Power and Scale

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orathaic
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Power and Scale

#1 Post by orathaic » Fri May 12, 2023 6:48 pm

It seems like another mass shooting another chance to criticize Americans (CF the thread about nuts) but this time the shootings were in a school in Serbia.

So i am going to make a prediction. The Serbian government will demonstrate its power, preventing a repeat of this incident, in a way the US state or federal authorities just can not.

Power at a smaller scale being more effective. That is my claim, the US President is less powerful, and less effective in the use of power than the Prime Minister of Serbia.

A testable theory instead of just offering up thoughts and prayers... My claim is that because the scale of the Serbian state is on the order of 50 times smaller than the US, Serbia will he better at addressing the issue of gun violence than the US is.

Further the absence of powerful wealth* accumulated in the hands of a small group means the needs of individual citizens will be more easily converted into political action.

That's it, that is the hot take. We will see if i am wrong.

*The GDP is ~362 times different, contrast with the population of only 50 times.

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Re: Power and Scale

#2 Post by Octavious » Sat May 13, 2023 11:21 am

Surely it's less a matter of scale and more a matter of what system of checks and balances exist within a particular nation? China, for instance, is rather larger than the US in terms of population, and yet considerably more effective in applying Presidential will.

I would be curious to hear, however, what you believe the impact would be on Serbian political effectiveness would be if it ever joined the EU?
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Re: Power and Scale

#3 Post by orathaic » Sat May 13, 2023 12:26 pm

Octavious wrote:
Sat May 13, 2023 11:21 am
Surely it's less a matter of scale and more a matter of what system of checks and balances exist within a particular nation? China, for instance, is rather larger than the US in terms of population, and yet considerably more effective in applying Presidential will.

I would be curious to hear, however, what you believe the impact would be on Serbian political effectiveness would be if it ever joined the EU?
I would argue that China is less effective for this fact, because one person can not know everything which is necessary to organise the lives of 1 Billion people (and even if the 'will' appears to be applied, that doesn't mean you don't have misinformation filtering to the top based on meeting targets which are set from the top - lies which would be easier to detect on a smaller scale).

But to your question, i don't know that duplicating EU level of integration would have the same negative consequences as the federalism of the US or single party apparatus of the CCP. The EU at least claims to have subsidiarity as an organizing principle. Devolution of powers to local governments in the UK looks like the ideal situation to be in as regards reducing the scale of your organisation to bring power closer to the people...

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Re: Power and Scale

#4 Post by orathaic » Sun May 14, 2023 11:03 pm

At the start of this video they briefly mentions reverse cargo Cult (not sure if they go into details): https://youtu.be/9_0E9IzXT34

Which is basically the idea that having built a plane out of sand (like a cargo Cult) and finding it doesn't fly, to reverse the idea and assume that real planes also can't fly.

In the context of Russian democracy, it is the assumption that since democracy doesn't work in Russia it must not work in other western democracies (which Russia was modelled on).

What i think is the interesting question is what ways is this Russian political misunderstanding not wrong, but actually correct (in ways which lead to confirmation bias for Russians studying western democracy).

Obviously, my thesis above is that democracy doesn't work as effectively at scale... So counter examples from smaller countries would be easier to find. But confirmatory examples from larger countries would be common enough for Russians to use to confirm their theory.

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Re: Power and Scale

#5 Post by ajdisciple » Fri Jul 28, 2023 9:12 am

Well said. I'm especially glad you brought up the term subsidiarity.

How are you finding your prediction about Serbia? I don't know what to make of it, but I do value what you've shared.

FWIW, here's an article from a couple weeks back. I haven't seen much else since the protests & immediate administrative fallout:
Inquiry committee for mass shootings in Serbia formed at opposition’s request – https://www.euractiv.com/section/politi ... s-request/

Thanks for raising this subject!

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