gwern comments on Calibrating your probability estimates of world events: Russia vs Ukraine, 6 months later. - Less Wrong

19 Post author: shminux 28 August 2014 11:37PM

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Comment author: DanArmak 30 August 2014 09:51:57AM *  7 points [-]

The right to self-determination seems to me to have been "recognized" as propaganda, but practically never practiced.

It was used post WW1, but only because there were two big multi-ethnic empires to be broken up. No-one proposed treating the victors similarly; their constituent nations which wanted independence had to fight for it, like Ireland did in 1920-1922.

Very few significant new nations have claimed statehood in the century since then on the basis of this principle without armed struggle. And when there's a civil war or rebellion and one side wins independence by military and political means, I don't give much credence to abstract principles.

Using Wikipedia's list of sovereign states by date of independence for the last century, the only states in the first half of the list (from 1973 to the present) that were established peacefully along ethnic lines are Czech and Slovak republics in the post-USSR breakup of Czechoslovakia. Most other Soviet states became nations despite being multi-ethnic, or fought bloody civil wars as in Yugoslavia. So did almost all African and Asian colonies post decolonization.

I admit I didn't have the patience to read all the linked articles on that list, and its older half (1914-1972), but at least its first half doesn't contain a single example of a part of sovereign nation breaking away on the basis of self determination without a major war. The older half probably might have some examples, but I expect them to be very few.

Comment author: gwern 30 August 2014 07:30:55PM 2 points [-]

The right to self-determination seems to me to have been "recognized" as propaganda, but practically never practiced.

If it has not been practiced, then it cannot be harmful as Ilya claims. So which is it: do international abstractions have no force and no consequences, in which case it doesn't matter at all, Kantian or otherwise, which abstractions are mouthed? Or do they matter at least a little bit? In which case you don't seem to have demonstrated any harm from the abstraction - fighting bloody civil wars is not a new phenomenon.

Comment author: DanArmak 30 August 2014 07:55:25PM *  3 points [-]

It hasn't been practiced. If it starts being practiced, however, it may be as harmful as Ilya claims, so his argument deserves a response. But saying:

I'm saying we live in a world where a right to self-determination has been recognized for something like a century now, even if it does not come with an automatic invasion authorization from the UN Security Council. So far, I'm not sure if it's been all that bad

Is not evidence because it hasn't been really practiced so far.

Also:

do international abstractions have no force and no consequences

I'm not claiming anything about other abstractions, some of which definitely have force, just this one.