European Era: Do you support the creation of a United States of Europe?

[Deleted member 31133]

Not just a step too far. It was an idea born out of your fundamental misunderstanding of the concept of nationalism. Nationalism is, at its core, a question of how far the authority of a government extends. That's always a valid question, and it's the same question you're asking (also the same question which you can't understand your friend asking). You're just as much a nationalist as any other - it's just that your nationalism is for a nation that doesn't currently exist. That may help you see the difference between nationalism and jingoism more clearly.

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Possibly my understanding then.

Nationalism I thought is support for your own nation and its interests, but also to the exclusion and/or detriment of the interests of other nations.

jingoism is much more extreme. This, I thought was an extreme form of nationalism with a aggressive and sometimes warlike foreign policy.

 

[Patsy]

Nationalism wouldn't end with a USE. Why? Look at Ex-Yugoslavia. Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia - the majority of the southern slav countries were one big state for many years dating back to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia after WWI, but in the end war still broke out. The Ustaša & Četnici both were fucking big & being in the Federativna Narodna Republika Jugoslavija & later Socijalistička Federativna Republika Jugoslavija didn't change shit & ultimately just made them bigger. The SFRJ went to shit after Tito died & war broke out which turned into the largest massacre/genocide in Europe since WW2.

The countries wanted to be independent & in the end we had 4 fucking wars that destroyed so, so many lives & we can still see & feel the end result it all had. Nationalism doesn't go away if you group together every fucking country - even if they have a similar language & similar cultures. Don't even get me started on how this all pretty much started due to different ethnic groups & religions & nationalists of fucking course not being okay with it. Before you could actually try to do something like this you'd need to get rid of the nationalism in a fuckton of countries unless you want wars to break out further down the line & I quite frankly don't believe that's possible.

I might be biased, because I had a lot of family suffer while Yugoslavia existed & when the wars broke out, but yeah. Knowing in-depth the whole history of Yugoslavia I don't see this working well nowadays. I'm a socialist & I don't necessarily think this is bad on paper, but I know too well how awful this can end. Maybe it could work with a few countries like some Western Europe ones, but as soon as you add southern &/or eastern slavs you can forget about it working longterm without problems. Also, personally, I think it's too culturally diverse & stripping all countries of their cultures & ignoring their histories just to have them be a number is awful & just adds even more fuel to the fire.

 

[Yrch]

Yes I can totally see that working.
Poland will simply decide to separate church from state, give rights to LGBQT people and remove their national Identity.
Easy, everyone will do that.
Just like Turkey fixed their shit to join EU years ago....

No sorry this is just a dream scenario.
As much as I'd like to end nationalism and get rid of all that patriotic shit this won't work. Cultures and ethics are vastly different and just like in the US, the economical power is so far off between some countries.
Education system would have been to be reworked and unified etc.

This would end up in some more powerful states trying to find a middle ground solution and smaller states would have just do bow their head or don't join.
Then you have problems with nationalism within your USoE and with countries who don't participate, leading to even more problems.

 

[Kemono]

Sometime in the future it won't be possible to not unite imo. Maybe not every country from the european union but in light of climate change, millions of climate refugees, water shortages, rising industrial powerhouses like india, etc., many will unite to try to keept their status and wealth.

A divided europe will only get the scraps left from the bigger countries. As soon as we understand that happening it'll go fast.

Great britian will be the first showcase for a developed nation to go alone.

 

[Xando]

Who decides who sits on the council? Will each member state have one representative? Will a country/state that contributes more financially or in terms of soldiers to the army have a greater say?

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The commission president appoints them just like the other commissioners they have to be confirmed by parliament. The council is filled with a limited number of people (i'm thinking 3 or 5).

 

[ThereAreFourNaan]

they should bring back the Holy Roman Empire

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Fully in favour of bringing back the title of Prince Elector

 

[Kwigo]

It's barely working as the EU, and there's already enough xenophobia among our countries. That would just be 10 times worse.

 

[BAW]

That region 3 wine truly is something else!

 

[GS_Dan]

There are a few countries which shouldn't be in the EU (looking at Hungary) at this point, so probably not? If they were gone, sure. Nationalism is dumb, borders are dumb.

 

[Shelbyville Milhouse]

A defense council which reports to the commission.

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Things like combined German-Dutch regiments (just as an example) already exist, you just would build on that. There's also already plans for tighter integrated defence forces and Brexit might've actually helped with that (because the UK was very much against it).

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From an operational stand-point multi-national military organizations already exist today, so it's not exactly an alien concept.
From a political stand-point it would have to be a body with representatives for all member states. Also I imagine a state of war would have to be approved by the EU Parliament.

