7 ms·

Lol, can't blame the writer for not understanding how Europe works. It's actually a bunch of countries, not states.

by nixxle 15y ago

tallanvor 15y ago
The article doesn't use the word state anywhere, but one of the definitions of state is "a politically unified people occupying a definite territory; nation.", so yes, Europe consists of multiples states.
robertskmiles 15y ago
The countries in the EU are known as 'Member States'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_state_of_the_European_Union http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_state_of_the_European_Un... Edit: Also the author of the piece is a native of an EU member state Edit2: Also now that I look I don't actually see the article mention the word 'state'. What the hell, man?
- zachgreen 15y ago
  I think he was simply implying that Germany doesn't control the rest of the countries in Europe like the US government controls its states.
  - sipefree 15y ago
    They don't control the rest of Europe (though right now with the Euro situation they probably just about do), however there are provisions for legal precedent in one Member State to apply in every. I have no idea how it works and when it applies, though. It's definitely not so direct as in the U.S.
    - krzyk 15y ago
      Courts in Europe are not precedence-based. At least not in all countries. Here (Poland) there is no such thing as precedence in courts, not to mention basing a verdict on precedence in foreign court.
roel_v 15y ago
EU legislation doesn't use the word 'country' anywhere, and neither does anyone working in the Commission. The EU is made up of 'Member States' in the parlance.
- seabee 15y ago
  Good thing too. 'Country' is a loaded word with various populations both claiming and denying their geographic locale as a separate country from the legal entity (or 'Member State') they're a part of.
arethuza 15y ago
Just to confuse things even more, some of the member states are made up of more than one country.
- babebridou 15y ago
  This is just false. Just to clear things up: - a state with lower-case S is a subdivision of a Federal Country. - a State with upper-case S is a synonym of Country. - All members of the EU are States/Countries. Some of these countries are Federal (Germany for instance) and are subdivised into states (Länder in the case of Germany). - Some States of the EU include multiple Nations. UK is one of these. Scotland is neither a State nor a state for example, but it's a nation. - Some States of the EU have territories that encompass States that are not members of the EU. Monaco or the Vatican are examples. Some of these States belong to the Eurozone though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstates_and_the_European_Union http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstates_and_the_European_Un...
  - barrkel 15y ago
    That's an amusing taxonomy, but don't fool yourself into thinking this stuff can be so precisely and unambiguously delineated. There's a continuum between a province with some autonomy to fully-fledged independent nation state, and the application of various English words to refer to particular entities that lie in different places on the continuum is governed primarily by history and culture, not by legal and political specifics. For any set of properties you care to define for nationhood or statehood, you can usually find entities that are not evenly cut into one or the other. The Commonwealth shares a head of state; for example, Canada would be a sovereign state (small s) within the terminology of the Commonwealth. The Common Travel Area has passport-free travel; Irish and UK citizens can vote in one another's national parliaments, while EU citizens generally can only vote in local and EU elections. British crown dependencies are distinct from its overseas territories. There aren't enough shades of meaning in the miserly handful of terms you defined above (and seems rather German-centric) to adequately cover all the dependent and independent relationships involved.
    - 15y ago

Lol, can't blame the writer for not understanding how Europe works. It's actually a bunch of countries, not states.

by nixxle 15y ago

Lol, can't blame the writer for not understanding how Europe works. It's actually a bunch of countries, not states.

The article doesn't use the word state anywhere, but one of the definitions of state is "a politically unified people occupying a definite territory; nation.", so yes, Europe consists of multiples states.

robertskmiles 15y ago

The countries in the EU are known as 'Member States'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_state_of_the_European_Union http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_state_of_the_European_Un... Edit: Also the author of the piece is a native of an EU member state Edit2: Also now that I look I don't actually see the article mention the word 'state'. What the hell, man?

zachgreen 15y ago
I think he was simply implying that Germany doesn't control the rest of the countries in Europe like the US government controls its states.
- sipefree 15y ago
  They don't control the rest of Europe (though right now with the Euro situation they probably just about do), however there are provisions for legal precedent in one Member State to apply in every. I have no idea how it works and when it applies, though. It's definitely not so direct as in the U.S.
  - krzyk 15y ago
    Courts in Europe are not precedence-based. At least not in all countries. Here (Poland) there is no such thing as precedence in courts, not to mention basing a verdict on precedence in foreign court.

roel_v 15y ago

EU legislation doesn't use the word 'country' anywhere, and neither does anyone working in the Commission. The EU is made up of 'Member States' in the parlance.

seabee 15y ago
Good thing too. 'Country' is a loaded word with various populations both claiming and denying their geographic locale as a separate country from the legal entity (or 'Member State') they're a part of.

arethuza 15y ago

Just to confuse things even more, some of the member states are made up of more than one country.

babebridou 15y ago
This is just false. Just to clear things up: - a state with lower-case S is a subdivision of a Federal Country. - a State with upper-case S is a synonym of Country. - All members of the EU are States/Countries. Some of these countries are Federal (Germany for instance) and are subdivised into states (Länder in the case of Germany). - Some States of the EU include multiple Nations. UK is one of these. Scotland is neither a State nor a state for example, but it's a nation. - Some States of the EU have territories that encompass States that are not members of the EU. Monaco or the Vatican are examples. Some of these States belong to the Eurozone though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstates_and_the_European_Union http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstates_and_the_European_Un...
- barrkel 15y ago
  That's an amusing taxonomy, but don't fool yourself into thinking this stuff can be so precisely and unambiguously delineated. There's a continuum between a province with some autonomy to fully-fledged independent nation state, and the application of various English words to refer to particular entities that lie in different places on the continuum is governed primarily by history and culture, not by legal and political specifics. For any set of properties you care to define for nationhood or statehood, you can usually find entities that are not evenly cut into one or the other. The Commonwealth shares a head of state; for example, Canada would be a sovereign state (small s) within the terminology of the Commonwealth. The Common Travel Area has passport-free travel; Irish and UK citizens can vote in one another's national parliaments, while EU citizens generally can only vote in local and EU elections. British crown dependencies are distinct from its overseas territories. There aren't enough shades of meaning in the miserly handful of terms you defined above (and seems rather German-centric) to adequately cover all the dependent and independent relationships involved.
  - 15y ago