RE AN INTERNATIONAL ECONOMY AND CURRENCY

RE AN INTERNATIONAL ECONOMY

The birth of a global marketplace has led to the emergence of that which is now termed the "multinational" company.  Such companies are capable of, and by now usually obligated to, obtain their materials in one place, produce their goods somewhere else, and sell their products in a market consisting of a third group of places, all for the sake of financial advantage.  These circumstances have simultaneously created and resulted in an extremely competitive marketplace, wherein the outsourcing referred to in the words "producing goods somewhere else" has become essential to many producers in their efforts to remain in business. 

Globalization has been additionally promoted by the fact that, in many industries, the scale of technology has today grown to the point that research and development of new products requires so great an amount of resources that it is necessary for a group of firms within an industry to join together to conduct it.  Furthermore, once so developed, it is necessary to market the resultant product in a worldwide marketplace in order to recover the enormous costs that were involved in their creation. 

Many, if not most, economists, businessmen, and political leaders, recognizing the desirability and inevitability of a worldwide marketplace, now favor a "free market"; that is, a world economy, devoid of strict regulation.  However, opposition, sometimes fierce, continues to rage, waged by organized labor, companies who have declined in the wake of imports and outsourcing by competitors, and plain simple "economic nationalists."  And as long as our economic world is divided into non-corresponding political entities, each with its own separate economic policies, trade restrictions, and currencies, such opposition will continue to attract support.  This is partly due to the fact that political divisions give rise to the existence of more advantageous conditions in some places, and correspondingly less advantageous circumstances in others--which in turn causes the "haves" to wish to bar and exclude the "have nots"; and the "have nots" to cast blame for all of their troubles upon the "haves."

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The term "global economy" was first heard with some frequency during the 1960s; and has been repeated increasingly ever since.  The concept of the multinational corporation also began to be referred to during this period.  At this time, many of these were American corporations, who built factories abroad for the purpose of taking advantage of the lower labor costs that existed in these foreign places.  This trend was further reinforced for companies of numerous nations by the fact that physical distance was no longer a major consideration in calculation of the costs of commerce, in that the cost of moving products around the world had become a lessor factor in their merchandising equations (but note that our current energy difficulties have cast a different light upon this concept). 

Subsequently, investment of American money in foreign countries became increasingly commonplace.  For example, by 1995, close to ten percent of U.S. pension funds were invested in Asian enterprise.  Lower interest rates in nation A will often be a cause for investors in that country to send their capital abroad, where the likelihood of more lucrative returns happen at the moment to be available.  Furthermore, the present state of information technology, and its accompanying capabilities, has led to a vastly shrunken and modified economic world.  It has been agreed by most economists that such foreign investment activity is an absolute benefit to the world economy in general.

Today, capital can be instantaneously shifted to anyplace on earth with the stroke of a computer key.  Companies can act and react in response to conditions and changes in the marketplace moments after they occur.  And consumers as well today become quickly aware of products, services, trends, and prices as they emerge; being thereby motivated and enabled to demand immediate gratification of their needs and desires.

As a result of all of this, that which has been referred to as "economic nationalism" has become less and less a force in worldwide commercial affairs.  On the other hand, our economic world is today experiencing an era of increasing regionalization.  Kenicki Ohmae refers to such emerging economically linked regionhs as "region states."  He describes these places as being truly "global" in orientation and outlook, welcoming foreign investment, foreign ownership, and foreign products; and maintaining as a criterion only a desire for "the best and cheapest products from anywhere in the world." (K. Ohmae, The End of the Nation State)

Commercial enterprises no longer look so much upon specific countries as places toward which to direct their marketing efforts; but, rather, to regions, which might consist of part of a nation-state, all of a nation-state, or an area consisting of all and/or parts of a number of such nation-states.

The United States has been aptly described as an early example of progress by a group of somewhat separate state economies into an integrated economy under the aegis of a federal government.  This arrangement gave rise to the eventual establishment of various federal regulatory agencies, such as the Securities Exchange Commission, Federal Communications Commission, and Federal Reserve Bank.  It is expected that the development of a single world economy would proceed along, and has in fact been following, such a track to a certain extent--as a number of semiautonomous national economies are progressing into membership in groups of more integrated regional economies.

