The Benefits of Patriotism

1. Equality

When people love the country where they grew up and they know about most, they prefer living there and helping it most, which keeps a balance between world's resources and populations, thus equality among Earth inhabitants by avoiding the centralization of one country/few countries everyone wants to migrate to while deserting their home countries — as in internal migration, or urban centralization, where a single city gets the lion's share of attention, services, and population.

DECENTRALIZATION is achieved by keeping people from flocking to the centralized countries, while encouraging those living there to live elsewhere, to create a fair power-balanced multipolar world.

Poor/unsafe/oppressive states should satisfy the basic needs of citizens first, to make life bearable there: their well-being, security and freedom, the lack of which makes many desert their country. Citizens' rights should be properly protected from violation by one another, by those in power, and by other countries.

Meanwhile, rich countries, whose citizens have a surplus of resources and more freedom of mobility between world's countries, should encourage citizens to explore, help or even inhabit other parts of the world. This helps achieve world balance, as well as giving citizens a uniqueness/self-actualization they miss in their overly-rich technologically-advanced countries, that don't benefit properly from their "skills" that another poor country could desperately need (like a company laying off gifted employees who can still be useful elsewhere). First world citizens should generally have a "broader patriotism" (acting more like Citizens of the World) than that of poor citizens stuck in third world countries. Their patriotism toward their home country is expressed by progressing further at home, while representing it abroad as good ambassadors sharing its experience and models of success with others. Patriotism is not absolute; it's derived from mutual interest wherever, whenever.

Some argue against patriotism saying that the centralization of some privileged countries is not harmful:

• They claim that the benefits enjoyed by centralized countries will eventually be shared by everyone worldwide. This is untrue, because in practice every country cares about its interest first and foremost. However, this can only work in the faraway future when people become able to travel fast/instantly between world countries, along with the benefits they can take from one place to another, when the world becomes a "real" global village, physically, not just digitally.
• They claim it's not a big problem to desert some countries as long as citizens are happy and successful elsewhere. This is untrue, because immigrants and their offspring eventually melt into their new environment, gradually losing interest in helping their original countries. Accordingly, much of the heritage, culture, history and achievements of their ancestors back home become ignored and gradually forgotten, which is a great loss to human civilization, as many such works have to be repeated again. Meanwhile, the living conditions of people at home get worse along with their resources that have nobody to handle properly; whereas rich and powerful countries grow more rich and powerful, to the point of gluttony among themselves and tyranny toward others.
• They claim that immigrants can still return the favor to their home country differently: having a strong expatriate lobby and representatives in parliament/government, speaking to foreign media for their fellow patriots and their problems at home, investing/encouraging investment in home countries, etc. This is mostly untrue, because it requires having a very high percentage of immigrants with the same origins in order to be really effective abroad; otherwise, the favors to do one's country while abroad are usually limited compared to those to do while at home.
• They claim that in overpopulated countries or those with high unemployment rates, it's better when people LEAVE. This is mostly untrue for many reasons:
  • The bulk of population is always needed at home to keep the country alive & strong; otherwise, it's usually lack of planning, not space, that causes uneven distribution of population.
  • Those who left could only be temporarily useless because of recession/turbulence/etc. after which they can return; or voluntarily useless, being too lazy/greedy/ignorant to work.

2. Economy

The natural resources a certain region has are better handled by the people living nearby, to save the cost of "transport, import, maintenance & adjustment" of commodities and humans, who must apply, travel and adjust to the host country they should first know, like and benefit from.

Any country's priority is to achieve SELF-SUFFICIENCY first, whenever possible, for saving the above costs, as well as avoiding the monopoly of big countries. Self-sufficiency is achieved in many ways:

• The state, esp. in poor countries, should use positive discrimination, or useful bias toward natives (like that used for assigning a quota to women, minorities, people with disabilities, etc.) until they are empowered and not discriminated against, to counteract society's/world's discrimination: favoring local employees, resources, products, or just airlines and tourism, over foreign ones when both foreign and local are equally available. Favoring home products boosts industry worldwide, forcing countries to meet their local demands, while exporting only unique products needed elsewhere. Open market/free trade is only useful when it helps countries "complete" one another, not create chaos and injustice by some toward the others.
• Countries with "extra" possessions should share with countries lacking "vital" possessions, for the fair distribution of world income, just as we do within the same country when the rich pay more taxes than the poor.
• The need is growing for a real effective world government, or a fair and strong supervisory body to supervise and care about ALL world citizens, more than the current UN and local governments do. Only then FULL economic globalization becomes justified, when legal globalization is achieved first. What we have at present is only cultural globalization in progress. Knowledge should precede law, and law precede economy, to avoid global chaos & injustice. Unfortunately, the present UN body along with its affiliate organizations (world ministries) is too feeble for that, being founded long ago at colonial/post-colonial times by biased world powers many of which still manipulate, if not illicitly, collectively colonize and enslave developing countries, using dangerous unethical technologies & humans, more dangerous than old-fashioned colonialism ever used. Modernization didn't eliminate greed from people or countries.