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Don't take this as a "not gonna work!", as I said I do support an EU army in theory. I just think there are interesting issues to discuss so I'm purposefully playing the Devil's Advocate here:

How is this council formed? We already have enough people iffy on "Brussel" and now a council, possibly made up of people you didn't vote or or people who aren't from your country are going to be in power of all the military? Do individual countries have a say in whether a part of that army is stationed in it's cities? If not, how are you going to sell this to people? If so, does every country have a vote and do all those votes weigh the same?

The idea that somebody is going to use an EU military to take over Europe is obviously ridiculous but that won't stop people from saying it would happen. I mean, Brexit happened. So you can't just sell this to people with facts and logic.

 

[FliX]

Unequivocally yes.
A federal system in which not everything is centralized. Give regions more say and just cut out the nation state level.

 

[Reckheim]

United states of America has no nationalism and right wing populism. Your logic makes sense.

 

[Deleted member 8852]

Changing countries to numbered regions to squash out nationalism is literally the setup of Code Geass, come on now lol.

 

[NekoNeko]

in a perfect world where everybody would get along? sure.

in the world we live in now? it would be a disaster.

 

[Patapuf]

I addressed this in my OP.

Rather than calling the new states by their previous country names, you would just call them numbered regions. For example, the country formally known as France would be region 3. England region 14 etc.

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A state in my country that has only about 10k inhabitants fused all it's town and villages into 4 administrative entities called "west, east" etc.

This was probably a necessary step because it was becoming difficult to fill all positions in the smaller political entities.

However the people living in this state hate this solution because there is absolutely no connection to these abstract entities anymore. Political participation is way down. There's fewer people doing voluntary work. A lot of smaller community stuff was lost.

tl.dr., you can't just erase the history of a place, even if it might be administratively convenient to do so.

 

[Deleted member 31133]

Great britian will be the first showcase for a developed nation to go alone.

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Slightly off topic, but I have a prediction that Brexit will fail. The economic damage will be so great that we'll have no choice but to rejoin the EU.

Assuming we're allowed back in that is.

 

[Xando]

Slightly off topic, but I have a prediction that Brexit will fail. The economic damage will be so great that we'll have no choice but to rejoin the EU.

Assuming we're allowed back in that is.

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UK rejoining won't happen unless they take the euro.

 

[Deleted member 2328]

Don't take this as a "not gonna work!", as I said I do support an EU army in theory. I just think there are interesting issues to discuss so I'm purposefully playing the Devil's Advocate here:

How is this council formed? We already have enough people iffy on "Brussel" and now a council, possibly made up of people you didn't vote or or people who aren't from your country are going to be in power of all the military? Do individual countries have a say in whether a part of that army is stationed in it's cities? If not, how are you going to sell this to people? If so, does every country have a vote and do all those votes weigh the same?

The idea that somebody is going to use an EU military to take over Europe is obviously ridiculous but that won't stop people from saying it would happen. I mean, Brexit happened. So you can't just sell this to people with facts and logic.

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The whole argument about "unelected" people in Brussels is bollocks, specially when comprared to what happens in most national governments. I don't see many people directly electing their defense minister. At least the Comission is heavily vetted by the EU Parliament which is directly elected.
You seem to forget that a lot of EU countries are already NATO members, so foreign military exercises and bases are not exactly news. You talk about selling the idea to then people, the just ask the countries in Baltics where Russia keeps playing war games right behind the border. Actually that's where the need for the EU battle-groups initiative came from.

 

[Deleted member 31133]

Changing countries to numbered regions to squash out nationalism is literally the setup of Code Geass, come on now lol.

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No lies.

I've never heard of Code Geass until now.

Is it based on a future utopia where the world is united into numbered regions? I'll guess now just by judging from that one picture.

 

[Onyar]

Some way or another it will happen, because if not we will not economically/sovereignty survive. That will require a lot of struggles for sure, but it's hard to understand the future of european countries wihout some kind of union between them.

 

[Shelbyville Milhouse]

The whole argument about "unelected" people in Brussels is bollocks, specially when comprared to what happens in most national governments. I don't see many people directly electing their defense minister. At least the Comission is heavily vetted by the EU Parliament.

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It is complete BS but that doesn't mean it wouldn't be brought up over and over again.

 

[Deleted member 7051]

It'd never actually work since it would require each country essentially gives up its autonomy and our countries are all far too old and far too proud to do that, but the concept is neat.