However, opinions have varied over whether regional economies constitute "stepping stones" toward, or "stumbling blocks" along the path to, an all-inclusive world economy.  For groupings of national economies into separate regional arrangements--such as the European Union and NAFTA--could encourage individual group identities on the part of the membership of each group; and thus comprise a setback in the world's progress toward a true global economy.  Furthermore, developing countries who are not members of one or another of these regional groups would be left out altogether; and thereby encounter delay in, or even cessation of, their own economic development.  Moreover, individual regional entities could become as hostile to global free trade as any nation-state has ever been--possibly even more so.  In addition, establishment and maintenance of a regionalized economic world could lead as well to a situation wherein the world will have assumed an arrangement into several regional political entities.  (Witness, for example, the plight of the imagined future world consisting of three ever-hostile, ever-battling, political entities as portrayed in George Orwell's 1984.)  Such might turn out to be as undesirable as, or perhaps even more so than, the current nation-state condition that prevails in our political world today.

Another detrimental result of unequal economic relations among nation-states is resort by some of the less advantaged to attempts to "catch up," via overly rapid or improper depletion of their natural resources, as well as other ecological abuses.  One example is the imprudent rate of deforestation that currently takes place among some of the developing countries, in efforts to export timber faster, or create more agricultural land, than regeneration could ever keep pace with.  A second is the excessive pollution created when factories in rapidly developing economies--such as what is today taking place in China, India, and Southeast Asia in general--pay scant heed to the ecological damage attributable to their operations.  A worldwide economy, governed by worldwide regulation, would regard natural resources as existing for the benefit of the world.  Consequently, no single country would be there to recklessly deplete its particular supplies thereof in efforts to "catch up to," or "keep up with," other nations' economies.  The net result would instead be a more efficient and productive utilization of our planet's natural assets; and a consequent economic advantage to all of the world.

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RE AN INTERNATIONAL ECONOMY AND CURRENCY

RE AN INTERNATIONAL ECONOMY

There was a time, many years ago, before the existence of political boundaries and the burdens they impose, when people traded amongst themselves freely and without concern.  Linked by ties of social and geographic proximity, but not yet encumbered by political and economic hobbles, they regularly exchanged the products of their hunting, fishing, and agriculture.  This elementary commerce transpired freely and easily; and problems were few and inconsequential.

Centuries later, mankind's economic picture has become far more complicated; and a great deal more troubled and troublesome.  With the development of our world into a chessboard of nations, struggling within ourselves as well as with each other, for various objectives, not the least of which being commercial superiority, we have spawned, and have had to endure, perpetual economic struggle, punctuated by occasional economic disaster.

It has been wisely commented that in many of man's affairs, first steps are often motivated by economic considerations.  Thus, the great French economist Jean Monnet was seemingly correct in his observation that mankind's earliest steps to political unity would likely be traceable along economic lines.

In the more recent past, huge economic crises usually took place in the wake of waves of inappropriate economic restrictions on the part of various nation-states.  A primary example would be the condition of economic affairs following World War I.  Large older countries strove to repair their damaged economies via excessive tariffs and exchange rates; while newer recently created states resorted to the same methods in efforts to protect their infant economies.  At that time, the pure and simple basic problem lay in the fact that our world consisted of a large group of individual national economies, each possessing very different economic concepts, together with a wide variety of structures to implement them. 

New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman has correctly designated such singular economic activity on the part of various individual countries as an example of "cheap nationalism."  He goes on to condemn such "jingoistic celebration of nationhood" as comprising mere "emotion-grabbing symbols," having little potential for "real, concrete improvements in quality of life."  (The Lexus and the Olive Tree)  Industries within individual nation-states which were experiencing difficulties have often turned, and still do turn, to their national governments for assistance.  When rendered, this help is usually int the form of subsidies and protection.  These forms of ostensible assistance have actually done little good for the producer or the consumer; for they create little or no incentive for real improvement or meaningful change.  In fact, a recent study has revealed that government protection of its domestic markets can actually constitute a serious cause of increasing levels of unemployment--for it serves to reduce, rather than expand, that nation's commerce and trade. 

