Europe continues to wrestle with the long arm of American law | Hacker News Reader

Europe continues to wrestle with the long arm of American law

european-views.com

73 pointslaurex113 comments

This article jumps from the CLOUD Act to the extradition of Dimitry Firtash to something about the US financial system to Iran... I see each point but this piece feels more like rambling than a comprehensive examination of any particular issue.

It's very confusing that the article intertwines domestic issues (the CLOUD act) with unrelated foreign policy issues.

I'm sure there are much better articles on this topic somewhere.

I see the contrary. The US has started to try to enact its laws outside its boundaries in ways that run counter to international conventions. This is maybe not a strategy, but at least a general trend. The article tries to make that obvious by listing examples that underscore how broad that trend is. You have to look elsewhere for the juicy details. There's a lot to be discovered.

Among those examples, it's interesting that Ukraine would gladly either prosecute or extradite Firtash -- a citizen of Ukraine, but Austria does not let either to happen. And I think that it speaks heaps of Austria and its business and political elite's connections to Russia.

> Washington cannot have a veto over European legislation or foreign policy initiatives

In regards to foreign policy, Europe will really have to invest in its military capabilities if they want more independence from the US. The fact that Europe was not able to effectively intervene in either Bosnia or Libya without US assistance when they are literally in the EU’s back yard means that the EU foreign policy will play second fiddle to US foreign policy.

Sounds like bad foreign policy , there are plenty of examples in history of what is bad for EU is even worse for the rest of Western countries. But works in reverse also, what is bad for the US is bad for the EU. Isolation is never the answer and only makes dictators that suppress human rights.

To understand the situation of today it is helpful to understand the past; the European efforts to build up a common pan-European defence infrastructure has been traditionally continuously torpedoed by Great Britain and this has taken place over a long period of time.

There are of course reasons for this, and obviously Great Britain is acting in their self-interest (they don't want a "shadow NATO" and they don't want to diminish in importance in USAs eyes, UKUSA/FVEY etc.), but Great Britain's interests are not really in the interests of Europe as a whole.

Now that Brexit seems to be happening, one way or another, expect to see a lot of European Union movement in the defence area. Also, time will tell if the e.g. UK Joint Expeditionary Force will stay in existence and enhance the new pan-European defence mechanisms with, among other things, British nuclear weapons, or not.

Furthermore, it is very naïve to assume that Europe is not already doing full-on preparations for the military implications of Brexit as well as the everso more likely dismantling of NATO. Mr. Trump has been signalling the latter for a long time, and even though much of his output seems to be a clumsy way to lure EU into doing more military business with the USA, the fact is that the White House and particularily the President of the USA is acting more and more erratic every day, so basically anything could happen (and probably will!).

Having a strategical autonomy and owning a substantial defence ability and capability is an existential issue for Europe, given its geographical location, as well as the increasingly hostile political rhetoric and gray zone actions of its neighbours, as well as the continuously erratic behaviour of its number one ally.

All good points. However, it's important to remember that France remains at the core of the EU, and has her own nuclear weapons (force de frappe) and large military. There was always a tension between UK participation with EU diplomatic/military initiatives, and UK alignment with the Anglophone world for military and intelligence cooperation: US leadership and fives eyes intelligence cooperation with US, Canada, Australia & NZ. The US/UK "special relationship" is a cliche much favoured by British politicians, but it does have real substance in the close military and intelligence cooperation. Of the world's five official nuclear weapons states, only one of them buys rather than builds - the UK buys the Trident missile system from the US. The warheads are of course UK manufactured with plutonium from our nuclear power stations. The UK was the first country to build nuclear power stations in the 50s. Propoganda at the time was all about clean cheap electricity. But their ultimate purpose was to generate plutonium for weapons.

Not really. The fact that most EU nations don't control their own nuclear weapons (or don't have the in the first place) does.

North Korean can't be invaded, because they have nukes. Iran would be untouchable if they had nukes. The Soviet Union had to obey the orders of the US, until they got nukes of their own.

