I would like to respond to a question brought up in today’s discussion.
“Would a liberalist state be more effective in dealing with issues of national sovereignty than a realist one?”
Liberalists tend to be optimistic. They strive for cooperation among nations, aim for negotiation instead of war, and look for mutual benefits.
Realists tend to be pessimistic. They view the global community as a constant power competition. As Machiavelli emphasized repeatedly, maintaining security is of the upmost importance because the international system is, according to him, dangerous. And as Machiavelli points out, you can’t trust anyone. These realist principles create an environment of tension and paranoia.
Liberalists would most definitely be effective in dealing with issues of national sovereignty because their goal is to reach an agreement through negotiation and to avoid fighting when possible. Liberalists also approach everything with rationality. Because of interdependence, sovereign states often choose to cooperate and recognize the importance of inter-state relations. Liberalists would much rather address a conflict with the intentions of a positive outcome because they wouldn’t want to lose a neighbor who provides valuable resources.
Another question that was brought up in class was, “Can the United States be considered a liberal state when only 9 days after the 9/11 attacks President Bush announced plans to send troops overseas?”
Some people argued that liberalists are generally slow to make decisions and that this was a rather speedy action on part of the United States. People also voiced their opinions that what drove the decision to send troops overseas was ignited emotion and that a large part of the fear, shock, and anger among Americans was stirred by the media. Was this U.S. action driven by emotion as opposed to rational thought? Although the media may have contributed to public sentiment, I do not believe it was the sole factor in support for the war.
We must consider the basis for this decision. Liberals advocate cooperation and open dialogue among international actors. However, cooperation is a two way street. In an extreme case where our nation suffered a direct attack on its people, the necessity to act more quickly became greater. Therefore, I maintain that the government’s relatively quick decision to send troops overseas was not a shift away from liberalist policy, but rather a power that has been consented to by the people through a constitution.
In regards to the second question you addressed, the accelerated response from the U.S. on 9/11 almost certainly does not coincide with the liberal ideals of pacifism and the furtherance of rationality. The United States immediately became the aggressor in Afghanistan and Iraq, neither of which had harmed America. Liberalism asserts that a liberal state is only on the extremely rare occasion, the initial aggressor in a conflict. In the case of the 9/11 response, the U.S. was this aggressor because it was a terrorist group that had attacked us, not a state.
ReplyDeleteThe invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan coincide more clearly with realist ideology, because in both cases the U.S. was attempting to maintain a balance of power, by overthrowing Saddam Hussein and the Taliban regime. Liberalists would assert that those attacks were a crusade against undemocratic ideals, but that is merely a spin off the reality that both of those countries were blockades to economic interests, and threats to U.S. security. The government acted as a realist entity regarding that decision, but one decision does not mean a complete decent from liberal ideals.