In more recent years, our world, still consisting of dozens of individual national economies, has come to be subject to, and governed by, forces that are worldwide in nature.  We are reminded of the presence of the current crowd of "faceless stock, bond, and currency traders, sitting behind computer screens all over the globe," (Thomas L. Friedman, op. cit.) constantly transferring their funds from place to place; as well as the many multinational corporations, who regularly open and close factories around the globe, in perpetual pursuit of lower costs and more lucrative markets.  These elements are, in reality, replacing national governments as primary sources of capital and growth.  Another phenomenon of late has been the emergence in many parts of the world of a breed of "merger and acquisition" experts, whose activities result in no improvement to products or services, but are, rather, solely consecrated to the creation of additional personal wealth, for themselves or those for whom they are acting.

The nature of contemporary commercial practices has in fact evolved to a point where national labels are less important, and therefore hardly necessary.  For example, what is the national pedigree of a product turned out in nation A, when most of its component parts have been obtained or produced in nations B, C, and D? 

Reflecting another current trend, economic focus in many parts of  our world has shifted away from agriculture.  Countries with mature economies have moved into the service sector; while a number of developing countries have turned to manufacturing as their principal economic activity.

Further, "horizontal linkages" among people from the same generations across the globe exert stronger economic forces than do traditional, vertical linkages between mixed generations living within a particular locale.  A world-famous brand of jeans or sneakers will thus likely be similarly in the shopping plans of persons of the same age and socioeconomic strata throughout the world.

As economic globalization continues to march forward, national economic systems are becoming more and more similar.  At the same time, as a result of this, the marketplace has become elevated to a rank in the minds of most of us that is higher in importance than our consideration of the concept of the nation-state.  Whether we realize it or not, this recent supremacy of the market over the state, and of economics over politics, has been responsible for the nonoccurrence of a number of political struggles that, in earlier days, could have led to warfare.

The marketplace today is thus becoming more and more a single global market.  Financial successes have been achieved by investment in global stock and bond markets, by companies setting up shop in various countries, and by sale of the goods produced by such companies in a worldwide trading system. 

THE DISADVANTAGES OF NATIONAL TRADE BARRIERS AND RESTRICTIONS

In Japan, a shortage of raw materials, combined with a highly skilled work force and a large amount of capital, created an economy that currently produces and exports many automobiles and electronic goods, while importing comparatively little.  But this state of affairs has nothing to do with the fact that Japan is a separate nation, directed by its own individual government.  Nor should its status and existence as a separate sovereign nation-state be given the credit for Japan's having entertained a trade/payment surplus, or having become an economic competitor with a number of other nation-states, including the United States, during recent years.  That is to say, it is the underlying nature of the people and of the place--not the government or its politics--that created the economic conditions that have come to exist there.

Likewise, cheap exports from China, which have been blamed for having caused unemployment in a number of other countries, are again in no way related to the fact that China happens to be an independent nation-state.  They are instead a consequence of the fact that this region of the world happens to contain an exceedingly great number of people, who comprise a surplus of labor.  This oversuppoy of available workers, coupled with the fact that most of them are unable to escape to other places in order to seek more lucrative conditions, results in pitifully low wages, correspondingly low production costs, and resultant low prices.

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It is, of course, quite easy to realize that a world composed of a large group of nation-states constitutes an antithesis to free trade.  Where nation-states are involved, economic policies are frequently wasteful, inefficient, and fashioned mainly for the purpose of producing an illusion of control.  It is simple for such economic policies to readily become oriented toward the welfare of bureaucrats and special interests within a particular nation, often resulting in needless subsidy and protection.  Decisions favoring the general community, or logical from a global standpoint, are consequently seldom arrived at.  And the final results are tariffs, quotas, and export subsidies, that result in higher prices and more limited consumer choices for the people who live in the very nation wherein such policies are originated.

Even more painful is the effect that protectionism on the part of major industrial countries inflicts upon people in other, developing, parts of the world.  For example, in parts of Africa and Latin America, purchase of as humble, but necessary, an item as a bicycle may require several months' wages, due at least in part to exceedingly high import tariffs in place upon their components.

On the other hand, as if to pour salt into the wound, vested interests in some industrial countries may pretend to assist developing areas by convincing them to open their markets to said industrial nation's products--while continuing to keep their own markets protected via high tariffs.  Under this arrangement, the rich get richer, and the poor more impoverished.