Sweden, of all countries, had a greater effect in the Albanian genocide than the US. Had Srebrenica been controlled by the Swedish armed forces and not the Dutch there would have been no massacre, or at a minimum the massacre would have been opposed by the armed forces stationed there, which would mean that it would have been no massacre at all.

Not a very well reasoned article. I think you can make a general argument about the role of US power, but in terms of legal structure, there is no question that GDPR - at the moment - is by far the most invasive on laws that apply to other countries, without respecting sovereignty. Similarly cases requiring other countries to censor peach - although as this article notes, this was brought back down to earth.

I Don't see what the conflict between the CLOUD act and GDPR, as described in the article is. GDPR requires companies to get consent before storing data, the CLOUD act enables US authorities to demand access to data even if it is stored on servers outside the USA.

Do the US authorities log every one who views the files and when and all propagation of them? And sent that back to the business and make it available for the user?

Does the GDPR actually require a company to be able to provide all that data when the copy has been requested and sent to a state entity? I doubt the EU is going to require companies to do that either way though.

> The CLOUD act enables US authorities to demand access to data even if it is stored on servers outside the USA.

That's the conflict. The GDPR imposes conditions on transferring that data to the USA. See https://gdpr-info.eu/art-44-gdpr/ and following sections especially https://gdpr-info.eu/art-49-gdpr/

If the data is not adequately protected - if it is fed into unaccountable law enforcement databases - then the transfer may not be lawful.

> the transfer may not be lawful

Lawful under whose law? It's legally required by CLOUD act, so mandatory under American law. This is the long arm of Europe just as much as America.

You could have a company based and hosted in Belize that stores data about a European who committed a crime in America. America can demand that data under her law; Europe can demand it deleted under hers. Who is right?

This is the making of both entities, not just America, unless there is some legal reason that the European law ought to take precedent. It's pretty clear what to do if you're incorporated in Europe or America; you follow the law of your base of operations. For multinationals or corporations alien to both, however, there's a dilemma.

In other words, your moral favor towards GDPR doesn't make it more legally important than CLOUD, nor vice-versa. Both are just as significant for an alien company or for a multinational.

Ever since the Peace of Westphalia, the international law is that each country sets its own laws for its own territory. Country A cannot enact a law that is effect on the territory of country B. So if the data is physically stored in the EU, it is naturally subject to the GDPR and no law outside the EU can do a damn about that. The CLOUD act, on the other hand, breaks that principle: it tries to compel actors outside the territory of the US to comply with US law.

Is it that clear-cut? The "actors" would be companies with a business presence in the USA. It's the data that is stored outside the country.

I suppose the closest equivalent would be financial assets, e.g. funds held in bank accounts. Can a court in the USA order a US company, or one doing business in the USA, to hand over assets held in a foreign bank account?

Your question is missing an imprtant stipulation: "when it is illegal for the bank to execute that order under the laws of the country in which the bank account resides." In this case, compliance with the court order is simply impossible. No ifs, no buts.

The bank wouldn't be the one executing the order. In a situation analogous to a CLOUD Act situation, the account holder would be ordered to withdraw the money from his foreign account and turn it over. To the foreign bank, it is no different than any other customer withdrawing money from their account.

No, the client gives the order and the bank executes it. If the order is unlawful for the bank, they cannot execute it.

I'm not sure that matters to a government. It certainly matters to the company on the receiving end of such an order, but is a sovereign state going to let other states' legislation pre-empt their own?

That's an easy one: yes. To make it a good analogy you'd need an injunction preventing them from doing so in the bank's country.

Would that change the situation in terms of what the US government can require?

US has been regulating activity outside of its borders for a loooooooong time. Look at the restrictions placed on the US financial system to combat money laundering. You can be indicted for "mis-using" the US financial system even if you are sitting in a place where we have no formal jurisdiction, but a legal assistance treaty does exist.

The key here is the treaty: the other country created explicit law within its jurisdiction by freely agreeing to the treaty.

Fair point.

Although, I will point out the United States has a similar instrument of enforcing its way around the world.