The only problem is the United States of America doesn't work (there are so many problems with infrastructure and government it's insane) and there's no guarantee a United States of Europe would fare any better since a lot of countries would have to give up their own carefully designed systems for whatever the United States of Europe decides every country should be doing.

I can't imagine folks here in the UK would be too happy to find out we have to drop the NHS for an even more poorly funded version implemented across Europe, y'know?

 

[Deleted member 8852]

No lies.

I've never heard of Code Geass until now.

Is it based on a future utopia where the world is united into numbered regions? I'll guess now just by judging from that one picture.

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No sadly it's based on imperial conquest and subjugation of countries for the glory of the great Britannian empire.

 

[asd202]

There are way too big disparities between countries for this to work.

 

[Javier23]

Maybe numbered regions was a step too far, but it was just an idea I had to end nationalism.

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If you are not trolling, then I assume you are reasonable enough to see how this is supervillain-tier thinking. "I know! I'm going to end all this democratic squabbling by taking over parliament". Like, I swear we had this in some Metal Gear game where the bad dude thought he could end hatred among nations by erasing every language from existence except for English.

You don't end ultranationalism by scrubbing off national identities or shitting in our collective history. I want further integration for Europe, but nobody wants their countries to be replaced by something else entirely, specially not an artificial construct helmed by a bureaucratic behemoth. Your plan is giving Brexiters night terrors, OP.

 

[SephiZack]

Do I support it? Yes.
Do I think it will ever work? No.

 

[Deleted member 31133]

UK rejoining won't happen unless they take the euro.

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I'm fine with that. Brexit may mean we have little choice to accept what ever terms of rejoining are offered.

 

[Astandahl]

Absolutely not. The EU is already a clusterfuck.

 

[Deleted member 2328]

It'd never actually work since it would require each country essentially gives up its autonomy and our countries are all far too old and far too proud to do that, but the concept is neat.

The only problem is the United States of America doesn't work (there are so many problems with infrastructure and government it's insane) and there's no guarantee a United States of Europe would fare any better since a lot of countries would have to give up their own carefully designed systems for whatever the United States of Europe decides every country should be doing.

I can't imagine folks here in the UK would be too happy to find out we have to drop the NHS for an even more poorly funded version implemented across Europe, y'know?

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It would be necessary to define what is the competence of the member-state and what is competence of the federal government. In response to your example I can give you the example of Germany, a federal nation where health policy is largely the competence of each state.

 

[ItsBobbyDarin]

I addressed this in my OP.

Rather than calling the new states by their previous country names, you would just call them numbered regions. For example, the country formally known as France would be region 3. England region 14 etc.

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Haha ok. I'm from state 4, how about you baby?

I would love it, but Brexit showed us that the elderly want to keep the status quo.

 

[Deleted member 9932]

Strong no.

 

[Klebby]

With the current structure of the eu I don't think anyone but the germans would support such a thing.
an eu army would be great, but such a thing wouldn't require a united states of europe

 

[Deleted member 2328]

Absolutely not. The EU is already a clusterfuck.

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You could argue that "is a clusterfuck" because a lot of decisions require unanimity between 27 members in the EU Council. If the EU Council functioned more in a similar way to a Senate where different tiers of majority votes are required, I guarantee things would be much more expedite. No Poland or Hungary having eachother's backs when it comes to shit politics, it would be worth it just for that.

 

[nekkid]

I addressed this in my OP.

Rather than calling the new states by their previous country names, you would just call them numbered regions. For example, the country formally known as France would be region 3. England region 14 etc.

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Hell, just call them districts and be done with it.

 

[Video Kojima]

Depends on which countries participate.

France,benelux, germany,nordics, spain and portugal would be the dream.

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This.
We have a lot of fascists states living off our taxes and always undermining efforts. They should be excluded. It's why I am somewhat glad the UK has left.

 

[deadmonkeyuk]

UNITED KINGDOM HAS LEFT THE CHAT

 

[Deleted member 31133]

If you are not trolling, then I assume you are reasonable enough to see how this is supervillain-tier thinking. "I know! I'm going to end all this democratic squabbling by taking over parliament". Like, I swear we had this in some Metal Gear game where the bad dude thought he could end hatred among nations by erasing every language from existence except for English.

You don't end ultranationalism by scrubbing off national identities or shitting in our collective history. I want further integration for Europe, but nobody wants their countries to be replaced by something else entirely, specially not an artificial construct helmed by a bureaucratic behemoth. Your plan is giving Brexiters night terrors, OP.

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No it's not a troll, but clearly the idea is so far out there that it makes it appearing I'm pulling everyone's legs.

