Like Humanism, Isolationism Is For Children
Michael writes in a recent post:
There are many angry people in the middle east, and I agree with Dr. Paul that our occupation of their lands makes the US a focal point of their anger, a lightning rod for their wrath.
I really need to address this exceedingly lame argument.
Prior to 2003, the US did not occupy land in the Middle East. This is problematic to your position given what happened on 9/11.
To be more charitable to your argument, I think you are echoing a common sentiment, typically referred to as isolationism, which goes something like this:
Meddling with other countries affairs is bound to breed discontentment. This discontent can boil over causing the formation of organizations intent on harming our country. Therefore, it’s best to not meddle in other country’s affairs.
Much like Humanism, isolationism is a hopelessly naïve view of the world. Let’s look at it some different reasons why.
First, we have meddled with many countries and yet only a small portion has seen organizations form set on causing direct harm to our country. There are the more obvious examples of our meddling like occupying Japan and Germany after WW2 or more subtle examples like placing high tariffs on certain Chinese imports. If the argument is that meddling in other countries affairs is the controlling variable for violent retaliation you have some explaining to do.
A second problem with isolationism and, it’s the basis for my charge of naivety, is that it’s completely unrealistic in a global economy. The very nature of international trade requires that countries meddle with each other. Often times that meddlesome comes in the form of treaties and agreements in international groups. Its worth noting that the more engaged a country is in global trade, that is the more amenable its to being meddle with, the less likely organizations from that country will form to harm the US. Unless you advocate the US pulls out of international trade it is simply impossible to strictly adhere to a isolationism policy and I don’t know about you but I like my iPods cheap.
The third problem is that isolationism restricts intervention in instances in which a state is committing atrocious acts against another state or it’s own people. Would Ron Paul have intervened in the Second World War? He certainly could not have done so on the basis of stopping the holocaust. How about Kuwait, Sudan, Darfur or Rwanda? Isolationism restricts intervention in any of these instances. Some might like to have the option open to intervene on moral grounds. I would like the option open.
There are more reasons why such a policy is foolish but I don’t want to list all of them.
If you ask me, a much more meaningful explanation for why some organizations do harm is because they live under an oppressive regime that often scapegoats US policy as to why they are oppressed. Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Osama argue that his antipathy towards the US was based on his belief that Saudi Arabian oppressive government was able to retain power thanks to the US?
It’s not meddling that causes the problem but oppressive regimes blaming the US for the oppression that is the problem. If you ask me, this is one of the reasons why invading Iraq was prudent. While it’s the case that terrorism was not coming out of that country, the conditions were absolutely ripe for it to occur. By invading and setting up a democracy you nip in the bud the development of fractious organizations that could have been inimical to the US.
In this explanation, the best way to deal with US hatred is to regime change nations that oppress their people. Clearly this is unlikely to work from a political perspective but what you might try and do is set up some free market democracy in some key regions until you run out of political will. Hopefully, over time liberal ideology will spread to the more oppressive regimes leading to bloodless democratic revolution. This seems to be in part the current administration plan in Iraq and Afghanistan. Under this policy, I think it would wise to add Iran to the list. This would allow the three nascent Democracies to form a strong contiguous allied front for liberal values in the Middle East.
With any luck, Iran will continue its efforts to build nuclear weapons giving the next administration the political capital needed to invade and establish democracy in that country. We can only hope for such luck.
December 4th, 2007 at 3:38 pm
I agree with the need for an interventionist policy. However, what really really really bothers me about YOU supporting an interventionist policy is that you also think that we don’t have to respect the rights of any non-citizens.
December 4th, 2007 at 3:47 pm
By definition non-citizens don’t receive rights from the state. But i promise to be really nice to any foreign citizenry that is not actively attacking my military.
Does that work for you?
December 4th, 2007 at 8:37 pm
I might buy that promise from you, because I know you. I’m not that trusting of the government- and I’m surprised that you are.
December 4th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
We can handle this two ways.
1. We can propose a international government with coercive force that can stop local nation states from violating international citizen rights.
2. We could keep the states as the absolute arbiter of rights to it’s citizens granting them freedom to treat citizens and non-citizens as they please with the only caveat the any other nation state may interfere with the way that state treats citizens or non-citizens.
I would argue in favor of the second option. As it so happens, this leads to less government oversight which is precisely in keeping with my position.
Whats nice about the second option is that the people can define its rights to the states as it pleases. It grants more freedom to more people. As a bonus, the most powerful nations in general derive their power from having democratic values. These groups of people are the ones most likely to treat non-citizens in the fairest way without imperiling the citizens to much. In this way the most powerful nations states are tempered by the democracy that bring them their power. In a sense, the way you entrust me with non-citizens I trust democratic countries do the right thing.
December 5th, 2007 at 1:28 am
Sorry, the second point is a single sentence, and I’m unable to sucessfully parse it. Could you re-state it? I want to understand your point.
December 5th, 2007 at 2:48 am
My bad.
2. We could keep the nation states as the absolute arbiter of rights to it’s citizens. We would grant nation states the freedom to treat citizens and non-citizens as they please. The only caveat is that any other nation state may interfere with any other nation state as it sees fit.
December 5th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
Oh ok, that makes sense. Yeah, we should keep individual nations with their own policies. And as I said at the start, I’m in favor of an interventionalist policy in general for the US. However, give nhow both you and the current administration have been slipping towards the position that non-citizens have no rights and therefore it’s ok to torture them, detain them secretly forever without presentin evidence, etc., I’d really really prefer that we, as a nation, democratically decide on some ground rules as to how we will treat non-citizens during these types of interventions. For a long time the Geneva Conventions have successully filled this role, but given your arguments that those Conventions don’t apply to the people we’re picking up now, I’d like us, as a nation, to decide on our policy before we do anything else.