However, it isn't GPDR, but rather the AGM-114 Hellfire missile. Not that I really disagree with most of the cases. But still, it is enforcing one's political will beyond "official" borders, short of declaring war.

My understanding my be wildly incorrect, but I have the impression that the GDPR is something that applies to EU citizens regardless of where they are. A German tourist who visits Tennessee who uses his cellphone, with a local sim card, to log into a website hosted in the US to buy tickets to view the world's largest ball of twine can, under GDPR, require that said website remove all information about his visit beyond what is required by law. That seems to be quite reaching.

This is the controversy. If I am the American site, my response to said German tourist is, "No, I operate under the laws of America and therefore am bound by no European decision." I.e. Europe has no jurisdiction over data stored outside her borders, and the citizen transmitted said data. It is indeed a reach, and unenforceable by Europe unless she personally sanctions company share-holders and agents from entry.

This is quite incorrect. However, a US citizen residing in EU will be covered by GDPR.

But EU citizens residing in non-EU countries are not.

The end of WWII, with the US as the victors, changed that.

Breton Woods is a great example of the massive change that was brought about. Yes, the Europeans agreed to it, but obviously under duress.

Winners make the rules. Always have, always will. And the US can do a ton if they found a compelling enough reason to.

Err. "Obviously under duress"? It was Keynes (GB) and White (US) who initially inched toward Bretton Woods. The French were keen right from the start of their involvement. It was the USA that insisted on watering down Keynes' proposals. Well Harry White really, with the US as sole nation profiting from WW2, and now world's creditor which gave leverage, not victory.

It was the end of Bretton Woods that started the ball rolling that led to the Euro. The end of Bretton Woods and US abandonment of the gold standard, was hugely inflationary - the mark of the seventies - and saw Europe trying to continue with a Bretton lite, though the first attempts didn't survive long.

Duress - meaning the war was still on, and the only government that could save them was offering terms effectively defining a new world order - definitely completely different from the world before the war.

Further, Bretton Woods was effectively a bribe, at least from the perspective of import tariffs.

So, yes, I believe that it was both carrot and stick, so that the US would be able to get the former colonial powers to fall in line. Doing so also destroyed the colonial status (witness India, a mere 2 years after the war as but one example).

A new world order built on Keynes' plan.

I'm not downplaying US part, Bretton Woods was, in essence an Anglo-US deal, but was hardly a US plan to save the rest. All the major nations of the time knew the progression that had followed Versailles, banking and currency crisis then Depression and war. The carrot to save Europe was the Marshall Plan.

That the USA had all the money by 1944 certainly changed the conference dynamic, and undoubtedly contributed to White being able to overrule Keynes. As an aside, US economist Brad DeLong claims Keynes was ultimately proved right on every point he was overruled on.

Indian independence was completely unconnected to any US action. Independence was inevitable from the 1930s. In a sentence: mid 30s Roundtables with Ambdekar, Gandhi, and McDonald; the outbreak of war in 39; and agreement to grant independence after supporting the war effort.

The Marshall Plan was a huge carrot, but came 4 years after Bretton Woods (which implies that Bretton Woods was not enough - or at least, not fast enough).

Also, the fact that the US had more soldiers in Britain than Britain did was a huge fact in their inability to keep the Empire together. I agree completely that the Indians wanted independence, but the sheer might of the US limited the British ability to hold on to it. In fact, the Suez crisis just a handful of years later (1956) demonstrably showed that the Americans were going to get what they wanted when they did not back the British takeover of the canal.

That being said, it is a very complicated picture, and all of these clearly were contributing factors.

Had the US not had all the money (good point, btw), and the European powers infrastructure not been so damaged, the negotiations would have been very different. At least, that's what I believe. For instance, the ability of countries to set up import tariffs, while exporting to the US without tariffs clearly supported lower cost labor, which the colonies had in spades. That gave the colonies more power to fight off their weakened colonial masters. That shift in power came at the most inopportune time for them - while they were capital poor and rebuilding.

