The International Order's Shifting Goalposts Posted by David Shorr

Another good discussion on the TPMCafe Book Club -- this week on Fareed Zakaria's The Post American World. Again we arrive at the question of whether the liberal international order is a culturally bound creature of America and its Western accomplices. Michael Lind really got things going with an interpretation of non-democratic powers' standing with regard to the order from the immediate post-War period to the present:

The Postwar version of liberal internationalism is the one envisioned by American internationalists during and immediately after World War II, as well as by traditional liberal internationalists like the first Bush after the Cold War. International security will rest with a loose concert or concerts of nonaggressive, but not necessarily democratic, great powers. And the basic international norm, to which there are exceptions for genocide and anarchy, will be nonintervention in sovereign states.

That's the old liberal internationalism (which, though realistic, is not Realpolitik). The new liberal internationalism is a product of the 1990s. In essence, it is an attempt to universalize the norms of NATO and the EU as the basis for world order, as an alternative to dusting off the never-implemented Postwar system after half a century.

Anne-Marie Slaughter's rejoinder on Cold War history focuses on multilateral efforts to solidify transatlanticism -- which highlights liberal norms beyond non-aggression, but doesn't really help with the question of universality. The real problem with Lind's analysis is that it slices out large chunks of the UN Charter, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the two principal human rights covenants. The Cold War power realities to which Lind refers ensured that these norms would remain largely aspirational rather than politically binding, but they were nonetheless there all the while. So contrary to Lind's argument, the supposed expansion of the rule-set after the Cold War's end was not a departure, but rather a fulfillment. For a really good presentation of this idea, see Kofi Annan's 2005 In Larger Freedom report, which launched his ill-fated effort to rally world leaders for a more effective UN.

So much for history. Going forward, we have two main questions. One, is whether the United States and its Western allies still have an important contribution to make to the global order, or whether they should get out of the way and let Asian and other rising powers lead the world into the 21st Century -- an issue raised particularly by Kishore Mahbubani's book, The New Asian Hemisphere. I'm inclined to agree with John Ikenberry, who argues the opposite over on Washington Note, saying that the legacy liberal order is "easy to join and hard to overturn." Second, can the United States and other established democracies help support the spread of democracy without provoking a new Cold War or running around changing regimes? The aforementioned Anne-Marie Slaughter post on TPM Book Club explains why this should be both possible and incumbent.

Comments

[peace]

The only problem with Ikenberry and Slaughter's "Concert of Democracies," concept is that it will probably include only the United States and a few Eastern European nations, and it would look a organization that was only meant to follow America's dictates to the majority of the World. The UN is a better organization for the United States to promote human rights since complaints could be listened to by various nations unlike the proposed COD which only includes a few countries. The United States also has to obey certain international norms such as ending the use of torture and getting rid of the concept of premptive war if it wants to promote the UN charter.

[David Shorr]

I completely agree with you. The one thing I'd ask is that we not think of Slaughter and Ikenberry only or mainly as advocates of the Concert of Democracies. John McCain is campaigning on the platform you describe so he's fair game. Anne-Marie and John are offering a lot of worthwhile ideas. In fact, even on the Concert idea, I was interested to see that Anne-Marie says there can't be a concert without India, South Africa, and Brazil; I'm not sure whether that was in the original Princeton Project report, but I think it's right.

[Don Bacon]

It's not so much "making a contribution" or "getting out of the way" it's acting collegially to make the world a better place. In other words, behave the same globally as we try to do locally in our own communities, recognizing that there are differences and then use our best efforts to reconcile those differences and move ahead.

There are major differences between western (US) and eastern (China) thought and behavior. These differences ought to be recognized. They may be (and appear to be) unreconcilable, and if so, either west or east must change or there will be a huge conflict.

US policy:
Endless war. The US promotes the arms race by foreign military sales, maintains 700 military bases in 120 countries and invades other countriesn directly (Iraq, Afghanistan) and by proxy (Somalia). The US promotes US world hegemony through economic and military means, power politics, aggression and expansion, and routinely interferes with the sovereignty of other countries, as militarily in Pakistan, and with its active promotion of human rights and democracy through the National Endowment for Democracy (and possibly soon by a Concert).

from China Embassy:
Maintaining world peace. China does not participate in the arms race [although she is significantly upgrading her military], nor does it seek military expansion. China resolutely opposes hegemonism, power politics, aggression and expansion in whatever form, as well as encroachments perpetrated by one country on the sovereignty and territorial integrity of another, or interference in the internal affairs of another nation under the pretext of ethnic, religious or human rights issues.

[peace]

There you go again Mr.Bacon defending a turbocapitalist power with a an extemlely poor human rights and environmental record. How progressive of you. If China continues destroying its own enivironment it will further add to the already increasing hole in the o-zone layer. In fact Mother Jones wrote an excellent article, last summer, about China's poor enivironmental record and how it is leading to massive economic damge upon the mainland. Of course you and the multiantional cooperations agree on one thing, China's enviromental record does not matter.

[Don Bacon]

peace,
I don't disagree with you about China's environmental problems. I've been there recently and I'm somewhat familiar with it. But the subject here is international/global order not human rights or environment.

I didn't defend anything, except perhaps by implication. My point is that the US and China have different approaches to foreign policy that need to be dealt with. Do you have something to add to that discussion regarding West vs. East?

[David Tomlin]

I am skeptical that China's recent military restraint reflects a difference of 'thought', an ideological disposition for 'maintaining world peace', rather than prudence under circumstances of relative weakness. Their behavior may change as the country's strength grows.

I'd like to know how the concession that China is 'significantly upgrading her military' is reconcilable with the claim that it 'does not participate in the arms race'.

Certainly the Chinese oppose military interventions on the humanitarian grounds that have lately been favored by the U.S. But in the not so distant past they have themselves taken military actions on grounds of historic claims to territory. After WW2 they invaded and conquered Tibet. More recently they fought border wars with Russia, India, and Vietnam.

Presently the Chinese have irredentist claims against Russia, and on a number of Pacific islands also claimed by various other powers.

[Don Bacon]

David,
The subject here is global order.

The arms race does have a domestic component, but it is usually thought of as a quest for world-wide military superiority, to include military force, bases and sea power. China is hardly even a player in this when you consider that the US has 700 bases in 120 countries, including tens of thousands of troops in half a dozen countries, plus a ten-carrier navy and a gigantic foreign military sales program. China has none of these.

China did not invade and conquer Tibet after WWII. China has had troops there since at least 1910, and in 1951 the Tibet government agreed to be part of China and that relationship is internationally recognized, even by the Dalai Lama. China has had border skirmishes. So what. China is currently on good terms with her neighbors. That is a long way from US behavior in the many countries subject to US military aggression.

Your speculations about why China acts the way she does how China's behavior might change is just that. History tells us that China has not been expansionist except long ago in Tibet. The entire history of the US has been expansionist, and these two tendencies need to be reconciled for global order to occur. Does national sovereignty exist or doesn't it?

[David Tomlin]

'China has had troops there since at least 1910 . . .'

The 1910 invasion failed. The troops were expelled by 1912.

'Your speculations about why China acts the way she does how China's behavior might change is just that.'

So are your claims about the 'thought' of Chinese leaders.

'History tells us that China has not been expansionist except long ago in Tibet. The entire history of the US has been expansionist . . .'

Entire history? Compare Sung Dynasty China with T'ang Dynasty China.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:China_1.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tang_Dynasty_circa_700_CE.png