Free Republic

HEIDELBERG, Germany -- Poland’s prime minister warned Monday that Europe may see “revolts” if the European Union, of which his country is a member, turns into a “super-state government” that ignores national differences. Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki was giving a speech at the university in Heidelberg, in Germany, about the challenges facing the continent where he said Ukraine is fighting Russia’s invasion to protect core European values of freedom. “I warn all those who want to create a super-state government by a narrow elite: if we ignore cultural differences the outcome will be the weakening of Europe and a series...

At first glance, the new nationalism of conservatives will seem benign and even uncontroversial. In his book “The Case for Nationalism,” Rich Lowry defines nationalism as flowing from a people’s “natural devotion to their home and to their country.” Yoram Hazony, in his book “The Virtue of Nationalism,” also has a rather anodyne definition of nationalism. It means “that the world is governed best when nations agree to cultivate their own traditions, free from interference by other nations.” There is nothing particularly controversial at all about these statements. Defined in these terms, it sounds like little more than simply defending...

Nation-states are making a comeback against transnational integration Later this year, the Trump administration will release its oft-delayed plan for Israeli–Palestinian peace — the latest in a quarter century of American attempts to resolve one of the Middle East’s most intractable disputes. At the heart of this effort — which has spanned five otherwise disparate post–Cold War presidencies — has been an enduring faith that American power can reshape the Levant much as it did Europe and Asia, conjuring a new, liberal, rules-based order in which former antagonists learn to live in peace, reaping the benefits of shared prosperity under...

...into separate cultures as settlers spread WestYou might think you live in a nation of 50 unified states, but according to author and journalist Colin Woodard, the U.S. is a lot less united than we like to think. According to Woodard, the country is divided not by state lines but is in fact separated into 11 neatly delineated nation states where dominant cultures are explained by who their early settlers were 'and the lasting cultural fissures they established.' Woodard writes in Tufts University's alumni magazine that the original North American cultures developed in isolation from each other in distinct regions...

NEW YORK (AP) - Gregory Green is between countries these days. In 1994 he founded The New Free State of Caroline, a small nation-state based on a speck of coral in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. But he lost it five years later in a custody battle with Kiribati, a country that only came into existence itself in 1979. So now Green, a conceptual artist by trade, is preparing to start again by claiming a pair of small islands in the Indian Ocean. Though he's cagey about exactly where they are. Unclaimed territory is hard to find these days....

The National Interest Issue Date: Winter 2003/04, Posted On: 12/12/2003 Networking Nation-States James C. Bennett The early 20th century was filled with predictions that the airplane, the automobile or the assembly line had made parliamentary democracy, market economies, jury trials and bills of rights irrelevant, obsolete and harmful. Today's scientific-technological revolutions (epitomized by space shuttles and the Internet) make the technologies of the early 20th century-its fabric-winged biplanes, Tin Lizzies and "Modern Times" gearwheel factories-look like quaint relics. Yet all of the "obsolete" institutions derided by the modernists of that day thrive and strengthen. The true surprise of the scientific revolutions ahead is...

To those of you familiar with the online game NationStates: Can you recommend a region that is well-stocked with nations dedicated to FR principles? I'm in one now that PURPORTS to be such a region, but plainly isn't -- e.g., voting for UN Resolutions that intrude into regions' and nations' authority to execute murderers, etc.

Members of the Left, who would lead us down Hayek's road to serfdom, have long rejected the Western notion of sovereignty. In particular, they believe any attempt to exercise control of our own borders is "racist," and possibly even a "hate crime." The Founding Fathers had a different view. In Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution, they empowered Congress to "suppress insurrections and repel Invasions." Today it seems America has lost control of its borders thanks to an invasion by illegal immigrants, and the Left continues to oppose American sovereignty for a simple reason: illegal immigration advances socialism. This...

1: THE PROBLEM Of the many words written for and against the coming war with Iraq, none has been more perceptive than Paul Johnson's observation in his essay "Leviathan to the Rescue" that such a war "has no precedent in history" and that "in terms of presidential power and national sovereignty, Mr. Bush is walking into unknown territory. By comparison, the Gulf War of the 1990's was a straightforward, conventional case of unprovoked aggression, like Germany's invasion of Belgium in 1914 and Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor." The implications of this remark - like the implications of the war with...