Keynes was a mountain of a man, but the US could not afford to let him run the show - as with any display of power, that's just not done. Even though Keynes may have been right about some aspects, the US had reason to distrust the Brits, as the US clearly knew the Brits would not give up their hegemonic place unless the US took it firmly. Under that thinking, the US was smart to shunt Keynes off to the corners (despite his huge influence). I think that the Suez Crisis showed that the Americans took the right approach here.

Excellent conversation - I love to see the vast knowledge of folks like you on HN !

That it came 4 years after was, in good part, thanks to the "agriculture only in Germany" Morgenthau Plan. The subsequent disclosure, possible extension of the war[1] with Goebbels making broadcasts against it in 44 & 45, and US media, politicians and public turning against it thankfully thoroughly poisoned it. It took a while to spin up a workable replacement (and one that would pass Congress), though the sheer extremity of the Morgenthau Plan undoubtedly helped that along. I have never got the impression Bretton Woods contributed to the demise of Morgenthau/rise of Marshall, but I can't rule it out. I haven't enough of the detail of Presidential and Congressional machinations. It's always read like Marshall was result of reaction to, and fallout from Morgenthau, as well as the inconvenient truth that a bankrupt Europe can't trade much at all. :)

That the US was going to be the new hegemon was clear in hmm, probably 43, perhaps even late 42. It just wasn't yet remotely palatable. Thus it wasn't unexpected that was the stance of the US going into Bretton Woods. The US had been pushing against European empire since earliest talk of lend-lease before Pearl Harbor, and obviously pre-war with less consequence. Even going back into the era the US still spoke overtly of an American Empire. Of course there was GB reluctance to accept their new role as junior partner - and some degree of not realising the actual implications of this. One easy example of that being famously difficult Monty during Market-Garden in 44.

Some parts of the UK political spectrum has still not recognised our place in the post-war scheme of things. Cough Brexit cough. More among some who voted Brexit than the instigators necessarily. Suez was merely the first concrete demonstration of France and Britain's new lowered significance. Not accepting UK decline has been something of a post-war Tory party theme. By Suez, the US absolutely had the strength, politics and attitude that their wish was prime. Course UK Labour had the very overt post-war policy to shed Empire in this period. So during Labour administrations, far from everyone having to fight off colonial masters, some were positively pushed, somewhat reluctantly and surprised out the exit... Which is another can of worms far too complex to play out on HN. In France I don't think de Gaulle ever got past having to ask the US for the 45 loan.

So in summary, yes, it's hugely complex. Had the US not been the only nation not near bankruptcy, the power dynamic of negotiations would have been very different. At the very least with more balance the World Bank and IMF would have looked different. Yet even so, the hope in Europe was it was still a better model to avoid 1929-1945 ever again.

FWIW Post-Suez under Nasser didn't turn out at all well for the Egyptians. Let's leave that one unopened though. ;)

[1] We'll never know, but there's a very credible case to be made that the proposed toppling of Hitler in 44, and subsequent surrender would have actually come, but for the publicity around Morgenthau. Being sent back to an agrarian age made surrender pointless, even though they had obviously already lost the war.

Ok, that would be a clear conflict.

There seems to be an exception for when "the transfer is necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims". I'm not qualified to say whether that would cover law enforcement requests, or whether some other considerations would make it illegal under GDPR to comply with 3rd country legal requirements. It would seem like a serious oversight if the legislators haven't given thought to this, though.

Wouldn't the access by the US authorities be an infringement with the GDPR since they don't have a data processing contract and are not declared as official data broker third parties on every american company's website.

Under European law, sure. But the American government is not and cannot be bound by European law, only by bi-lateral treaty. In fact, not doing so would be a violation of American law, and deleting that data in compliance with GDPR would be illegal under American law. Regardless of your moral stance on the issue, one law does not have a greater legal significance. This is exactly why we have bi-lateral treaties.

It's the companies that are bound by laws in both jurisdictions. If a company operates in several jurisdictions, and can not comply with the laws in one without breaking the laws in others, it's not a matter of precedence, just a bad situation to be in.

Edit:sorry, I didn't understand the point you were making. You're correct.

