Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Andreas on March 07, 2005, 02:46:37 pm
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How do you think the European Union will develop over the next decades? Will it fall apart at some point, will it become the US of E, or what?
If EU could get rid of that horrible bureocracy it has become, I think it could become a major player in economics and politics, but in order to do that they would have to heavily centralise their decision making.
And as a last note, I am stricktly against Turkey becoming a member of the EU (the Union already has enough problems among it's current member states, and IMO it is expanding too fast as it is already).
Discuss!
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nothing much will happen over the next decades. think a hundred years forward or so, and we're talking one united european nation. maybe.
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It's the next major player, the problem is it's so full of ****e at it's core we're doomed to facism.
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Originally posted by vyper
It's the next major player, the problem is it's so full of ****e at it's core we're doomed to facism.
Iron and clay. :nod:
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I'd like to think that without the support of Great Britain (including the people) that Europe can't progress very far. And with papers like The Sun still going I don't think there will be support for a USE or anything like that.
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Originally posted by Ai No Koriida
If EU could get rid of that horrible bureocracy it has become,
The problem, Koriida, is that beuacracy is a natural outgrowth and state for socialist systems which is what most European nations are. Sure everythings free but you have 10 different forms to fill out to prove you need it.
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*sighs and doesn't even try*
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vyper, show me one socialist government that hasn't devolved into a beauracratic nightmare.
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And how many european 'socialist' governments have you directly interacted with then, Lib? Or are you going by second-hand opinion?
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Elbonia.
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Originally posted by Liberator
vyper, show me one socialist government that hasn't devolved into a beauracratic nightmare.
erm, probably the Zapatistas.
Though you are basically right about socialist governments and beaurocracy. However, the culprit there is not socialism itself, but statism, which is present to a large degree, especially these days, in rightist governments as well. Beaucrocracies (erm, that can't be right, can it?) both cause and result from increased governmental power, and since more or less all governments love their power and want to increase it, I think its unfair to single out leftist ones.
Its really a give and take, more freedom vs better quality of life (not including freedom as quality of life.).
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Freedom is quality of life.
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For once I'm on your side.
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I meant things like road quality, literacy, healthcare and economic standing. Yes, freedom is quality of life, but its necessary to make that distinction, however artificial, because they are not necessarily one and the same.
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Freedom is a cornerstone for quality of life, but a cornerstone by itself does not make a building.
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Unless you're a stone-burrowing insect, in which case it does.
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Consider that business that expand quickly by buying up smaller businesses tend to falter or even implode messily... and consider that the EU is expanding quickly by adding new member states...
There may be a correlation, there may not.
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The EU members are getting closer and closer to each other by the year. It's a slow proces but not one even the UK can stop (cause they too regularly come with yet another project that should coordinated on EU-level. Which is policy-speak for "let the EU run it")
And remember that the EU already works at multiple speeds. Not all the members are in Schengen or the euro-zone for example (although al the new members are legally bound to join at some point).
But we'll not call ourselves the US of E for sure. Too silly.
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Originally posted by Crazy_Ivan80
But we'll not call ourselves the US of E for sure. Too silly.
Don't bet on it.
You could become the Coalition, which would make the USA the Alliance.
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Lib, have you been playing Starlancer again?
Anyways, if somebody is curious, I am certainly not a federalist, and yes, USE sounds ultra-corny :no:
As I said before in anoether thread, EU should be built on the premise of being strictly an economic alliance, with trade and tax agreements, like it's predecessors ECSC/EEC, rather than trying to become an all-powerful federation. Hopefully/maybe in the future (50-60 next odd years) the EU will shift it's focus more back to the economy.
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Originally posted by Liberator
Don't bet on it.
You could become the Coalition, which would make the USA the Alliance.
Alliance with who?
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Originally posted by aldo_14
Alliance with who?
CANADA!
:D:p
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Originally posted by Liberator
Don't bet on it.
You could become the Coalition, which would make the USA the Alliance.
we'd be the global defence initiative. you'r the bruthahood uf nod.
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Originally posted by Deepblue
Freedom is quality of life.
Up to a certain point. Too much freedom is chaos.
If you had complete freedom, you'd have a few who'd have your so called quality of life, and the others would be crushed by them, and that would turn to totalitarism. Ain't that a funny paradox? :p
Freedom is so over-rated if you ask me :p
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Originally posted by Nico
Up to a certain point. Too much freedom is chaos.
If you had complete freedom, you'd have a few who'd have your so called quality of life, and the others would be crushed by them, and that would turn to totalitarism. Ain't that a funny paradox? :p
Freedom is so over-rated if you ask me :p
Complete Freedom = Anarchy... Anarchy + Time = Tyranny, why?.. because somebody will nearly always climb to the top of the heap through whatever means necessary..
what sorta freedom one should shoot for is Relative Freedom.. meaning the same general "freedom" most people enjoy today, Freedom of speech, Freedom of worship, etc, etc.
as for my opinions of the EU?.. well, i won't pretend i know much about it, save for the fact that it's a coalition of European Countries who are banding together, rather than being forced together by a single party, like the Soviet Socialist Republics way back when..
it's also giving small european countries a bit more financial clout to help deal with the Big Economic Player on the earth, which would be the US and its allies.. which is ironic, mind you, since america, doesn't seem to be all that well off as it likes people to think, for example, a friend of mine over IRC was complaining 'cuz she couldn't afford the $250 Doctor's bill for just an abcess (which popped, by the way), and the visitation..
and here i am, able to go to the doctor's for fifty bucks, and get most of that back via a medicare rebate.. i won't even touch the prescription drugs issue.. i'm sure many an australian know how cheaply compared to the US one can get prescription medication here if they're unemployed.
i'm not blaming the US for anything, tho, if anything, there's people who have a far worse situation in other countries across the world, russia, for example, a former superpower, now trying to recover from nearly breaking itself during the cold war and afterwards.
i won't even mention third world countries, they go without saying.
what i'm getting at here, is that America isn't as Gilded as its politicians like us to see it.
but, the European Union might be a Blessing and a Curse, we'll just have to wait and see.. i don't see how it'd become the next communist state, however..
