World Government for Earth

[Never wrong People]

World Government - goals and why it would be great.

All laws are more powerful the local laws, a good way of thinking of it is like the relationship of US federal government to state governments.
Power of the purse, levy taxes and spend money
Relegation will balance the play field to not undermine the economy - to prevent bubbles in the economy and cause real growth
No tariffs - free trade for all
One currency - so simple
No social or moral or religion issues
World police force enforces all laws including human rights, has power to go anywhere to enforce laws about rights and private protection are still around (right to trial and other protections)
Crime can be hunted everywhere - can not run from the cops to criminals
Global warning action can be taken if wanted
State sovereignty does not exist

[Vojvodina-Nihon]

Wrong forum. Find a mod to move it to General.

[Bluth Corporation]

All laws are more powerful the local laws

In the past 150 years, governments have become more repressive and more destructive than ever before--and you want to make government even powerful, and put a single government in control of the entire world with no practically effective checks on its power to wreak havoc on the sanctity of individual sovereignty?

Relegation will balance the play field to not undermine the economy - to prevent bubbles in the economy and cause real growth

By and large, economy-specific regulation (as opposed to laws against things such as murder, theft, vandalism, fraud, etc. which apply to businesses and individuals alike) destabilizes the economy and inhibits growth because it makes any venture riskier, and forcing businesses to jump through bureaucratic hoops that don't actually contribute to production is obviously more inefficient than not forcing it.

No tariffs - free trade for all

Actually a valid argument.

One currency - so simple

Reasonable, though

No social or moral or religion issues

OK, this is the biggest fallacy of them all. World government would lead to Balkanization of the whole world.

People don't fight other people because they're from other countries. People fight other people because they don't like each other, regardless of how sane those reasons might be. World government would be Yugoslavia writ large. Putting Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, Albanians, Slovenes, and others under a single government didn't cause them to magically stop fighting each other; world government would be the same thing on a global scale.

Frankly, ethnic identity is bunk. There is only the individual. But there are enough people who don't realize this to create massive problems for the rest of us if they're forced to all live together under one single, worldwide, ultra-generic state. It'd be disastrous.

World police force enforces all laws including human rights, has power to go anywhere to enforce laws civil rights and private protection are still around (right to trial and other protections)

Crime can be hunted everywhere - can not run from the cops

I fail to see how a world where even the theoretical possibility of escaping an unjust and oppressive and illegitimate law by leaving the country and going somewhere where that law does not exist would be better than a world where that possibility does exist.

Global warning action can be taken if wanted

Governments are not the best mechanism to deal with this problem. Climate change of any sort is only bad to the extent that it adversely affects human activity, and no centralized monolithic entity can possibly ever hope to have the information-aggregation and information-processing capacity: first, to determine whether or not a given event's net effect on human activity is positive or negative; second, if it is negative to discover just how negative; and third, how to counter it without making the negative effect on human activity greater than it already is.

State sovereignty does not exist

How is a world government not a state? The only legitimate kind of sovereignty is individual sovereignty, anyway, and I fail to see how world government would be an improvement on this.

[Parthenon]

I am going to be completely honest, this went from a bad thread to a terrible thread when I noticed mention of global warming....

Every empire in history has failed for two reasons, efficiency and identity. Governing 6 billion people is impossible if there is no common identity and a lack of efficiency in administration.

[Bavin]

Parthenon said
Governing 6 billion people is impossible if there is no common identity and a lack of efficiency in administration.

There is a common identity: humanity, and the greater good
It would be inefficient as hell. It is a good idea, but need serious work. How about a global senate, like the UN, but with actual power. All nations conform, or are shunned. All nations contribute to a single military/peacekeeping force. All nations still theoretically keep their sovereignty, like states in the US

[Milks Empire]

They tried something like this, but on a smaller scale, many times throughout history. I believe some of the best known were called the Hellenistic Empire, the Roman Empire, the Islamic Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Kalmar Union, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics... did I miss any? But at any rate, you tell me... are any of these still around today?

[Cameroi]

the choice is not whether or not we'll have one, but what kind do we want.

do we want a world dictated by the selfconcerned interests of one or a handful of the most powerful sovereignties, in truth, of the paracriminal economic interests that actually pull their puppet strings,

or do we want an unbiased means of protecting real people, places and things, from the thoughtless destructiveness of those same myopic interests, hiding themselves behind pretensions of patriotic ideology and self ritious religiosity?