Is the CLOUD act applicable to non-US companies?

Regarding GDPR, access to the data by law enforcement has specific rules [1] which makes them lawful in some cases.

[1] https://www.dataprotection.ie/en/organisations/law-enforceme...

I don't see how this is confusing to people. EU and USA laws don't apply to the data- you can't put data in jail and you can't fine data. The laws apply to the people that control the data. It's not about whether or not the data is stored in a particular locality, it's whether or not there is a person within your jurisdiction that has access to/control of the data (if a server is located in your jurisdiction that implies that a person is around to shut the server down). The big issue is that we underestimate the exposure we have to other countries, especially if you sell a service or ads to foreign entities.

The large scale of big websites means that they have people working in multiple countries, so they are subject to multiple sets of laws. I don't really think any American lawyer is arguing in a courtroom in the EU that American laws apply in Europe. But they might be telling a company HQ in the EU to follow American laws or they will shut down their American servers, bank transactions, employees, and supporting contractors/software- all of which are subject to American laws. And if a European citizen travels to the USA, breaks the law, and then travels back to Europe, then an extradition request is valid, and the EU is going to have a tough time if they deny it.

The EU won't comply with an extradition request from the USA if the law wasn't broken in the USA. However, I think we often underestimate the amount of exposure that these multi-national companies really have. A company in the EU can't flaunt American laws and tell their American employees to break American laws.

So when we find situations where it is literally impossible to comply with both the GDPR and CLOUD act these multi-national companies are going to have to separate themselves. Facebook-EU and Facebook-USA are going to have to have a big wall between them, and there can be an API that lets Facebook-EU users see the profiles of Facebook-USA users, but they will have to be separate entities to comply with each set of laws, and so that American lawyers can't pressure Facebook-EU to comply with something by threatening the American version.

Meanwhile here in the US I have to acknowledge that websites use cookies 500,000 times a day. Thanks, Europe.

Well, we figured if we're so powerless, we might as well punish the US for their misdeeds in other ways. You're welcome.

We also punish ourselves in the process, though.

We have to be prepared to sacrifice if we're to effect change in the world.

That has nothing (or not much) to do with Europe, but everything with the website owners/makers.

Those website owners put those cookie notices up just for fun?

Because they want your data. If they didn't, no need to give the user any options.

Before this law websites collected my data. After this law, websites collect my data AND I am harassed with notices.

If the intent of this law was to stop websites from collecting user data then it appears to me it has completely failed while also introducing more friction for users.

They won't be collecting it if you opt out.

The problem is: that’s what’s supposed to happen. In practice, most websites go for the: by visiting this site, you consent to our tracking cookies. Which, as I understand (as a US citizen), is illegal under the cookie law.

Sure, they could also mining bitconins or installing rootkits on your machine. The law won't prevent people from doing illegal stuff, but at least they can be persecuted.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Talk about HN doublethink/doublespeak on privacy.

Not EU's fault if websites developers can't figure out how not to display EU mandatory popups in the US (pro tip: it's not that difficult). On my side of the pond these popups are actually useful.

Maybe the EU could've tried becoming GDPR compliant themselves before it went into effect? That way they would've had an idea of what it would take to do so.

EU could've tried becoming GDPR compliant ?

Can you elaborate on that ?

The EU commission's own websites were not GDPR compliant for quite a long time after GDPR took effect. They still eventually became compliant, but it wasn't there from day 1, which is what you would expect from the body that made the regulation.

Part of the reason why is that the commission doesn't have to follow GDPR (rules for thee).

Ah right, let's cancel everything then... This is buzzfeed level of argumentation. What do you care about ? The official GDPR website developers being too lazy to update their own website or Facebook, Google & co. willingly juicing every single drop of your privacy ?

Normally I would dismiss this as trivial, but the GDPR was intended to make a point. Both as a bit of a slap to American tech companies, and to claim that, "We in EUrope take privacy seriously!" If you are going out of your way not just to pass a law but to vocally chastise companies, it is reasonable to expect you have gotten your own house in order first.

