Most people admire prosperous and democratic countries and want to live in such places. We will differentiate big prosperous and democratic countries (BPDC) and small prosperous and democratic countries (SPDC). Let us name just 5 BPDCs and SPDCs: the USA, Japan, Germany, France and the UK, on the one hand, and Denmark, Switzerland, Austria, Belgium and Slovenia, on the other. In here, we will refer to BPDCs as big countries and about SPDCs as small ones. So what are the differences in living in such big and small countries that are prosperous and democratic?
A big country gives big opportunities to its citizens, where they do many big things which will affect the rest of the world. Evidently, a big or great country is a place of many great individuals. There are hundreds of bright individuals from the USA, Japan, Germany, France and the UK who contributed to the world history and civilisation. JFK was a great man not because he was a great individual but also because he was a leader of the great nation. Any successful American politician is visible worldwide.
But how about the people of the small and happy countries, like Denmark, Switzerland, Austria, Belgium and Slovenia? These and similar countries don’t provide great opportunities for their citizens in terms of political arena, educational institutions, business organizations or mass media. They don’t have Paramount Pictures or Hollywood, Harvard or Oxford, CNN or BBC, Toyota or Siemens, New York Times or Paris Match, Louvre or British Museum. They have fewer Olympic champions, famous writers, Nobel laureates and other celebrities than big countries. The rest of the world knows something about them and their most noticeable individuals but there are too many activities in the big countries to follow. The world prefers to read The Times or Newsweek, to watch CNN or BBC than to follow the local news or political event in a small and prosperous country. But that doesn’t bother the people of the small countries because they are quite happy even without this world attention. Just some of them, I guess, would have preferred to live in a big country.
Small, prosperous and democratic countries are not great in their size but they are great in their everyday life. According to the World Economic Forum’s report many small countries are better in economic competitiveness than the big ones. They better protect their citizens, give care to their children and provide a unique cultural environment for people. So there is no simple correlation between the greatness of the country and the greatness of the individual’s life. The most important thing is that a happy country helps its people in achieving happiness, and the happy individuals make a happy country. The size of the country does matter for the most people but not for the most individuals.
Alisher Faizullaev 