The Failure to Integrate: It’s a Religious Problem Too Posted by Shadi Hamid

This is one of most amusing pictures I’ve seen in quite some time. It’s even funnier if you let your mind wander a bit (click on it).

On a more serious note, I think this image captures quite well the manifold complexities of a religious culture confronting modernity. Everywhere in the Muslim world, the religious and non-religious find themselves in an uneasy embrace. And it provokes a very fundamental question that people are grappling with from Egypt to England. To what extent can a traditional culture truly become part of a commercial, “hypersexual” society that holds little as sacred? In asking such a question, sex, politics, culture, religion, and economics become inextricably intertwined. It is at once frightening and fascinating.

Two weeks ago, I went to a talk by BBC correspondent and author of Only Half of Me, Rageh Omaar. He downplayed the problems of Muslim integration in Britain and argued that the vast majority of Muslims are mainstream and moderate, while a fringe minority gives them a bad name. He himself is a perfect example of the well-integrated British Muslim who has found a richness and comfort in a “dual identity.” But, as he himself noted, he is a “non-observant” Muslim. That’s important, and it lends credence to something I’ve been thinking about for some time. I would posit that the less observant you are, the easier it is for you to integrate into Western culture. And the more observant you are, the harder it is. Because Western Muslims on average tend to be more observant (or, if you like, “scripturally-aware") than their non-Muslim counterparts, this may help explain why they will find it harder to integrate in Western society than their Irish, Jewish, and African counterparts before them: if you don’t go to pubs, if you don’t date, if you are not at ease with members of the opposite sex, if you can’t sing along to the chorus of “Hey Jude” or “Wonderwall”; if you can’t appreciate just how darn good The Arctic Monkeys are (i.e. because you consider the use of string instruments a violation of Islamic law); well, then, you simply cannot and will not be able to integrate into British culture. In many ways then, the failure to integrate is not simply a structural problem that can be explained away through socioeconomics or politics. Rather, what we're talking about is, at least in some respects, a clash of cultures. I don’t think there should be a clash. I don’t think there has to be. But there is one.

A Fresh Perspective from NATO Summit Posted by Lorelei Kelly

One of my favorite Brits, Martin Butcher, moved back to the UK from Washington earlier this year...but lo and behold, he's back online already with some fresh reporting from the NATO summit in Riga....you can see the rest here.

Can NATO transform for the 21st century?

From Acronym Consultant Martin Butcher in Riga, November 27, 2006

NATO heads of State and Government meet in Riga, Latvia, on November 28/29, with many outstanding questions on their agenda. While NATO and national government sources agree that the worst of the conflict from the build-up to the invasion of Iraq has dissipated (and for some in Europe the firing of Donald Rumsfeld, US Secretary of Defense helped), there is a sense that the organisation is somewhat adrift - carrying out missions from Kosovo to Afghanistan, but with no underlying purpose to tie it together.

The subjects that will be on the agenda at the specially made table in Riga - Alliance transformation, burdensharing, the Comprehensive Political Guidance, and even Energy Security - are far less significant than the subjects that will be overlooked - enlargement, the perennially troubled issues of NATO-EU and NATO Russia relations, and most notably the rewriting of the Alliance's mission statement, the 1999 Strategic Concept, with the role of nuclear weapons in Alliance defence policy at its heart.

All this throws up questions which will have to be answered if NATO is to be an influential and important alliance in the 21st Century - what is NATO's role and how should it accomplish that role. A shiny "transformation" exhibition at the Olympic Sports Complex Summit venue shows what the Riga Summit is meant to be about. But there are those in Riga who fear that the focus on the somewhat loose concept of 'NATO transformation' means less than meets the eye.

Riga 2006 was to have been the 'transformation summit', and settled those questions once and for all. Now, it is merely the latest in a line of summits, leading from Istanbul, through Riga, to another Summit in 2008, followed by a 60th birthday party Summit in 2009. Transforming the Alliance, it seems, is a long and politically contentious process.

read the rest of the article here.

Carl Bildt has a blog Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Well, this is fun -- the kind of random thing you find while tooling around the web on a Friday night.

Carl Bildt, former Prime Minister of Sweden, former UN High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, a very smart guy who had a real knack for rubbing American officials the wrong way, has a blog.  I happened upon it because of his comments on the UN Secretary-General race that Suzanne also posted on.

It's mildly interesting but not earth-shattering to read -- a useful barometer of one strand of European thought, I suspect.  But imagine the possibilities.  What if Bill Clinton had a blog?  Come to think of it, why doesn't he?  What if Clinton and George H.W. Bush had a blog together?  What if Bob Dole had a blog?  What if Tony Blair blogs in retirement?  What if Kofi Annan did?

If readers know of other former heads of state/government who blog, let me know.  I think a list would be fun.  (I notice Bildt doesn't have a blogroll yet...) 

British Muslims Want Islamic Law...in Britain (but at least their women are attractive) Posted by Shadi Hamid

I must say I'm a bit troubled by this poll which indicates, among other things, that 40% of British Muslims want Islamic law to be implemented in….ummm….Britain. This particular survey is a few months old but as relevant as ever in light of heightening tensions in Europe over Muslim immigrants. This is bad news. More troubling is the fact that 20% of respondents sympathize with the “feelings and motives” of the terrorists who killed 52 of their countrymen on July 7, 2006. I guess the positive part is that 99% thought the 7/7 attacks were “wrong.” What a relief. Isn’t it strange that we’ve reached the point where “good news” is when Muslims agree that slaughtering people in cold blood is wrong? The moral compass of British Muslims, one suspects, is not in the best of shape. It may even be upside down (or was it knocked over?). 

At least the Blair government is responding constructively, reaching out to the Muslim community, strengthening moderate voices, and encouraging Muslims to play a greater role in mainstream political life. (Then you have the French way of dealing with minorities which is, shall we say, a bit less post-enlightenment). 

