Korean Job Discussion Forums

[mises]

[Ya-ta Boy]

alJazeera is reporting 41 killed by the gov't in Yemen. At some point, events there are going to take first place over Libya and Bahrain in the media.

[bucheon bum]

Congrats to the UN for passing the no-fly zone resolution. Congrats to France for stepping up to the plate.

This is not 2003 by a long stretch. I don't know if the end result will be positive but at least the world is TRYING to stop some homicidal maniac from annihilating thousands of his country men.

[bucheon bum]

I'm presently watching a news story on Al Jazeera about protests in 3 Syrian cities, a few protesters killed.

[Madigan]

[Fox]

[stilicho25]

I think there are some benefits to having nations based on one ethnicity. Most of us have lived in Korea, Japan, or both, and witnessed the positive aspects of a society formed around a core ethnic group. It seems to me that people seem to have much easier time cooperating for the public good if they believe that the people around them are the same "tribe" as they are.

I am not saying I would want the US to copy this, as it would be an awful mess, but I wish we could use culture in the same way that Japan uses ethnicity to create a cooperative society. Make "American" mean a sort of independent hard working, intellectual pragmatist, and then use the public schools and welfare to reward behavior that conforms to this, and punish behavior that doesn't.

At the moment it looks to me like we are forced to cooperate by gov institutions, which in the long run is poisonous. If bring the legitimacy of the gov into question, and creates a toxic atmosphere around whatever public good they are trying to achieve.

[Fox]

[stilicho25]

True, but I think at this point that the reasons we go to war seem completely random. We have no reason to back either side in Libya. On the other hand, we do have a reason to intervene in Bahrain. Its a client state, backed by other client states, and yet It seems to able kill it's own citizens with impunity.

However arbitrary ethnic affiliation is as binding agent, and the basing of a foreign policy on that, It can't be any more so then what we have now, which to me almost seems like just emotional responses to whatever horror is on the TV.

Also, did anyone read the Andrew Sullivan piece about Obama not consulting congress? At least Bush pretended that mattered.

[Fox]

[stilicho25]

Hey Fox, do you mean that its impossible to do so, or that it would be as or more counterproductive than what we are doing now?

I would argue that there have been and are today examples of ethnic solidarity that are expressed in foreign policy. How about the "Slav question" that has been a sore point for Russia in the last 150 or so years. From Tolstoy to the latest conflict, it seems that Russia bases at least part of its foreign policy on protection of Serbia and other Slavic nations. Would you consider this ethno-nationalism?

I guess that could be an ideology of "slav protection" but how is that different from what Mises is saying?

[Menino80]

Ask a Pole how they feel about their Russian brethren. Or a Ukrainian.


Serbia was a checkerboard away from Russia when it was great gaming with Austria. It was balance of power clothed in nationalist rhetoric.

Stalin hated Tito when it became apparent that he wouldnt' play ball. Neither Tito's Communism nor Slavunism spared him.

[Fox]

[Menino80]

The thing is there are almost no countries on earth that are ethnically inhomogeneous and have more than 8 million people. Korea and Japan are quite unique in this regard, with maybe Poland being another example. Then there are the various post Hapsburg and USSR satellites which have been buffer states for most of their existence and have not and will not pursue robust foreign policies.

Also, Poland is a good example as a country that has been kicked around for hundreds of years but still manages not to have a massive chip on its shoulder at all times about everything cultural.

[caniff]