[Romanar]

the choice is not whether or not we'll have one, but what kind do we want.

do we want a world dictated by the selfconcerned interests of one or a handful of the most powerful sovereignties, in truth, of the paracriminal economic interests that actually pull their puppet strings,

or do we want an unbiased means of protecting real people, places and things, from the thoughtless destructiveness of those same myopic interests, hiding themselves behind pretensions of patriotic ideology and self ritious religiosity?

It's not which kind we want, but which kind we would get. Which kind of local/national governments have we gotten in the past?

[Bluth Corporation]

They tried something like this, but on a smaller scale, many times throughout history. I believe some of the best known were called the Hellenistic Empire, the Roman Empire, the Islamic Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Kalmar Union, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics... did I miss any? But at any rate, you tell me... are any of these still around today?

I said that already

[Grays Harbor]

No social or moral or religion issues

OK, this is the biggest fallacy of them all. World government would lead to Balkanization of the whole world.

People don't fight other people because they're from other countries. People fight other people because they don't like each other, regardless of how sane those reasons might be. World government would be Yugoslavia writ large. Putting Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, Albanians, Slovenes, and others under a single government didn't cause them to magically stop fighting each other; world government would be the same thing on a global scale.

now, now. its not nice to confuse dreamy idealogues with rude things like facts. tsk tsk.

and I agree. Regionalism and factionalism would not disappear just because a handful of ivory tower theorists wish it so.

[Reunified Romania]

Civil World War waiting to happen.

[Gewinny]

Honestly, I think that would be a horrible idea unless we were a species with a hive mind. There's too much potential for it to become corrupt and not enough chance of the people being able to overthrow such a hulking mass of government. Of course, this also depends on the type of government. There's no way anything could please everyone - if it was a democracy-type set up, trying to get a unanimous vote would be absurd but if the majority took the vote minorities would be absolutely crushed out, and I think it would be difficult to enforce - or even pass - any kind of legislation that could stop that. I think such a system would ultimately degenerate into some kind of dictatorship.

Furthermore, in my opinion such a government would eventually break off into thousands of sub-governments - 'countries', you could call them - anyway. Like-minded people would gravitate to each other and form their own groups. Even if such groups weren't recognized by the government, they would fight each other nonetheless over opposing beliefs and simple hatred, so a worldwide system would do little or nothing to end war or conflict of any kind - in fact, in my opinion it might even increase them as group after group tried to disconnect themselves from the other groups, ultimately leading to a world war on an incredible scale.

Basically, I think it would cause more problems than it would solve (not to mention that it would be unrealistically difficult to achieve in the first place).

[Reunified Romania]

Basically, the Human has a very powerful sense of individualism. He already doesn't like being told what to do, imagine the chances of a gigantic global government trying to tell 10 billion people what to do. It's a pressure cooking waiting for the right moment to explode.

[Sanctus-Terra]

World Government - goals and why it would be great.

All laws are more powerful the local laws
Power of the purse, levy taxes and spend money
Relegation will balance the play field to not undermine the economy - to prevent bubbles in the economy and cause real growth
No tariffs - free trade for all
One currency - so simple
No social or moral or religion issues
World police force enforces all laws including human rights, has power to go anywhere to enforce laws civil rights and private protection are still around (right to trial and other protections)
Crime can be hunted everywhere - can not run from the cops
Global warning action can be taken if wanted
State sovereignty does not exist

No. World Government would quickly be taken down if it was ever put into effect. We have different countries because: If you don't like how one system of government works, you can move to a different country for a (hopefully) better life.

[Never wrong People]

I would counter that some issues need to be deal with on a global level like the tracking down of criminals.
This thread is not for how the government would be set up. (in theory it could be anything)

[Never wrong People]

By and large, economy-specific regulation (as opposed to laws against things such as murder, theft, vandalism, fraud, etc. which apply to businesses and individuals alike) destabilizes the economy and inhibits growth because it makes any venture riskier, and forcing businesses to jump through bureaucratic hoops that don't actually contribute to production is obviously more inefficient than not forcing it.

It would be some regulation, but not giant amount.
A good sense of the regulation would be around the amount the US had under GWB.

[Northwest Slobovia]

World Government - goals and why it would be great.

