site banner
PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   752 thread views

Transnational Thursday for September 19, 2024

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Increasingly convinced that polar access is going to become a wedge issue for the Russian-Chinese alliance: Russian fisheries practices have generally leaned towards conservation and effective management of existing stocks and I don't particularly get the sense that they're down to let China go scorched-earth in their EEZ or even in international waters where straddling stocks are a problem.

Russian fisheries practices have generally leaned towards conservation and effective management of existing stocks

Interesting. Perhaps this is bigoted of me but my general impression of Russian institutions would have led me to assume they'd take a far more recklessly extractive approach. Glad to hear that's not the case.

Yeah, it surprises a lot of people, but Russia has had really successful longstanding agreements with the US and Norway dating back well into the Soviet era. Generally speaking, Russia's willing to align with its neighbors against more exploitative third parties (historically Poland and Japan, but possibly China in the future).

How you managed to classify Poland as exploitative here?

(unless it is about dimitriada approximately billion years ago)

Polish supertrawlers were the fleets that first exploited the Peanut Hole (the small stretch of the Sea of Okhotsk that was out of Russia's EEZ until 2013 I believe) and were also pretty active in the Donut Hole (the stretch of the Bering Sea outside of the US and Russia's EEZs) until both ended up being closed. It was kind of surprising to learn about it at first because they kinda get smol beanified due to their history but especially in the post-Soviet era they've been a pretty substantial third party presence in international fisheries (Also, as someone currently taking an imperial Russian history class I fw the Time of Troubles reference heavy)

Interesting. I guess that balances say 0.01% of what Russians have stolen during WW II.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats