While presidential contenders in the U.S. debate the record of Pakistan in supporting the fight against Al-Qaeda, Islamabad prepares for elections. The last few months have put President Musharraf’s military dictatorship in a tough spot, putting into question the general’s re-election hopes.
Pakistan’s Supreme Court overturned—much to the delight of an emerging civil society that turned out in droves to protest Musharraf—the administration’s decision to remove regime critic Iftikhar Chaudhry on apparently trumped up charges.
In addition, the court has allowed for the return of exiled opposition party leaders Bhenazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Pakistan Muslim League respectively, to campaign for the approaching election.
Although Ms. Bhutto has yet to voyage back to her country, she has been busy maneuvering for the election. This week, former Prime Minister Bhenazir Bhutto reached an electoral agreement with Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf. The deal is simple: Bhutto offers her support in the upcoming election in exchange for Musharraf stepping down as general, giving up his dual role of military commander and president.
The Musharraf-Bhutto accord raises three important questions. First, is Bhutto selling her soul to the devil, denigrating democracy by aligning herself and her party with a dictatorship for electoral gain? Second, will this extend the life of the Musharraf regime? And finally, will this strengthen Musharraf, allowing him to better take the fight to terrorists taking sanctuary in Pakistan?
Bhutto is certainly no supporter of Pakistani military autocracies, as her father was executed by a former military regime and she herself was thrown out of the country and accused of corruption in 1999 after Musharaff took power in a bloodless coup. So why is she seemingly allowing the administration to continue governing?
Her former rival Sharif has indeed characterized, in so many words, her negotiations with the regime as a Faustian betrayal of democracy, declaring it a “clear violation” of an agreement that “says no deals with military dictatorships.” Yet the PPP leader’s decision is a shrewd one, which could perhaps lead to the full return of democracy to Islamabad.
By forcing Musharaff to slip out of his military uniform, in return for short-term support, she has weakened his backing from the powerful military, which could lead to his eventual downfall.
She has also bought her way back to Pakistan, allowing herself the opportunity to rally the troops and plant seeds for democracy—she was the one who actually made progress in forcing the regime to reform, albeit slowly. Moreover, the move distances herself from potential adversary Sharif.
What does Musharraf stand to gain from acceding to Bhutto’s demand that he end his military career? The (former) general wishes to shore up support for this important election after a shaky few months has endangered his stay in power. Musharraf thinks he solidifies his position with the assistance of the popular Bhutto.
Whether it backfires in this election is doubtful but remains to be seen. His military removal, however, could certainly undermine his long-term legitimacy in the eyes of the armed forces and lead to democracy.
Some American officials would like to see the restoration of Pakistani democracy. Democratic presidential hopeful Barak Obama recently stated: “our goal is not simply an ally in Pakistan, it is a democratic ally.”
His opponents quickly jumped on him for this remark. Senator and Democratic Presidential Candidate Chris Dodd scolded: “While General Musharraf is no Thomas Jefferson, he may be the only thing that stands between us and having an Islamic fundamentalist state in that country.”
The remarks from Obama and Dodd sum up the classic quandary in American foreign policy in general, and specifically in regards to current relations with Pakistan: should we push for democracy in a country in which the results are unpredictable or do we continue supporting an allied, yet autocratic, dictatorship?
Dodd’s statement that democracy would bring radical Islamic sentiment to power in Pakistan is likely untrue. Islamists, when running, have never garnered more than ten percent in national elections, and would unlikely do so in the near-future.
At the same time, Obama’s comments could be described as naïve. Democracy, as seen in Iraq, is not a panacea for the country’s problems, and the fact that Pakistan is host to nuclear weapons should preach caution and stability. While Musharraf, to be sure, could do more, he has been an erstwhile American ally.
Musharraf needs support, and Bhutto’s sponsorship will give the president more room to fight extremism, and Washington should be happy about the deal. Democratization should be homegrown and gradual.
The U.S. should support democratic institutions and civil society in Pakistan, hopefully leading to a stable democracy in the long-term. Musharraf and Bhutto’s agreement, while perhaps Faustian on Bhutto’s part in the short-term, could lay the foundation for this to come to fruition.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Friday, August 24, 2007
History's Straightjacket
The age-old quip tells us: “History always repeats itself.” But when is history allowed the opportunity to repeat itself? In other words, when can countries be forgiven for painful historical events and truly move on?
WWII aggressors Germany and Japan are still paying their dues over sixty years later. Although much has been forgiven, both are still regarded with a degree of contempt and suspicion by their neighbors.
Germany’s post WWII experience has been slightly easier than that of Japan in this regard, namely because of EU integration and the Cold War. Western Europe, which was ravaged twice by German expansionism in a span of just over two decades, was rightly concerned after the war about containing Germany.
To that end, ambitious officials created the European Coal and Steel Community in 1950. The main aim of the new supranational entity was to take these two precious commodities, which are essential for war, out of Germany’s (by then Western Germany) hands and put them in the joint control of the community’s six participants: France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Italy.
The ECSC then progressed into the European Economic Community with the 1957 Treaty of Rome, further integrating the economy of Western Germany with much of the rest of Western Europe. This was a further check on the country’s ambitions.
Economic collaboration was also backed up by security cooperation in the form of NATO. A popular motto for the mutual security agreement at its inception in 1949 was: “Keep the Americans in, the Germans down, and the Soviets out.” As a result, Western Germany was devoid of a fully sovereign military, and the Soviet threat helped convince the U.S. to station troops in the country for an indefinite period of time.
