Great post, eriposte, thanks. I'm in the read your history and get completley out of both camp.
Posted by TIKI AL at December 24, 2008 09:33 AMWe cannot have an enlightened foreign policy, for the simple reason that we cannot have a foreign policy at all. All politics is domestic and therefore all foreign policy is merely an allegory for domestic factional politics.
Posted by Frank Wilhoit at December 24, 2008 10:02 AMFrank, you seem to be saying that by definition a policy is part of politics. My dictionary's first definition of "policy" is simply "plan of action", and if a government is going to interact with the rest of the world (as it obviously is), then it's going to have a plan of action or at least a series of plans. No doubt it usually is the case that foreign policy is domestic policy writ large (whichever country we're talking about), but it would be nice if the USA, in view of its enormous power and influence, could try to disentangle the two a bit.
For instance, many Americans claim as a success the fact that since the World Trade Center, there have been no terrorist attacks on US soil, and of course the first concern of a state must be its own citizens. But does it always have to be "own citizens first and the rest of the world nowhere"?
This applies just as much to the UK, insofar as we still have any power and influence in the world. Any attempts even to talk about an ethical foreign policy have been met with derision in sections of the British press, and I dare say it would be the same in the USA, but wouldn't it be great if we could get away from, for instance, the idea of supporting any foreign government, however brutal, against its domestic opposition, just because that opposition is somewhat left-wing, and/or because the "stability" provided by the brutal regime makes things easier for trade? No doubt such thoughts are impossibly idealistic, but, as the world grows smaller and weaponry more formidable, if we don't all swim together we may sink together.
I think two factors are very important. Economic issues have never been so important and Obama is not ideological - he is very much a pragmatist. I think you'll find Clinton uses a broader State involvement to implement administration policy but that policy is going to be decided on a cabinet level. I expect very little turf war on economic issues. Neither State or Treasury will be off message. I strongly suspect that Obama is not a fan of Monetarist philosophy and Treasury, the World Bank, etc... will be much more regionally contextual in their policy regardless of the level of State involvement.
Posted by allansfca at December 25, 2008 08:45 PM