In 1992, flush with victory in the Cold War, Francis Fukuyama penned an Hegelian book called The End of History and the Last Man. Fukuyama hypothesized that “liberal democracy may constitute the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution.” In other words, he speculated that we had reached a point in history that we would be hard pressed to improve upon…and not only that, but that there was a remarkable worldwide consensus that representative goverment was the best form of government. And, even beyond that, Fukuyama asserted that liberal democracies had broken the dialetic. They did not contain within them the internal contradiction that led to the demise of other systems of government.
As evidence for this Fukuyama cited a chart (with updates) from Michael Doyle’s 1983 article in Philosophy and Public Affairs called “Kant, Liberal Legacies, and Foreign Affairs”. Doyle defined a liberal democracy as a country with “a market economy, representative government, external sovereignty, and juridicial rights.” Under this criteria, Doyle found the following number of liberal democracies in history.
Prior to 1790= 0
1790= 3
1848= 5
1900= 15
1919= 25
1940= 13
1960= 36
1975= 30
1990= 61
[as an aside here, you will notice that 1975 shows a temporary dip. Here is the list of countries that were considered liberal democracies in 1960 and 1990, but not in 1975. See, if you see a trend: Chile, Brazil, Uruguay, Bolivia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Philippines.]
You could make other charts that showed the trend of communist countries, monarchies, and dictatorships. They would all show a downward trend. What’s important isn’t the absolute numbers, but the fact that the ideological underpinnings of communism, monarchism, fascism, and dictatorship have been undermined and show no bright prospect of returning to widespread legitimacy.
One of the consequences of this development is that strongmen lost their ability to make ideological claims to justify their own power. They could no longer place themselves on one or the other side of the Cold War and claim to be protecting the country from either rapacious capitalists or insidious communism.
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A corollary consequence was that the United States (and the West generally) and Russia lost the ability to justify the use of client strongmen as necessary evils in a worldwide ideological struggle. The Soviet collapse was so total that they were left with only one embarrassing legacy: North Korea. However, the West was left with its historic alliances of convenience with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. And the blowback was immediate. In many ways, you can see the rise of groups like al-Qaeda as a natural outgrowth of the loss of legitimacy for the rulers of those countries when the Cold War came to an end. Russia has experienced a similar problem from some of its breakaway provinces: notably Chechnya and Uzbekistan.
Liberals need to articulate a foreign policy that takes into account the reality of a terrorist threat arising from the Cold War legacy, but that doesn’t see the problem in apocalyptic terms. To some degree, the problem is intractable. If the solution is more liberal democracies, that by definition means the overthrow of governments that were valuable strategic allies during the Cold War, but much more importantly…it means instabilty in a very important part of the world. Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Any prolonged interruption of Saudi Arabian oil could create huge economic losses and cost millions of jobs around the globe. And an Islamist government in Egypt could have far-reaching and unpredictable consequences.
Furthermore, the overthrow of these governments is not likely to automatically lead to liberal democracies, as happened throughout Eastern Europe, Latin America, and the Far East.
We are stuck in a vice between providing economic and political stability, and supporting strongmen that deny their citizens’ basic rights, which gives rise to anti-American sentiment and to anti-American terrorism.
Part of the solution lies in trying to lessen the potential downside of instabilty. The less an interruption of Saudi oil supplies would hurt, the more willing we can be to accept some uncertainty about their form of government. Another part of the solution is to strengthen the anti-proliferation arm of the United Nations. When countries like Pakistan get nuclear weapons, and they do not have the political institutions and civilian leadership of their military to provide basic assurances about the security of those weapons, it puts the international community in a no-win situation. We cannot afford political instability in Pakistan, so we cannot support any liberalization of their form of government. The more we support the dictatorship in Pakistan, the more hostile the populace becomes toward America, and the less we can afford a popular revolution there.
There are no magic bullets that will solve these problems. Each country is unique. A sound policy will look to diminish the downside of instability in each country, to cautiously push for liberal reforms, and to strenghten international institutions that can help prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and that can help provide guidance and assistance as these countries make a difficult transition toward liberal democracy.
Therefore, a liberal foreign policy should emphasize energy independence, human rights, multilateralism, anti-proliferation through the UN, foreign aid, and political liberalization.
Some will see this as a continuation of imperialistic policies. And in some sense, they are imperialistic. But, they are also pragmatic and cautious.
And they incorporate a nearly worldwide consensus on the interests of the global economy and collective security, rather than the narrow unilateral interests of the Bush neo-colonialists.
Fukuyama, btw, has changed a bit since The End of History. The American Prospect ran a very interesting article about him last fall Link.
Check out the article if you have time. I’m going to finish re-reading it tonight.
Well, oddly Fukuyama was a signature on the founding PNAC document, but has distanced himself from the group in recent years.
That distancing has been quite dramatic. He has publically fallen out with Krauthammer with each penning essays attacking each other. Krauthammer even implied Fukuyama was anti-semitic after Fukuyma accused Krauthammer of ignoring obvious eveidence and reality! Fukuyama also denounced the Bush foreign policy as a failure with the Iraq war harming US interests as well as undermining support for future “benevolant imperialism” to slightly paraphrase. He also urged a vote for Kerry before the last election.
