Here is a question I have: what is the Liberal philosophy of foreign policy in this country? What is its organizing principle?
The Conservative philosophy of foreign policy exists and everybody knows what it is. Its organizing principle is that the US should strive to be the world’s policeman / arbiter / “a force of good in the world.” Leaving aside the issue of whether this is a good philosophy and whether we agree with it, I want to point out that it exists and everybody is familiar with it, not only here but pretty much everywhere in the world.
Now my question is: what is the alternative? I’ve been trying to find out what the organizing principle behind the Liberal approach to foreign policy is for years but it’s a lot more elusive. Liberal commentators are very open as to what they don’t want to see happening in terms of US foreign policy. They are, however, very reticent concerning what they do want.
Sometimes I think that the ideal foreign policy for Liberals is that of a complete Buchanan-style withdrawal coupled with a stream of payments to poorer countries. This would be akin to paying the world to leave us alone so that we can engage in contented navel-gazing without being disturbed by pesky outsiders.
At other times, it seems like there is not even such a limited philosophy in place, and the Liberal response to every situation that arises is strictly situational and based on “let’s see what the other side is advocating and do the exact opposite.”
Does anybody have an answer?
Clarissa's Blog 
“At other times, it seems like there is not even such a limited philosophy in place, and the Liberal response to every situation that arises is strictly situational and based on “let’s see what the other side is advocating and do the exact opposite.””
I think your’e close. AFAICT the liberal position is that the US is privileged and harmed more people than any other country and must atone for this and be very careful about what it does lest it do harm again.
It’s almost entirely negative in orientation and is based on what the US should not do.
This is partly why Obama is so ineffective (most of the time). He really doesn’t want to be in a position where it looks like he’s trying to prioritize US interests.
That’s kind of mushy and unclear but that’s all I’ve got on short notice.
LikeLike
I was really hoping to be mistaken here, so this is not good news. 🙂
How do people explain this to themselves, though? “I hate the foreign policy of these guys but I will not come up with one of my own” seems like a very illogical position to hold.
LikeLike
Building coalitions instead of acting unilaterally, more diplomacy instead of war, ‘humanitarian intervention’ (like what the French did in Mali a couple of years ago), empowering global institutions like the UN, International Court of Justice, and human rights organizations (you can’t sabotage them by vetoing popular proposals, or worse, not even subscribing to these institutions in the first place and then claim these institutions don’t do anything).
Don’t have your national interests purely dictated by your biggest corporations.
Be somewhat consistent with your principles. You can’t bleat about the war on terror and democracy in the middle east while having Saudi Arabia, the single biggest purveyor of radical Islamic terrorism, as your close ally. These motherfuckers funded 9/11, for god’s sake!
Balance all of the above with ground realities and your material national interests. Nobody said it would be easy.
LikeLiked by 1 person
“Building coalitions instead of acting unilaterally, more diplomacy instead of war, ‘humanitarian intervention’ (like what the French did in Mali a couple of years ago), empowering global institutions like the UN, International Court of Justice, and human rights organizations”
LikeLike
Might be left of liberal but work toward demilitarization, reducing power of corporations, support for human rights, fair trade, things like this. But the way the world is set up, it is as though the choices in foreign policy are conservative and reactionary. It is a good question because given the structures in place it is almost impossible not to be at least somewhat conservative in foreign policy, or so it would seem. ?
LikeLike
I think it will be easier as soon as an organizing principle is found. Something like “Our role in the world is to. . .”
As an example, in Spain there is this idea that is gaining popularity that Spain should do all it can to foster a pan-Hispanic alliance that would serve as a counterpoint to the hegemony of the English-speaking civilization in terms of cultural and civilizational advances. This is an organizing principle and a set of policies can grow out of it.
In Russia, the organizing principle of foreign policy is to go back to the time of the Yalta agreements. The competing approach is to withdraw from foreign policy and concentrate on internal economic development.
LikeLike
Conservative foreign policy is always based in the idea of Power Politics (nations act in the international arena to protect their interests) while Liberal ideas would like to be based in what used to be called (IIRC) Issue Politics (nations act together in the international arena to solve common problems).
LikeLike
“nations act together in the international arena to solve common problems”
LikeLiked by 1 person
I agree. Well put, Cliff.
LikeLike
“Power Politics” has ALWAYS been the way international affairs have worked, ever since dawn of civilization and the development of nation-states capable of forcing their will on weaker neighbors — and today, of extending that power on a global scale.
Rules of “international law” and voluntary intergovernmental organizations like the League of Nations (created after WWI to prevent WWII) and the United Nations (created to prevent wars after WWII) will never function as their idealistic founders hoped, because the more powerful individual member nations will always act in their own self-interest at the expense of weaker members. This is human nature, and it’s not going to change.
Laws, international or local, are useful only if there’s a penalty for breaking them. At the global level, there’s no penalty restraining the powerful, unless it’s an equally powerful counter-force. This was true for Sparta, for Rome, for the British Empire, and during the long face-off between the USSR and the West led by America.