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As long ago as the latter part of the eighteenth century, the rationalist theory of society emerged in Europe.  Recognizing institutions such as monarchy, the class system, and the established church to be merely results of force of habit and the self-interest of certain groups, thinkers concluded that in commerce, clear and simple business sense and accounting would provide a better way.  It was concluded that free trade and a single tax would be the best road that the ongoing expansion of the world of business should be made to follow.  It came to be realized that taxing successive  steps in the import, manufacture, and export of goods constituted an impediment to the natural flow of the world's products.  Such a system of export bounties and import duties, labeled the "mercantalist system," was condemned as an evil "born of the needs of war and the selfishness of merchant groups," and as comprising a hindrance to peace and wise government.  Moreover, it was simple to perceive that such encumbrances raised prices and diminished the purchasing power and prosperity of all.  However, not much was actually done about it.

Proceeding forward to the present day, the traditional nation-state has continued to be criticized as "unnatural," and even "impossible," as a business unit component or regulator within our twenty-first century global economy.  In today's global market, the hulk that is the nation-state seems to "merely get in the way."  Solutions to economic issues are said to flow naturally to beneficial conclusion without the intervention of nationsal governments; and their "traditional middleman function" is described as largely unnecessary.  In fact, undue attempts on the part of the governments of nations to demand from, or dictate to, the participants in today's global capital markets only induce diversion of the flow of capital to other places--resulting in unfavorable outcomes, such as an impairment of the national currency, and shortages of investment funds, within those countries. (Kenicki Ohmae, The End of the Nation-State)

Most economists agree that free trade is superior to any and all forms of trade restriction or protection; and that if protectionism were abandoned or reversed, benefit to all the world would ensue.  In fact, the foregoing is described as one of the few tenets that virtually all economists agree on.

In a single united world, we would hear no terms such as "production surpluses" or "trade deficits" among nations.  For there would be no nations--only regions of our world, which would produce or manufacture more, or less, than other regions. This would precipitate no specific economic effect upon the residents of that, or any other, particular area.  Instead, an "averaged" effect would ensue, regarding the totality of a single world economy.  Negative effects, if any, would be milder when considered within the context of the entire world; and be more easily remedied or corrected, if worldwide conditions and resources were applied to their relief.

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THE DISADVANTAGES OF NATIONAL TRADE BARRIERS AND RESTRICTIONS

Modern economic theory, which came to include the custom of regulation of trade between countries, via tariffs and outright trade barriers, happened to be born at approximately the same time as the actual development of the nation-state as a political entity.  This accidental combination of events went on to evolve into an arrangement that is today taken for granted by mankind: that the government of a nation constitutes the primary organizational form, as well as managing entity, of economic affairs within the state.  Such a right originates from, and is mainly based upon, the fact that the national government possesses control of that nation's military resources; and can thus enforce such economic controls as it should deem meet to immpose upon its citizens, and its trading partners as well.

But there is in fact no logical purpose in each of a hundred separate nations protecting the producers and manufacturers within each of its respective borders from competition by producers and manufacturers within the other ninety-nine--whose governments are performing the same operations as regards their own producers and manufacturers, concerning the potential competition that they might face from the other ninety-nine.  As a result, instead of a worldwide venue for all producers and manufacturers to market their goods, and from which all the world's people might obtain their requirements on an equal basis, we are divided into a hundred separate enclaves, within which only the products and goods of that particular place are freely purchased and sold.  Beyond these border lines, a producer's products and a manufacturer's goods must navigate a morass of ninety-nine different sets of regulation and restriction, which, at the end of the day, bestow no benefit upon buyer or seller.  (I do not here refer to restrictions or regulations as to safety, health hazards, or the like.  I would, in fact, desire to see a single universal set of safety and health-related requirements of the highest caliber imposed upon all products and goods that are cultivated or manufactured, be they utilized or sold locally or across the globe.)

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Variouys attempts have been undertaken on an international level to rectify this situation; which seems to corroborate the allegation that it does constitute a condition in need of correction.