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Dr. Charles Krauthammer“He Tarries: Jewish Messianism and the Oslo Peace”
The Distinguished Rennert Lecture for 2002, delivered upon the awarding to Dr. Charles Krauthammer of Bar-Ilan University’s Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies ‘Guardian of Zion’ Award, in Jerusalem, June 10, 2002.
Some of you may know that I used to be a psychiatrist, but I want to assure you tonight that I am a psychiatrist in remission. I haven’t had a relapse in twenty years, I have been doing very well. I am sometimes asked what is the difference between my career today as a legal observer of governments and politicians in Washington and a psychiatrist. And I tell people that in both professions, in Washington where I observe political actors, and in psychiatry where I used to work in an asylum, I see people every day who suffer from delusions of grandeur and paranoia, with the exception that today those people have access to nuclear weapons, so it makes it a little bit of a more interesting game.
I want to talk to you tonight about an important, and I think neglected, aspect of Jewish consciousness, namely Jewish Messianism. Thirty-five years ago today the Six-Day war ended. It seemed like a new era, and I remember some months afterward my rabbi questioned whether we should continue to celebrate Tisha Be’av. Jerusalem had been reunited, the Temple Mount was ours, Israel. The land had been retaken, perhaps we had entered a new age.
The cruel lesson of the last thirty-five years is that we will always have Tisha Be’av and we will always need to have Tisha Be’av.
It is true that according to Maimonides, one of the fundamental beliefs of Judaism is belief in the coming of the Messiah, but that does not mean that we have to believe in the imminent coming of the Messiah. In fact, the rabbis long discouraged the belief in the imminent coming of the Messiah as almost a form of impiety. Messianic speculation has not been good for the Jews.
… This led the rabbis to discourage Messianic speculation, and as we know, there is rabbinic injunction against hastening the end, lo lidchok et haketz, presuming by human agency to bring about what only God can. And yet, the Messianic hunger never dies, but it often goes unnoticed.
There are today at least three of these strains worth noticing. The first, and the one that has received the most attention, is the religious Messianism of the more extreme and radical elements of the Gush Emunim, and the purist culture of which, which is the Temple Mount faithful, who spend their waking hours learning Leviticus so that they will be ready to offer sacrifices in the new temple …
Pulitzer Prize 1987 – WaPo
COMMENTARY – For his witty and insightful columns on national issues.
“But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.”
▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
We are stuck in a vice . . .
But we built it, we can throw it out. I don’t see the Imperialism in your solutions, just the pragmatic. In the recent past Carter’s foreign policy in Latin America was close, and I think would have incrementally released the pressure on that vise. A set of decent foreign policy guidelines completely undone by “Reagan’s Rangers”.
I think you’re right about the principles, but I wouldn’t characterize them as “liberal”. I’d just call them rational.
I am sure Ductape will see the entire thing as imperialistic.
But I see it as more elitist than imperialistic.
For example, I could care less if Norway arms itself to the teeth with ICBM’s, but I would love to figure out a way to take away Pakistan’s nukes. The reason for this double-standard? Pakistan is too unstable, has too little civilian control and oversight, and those weapons are not sufficiently safe from bad actors that might make use of them for their own crazy reasons. And the type of government that might come into existence if there were a popular uprising is not one that I think India (or anyone else) would trust. It could lead to a preemptive and possibly nuclear war between India and Pakistan. And it is the most realistic way a bomb could wind up going off in an American city.
So, I do not apologize for having a double standard.
If Ducky thinks that makes me a hypocrite, so be it.
As for Iran, I believe they are better prepared to have a secure nuclear weapons program. But they really can’t pursue one while making threats to Israel’s very existence. No one can rebut the warmongers and supporters of Israel before the American court of public opinion when those two things are combined.
Iran needs to convince the international community that they are not pursuing a weapon or we will be unable to prevent a war. The rhetoric is not available to prevent it.
I very much hope Iran understands this.
Um, are you replying to my comment?
yes, I am. I’m kind of agreeing with you and kind of agreeing with anyone who does see my approach as imperialistic.
Americans who are not imperialism enthusiasts are the exception.
After all, Americans are taught from birth that they are an exceptional Master Race, to whom universally accepted norms of decency, international law, human rights, etc. simply do not apply.
The world, they are taught, belongs to the United States, might means right, and if America does it, it’s not a crime.
These are deeply ingrained values, so deep that many Americans do not even realize they are there.
That realization, BooMan, is an important first step, another important step is reading about other values.
And I must add I am very happy to see so many exceptions to the rule and cultural rebels, imperialist rejectionists, or, as Washington prefers to call it, terrorists, here on BooMan Tribune! đŸ˜€
Maybe in your happiness, Ductape, you will eventually arrive at the conclusion that sweeping generalizations about Americans are not as accurate as you think they are.
While it is true that the US does not have a “left” as such, there are individuals who oppose US policies, and reject the indoctrination, or if you prefer the modern expression, who don’t drink the Kool-Aid.