Today, the U.S. has largely abdicated its role as the sole remaining superpower, and vermin like Putin and ISIS are moving in from the dark woods as the civilized world retreats.
LikeLike
Both of these guiding principles (the conservative and the Liberal) are deeply deficient. But at least we have been able collectively to articulate the latter, which is a step in the right direction.
If it were up to me, I’d choose a completely different guiding principle that doesn’t coincide with either of these two.
LikeLike
Have you formulated this guiding principle?
LikeLike
“Laws, international or local, are useful only if there’s a penalty for breaking them. At the global level, there’s no penalty restraining the powerful, unless it’s an equally powerful counter-force. ”
LikeLike
Unfortunately, this isn’t an abstract argument, and it has nothing to do with concepts like good or evil or justice. It’s simply the way the world works.
Putin’s arguments, from what I’ve read on your website about the propaganda in Russian media, is that he’s reasserting Russia’s greatness to stand up to encroaching evil external forces like the U.S. and NATO.
LikeLike
Exactly, Putin wants to be a powerful counterforce to the US. His argument is that the US does more harm than good when allowed to run unchecked and he will check it.
And he’s actually being successful, given that Obama seems ready to agree to prop up Assad.
LikeLike
😀 Man, you sound like Marine Todd.
For the uninitiated, this is the origin story of our hero Marine Todd:
A liberal muslim homosexual ACLU lawyer professor and abortion doctor was teaching a class on Karl Marx, known atheist.
”Before the class begins, you must get on your knees and worship Marx and accept that he was the most highly-evolved being the world has ever known, even greater than Jesus Christ!”
At this moment, a brave, patriotic, pro-life Navy SEAL champion who had served 1500 tours of duty and understood the necessity of war and fully supported all military decision made by the United States stood up and held up a rock.
”How old is this rock, pinhead?”
The arrogant professor smirked quite Jewishly and smugly replied “4.6 billion years, you stupid Christian”
”Wrong. It’s been 5,000 years since God created it. If it was 4.6 billion years old and evolution, as you say, is real… then it should be an animal now”
The professor was visibly shaken, and dropped his chalk and copy of Origin of the Species. He stormed out of the room crying those liberal crocodile tears. The same tears liberals cry for the “poor” (who today live in such luxury that most own refrigerators) when they jealously try to claw justly earned wealth from the deserving job creators. There is no doubt that at this point our professor, DeShawn Washington, wished he had pulled himself up by his bootstraps and become more than a sophist liberal professor. He wished so much that he had a gun to shoot himself from embarrassment, but he himself had petitioned against them!
The students applauded and all registered Republican that day and accepted Jesus as their lord and savior. An eagle named “Small Government” flew into the room and perched atop the American Flag and shed a tear on the chalk. The pledge of allegiance was read several times, and God himself showed up and enacted a flat tax rate across the country.
The professor lost his tenure and was fired the next day. He died of the gay plague AIDS and was tossed into the lake of fire for all eternity.
Semper Fi. p.s. close the borders
LikeLike
What has your silly joke got to do with ANYTHING I actually said?
LikeLike
There are liberal hawks and liberal doves. Liberal hawk doctrine draws heavily on a principle called “responsibility to protect.”
LikeLike
Would you elaborate a bit on the liberal hawks’ “responsibility to protect” principle?
Does this mean that a country is justified in going to war ONLY when it is under absolutely no threat from the aggressors (as was the case when the U.S. led the NATO bombing campaign against Slovakia, which didn’t threaten a single European country outside its borders)?
LikeLike
I think you mean Serbia not Slovakia? Although Serbia did threaten at one time other former Yugoslav republics like Slovenia (very briefly), Croatia, and most notably Bosnia.
LikeLike
You’re correct, I meant Serbia. And I should have specified that it didn’t threaten a NATO country (which would have mandated a NATO military response).
LikeLike
RTP is not so much the responsibility to protect one’s allies, as to protect the victims of war crimes.
LikeLike
But when RTP intervention is applied in a situation where neither the national interest of the intervening country nor of its allies is threatened (as was the case with U.S. intervention in Serbia), the decision to intervene is invariably arbitrary.
We intervened in Serbia because thousands of women were systematically being raped, while at the same time ignoring the fact that vastly more women and children were being systematically raped AND mutilated in Africa.
Yes, you can make the case that Europe is within our sphere of influence, and that the relatively small Serbia operation was doable, whereas intervention in Africa would have been a fiasco.
Still, the intervention in Serbia was extremely arbitrary, and arguably in violation of NATO’s defensive charter.
LikeLike
Protect whom and from what?
LikeLike
OT:
I’m really surprised I haven’t heard anybody in a mainstream publication or any candidates link together border security/international policy and climate change. Perhaps it’s too hard to do?
<a href=”http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/science/earth/study-links-syria-conflict-to-drought-caused-by-climate-change.html>Climate change has exacerbated the war in Syria
LikeLike
This is not a statement that anybody can make responsibly and support with evidence.
LikeLike