"Success," like the man says, determines how you answer that question. If you believe nation-states and governments to be deterministically expansionist, then your question answers itself.

Fasces fumbled the question, which is not about size of government but about size of country. Fasces thinks government is more effective/"successful" when the size of the country is smaller. It has nothing to do with size of government.

What Putin said, that was my bad. However a smaller country is easier to govern, and so therefore the state will be better of, if in a small country...

Well how long has Belgium even prospered without a government.

"smaller country is easier to govern"

That is self-evident. It is however not relevant to the question unless you define success as smooth handling of daily governmental agenda.

So, I ask similarly to what Nebuchadnezzar wrote, how do you define success?

That's because the central government is so weak it leaves much of the day-to-day administration to the regions., but it has a very large ratio of civil servants to population, so it has a very effective bureaucracy. That said though, Belgium cannot implement new spending projects or new plans to reduce their deficit because of their national paralysis.

But Belgium is another case of a small country that is very difficult to govern. You don't see France or Germany setting records for number of days without a government.

Ok, maybe this question was slightly taken out of context. The question is, is one big country or a few little ones a more efficient way to govern.

As Putin was calling for conglomerating countries into one mega-socialist power and I was saying that is a bad idea. (but not just because a mega-socialist power is not sustainable)

This got the arguement into whether an empire or a city state can do better at governing the people.

it is different. Different solutions are correct for different sizes of country.

This does not mean i know what the ideal solution is...

Fasces, why do you support a political party that wants to keep Quebec in Canada and which ruthlessly attacks the Bloc? You think small is better but not in Canada?

@ Everyone

Are we talking about geographic size or the size of the population? India is not the biggest country, but its population density is very high. I cannot imagine India is easy to govern (Isn't the corruption fairly widespread?)

Ironically in smaller countries I think communism can work, and yet I am advocating a fascist small government... (however not a hope in hell for large countries)

I leave for class for a while, and come back to shit news and a thread gone wild and then split off into another thread...

I think the communal idealism of communism can work on a small scale; on a larger scale, I feel that would break down and simply give way to an elite class rising above the rest and exploiting the others.

/Ditto fascism, though I must admit it doesn't sound appealing on any scale.

I was talking about geographic size. India is a large country on every dimension, so I don't think it matters in that case.

You say India is governed poorly, I think India is governed remarkably well considering its conditions. Political scientists believe India is the one glaring anomaly in almost every predictive theory. India is not supposed to be a liberal democracy, it is too poor and too diverse, yet it is. States in India such as Kerala have first world marks on things like infant mortality and literacy, and yet their income is extremely low. India has been threatened by terrorism and invasion throughout its relatively short history, and has a huge population of Muslims that must have some feeling of affinity towards their Pakistani rival, and yet it has not turned into a garrison state - which would only be natural. India is a rising economic power in spite of itself.

And while corruption is a problem (and it is in any developing country - http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/World_Map_Index_of_perception_of_corruption_2010.svg), the top level of the civil service - the Indian Civil Service, is very competent and effective.

I also think the fact that of all the states which arose from British India, the largest is by far the most effectively governed, says a lot. Compare India to Pakistan and Bangladesh, still large in population but much smaller than India (and both much less diverse), and see who performs better on governance.

"considering its conditions"
Exactly its conditions, any large country would have a hard time keeping out the corruption in politics, but it is much easier to focus on a smaller country.

Is there a correlation between smallness and lack of corruption? I don't know, look at the index.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index#Rankings

Your own country is #6, you're hardly small. Look at the other side - plenty of small countries among the most corrupt in the world.

But once again I ask, why don't you support the BQ? You've dodged this question twice now.

The BQ, those fucking separatists should realize that Quebec doesn't have the economy to survive on its own and give up. I am glad that they have only 4 seats this time.

"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index#Rankings"
By size, I mean population, and with the lowest population density out of any country in the world, we have a pretty small population.
And 3 countries I referred to as being rich because their small are in the top 20...
The 4th, Liechtenstein is under the 'no data' category...

@ Putin33

Thank you. I didn't know I was misinformed about the political state of India.
**************
I think communism is only practical on a very small scale (in a community (not even a country) smaller than 100,000 people or so) and would have to be by choice. It is impractical to force people into communism.

I agree with obiwan. The communal idealism of communism can work on a very small scale. Communalism was very popular amongst communities of German immigrants in America's Midwest.

On a large scale, I would advocate fascism. I believe fascism is very practical, unlike large-scale communism. However, because fascism invites nationalism, and nationalism invites the creation and maintenance of a large military, I believe a world of fascist governments would be much less peaceful than a world of ideal communism.

"On a large scale, I would advocate fascism. I believe fascism is very practical, unlike large-scale communism. However, because fascism invites nationalism, and nationalism invites the creation and maintenance of a large military, I believe a world of fascist governments would be much less peaceful than a world of ideal communism."
agree, but I don't think war is a bad thing,as it increases the efficiency of the public sector...

"that Quebec doesn't have the economy to survive on its own and give up. I am glad that they have only 4 seats this time."

So Quebec is too small to survive but you're on here touting the greatness of principalities like Luxembourg and whatever. Odd. Quebec's GDP is huge compared to many other small countries - 20% of Canada's 1.34 Trillion dollar GDP - so about 268 billion. That'd put Quebec at around #34th in the world.

...I don't think war is a bad thing,as it increases the efficiency of the public sector...
what a bullshit, it makes the public sector ignore things because there is less money, not because they work more efficient.

Also, i think this threat is much to simplistic, size has an influence, but there are way more factors with a much bigger influence. There is a lot written about the influence of the size of municipalitys on its effectiveness, but the fact is, there has been non proven influence because of the complexity of the subject matter.

However Quebec's economy is different, it relies on the maritime provinces, buying the resources off the maritimes and selling them to the states at a higher price. It would seriously mess up both our economies and quebecs if quebec separates.

Many of the small countries you have been promoting have similar situations. Singapore is entirely reliant on trade with Malaysia, etc.

Of course small countries are reliant on trade, but I never said trade is bad...

You talk out both sides of your mouth. I don't get why small countries are always better except in the case of Quebec.

Because I am nationalist, I will never let the great country of Canada be split into multiple different countries. That is why.

Well why not, Canada would be more effectively run, right?

Well of course, Parliament would have an easier time getting majority governments and more would get done faster. Government would become more efficient and would better serve the people.

However we would become the 4th largest country in the world without Quebec, a price I am not willing to pay.

I'm sorry Fasces, your reasoning is stupid and contradictory. That is all.