Barnett has an excellent post today discussing the role of demographics in driving changes to the 20th Century state system.

My argument is about what Israel can or cannot survive as–state-wise–in a future, increasingly globalized world. France can’t survive or thrive in that future as just white French, unless it discriminates consistently to maintain that end. If it does that, the Paris riots are only the beginning and soon enough France will stop resembling a democracy as we define it. Israel’s problem is not different from that, nor is Japan’s, with it’s rapidly aging demographics, nor Ireland’s, which for the first time in its modern history is grappling with non-European immigrants.

Systemic discrimination is the only way that current demographic trends will change. I suppose more extreme actions, like genocide or ethnic warfare could also disrupt the demographic trends. In any case, the larger point stands. Demographic data is a useful tool for thinking about the future since demographic trends are fairly stable along longer time scales than many of our other data sources. When using this tool, however, one must be careful to not equate demographics with identity. Barnett does not equate the two, and it is from this point that his basic insight arises.

Barnett separates what this trend necessarily involves (barring dramatic and systemic discriminatory actions, there will be more descendants of non-Europeans and non-whites in the future) and what is up for grabs (how states will respond to these demographic changes). While one’s genetic heritage is static (at least, it is for the moment - all bets are off once body modification/body art expands to include one’s genome), one’s identity can be quite dynamic. This is what Barnett is getting at when he says that:

It all boils down to this question: can anybody become a full citizen of your state? Or are they restricted by reasons of race and/or religion?

Citizenship does not necessarily have to equate to ethnicity, which is simply a special case of the larger reality that identity does not equate to ethnicity. In order to prevail in a globalizing world, states will need to continue the decoupling of citizenship from ethnicity. If they do not, then those that do not have sizable immigrant will face declining populations and declining standards of living as they firewall themselves off from immigrant labor pools. Those that already have sizable immigrant populations (like France) will face increasing sectarian strife (Paris suburb riots on steriods) if they cannot integrate immigrants as full citizens.

In this sense, it comes down to identity.