Grandkhan
Telvanni Master Wizard
In. In Europe. Otherwise the Russians will get mad because you're claiming them!
Capto Iugulum Background Thread
- Thread starter EQandcivfanatic
- Start date
In. In Europe. Otherwise the Russians will get mad because you're claiming them!
Shadowbound
Incorrugible
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2007
- Messages
- 4,079
I'm calling it France, because no one has provided a good argument beyond "we hope to include Catalonia and Britanny at some point".
If you want those countries in the Confederation, you're in for a bad time.
If you want those countries in the Confederation, you're in for a bad time.
J.K. Stockholme
Right Opposition
Call it the Confederation, that's how the old Confederation was always known.
Gem Hound
Deity
I think the Confederation is better, since they will not get Catalonia or Brittany except through force of arms I think. 
And beyond than that the Confederation is built on anti-nationalist principles?
A name recalling Gaul isn't utterly out of place- my own nation, a former Imperial Scandinavian colony, was named in a fit of historical romanticism after (what is ITTL believed to be) a semi-mythical 11th century settlement populated by a few handfuls of pagan Norse adventurers, attested to by two dubious sagas written by Icelanders, of all people. 
Shadowbound
Incorrugible
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2007
- Messages
- 4,079
...then why the hell does it exist?
French nationalism.
Economic incentives will work for customs unions, security concerns for alliances. But a single confederation cohesive enough to be a nation-state? Nationalism.
J.K. Stockholme
Right Opposition
correction: Confederate nationalism.
Lord of Elves
Suede-Denim Secret Police
- Joined
- Oct 31, 2009
- Messages
- 6,976
For my part I think a kind of ridiculous onus is being placed on J.K. Stockholme. Country names are famously arbitrary. Etymologically Italy means, "Land of Cows". It is the United States of America and not the United States of Columbia largely out of regional preference. If J.K. Stockholme's state has a poorly-chosen or illogical name for itself, it's not really in bad company.
TheLastJacobite
No Commies
EQ, any plans of adding a list of the various blocs and alliances to the front page? And finally changing Squadrons to Wings?
Are you suggesting that no cohesive state can exist without nationalism? Well, if so, blame EQ, not me. My aim was to create a cohesively anti-nationalist state, and I succeeded in doing so; within the logic of the NES, it is not nationalism that binds the Confederation together. The FBC was created as an organisation to further the mutual interest of its members, on a principle not unlike, "United we stand; divided we fall", and held together on the basis of Confederation and the idea that members weren't allowed to secede because that would weaken the whole. Of course, it's a set of ideas with inherent weaknesses from which the Confederation suffered persistently, but that is the principle of its existence, not any form whatsoever of nationalism.
I'm not sure if you were around in CIEN, but you might like to note that it was founded by a load of monarchs of a decidedly anti-nationalistic sort to counter nationalists (particularly Languedoc/GamezRule's proposed Empire of France).
No, not Confederate nationalism either. There's no Confederate nation, and nationalism is to be considered anathema, and therefore there neither is, neither can be Confederate nationalism. The point is just Confederation.
Jehoshua
Catholic
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2009
- Messages
- 7,284
The two French confederations are profoundly ideational entities. Rather than being based in nationalism or a common culture and tradition, they are rooted in a common ideal and set of principles, much like the United States is IRL I would add (its not a nation-state, but rather its identity is rooted in an idea).
Jehoshua's thought on it seems correct to me, in terms to being based on a common ideal rather than a national state.
@TLJ: I have no intention on adding blocs and alliances to any page, though they may be able to have pages on the wiki should someone else choose to add them. My reasoning for this is because alliances and so forth have shifted and changed quite a lot, and there are no clear definitive lines of alliance at any given point with one or two exceptions.
@TLJ: I have no intention on adding blocs and alliances to any page, though they may be able to have pages on the wiki should someone else choose to add them. My reasoning for this is because alliances and so forth have shifted and changed quite a lot, and there are no clear definitive lines of alliance at any given point with one or two exceptions.
J.K. Stockholme
Right Opposition
@Spry: as I argued with EQ through other mediums, the anti-nationalism of the Confederation was it's biggest weakness, because flatly rejecting ethnic identities frustrated the very ethnicities the Confederation was supposed to integrate. I would expect a nuanced evolution, probably multiculturalism with some modifications, would be more reasonable in the coming decades (though I'm not of course committing myself to any policy yet).