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No country, really, has a right to have a 'holier than thou' attitude.
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Oh, yeah, forgot to give my opinion on that EU thing... Well, to be honest, I don't know much about it :p From what I know, it's an interesting thing that enforces on others many laws that we already have anyway, that enforces economic goals that hardly any of its members can achieve, that helps the poorest members ( take Spain, I like that quote from their... prime minister? who told his people "remember, 2/3 of the highways you're driving on have been paid by the EU" before the vote for the EU constitution, which led to an interesting result btw: the thing was accepted by a crushing majority, while the crushing majority of Spanish - Spaniards? darn, I never know - didn't even vote, you see where I'm getting to? :p )
Well, for most, I believe it's a useful thing that, in the long term, will give more economical power to the European countries, but has little impact on people's daily life; and, mostly, i'm sure it'll never turn into a federal entity. The European melting pot of cultures is so complicated it just can't happen, even if everybody wanted to, which is as unlikely as USA wanting to go back to the British Kingdom as a set of colonies.
And as for Turkey, well, I'd say that 1) they're not really part of Europe and 2) their people's rights are far from the UE standards so they're not a right candidate. But in all honesty, from my humble point of view dare I say, I just don't care if they're gonna be in or out because 1) it's planed to be voted in, what, 8 years? 2) weither they're in or out, it won't change a damn thing for us, and probably not much for most of them either, because as it stands, it's just a thing to legislate high laws and economics, not "commoner"'s ones.
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Originally posted by kietotheworld
I'd like to think that without the support of Great Britain (including the people) that Europe can't progress very far. And with papers like The Sun still going I don't think there will be support for a USE or anything like that.
Point of order: The Sun is not a newspaper, it's a comic :p
But there will be big changes in the next 10 years, as the union expands further eastwards to include Iran and Iraq....:nervous:
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Originally posted by Nico
Oh, yeah, forgot to give my opinion on that EU thing... Well, to be honest, I don't know much about it :p From what I know, it's an interesting thing that enforces on others many laws that we already have anyway, that enforces economic goals that hardly any of its members can achieve, that helps the poorest members ( take Spain, I like that quote from their... prime minister? who told his people "remember, 2/3 of the highways you're driving on have been paid by the EU" before the vote for the EU constitution, which led to an interesting result btw: the thing was accepted by a crushing majority, while the crushing majority of Spanish - Spaniards? darn, I never know - didn't even vote, you see where I'm getting to? :p )
Well, for most, I believe it's a useful thing that, in the long term, will give more economical power to the European countries, but has little impact on people's daily life; and, mostly, i'm sure it'll never turn into a federal entity. The European melting pot of cultures is so complicated it just can't happen, even if everybody wanted to, which is as unlikely as USA wanting to go back to the British Kingdom as a set of colonies.
And as for Turkey, well, I'd say that 1) they're not really part of Europe and 2) their people's rights are far from the UE standards so they're not a right candidate. But in all honesty, from my humble point of view dare I say, I just don't care if they're gonna be in or out because 1) it's planed to be voted in, what, 8 years? 2) weither they're in or out, it won't change a damn thing for us,
in other words, all the EU essentually boils down to, is a Bunch of Economic Standards. that are set by the larger economic players in Europe, at the behest (or chargrin?) of the smaller, poorer members?
Sounds plausable from my sometimes Cynical Standpoint.
i also wonder, if it's basically an effort to keep large US-Based Corporations (hey, it's happened heaps here) from buying-out, or taking over, businesses, mining, and other high-value moneyspinners in europe..
like i said before.. economic clout. the larger players in europe band together, the smaller, and poorer ones alike join with the larger parts to maybe catch the windfalls of working with the big players, in order to keep their businesses local..
it's almost globalisation in miniture, innit?
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Originally posted by Clave
Point of order: The Sun is not a newspaper, it's a comic :p
But there will be big changes in the next 10 years, as the union expands further eastwards to include Iran and Iraq....:nervous:
I demand you retract that statement!
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It's insulting to comics.
Like the Daily Mail and Daily Express(amongst others), the Sun is roughly on the level of toilet paper. Used toilet paper. Toilet paper, in fact, that has been used by an obese building merchant with chronic explosive diarrhea and a penchant for week-old chicken vindaloo.
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Well, the coalition won. :p
I found plenty of examples for socialist states. The GDR, Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary...oh, wait, that map I was looking at is 15 years old. :D
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Originally posted by mitac
Well, the coalition won. :p
I found plenty of examples for socialist states. The GDR, Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary...oh, wait, that map I was looking at is 15 years old. :D
Well, if we get into this, then we should maybe define what "socialist" means - is it a complete communistic utopia (none exist) or do Scandinavian-style socialdemocratic countries count? Does Soviet Union?
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The problem of the EU is that no one knows what it acutally does. Most of the things you hear are myths or ony half the truth. Just think about the EU charta that's being worked on right now. I bet half of the EUpeople don't even know about that, among other things.
I don't know who's responsible for the info coverage on the EU, the EU institutions themselves or the member countries gouvernments(probably both), but there happenings there need to be brought to the public on a broader scale.
Over here, about the only time you hear about the Union is during elections when some obscure parties claim the EU is the source of all evil while others state that it'S th peak of economic evolution with both sides saying squat about it actually.