These two initiatives helped allay European suspicion of Germany, and allowed its former, bitter enemy France to seek rapprochement. The two countries signed the Elysee Treaty in 1963, pledging alliance between the two countries. Although this did not stop some from being frightened about the reunification of Germany in the early 1990s, now, popular contempt for Germany is an exception. Many on the continent, however, still fear and or envy its economic might.
Germany’s Nazi past still limits popular and governmental support for committing German troops abroad. Deploying troops in the Balkans in 1990 was a big step, but Germans and others are still extremely wary of doing so—as shown in the rancorous political debate over the country’s current NATO commitment in Afghanistan.
Although much of Germany’s criticism is self-inflicted, Japan, on the other hand, is still routinely pressured by its neighbors, namely China and South Korea, to apologize for its war crimes. This is in part because of the Japanese-right’s stubborn attempts to whitewash its WW2 history from school textbooks and former Prime Minister Koizumi’s visits to the Yasakuni Shrine, which honors WWII dead, including war criminals.
Although Koizumi’s successor, Shinzo Abe, has yet to visit the controversial shrine, his nascent administration has pledged to make Japan a “beautiful country” and in doing so put its WWII guilt to rest. The constitution, largely written by American “new-dealers” after WWII, lies in his way.
Article nine of that document dictates that Japan cannot wield an army, only a self-defense force. However, Abe has committed self-defense forces to Iraq for reconstruction efforts, and the Defense Department was recently promoted to a cabinet-level department—much to the dismay of its neighbors.
Japan’s historical revisionism is partly to blame for frosty relations with its Asian neighbors. Although China is certainly still bitter about Japan’s imperial excess, specifically the “rape of Nanking”, historical references are partially a guise for Chinese regional power concerns.
China fears a U.S. backed, powerful Japan wielding an army and perhaps nuclear weapons in the region. Allusion to Japanese war crimes is a sympathy-invoking façade for unease about Japan’s potential threat to China’s hegemonic status in the region
So what will it take for these countries and others to forgive and forget? It is unlikely that those countries afflicted by WWII abuses will ever forget, but they may forgive.
Those born well after WWII will not have the chance to forget, they never experienced the horrors or national suspicions caused by that war. Consequently, post WWII generations, especially the “Euro-generation” in Europe, are unlikely to invoke WWII gripes too often.
Historical grievances, however, are still alive and well in many parts of Europe, especially in the East. In general, much of Central and Eastern Europe is expectedly anxious about an increasingly bellicose Russia, and still bitter about Soviet post-war occupation.
Yet Poland, invaded by Germany and Russia numerous times, seems the most resentful of its troubled past, recently using WWII era historical references to defend its national interests.
Poland’s defense minister, Radek Sikorski, compared the German-Russian Baltic Sea pipeline, which conspicuously bypasses Poland, to the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, the 1939 agreement between Germany and Russia to split up Polish territory between them.
And in defense of his country’s unwillingness to accept a diminished voting status in the EU, an electoral framework based on population, Polish Prime Minister Lech Kacynski declared, “"If Poland had not had to live through the years of 1939-45, Poland would today be looking at the demographics of a country of 66million."
History will always be used for political gain and people will attempt to use it to compare and contrast current events—witness the rampant analogy between Vietnam and Iraq. And historical abuses cannot be swept under the rug. Victims have a right to bring up painful historical events so that the ill-treatment does not happen again. But WWII-era cruelty should not disbar reformed countries such as Japan and Germany from becoming normal countries again.
Will these countries shrug off their historical straightjackets? As with most things in history, only time will tell.
WWII aggressors Germany and Japan are still paying their dues over sixty years later. Although much has been forgiven, both are still regarded with a degree of contempt and suspicion by their neighbors.
Germany’s post WWII experience has been slightly easier than that of Japan in this regard, namely because of EU integration and the Cold War. Western Europe, which was ravaged twice by German expansionism in a span of just over two decades, was rightly concerned after the war about containing Germany.
To that end, ambitious officials created the European Coal and Steel Community in 1950. The main aim of the new supranational entity was to take these two precious commodities, which are essential for war, out of Germany’s (by then Western Germany) hands and put them in the joint control of the community’s six participants: France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Italy.
The ECSC then progressed into the European Economic Community with the 1957 Treaty of Rome, further integrating the economy of Western Germany with much of the rest of Western Europe. This was a further check on the country’s ambitions.
Economic collaboration was also backed up by security cooperation in the form of NATO. A popular motto for the mutual security agreement at its inception in 1949 was: “Keep the Americans in, the Germans down, and the Soviets out.” As a result, Western Germany was devoid of a fully sovereign military, and the Soviet threat helped convince the U.S. to station troops in the country for an indefinite period of time.
These two initiatives helped allay European suspicion of Germany, and allowed its former, bitter enemy France to seek rapprochement. The two countries signed the Elysee Treaty in 1963, pledging alliance between the two countries. Although this did not stop some from being frightened about the reunification of Germany in the early 1990s, now, popular contempt for Germany is an exception. Many on the continent, however, still fear and or envy its economic might.
Germany’s Nazi past still limits popular and governmental support for committing German troops abroad. Deploying troops in the Balkans in 1990 was a big step, but Germans and others are still extremely wary of doing so—as shown in the rancorous political debate over the country’s current NATO commitment in Afghanistan.
Although much of Germany’s criticism is self-inflicted, Japan, on the other hand, is still routinely pressured by its neighbors, namely China and South Korea, to apologize for its war crimes. This is in part because of the Japanese-right’s stubborn attempts to whitewash its WW2 history from school textbooks and former Prime Minister Koizumi’s visits to the Yasakuni Shrine, which honors WWII dead, including war criminals.