As well, to the lay person, it would be very appropriate (even if internally inconsistent and incorrect) to call what has happened in the past few years Confederate nationalism. Jehoshua's observation is correct, much like the US, the collective identity is based on common principles, and this is a form of nationalism - it's not an ethnic nationalism, but it's a civic nationalism - which is why, despite the country being an ideational identity, for all practical purposes it has the power of nationalism among those who believe in the correct configuration of civic ideals and principles.
As well, to the lay person, it would be very appropriate (even if internally inconsistent and incorrect) to call what has happened in the past few years Confederate nationalism. Jehoshua's observation is correct, much like the US, the collective identity is based on common principles, and this is a form of nationalism - it's not an ethnic nationalism, but it's a civic nationalism - which is why, despite the country being an ideational identity, for all practical purposes it has the power of nationalism among those who believe in the correct configuration of civic ideals and principles.
J.K. Stockholme
Right Opposition
@Nailix: From the front page, you can go to the "Wanted Pages" section, listed at the bottom. Then search for "Italy" - click that, and then say "create as nation". You'll need an account of course.
Well, it's a bit of a volte-face, isn't it, going from being constructed around the premise that nationalism is positively bad to the premise that nationalism might be promoted? But then I always took this as my challenge.
Importantly, though, you must not, I think, behave like there isn't a volte-face. That is to say - Confederate nationalism, as a concept, might be quite similar to the Confederation's previous belief in itself, but it cannot be ignored that this self-belief if believed in theory to stem from anti-nationalism. Now, it's true that this anti-nationalism is kind of like nationalism in its effects - in its increasing of cohesiveness - but you really must realise that they are nevertheless universally perceived as opposites. You need to consider whether it is viable and IC for a political establishment so entrenched in the concept that nationalism is bad, and full of the experiences of the New French Party in Burgundy and the French Brotherhood, to suddenly change their minds about this - and if they do change their minds, you need to consider whether it is viable to convince all the common people and intellectuals who have been backing Septembrism over the years to suddenly appear, at least, to abandon their principles of anti-nationalism in favour of what is, apparently at least, the opposite. At any rate, what you are proposing is surely not a natural or obvious train of thought and rhetoric for the Septembrists and the Confederate government to take.
Why is it plausible that the Septembrists should suddenly now realise, especially in their moment of success having just convinced the people and governments of France that theirs, the old way and ideology of the Confederation, is the way forward, that they were wrong all along?
I appreciate that you say you intend to be cautious, but I think you should wait a long time - and find logical and IC reasons for the development, without pushing it except from within role - before even starting to talk about a Confederate "nation".
Importantly, though, you must not, I think, behave like there isn't a volte-face. That is to say - Confederate nationalism, as a concept, might be quite similar to the Confederation's previous belief in itself, but it cannot be ignored that this self-belief if believed in theory to stem from anti-nationalism. Now, it's true that this anti-nationalism is kind of like nationalism in its effects - in its increasing of cohesiveness - but you really must realise that they are nevertheless universally perceived as opposites. You need to consider whether it is viable and IC for a political establishment so entrenched in the concept that nationalism is bad, and full of the experiences of the New French Party in Burgundy and the French Brotherhood, to suddenly change their minds about this - and if they do change their minds, you need to consider whether it is viable to convince all the common people and intellectuals who have been backing Septembrism over the years to suddenly appear, at least, to abandon their principles of anti-nationalism in favour of what is, apparently at least, the opposite. At any rate, what you are proposing is surely not a natural or obvious train of thought and rhetoric for the Septembrists and the Confederate government to take.
Why is it plausible that the Septembrists should suddenly now realise, especially in their moment of success having just convinced the people and governments of France that theirs, the old way and ideology of the Confederation, is the way forward, that they were wrong all along?
I appreciate that you say you intend to be cautious, but I think you should wait a long time - and find logical and IC reasons for the development, without pushing it except from within role - before even starting to talk about a Confederate "nation".
Shadowbound
Incorrugible
- Joined
- Mar 4, 2007
- Messages
- 4,079
Yeah, so, anti-nationalism isn't a unifying force. Anyone who says otherwise is wrong. If France was based on anti-nationalist principles, then the first thing it'd do would be to dissolve itself.
The Soviet Union was a state based on anti-nationalist marxism, and the moment that the threat of violence stopped being a unifying force, it dissolved into its component parts.