All laws are more powerful the local laws

Please think very hard about this. Assume some form of representative democracy -- I can't imagine running the world by direct democracy. If votes are allocated by population, just the top five largest countries (China, India, US, Indonesia, and Brazil, in order) voting en bloc could force everybody else to do what they wanted. By "one country, one vote", some arrangement of tiny countries could inflict their will on the vast majority. A two-chamber system like the US would probably lead to the some of the Big Eleven (populations fall really quickly after that) allying with whoever is convenient to get their way.

Power of the purse, levy taxes and spend money

So the poor countries can legally rob the rich ones, I suppose. Ain't gonna happen.

Relegation will balance the play field to not undermine the economy - to prevent bubbles in the economy and cause real growth
No tariffs - free trade for all
One currency - so simple

This treats the world economy as a single unit, w/o any ability to adjust to local conditions. That barely works now for the large countries (both EU and US states slip into recession while other states have booms), so scaling it up will make those problems worse.

As a federalist at heart (note small "f"), I have just four words for this proposal: "absolute power corrupts absolutely". For the same reason, I see no reason to have a world government with any more power than just giving INTERPOL and the ICC some teeth.

[O-Seventon]

This is the UN's goal

[DrunkenDove]

Please think very hard about this. Assume some form of representative democracy -- I can't imagine running the world by direct democracy. If votes are allocated by population, just the top five largest countries (China, India, US, Indonesia, and Brazil, in order) voting en bloc could force everybody else to do what they wanted. By "one country, one vote", some arrangement of tiny countries could inflict their will on the vast majority. A two-chamber system like the US would probably lead to the some of the Big Eleven (populations fall really quickly after that) allying with whoever is convenient to get their way.

The same could be said of all religions of all democracies. Just because it happens on a world scale doesn't mean that people from China are going to gang up on the people from Pakisitan any more than the people of Cornwall gang up on the people of Bath

So the poor countries can legally rob the rich ones, I suppose. Ain't gonna happen.

Already happens, and no one is that shook up about it. If anything, a world government would cut down on this kind of looting by giving the exploited a voice.

This treats the world economy as a single unit, w/o any ability to adjust to local conditions. That barely works now for the large countries (both EU and US states slip into recession while other states have booms), so scaling it up will make those problems worse.

Agreed. There must be some for of economic hegemony for a single currency to work.

As a federalist at heart (note small "f"), I have just four words for this proposal: "absolute power corrupts absolutely". For the same reason, I see no reason to have a world government with any more power than just giving INTERPOL and the ICC some teeth.

The idea that a world government would be dangerous because it's just too powerful just doesn't ignores the current power of local governments. Sure, if a dictator got hold on power we'd all be fucked, but the same is true of the current set-up. If a dictator got a hold on power in the US today, there's nothing that any other country would do to stop it. Countries go war for reasons of realpolitik, not to police the world into freedom.

[DrunkenDove]

This is the UN's goal

No it isn't. If it was, why would the US and China be in the driving seat? Both countries are notoriously independent and wholly suspicious of international organizations and muli-lateral efforts.

[Ordo Drakul]

The US Constitution holds one of the best templates for a one-world government, though it's a largely ignored document these days...

[Southern Bred People]

like to see them try to take my guns!!

[Southern Bred People]

Basically, the Human has a very powerful sense of individualism. He already doesn't like being told what to do, imagine the chances of a gigantic global government trying to tell 10 billion people what to do. It's a pressure cooking waiting for the right moment to explode.

EXACTLY!!!

[Zavizar]

They tried something like this, but on a smaller scale, many times throughout history. I believe some of the best known were called the Hellenistic Empire, the Roman Empire, the Islamic Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Kalmar Union, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics... did I miss any? But at any rate, you tell me... are any of these still around today?

Don't forget the Nazi German "Empire"!

I'm not really in support of government to begin with because either way you look at it government will always be corrupt.

[Milks Empire]

They tried something like this, but on a smaller scale, many times throughout history. I believe some of the best known were called the Hellenistic Empire, the Roman Empire, the Islamic Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Kalmar Union, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics... did I miss any? But at any rate, you tell me... are any of these still around today?

Don't forget the Nazi German "Empire"!

I'm not really in support of government to begin with because either way you look at it government will always be corrupt.

Except Hitler wasn't trying to create an empire with people from multiple ethnicities. He was out to eradicate pretty much everyone but the Nordic "Aryan" people. Imagine his shock if he would have run into the real Aryans in India...