In the 1860s, prompted by efforts originated by Napoleon III, it appeared that a new era of freedom of trade might be dawning upon Europe.  Unfortunately, opposition by certain industrialists, and subsequent government distractions concerning warfare, caused an early demise to this new and hopeful trend. 

In 1913, American President Woodrow Wilson attempted to ameliorate America's economic plight by reducing tariffs via the Underwood-Simmons Tariff Act.  Quite simply, reduction of our tariffs would serve to reduce the price of goods for the American consumer, in that foreign producers would not need to add a high tariff premium to their products.  At the same time, American producers would be obliged to reduce the prices they charged in order to compete with their foreign competitors.  It was apparently another good idea by this great visionary; but subsequent events reduced its necessity.  The outbreak of World War I not long thereafter caused American products to become widely demanded throughout the world for a time, and the protectionism afforded by tariffs was no  longer a major concern.  Moreover, America's institution of the federal income tax, via the Sixteenth Amendment in 1913, shifted the nation's primary source of income from tariffs to said tax revenues.

Following World War II, multilateral negotiations were undertaken in efforts to liberate the world from import constraints and other economic barriers.  A result was the International Trade Organization, a "compromise agreement" between American and British negotiators at the Bretton Woods conferences.  By 1950, the United States Senate would disapprove its proposed charter.

In the interim, however, during October of 1947, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade ("GATT") was signed by the U.S. and a number of its trading partners, in new efforts to promote "freer and fairer" trade, mainly via reduction in tariffs.  Article XXIV of this Agreement, comprising rules governing regional trading arrangements, provides that:
a.  barriers to trade among participants must be completely eliminated regarding substantially all aspects of trade among signers of the Agreement; and
b.  there shall be no increase in duties or other commercial regulations levied upon imports from non-member countries.

Between 1960 and 1989, international trade grew by leaps and bounds.  This was an effect of an increase in incomes throughout the world, as well as numerous technological advances.  But the division of our planet into an array of separate nations, each with its own economy and economic difficulties, resulted in various setbacks referred to by such negative terms as "trade deficit" and "falling currency."  An extreme example of this was the plunge on Wall Street that occurred in October of 1987.  Described as a day "far worse than 1929," its causes were attributed to factors which included the aforementioned terms: "trade deficits...[and] the falling dollar." (Clifton Daniel, Ed. in Chief, Chronicle of the 20th Century) 

In the late 1980s, as expanded world trade produced a more and more interdependent world, the need for freedom in the marketplace made itself ever more apparent.  British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher expressed the belief that the unhindered flow of world trade would serve as a guarantee of prosperity.  By 1988, the United States and Canada had signed a Free Trade Agreement, designed to end all trade barriers between the two countries by the year 2000.  And in 1992, a pact of a similar nature was entered by the U.S., Canada and Mexico.

Subsequently, following negotiations begun in 1986, called the "Uruguay Round" of the continuing GATT conferences, and upon final accord at Marrakesh, Morocco, in 1994, the World Trade Organization came into existence.  It has been described as an intended "meeting place where willing nations could sit in equality and negotiate rules of trade for their mutual advantage, in the service of sustainable international development." (New York Times Magazine, Aug. 12, 2002)  Instead, however, the organization has been accused by its critics as having become an unbalanced institution, largely controlled by the United States and the nations of Europe, and especially the agribusiness, pharmaceutical, and financial servicxes industries in those countries.

The European Union constitutes another attempt by a number of nations to open themselves to each other in ways which include economics and trade.  (I will attempt to describe it in some detail in a later post.)

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THE DISADVANTAGES OF NATIONAL TRADE BARRIERS AND RESTRICTIONS

It appears that a worldwide, borderless, capitalist economy, wherein trade, investment, and other commercial activity are able to function unfettered by national borders, would produce benefit to all of mankind.

The world, as we now know it, is a world of borders; and furthermore, by reason thereof, a world of barriers.  We are not only separated and bound by political boundaries; we are also divided by economic "femces," that needlessly separate us, and hinder our progress.

It is a recently oft-cited fact that the twenty-first century is a period during which many economic decisions are founded upon global bases.  Capital markets have become worldwide; and investments flow to the regions that are "transparent" (i.e., open) to the international financial commumnity.