Although Koizumi’s successor, Shinzo Abe, has yet to visit the controversial shrine, his nascent administration has pledged to make Japan a “beautiful country” and in doing so put its WWII guilt to rest. The constitution, largely written by American “new-dealers” after WWII, lies in his way.
Article nine of that document dictates that Japan cannot wield an army, only a self-defense force. However, Abe has committed self-defense forces to Iraq for reconstruction efforts, and the Defense Department was recently promoted to a cabinet-level department—much to the dismay of its neighbors.
Japan’s historical revisionism is partly to blame for frosty relations with its Asian neighbors. Although China is certainly still bitter about Japan’s imperial excess, specifically the “rape of Nanking”, historical references are partially a guise for Chinese regional power concerns.
China fears a U.S. backed, powerful Japan wielding an army and perhaps nuclear weapons in the region. Allusion to Japanese war crimes is a sympathy-invoking façade for unease about Japan’s potential threat to China’s hegemonic status in the region
So what will it take for these countries and others to forgive and forget? It is unlikely that those countries afflicted by WWII abuses will ever forget, but they may forgive.
Those born well after WWII will not have the chance to forget, they never experienced the horrors or national suspicions caused by that war. Consequently, post WWII generations, especially the “Euro-generation” in Europe, are unlikely to invoke WWII gripes too often.
Historical grievances, however, are still alive and well in many parts of Europe, especially in the East. In general, much of Central and Eastern Europe is expectedly anxious about an increasingly bellicose Russia, and still bitter about Soviet post-war occupation.
Yet Poland, invaded by Germany and Russia numerous times, seems the most resentful of its troubled past, recently using WWII era historical references to defend its national interests.
Poland’s defense minister, Radek Sikorski, compared the German-Russian Baltic Sea pipeline, which conspicuously bypasses Poland, to the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, the 1939 agreement between Germany and Russia to split up Polish territory between them.
And in defense of his country’s unwillingness to accept a diminished voting status in the EU, an electoral framework based on population, Polish Prime Minister Lech Kacynski declared, “"If Poland had not had to live through the years of 1939-45, Poland would today be looking at the demographics of a country of 66million."
History will always be used for political gain and people will attempt to use it to compare and contrast current events—witness the rampant analogy between Vietnam and Iraq. And historical abuses cannot be swept under the rug. Victims have a right to bring up painful historical events so that the ill-treatment does not happen again. But WWII-era cruelty should not disbar reformed countries such as Japan and Germany from becoming normal countries again.
Will these countries shrug off their historical straightjackets? As with most things in history, only time will tell.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Rove's Legacy Can Only Be Seen on This Side of the Atlantic
The departure of Karl Rove, Bush’s most trusted advisor, from the White House was followed by a flurry of commentary on the boy genius' legacy. The American press is unsurprisingly having a field day. But major media outlets across the pond in Europe are also taking great interest in the announcement, leading one to wonder what effect, if any, the “architect” has had on the European political scene.
El Pais, the largest and most influential Spanish newspaper, featured an op-ed this week on Rove’s political tenets. The paper, which usually offers thoughtful and on-point analysis, dropped the ball on this one. Aside from gratuitously concentrating on the Iraq War, an endeavor that Rove certainly helped sell to the American public but was not his brainchild, the op-ed drastically overestimates his political influence outside of the United States.
Its author, Jose Ridao, notes that Rove’s modus operandi is to “bank on the radical mobilization of one’s own side, concentrating political debate on those issues in which, according to the principle of moral clarity, the other side had a limited capacity to offer alternatives.” This general observation is fairly accurate. Rove certainly polarized the electorate, focusing on divisive issues to rally the base to the voting booths.
But this is where the article’s utility ends. After the general synopsis, the author tries to link Rove’s strategy with that of European conservatives. Ridao argues, “The model based on the Rove hypothesis has, in large part, been imported by the conservative parties of Europe, who have sought inspiration for their policies on the other side of the Atlantic.”
While lumping together the political strategy of the entire continent’s center-right parties, he tries to illustrate his point by only focusing on his home country’s political situation. “Spain is one of those European countries in which Rove’s electoral strategy has been implemented, and where its power of polarization has been most apparent,” Ridao declares.
To be sure, Spain is the most polarized it has been since the democratic transition in the late 1970s. Until a few years ago, the two main parties, the center-right Popular Party and the center-left Socialist Party, came together to formulate a largely bi-partisan strategy on important issues such as terrorism and immigration.
This, for the most part, is no longer the case. But it is not because Spanish conservatives are using Rove as their ideological brain-trust. It is, on the contrary, the confluence of two primary factors.
First, the attacks of March 11th poisoned the entire political process. The Socialists, and many Spaniards, connected the train bombings with the Popular Party’s support of the Iraq War. They then accused the PP of covering up the fact that Islamic jihadists were to blame for the attacks, as government officials incessantly accused the homegrown terrorist group, ETA, for the bombings despite evidence clearly linking Islamists to the attacks.
PP has denied these charges and some of its back-benchers still offer conspiracy theories insisting on ETA’s guilt. More importantly, they are still bitter about the surprise election of Socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, three days after the terrorist attacks, alleging the administration won only because of terrorism.
Second, after taking office, Zapatero passed radical initiatives that have further widened the partisan divide. By implementing controversial measures—in a largely catholic country—such as legalizing gay marriage and cutting off public funds to the Catholic Church, the new Prime Minister naturally drew the ire of many Catholics and the conservative Popular Party. Devolving more power to the regions, especially Catalonia, was also another point of departure for the nationalist PP, as the center-right predicted the “Balkanization of Spain.”
