<HTML>Chris Burford writes: <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">Consider the situation of Canada, nearer to most LBO-talk subscribers than the Balkans. There has been a substantial loss of anglophone inhabitants of Quebec over the last 20 years. No doubt through a mixture of reasons, economic, emotional etc. Some with a perceived sense of discrimination against them, some with just a sense of discomfort, a few no doubt, after some ugly conflict in which they feel their civil rights were severely abused. No doubt some young men got killed in gang warfare as they always do. Now not all parts of Quebec province are francophone. Perhaps, to be devil's advocate, the problem could be solved by shaving off the anglo-phone bits and let them join Ontario or the maritime provinces....</BLOCKQUOTE> And then what happens to the Francophone communities/sections of Ontario and the Maritimes? Remember also that these communities are not necessarily geographically contiguous to each other. You are back to your original dilemma, and to the fact that no matter what the geographical unit, some community will be in the minority, and must have its rights guaranteed by the state. Leo Casey United Federation of Teachers 260 Park Avenue South New York, New York 10010-7272 (212-598-6869) Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has, and it never will. If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its waters. -- Frederick Douglass -- </HTML>