How is it "not that difficult"? Can you go into detail?

What are the consequences of failing to serve a popup to e.g. a European who's using a VPN, or who has a slightly unusual IP address for which geolocation doesn't work properly, or to someone with a non-European account who is in Europe on a visa?

We're talking about the 0.0001% here, and frankly it doesn't matter. The EU has a fundamentally more sane judicial system than the US, no one will be prosecuted because they didn't serve a pop up to a single EU user who were using a VPN. What matters is that companies are legally obligated to treat personal data as best as they can and if it's proven that they willingly messed up or that they made stupid technical decisions (ie leaving an ES instance open without any password or network protection level of stupidity) they will be held accountable. It's not perfect but it's much better than nothing.

What is it that you use these popups for?

Under the GDPR, data collection must be opt-in, so if you say no it shouldn't collect.

Blaming harassment on the law seems a bit strange, it's the website doing it because it wants have your data, not because it is obliged to ask you about it. Not collecting data is an option too, but it seems not to these websites.

Even saying "no" is annoying though. If I don't want cookies then I can turn cookies off in my browser settings and turn it on for the sites I like.

> If I don't want cookies then I can turn cookies off in my browser settings and turn it on for the sites I like.

Most people have no idea about these settings and shouldn't have to worry about them.

There is no 1:1 relationship between cookies and data collection (they can collect data about you without cookies, and cookies are often used for legitimate & useful purposes).

>legitimate & useful purposes

those don't need consent.

> Before this law websites collected my data. After this law, websites collect my data AND I am harassed with notices.

For me it is a very good filter - most of the time I don't actually care that much about the website so... you want my data ? ctrl-w it is.

You are in the minority.

It is a very good filter. A few sites have a clear accept reject. The majority have a questionable accept, go to next screen to reject, annoying but acceptable. But then there are a few that make it practically impossible to opt out. Those are obviously malicious and of course should not be trusted for anything.

No, the intent of that law was to make sites think twice about whether they want to continue abusing their visitors, in hope the market will self-regulate.

The GDPR is the result of market failing to self-regulate, and now sites can't get data without consent, unless they want to get fined.

It reminds me of those useless "Enter your Date of Birth to Proceed" forms on alcohol and porn sites.

Pointless. But it made someone in the EU feel like they accomplished something.

You don't need a cookie banner for legitimate reasons. Ie a session cookie to save your login.

Then why does the EU commission's own website have that same type of cookie popup?[0] If this isn't the intended outcome then why can't they make their own website not have the annoying popup?

[0] https://europa.eu

Good question. uBlock Origin doesn't show any third party domains (after I clicked "accept"). I also don't see any meaningful (tracking) cookies at all. So, their cookie consent banner is actually unnecessary.

But at least they don’t put you in prison.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-15/-the-amer...

Google the "I don't care about cookies" add on. Works wonders

> Europe continues to wrestle with the long arm of American law

In the case of the right to be forgotten, isn’t that the reverse? Europe trying to make Americans not to talk about past crimes of EU citizens?

Europe claims that the GDPR applies to data stored outside Europe, USA claims that their search warrants apply to data stored outside the USA. Seems pretty symmetrical to me.

This article is a nationalist piece with few to no logical arguments. It's meant to spread a flamewar online.

I don't agree, the article is unilateral, but it has very sound arguments

No, these are apples and oranges. GDPR regulates what obligations a site collecting data of european users has (for example, acquiring consent). This imposed regulations on a direct, contractual relationship (whether the contract is implicit doesn’t matter here). Every party involved then has rights to sue if the agreed contract is violated. A US company providing service to US customers has no obligation from GDPR (but have fun making that distinction in practice)

US search warrants on the other hand basically circumvent local law. I, as an Austrian Citizen, have no way to protect myself against such warrants if I decide to put my data in, let’s say, office365, even if the physical location of my data is within Europe and the actual operation of the Servers is handled by a different, European company.

In my opinion, this is nuts. The US should have to go through the same channels for foreign police assistance as everybody else.