The Soviet Union was a state based on anti-nationalist marxism, and the moment that the threat of violence stopped being a unifying force, it dissolved into its component parts.
Luckymoose
The World is Mine
I needed to point this out for CI, based on some players assuming things about history.
In OTL, yea, the US has this. But I think an important question to ask, and one all the players in the US in CI are ignoring, except maybe TheMeanestGuest, is that the US in CI was a terrible military dictatorship and didn't have the same civic nationalist building or luck of OTL to hold the damned thing together. Throw in three civil wars to rip the place to pieces for not just ideologies, but regional nationalism (like New England or Florida or Jacksonia) and you've got a Union that shouldn't exist. The USA of OTL is extraordinarily lucky and there is none of this luck in CI. The continent is huge, and the people in Florida or Jacksonia or even New England couldn't give a damn about something five thousand miles away when millions upon millions of civilians and soldiers have perished consistently to fight off reunification.
The USA is not an automatic entity because you say so. History has to go a very specific way for the place to hold together and be happy friends, and in CI it hasn't.
J.K. Stockholme
Right Opposition
@Spry:
You are rather straw-manning the pro-Confederate "nationalist" conception I've forwarded thus far (which as I should note, I neither endorse nor attack - I merely think it's the logical consequence of Confederate/French history). This is not a sudden reversal, it would have began at the end of the Rhine-Rhone War, when it became abundantly obvious that the threats of violent ethnic separatism (German/Italian Brotherhoods) as well as the violence of other states claiming ethnic marginalization because of the policy of anti-nationalism, could not be addressed by simply MORE anti-nationalism.
When I suggest that there exists a Confederate nationalism, it's not because I expect Confederates to refer to themselves as nationalists (at least not at this time), but that in all basic functions it is a kind of nationalism that co-exists with the regional-national identities of the Confederation's member states. What makes the Confederation special is that it's nationalism is inherently built to defy all the problems of nationalism (which the old Confederation's anti-nationalist policies were trying to combat).
War between competing ethnicities, tension within states between such groups, discrimination, nonsense stereotyping, and thuggery by rebel nationalists, are all problems that a Confederate identity, even if itself a nationalism, still addresses, by making peace, security, democracy, secularism (in short, liberal democratic civic goals) it's primary solidarity, over simple ethnicity.
Septembrists can, without being inconsistent, still violently argue against (ethnic) nationalism in general, while being patriotic for their own Confederate nationalism, because this Confederate nationalism is designed expressly to fight those basic problems of other nationalisms.
Final note: again, this is purely analysis of what I consider to be a valid, and probably popular, self-conception of Confederate identity. It would follow from this, that a kind of inclusive multiculturalism could flourish, in which regional-national identities are recognized, but subsumed under a more noble Confederate identity (again, merely a hypothesis).
You are rather straw-manning the pro-Confederate "nationalist" conception I've forwarded thus far (which as I should note, I neither endorse nor attack - I merely think it's the logical consequence of Confederate/French history). This is not a sudden reversal, it would have began at the end of the Rhine-Rhone War, when it became abundantly obvious that the threats of violent ethnic separatism (German/Italian Brotherhoods) as well as the violence of other states claiming ethnic marginalization because of the policy of anti-nationalism, could not be addressed by simply MORE anti-nationalism.
When I suggest that there exists a Confederate nationalism, it's not because I expect Confederates to refer to themselves as nationalists (at least not at this time), but that in all basic functions it is a kind of nationalism that co-exists with the regional-national identities of the Confederation's member states. What makes the Confederation special is that it's nationalism is inherently built to defy all the problems of nationalism (which the old Confederation's anti-nationalist policies were trying to combat).
War between competing ethnicities, tension within states between such groups, discrimination, nonsense stereotyping, and thuggery by rebel nationalists, are all problems that a Confederate identity, even if itself a nationalism, still addresses, by making peace, security, democracy, secularism (in short, liberal democratic civic goals) it's primary solidarity, over simple ethnicity.
Septembrists can, without being inconsistent, still violently argue against (ethnic) nationalism in general, while being patriotic for their own Confederate nationalism, because this Confederate nationalism is designed expressly to fight those basic problems of other nationalisms.
Final note: again, this is purely analysis of what I consider to be a valid, and probably popular, self-conception of Confederate identity. It would follow from this, that a kind of inclusive multiculturalism could flourish, in which regional-national identities are recognized, but subsumed under a more noble Confederate identity (again, merely a hypothesis).
