Self-determination is the right of nations and nationalities to be independent and form their own governments. This right was first brought by Wilson Woodrow, the president of the United states, with his fourteen points which would lead to world peace. Those fourteen points included self-determination which led to the fall of the Ottoman and Austria-Hungarian Empires. It is also significant because there is still an issue with self-determination even if this right is in the charter of the United Nations. Even if the people have the right to declare their independence and create their own government, sometimes, this right is not granted. We only have to take the example of Catalonia, this region of Spain did a referendum the first of October and the “yes” won. But as an answer to this referendum the government of Spain used the article 155 of their constitution to regain control of Catalonia. Therefore, Spain would’ve to face UN, since, it went against the Human rights but no sanction has been sent yet. But just the fact that self-determination was not followed is a sign that the issue of self-determination is still there and significant. Furthermore Catalonia is not the only one facing the same problem there is also Kurdistan in the Middle East.
The League of Nations was also first brought by Wilson Woodrow who wanted an international organisation to lead Humanity to world peace. But with WW2 we know that this organisation failed, but why ? First, this organisation didn’t possess a real power on the international scene, therefore, the League of Nation (LN) wasn’t really respected. Furthermore, with the permanent members of the council, they could veto any sensitive subject that would affect their agendas. Second, the fact that it relied on collective security, because, in theory, this principle would be good but in practice the countries wouldn’t want to defend another country without something in return because the countries would not want to send their own troops, use their own money and weaponry for nothing the countries would only follow their own respective agendas. This is the mean reason why the LN couldn’t stop the WW2. But with its death came the birth of the United Nations that should be an improved version of the LN but will it be able to stop the storm that’s coming ? We can only hope that it will.
Hi Charles,
I enjoyed reading your blog post, and as I wrote mine on the same topics as yours I was pleasantly surprised as well. I thought that the way you addressed the significance of self-determination was very interesting, especially with the integration of a modern day example that is well known. However, I do think that it might have been more relevant to have an example from the time period of the world post-WW1 just to drive home the point even more. For the League of Nations, I liked how you made the link to World War Two and examined how the failure of the League of Nations could have lead to the outbreak of a new war, as it was something I didn’t think about in my own post. It would have also been interesting to see something about the significance of its existence or maybe of its conception. Nonetheless, I did enjoy reading your blog post.
Cire
Hi Charles,
The first part of the blog post related to self-determination effectively addresses historical context and maximizes conceptual analysis related to modern day issues. Keep it up!
The significance is, unfortunately, not as prominent within the LoN piece. However, it does include evaluation of the consequences of this important outcome of WWI.