For its part, the PP has also overreacted to many of these measures and has predictably used any Zapatero slip-up for political gain. Here is a case in point: when ETA bombed the Madrid airport last December, the PP used the tragedy to rail against Zapatero’s peace process and dialogue with the terrorist group.
Thus, in sum, the March 11th attack and its effects, Zapatero’s radical agenda and PP’s heavy-handed response to that agenda are largely to blame for the electoral divide in Spain. Perhaps PP is now taking advantage of the ensuing polarization in a Rove-esque manner, but it was clearly not the party’s unilateral and deliberate strategy to divide the country, as Ridao asserts.
Looking around the rest of Europe, Ridao’s hypothesis does not garner much validity either. In the United Kingdom, the conservative Tory Party has not tacked to the right in lieu of Rove’s success; it has modernized in an effort to fight the Labour Party for Middle England. To that end, new Tory leader David Cameron seems to talk more about global warming than tax cuts and family values.
In any event, European conservatives simply could not follow Rove’s strategy even if they wanted to. What were the divisive issues in which Rove trumpeted to rally the faithful? Gay marriage, the Terry Schiavo case, and stem-cell research featured prominently in the 2004 election. These matters whipped up evangelical, counter-establishment fervor for Rove and the republicans’ cause.
In Europe, there are not many church-going Christians, let alone evangelicals, left. Aside from perhaps the more catholic and conservative countries in southern Europe, such as Spain, Portugal and Italy, religion rarely enters the political discourse. Center-right politicians campaigning on these issues, as Rove suggests, would at best be laughed at. Hence, there is simply no comparison between Rove’s tactics and European conservatives.
However, in the United States, he has undoubtedly shaped the political landscape. Critics and admirers alike cannot refute Mr. Rove’s electoral success: victories in two Texas gubernatorial races, two presidential contests, and the 2002 mid-term landslide. Democratic consultant James Carville affirms, “He has pulled off some of the most unexpected and impressive victories of modern political history.” As a result, before the Democrats’ “thumping” of republicans in the mid-term elections last autumn, Rove predicted a permanent majority for the GOP.
Yet, the recent election results and the failure of Bush’s second term agenda—social security, immigration, etc.—should force him to retract that statement. Bush's lame-duck status is proof, according to detractors, that “Rovianism”—divide and conquer politics—may be good for elections but poor for governing.
The republicans are now trailing democrats in generic and presidential polls, and will face an uphill battle in 2008. Rove’s success was short-lived, and his political approach is not likely to be utilized in upcoming races. The country is definitely, partially because of Mr. Rove, more polarized—red versus blue. So, Ridao may be right about one thing after-all: “His [Rove’s] hypothesis will not survive his political career for too long.”
El Pais, the largest and most influential Spanish newspaper, featured an op-ed this week on Rove’s political tenets. The paper, which usually offers thoughtful and on-point analysis, dropped the ball on this one. Aside from gratuitously concentrating on the Iraq War, an endeavor that Rove certainly helped sell to the American public but was not his brainchild, the op-ed drastically overestimates his political influence outside of the United States.
Its author, Jose Ridao, notes that Rove’s modus operandi is to “bank on the radical mobilization of one’s own side, concentrating political debate on those issues in which, according to the principle of moral clarity, the other side had a limited capacity to offer alternatives.” This general observation is fairly accurate. Rove certainly polarized the electorate, focusing on divisive issues to rally the base to the voting booths.
But this is where the article’s utility ends. After the general synopsis, the author tries to link Rove’s strategy with that of European conservatives. Ridao argues, “The model based on the Rove hypothesis has, in large part, been imported by the conservative parties of Europe, who have sought inspiration for their policies on the other side of the Atlantic.”
While lumping together the political strategy of the entire continent’s center-right parties, he tries to illustrate his point by only focusing on his home country’s political situation. “Spain is one of those European countries in which Rove’s electoral strategy has been implemented, and where its power of polarization has been most apparent,” Ridao declares.
To be sure, Spain is the most polarized it has been since the democratic transition in the late 1970s. Until a few years ago, the two main parties, the center-right Popular Party and the center-left Socialist Party, came together to formulate a largely bi-partisan strategy on important issues such as terrorism and immigration.
This, for the most part, is no longer the case. But it is not because Spanish conservatives are using Rove as their ideological brain-trust. It is, on the contrary, the confluence of two primary factors.
First, the attacks of March 11th poisoned the entire political process. The Socialists, and many Spaniards, connected the train bombings with the Popular Party’s support of the Iraq War. They then accused the PP of covering up the fact that Islamic jihadists were to blame for the attacks, as government officials incessantly accused the homegrown terrorist group, ETA, for the bombings despite evidence clearly linking Islamists to the attacks.
PP has denied these charges and some of its back-benchers still offer conspiracy theories insisting on ETA’s guilt. More importantly, they are still bitter about the surprise election of Socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, three days after the terrorist attacks, alleging the administration won only because of terrorism.
Second, after taking office, Zapatero passed radical initiatives that have further widened the partisan divide. By implementing controversial measures—in a largely catholic country—such as legalizing gay marriage and cutting off public funds to the Catholic Church, the new Prime Minister naturally drew the ire of many Catholics and the conservative Popular Party. Devolving more power to the regions, especially Catalonia, was also another point of departure for the nationalist PP, as the center-right predicted the “Balkanization of Spain.”
For its part, the PP has also overreacted to many of these measures and has predictably used any Zapatero slip-up for political gain. Here is a case in point: when ETA bombed the Madrid airport last December, the PP used the tragedy to rail against Zapatero’s peace process and dialogue with the terrorist group.
