerry on a federal solution for the Ukraine, the Kremlin is quite set on their western neighbour having constitutional reform. Kiev is having none of it. I suppose autonomous states in a federation would have an easier time asking the Tzar to join Russia. Can't help but see it as a more streamlined, disimulated version of what Jirinovsky was banging on about a couple of weeks ago, i.e. breaking up the entire region to roughly pre-WW2 borders - annexing North-Western Ukraine to Poland, Transcarpathia to Hungary, and Moldova and Bukovina to Romania, with the rest (read "most") of the Ukraine (and Transnistria) coming back to the Russian motherland, of course. I think he wants Belarus as well, but I might be misremembering and I can't be arsed to look up the article right now.
Which reminds me, apparently Putin's been whinging to Merkel about the "blockading" of Transnistria. You know, that place where the Russians are still keeping roughly a thousand "peace keeping" troops, despite having committed to withdrawing them donkey's years ago.
In any case, we might be seeing the conflict move farther along from military to political, these last two months running up to the Ukrainian elections are when all sides will be trying to lay the groundwork for a "democratic victory."
nemyax on 1/4/2014 at 12:33
Quote Posted by Ostriig
with the Ukraine you have a roughly even split down the middle
The distinction is not really clear-cut geographically. People's sympathies are pretty polarised both in the east and in the west of Ukraine.
However, it appears that a strong dislike for the prospect of federalisation is something they have in common. They see it as a recipe for the dismemberment of the country, even though countries like Germany and the US work quite well as federations.
Quote Posted by Ostriig
Jirinovsky
He's the court jester. He doesn't really deserve the attention he gets.
icemann on 1/4/2014 at 13:02
Though if what happened in Crimea occurred world wide, where there are regions where there are larger percentages of a foreign nationality compared to the indigenous/country's nationality, and then giving that region over to whatever foreign country they happened to belong to, we'd be seeing QUITE a lot of changes to maps. Silly as that would be. But it's essentially what happened in Crimea.
Beleg Cúthalion on 2/4/2014 at 09:57
Quote Posted by nemyax
They see it as a recipe for the dismemberment of the country, even though countries like Germany and the US work quite well as federations.
I cannot speak for the US, but the fact that Germany's federal states are in fact (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_of_Germany) states with their own rights etc. is barely noticeable in the everyday life and awareness of the people. The whole of Germany seems IMHO much more important in politics, identity and practical issues (travel, bureaucracy etc.) than the affairs of the individual states. You would have a hard time finding the same issues of ethnicity or language(s) here. I cannot even remember problems like this from the state of 1871 where for the first time you had some sort of stricter central government after hundreds of years where smaller states were much more important.
demagogue on 2/4/2014 at 10:49
The US used to be very split and did have a civil war, which federalism contributed to greatly AFAIK. So it did have its cost. But then I think it took the South completely collapsing for them to modernize. If they had been allowed to split off, they'd have probably gone the fascist route (though federalism was still a problem by allowing Jim Crow laws up to the 1960s even staying part of the US). Their entire way of life was morally bankrupt and way beyond vanilla politics to deal with. Sometimes crises are necessary to progress I think. Federalism only works ok now because the civil war and civil rights battles are over.
I don't know that that logic has to apply everywhere, but something about fighting an unwinnable battle to exhaustion does get people to reassess what's really important in life I think. And I don't think it's ideology. My bias is people should relax on ideology & better to have a broken government & insufferable opposition to teach you how dumb it is than radicalizing it and making things worse. Hence the hidden advantages of dysfunction, crisis, and gridlock. Granted it doesn't always work out that way I think. Sometimes crisis just breeds resentment and more crisis for the next generation. =/
june gloom on 2/4/2014 at 10:57
I don't know if civil rights battles are over yet. I don't think they ever will be for a long. There's always going to be some demographic that keeps getting fucked over while a bunch of regressives do everything they can to shit on them and everyone else.
icemann on 2/4/2014 at 14:00
Second that.
Nowadays it's equal marriage rights for gay people that is the big thing. Though what would come after that I have no idea.
Perhaps better treatment and improved government programs for indigenous races within countries that were conquered / colonized many centuries earlier. For example in my country, most aborigines live in extremely terrible conditions where alcoholism, rape, bad housing etc are all the norm. Not good. That said, there has been several attempts to try and fix the issue though all have epic failed big time so far.
nemyax on 2/4/2014 at 14:48
Quote Posted by icemann
there has been several attempts to try and fix the issue though all have epic failed big time so far
Through whose fault did they fail?
