On Wed, 16 Feb 2000, Billy Brown wrote:
> Todd Huffman wrote:
> > I will have to write a final paper for my polital theories class in a
> > couple weeks. I don't want to do the same mediocre paper as everyone
> > else who has taken a politcal theory class.
>
> If you want to be really theoretical, I've always been partial to
> constitutional design. You can easily come up with all kinds of
> arrangements that are radically different from anything that is actually
> being used, and its fun to try to figure out how to solve all the problems
> that have surfaced since the more prominent constitutions were enacted.
>
Well, if you really want an interesting topic, take one of the most
recently written constitutions (the Russian Constitution), and compare
it to the U.S. constitution (over 200 years old). The interesting
thing is that I believe the Russian constitution is a *huge* document.
Why did they have to create such a big constitution when they have a fine
example of one that seems to work? You might want to focus on just
issue involving protections of civil/personal rights.
Another possibility is what government responses will be to the
migration of their populations to the first countries to allow
access to "almost anything" machines. Related to that is
what does a country do when people stop working for a living
(no income taxes), and don't buy anything (no VAT taxes)?
And yet a final interesting topic would be whether or not societies
will mandate genetic engineering when it becomes feasible to
"pacify" criminals or "improve" the intelligence of the below average?
The first country that mandates "peaceful" "smart" people is going
to have a huge competitive advantage.
Robert
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