Narcissistic Sovereignty--Say What?

The other day the Geek ran across a statement that got his dander up. Back in 1989 the UN passed a convention on the Rights of the Child. This is not the sort of subject that normally interests the Geek in the slightest. UN conventions are typically so much chaff in the political winds of the moment, visually distracting and of little apparent substance.

The United States along with the geographic expression of Somalia has failed to sign the convention. One hundred ninety-three countries have, it is alleged, "ratified" the Convention. (The writer(s) failed to differentiate between "signing" and "ratifying.")

According to Harold Cook who was speaking at a press conference called by sundry groups favoring the American adoption of the Convention dilated as follows. “It might sound dismissive, but I think it has something to do with what I would call, and some other people call, narcissistic sovereignty."

No, Mr Cook, to the Geek's ears your term does not sound at all dismissive. Quite to the contrary it rings loud and clear as a challenge.

You are not alone in issuing the challenge to the concept of national sovereignty. Rather, Mr Cook, you are in a large group which has emerged over the past twenty years who hold the firm belief that the nation-state is the root of all evil in today's world. The Geek entertains no doubt that you, Mr Cook, and others of your persuasion are convinced that the nation-state is supported only by reactionaries who cling to the outdated concept as they do their "guns and religion" as they are gripped by fear in a changing global environment.

The other pole of perspective on this UN Convention on the Rights of the Child was represented in the coverage of the press conference by Michael Smith, president of the Homeschool Legal Defense Association. In Mr Smith's eyes Senate ratification of the Convention would allow the UN's version of international law to supercede federal and state laws regarding parental rights.

Smith was joined in his opposition to the explicit violation of US national and state sovereignty by Austin Ruse, president of the conservative group Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. This group is not a warm supporter of the UN, it might be noted.

Ruse's take on the Convention, the UN and those such as Cook who support both without hesitation is simply that the goal of these institutions and people is the destruction of national sovereignty. Ruse is blunt. “They no longer want independent nations deciding what to do, but good citizens in a new international order."

The nation-state is defined by several factors. These same factors provide the basis for sovereignty which can be best understood historically as the capacity of the polity, ideally with the consensual support of the society, to substantially and directly exercise authority over the society.

Walk through the factors which have served to define the nation-state historically since the emergence of the modern examples of the type roughly five hundred years ago. (That's right, the nation-state as generally understood today is a relatively recent invention. Also, please recall that the idea and its expression are European creations.)

The first requirement is that a nation exists. A nation is comprised of a society bound together by ethnic, linguistic and cultural characteristics as well as a shared history and a set of defining myths. A nation exists when there is a collective sense of "us" based on these considerations without regard to any other factor such as the nature of the government or the geographical range occupied by the nation.

The second requirement is that the nation inhabit a specified geographical area with defined limits. The nation-state must have borders. While it is a historical fact that borders can be shifted, typically by armed force, the limits exist and are recognised by other nation-states.

Finally the nation-state must have a government of whatsoever form which has the power to defend the borders. (OK. To err on the side of accuracy, a robust defense often has implied taking over somebody else's territory but the basic consideration remains that of defense.) The ultimate reason for existence of any government is that of securing the territorial integrity of the land inhabited by the nation. To this end it must have the power to levy an armed force, supply and support that force and order the force into combat.

There have been many nations which never achieved the status of nation-state because they lacked one or both of the other requirements. The Indian nations of North America were self-conscious, they knew who they were and how they differed from other, similar nations. Some had strong governments with the capacity to levy and dispatch force. But, none had any concept of borders, of possessing land from which all others could be excluded.

The existence of a border, a recognised line in the sand backed by political will and, if necessary, armed force was the missing ingredient in the case of even the largest and most complexly organised of the Indian nations of North America. The same may be said of the indigenous peoples around the world.

Historically the development of the European nation-state was both prolonged and bloody. The full realization of national sovereignty took many wars, seas of blood and (in today's sensitive language) uncountable violations of basic human rights. The development of a workable mechanism of national sovereignty in the US did not take as much time, blood or violation of the rights of men, women and children. Still it did take three wars and the best part of three centuries to develop.

Considering the price which has been paid to implement a viable set of mechanisms expressing national sovereignty, it is not a commodity to be disposed of or even infringed upon lightly. It is not, pace, Mr Cook, "narcissistic" to consider carefully whether or not an international convention which would carry with it the potential for new internal enforcement mechanisms should be ratified or even signed.

The adoption of an international convention, even one written under the auspices of the UN does not imply, pace, Messers Smith and Ruse, that black helicopters laden with UN social workers will be descending upon us. That may be an appealing fantasy, but isn't a probable event in the real world.

More interesting to the Geek at least is the profoundly schizoid attitude shown by the UN and the numerous post-national, High Minded in the US.

"Schizoid, you say, Geek? Isn't that kind of harsh? You better make your point. Clearly."

OK, bucko. The Geek accepts your challenge.

The UN with the support of the post-nationalist, High Minded people in the US is addicted to interfering in the internal affairs of failing states. While the motivation is always one of preventing or limiting "humanitarian crises," the goal is to maintain the existence of artifacts which do not have the three necessary attributes of the nation-state. The UN and its High Minded supporters here have a fixation on preventing self-conscious nations from carving out states with both borders and a legitimate polity from the larger geographic expression which contains them.

Arguably states deserve to fail when a definable nation within the geographic limits withdraws its allegiance to the artifact and seeks to go a separate way. This is true whether the larger entity is an empire (think the colonial insurgency against the British Empire which brought the US into existence) or a "state" such as Sudan or the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

As was illustrated by the dissolution of Yugoslavia, outside intervenors are most effective when they limit their efforts to ameliorating the human costs of dissolution. Sometimes facilitating humane ethnic cleansing is the least-worst course to take. Sadly, the High Minded were way too late in accepting this reality in the chaos of Yugoslavia's melt down.

At the same time as it seeks to preserve states which do not merit preservation, the UN and the High Minded seek to diminish the national sovereignty of states which have existed to the benefit of their citizens as well as neighboring states through slight of hand moves disguised as international conventions or, as exemplified by the Millennium Development Goals, the enforced transfer of national wealth.

National boundaries are not to be considered the functional equivalent of county lines dividing administrative districts within American states. National governments are not simply county commissions writ large.

Boundaries, governments, sovereignty itself are all the expressions of a people, their shared identity, their common values, hopes, fears and needs. Their maintenance is still essential as long as the nation sees itself as an integrated, coherent whole with a legitimate polity. While some aspects of sovereignty can be and have been compromised in the pursuit of interests and goals shared by other states, any and every compromise must be scrutinized carefully. Every erosion of sovereignty must be undertaken in order--and only in order--to benefit the national interest of the state and its citizens.

In order to be neither "narcissistic" nor self-abnegating, conventions like all treaties which limit the absolute freedom of action implicit in a nation-state's existence must be considered only in the light of genuine national interest both short- and long-term. By doing so it is possible to make wise choices and reduce the likelihood that the Law of Unintended Consequences will be invoked.

That sort of caution is, Mr Cook, Fellow of the American Psychological Association, not at all "narcissistic." It is called good statesmanship.