Eugine_Nier comments on Peter Thiel warns of upcoming (and current) stagnation - Less Wrong
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Whenever you make such comments, you are making it impossible for me to upvote you, because if you end up upvoted, that'll by itself show the falseness of your claim, and therefore it would be a post unworthy of an upvote.
I promise an upvote for your comment however, if you edit to remove this sentence, because the remaining points you make are very interesting and worthy of such. (edited to add: Now upvoted, as per promise.)
Now to the content-relevant bits:
You are making true claims as far as it goes, but I don't think you're seeing the bigger picture in regards to colonialism and decolonization both. For starters it's my impression that the primary stated objections to colonization are deontological ("They don't have the right to rule us/We don't have the right to rule them") as opposed to utilitarian ("We're better off without them"/"They're better off without us")
Now I'm not a deontologist, but I wouldn't mind calling myself a rule utilitarian. And what I see is that claiming the right to control another nation is still used by even Nazi-sympathisers to excuse Hitler's policies (The argument is "If Britain had the right to rule over the hundreds millions in India, why couldn't the Nazi be allowed to rule over Poland and Czechoslovakia"). It was also used by the Soviets and the Americans to excuse their own interference (in a different way).
In this manner, European colonialism served to justify both German and Japanese imperialism in the eyes of their citizens; thus contributing to World War II -- it possibly had an even more direct effect on World War I, which may have been motivated by a German desire to take some colonies. And conversely after European Colonialism was defeated, and the rule "We must not control other nations by force" firmly established, one gradually sees peace descend on the European continent itself, and eventually a decrease in the amount of interference that the Soviets and Americans applied on their own spheres of influence too (Eastern Europe and South America respectively).
In short: In a world where European colonialism still thrived, would we have seen the Eastern European communist governments collapse? European decolonization had a primarily positive effect on Europe, the way I see it. Perhaps some Africans would want to be controlled by Europe again, I don't see Europeans as willing to accept the offer though.
Lastly in your condemnation of decolonization, i'm not clear if you're truly arguing:
a) It was a wrong choice for the colonized people to seek independence
or
b) it was a wrong choice for the European nations to grant it to them
I think you'll find it hard to argue for (b) -- effectively that France should still be wasting lives and money fighting wars in Algeria and Vietnam, or that the UK should be trying to crush the Indians violently. It's easier to argue for (a) -- especially if you limit your argument to sub-Saharan Africa, where the borders were artificial, the national identity often nil, etc,etc.
Do you have a citation for that? It would surprise me to learn that such equality was even discussed about a thousand years ago.
Are you sure that's not just war fatigue following the world wars? Notable is that Europe experienced another period of peace of comparable length in the 19th century following the Napoleonic wars and the congress of Vienna. This despite that period being the height of colonialism.
You fail to explain why this is obviously a good thing.
I care to justify points that are challenged, not points that aren't challenged. Are you challenging the point -- by which I mean "are you prepared to argue the opposite"?
Well, I fail to see how more Western European intervention in Eastern Europe and the Soviet sphere more generally would not have improved the lives of the residents of that sphere.
Ah, I think I just confused you with a badly phrased statement. I meant a reduction of the Soviet and American interference in their own formerly solidly-controlled spheres (will edit ancestor comment to make it more clear).
Well the USSR had sufficient control over it's sphere that it didn't need to "interfere" per se despite the norm against colonialism.
As for the US, it could reasonably be argued that Latin America would be better off with more US interference for the same reason Africa was better off under colonialism.
I seem to recollect conventional Soviet invasions of obstreperous Soviet puppet states followed by massacres by Soviet troops and soviet secret police.
One can argue that western Europe is largely puppet states of the US state department, but the State Department employs more decorous methods that do not leave behind so many bloodstains.
In the 1950s Kruschev used Anglo-French intervention in Egypt as an excuse/justification for not withdrawing from Hungary.
The Soviet Invasion of Aghanistan was opposed by the entire postcolonial world, including post-colonial states like India and Pakistan. The Soviet defeat at Afghanistan then may have led directly to the "Sinatra doctrine" which enabled the whole of Eastern Europe falling away.
An interactive graph
Africa has fallen behind the rest of the world in a way that Latin America hasn't.