Anyone who collects old maps knows how international boundaries change over time. Romans get carved up by Visigoths, Nazi Germany’s collapse creates new East-West zones, ancient societies vaporize for unknown reasons (Anasazi Native America people disappear from our Western states), environmental and resource exhaustion depopulate the Easter Islands, Spain discovers America, etc. Ever wonder about the United States? Given the degree of political polarization – factions completely unwilling to entertain compromise, economic upheaval and job displacement and long-term environmental damage, ever wonder how the United States would reconfigure if it broke apart? After all, nations do not continue forever, and 400 years is generally an outside average date for most social structures. We’re at 236 years and probably have a few more to go, but ….
If the seas do actually rise and invade our coastal communities, if global warming does continue and expand the current drought that stretches from Florida to Arizona, if raging massive fires increase, if hurricanes intensify, and if the water used to irrigate much of the plains states (the Ogallala Aquifer) does dry out, these elements are probably going to occur within a century… and given their proximate likely occurrence, will probably cause a massive and simultaneous demand on the federal government (what will the deficit look like then?) for disaster relief. Add the rise of China and India in relative importance and the decline of the United States suffering from an undereducated and hence less productive workforce due to cutbacks earlier in the century.
Okay, we all know Texas is already packed and ready to leave, but what about the rest of the United States? There are folks who see New York and New England breaking off, maybe with New Jersey, Delaware and parts of Pennsylvania. The South might form its political unit, although Florida might go its own way. Chicago and the upper Midwest would have to see whether they wanted to merge with the now decimated Plains States, and the Western States might play off their mineral wealth for higher status within one political configuration or another. Access to the sea will be a big issue.
On the West Coast, other issues abound, as California is very likely to go its own way, with natural resources and strong linkage to a growing Asia, if it has conquered its financial malaise and dealt with “The Big One” (earthquake) and handled the ocean rise. Unless part of California rolls into Cascadia (flag above): “Cascadia is the proposed name for an independent nation that would be created by the combination of British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington through the secession from their respective federal governments. Other definitions of Cascadia include a large bio-region extending from north to south from the tip of southern Alaska down into Northern California, and encompasses to the east parts of Alberta, the Yukon, Idaho and Western Montana. The boundaries of the proposed government could incorporate those of the existing province and states.” Wikipedia. The natural resources of that combination would be staggering, but why would Canadian s accept such a nation?
Shorter term, we are already seeing movements within various of our own United States. For anyone who lives here, California has long been too big to be governed effectively. While most of us who have speculated believe that the state could be carved into southern, central and northern sections, there are folks in the southeastern part of the state (centered around Riverside and San Bernardino Counties) who want nothing to do with the rest… or Los Angeles for that matter. The movement reflects the political polarization that is gripping the rest of the nation: “Frustrated by a state government he calls ‘complete ly dysfunctional’ and ‘totally unresponsive,’ a conservative Republican county supervisor is pushing a proposal for roughly a dozen counties in the eastern and southern parts of the nation’s third-largest state — conspicuously not including the heavily Democratic city of Los Angeles — to form a new state to be called South California.
“‘We have businesses leaving all the time, and we’re just driving down a cliff to become a third-world economy,’ said the supervisor, Jeff Stone, who once ran for the Legislature. ‘Anyone you ask has a horror story. At some point we have to decide enough is enough and deal with it in a radically new way.’ … He added: ‘I am tired of California being the laughingstock of late-night jokes. We must change course immediately or create a new state.’
“Mr. Stone’s list of complaints is long — too much money spent on state prisons, too much power for public unions, too many regulations and not enough of a crackdown on illegal immigration. It seems clear that he has struck a nerve in some quarters; he said that his office has been inundated with thousands of e-mails, letters and phone calls supporting his call for secession.” New York Times, July 12th. Given the total collapse of both the job and housing markets in this part of California, Mr. Stone might be gratified (and later sorry) as to how many Californians in other parts of the state might support such a succession movement! Whatever the result, the fact is that people are now busier emphasizing their differences and individual needs – a very common social response in severely impaired economic times – than they are looking for commonality. It really isn’t a very good sign for the future of the United States… as we know it.
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