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EU chief opens door for Canada to become 'associate member'

693 points · 905 comments · hackernj

  1. Barrin92 · · focus · HN ↗
    I'm proud to live in the EU because for all its faults we have one thing going for us, we seem to be the only large institution that countries still want to voluntarily join, and can voluntarily leave.

    In a world in which the other great powers revive the Monroe Doctrine or threaten their magnitude smaller neighbors with annexation we're not doing so badly. There is an inherent pettiness, weakness and fake strength in autocracy and force and it's often why I think the EU receives so much disproportionate hate.

    1. drstewart · · focus · HN ↗
      >we seem to be the only large institution that countries still want to voluntarily join, and can voluntarily leave.

      Really? Because there's this organisation called CUSMA that nations can voluntarily leave (the US) and some want to stay in (Canada).

      It's economy is larger than the EU btw.

      1. vrganj · · focus · HN ↗
        CUSMA is just a trade deal, not a full-on organization like the EU.

        If we're doing a trade deal measuring contest, I will just point out that the EU has the world's largest free trade network, including Canada (already), South Korea, most of Latin America, India etc etc.

        1. drstewart · · focus · HN ↗

          [dead]

          1. vrganj · · focus · HN ↗
            Apples, Oranges etc once again. Of course NATO is a completely different kind of organization from the EU.

            The Catholic Church has more members than NATO, too, but it's a completely nonsensical comparison.

            The EU doesn't have some mythical status that doesn't apply to any other organization, it just has a very specific status in political science that it's the most successful example of: Supranationalism.

            Anyways, why are we doing this silly phallus size competition in the first place? Can't we just accept that the EU is a major player on the world stage and that people look up to it?

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