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> In this age, there is no longer any state needs to be larger than say, 1500 square km - about the size of a large county.

Assuming a rectangle of 30 by 50 kilometers, and no organized military for defense, it would take the Russians about 30-45 minutes to reintroduce the imperial subject experience on your proposed utopia.

The reason states are required are that other people are organized in states. Now I am guessing you are from the US, the standard of your living is only made possible, by millions of men and women working seriously to guarantee it, and thousands of nuclear weapons. Take either out of the equation, and your standard of living will very quickly become untenable.

Hell, the internet that you believe can solve all the problems, is only operational because hundreds of thousands of people are continuously working on it, many of them government employees.

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>Assuming a rectangle of 30 by 50 kilometers, and no organized military for defense, it would take the Russians about 30-45 minutes to reintroduce the imperial subject experience on your proposed utopia.

Lmao, which they will get around to after regaining and relosing the same Ukranian square kilometer 20 times for the next 12 months.,

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We need large nation-states to make the modern world possible. The internet isn't just bits; everything depends on stuff that has to be shipped by sea. It takes a hegemon like the US and its allies to keep the sea lanes open. Navies are super expensive and a collection of small states wouldn't be able to build ships that could operate around the world.

If anything, technology is making possible for states like Yemen and Iran to shut off chokepoints. It might take multiple powers working together to keep things open.

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>It takes a hegemon like the US and its allies to keep the sea lanes open

Sea Lanes Opened by the USA: 0 Sea Lanes Closed by US Interventions: 1

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This tally only makes sense if you believe history started 2 years ago. The US literally re-opened the Strait of Hormuz itself back in the 80s during the Tanker War, at the very least for Kuwaiti oil tankers during Operation Earnest Will.

The current administration clearly does not care about freedom of navigation operations, but every other post war administration made it a major priority and they are still being conducted in spite of the current cluster.

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>Operation Earnest Will.

Its crazy to not see that as the result of more US interventions in the middle east blowing up in their face, than actually any kind of goodwill mission.

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What happens when China or Russia decides to stay a massive empire and starts conquering your microstates? What happens when state A allows the dumping of pollution that flows into state B?
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>What happens when China or Russia decides to stay a massive empire and starts conquering your microstates?

Coordinated Defense pacts are already a thing. Like are you worried that these micro states wont want to join NATO?

And before you get weird, 5 + 5 + 5 is the same as 15. Theres no reason to imagine smaller militaries per capita.

>What happens when state A allows the dumping of pollution that flows into state B?

Man they might need to communicate on that one hey.

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So you propose to replace the nation states with corporate governments. Okay, two questions: who gets to make the laws, including the property laws? and who gets to enforce those laws?
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Given the vacuum left by pinhole-sized states, Vodafone could become the issuer of propaganda itself as it would have the airwaves and the power of a large state.
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Well, I suppose my argument does turn on the scope on which you consider each of these 10 points.

My presumption is that, as nation-states are deprecated, coordination between them will have to take the shape of sufficiently decentralized technology that the "networks have the ability to vet and ignore" portion becomes a local and voluntary process.

And - probably an area where reasonable people disagree - it's the (real or perceived) authority that makes it possible to "be used for evil"; if there is no badge and gun, and each message (broadly considered) is to be considered on its own merits (both for its truth and its persuasiveness), then I think that corporate propaganda just lands in the 'ignore' (or even 'spam') pile.

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You do understand that the communist party of China has very different ideas about networks, vetting and voluntary processes than you do right?
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> The internet solves every problem the nation-state purports to.

Nations organize themselves into states to protect and promote their interests, including their existence as cultural and ethnic groups, from competing states (and other dangers, e.g. natural disasters). A.k.a. politics.

I was not aware politics has been solved by the internet.

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>including their existence as cultural and ethnic groups

I mean if people want to have a distinct culture or ethnicity they will or will not as they desire.

If anything the history of the nation state is forcing 12 different ethnic groups into a single culture that only reflects part of their heritage. Look at Nazi Germany trying to suppress Bavarian culture as insufficiently German. Or the UK suppressing Welsh and Irish culture.

Nation States enforce a mono culture to build false unity, always has been.

>from competing states

Ukraine Iran and Afghanistan are really the only states that have done defense "Alone" in recent memory. Everyone else joins larger groups for defense. NATO for example. The Nation State isnt the headline defensive organism, and when it is, its generally a failure.

>Nations organize themselves into states to protect and promote their interests.

This is the closest to the truth, except it would be better put as

>Nations organize themselves into states to protect and promote the interests of the ruling party.

Always has been, ever since the 2 dominant forms of government were Palace Economies and Temple Economies. The goal was suppression and slavery of farmers to ensure the quality of life of the people in the cities, so they can build secondary and tertiary industries to enrich the Prince or Priest at the top of the pack.

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