December 5th, 2007 at 5:01 pm
We already did. Turns out non-citizens have a limited version of haebus corpus. Sounds about right to me.
December 5th, 2007 at 5:31 pm
I think you took my statement a little bit farther than I had intended. You brought up several excellent points about the disadvantages of isolationism, which is why I am not an isolationist, nor have I ever been. Our economy is a global one, and these economic ties have been the major reason IMHO why we have not and will not see another world war or other large scale conflict. The countries of the world are simply too interdependent, which is why the major violence (though not major in a historical or per capita sense) today comes not from nations but from radical groups that do not represent any country. These groups are often formed under oppressive regimes, and they do scapegoat America for various reasons.
My point is that the United States should not embargo and sanction the hell out of nations whose ideologies we do not agree with until we decide to take military action to change the oppressive regime. By isolating these nations, we cut their citizens off from the free exchange of ideas that helped to spread democracy in the first place. We allow these dictators to continue their shabby treatment of their people, and allow them to blame their problems on the US, as we are not their to defend ourselves. Economic sanctions only worsen the problem as they cause these countries to deteriorate, and they now have these sanctions placed by America to blame for it.
Isolationism has never been my goal. Quite the opposite. I wish to bring these wayward nations into the economic fold. Look at China, once staunch communists, it has now become impossible for them to remain so as the free global market becomes ever more tantalizing and rewarding. However, look at Cuba and North Korea (and Saddam’s Iraq), both countries cut off from the outside world, their populaces ignorant of what is really going on, and they remain communists because they don’t see a better way. Also, it is much easier this way for their leaders to stay in power. I’m guessing if they had more oppressive regimes they would spawn anti-US terrorists.
And now to Saudi Arabia–birthplace of 15 of the 19 hijackers. Oil accounts for 90 percent of their total exports, meaning their populace as a whole is not terribly involved in the global economy. Their government is set up to receive a great deal of this money and has created a welfare state. They do not in any real sense COMPETE in the global economy, they are just lucky to be living on top of the largest oil reserves in the world. Government funded schools teach Islam, the country is governed by Shari’a law, unemployment is at 12%, and i’m guessing people don’t learn much about democracy considering it’s a monarchy. So their is this oil funded, human rights abusing regime that produces terrorists as a by-product, and guess which country buys the most oil?
I want to see America involved in varied and positive ways in other countries’ economies. It is those ties that keep countries from going to war, it is those ties that allow people from different nations to put aside their differences for mutual benefit. It is most important to build those ties in nations that we do not have them with, so that we can be a positive force in those countries and vice versa. And while we are involved in those countries, those people might learn a little about democracy. And as we have seen across the globe, once people learn about democracy, it isn’t long before they want it. And that’s all it takes. It is not in line with the principles of democracy to shove it down people’s throats. They have to want it. All I am saying is that we need to be in a position to give these people information on democracy when they are ready (which they just might be if they are living under oppressive regimes).
In sum: keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.
December 5th, 2007 at 5:53 pm
Good lord I just read your last paragraph. Iran? come on, most of those people like us, Ahmadenijad has no real power, and they wouldn’t ever attack us with nukes because we would turn their country into a parking lot. Please stop with this anti-Iran nonsense, i would like to think it is below you.
December 5th, 2007 at 8:21 pm
If military efforts were the most decisive factor in reducing terrorism, Costa Rica would suffer from at least as much terrorism as any other country in the world.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_of_Costa_Rica
December 5th, 2007 at 11:56 pm
Dan, if that comment is aimed at me please point to where I say that ‘military efforts are the most decisive factor in reducing terrorism’.
December 6th, 2007 at 12:05 pm
“Prior to 2003, the US did not occupy land in the Middle East. This is problematic to your position given what happened on 9/11.”
I don’t think you are honestly ignorant enough to actually believe that the US had no involvement there. You are trying to argue against this position, if I am unmistaken:
“Meddling with other countries affairs is bound to breed discontentment.”
You imply instead that if a country meddles it will instead cause a decrease of terrorism directed against said country. This would presumably also carry with it the idea that failure to meddle emboldens terrorism against the country that fails to meddle. If this is the case, why isn’t Costa Rica (a mostly nonmeddling state) a victim of more international terrorism than countries that currently have policies of meddling, such as the US and Israel?
December 6th, 2007 at 1:19 pm
You failed. I have no idea how these things are related. Furthermore, I have no idea how you are getting to the characterizations of my positions you state in your last comment. I can truly say I am fucking baffled. It feels like you didn’t read my post.
December 6th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Aw. Poor Steve, routed again.
“I think you are echoing a common sentiment, typically referred to as isolationism, which goes something like this:
Meddling with other countries affairs is bound to breed discontentment. This discontent can boil over causing the formation of organizations intent on harming our country. Therefore, it’s best to not meddle in other country’s affairs.
Much like Humanism, isolationism is a hopelessly naïve view of the world. Let’s look at it some different reasons why.”
You provide a definition of what you are referring to when you say ‘isolationism’, and then you proceed to yammer about something else for a while, before attacking that position. Your attack attempts to build an argument that “the best way to deal with US hatred is to regime change nations that oppress their people.” - a clearly ‘meddling’ solution.
This isn’t rocket science. I’m unclear as to why you are apparently trying to retreat from/disavow your argument against the ‘meddling is bad’ position (by claiming that I am being unfair in attributing it to you), unless you merely realized that it was indefensible and are trying to avoid losing face by throwing unsubstantiated accusations of failure in my direction.
December 10th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Still confused. I was never making the argument meddling is always bad.
December 11th, 2007 at 1:00 am
“against” - Daniel
December 11th, 2007 at 1:38 am
Still confused.