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Comment by verroq | Hacker News Reader

Ethno states with shared culture and little internal division due to racial tensions tend to run quite well.

See: China, Korea, Norway, Denmark, Czech republic

Counterpoint: North Korea.

I am sometimes baffled at how the leaders at NK can't have a look at just down the DMZ and see what they could have. The difference in social indicators is magnitudes better. Their ideology has been proven so wrong. I wonder what will take them to just give up.

If they are worried about punishments for what they have done, they could just cut a deal to let them have a lot of assets and be immune from judgement against past crimes.

I'm sure the leaders enjoy their position in north korea quite a lot. Better to be a king in somewhere like North Korea than to be an ordinary person somewhere else.

Really? I mean, think of the story of Boris Yeltsin visiting a grocery store.

Is the life of the average North Korean government official actually better than my life as an SRE in Brooklyn? I think I have way more access to luxuries than they do.

Could end up as a rich real estate mogul though as a unification condition. Still a decent deal.

Probably have to be at that position to understand that rationale I guess, right now it just seems heartless.

When was the last time North Korea had a race riot?

Also North Korea has a lot more geopolitical disadvantages at hand, namely sanctions.

An ethno state helps you avoid several classes of problems, like strict typing prevents runtime type errors. It doesn’t solve all administration problems.

But patronage of two big states which would be more than happy to keep a developed buffer state between US military bases. NK at least was rich in resources unlike SK.

When was the last time most countries had a race riot? Some countries have racial tension but not all ethnically diverse countries have serious racial tension.

Even if its not race, all countries have divisions. Some countries function well enough that divisions dont devolve into riots. Other's don't.

> It doesn’t solve all administration problems.

The parent post basically was claiming that it helped with all administrative problems (a claim that i certainly agree is absurd)

if you care to look you'll find it's often at the expense of those who aren't part of the homogenous culture. It can be hidden or minimized, but it doesn't make it go away.

Pretty sure China's not an ethnostate, as much as the CPC would want it to be, and pretty sure the lack of internal division is from their atrocious suppression of minority groups.

Less than 5% of the Chinese population is non-Han. I think the Manchu are the single largest minority and their language is for all practical purposes dead, along with any living distinct culture.

China is still vast majority Han Chinese, with 55 minorities. It does not invalidate the point.

Doesn't make what he said false though. If your state caters to mostly the wishes of the 93% majority suppressing others, you can effectively consider it to be an ethnostate for arguments.

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