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The scope and intensity of governments have clearly increased over the centuries, as have the size of firms. We’ve had some near global empires in the last few centuries, some serious attempts at world domination, and we now coordinate more via the United Nations and international treaties.
So it seems to me quite likely that we will soon try a stronger world government. And since a world government has no outside threats, it could more easily preserve itself, even if harmful. So we risk locking in a harmful world government, little interested in improving that situation.
On the other hand, we expect a world government to suffer especially from the empire bias, more than most other organizations. So a world government may well over-reach, promising more than it can deliver, and making people visibly worse off. In addition, since nations today often feel unified in response to outside threats, a world government will induce less loyalty and more local complaints, the seriousness of which it is likely to underestimate.
So not only is the world likely to try a world government soon, that experiment is also likely to end badly, with many folks vowing “never again.” As I said yesterday:
Whether a world governments will be worth its empire costs depends on how serious and frequent are [global coordination] problems, and on how much better we learn to structure large organizations to avoid the empire bias.
Those who think a world government would be worth its cost in the long run should probably not be that eager for its first experiment to start soon; they should instead work to improve our mechanisms of governance, to make an efficient world government actually be feasible. A later better effort has a better chance of lasting.
World Government
Amazing!Marshall McCluhan wrote that "The media is the message." All the above comments originate ON PLANET EARTH! Every one came from a human being BORN ONTO THE PLANET! Simply using cyberspace to communicate is to recognize the fundamental UNITY OF THE SPECIES.Inter-national wars called "World Wars" started 96 years ago. (I was in the 2nd as a B-17 bomber pilot.) But as of August 6, 1945, war went from relative to absolute. Einstein said "if we don't eliminate war, war will eliminate us." THE BIG US! Nations fight war BECAUSE THERE'S NO LAW TO STOP THEM. Those of you who argue against a world government have no answer to how to prevent a final holocaust. Ever hear of human rights? Of morality, reason, wisdom, understanding, commonsense? The humans whirling around the planet every 90 minutes at 11,000 mph in the space station see THE WHOLE APPLE, A "VERTICAL" VISION. Everything I have read here is "horizontal," the old "we-and-they" philosophy of conquerors. GET REAL AND SURVIVE!
Michael, we have strong reasons to expect larger integrated markets to be more efficient. Since larger nations have those, but aren't overall more efficient, I conclude that their governments are substantially less efficient.