No, their numbers are not large enough to effect a lot of changes that they, and many people throughout the world would like to see, like moves toward legitimate statehood, and maybe one day, even democracy.
But that does not, in my opinion, invalidate their value, or make their struggle meaningless, or make each one, including you, any less precious in my eyes.
I disagree with you hear. I should think that we don’t want ANY country with ANY government and ANY amount of civilian control to get ICBMs. Nations (even Norway!) change dramatically and frequently, and to think that the world is at an end or that liberal democracies don’t use nukes is to deny history, human nature and the inevitability of probable events over time. Eventually everything will happen. Don’t forget that when you’ve killed all the terrorists, you’ll still have anarchists to deal with. Deal with the anarchists, you’ll have anti-corporate luddites, after them inter-corporate violence, after that…
“Security” is impossible on this Earth. ‘Defense’ is what our Foreign Policy should be based on. This Semantic switcheroo was a very important development in moving from an already indecent foreign policy to the outright ‘license to kill for profit’ of the Bush Doctrine. Combine this with the conflation of a military opponent and a war tactic. We are in an admittedly endless War with ‘Terrorism’. This is the post-9/11 adjustment we’ve made, the way to best enshrine specific, closely bound corporations, individuals, nations and their political representatives in the US gov’t. The way to fascism.
World history has not ended with liberal democracy, and to say so is to provide cover for the reality that governance itself is moving away from the liberal forms of government of/by/for the people and into corporate boardrooms and lobbyist’s offices of/by/for profit. The unitary, ‘corporate’ management style of our current, white Christian President would make Mousellini smile. There is no longer any way to deny that while perhaps representative government has reached a zenith in liberal democracy (certainly not an ideal), corporate governance of/of/of the people has just begun and there will likely never be a majority of Americans who can/will understand that this is not a good thing.
Policy debate is great, but is limited by the will of those who govern our lives to make change. I am really feeling a huge leadership vacuum on the left. Yet Honesty is the issue of the day. Honesty? Honest house-slave Dems (to borrow Hillary’s simile) are worthless to me. I want a Gore/Clark ticket more and more every day (Clark is his bulldog/figleaf, as Defense {vs. ‘Security’} Czar). Gore as the FDR character in Philip Roth’s ‘The Plot Against America’. We need someone who will present the big picture solution, such as President Gore did in his Big Speech and was getting at, albeit awkwardly, with his ‘Class Warrior’ stance in the election he won a few years back.
Really, I’d love to have a few good years of a deep and potent Kucinich bonghit, but that’s fantasy land.
A corrolary consequence was that the United States (and the West generally) and Russia lost the ability to justify the use of client strongmen as necessary evils in a worldwide ideological struggle. The Soviet collapse was so total that they were left with only one embarrassing legacy: North Korea. However, the West was left with its historic alliances of convenience with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan.
You tired Boo? What’s up with this?
There were strongmen, allied quite firmly with Russia, post Soviet breakup in Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan. Not to mention Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, Transdniestr and South Ossetia.
As for the U.S., what the heck do you call Bosnia, Indonesia, Albania and Croatia? Plus the old standby of Saudi Arabia. And all that’s on Clinton’s watch.
Market economies and “liberal democracies” don’t have anything to do with it. Respect for human rights DOES.
Pax
not tired, just looking for brevity.
My point with only mentioning Chechnya and Uzbekistan is just that they are the sources of anti-Russian terrorism, unlike Belarus.
As for America, I could have added Jordan, the Emirates, and a few other countries, but I was sticking to the nations that constitute the biggest foreign policy challenge.
Yugoslavia? That’s a whole other story.
(Sorry I only have the orange version at the moment.)
As much as I like the grand idea of liberal democracy and the noble principles contained therein, the problem is always that governments can frequently masquerade as liberal democracies, and they can dupe their citizens into beliebving they’re liberal democracies, but in fact they are anything but.
The Nobel prize willing Indian economist Amartya Sen, in describing the mechanics and economics of poverty and disenfranchisment within (even liberal democratic)societies made a very good case that the efficacy of government is defined less by what rights it’s citizens have under the law but rather by the citizens’ ability to exercise those rights. (Stalin had a terrific liberal constitution in 1936, yet the rights and freedoms contained therein were not exercisable by the population. We here in the US are guaranteed certain rights as citizens that, in practise are very often impossible to assert or defend.)
So, while liberal democracy is a great idea, we should be asking where it really is being practised and why, (at least we here in America), find it so difficult to acknowledge that what we have as a government is not even a functioning democracy, let alone one founded onliberal principles.
So what does non-proliferation look like to a liberal “pragmatist.”
In the heady days when the non-proliferation treaty was signed, the idea was that it was the “stop” before the “reverse”. In other words, the percieved threat of nuclear war between the nuclear powers was to be rolled back. Of course this valliant attempt to put the genie back in the bottle did not suceed except it did result in treaties that highly restrict the development of novel nuclear weapons by banning esting. Only Bush has sought to ignore them in trying to develop mini-nukes.