Talk:Westphalian sovereignty
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[edit] Westphalian sovereignty and Contingent sovereignty needs attention
- These articles were apparently created as part of a cover history for User:Liliana Dioguardi, who has been suspected to be in the employ of a Kremlin propaganda effort - specifically in her creation and maintenance of the International Council for Democratic Institutions and State Sovereignty article in support of the public legitimacy of that organization. The prominent international news and business magazine The Economist magazine has reported that this organization is likely a front for a Kremlin-sponsored disinformation effort, and has specifically identified the ICDISS article and User:Liliana Dioguardi as part of this effort. See these articles[1][2] and the ICDISS article talk page[3].
- While these articles seem to be legitimate subjects, Dioguardi is responsible for all, or almost all their content - this makes these articles suspect for NPOV reasons.. I urge Wikipedians with a political theory/history/international relations/international law background to help build these articles beyond their sad "cover story" beginnings. Bwithh 05:53, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
- I studied IR to Bachelor's level, but find the summary on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_of_Westphalia of the modern impact to be sufficient; I'll try and have a read through over the weekend if I can, but I'd suggest a redirect with a slightly padded out definition of sovereignty in there. It's definately a very significant treaty but that impact is already discussed in the main article. --195.137.123.244 15:26, 8 August 2006 (UTC)-MatGB
- Hi. I guess I count as an expert here (I'm a political philosopher, and much of my research work is on the problem of Global justice). I'd like to make two points:
- I agree with the comment above that Peace of Westphalia covers the material here.
- The 'Opponents' section is absurdly POV - as a cosmopolitan opponent of the Westphalian system myself, I slightly dislike being lumped in with Hitler and Al Qaeda!
Cheers, Sam Clark 15:51, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
- I think this topic deserves its own article separate from the historical event Peace of Westphalia . I've replaced the POV stuff with the beginnings of a proper article JQ 23:10, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
Fair enough - I like the work you've done so far. A small thing, though: isn't 'imagined communities' Benedict Anderson's coinage, not Anthony Giddens's? Cheers, Sam Clark 09:40, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
- I wasn't aware of this (I saw it in Giddens, but maybe he regarded it as so well-known as not to require attribution). Google shows you're right. Fixed now. JQ 09:59, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
- Support proposed merge of Westphalianism (very stubby) into this article JQ 03:26, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
- Me too. Cheers, Sam Clark 08:50, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
[edit] 1850?
- ... forcible intervention by one country in the domestic affairs of another was less frequent in the period between 1850 and 1900 than in most previous and subsequent periods (Leurdijk 1986).
Pardon me, but if it took two hundred years to have this effect, then maybe it wasn't the Peace of Westphalia that did it.
Much of this article seems to be taken up with modern criticism or discussions of the system, not of what it actually is, or how it has historically been interpreted. It almost makes it look like a neologism. Mdotley 03:25, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
Nobody knowledgeable has any time to spare for this article. The obvious flaw pointed out by Mdotley has gone more than half a year without correction. Should it be marked for deletion? --Metaed (talk) 20:06, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
- Mdotley's point is Original research unless there is a a Reliable source making this criticism, or responding to it. If there is a problem here, it's a problem with the way the concept has been used in the literature, not a problem with the article.JQ (talk) 03:31, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
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- This is not a problem with the way the concept has been used in the literature. It is bad writing. Poor organization, rambling, and leaving things out.
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- The article promises to define Westphalian sovereignty and point out what's notable about it. Before we know it, we have gotten to a fact about the effect of the rise of nationalism upon the rate of interventionism in the period 1850–1900, and we're off topic. No facts to explain how that period came to be different from the periods before and after, or what, if anything, Westphalian sovereignty had to do with it. This is what I mean by an obvious flaw.
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- The article brings in the terms Westphalian system(s), Westphalian doctrine, and Westphalian state without first clearly defining or even differentiating them. Are they synonymous with Westphalian sovereignty? Or is one a concept, another a multinational political system, another a doctrine, and another a type of state? There is a belated attempt at a definition of Westphalian System, but it does not appear until late in the article, long after it has been used.
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- The article is at odds with itself. It presents controversies about the terms I just mentioned and about the meaning of the treaty itself, but in a disorganized way. It is divided into traditional view, revisionist view, and modern view. But the disputes are distributed under all three headings, and presented as if there are really only two points of view: pro and anti Westphalian sovereignty. The effect is to make it sound as if the following are all the same controversy: whether the Peace of Westphalia was the origin of nation-state sovereignty, whether nation-state sovereignty as it exists today is useful or moral, and whether nation-state sovereignty is eroding.
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- The article is overloaded with irrelevant controversy. There's plenty of room under Peace of Westphalia for the disagreement over whether it created sovereign nation-states. The debate over globalization is covered elsewhere and could be referenced by a See Also. Let this article explain what is meant by Westphalian sovereignty and what is notable about it. Maybe even present enough facts to make clear what the low rate of interventionism 1850–1900 has to do with it! But if an expert is not going to step up, I would prefer to can the article rather than leave it in this condition. --Metaed (talk) 09:24, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
