Smaller Countries are Better than Larger Countries

REBUTTALSorry for the late reply, I have been quite busy with family matters as of late. Apologies in advance. While I am aware that my opponent has quite viciously rebutted my original argument, I will not reply to any of his claims this round and will solely rebut his own argument, per the rules of the debate. So let’s get started!Happiness/EconomyWhile I am sure that my opponent could find several economically and socially content smaller countries, a portion does not designate that smaller countries are always better than larger countries. While I do admit that there are many large nations which suffer economically and as a result are less “happy”, smaller countries do not escape unscathed. For example, Syria ranked as the fifth most unhappy nation. Similarly, our favorite Gold Coast nation of Sierra Leone ranked as the sixth most unhappy country. Cyprus and the de facto nation of Northern Cyprus ranked seventh and eighth, respectively Cambodia ranked ninth and Lebanon 10th. Therefore if we are not counting Iraq or Greece as a small country (which is debateable), six of the top ten most unhappy nations can qualify as “small” [1]. As for the next point regarding GDP, the average wages of a nation does not in any means determine that one nation is more “socially developed” than the other. Also, the USA, China, and Russia are not the only “large” countries in the world. If we are deciding the supposed superiority of a country based on GDP, your argument has many flaws due to the fact that many large nations have superb GDP’s. For example Norway ranked as the 2nd GDP per International Monetary Fund in 2013. Australia ranked 5th, Sweden ranked 7th, the USA ranked 9th, Canada ranked 10th, Finland 12th, etc [2]. CorruptionThis argument, I must profess, is utterly absurd. While it may be true that some smaller nations, primarily the European ones, may have less corruption, this does not derail the fact that many smaller nations are not as pristine. If we look at your very own source, we find that North Korea ranks 174th (of 175), South Sudan 171, Eritrea 166, Yemen, Guinea-Bissau, Syria, Burundi, and Haiti all 161, etc [3]. Therefore there is absolutely no correlation between size and level of corruption. Also note that the not all of the countries in the world are westernized ones, as those are the only nations which my opponent has utilizes thus far in this debate. PeacefulnessAgain my opponent makes the fatal error of not recognizing non-westernized “small” nations. Using your own source I can find that many small nations are classified as non peaceful. Such as Guinea-Bissau (145 out of 162), Rwanda (137), North Korea (153), Yemen (147), etc [4]. I let the numbers represent themselves. ConclusionI would like to reiterate the fact that my opponent has intentionally left out a huge percentage of data which can be all found in his own sources. While it may be true that European nations are more peaceful, and by extension smaller European nations as all European nations are small. However, this ignores the fact that many small countries outside of Europe are struggling tremendously, such as Sierra Leone, Burundi, Rwanda, North Korea, Cambodia, Eritrea, Guinea-Bissau, and others. Therefore I must conclude that the size of a nation has absolutely no relation to the superiority of that nation. Sources[1] http://abcnews.go.com...[2] http://en.wikipedia.org...[3] http://www.transparency.org...[4] http://www.visionofhumanity.org...