Thus, in sum, the March 11th attack and its effects, Zapatero’s radical agenda and PP’s heavy-handed response to that agenda are largely to blame for the electoral divide in Spain. Perhaps PP is now taking advantage of the ensuing polarization in a Rove-esque manner, but it was clearly not the party’s unilateral and deliberate strategy to divide the country, as Ridao asserts.
Looking around the rest of Europe, Ridao’s hypothesis does not garner much validity either. In the United Kingdom, the conservative Tory Party has not tacked to the right in lieu of Rove’s success; it has modernized in an effort to fight the Labour Party for Middle England. To that end, new Tory leader David Cameron seems to talk more about global warming than tax cuts and family values.
In any event, European conservatives simply could not follow Rove’s strategy even if they wanted to. What were the divisive issues in which Rove trumpeted to rally the faithful? Gay marriage, the Terry Schiavo case, and stem-cell research featured prominently in the 2004 election. These matters whipped up evangelical, counter-establishment fervor for Rove and the republicans’ cause.
In Europe, there are not many church-going Christians, let alone evangelicals, left. Aside from perhaps the more catholic and conservative countries in southern Europe, such as Spain, Portugal and Italy, religion rarely enters the political discourse. Center-right politicians campaigning on these issues, as Rove suggests, would at best be laughed at. Hence, there is simply no comparison between Rove’s tactics and European conservatives.
However, in the United States, he has undoubtedly shaped the political landscape. Critics and admirers alike cannot refute Mr. Rove’s electoral success: victories in two Texas gubernatorial races, two presidential contests, and the 2002 mid-term landslide. Democratic consultant James Carville affirms, “He has pulled off some of the most unexpected and impressive victories of modern political history.” As a result, before the Democrats’ “thumping” of republicans in the mid-term elections last autumn, Rove predicted a permanent majority for the GOP.
Yet, the recent election results and the failure of Bush’s second term agenda—social security, immigration, etc.—should force him to retract that statement. Bush's lame-duck status is proof, according to detractors, that “Rovianism”—divide and conquer politics—may be good for elections but poor for governing.
The republicans are now trailing democrats in generic and presidential polls, and will face an uphill battle in 2008. Rove’s success was short-lived, and his political approach is not likely to be utilized in upcoming races. The country is definitely, partially because of Mr. Rove, more polarized—red versus blue. So, Ridao may be right about one thing after-all: “His [Rove’s] hypothesis will not survive his political career for too long.”
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
America's Balancing Act
Students of international relations are constantly bombarded with realist theory. It is undeniably the foremost school of thought in the field, informing many of the decisions of international statesmen.
After a period of neo-conservative excess, U.S. foreign policy may be reverting back to the realist model, as recently manifested in two initiatives: the India nuclear deal and the military assistance package to the Middle-East.
Realism and its successor neo-realism utilize the concept of power to predict relations between states, but differ on the cause of the struggle. Classical realism, which grew out of the WW2 era, posits that states are led by people who inherently lust for power.
Replacing this psychological premise with a structural one, neo-realists dictate that states struggle for power above all else because the international arena is anarchical—there is no global sovereign or mediator to restrain states.
Power, as a result, keeps the order of things. Only power prevents the domination of a state at the hands of another, as the world stage is a free for all in which states must largely depend on themselves to survive.
The balance of power naturally flows from this notion. To keep states from clashing with each other for greater power and status, they must wield similar capabilities. As the Roman general Vegetius once said: “If you want peace prepare for war.”
While states often build up their own capabilities to counter a powerful neighbor, others can also balance their rivals by encouraging or assisting allies in the region. The existence of the U.S. somewhat owes itself to this phenomenon. France sought to restrain the imperial ambitions of its continental foe Great Britain by aiding the American colonialists’ effort during the Revolutionary War.
Balancing has been a mainstay of US foreign policy since its inception. One could make the case—Woodrow Wilson’s idealistic aspirations notwithstanding—that American involvement in WWI was to restore the balance of power in Europe. In the same vein, the Cold War was fought via American and Soviet proxies in all regions of the world so as to prevent the tipping of the scales of power and influence too much in the other's favor.
The most strategic and ambitious balancing endeavor during the Cold War was Nixon’s opening of China in 1972—the brain child of Henry Kissinger, the arch-realist and then National Security Advisor and Secretary of State. By commencing relations between Washington and Beijing, Kissinger wished to drive a further wedge between the communist juggernauts China and the Soviet Union.
The Sino-American rapprochement predictably checked and frightened the Soviets into concessions. According to Kissinger, this triangular diplomacy clearly played a role in the ensuing arms control talks between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
China, the former balancing partner, is now paradoxically the target of a balancing effort by the US. The meteoric rise of China, spurred by double-digit annual economic growth rates, concerns American policymakers who fear the Asian power will frustrate US endeavors in the region and the world.
A strategic alliance with China’s neighbor and the biggest democracy in the world, India, could check Sino ambitions—or so the geopolitical thinking goes behind the recent nuclear agreement between Washington and New Delhi.
Two years ago, President Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh struck a controversial deal over nuclear cooperation. As New Delhi is not a Non-Proliferation Treaty signatory, having tested nuclear weapons in the late 1990s, it is a nuclear pariah devoid of nuclear assistance and technology from the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
The new agreement helps reverse India’s nuclear isolation. In return for allowing International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards on most of its civilian nuclear program, New Delhi receives, among other things, nuclear fuel and technology.
Opponents of the deal predict the drifting of the NPT into relative insignificance, encouraging Iran and others to flout its stipulations. It could also foster a nuclear arms race in the region. Getting the nuclear pact through a relatively hostile US Congress will, as a result, be a tough hurdle to clear.
