US Populace Jealous of Power?
I can't remember the exact train of thought--maybe Rachael Anne can supplement the record--but we were talking about various countries and I said something to the effect that it's surprising how limited our government is in the US when our citizens (relative to every other populace in the world, I dare say) are very naive about their own rulers. I.e. (and I think I got this notion from a Rothbard story about him hanging out with Polish dissidents) I think Americans trust their government far more than, say, a French or Swedish person trusts his. And yet, paradoxically, those governments have far more power.
Rachael suggested that this might be due to the simple fact that the US government is relatively young. Now it depends how you want to measure it, of course: E.g. the French Revolution happened after the American. But certainly France is older than the United States of America. So even though the French (we assume, and maybe this is wrong) are more cynical about their politicians, nonetheless they've had government around for so much longer (in their cultural history) that c'est la vie when it comes to various programs and powers.
Rachael suggested that this might be due to the simple fact that the US government is relatively young. Now it depends how you want to measure it, of course: E.g. the French Revolution happened after the American. But certainly France is older than the United States of America. So even though the French (we assume, and maybe this is wrong) are more cynical about their politicians, nonetheless they've had government around for so much longer (in their cultural history) that c'est la vie when it comes to various programs and powers.
It occurs to me that the causality could run the other way, too, in a theory that's far more complimentary to Americans. Perhaps the reason the French (say) are more cynical is that their rulers have had more power and thus more opportunity to show how bad politicians can be. No American president has ever starved millions to death (okay Abe gave it the old college try) because none has really had the option of completely nationalizing agriculture (okay FDR gave it the old...) and thus we're not as cynical as the average Russian.
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gf,
I don't have any kind of objective measurement. But I thought it was a generally accepted fact that the welfare state is bigger than in Sweden than here, say, and that generally speaking business regulations are stricter in most of Europe.
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