Sometimes, we need to make sacrifices for the greater good. You talk about scrubbing off national Identity, but that makes it seem like some cheap B-movie evil plot. It has happened throughout history where smaller kingdoms or nations have been sacrificed to combine with others to form a bigger state.

The idea isn't that far fetched.

 

[Deleted member 31133]

Absolutely not. The EU is already a clusterfuck.

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Maybe because the EU is divided between 27 member states. Unification of the states would fix a lot of problems with the current EU model.

 

[Midas]

more chance of another Balkanization of Europe

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Yeah, that's my view of it as well. Well, maybe not of existing countries but with almost dictatorship going on in some countries - I can see EU being a thing of the past in a decade or so.

 

[Sunfyre]

I hope for it, and I support it.

 

[Joni]

Just like Turkey fixed their shit to join EU years ago....

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That fails to take into account that Turkey did improve certain stuff, or didn't worsen in other aspects because of the idea that EU joining would be possible. They should just never have believed the UK's lies in that they had a chance to join.

 

[Javier23]

The idea isn't that far fetched.

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Oh, but it is, and it is ignorant and a fundamental misunderstanding of what the EU is. No one is literally letting themselves be swallowed up as a sacrifice of sorts, and if we are not doing this on a voluntary basis then this is a whole other monster. The EU was always about nations coming together, not sacrificing themselves at the altar of Europe. Experiments in recent history to integrate other peoples by making them abandon what defines them have all ended as horribly as anyone could have expected.

 

[Deleted member 7051]

It would be necessary to define what is the competence of the member-state and what is competence of the federal government. In response to your example I can give you the example of Germany, a federal nation where health policy is largely the competence of each state.

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The thing is, Germany wouldn't have that any more either. It would become the "member state" and the government of the United States of Europe would be the new "federal government".

And that federal government would not leave something important like healthcare to the individual states because you'd have some countries with national healthcare and others without, which kinda defeats the purpose of a united Europe. You couldn't let countries with their own NHS keep it while others got an EHS (European Health Service) either because those poorer countries will rightfully ask why their healthcare standards are lower.

So the only way it would really work is to make an EHS for all the member states, that each country helps pay for - except, as I said, those richer countries with better healthcare aren't going to like losing it and still paying more to Europe just so other, poorer countries, can get access to the same EHS as everyone else.

Again, it would be like America - where richer states are paying more into the country than poorer ones and getting less out of it, too. The only reason a system as bollocksed up as that even flies in America is because everyone was already signed up long before it went bad.

Good luck convincing richer European countries to give up their autonomy and accept a lower quality of life so that they can support the poorer countries of the United States of Europe.

The only reason the European Union works is because its non-invasive. Contrary to popular belief, it doesn't actually tell countries what they can and cannot do and only really exists to establish standards and procedures for smooth cooperation between European countries.

 

[John Dunbar]

i want another kalmar union.

 

[Deleted member 31133]

Oh, but it is, and it is ignorant and a fundamental misunderstanding of what the EU is. No one is literally letting themselves be swallowed up as a sacrifice of sorts, and if we are not doing this on a voluntary basis then this is a whole other monster. The EU was always about nations coming together, not sacrificing themselves at the altar of Europe. Experiments in recent history to integrate other peoples by making them abandon what defines them have all ended as horribly as anyone could have expected.

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You make it sound like some evil plot.

Nobody is being swallowed up by force. It would be a gradual change as a way to promote European harmony and cooperation.

 

[Shodan14]

This is not a yes/no question, sorry.

Also if you think federation solves nationalism you may want to have a look at Austria-Hungary or Yugoslavia.

 

[Rangerx]

I support a federal Europe absolutely.

 

[Pluto]

A USE consisting of the current 27 EU members? Hell no!

A political union between Germany, France, Benelux, Ireland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Austria ... sure, I can see that, Scotland can join too if they ditch the rest of the UK.

 

[Reckheim]

You make it sound like some evil plot.

Nobody is being swallowed up by force. It would be a gradual change as a way to promote European harmony and cooperation.

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what would happen if some EU countries refused to join the union. Would you just leave them out? I can safely assume half the countries would not join (probably more)

the only way you are creating this 'union' is by force.

 

[Ac30]

This is not a yes/no question, sorry.

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Yeah, this is way too complex of a question to answer with a simple yes/no. Would I expand the EU's fiscal capabilities? Absolutely, and I would give it far more leeway to set independent foreign policy objectives, but a proper federation, no thanks. We already have the European equivalent of Wisconsin in Hungary and I don't want them having a say in our domestic politics.