A difficult truth to accept: Liberal democracy is not favored around the world
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Anonymous
Are you equating Iran with Persia? |
Anonymous
The last (only?) wave of Iranian immigrants to the US fled their homeland when the American backed shah fell and those coming here were allies of that illegitimate, oppressive, and murderous regime. Many of those have hands soaked in blood and torture. |
Anonymous
Unsurprisingly, lack of full democracy is leading risk of civil wars, which have been increasing not decreasing … |
Anonymous
It’s a pretty rubbish website. You can tell from the text. It also says there are 6,000 US expats living in Egypt while the US embassy’s own website estimates 60,000 US citizens. Assume it’s unreliable. |
Anonymous
LOL |
Anonymous
What’s happening? The U.S. government doesn’t formally track how many Americans leave the U.S. but the most recent estimate puts the figure at nearly nine million. This figure represents a doubling of the 1999 figure, placed at 4.1 million. The number of expats has more than doubled in the last fifteen years — a number growing faster than the rate of the U.S. population itself. After the 2016 U.S. Presidential election many Americans said that they would leave the country, though no figures exist to show whether a significant up-tick has occurred. Where are people going? So where are these American expats going? According to the Association of American Residents Overseas (AARO), US expats can be found in more than 160 countries: * 40% opt for the Western hemisphere — Canada, Central and South America. * 26% move to Europe. * 14% head to East Asia and the Pacific — think Australia and New Zealand as well as China and Japan. * 14% head to the Middle East. * 3% travel to Central or South Asia. * 3% choose Africa. https://www.aetnainternational.com/en/about-us/explore/living-abroad/culture-lifestyle/where-are-Americans-emigrating-to-and-why.html#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20Association%20of,well%20as%20China%20and%20Japan. Why have millions of Americans moved to these countries instead? Analysis by Andrew Van Dam Staff writer December 23, 2022 at 6:00 a.m. ES https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/12/23/american-emigrants/ By almost any metric, Mexico is the top destination for Americans leaving the country. But there’s an unusual reason for that, which becomes apparent when you slice Mexico’s American population by age. Typically, migrants from America are young adults — think students, Mormon missionaries and Marines — or middle-aged professionals. But American Mexicans are neither: Two-thirds are under 18 — children, in other words. The vast majority of these young Americans have two Mexican parents, according to a demographic analysis of Mexico’s data by Claudia Masferrer (El Colegio de México), Erin Hamilton (University of California at Davis) and Nicole Denier (University of Alberta). Born in the United States as Mexican immigration peaked, they returned to Mexico with their parents as the U.S. Mexican population crested in 2007 and fell during the Obama and Trump administrations. Many parents returned voluntarily, but research shows about 1 in 6 were deported. These young American Mexicans — some call them “accidental Americans” because they didn’t choose their American citizenship — tend to be concentrated in border states, particularly Baja California and Chihuahua. In other top destinations — Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Israel, Australia and other advanced economies — most Americans arrive on purpose. Or at least that’s how it looks at first glance. But when you scratch the surface of almost any American emigrant, you often find a series of accidents. …. Stereotypes of the idly rich or retired expat aside, research by FVAP, the voting agency, finds that the majority of American voters in every world region are also workers. (In most regions, retirees form a large minority, making up more than a quarter of the expat population in Southeast Asia and the Americas.) There’s no data on what sort of work these Americans do. The Census Bureau’s surveys tracking Americans who return stateside show that they are much, much more likely to be active-duty military than most Americans. They’re also more likely to work in public administration or education, but less likely to work in health, manufacturing, retail or construction. …. I haven’t met many Americans in Cairo, Damascus or Abu Dhabi who are truly motivated solely by money,” said Blatteis, who has lived in each. “It’s usually people that are pretty academically and intellectually curious. A good chunk of my friends end up marrying people from cultures completely different than their own.” Caglar Ozden, World Bank lead economist and co-director of its upcoming World Development Report, has learned over two decades studying migration that immigrants defy categories. Whether they are asylum seekers or adventurers, Armenians or Americans, once they get settled, they all start to behave in similar ways: They look to study and work. They build social networks. They learn the language. “As a scholar of mobility, that’s what I have learned,” Ozden told us, his voice urgent. “Our common traits are way, way bigger and more fundamental than our differences.” |
Anonymous
| Two of the up and coming countries while no friend of each other make no bone about oppressing minorities and disdain for democracy in their respective countries. With the Chinese it’s to be expected but the way the Indians have betrayed democratic values is pretty shocking. |
Anonymous
| It’s pretty hilarious that the OP seems to think everybody is messed up except coastal liberals. Right. Everything is going great for places run by coastal liberals. Except maybe their public schools are a disaster, taxes are too high, crime is out of control, sanctuary housing is overflowing, & homeless people are living on sidewalks. Other than those few barely noticeable anomalies, it’s clear sailing. |
Anonymous
No, I am saying that maybe it’s time to either stop meddling in other countries’ affairs, or at least stop pretending that this is done for the sake of democracy… Democracy is great, I love it. But let’s pretend it can happen everywhere, Where there is a will, there is a way, etc |
Anonymous
NP This is a good point. The list is long of countries that have become decidedly undemocratic after US meddling and scheming. Or what’s even worse is when US gets played (like how Aung San Suu Kyi who took advantage of the good will of the US for decades and then betrayed the democratic world and proved to be just as brutal as the military junta). |
Anonymous
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Look, democracy is great, but it’s not something that’s easy to build anywhere. And maybe some countries don’t even want it.
I think building democracy has become a catch all phrase for making less developed countries more likely to serve the U.S. interests. They are promise’s economic prosperity and freedom as a byproduct, but it doesn’t always happen and it’s just that, a byproduct. It usually isn’t as great as it was supposed to be. So people get disillusioned and turn back to their totalitarian leadership or elect new one - who are often populists. |
Anonymous
Because as I said before, there are only two choices for the countries that aren’t part of the “first world” today - either become essentially subservient to the U.S. (under the guise of building democracy) which doesn’t bring much prosperity, OR start standing their ground and at some point being cornered into becoming autocracies, totalitarian regimes etc. |
Anonymous
India is poisoned by democracy. Without its own Deng, it will never move to middle income status. No country has attempted democracy at India’s relative per capita economic status and been able to develop into middle income status. If China had Ghandi, Nehru and Jinnah instead of mao and deng, it would be crushingly poor to this day. Deng especially is extremely underrated when it comes to sheer influence on the number of humans he moved up the HDI ladder. History will judge Deng extremely kindly |
Anonymous
I agree wholeheartedly with you. |
Anonymous
so what do you think has changed, so that the path that was open to S. Korea or China is no longer open? or even Spain, which was impoverished under Franco. Or East Germany, which was impoverished before unification? Or Ireland, which was impoverished under British rule? Although China does seem to be oddly turning to totalitarianism and patriarchy under Xi. I agree with the poster who said Deng is going to be one of the great names in history. |