But its supporters tout India’s clean proliferation record and the resulting strategic alliance—a.k.a. the balancing of China—in defense. Most realists, Kissinger included, unsurprisingly back the accord.
Another U.S. endeavor marked by realist thinking is the arms assistance package to the Middle-East. Washington proclaimed this past week its intention to provide $60billion in arms to regional allies, notably Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and—surprise, surprise—Israel.
While the numbers are astounding, this is nothing new. The U.S. has for decades supported the regimes in Riyadh, Cairo, and Tel Aviv. But the impetus for the increased aid is a rising and nuclear-ambitious Iran. As a Jerusalem Post editorial notes, “If Iran is the center of the axis of evil, then Saudi Arabia is the center of the axis of ‘realism' and the pre-9/11 worship of ‘stability' as the strategy for safeguarding Western interests.”[1]
Balancing Tehran, whose support for Hezbollah, Hamas, and Shia militias in Iraq has frustrated America’s desires to remake the region and diminish terrorism, is the main priority. Using Sunni proxies in the region, who are also worried about a rising Shia Iran, to curb Tehran’s regional influence is a strategic, realist policy known as “offshore balancing”.
Leading realist Stephen Walt observes, “Offshore balancing …recognizes that the United States does not need to control these areas directly; it merely needs to ensure that they do not fall under the control of a hostile great power and especially not under the control of a so-called peer competitor.”[2]
The fallout from Iraq, which all but eliminates the case for invading Iran, shrinks Washington’s options, leading to a renewed emphasis on checking Iran through regional intermediaries. Hence, with the new arms program Washington hopes to balance Iran without doing the dirty work.
Whether these two realist undertakings truly succeed in enhancing regional stability and balancing China and Iran remains to be seen. To be sure, both enterprises are flawed and riddled with obstacles.
Beijing could seek to counter the nuclear deal with India by offering a similar agreement to Pakistan, which would likely destabilize the region. A nuclear arms race and renewed tension between the Islamic and Hindu nations could be the byproducts of such a deal.
Moreover, even if one conceded the fact that US-India ties will strengthen as a result of the pact, New Delhi will still exhibit independence from Washington, especially as its power grows.
Indeed, Indian Lt. General Satish Nambiar recently confirmed this suspicion, warning: “This must be a partnership, not an ‘alliance’. No blind allegiance, nor subservience.”[3] India is currently mulling a decision to build a $9billion oil pipeline in Iran—perhaps an early test for the nascent alliance.
Regarding Iran, the U.S. is unfortunately, because of Iraq, cleaning up partially its own mess. Tehran’s revolutionary goal of spreading its Islamic system of government and its links to terrorism, to be sure, are dangerous traits and point to the need for containment. But overthrowing the Sunni/secular regime of Saddam Hussein, which Washington utilized prior for similar purposes of balancing Iran—arming Baghdad in its eight year war with Tehran in the 1980s—has helped the Iranian theocracy.
Offshore balancing could be the answer. But the regional microcosm that is Iraq—warring Sunni and Shia factions—could spread to an all-out conflict. And arming Iran’s Sunni adversaries can have counterintuitive, negative results: leading Tehran to speed up its pursuit of a nuclear weapon to offset its heavily-armed and US-backed neighbors. Yet, Washington lacks alternatives: this may be the least bad one.
Democracy promotion, a chief tenet of neo-conservatism, will always be a US foreign policy goal. But the damage from Iraq could signal the revival of realism and lead to similar efforts to those described above. Containing China and Iran are near-term and long-term priorities for U.S. policy-makers and the result of these exercises will be a litmus test for the continuing viability of the US as the global hegemon. If the balancing act does not bear fruit, it will be a hard act to follow.
[1] Please see: http://www.fpa.org/topics_info2414/topics_info_show.htm?doc_id=512707
[2] Walt, Stephen. “In the National Interest.” Boston Review. February/March 2005. http://bostonreview.net/BR30.1/walt.html
[3] Luce, Edward, and Johnson, Jo. “Welcome to the Club.” The Financial Times. August 3, 2007.
After a period of neo-conservative excess, U.S. foreign policy may be reverting back to the realist model, as recently manifested in two initiatives: the India nuclear deal and the military assistance package to the Middle-East.
Realism and its successor neo-realism utilize the concept of power to predict relations between states, but differ on the cause of the struggle. Classical realism, which grew out of the WW2 era, posits that states are led by people who inherently lust for power.
Replacing this psychological premise with a structural one, neo-realists dictate that states struggle for power above all else because the international arena is anarchical—there is no global sovereign or mediator to restrain states.
Power, as a result, keeps the order of things. Only power prevents the domination of a state at the hands of another, as the world stage is a free for all in which states must largely depend on themselves to survive.
The balance of power naturally flows from this notion. To keep states from clashing with each other for greater power and status, they must wield similar capabilities. As the Roman general Vegetius once said: “If you want peace prepare for war.”
While states often build up their own capabilities to counter a powerful neighbor, others can also balance their rivals by encouraging or assisting allies in the region. The existence of the U.S. somewhat owes itself to this phenomenon. France sought to restrain the imperial ambitions of its continental foe Great Britain by aiding the American colonialists’ effort during the Revolutionary War.
Balancing has been a mainstay of US foreign policy since its inception. One could make the case—Woodrow Wilson’s idealistic aspirations notwithstanding—that American involvement in WWI was to restore the balance of power in Europe. In the same vein, the Cold War was fought via American and Soviet proxies in all regions of the world so as to prevent the tipping of the scales of power and influence too much in the other's favor.