The Brits certainly have their work cut out for them in a country where so despicable a personage as Yvonne Ridley is relatively mainstream and even popular among Muslims. You may recall that this is the same woman who was captured by the Taliban in 2001 and then suffered from a rather acute case of Stockholm Syndrome. Once a journalist for the Sunday Express, she is currently Britain’s resident terror apologist. Yes, in case you didn't know, she hates her country. Not surprisingly, she has allied herself with the infamous George Galloway, who Hitchens thankfully dispensed with several months ago. In common, Ridley/Galloway have an irritating way with words. Ridley’s prose style is a study in colloquialism, coarseness, and self-caricature. Not only does she openly sympathize with terrorist attacks against innocents but has managed to write the the closest thing I've ever seen to a pro-Zarqawi missive.

Enough of Yvonne Ridley. I now turn my attention to someone more worthy of attention - Miss England 2005. Her name is Hammasa Kohistani (she is ravishing, by the way). As a Muslim and as someone who fled the Taliban regime when she was a young girl, her victory holds special significance for those working for integration. Britain is quite unique in this regard - there are some British Muslims who are quite well-assimilated (there are Muslims in the House of Commons and the House of Lords) but then are those (and their numbers seem to be growing) who appear intent on recreating a mythical Islamic state in Liverpool, where, God knows, they'd probably ban the Beatles. Now that would be blasphemy.

... As Others See Us Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Last week, a European friend sent me this article, "America's rising anti-Europeanism," from the new  journal Europe's World, a European product that appears to be attempting to be like Foreign Affairs, but hipper and, well, European (check out that pink cover -- all it needs is an Hermes tie to match).

I'm still not sure what my friend was trying to tell me -- is this like those adolescent advice columnists who tell you to send your stinky friends deodorant anonymously? -- but the subject is worth some thought.

Dutch security policy thinker Peter van Ham says that we have "a groundswell of annoyance and pessimism in the US about Europe."  True enough, although of course it sounds even better if all one's analysis is based on Fox News, the Wall Street Journal ed board, and right wing talk radio, as this one seems to be.

Munich's Security Conference: Deja Vu or Defining Moment? Posted by Julianne Smith

While he is out of pocket this week, Derek Chollet asked me to report on the annual Munich Conference on Security Policy (aka Wehrkunde), which I had planned on attending this past weekend. Unfortunately, the flu kept me stateside but thanks to a few calls to friends and the conference website, I can still offer some highlights.

This high-profile conference always has an air of déjà vu to it and this year was no exception. The conference program addressed many of the same topics as in years past: the future of NATO, the state of the transatlantic partnership, and challenges in the Middle East. Like a well-rehearsed script, the Americans asked the Europeans to spend more on defense and the Europeans cautioned against NATO overstretch. Many of last year’s recommendations – to strengthen the EU-NATO relationship, expand NATO’s partnership programs, and deepen the dialogue between the United States and Europe – were repeated. However, three things made this year’s conference different:

One, the arrival of Angela Merkel on center stage. Germany’s new Chancellor made an impressive debut. Her confident and firm delivery of her hard-line position on Iran’s nuclear ambitions was met with a roaring round of applause. She also used the opportunity to state her strong support for NATO (“NATO is the most important body for international conflict management”) while making some rather provocative recommendations, including the rewriting of the Alliance’s 1999 Strategic Concept by 2009. Merkel’s remarks were a welcome departure from the tone and substance of her predecessor whose commitment to the transatlantic relationship remained in question during the last few years of his tenure. Personally, I also appreciated the addition of another female speaker at an event that is so heavily dominated by men.

Rocks and All, A Moderate Gone Posted by Heather Hurlburt

It's worth pausing a moment over the death of Ibrahim Rugova this past weekend, before you hurry back to Iraq, Iran and domestic spy scandals.

Rugova was President of Kosovo; he was also, as Laura Rozen recalls over at warandpiece.com, a Sorbonne-educated Shakespeare scholar. 

He was famously eccentric and indecisive -- and even more famous for handing out chunks of Kosovo's native rock to foreign visitors.  (For a while, the size of your rock -- no, I am not kidding -- was a real status question in the Clinton foreign policy establishment.)

Over time, as Kosovars lost faith in the international community's promises, and violence created facts on the ground where negotiations had not, Rugova was pushed further and further aside, and this -- along with a deep Kosovo fatigue -- accounts for how little attention his passing received here.

But he remained Kosovo's last best unifying force, the living incarnation of all that was unbendable yet humane in the Kosovar spirit, the embodiment of a decade-long campaign of non-violent protest that built alternate institutions alongside those imposed from Belgrade and kept civil society functioning until the hard men took over.  Compare his political longevity, even with attenuated powers, to the fate of moderates in Bosnia, or Iraq.  Consider the size of the hole his passing has opened up in Kosovar politics.

My favorite Balkan wiseman says there is considerable question about whether Rugova's political party, still Kosovo's largest, can even survive his passing. 

With Rugova, the EU and US could still imagine that we might not have to choose between better government in Kosovo and the Kosovars' absolute determination to achieve independence.  With him gone, that dream -- which is what it was -- is gone as well.

Even given the ambivalent legacy of present-day Kosovo, and Rugova's often-frustrating passivity, I'm not sure one person could ever do more to lead a country toward democracy, moderation and secularism than Rugova.

'The Sky Is Black With Planes?' Posted by Heather Hurlburt

In my bucolic 70s-80s suburban childhood, that was how the execs at the Fortune 500 media company where my dad worked described the cascading chains of management transfers among media properties.

Today, though, I'm looking at some of the CIA-torture-plane reporting coming out of Europe, counting up the national inquiries -- the BBC and Le Monde between them report eight into CIA activities on or over their territories -- and thinking two things.  First, the scandal is going to stay alive and bedevil our relations with Europe for a long time, as these national inquiries feed off each other.  In addition to the eight above, questions have been raised in Austria, Italy, Germany and the UK that I know of.   Der Spiegel and The Guardian reported 437 CIA flights to Germany since September 11, and 210 into Britain.

Second, that sounds like a lot more activity and many more flights than would have been needed for the 26 "ghost detainees" Human Rights Watch has listed.  The Washington Post said earlier this week that there had been eight prison facilities, which seems to suggest rather more than 26 individuals.

Euro-Leaders to Rice: Thanks, We Needed That (Not.) Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Ever have a life partner, colleague, or friend who interrupted your brilliant storytelling at cocktails with the words, "that's not how you told it last time?"

That's more or less what Secretary Rice, who had been getting oodles of good press for her diplomatic abilities,  did to our European allies this week.

But today in Germany it seems that two can play at that game.

Secrets Overshadow Rice Visit to Europe Posted by Julianne Smith

Derek Chollet has asked me to guest blog this week.  Who am I?  Click here. 

Anytime transatlantic tensions have soared in recent years, Atlanticists on both sides of the pond have found solace in the fact that counter-terrorism cooperation between the two continents remains rock steady.  Even at the height of the Iraq debate, when the French were creating a multipolar moment with the Germans and the Russians in an attempt to block the U.S. invasion, French and American security officials were busily sharing intelligence on suspected terrorist cells, ironing out extradition agreements, and strengthening judicial cooperation.  No matter how many times the headlines have said we hate each other, no matter how many polls have highlighted our “values gap,” and no matter how loud the shouting has become at Munich’s annual security conference,  the counter-terrorism community has slogged on.   

But new accusations about secret prisons in Europe run by the CIA, coupled with other concerns about U.S. policy on torture and rendition, now threaten to erode the mainstay of transatlantic security cooperation.  American policymakers have been inundated with requests for more information on the so-called “black sites,” and the EU has launched an official investigation, threatening to suspend the voting rights of any EU member state that is found to have hosted such sites.  Unlike past transatlantic debates over the EU arms embargo or Iran, this one threatens to damage the Teflon-coated world of intelligence sharing and law enforcement cooperation across the Atlantic.  Intelligence sharing between Europe and the United States certainly won’t grind to a halt but European political elites are coming under increasing pressure from their angry publics to distance themselves from any U.S. practices that infringe on human rights and international law.  That spells trouble for European intelligence officers who cannot say with certainty how the intelligence they share will be used by their U.S. counterparts. 

In an effort to preempt the barrage of questions she will face on the subject in Europe this week, Secretary Rice hosted a press conference yesterday just before her plane left Andrews Air Force Base.  But her broad reassurances that the U.S. does not condone torture and promises to look into the matter are unlikely to prevent this black cloud from following the Secretary across Germany, Belgium, Ukraine, and Romania.  The Europeans want details and dialogue – two things the State Department isn’t providing at the moment.  Until that changes, attempts to focus on any of the multiple items on our common transatlantic agenda will be tough. 

Daniel Benjamin (who just wrote a great piece in Time tied to this subject) and I leave for Holland later today for a dialogue with Europeans on terrorism-related issues.  Time allowing, I will report back with fresh insight from the land of wooden shoes.

Europe is Simmering Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Well, I will say one thing for Dick Cheney -- he keeps it discreet.  Imagine your country mired in crisis and having the news screen full of senior officials, very senior officials, bickering over approaches in public.

That's what they're getting in France -- from cars burning in the suburbs to toupees burning in central Paris.

There is much to say about the disturbances in France, what they do or don't say about multiculturalism, what they do or don't mean about Islam, assimilation, and the value of US vs. European models of pluralism.  The New York Times in all its "select" wisdom won't let me link to it, but the two op-ed pieces by French commentators today are excellent, thoughtful contributions.  A few quotes from Oliver Roy, one of the world's pre-eminent observers of political Islam:

Many see the violence as religiously motivated, the inevitable result of unchecked immigration from Muslim countries; for others the rioters are simply acting out of vengeance at being denied their cultural heritage or a fair share in French society.  But the reality is that there is nothing particularly Muslim, or even French, about the violence.  Rather, we are witnessing the temporary rising up of one small part of a Western underclass culture that reaches from Paris to London to Los Angeles and beyond.

Read through that again...

But the French youths are not fighting to be recognized as a minority group either ethnic or religious; they want to be accepted as full citizens.  They have believed in the French model (individual integration through citizenship) but feel cheated because of their social and economic exclusion.  Hence they destroy what they see as the tools of failed social promotion: schools, social welfare offices, gymnasiums.

A fantastic gloss on a quote in the Washington Post over the weekend; the rioters, an older Muslim man said, are "destroying their kindergartens."

Now, before you get too smug about Europe, think a little bit about the violence that raced through New Orleans after Katrina (although, I know, the media overstated it).  This is just a grim, grim diagnosis of how we have allowed an indigestible lump of poverty and hopelessness to grow up in our midst.

Almost 15 years ago I spent an unlikely night in a Paris bainlieu.  My host was a junior French diplomat who had moved back to the capital and found his means very limited.  He picked me up at the train station, we got into the Metro and got out into a vista of high-rises and Arab faces.  It wasn't the Paris of my school trips, but it didn't seem to faze him.  I politely said nothing.  Later, we took the Metro back to Paris, this time with a sea of immigrant teenagers whose surprise at seeing us in their midst only grew as we switched back and forth between English and French.

Finally one of them said to my friend, "yo, where'd you get her?"

"In Vienna," he answered, as if that explained everything.  Finally, we struck up a conversation.  The kids were within five years of our age, but as my friend explained his career path -- university, learning languages, the diplomatic service, a posting in Vienna where, yes, there were women from all over, it was clear that he might as well have arrived from Mars.  Although he was himself the child of hardscrabble immigrants -- French repatriated from Algeria -- their lives had no points of commonality beyond the train we all sat in.  They couldn't imagine any of his options being opened to them.

I could go on forever about the broader implications of all this.  Instead, I think it's time for those of us who focus on foreign affairs to start thinking, again, about the implications of a Europe that is AWOL from its accustomed role in world affairs.  Last week I promised to track and post on Europe's reaction to the news that the US has outsourced its prisons to Central Europe.  But another diplomat friend gently chided me:

Europe is too busy looking inward to care, he said, and reminded me that, while Paris burns, Spain is wrenching itself around the problem of Catalan autonomy, the Dutch are having a parliamentary wrangle over why they went to Iraq and whether they should up their ante in Afghanistan; Italy is in the throes of yet another corruption scandal as its government continues a long (by Italian standards) slow decline.  Germany, remember, still doesn't officially have a government.

Progressives have gotten into the nice but lazy habit of figuring the Europeans will help us over the humps we can't quite get over ourselves: international pressure and money for Iraq, troops for Afghanistan, a new approach for Iran, aid money for Africa and Asia, greasing a final status deal for Kosovo, etc. etc.  Then there's the whole matter of trade policy, where the planets must align creativity and flexibility in both Europe and the U.S.

Fuhgeddaboudit.

I'm not saying Europe will disappear; but if you are a progressive thinker hatching plans that require Europe to stick its neck out, take the lead, or change its own policies dramatically, better start re-thinking.

Remembering Dayton Posted by Derek Chollet

The discussion here and elsewhere on the future of humanitarian intervention, muscular Wilsonianism, and the use of force serves as a reminder of the role that the 1990s debate about Bosnia played in shaping much of the current thinking – and rethinking – about these questions.  Which also gives reason to remember an important anniversary: 10 years ago today, American negotiators were holed up behind a high-barbed wire fence on a secluded Air Force Base outside Dayton, Ohio, in the midst of an intense effort to end the Bosnian war.  The story of how the U.S. got to this point – three years of dithering and indecision as Bosnia bled, followed by five months of diplomacy to end the war capped by the Dayton Peace Accords – is an important one to draw lessons from.

I try to tell this story – and draw some lessons for today – in a new book I have written about the Dayton peace process (shameless, I know).  Let me take this chance to develop briefly some ideas about why I think Dayton mattered – and what this means for today.

Dayton’s core accomplishment is what it did for Bosnia: it ended a war and gave hope to millions who suffered immense hardship.  But it did more than that.  Dayton brought to an end one of the most difficult periods in the history of U.S.-European relations, helping define a new purpose for the Transatlantic Alliance and organizations like NATO, and ultimately, restored the credibility of the United States in the world. 

The Dayton agreement was also a turning point for American foreign policy.  The course the U.S. chose fit within a well-established American diplomatic tradition: a policy that challenged the status quo and reflected an all-or-nothing approach driven less by concerns about niceties or allied consensus than by getting something done.

This mattered for America’s global standing; it mattered for President Bill Clinton personally.  After years of disappointment in foreign policy – from their inability to solve Bosnia, to the “black hawk down” disaster in Somalia, the chaos of Haiti, and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda – Clinton and his team emerged from Dayton with greater command, confidence, and global respect.  In less than six months during 1995, Clinton had taken charge of the Transatlantic Alliance, pushed NATO to use overwhelming military force, risked America’s prestige on a bold diplomatic gamble, and placed 20,000 American military men and women on the ground in a dangerous environment to enforce the agreement.

The Bosnia experience has taught many lessons, but the most important one is this: when it comes to solving global problems, American leadership remains indispensable.  America’s failure to lead during the early 1990’s contributed to the international community’s inability to solve the Bosnia’s crisis; but its bold action in 1995 stopped the war. 

And here’s what progressives today need to remember: this approach included allies, but in the end it was largely unilateral, rejecting the United Nations and keeping our friends at long-arms-length (during the negotiations in Dayton, the Europeans were largely reduced to being spectators).  The United States acted first and consulted later.  And it was not only truly maximalist in means, but in ends: rather than simply seek a cease-fire between the parties (as most Europeans wanted), the United States sought to create the contours of a new Bosnian democratic state.

Perhaps it is fitting that the best description of this comes from the top European involved in these negotiations, Sweden’s former Prime Minister, Carl Bildt.  The “simple and fundamental fact” of the history made in Dayton, Bildt recalls, is that the “United States was the only player who possessed the ability to employ power as a political instrument and, when forced into action, was also willing to do so.”  This lesson from Dayton is sometimes easy to overlook today, ten years later, when many around the world are questioning the purpose of U.S. leadership, chafing at the exercise of American power, or claiming that American assertiveness is something new. 

The New German Government and Iraq Posted by Derek Chollet

Last week, Germany’s two major parties on the right (CDU) and left (SPD) agreed on a “grand coalition” to lead the country in an unusual power-sharing arrangement: the CDU’s leader, Angela Merkel, will become the new Chancellor, yet the SPD will retain the majority of the government ministries (8 to the CDU’s 6), including such crucial ministries as foreign, finance, and justice.  The SPD announced their choices for ministries last week, and Merkel unveiled her choices yesterday.  So Germany’s new government appears set.

With Germany in need of deep reforms (just to name a few challenges: it has a stagnant economy, aging population, crumbling education system, and serious immigration problems), this arrangement seems closer to a recipe for gridlock than dramatic change.  And after spending a few days in Berlin last week listening to German government officials and thinkers (I was there at a conference hosted by the SPD’s think tank, the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung), it’s clear to me that no one really knows what the government agenda is going to look like – and that there is going to be a lot of debate about what kinds of changes Germany’s voters actually want.

The conventional wisdom is that with Merkel in power, Germany’s relationship with the U.S. will be smoother – her predecessor, Gerhard Schroeder, famously stoked anti-Americanism during his last election in 2002, and goes out of his way to remind people that Germany made the right call on Iraq.  Merkel has already met with Bush, and it was no secret that official Washington was rooting for her.  But while the tone might be better, few expect the substance of Germany’s policy towards important issues to change much.

This is especially true with Iraq – which is, not surprisingly, one of the starker contrasts I found between the debates in Berlin and Washington.  In Germany, the Iraq debate is still only about the past – why things went so wrong, why the U.S.-German relationship became so spoiled, and how we have to fix it.  The Germans don’t seem to have really clued into the dominant discussion here, which is how we are going to get out.

This is especially troubling because how we get out matters to them. German leaders are quick to say that what happens in Iraq is clearly in all of our interests – after all, Iraq is a lot closer to Europe than the U.S. – and they point out that they are providing modest help, such as debt relief and training.  But they know that it’s not much.  And even though they agree that Iraq’s future matters for them, they don’t seem to have much of an opinion about what to do about it – whether or when troops should leave, or how they could do more to ensure an outcome that is in their interests too.  It's  a combination of complacency and denial.

It seems to me that the Germans have leverage that they are not using.  Merkel could come to the U.S. say publicly something like: “we’ve disagreed about the war, but now we all need a solution in Iraq, and we’re willing to think of creative ways to help you – which of course helps us.”  That would certainly influence the debate here. Yet by refusing to engage on this issue, they are doing little to give the Bush team any reason to change its policies.

But more frustrating to me is that the U.S. is not using the leverage it has to encourage our European friends to do more.  They agree that it is in all our interests for Iraq to succeed, but we’re not really asking much of them, or including them in any discussion about Iraq’s future.  Even the conference I attended – whose purpose was to promote Transatlantic cooperation – failed to do this, focusing instead on other issues like immigration, China and India, and Turkey and the EU.  The American debate about when to withdraw is itself leverage – if the European’s believe that we about to get out, they will be forced to assess how this will impact their interests (right now, they seem to believe the Bush rhetoric that we will stay forever).

Of course, using leverage does not mean that it will succeed.  Maybe it is just naïve to think that the Bush team will be swayed by anything another country says or does, even a friendly leader like Merkel.  And it may simply be that, for reasons of both politics and competing priorities, countries like Germany simply can’t do more in Iraq, even if the outcome there -- good or bad -- matters a lot to them.  But it seems worth a try.   

Russia: Back on the Front Burner Posted by Derek Chollet

Former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance used to say that one of the hardest things about managing American diplomacy was that, just when you think you are on top of things, “at any moment in the day at least two-thirds of the people around the world are awake and some of them are making mischief.”  With American foreign policy consumed by the war on terror and Iraq, as well as showdowns with North Korea and Iran, it is very difficult to respond to larger trends.  As Suzanne points out  below, policy wonks and deep thinkers are trying to get their heads around challenges like the rise of China and the greater diplomatic and economic role of India.  I predict that another issue we will be talking and worrying about a lot more in the coming months and years will be one of American foreign policy’s oldest chestnuts: Russia.

Russia has receded from the front burner of U.S. diplomacy – there are lots of reasons for this, among them 9-11, Putin’s self-professed “cooperation” in the war on terror, Russia’s oil-fueled economic rebound, Bush’s close embrace of Putin (looking into his soul and all that), and his efforts to restore “order” in the Russian state and society.

Yet in the coming years, what happens inside Russia and in the states on its periphery will impact just about every major strategic issue we face: the threat from Islamic jihadists, energy security, the future of democracy, China, Central Asia, nuclear proliferation, pandemics like HIV/AIDS, just to name a few.  And Russia's internal stability will continue to be a real concern -- especially with a 2008 leadership transition approaching, when constitutionally Putin cannot run for reelection as President but few think that he will disappear from power.

There’s a strong case to be made that things have gotten worse in Russia, not better.  A few weeks ago I was in Moscow and had the opportunity to meet with a wide range of people.  Few argued that Russia was a democracy – in fact the consensus is that Russia is a “bureaucratic authoritarian” regime.  The key difference was whether people thought that that was good or bad, or whether it was anyone’s fault (meaning, that the lack of democracy was just the way Russia is). 

On the one hand, Putin’s defenders talked about the importance of the “order” that has been established and how many of the rollbacks of democracy (such as crackdown on independent sources of power, especially in the media, as well as appointing rather than electing regional governors, etc.) should be compared with how Western countries do things, which in some cases is not all that different.  Yet on the other hand, it is clear that the lack of openness and access to television suppresses political opposition – and that the trend line in Russia in terms of democracy is heading in the wrong direction.

Visiting Moscow, and seeing the enormous economic growth that is happening there, it appears that ordinary Russian citizens do have individual freedom – there is a growing middle class consumer culture – as long as they don’t challenge the state.  Some argued that there is a growing disconnect between the Russian people at the Kremlin leadership: that ordinary Russians are ready for rule of law and democracy but that the political elites are not.

From the perspective of American interests, there’s a lot to be worried about here.  The stakes are huge.  Yet America’s policy toward Russia has been on auto-pilot – as Fred Hiatt pointed out yesterday in the Washington Post, the Administration has a “fairly coherent strategy regarding Russia's slide from democracy: Ignore it. The National Security Council apparatus in the White House believes that what happens inside Russia is irrelevant to the United States; that the United States can't do much to influence domestic events in any case; and that dwelling on Putin's authoritarianism would compromise other U.S. interests in bilateral relations.”

This head-in-the-sand approach is going to become increasingly unsustainable.  As the contradictions pile up, it will be very hard to look the other way.  Next summer, Putin will host the G-8 leaders at their annual summit in St. Petersburg. This will be the first time Russia will host the annual G-8 summit meeting as a full member, and thousands of journalists and other activists will be there.  That means that not only will Putin come under pressure to explain himself, but the seven other leaders of the world’s major democracies will have to justify why they are standing there and not criticizing their host for his rollback of basic freedoms.  Remember that when the G-8 began in 1975 – then as the G-6 – the leaders affirmed their individual responsibilities “for the government of an open, democratic society, dedicated to individual liberty and social advancement.”  But this is not the direction Russia has headed under Putin.  So it will make for an interesting photo-op.

What if they had an election and no one won? Posted by Heather Hurlburt

So says Der Spiegel.

A good, short survey of where the various coalition possibilities stand this morning is here.  To do it any more precisely I would need a chart. 

There are some fascinating echoes of recent events in other countries we know and love. At one point, pollsters were projecting that Social Democratic leader and current Chancellor Schroeder would have three more seats than his conservative opponents.  Didn't pan out.  Chancellor Schroeder's almost-victory-claiming performance has some commentators calling him brilliant, others crazy.   My question:  when will we have screaming Schroeder dolls?  And check here to learn how complex things get if no government has been formed by October 18, when Schroeder's term officially ends.  (Not so bad, the electoral college...)

Heather, you're being flip again:  Why does this matter?  Craig Whitney reminds that Germany exports more than any other nation and is a central player in the EU.  But that's understating the case:  Germany is a central player on the cast of issues where politics and economic meet.  Will the EU get off the dime on agricultural reforms and push past the US on trade liberalization?  If Germany provides the momentum.  Other issues where Germany plays the impetus-or-spoiler role range from Iran-nukes to UNSC reform (if that remains relevant) to maintaining forward motion in the Balkans.

But there's another, broader reason.  Malaise.  (An aside:  Jimmy Carter never said it.  The word was in pollster Pat Caddell's memo to him.)  This divided vote, with a strong protest component against broadly-unspecified change and reform, is in many ways a continuation of the anti-EU treaty protest votes we saw in the Netherlands and France earlier this year.  Some of the more panicky-toned commentary that came out before the election reflected the fear on the one hand that Germany and Europe are stalled, have lost momentum; and that on the other hand, the German and European way of life and standard of living are under threat.

Lots of bad answers to this have emerged, but no good ones.  And I would argue (as I sit in the state tied for highest unemployment rate in the country, 40 miles from the poorest big city in the country) that the hyping of fears about terrorism in the US overlays a rather similar concern.  What to do about globalization -- how to regain both the reality and the popular sensation that we own it, not the reverse?

Some Germans think that a "grand coalition" of Social Democrats and Christian Democrats might provide space for new answers, and new leaders, to emerge -- that, along with significant social unrest, is the legacy of Germany's only previous "grand coalition," in the late 1960s.  But can that still happen?  And what's the analogy for countries without the possibility of coalition politics?

Meanwhile in Germany Posted by Heather Hurlburt

While the pot bubbles in Iraq, we check back on the September 18 German elections. A few weeks ago, the sky was falling in German politics.  The Financial Times’ Berlin bureau chief saw the possibility of Germany “slipping into the fully-fledged political crisis that it has been edging towards, unnoticed, for the past two decades.”

And current Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder raised the specter of civil unrest if a conservative coalition gains power and enacts significant economic reforms.

Why?  Angst about Schroeder's apparent inability to convince Germans of the necessity of economic reforms and sacrifice (labor market flexibility uber alles, apparently), and the emergence of a new potential kingmaker/spoiler party, Die Linke (the leftists), a union of the East German communist successor Party of Democratic Socialism and a splinter group from Schroeder's SPD.  Up to this week, polls were showing half of voters undecided, allowing a political analyst's paradise of speculation and matchmaking. 

Now, though, the latest polls suggest that the undecided are making up their minds in Germany, and, with the election less than three weeks off, breaking for conservative challenger Angela Merkel, her Christian Democrats and their expected junior partner the Free Democrats.

This after weeks of agonizing about all sorts of scrambled possibilities as undecideds stood close to 50 percent:

Would the governing Social Democrats under Schroeder slip back into power with the same anti-US rhetoric that brought Schroeder a surprise victory last time, this time focused on US designs on Iran instead of Iraq?

(Looks like not – Schroeder is picking up undecideds at a much slower rate than Merkel.)

Would the Christian Democrats and Free Democrats fail to clear 50 percent, requiring a Grand Coalition with the Social Democrats? (Imagine W. offering Joe Lieberman the vice presidency in 2000 and you get the idea of the angst behind this.) Free Democrat parliamentarian Werner Hoyer said that such a coalition would be “reason to emigrate.”

Others are calmer.  An American analyst argues that Germany’s previous CDU/CSU-SPD Grand Coalition, of 1966-1969, was the necessary confidence-builder that paved the way for the long and successful reigns of Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt; that it strengthened the center-right FPD and paved the way for the emergence of the Greens. Janes also argues that the period set Germany up for a decade of economic prosperity and laid the foundations of Germany’s Ostpolitik, the engagement with the East that helped undermine the foundations of the Berlin Wall. The Grand Coalition period, though, can also be seen as the (re) birth of right- and left-wing extremist movements. A fertile time for good and ill, in short.

I sense from the coverage that the levels of hysteria about the results that we were seeing a few weeks ago are ratcheting down. Chief among reasons is the slippage of Die Linke (the Leftists). While it surged earlier in the summer, the latest polls suggest it could miss the 5 % threshold to enter parliament at all.

So what does it all mean?  The question of whether Germany is "ready" for a woman Chancellor is of interest for various reasons. 

Then there's the question of what Merkel can do on the economy and will do with Germany abroad.  She is likely to make further efforts to rebuild ties with the US, but there will be limits on what she will want to offer while her top priority is difficult and unpopular reforms at home.  Some imagine her taking up the banner of European leadership in the post-Eu referendum vacuum, but this too seems unlikely given the challenges she will face at home, at least right away.  A CDU administration is likely to produce some significant shifts within the EU, not least on trade policy; the French will find themselves more isolated.  Would the EU then be able to move more strongly to put the US in a corner on agricultural liberalization and other trade issues?  An interesting question.

Lastly, even though the furor has died down a bit, significant changes are afoot in Germany.  Manfred Guellner, head of Germany's Forsa polling group, put it this way – the institutional system that has given Germany so many decades of stability “has reached its limits.”

Two weeks ago I ran into a former US Ambassador to Germany, a man never at a loss for words.  What's going to happen?  I asked.

"I don't know" he said.  "But fasten your seatbelts.  The post-Cold War order is breaking up.  And really, why shouldn't it?"

The telephone is ringing... Posted by Heather Hurlburt

My ten cents on Suzanne's post-referendum questions:

Will this amplify pro-US voices?  No.  It will distract pro-and anti- US voices alike by refocusing everyone internally, on questions like how do you salvage the chunks of the constitution that concern the EU's fundamental operating mechanisms.  So the problem will be getting anyone to answer, pro- or anti-, when we call.   

Then, too, this will weaken the governing parties in France and (after Wednesday, in all probability) the Netherlands.  The Dutch government has been quite pro-US, and it's not likely that a Socialist-led French government would be less inclined to play games at US expense than Chirac.  So that is not a plus for us.