The "wealth-gathering" regions of our world are not neatly confined within certain politically defined boundaries.  They exist because they happen to be "wealth-gathering" by their nature, composition, resources, and personality.  Therefore, they lie at times within, and sometimes across, national boundaries.  Conversely, the typical nation-state is far from uniform in its characteristics and composition.  It is frequently a combination of a number of different regions, having vastly different resources, capabilities, and requirements.

In order to thrive to their fullest, these regions need to possess autonomy to function without the stricture of political constraints.  Such constraints usually take the form of unnecessary or redundant governmental regulation, control, and protectionist imposts.  In fact, for this reason, the knowledge-intensive pioneer companies that are today springing up in our modern world are gravitating toward friendlier environs, as regards regulation, such as offered by countries like Malaysia and Singapore.

In a nutshell, protectionism, and the regulations and prohibitions that it gives rise to, are hostile toward, and destructive of, a global atmosphere, within which the entire world may derive benefit from the fruits that are the product of the ingenuity and accomplishments of all of mankind.

It is strange but apparently true that once the government of a place opens itself up to the global system and sheds needless protectionism, prosperity seems to magically follow.  It is for this reason that globalization has apparently significantly raised standards of living across the globe, in countries from China, Korea, and Malaysia to Argentina and Brazil.

There was a time when production, purchase, and sale of consumer goods were principally carried on "at home"  that is, within a local region.  But, as can be readily recognized, that has all changed; and a sizeable portion of the economies of the United States and most other nations depends upon trade.  For example, foreign trade represented only thirteen percent of the United States' gross domestic product in 1970; but, by the turn of the twenty-first century, it had risen to about thirty percent.

The fact that trade-flows in today's world continue to be determined by, and continue to be a function of, national boundaries constitutes a defect within, and an impediment to, the world's economic well-being.  Trade and economics ought not be--althoughthey continue to be--regarded as spheres and exponents of respective nations' foreign policy.  A result, as well as a proof, of this lies in the fact that, today, disputes over trade barriers are the subject of more international concern than are the many and strenuous disputes over border lines.

As a primary principle, it should be realized that the success of an industry in a particular region is not determineed by the political boundaries within which said industry, or region, happens to be contained.  Rather, it is a result of the resources within that industry or region, and the efforts and activities of certain individuals or groups of people who constitute or populate it.  As Kenichi Ohmae, a well-known and knowledgeable author of numerous works on business and finance, characterizes it in his The End of the Nation-State, "economic activity in today's borderless world follows ...information-driven efforts to participate in the global economy." 

Thus, excellence of an industry, or a group of people within a certain place, should not be able to be resorted to as a sword or a shield in international affairs--to the detrimant of the industries and/or the consumers who depend upon them.

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THE DISADVANTAGES OF POLITICAL BOUNDARIES

Jesus' teachings regarded the state as something to be tolerated and obeyed as necessary--but subject, nevertheless, to the universal rule of one God over all people and every state.  And He was eventually executed for agitation and sedition--both crimes against the Roman state, to which His civil--though not His spiritual--loyalty was due.

In his City of God, St. Augustine affirmed (somewhat in keeping with what I have been stating in recent posts) that the earthly city constituted but a painful monument to mankind's fall from grace.  That is to say, the division of man into separate groups or tribes, divided by self-identity, and ever-seeking to preserve and expand their proclaimed boundaries, seemed but another burden that enlightened man bears the task of overcoming.

Disputes concerning boundary lines go back to ancient times; and thus appear to betray the primitive and backward "tribal mindset" from whence they originate.  Barbarian rulers often quarreled over lands touched by their common bounds.  Subsequently, the principle of boundary, and of territory within such being controlled by particular persons and groups, evolved into what would become known as "sovereignty."

We have become so long accustomed to the terms "sovereign" and "sovereignty," and to the ideals which they convey, that we take the concept not only for granted, but consider it a fundamental ingredient of life in the civilized world.  It is a consideration, sometimes guiding, more often binding, in every aspect of diplomacy, public policy, and ethics.