3. Efficiency

Resources are better managed by the people who lived long in a certain place, since they usually know better about it. Meanwhile, importing foreign experts/workers is good only when a certain expertise/labor force is lacking at home (just as we import foreign goods, as long as the "human imports" are not more harmful than useful). The bulk of useful knowledge someone has (from work/education/reading/experience) affects them & the place where they live:

• Most commonly, you know about your country more than other countries, which makes you more useful to it than someone who doesn't know about it.
• Less commonly, you are esp. gifted in a field of knowledge not valued at home; then it's better to move to a country where it can be valued, from which it can even reach and benefit the rest of the world (e.g. invention/discovery/medicine/theory/research etc.), AFTER benefiting the host country first.
• Least commonly, you know about a foreign country more than yours; e.g., you specialize in a foreign language/environment/history/politics ... If your knowledge is not needed at home, it's better to move to the country of your specialty, or to communicate with and help its people from home. However, knowing about foreign countries can be useful to one's own country too, for cooperation with them and introducing successful foreign models to one's fellow citizens.

If your knowledge is of a universal type, equally useful and valued anywhere; then it makes no difference where you live as long as you enjoy your life.

4. Specialization

It's better when each country finds its own niche in world order, where it can present to other countries something unique unfound elsewhere, natural or acquired. No country is 100% self-sufficient, however it aspires to be, that it needs others to be complete, not to compete with. Patriotism creates a more diverse world than a homogeneous one (that some wrongly charge patriotism with), where every nation knows who and where it is, before moving forward or outward.

Loving a place/time/person makes one automatically love, learn, cherish, and improve the special qualities about it/them. Patriotism instinctively guides citizens to discover their natural and cultural specialties: their own resources, traditions, industries, and identity that has existed for ages. They won't imitate or copy another country blindly. They mindfully will, only to add foreign elements to serve the local ones, when no home equivalent is found. 

Specialization is personally useful too. When one is happy/successful/famous in a different/difficult environment, it makes outsiders more curious about, respectful of, and willing to benefit from them and their unique experiences. One can cooperate more with others, when one has something different to offer.

5. Commitment

People whose origins belong to a certain place, or whose past memories took place there, are more emotionally attached to it, which motivates them to devote more time & energy to it, than those who had neither memories nor origins there. They can endure many hardships their country faces, willing to sacrifice some of their own self-interest for the public interest, and temporary gains for future ones. Examples:

• When violence erupts or a disaster strikes in a country, foreign or unsympathetic residents are more likely to leave first, before everyone else, partly because they have no deep attachment to it or enough knowledge about it, not knowing or caring to know how to survive there and then.
• Patriotic citizens help their country collectively/individually, as long as they believe their effort will be fruitful "eventually." Even when a society is temporarily led by a bad "elite," or inhabited by a majority of ignorant/disloyal "masses," who may even harm the person offering them help, he/she can still support it, as support takes many forms, unrestrained by those in control or those controlled. Thanks to its tremendous brain power, the wise meritocratic "rightful" elite can control/tame both greedy leaders and ignorant masses.

6. Interest

Every relationship is based on "mutual interest." A country needs its citizens as citizens need their county; and each is affected by the changes happening to the other: physical, financial, social, political, etc.

Like a mother, a nation gives more privileges, e.g. citizenship, to inhabitants who are more emotionally bonded to it (patriotic), for growing up/living long there, faithfully serving it, bonding with its people, etc. Every action a person takes indirectly affects their country (i.e. public interest: the interest of those sharing one's country—its resources, laws, problems, etc.), before affecting the entire world.

The favors between citizens and states can be shared for present, past or future reasons: you help your country because it helps you now, had helped you before, or will help you later (you plan to live, grow old and die there).

• Present benefits are more symbiotic than patriotic, based on "immediate" interests: A country gives good salaries/services to its citizens, who in turn work hard and pay taxes.
• Past benefits are not past if they still bear fruit: A country helps its citizens during childhood, giving them free education, vaccination, and other child benefits, until they grow up and return the favor.
• Future benefits: A country gives retirement pension to retired workers who had served it before, because their services are still useful.

7. Security

"A bird in hand is worth two in the bush": living in an unknown environment may have more risk than living in one you know. Other than the physical, there are social and psychological benefits making life generally safer and easier with fellow citizens: shared language, culture, traditions, memories, identity, and roots that can't exist elsewhere.

However, sometimes when citizens suffer much at home or feel unwelcome there, and all possibilities to cope with life there are exhausted, they should consider alternatives. This is usually the fault of other citizens, not the country (that has survived for ages for its unique, natural and developed character: people come and go, but nations remain). So when some disloyal citizens breach the pact between them and their country, they make life difficult for other innocent citizens who are indirectly forced to leave.

Thus, it's always good to learn about other countries (whether for migration, cooperation, knowledge ... or diversion), comparing the physical and emotional cost of applying, traveling ... and living there, to life at home, before making a decision.

8. Pleasure

We "enjoy the past" in our homeland more than any other place, as we can find there more evocative objects, places and people to communicate with, connecting us with our origins. Our memories help us understand ourselves better, giving unity to life's different stages from birth to death. Sometimes, citizens help their country merely for those pleasant memories that shaped their lifelong personality. Even though they are saved as mere brain signals, they affect other brain parts all life long. Connecting with one's past is useful for better self-understanding, reclaiming lost advantages, honing old skills, evoking old pleasures, etc.

What is  Patriotism       |       Examples of Patriotism       |       Global  Citizenship

History Benefits     |     Attachment to the Past     |     Tribal Instinct