Moreover, parties scrambling for position in those countries, plus the elections coming this fall in Germany, will provide endless temptation to play on popular hostility to the US.  So as long as the US is perceived as the source or cause for much of the existential globalization angst that I mentioned in my last post, this does nothing good for pro-US voices.

Are we better off with a single number to call?  Suzanne, you may have your own views about this from your time at the UN.  But my experience working with the EU at the OSCE, and then on the Balkans, is that the US loses more than we gain when the EU is disunited and thrashing -- because the thrashing itself gets in the way of getting anything done.  The ideal situation for us is one where we can work individual states early and influence the decision the EU makes -- and then have all the EU members committed to something that is either favorable to the US or at least less harmful.  Of course, that assumes a lot of forethought and coordination on our part.

It's also worth remembering that EU unity constrains negative urges as well as positive ones; as long as Europeans themselves want the ever-closer union, I believe the US should be quietly supportive.  Where the US should never let itself get (and Condoleezza Rice's Constitution endorsement last week came close) is seeming to endorse Euro-elites' ambitions when the citizenry is not ready to follow -- there's very little in that for us.

I also think that the "non" and "nee" votes matter less for Europe's foreign policy than one might at first think.  Opposition to the establishment of a permanent EU foreign minister and a desire to be more or less oppositional to the US were not high among the reasons for voting no.  Those developments toward integration are likely to continue apace -- and, as everyone who's had to deal with them knows, the reality is something less than an impregnable wall of foreign policy unity.

Which brings me to China.  This is a lose for China in one sense -- lifting the arms embargo is not going to be top of anyone's list for a while.  For sure China is exploiting confusion or inattention anywhere it can.  But on trade issues, and in terms of develoing relationships to counterbalance the US, China too needs someone to answer the phone. 

Where China is a clear winner is in the drift of European economies, and their difficulty in rebuilding competitiveness.  If these votes represent, as some have argued, continued angst and opposition to the economic changes necessary to compete, then that's a win for China.  But not because of the constitution or even the EU per se.

 

EU Constitution - Que Sera Sera Posted by Suzanne Nossel

There will be weeks and months of analysis over what's happening in Europe and why. 

By and large the progressive and modernizing forces in Europe were behind integration and the Constitution, and for good reason:  the Union has helped bring struggling European economies to prosperity and has proven a powerful liberalizing force throughout Eastern Europe and now approaching the borders of the Soviet Union and the Arab world.  It has strengthened Europe's role as a player on the world stage which, by and large, has meant another loud voice in support of values similar to our own.

The opposition movement ginned up the likes of Jean-Marie Le Pen and was in some ways frightening.  I know less about this than Heather and Derek, but would love thoughts from them and others on a few issues:

Will this amplify pro-U.S. voices in the EU? One of Chirac's major fears with a no vote was lessening French influence in the EU.  This presumably means a larger role for Britain and the new members, all of which tend to be more in sync with U.S. policies.  Although the French no was a victory for the forces of insularity, these countries tend to be more outward looking. 

Though we've long sought it, are we really better off with a "single number to call" in Europe - I believe Kissinger coined the demand for a single number to dial for a coherent European foreign policy.  But solidly unified European positions are great only insofar as we agree with them.  When we disagree, or when a position is still under formation, it may be easier for the U.S. to have influence when its acknowledged that the Union's position is the sum of its parts.  That way, by lobbying individual countries, we can influence the whole.  It's a slow and painful process, but easier than bumping our head up against a wall.  A rock-solid, totally cohesive European policy-making regime would presumably be more resistant to U.S. influence.  A looser regime may be easier to work with.

China card - My guess is that in the coming months China tries to take advantage of confusion in the EU to extend and solidify their trade relationships and influence in their own region and in Latin America.   My guess is Beijing views this as a clear win.

Thud. Posted by Heather Hurlburt

A resounding "non" from the French for the EU Constitution today.  We will have days of commentary about how much this was "an opportunity to say up yours to the government" (as a European diplomat said to me), "about the economy" (a German scholar of organizational behavior), about immigration and Turkey, the EU's democratic deficit, and so on.

I'll say "all of the above" and stay out of that discussion, because I think there's a larger lesson here for progressives.  In a democracy, when governing elites let themselves get too separated from the people they represent -- or allow the perception of separation to go unrepaired -- the people will eventually figure out a way to bite back in a tender place.

In a funny way, the EU Constitution seems to have become for the French and the Dutch (and the Brits and perhaps some others as well) the same bogeyman that the Republicans have managed to make the dread multilateralism here at home -- representative of all that larger forces are trying to cram down your throat in the name of modernity, globalization, the 21st century.

Why do the French think that the Constitution would threaten their social policy with dread Anglo-Saxon liberalism while the British think it would bring on too much Continental socialism? (This wonderful insight came from the Brookings discussion that Derek referenced a few days ago.)  Because those are the external bogeys each fears.  If the EU Constitution didn't exist, it would have had to be invented to express the angst of the moment.

What are we afraid of here?  Globalized terrorism, a changing economy where whole categories of job and the secure lives that went with them are vanishing, a future which is fast-moving and cosmopolitan, where jobs and diseases and the new neighbors next door come from places you can hardly spell.

All reasonable fears.  But progressives are stuck in the "there's no easy answers" stage, ceding the field to conservatives who have easy answers, if not good ones:  close the borders, cut off debate,  subpoena your library books and test our kids silly on a few skills while choking off funding for the rest.

Question is, will the Europeans figure out a better response?  The early indications don't look good -- all the considerable creative energy is likely to go toward figuring out clever treaty fixes.

So whatever this vote ends up meaning for the European project, and US-EU relations, and big issues we care about, etc. etc. -- and even if you think, as I do, that few tears need be shed over the constitution itself -- it should serve as another wakeup call, as if more were needed, that this new century is unsettling to people everywhere, and people are responding by refusing to buy in to new constructs policymakers come up with, however manifestly sensible they may seem to their creators.  Think about it as a disconnect between technology and end-user.

