People could (and probably would) still live in communities with common cultural and religious ties, even in a world without national borders. And, in this world of international borders, people from disparate backgrounds manage to immigrate and integrate just fine.
National boundaries don't really map to the borders of cultural and religious identity (as can be readily seen in the Middle East), so your argument here (which seems to be that the former is needed to preserve the latter) doesn't seem well supported.
> National boundaries don't really map to the borders of cultural and religious identity (as can be readily seen in the Middle East), so your argument here [..] doesn't seem well supported.
That is because we already let immigration happen. And it supports my thesis really well, as this immigration lead to severe problems amongst groups of different cultural backgrounds.
> People could (and probably would) still live in communities with common cultural and religious ties, even in a world without national borders.And, in this world of international borders, people from disparate backgrounds manage to immigrate and integrate just fine.
Those groups living clustered together isn't integration but segregation.
>That is because we already let immigration happen
It's also because national boundaries tend to be more about resource allocation and political necessity than the preservation of culture or religion. Look at the problems caused by the British Empire carving up the Middle East after World War 1.
Now perhaps you might argue the national borders there should correspond more to local tribal and cultural identity (and maybe they should) but the point is they don't, and they rarely do anywhere.
>And it supports my thesis really well, as this immigration lead to severe problems amongst groups of different cultural backgrounds.
At one time, Americans felt that Irish and Chinese immigrants could never properly integrate... to say nothing about free Africans. Yet all of those groups have been unambiguously integrated.
I work around Indian and Middle Eastern immigrants. Hindus and Muslims. It's remarkable how unremarkable they are given how incompatible "Western culture" is supposed to be to them. There aren't always "severe problems" with immigrants from different cultural backgrounds. Sometimes there are, yes, but it isn't a rule of nature.
>Those groups living clustered together isn't integration but segregation.
Those aren't boolean states. Someone can maintain a connection to their heritage while still being a part of greater society.
> At one time, Americans felt that Irish and Chinese immigrants could never properly integrate... to say nothing about free Africans. Yet all of those groups have been unambiguously integrated.
The Irish are not so different from the people that made up America back then. The Chinese who come here flee a communist/socialist regime, they are more than happy to assimilate to capitalism and the American way of life.
> [..] There aren't always "severe problems" with immigrants from different cultural backgrounds. Sometimes there are, yes, but it isn't a rule of nature.
As I acknowledged above.
> Those aren't boolean states. Someone can maintain a connection to their heritage while still being a part of greater society.
Right, but living in segregated communities inside another country is not maintaining a connection to heritage but simply not integrating.
National boundaries don't really map to the borders of cultural and religious identity (as can be readily seen in the Middle East), so your argument here (which seems to be that the former is needed to preserve the latter) doesn't seem well supported.