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Idaho. There are also right-wing succesionist movements in Texas, South Carolina, and elsewhere. Given a 2018 poll which found 39 percent of probable voters supported the right of states to succeed,43 it is unlikely such initiatives will go away any time soon.
The problem is, of course, these efforts do not confront underlying structural problems of the American Republic but instead simply propose realigning existing political boundaries to meet personal needs, beliefs, or agendas.
As such, none of the above-mentioned proposals provide a viable solution for remedying America's ills. America cannot even turn to other countries,, because many countries that once held out promise for major democratic reform are also finding their efforts stifled.
In South Africa, which emerged from years of apartheid, financial scandals continue to plague the country’s elected officials; in Poland, where the promise of Solidarity in the 1980s caused the overthrow of the authoritarian regime, legal experts from the Council of Europe rights watchdog group argue constitutional issues are undermining democracy, human rights and the rule of law; in Czechoslovakia, whose Velvet Revolution also held forth great promise, has had its government rocked by political scandal, charges of spying and bribery, with the result there is a general sense creeping retrograde changes will once again raise their head; and in
Thailand, which in 1999 was ranked by Freedom House as a “free nation,” the country not only experienced a coup in 2006 but most recently found the electorate approving a charter in 2016 that endorsed a military-backed constitution giving the unelected Senate the right to help choose a potentially unelected prime minister.
Then there is Egypt, which experienced the Arab Spring, toppled the autocrat President Mubarak, elected the Muslim Brotherhood to power, and then installed, through a “coup-volution” of 2011, an authoritarian successor, President Abd al Fattah al-Sisi, who practices a “delegative authoritarianism” where he perceives himself as the “embodiment of the nation and the main custodian and definer of its interests;” Libya, another country which showed promise through the Arab Spring after the toppling of Moammar Gaddafi, has seen its rush to democratic reform stifled by a lack of preparedness, opening a door not only to dueling factions but increasing influence by Egypt and the Islamic State; and Morocco, where 98% of Moroccans voted to approve a 2011 constitution that was more an authoritarian plebiscite than a democratic referendum, creating in effect a octroyée constitution–a constitution issued by the head of state without the participation of representative institution–characterized by a lack of transparency.
Even some of the longer-term reform efforts, which were being touted as models for more engaged democratic and more fair economic systems, are being challenged. For example, democratic socialist reforms of Scandinavian countries have increasingly come under attack. Sweden, which from 1870 through 1936 was the fastest growing economy in the world, has seen its economy slow since the 1990s, bringing about increasing calls for an end to socialism through ‘free market’ initiatives not only in Sweden but also throughout Scandinavia. Questions are also being raised about the viability of the European Union model, given the fallout from Brexit. And though many people still hold out hope for secessionist movements now being proposed in places like Scotland and Catalonia, which would promise more democratic reforms than would be possible under the United Kingdom or Spain, there is no evidence the respective movements will actually be realized. As such, none of these frameworks can be used to address the ills experienced here in America.44
What if the Real Issue is the Nation-State Itself?
Addressing problems in our republic in a
non-systemic way is like playing a game of “Wack-A-Mole”–as soon as you hammer down one problem, another pops up. It might be