How would the US enforce anything against a EU company hosting data in the EU?

Likewise, I think it's somewhat silly to think that the EU will actually manage to do anything, or even successfully fine a US company with no presence abroad that just so happens to have customers in the EU, for GDPR violations.

What are they even legally able to do if you, as a US company, simply refuse whatever the EU asks.

Absolutely nothing is my (IANAL) bet. If you're not physically in the EU, I have a very hard time believing any US court would allow you be... extradited? Or even enforce fines from a foreign government.

Then again, maybe I'm totally wrong and am just confused about how EU law can regulate those not under their jurisdiction.

They could always block you from doing business with your customers (or suppliers) in the EU.

Obviously it would be much easier to enforce against companies that do have some presence in the EU.

In the case of office365, they enforce it via Microsoft. In other cases, the hosting provider. Avoiding US based companies hosting anything at scale is surprisingly difficult.

I have had good expierience with Hetzner (germany-based), but all you get is cloud vps boxes and storage.

> In my opinion, this is nuts. The US should have to go through the same channels for foreign police assistance as everybody else.

So Office365 is owned by an American company, which the US has full jurisdiction over. If you don't want to deal with American laws, then don't deal with American companies. But given that American companies basically set the standard for computing, good luck.

> Europe trying to make Americans not to talk about past crimes of EU citizens? This is just bt

My problem is with the impacts of FATCA — a law that has dire outcomes for Americans and “accidental” Americans (and their spouses) living abroad. These data laws have limited material effects to someone’s daily life, but FATCA affects everything from mortgage eligibility, retirement accounts and even daily banking.

https://etcanada.com/news/521610/hundreds-sue-french-bank-bo...

It's even annoying for non-Americans living in other countries who have to declare that they're not American and don't have any tax liabilities to the USA.

Sooner or later, a global government with global enforcement powers will be necessary if we want to tackle challenges of global magnitude, like digital privacy, climate change, and artificial intelligence. As long as national governments are free to do as they please, these situations will continue to exist. Think an EU-like structure, but for the world.

Sooo...the UN but on steroids?

Hopefully, one day, because a world divided into nations is woefully unequipped to handle challenges that don't respect national borders.

A world divided into provinces... A world divided into counties... A world divided into cities...

Sub-jurisdictions are a fact of life.

The claim isn’t that subdivisions are evil, it is that we should aim for a tree, not a forest.

When “city” was the top-level structure, there was more than one, and cities had conflicts (economical and wars).

Countries solve that problem, but, because there’s more than one country, introduce the problem that countries had conflicts.

Country groups (Germany, the USA, the EU, NATO, Warschau pact) solve that problem, but, because there’s more than one, introduce the problem that country groups have confocts.

The UN, in theory, solves that, and, because there’s only one, don’t introduce another, but it isn’t powerful enough.

We have been always at war with Mars.

First we have to colonize it.

And maybe then we'll pick up on the pattern and go straight for the United Federation of Planets.

More than that, creating a joint governing body tends to create possibilities and incentives for peaceful conflict resolution that stabilize the area. For example, Europe has been war-torn for many centuries before the unification started after World War II. Since then, central and west Europe have had the longest period of peace in 500 years.

You have an incredible number of confounding variables here. Most of Europe was rebuilt by the Marshall Plan and had time to settle under the Pax Americana. There was also the dawn of digital technology and the information, unification against the communist threat, a massive increase in standard of living, significant economic pivots, a removal of monarchs and a reduction of the powers of those who remained, etc. I can't say there was no effect, but I sincerely doubt it was the sole driver of peace in Europe. Also recall that the EU wasn't formed until the early 90's, but Europe has been largely at peace since WWII.

No, this is not as complex as you make it out to be. First, the unification of Europa as a process started back to the 1950s. The EU isnkust the latest if a series of institutions that were founded and replaced in pursuit of that goal. Second, if you look at the western European countries before 1945 you will see that they had been quick to go to war with each other consistently throughout history. War was merely a tool, a way to continue policy making by other means. This approach got out of comtrol and caused World War I. World War II was cause by mad men who stoped at nothing to inflict as much death and damage as they could possibly do. Tjose horrors made the survivors realize that Europe cannot go on like this. This is what led de Gaulle, the former commander of the French army to approach the West German Chancellor Adenauer and ask for cooperation in building something that guarantees lomg term stability on the continent.