A perpetual danger and potential abuse inplicit in every instance of sovereignty is the theoretical capability of the "sovereign" ruling power to coerce and to abuse its population without fear of outside interference.  Indeed, many wrongs have been committed within nation-states by the governing power upon its people, via resort to the justification of exercise of sovereign right.  These often go unchallenged by the rest of the world, based upon the concept that they constitute exercise of attendance to that nation's private affairs.  But, if the acts of a world government are by their nature viewed upon a worldwide stage, and thereby always evaluated against the measuring rod of universal objective principles of civilized human right, such wrongful acts could never be sanctioned, and therefore ought not occur.

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THE DISADVANTAGES OF POLITICAL BOUNDARIES

It is my purpose to offer a vision of what our world could become if the residents of nation-states chose to abandon the senseless factional considerations that have driven human against human for generations, mainly on the basis of which side of a line they happen to have been born.  It is a vision of an improved state of society, in which the absence of borders would promote working together to solve common problems--instead of endless generation of new and additional problems caused by this factional conflict and hostility.

History and headlines daily present us with a vast array of happenings and circumstances--some grave, and some downright amusing--which are attributable to the fact that our world is encumbered by borders and separate nations.  In this regard, it can be interesting to consider a random few among thousands of such situations, for the purpose of conjecturing what would not happen should our planet become a world without borders:

In a world without borders, nation A, formerly allied with nations B and C in the prosecution of a war against D through J, would not, once an armistice had been reached, turn around and declare war on nations B and C--as Italy did to its former allies Germany and Japan in 1943 and 1945, respectively.

In a world without borders, nations A and B would not commence occupancy of smaller, more defenseless, countries C and D, staying until they were directed to withdraw their troops by an international body--as was the case when Britain and France commenced occupancy of Lebanon and Syria, until directed to withdraw by the United Nations in 1946.

In a world without borders, nation A would not warn nation B that it risked "all-out war" if it attacked nation C--as Egypt warned Israel, regarding a perceived intent on the part of Israel to attack Syria in 1967.

In a world without borders, ninety two people would not be sentenced to death for treason against their nation--as occurred in 1971.

In a world without borders, agencies of national governments wouldnot need to resort to assassinations in order to accomplish their missions--as a congressional investigation into the United States' own Central Intelligence Agency determined in 1975.

In a world without borders, nation A would not resort to selling arms to nation B, as a "rebuff" to nation C--as was our sale of arms to China in 1980, described in the media as a "rebuff to the Soviet Union."

In a world without bgorders, a general of the army of nation Awould not be sentenced to twelve years imprisonment for "mismanagement" of a war waged by nation A against nation B, over a few tiny islands in the vicinity of nation A--which were claimed to be "owned" by nation B--as happened during the invasion that Argentina undertook against Great Britain over the Falklands and South Georgia in 1982.

In a world without borders, nation A would not need to expel three envoys of nation B, in retaliation for nation B's recent expulsion of theirs--which exchange occurred between Great Britain and Syria in 1986.

And in a world without borders, nations A, B, and C would not refuse to recognize nation D's right to exist--as is the case concerning a number of Arab states' continuing position regarding Israel to this day.

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If there were no borders, nations would not dominate, annex, attack, wage war against, nor conquer, other nations.  Nations would not seek to expand their respective national territories by taking territory away from other, perhaps smaller or weaker, nations, by means of threat or invasion, as has been customary throughout history.  There would be no larger or stronger nations; nor would there be smaller or weaker nations.  And larger or stronger nations would not fight over, negotiate concerning, grant or disapprove among themselves "spheres of influence," or dominance over, smaller or weaker nations.  There would be no riots, insurgencies, or other acts of violence within the cities and villages of certain nations, in attempts by indigenous peoples to rid themselves of the presence of occupying troops of foreign nations.

Nsation would not take sides in favor of or against other nations.  A nation would not have to resort to threatening a second nation in order to convince that second nation to refrain from attacking a third nation who happened to be a neighbor or ally of that first nation.

Nations would not be able to adopt an official religion, such as Catholicism or Islam; nor an official economic system, such as communism.  And nations would not need to resort to military action on account of threats of infiltration by their neighbor's doctrines across their borders. 

Regions would not be carved up into new national entities following wars or conferences, with little or no regard for the composition of the peoples living within these places.  People related by blood or culture would no longer be rendered "citizens" of one or another among two and even threenations--and thus need passports in order to "go home for the holidays."

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