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Dream States: A Lurking Nightmare for World Order

Online ISBN:
9780197811672
Print ISBN:
9780197811634
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
Book

Dream States: A Lurking Nightmare for World Order

Published online:
11 April 2025
Published in print:
13 June 2025
Online ISBN:
9780197811672
Print ISBN:
9780197811634
Publisher:
Oxford University Press

Abstract

Around the world, numerous communities dream of secession. Their ambition is to redraw established national borders, laying claim to a separate sovereign territory of their own—their own “dream state.” The aspiration is understandable but could prove to be a lurking nightmare for many. The danger of prolonged conflict is grievously underappreciated. At risk are countries of every size and location, from tiny statelets in the Caribbean or Pacific to large and fragile multiethnic federations like Russia and India. The threat extends even to the United States, which these days seems more politically disunited than united. Two questions define my agenda. First, how serious is the danger of separatist conflict? And second, what can be done about the danger? To assess the threat, we must distinguish among different types of dream states. To reduce the threat, we must abandon the traditional dichotomous conceptualization of statehood, which insists that communities are either fully sovereign or else completely subordinate. Instead, sovereignty can in practice be disaggregated, allowing for various hybrid forms of political authority.

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