Gradeup Magazine: Let's Speak Politics #6

By N Shiva Guru|Updated : November 8th, 2016

Q: What if there were no political borders between countries?

A: It is one thing to ask for a free movement of labour and goods, and another to say we have to wipe out borders of all kinds. When you wipe borders you are asking for a common world government.

Whose laws will you follow?

Any kind of authority needs a boundary. Think of this simple scenario. A guy commits murder and runs off to a distant country. Without political boundaries how will you bring that guy to justice?

Some of you would attempt to say, we will have an international police [a bigger Interpol] and have anyone committing crimes anywhere can be arrested anywhere.

There in lies the problem. What a crime is depends on a particular legal system. A crime in one place would not be a crime elsewhere. In Saudi Arabia being a gay is a crime, while marrying multiple women is not. If you don’t have any boundary with Saudi Arabia, what kind of laws will you have - yours or theirs?

How about having a world government that can manage? A world without open borders will need a single world government. That government will follow the laws of the majority. Who is the majority in the world? Is it the liberals of Sweden or the communists of China?

What economic system?

Will you follow capitalism, communism, socialism or some such combination? Economic systems are more like cuisines. Not everyone will like a particular combination. Will it be labour friendly or business friendly? Will it allow equal rights for women? Will it keep religion from the workplaces and Parliaments?

What options do you have if you don’t like?

Let’s say the whole world comes under the control of an Asian government [in a democracy that will be the case and same in a dictatorship]. What if you don’t like their laws and execution? Where will you immigrate to? How will you escape such a government? What if someone like Assad is the President of the World Republic and is casual about the use of poison gas on dissidents?


We need nations - a group of people who aspire for a particular legal system/political system/economic system/cultural system. Just as not everyone likes the same cuisine, not all of us like a common system.

For nations to exist, there needs to be political boundaries. Otherwise, the authority enforcing the legal/economic/political system cannot do anything.

Q: Is colonial rule bound to fail in the long run? Is there something inherently unsustainable about it?

A: The biggest problem with colonialism [and in bad M&As] is that the people who rule are quite disconnected from people being ruled. That makes them make big policy mistakes leading to large calamities. When such calamities occur, it will be easier for the locals to point to the elephant in the room - the outsider. Rebellions follow from that.

For instance, in British India none of the viceroys sent from Britain were born in India or have had any level of significant experience with India. And none had an intent to settle in India. Given the short term postings - they never bothered to understand India in detail and connect with its people. The viceroys and governor generals lived in fairly secluded, large estates - and disconnected from people’s emotions.

When those in power are disconnected from the subjects, they will not get the right data to make their decisions. This happens not just in the political world, but also in the corporate world. In fact, this one reason why many M&As fail too. The acquiring company treats the company they bought as their colony. This distances them from those doing the work and eventually make stupid decisions. When the acquirer makes a bad decision it rouses an already disgruntled workbase who will then rebel.

This is why colonialism is inherently unsustainable. If the colonial power doesn’t merge with the populace [like in India, Indonesia] they eventually face rebellion. If the colonial power becomes one with the populace [such as what happened in Canada and Australia] colonialism naturally vaporizes. In either case, colonialism is unsustainable.

Comments

write a comment

Follow us for latest updates