For real globalisation, look at Ancient Rome

ian skidmore

The trouble is that the new replaces the old. It cannot bear to share.The railways replaced the canal and deliberately wrecked those waterways.
The motor car has replaced the horse and in larger issues we have repaced the classical world,more is the pity, Had we used modern innovations and the old ways side by side we wouldn't be in such a mess now

Steven Bushnell

Seven hundred years? Seven hundred years until the city of Rome fell, at which time the capital of the continuing empire was in Constantinople.

Sandeep Murthy

Mr. Jones, surely you have heard of Democritus of Abdera, a Greek philosopher of ancient times who proposed a very simple and beautiful atomic theory of matter (more than two thousand years before its modern reincarnation). Leucippus and Thales of Miletus were two other Greek philosophers who were associated with the atomic theory.

Of course, the Romans were excellent administrators, lawyers, architects and engineers - that is, doers - but for philosophy we must learn from the Greeks.

More generally, philosophy is complex because reality is complex.

Mike Schroeder

One reason the Roman Empire lasted as long as it did was that it exacted tribute from it's conquered nations, thus not having to over burden it's own citizens with draconian taxes--i.e., at least until the last couple of hundred years of its existence.

The reason America's Empire will collapse much quicker is because it does just the opposite.

David Chorley

Of course the Roman Empire only spoke in two official languages. The polyglot EU will never catch up to the US until it voluntarily reduces the number of official languages... or the US abandons English.

Denitsa

European Union is complex, because our time is complex. You can't just gather bunch of countries that not too long ago fought among each other and tell them, you're brothers, we're one country.Whose country, whose history, whose money, whose language, whose laws, whose industries?

You can't just tell them, we're gonna use this language, because it's better than all other languages. Languages that were used for couple of hundreds or thousand years.

I share your respect for Roman Empire, but you can't compare the society now and then. Sure, more laws, more corruption. Same goes for people. More people with power, more corruption.

But can you run the EU with it's 27 members with 10 people? Or with 10 laws. Can you fix their relationships from patents to branding of local products? Trough environment, civil rights, taxes, markets, science transfer and so on.

The Romans had it easy, because they didn't care if in some province women were stoned to death. Should the EU not care about that?

Yes, you can easily say we don't have to fix those things, we can just let it have it their way. And then all your precious industry will go to Romania and Bulgaria, because of the cheap working force or lower taxes. Then to the next eventual members.
Or you'll buy something from another EU member, something to eat, and it will give you an exotic disease, because you don't have a common safety regulation. Or you'll apply for a patent in UK and someone in France will beat you to it. Or whatever.
Our world is complex my friend. You can't just take the money and leave the people to do whatever they like.

European Union isn't an Empire and it hasn't conquered any of those countries. They don't have any obligations to it if the EU doesn't have obligations to them. Same goes for rights and so on.

I don't understad why peolpe try in any way to kick the EU in the dust. If you happen to visit some other countries than the starting 7 or 8, you'll see what a MAJOR difference there is in the life style, quality of life, the understanding of quality life, the economics, EVERYTHING! WE're strong in our variety. And if we want to get even stronger, we have to learn to respect that variety, use it for the common good and control it for the common well-being. And if that has to pass trough 7000 laws and regulation and a million happy Brussel burocrauts, so be it. We can fix that in the process.

If we want to create, we have to be ready to destroy. But we can't destroy something that isn't even there. So instead of just building on the euro-scepticism, I suggest the author to get more realistic. And to stop for a minute and think of Europe 60 years ago. And then to see Europe today and explain to all of us how bad the result is. It's not the same withouth the cheap roaming tarifs, without the open borders trough the continent, without the money for infrastructure or any other idiotism you think of, without the free visit to a doctor in any European country you visit just like that.

TDK

ian skidmore writes

"The railways replaced the canal and deliberately wrecked those waterways."

Nonsense.

The simple fact is compared to canals, steam traction railways were cheaper to operate per ton mile for moving goods and had the added advantage of being quicker. Before, when the early tramways were hauled by horses they proved cheaper to build but more expensive to operate and consequently were used as feeders to canals (and other waterways). For example the Peak Forest Tramway fed a canal, being built where the latter would have been prohibitively expensive.

On top of that railways were able to penetrate areas canals had not with an consequent reduction in transshipment cost. That fact largely explains why railways have now given way to road, except for bulk goods.

Once the trunk railways were built the canals declined of their own accord. Many canals became uneconomic and ultimately fell into disuse. Occasionally railways bought canals and continued to operate them; alternatively they used the canal route as a trackbed and sometimes they closed them because it made economic sense to consolidate the traffic.

It wasn't always against the will of the canal owners to close canals. Railway building required an Act of Parliament, and this might fail if opposition wasn't assuaged. Since canal owners foresaw that a competing railway would render their business obsolete they opposed new railways with the consequence that railway builders would often be forced to buy the canal to obtain their Act. At other times the canal owners were the railway builders.

The question arises: Why buy an expensive asset and then deliberately run it at a loss? It is unrealistic to expect anyone to deliberately keep open a loss making canal, especially when they could place its loads onto their own trains. And it is unreasonable to expect buyers to pay over the odds to keep canals in business.

It is especially absurd to argue that the railways deliberately wrecked the waterways when many survived in use till the mid 20th century, by which time they largely became a means for leisure rather than goods shipment.