Oh Non! Posted by Derek Chollet

Just to echo what Heather wrote yesterday regarding tomorrow’s vote in France on the EU constitution, to be followed by the vote in the Netherlands: for those who believe in a strong EU, it will not be a good week.  Having spent the past week in the Persian Gulf and UK (hence my extended absence), all anyone is talking about is how the French will vote “no” and expect the Netherlands to follow suit.  France’s leaders pretty much gave up hope a few days ago. 

It’s anyone’s guess what will happen after these votes derail the EU constitution, other than that this will set off a bonanza of business for European wonks and think tankers – for a good start, see this recent discussion among some American European specialists.  Another certainty is that we will be entering a phase of internal Euro-hand-wringing and navel-gazing that will make strong U.S.-European cooperation on a variety of important issues a lot more difficult.

Oddly enough, one person who is secretly happy about all of this is British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has committed to holding a British referendum on the constitution sometime in the next few years.  The EU constitution is even more unpopular in Britain, and most consider a British “yes” even more improbable.  One of Blair’s fears was that all other countries would have approved the constitution and that the fate of the treaty would hinge entirely on Britain.  With a French no, he’s off the hook.  And in July, Britain takes over its six-month presidency of the EU (a rotation that the EU constitution would end), which gives Blair a chance to lead the effort to pick up the pieces from this mess – which is one way to work his way back from the Continental beating he has taken over Iraq. 

What Brussels Has Joined: European Disunion II Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Just a quick Friday afternoon note, to get my points for prescience or look bad Monday morning:  things are not looking good for the EU Constitution referendum in France this weekend, and even worse for the follow-on in the Netherlands next week.

Folks I talk to confirm what we're seeing in commentary; this represents less a specific rejection of the frankenstein-of-a-constitution than a general sense of unease with the EU's "democratic deficit" overlaid by a very specific sense of anger at incumbent governments, the problems associated with immigration, and --dare I say it? -- a soupcon of malaise with the 21st century in general.

Saw a marvelous quote involving the Dutch foreign minister stumping for the treaty (amusing to imagine Secretary Rice pressing the flesh for a treaty, no?).  A citizen informed him that he couldn't possibly change her "no" vote, and he politely asked why.  "I just want to say 'no' to something," the woman replied. 

Meanwhile, the same day the German parliament approved the Constitution, having declined to submit it to popular vote, the German public showed its disaffection another way -- opinion polls showed Angela Merkel, leader of the conservative opposition CDU, overtaking incumbent chancellor SDU Gerhard Schroeder for the first time.  Polls said 60 percent of Germans want a new government -- at the same level they showed just before Germans dumped longtime chancellor Helmut Kohl in 1998.

All this suggests several things.  If France and the Netherlands both vote no, the EU will be consumed with containing the damage, and probably negotiating several less all-encompassing treaties to put some of the Constitution's practical provisions (the arduously-reached new rules on who gets how many votes, Commissioners, etc.) into practice.  Even if one or both squeak it out, which is looking unlikely, this heralds a period of turbulence and inward-focus for Europe.  Bad news, I think, for big issues like UNSC reform (Suzanne will correct me if not), final status for Kosovo, new approaches on development assistance, and other areas where Europe either does or should take the lead.  It shouldn't, one hopes, affect the highest-profile issues like Iran... but one wonders.  The more unsettled things are, as well, the more incentive for politicians on all sides to take shots at the US, disturbing those relationships just as they seemed to be calming down a bit.

Bad news for US exporters, good news for US tourists and foreign-affairs boondogglers:  BBC had someone on this morning confidently predicting that the euro would fall a bit if France votes "non."  Buy those plane tickets now!

European Disunion Posted by Suzanne Nossel

Laura Rozen prints a few letters from European commentators talking about why the new EU constitution may be on the verge of being voted down in the Netherlands and France.  At some level its hard not to think it may do some good for the Europeans to be reminded how local politics, economic interests and popular fears can interfere with even the noblest geopolitical intentions.   

Is Europe off the hook? Posted by Derek Chollet

One of the significant positive shifts of the Bush Administration’s second term foreign policy has been its approach toward Europe. Part of this is a reflection of the past -- after the first four years, it is hard to imagine how transatlantic relations could get any worse.

Yet as the Economist has recently pointed out, there has also been a notable change in the Bush Administration’s attitude toward Europe -- the Europeans are happy with the visits by President Bush and Secretary Rice and they praised the important speeches each delivered in Brussels and Paris respectively (the substance of both speeches American progressive internationalists could and should agree with).

Despite this charm offensive, the Europeans are still negatively obsessed with Bush -- I think they are more obsessed with him than most Democrats in the United States.  At a policy conference in Germany I attended last weekend, someone posed the question of what it meant to be European. The first answer offered: "not Bush." Now this was partly a joke, but it also received a round of hearty applause. In fact, many participants argued that Europe’s loathing of George Bush has done more to bring about European unity than anything else. Again, this is certainly a stretch, but has an element of truth.

This leads one to ask: if being anti-Bush is an important part of being a European, then what will being a European mean in 2008, after Bush is gone, or what would it have meant this year if John Kerry had won? (This is a good reminder for progressives as well -- it’s not good enough just to be against Bush, we need to stand for something).

Of course, the Europeans were shocked that Bush won reelection -- but in reality, this let many of their leaders off the hook. Oddly enough, while a Democratic victory would have created a great deal of goodwill between the two sides and made the Europeans much happier, Transatlantic relations would be more challenged today, not less. The reason is simple: Democrats have higher expectations of our European allies -- and quite possibly, these expectations are unrealistic.

For example, the progressive answer for Iraq is not to pull out tomorrow, but to get the Europeans and organizations like NATO more involved to ease the burdens on our troops and give the occupation greater legitimacy in the eyes of the Iraqi people and the world. Our belief is not that Bush has asserted too much leadership concerning Europe, but that he has asserted too little.

But what’s striking is how unprepared the Europeans would have been for this -- the limits of their military capabilities are well-known, but few in Europe seem to recognize that a Democratic Administration would have asked more of them. They still want to debate what happened three years ago in the run-up to the Iraq war, not what they can do to help us today in Iraq. I don’t think that this is good for them; but I know that it isn’t good for us.