The most strategic and ambitious balancing endeavor during the Cold War was Nixon’s opening of China in 1972—the brain child of Henry Kissinger, the arch-realist and then National Security Advisor and Secretary of State. By commencing relations between Washington and Beijing, Kissinger wished to drive a further wedge between the communist juggernauts China and the Soviet Union.
The Sino-American rapprochement predictably checked and frightened the Soviets into concessions. According to Kissinger, this triangular diplomacy clearly played a role in the ensuing arms control talks between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
China, the former balancing partner, is now paradoxically the target of a balancing effort by the US. The meteoric rise of China, spurred by double-digit annual economic growth rates, concerns American policymakers who fear the Asian power will frustrate US endeavors in the region and the world.
A strategic alliance with China’s neighbor and the biggest democracy in the world, India, could check Sino ambitions—or so the geopolitical thinking goes behind the recent nuclear agreement between Washington and New Delhi.
Two years ago, President Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh struck a controversial deal over nuclear cooperation. As New Delhi is not a Non-Proliferation Treaty signatory, having tested nuclear weapons in the late 1990s, it is a nuclear pariah devoid of nuclear assistance and technology from the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
The new agreement helps reverse India’s nuclear isolation. In return for allowing International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards on most of its civilian nuclear program, New Delhi receives, among other things, nuclear fuel and technology.
Opponents of the deal predict the drifting of the NPT into relative insignificance, encouraging Iran and others to flout its stipulations. It could also foster a nuclear arms race in the region. Getting the nuclear pact through a relatively hostile US Congress will, as a result, be a tough hurdle to clear.
But its supporters tout India’s clean proliferation record and the resulting strategic alliance—a.k.a. the balancing of China—in defense. Most realists, Kissinger included, unsurprisingly back the accord.
Another U.S. endeavor marked by realist thinking is the arms assistance package to the Middle-East. Washington proclaimed this past week its intention to provide $60billion in arms to regional allies, notably Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and—surprise, surprise—Israel.
While the numbers are astounding, this is nothing new. The U.S. has for decades supported the regimes in Riyadh, Cairo, and Tel Aviv. But the impetus for the increased aid is a rising and nuclear-ambitious Iran. As a Jerusalem Post editorial notes, “If Iran is the center of the axis of evil, then Saudi Arabia is the center of the axis of ‘realism' and the pre-9/11 worship of ‘stability' as the strategy for safeguarding Western interests.”[1]
Balancing Tehran, whose support for Hezbollah, Hamas, and Shia militias in Iraq has frustrated America’s desires to remake the region and diminish terrorism, is the main priority. Using Sunni proxies in the region, who are also worried about a rising Shia Iran, to curb Tehran’s regional influence is a strategic, realist policy known as “offshore balancing”.
Leading realist Stephen Walt observes, “Offshore balancing …recognizes that the United States does not need to control these areas directly; it merely needs to ensure that they do not fall under the control of a hostile great power and especially not under the control of a so-called peer competitor.”[2]
The fallout from Iraq, which all but eliminates the case for invading Iran, shrinks Washington’s options, leading to a renewed emphasis on checking Iran through regional intermediaries. Hence, with the new arms program Washington hopes to balance Iran without doing the dirty work.
Whether these two realist undertakings truly succeed in enhancing regional stability and balancing China and Iran remains to be seen. To be sure, both enterprises are flawed and riddled with obstacles.
Beijing could seek to counter the nuclear deal with India by offering a similar agreement to Pakistan, which would likely destabilize the region. A nuclear arms race and renewed tension between the Islamic and Hindu nations could be the byproducts of such a deal.
Moreover, even if one conceded the fact that US-India ties will strengthen as a result of the pact, New Delhi will still exhibit independence from Washington, especially as its power grows.
Indeed, Indian Lt. General Satish Nambiar recently confirmed this suspicion, warning: “This must be a partnership, not an ‘alliance’. No blind allegiance, nor subservience.”[3] India is currently mulling a decision to build a $9billion oil pipeline in Iran—perhaps an early test for the nascent alliance.
Regarding Iran, the U.S. is unfortunately, because of Iraq, cleaning up partially its own mess. Tehran’s revolutionary goal of spreading its Islamic system of government and its links to terrorism, to be sure, are dangerous traits and point to the need for containment. But overthrowing the Sunni/secular regime of Saddam Hussein, which Washington utilized prior for similar purposes of balancing Iran—arming Baghdad in its eight year war with Tehran in the 1980s—has helped the Iranian theocracy.
Offshore balancing could be the answer. But the regional microcosm that is Iraq—warring Sunni and Shia factions—could spread to an all-out conflict. And arming Iran’s Sunni adversaries can have counterintuitive, negative results: leading Tehran to speed up its pursuit of a nuclear weapon to offset its heavily-armed and US-backed neighbors. Yet, Washington lacks alternatives: this may be the least bad one.
Democracy promotion, a chief tenet of neo-conservatism, will always be a US foreign policy goal. But the damage from Iraq could signal the revival of realism and lead to similar efforts to those described above. Containing China and Iran are near-term and long-term priorities for U.S. policy-makers and the result of these exercises will be a litmus test for the continuing viability of the US as the global hegemon. If the balancing act does not bear fruit, it will be a hard act to follow.
[1] Please see: http://www.fpa.org/topics_info2414/topics_info_show.htm?doc_id=512707
[2] Walt, Stephen. “In the National Interest.” Boston Review. February/March 2005. http://bostonreview.net/BR30.1/walt.html
[3] Luce, Edward, and Johnson, Jo. “Welcome to the Club.” The Financial Times. August 3, 2007.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
The End of an Era?
