In what sense?

I've been waiting for you to ask that

My thesis was based on the realization, and frustration, that there had never been a serious modeling of nations as the primary actors in the world. Individuals, States, and Systems had all been looked at, but not the nations that seem to me to be the center of history (the French, the Germans, etc.) The thesis was based on the idea that Nations could be shown to be the primary movers on the world stage — that all of this grand competition was really cultural competition – and that be evolving cultures one could accurately simulate a slice of history.

Some of the results were surprisingly accurate, such as a predicted European hostility to Jews, but the brute work involved in building a model burned me out of that approach.

More and more, though, I'm skeptical not for practical reasons but from foundations. My work, A Computer Model of National Behavior, was channeling Emile Durkheim when he said “omnis cultura ex cultura.” The more I think of it, the less likely that seems. My model excludes systematic competition, but surely that's important. My model excludes genetic and psychological factors, but surely those are important. (To use a funny example, is it just a coincidence that America may be a state composed of hyperactive neanderthals? [1] )

So in short, I don't believe that a culture-based model of the world can show what's really going on. Systems which effect how individuals deal with each other, sure, but not Cultures as these superorganisms that are separate from the individuals comprising them.

There is a romance in imagining Nations as first-class entities, but I do not believe it is a love justified by facts.

[1] http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2006/08/20/are-americans-hyperactive-neanderthals.html