Isn partitioning a state on ethnic lines messy when transfers of population are required?
When are such transfers “required”? It is often the case that border areas have mixed populations; then one must try to draw the borderlines to reflect the ethnic reality as accurately as possible, after which the residue on either side will gradually either assimilate or emigrate. The best examples are the dissolution of the USSR and the “Velvet Divorce” between the Czech Republic and Slovakia; and I’m sure that the ultimate dissolution of Canada and Belgium will be at least as civil. Of course, human affairs aren’t always conducted so tidily, as the division of the former Yugoslavia shows. The Serbs tried to grab as much land as possible by killing or expelling non-Serbs; the result was that they wound up being expelled from Krajina and Kosova, as they deserved, though they still possess their ill-gotten gains in Bosnia (thanks to the outrageous arms embargo that deprived the Bosnians of the means of self-defense. The Eurocrats have a vested interest in trying to frustrate attempts t