The world’s longest political dynasties have not fared so well in recent times. Ten years ago, Mexico, Sweden, and Japan were ruled by parties who had retained power, almost uninterrupted, for decades. Now, each country’s former hegemonic parties have either lost power or are in the process of doing so.
Mexico’s Institutional Revolutionary Party, whose favorite past-time was ballot stuffing, lost their over 70 year-old authoritarian grip on power in 2000. PRI is now the third biggest party in Mexico.
The record of Sweden’s Social Democrats is more impressive, as they, unlike the PRI, garnered their legitimacy democratically. Before their 2006 electoral debacle, in which the party lost to a center-right coalition, the Social Democrats held the reins of power for 65 of the last 74 years.
Now, Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party, who has only been out of power for nine months in its fifty-two year history, is in trouble. Last weekend’s upper house elections saw the opposition Democratic Party of Japan crush LDP and win a majority.
Abe is now in a fight for his political life, with the DPJ and others calling for the Prime Minister to cow to the voters’ wishes and resign—as did Ryutaro Hashimoto in 1998 under similar circumstances.
The electoral thrashing is partially a result of the numerous gaffes of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s nascent administration over the past year. After Abe’s health minister described women as “breeding machines”, Fumio Kyuma, the first Japanese defense minister since WW2, resigned after stating that the U.S. was right to use nuclear weapons in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The administration’s missteps turned fatal when Toshikatsu Matsuoka, the agriculture minister, killed himself over corruption charges. Yet, the point of no return for voters was when the administration reportedly lost 50 million pension records, a blunder which could hit at people’s very livelihoods.
Policy-wise, Abe was also apparently out of touch with the voters. His efforts to “make Japan a beautiful country,” bringing it out of its shame over WW2, did not supersede voters’ concerns with the economy. Making more patriotic text books and transforming the role of the military are not bread and butter electoral issues, and can frighten voters. As Gerry Curtis of Columbia University asks, “Where else in the world do you find a prime minister who wants regime change in his own country?”
Abe’s more somber and dour personality also turned off voters who were used to the rock-star appearance of his predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi. The more the voters were introduced to Abe, the farther his approval rating dropped. When coming into office last September, his popularity was over 70%, almost a year later it hovers between 20-30%.
Despite recent calls for his head, Abe appears defiant. At the end of the day, his party still commands a majority in the more powerful lower house, which names the prime minister. If he can head off the criticism from his own party, the prime minister may be able to survive.
Does the poor electoral showing mean the end of the LDP dynasty? Perhaps. DPJ has made great political inroads, but it is very fractured, and won more on the account of LDP’s slip ups rather than its own record.
But to be sure, LDP will have to rethink its strategy and reform. This is good for democracy in Japan, as was the demise of the Social Democrats in Sweden and—especially—PRI in Mexico. Electoral competition can only stimulate the performance of LDP, which now knows that it cannot take for granted the allegiance of the voters. So if it is indeed the end of an era, it is likely to be replaced by a better one.
Mexico’s Institutional Revolutionary Party, whose favorite past-time was ballot stuffing, lost their over 70 year-old authoritarian grip on power in 2000. PRI is now the third biggest party in Mexico.
The record of Sweden’s Social Democrats is more impressive, as they, unlike the PRI, garnered their legitimacy democratically. Before their 2006 electoral debacle, in which the party lost to a center-right coalition, the Social Democrats held the reins of power for 65 of the last 74 years.
Now, Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party, who has only been out of power for nine months in its fifty-two year history, is in trouble. Last weekend’s upper house elections saw the opposition Democratic Party of Japan crush LDP and win a majority.
Abe is now in a fight for his political life, with the DPJ and others calling for the Prime Minister to cow to the voters’ wishes and resign—as did Ryutaro Hashimoto in 1998 under similar circumstances.
The electoral thrashing is partially a result of the numerous gaffes of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s nascent administration over the past year. After Abe’s health minister described women as “breeding machines”, Fumio Kyuma, the first Japanese defense minister since WW2, resigned after stating that the U.S. was right to use nuclear weapons in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The administration’s missteps turned fatal when Toshikatsu Matsuoka, the agriculture minister, killed himself over corruption charges. Yet, the point of no return for voters was when the administration reportedly lost 50 million pension records, a blunder which could hit at people’s very livelihoods.
Policy-wise, Abe was also apparently out of touch with the voters. His efforts to “make Japan a beautiful country,” bringing it out of its shame over WW2, did not supersede voters’ concerns with the economy. Making more patriotic text books and transforming the role of the military are not bread and butter electoral issues, and can frighten voters. As Gerry Curtis of Columbia University asks, “Where else in the world do you find a prime minister who wants regime change in his own country?”
Abe’s more somber and dour personality also turned off voters who were used to the rock-star appearance of his predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi. The more the voters were introduced to Abe, the farther his approval rating dropped. When coming into office last September, his popularity was over 70%, almost a year later it hovers between 20-30%.
Despite recent calls for his head, Abe appears defiant. At the end of the day, his party still commands a majority in the more powerful lower house, which names the prime minister. If he can head off the criticism from his own party, the prime minister may be able to survive.
Does the poor electoral showing mean the end of the LDP dynasty? Perhaps. DPJ has made great political inroads, but it is very fractured, and won more on the account of LDP’s slip ups rather than its own record.
But to be sure, LDP will have to rethink its strategy and reform. This is good for democracy in Japan, as was the demise of the Social Democrats in Sweden and—especially—PRI in Mexico. Electoral competition can only stimulate the performance of LDP, which now knows that it cannot take for granted the allegiance of the voters. So if it is indeed the end of an era, it is likely to be replaced by a better one.
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