Words matter; they may not break bones, but they can wreak havoc if they are used carelessly or ideologically. Political labels can stick, and, if inaccurate, they can result in people having an incorrect impression of what something or someone is, politically. The war that began in North America in 1861, for example, has typically been labeled as a civil war, but it may be more accurately labeled as the C.S.A.-U.S.A. War because the Confederate States of America did not want to take over the U.S.A.; it was not as if the C.S.A.’s goal was to conquer and government the U.S.A. Having established itself as a functioning political entity even though U.S. President Lincoln refused to acknowledge the political existence of the C.S.A., that union could be said to have existed and been at war with the U.S.A. from 1861-1865. Two unions of states were at war with each other; it was not as if the Union Army was at war with individual seceded states. The C.S.A. had a government apart from the state governments. So “the war between the states” is an inaccurate label because it denies the existence of the two unions. But the common label of a civil war is also problematic because two political factions were not fighting each other for control of the U.S.A. If this criticism seems unusual and even perhaps rather strange, the reason may be because the victor’s labeling of the war has been so overwhelming. My point is that this does not mean that the labeling is accurate just because it has been widely accepted. Similarly, the labeling by E.U. officials (including the E.U.’s ambassador to the U.S.) of the European Union as a bloc is not accurate.
The full essay is at "Proliferating Blocs."
