Are Smaller Countries The Future Of Better Governance?

in life •  8 years ago 

Are Smaller Countries The Future Of Better Governance?

Gone are the days of massive empires spanning multiple continents and here are the days of independent countries governing themselves, and as time goes by the trend seems to show an increase in sovereign territories. With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the liberation of other areas from colonialist rule in the 20th century, the number of sovereign states has nearly doubled. There are many flaws with large land masses being ruled by a single government, which makes me believe that as we continue into the future, we will see more and more sovereign states come into existence. I also believe that this future is a brighter one and a way to better facilitate the wants and needs of a country’s people.

Vastly Different People With Different Beliefs

The government’s only job in my opinion is to act on the wants and needs of the people it oversees and in current large countries like the United States or China, people can be so different that catering to everyone’s needs is impossible. Instead of holding control over one large mass of land, perhaps countries like the US and China would be better divided into different sovereign states that oversee the best interest of smaller and more manageable populations. In the US for example, I live in New York and if I hop on a plane and head south west for 3 hours and land in Texas, the beliefs ideologies and opinions are almost opposite of mine. Sure we have states that do have some amount of power, but the federal government overseeing the states have a large amount of power and influence on how a state acts. Smaller homogenous countries (in ideals not necessarily race) have quality of life much higher than bigger diverse countries mainly because they can directly manage a group of people who for the most part have similar concerns and want similar outcomes.

The Current Voting System In Many Democracies Leaves Half Of The Country Dissatisfied

In the US we have two massive parties that over and over fight for control of our government while a third party almost never has a chance. The voting system in the US is designed in a way that will always make people vote either Democrat or Republican because people settle instead of voting a third party because they feel like they wasted their vote. Either the voting system needs to be changed, which will never happen because the two parties like having dominant control, or smaller sovereign states could be created to lump together areas with similar beliefs and ways of life to vote in a way that will represent their needs better. By the way, YouTuber CCP grey does a fantastic video about how the voting system could be improved which I will link here if you have never seen it.

Smaller Countries Might Have Better Control Over Finances

When dealing with numbers on a much smaller scale, things become much easier to figure out, which in my opinion is a large part of the reason many governments overleverage themselves and pass on debt to the next generation. When a government decides to tack on another billion dollars to programs that don’t need extra funding and sometimes say they don’t need the extra funding, “cough” Armed Forces “cough” it doesn’t seem like much in the grand scheme of things because the debt is so high already. This way of thinking has raised world public debt to astronomical levels, admittedly even in smaller countries. However, there is potential for smaller countries to choose a government that does a better job with balancing the budget and has control of their own Federal Bank. We are already moving towards a time of all digital money, so controlling the supply if needed will be easier than ever. Rather than guessing in the dark, we will be able to see the effects in real time. Managing this on a massive scale with a large government is going to be impossible. Smaller countries and governments would have a much easier time dealing with and controlling the finances of a country that way. Of course there are many other potential factors that could takes place, but in my opinion if the government that is creating a budget is more involved and knows the way of life of all of their people and what they want, our deficits would never be as high as they are today.

Although I’m sure many people are against a large amount of small countries over large ones, there are definitely benefits to moving in that direction. I don’t think a world without a government is possible in all reality, not that it can’t be done, just that it won’t be done out of fear. However I think that smaller and better managed governments with smaller populations to manage would be much more successful in the long run. As always, what are your opinions on the topic?

-Calaber24p

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Looks at Switzerland. They realized centuries ago what EU struggles to do now. Excellent post.

Agreed, Switzerland has always stuck to a specialization, stayed out of international affairs other than making trade deals, and their citizens have been rewarded for it.

@calaber24p - very well written, upvoted, although I disgree.

If we look at economic side of this, small country's economy cannot survive unless it relies on export. If it is really small then it relies both on import and export...and then it takes its own niche in global trade system.

Not even mentioning that in this scenario you become COMPLETELY dependent, this can only function as long as system functions properly.

You don't provide examples, which exactly small countries have better quality, but I can easily explain for the paid for this quality.

I agree each small country would have to specialize, but there can be good rewards in that. Countries that come to mind are Liechtenstein, Switzerland,Luxembourg all countries with extremely high gdp per capita and small populations.

Yes, but it was possible in the environment of constant money printing and these countries chose to be safe heavens for rich individuals' wealth.

Money printing will stop very soon (in fact, it already stopped in the US) and very soon all these countries will experience significant decrease in their income.

Switzerland actually has a large manufacturing base, larger than banking.

Money printing will stop very soon (in fact, it already stopped in the US) and very soon all these countries will experience significant decrease in their income.

Money printing will never stop, it is one of the basic fundamentals of Keynesian Economics. The US hasnt stopped money printing, they have just stopped QE. Income usually never goes down either, only real income which is inflation adjusted. These small countries that are specialized are most likely only going to be affected because of countries they trade with importing less, but for the most part won't see as big of a hit to their economy as other European nations are.

To some degree we have a test case going on here in the UK since we voted to separate from the EU..It will be interesting to see how it plays out here. Personally I think there is a case for world government and world police. World gvt. could stamp down on Assad in Syria and world police could stamp down on people traffickers exploiting the refugee situation.

Yeah it should be interesting, although smaller populations would need to rely on good trade deals and better international relations than the UK currently has, but will be interesting nonetheless.

You make some interesting points there... I personally am not much into the whole country thing. I dislike borders as well lol.
As things are, the best is to have regional powers with a high degree of independence from the state. In my country, which is a small one, regionalization is mostly obsolete. The power and decision making is all concentrated in the capital. Which ends up being bad to the population, as you say.. Kudos, and following!

Thank you! What country do you live in if you dont mind me asking?

I live in Portugal =)

@calaber24p Upvoted and followed! This is a great post and was chosen to feature on the front page of today's 'Steem Talk' edition: https://steemit.com/news/@steemtalk/steem-talk-your-daily-best-of-steemit-digital-newspaper-wed-evening-edition-22

I think you should tell the governments what they should be doing by acting on what there people want and not what's best for themselfs.

If only we lived in a perfect world :)

Wishful thinking :)

It has definitely been the history of it so far and by far. Namaste :)

this is a nice post. interesting and i enjoy reading. upvoted

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I think a global civilizaiton is coming into being and that one day there will be one planetary system of government and that all of Humanity will put cultural and societal differences aside and come together in love, harmoney, peace and togetherness to enhance the human condition and travel to the stars. :)

I don't think smaller countries is the answer. Instead of just dividing ourselves into us vs them we need to learn to get a long. Separating humanity into countries based on their ideals is just going to polarize the ideals and make them more extreme. Exposure to more ideas and differing view points is good and makes people question what they previous thought.

Yes! Yes! Yes!~ This goes right along with the posts I have been making.
Decentralized Collectivism & The Symbiosis Project for those who are interested in the topic.

I always thought, if a sub-national region—like the US South or Kurds in the Middle East—wants autonomy they should have it! Now, the nation might stipulate they won't take in refugees if the new country becomes a failed state, or something like that. But, I just never understood how people can think it moral to allow a country to force people to be a part of it. Can you imagine if a parent used force to keep their child in their house throughout adulthood? People would be shocked and appalled.

Anyway, good post! Hope to see more like this. 😄