There are approximately 30 countries on this continent. With so many actors, the chances of enduring peace over long periods of time are rather slim, no matter the external circumstances. Just look at prevalence of armed conflicts in the rest of the world.

Approximately 30? In the EU, yes, but the continent has 44 to, if one counts ones with limited recognition such as Kosovo and Transnistria, 50 countries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe)

The breakup of the Soviet Union created quite a few countries in Eastern Europe.

Also, quite a few were formed in bloody war(s) in the split up of Yugoslavia.

Yup. Exactly what I meant. Subdivisions are necessary to manage complexity, but as you said, it's about having a tree rather than a forest. It's about having an organization at the top capable of encouraging cooperation and preventing competition between nation states.

I worry about the picture you are painting. Most of the time there was organization at all these levels — the Attic city states understood themselves to be Greeks — for centuries before the efficiency and effectiveness of the higher order ones reached a degree where they could be useful. Part of what makes them work at all is actually the degree to which they are counter-balanced by the subordinate ones.

It is possible the UN simply isn’t structured enough to address conflicts. For example, could the recent conflict over postal rates have gone through the UN? Adding “power” to the top does not necessarily create an upper layer that leads to stability. The Roman emperor was very powerful; but the effect was a lot internal conflict and war. The balanced states we have seen in recent years — more effective than what preceded them, though in a legal sense much less powerful — are doing well at abating internal conflict in part by reducing the stakes.

Take it to an absurd extreme: should a bureaucrat in Potsdam make decisions about a farmer’s water dispute with their neighbor in rural Utah? That’s what “world government” ends up looking like. Despite a bunch of wires crisscrossing the global, all politics, as Tip O’Neil famously said, is local.

> Take it to an absurd extreme: should a bureaucrat in Potsdam make decisions about a farmer’s water dispute with their neighbor in rural Utah?

Of course they shouldn't. Hierarchical structures are good and you want issues to be resolved as low in hierarchy as possible. The point of a global government is to tackle the problems that cannot be currently solved, because we're missing a hierarchy level. Because, like 'Someone pointed out in another comment, global governance is a forest, and not a tree.

The role of a global government isn't to mediate hyperlocal disputes. It's to force countries to stop letting corporations play them against each other on corporate taxes. It's to coordinate a common, simultaneous response to the challenges of climate change. It's to help everyone cooperate in solving other global challenges, where actions on one side of the world have an effect on the other side.

Maybe Henry would want that. It’s not necessary. We have a framework for copyright, international maritime law and so on. So it doesn’t need to have a global government but it needs to be an international body with a great majority of countries as signatories.

Thanks, but no thanks. I very much prefer the right of peoples to self-determination.

Sovereign nations may then enter multilateral treaties (if they so wish) to handle these matters.

Devil's advocate: Do countries have the right to be dictatorships or fiefdoms where few control most of the wealth?

It seems that in most countries few control most of the wealth, regardless of whether they're dictatorships or democracies.

Sure, this is a good question. You'll note that few peoples actually choose to live in a dictatorship. Moreover recent history has shown that external countries (even with a UN mandate) throwing over dictators for the supposed benefits of the people rarely ends well for everyone. There's undeniably a conflict between the "right to interfere" and the sovereignty of nations. I am afraid we won't solve it here in a few Internet posts!

Countries don't have rights, they have powers, and derive those powers from keeping the governed from revolting. Natural law and so on is a justification for revolution, but realism is how things work.

No thanks. I like having the option to move to jurisdictions with laws and customs that are more to my liking.

Think a Brexit-like event, but for the US. (Wouldn't be the first time...)

Trump withdraws US from UN perhaps? The US never participated in the League of Nations after WWI, even though it was Wilson's idea, because Congress wouldn't ratify.

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