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Internationale instellingen zijn nog steeds belangrijk voor de VS

Nov 9, 2020 Joseph S. Nye, Jr.

CAMBRIDGE – Donald Trump mag dan zijn minachting hebben getoond voor internationale instellingen, zijn presidentschap van de VS heeft de wereld herinnerd aan het belang van effectieve en veerkrachtige instituties. Bij de presidentsverkiezingen van 2016 voerde Trump campagne op basis van het betoog dat de multilaterale instellingen van na 1945 andere landen hadden laten profiteren op kosten van de Amerikanen. Zijn populistische aantrekkingskracht berustte uiteraard op veel meer dan zijn buitenlands beleid, maar Trump legde met succes een verband tussen binnenlandse ressentimenten en het buitenlands beleid door economische problemen te wijten aan ʻslechteʼ handelsverdragen met landen als Mexico en China, en aan immigranten die wedijveren om Amerikaanse banen. De liberale internationale orde van na 1945 werd als de grote boosdoener afgeschilderd.

Zoals ik laat zien in mijn boek Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump, zijn Amerikaanse presidenten nooit perfecte institutionele liberalen geweest. De steun van Dwight Eisenhower voor heimelijke acties in Iran en Guatemala, en die van John F. Kennedy voor die in Cuba, waren niet te verenigen met een strikte lezing van het Handvest van de VN. Richard Nixon doorbrak de regels van de economische instellingen van Bretton Woods en hief in 1971 importtarieven op de producten van onze bondgenoten. Ronald Reagan negeerde een uitspraak van het Internationale Hof van Justitie, waarin het leggen van mijnen door zijn regering in de havens van Nicaragua illegaal werd verklaard. Bill Clinton bombardeerde Servië zonder een resolutie van de Veiligheidsraad.

Niettemin steunden Amerikaanse presidenten vóór 2016 in de meeste gevallen internationale instellingen en streefden ze naar de uitbreiding ervan, of het nu ging om het non-proliferatieverdrag onder Lyndon Johnson, wapenbeheersingsverdragen onder Nixon, het verdrag van Rio de Janeiro over klimaatverandering onder George H.W. Bush, de Wereldhandelsorganisatie (WTO) en het controleregime op rakettechnologie onder Clinton, of het klimaatverdrag van Parijs onder Barack Obama.

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j. von Hettlingen Nov 11, 2020

According to Joseph S. Nye, Jr. we live in a “century of transnational interdependence.” In our interconnected world, “isolation is not an option, and nationalism versus globalization is a false choice.” A pandemic or a “carbon atom” does not respect borders and politics. The right approach is “to combine a strong national identity and global concern.” Close cooperation between countries to combat many global challenges is essential, because these threats cannot be solved on national level by one country alone.
The author quotes the historian and philosopher, Yuval Harari, who in an interview in May, 2019 said that nuclear war, climate change, and tecnological disruption are the “three common problems” humankind faces, because they “make a mockery of all national borders,” and that they “can be solved only through global cooperation.” Harari insisted artificial intelligence poses as great a threat to humankind as climate change and nuclear war and a technology race in genetics could threaten the whole of humanity.
Since Trump took office, he has been shredding institutions at home and abroad, making good on his 2016 campaign promises. He believed “the post-1945 multilateral institutions had let other countries benefit at American expense. His populist appeal rested on far more than foreign policy,” because he “successfully linked domestic resentments to foreign policy by blaming economic problems on ‘bad’ trade deals with countries like Mexico and China and on immigrants competing for jobs. The post-1945 liberal international order was cast as a villain.”
Tracking presidents and foreign policy from FDR to Trump, the author comes to the conclusion that “American presidents in most instances supported international institutions and sought their extension, whether it was the Non-Proliferation Treaty under Lyndon Johnson; arms control agreements under Nixon; the Rio de Janeiro agreement on climate change under George H.W. Bush; the World Trade Organization and the Missile Technology Control Regime under Clinton; or the Paris climate agreement under Barack Obama.”
Echoing Trump’s utter disdain of multilateral institutions, his top diplomat, Mike Pompeo questioned the values of the UN and the EU in a speech in December 2018. He claimed that since the end of the Cold War in 1990, the international order “has failed” the US, and “multilateralism has become viewed as an end unto itself. The more treaties we sign, the safer we supposedly are. The more bureaucrats we have, the better the job gets done.” Trump pulled the US out of the Paris climate accord and the World Health Organization, as a result of his “narrow transactional approach” to institutions.
As Trump is not educated in political science and surrounds himself with incompetent people, they have failed to understand the significant role multilateral institutions play. They are needed to solve increasingly complex collective action problems. They co-ordinate the actions of individual states, and together they help create global public goods such as public health, particularly contagious disease control; global peace and security; concerted management of the global natural commons to promote their sustainable use and to protect the environment etc.
Institutions “can sometimes lose their value and become illegitimate,” because they have been rendered obsolete in the absence of innovation and reform. Trump has disparaged the World Trade Organization. In his view the WTO is outdated, sclerotic, and generally bad for America. “By renegotiating various trade agreements in a manner that damaged the WTO and US alliances, the Trump administration showed that the US, as the world’s most powerful country, can break these threads and maximize its short-term bargaining power.”
The author urges the US to build “a network of multilayered partnerships with others.” He says America can rely on its “hard military and economic power but also…its soft power of attraction, based on an open and inclusive culture, liberal democratic values, and policies that are widely perceived as legitimate.” It does not hurt to have a Jeffersonian “decent respect for the opinions of [human]kind” and the “use of institutions that encourage reciprocity, which will be “crucial to the success of US foreign policy.”
To cite Henry Kissinger, “the world order depends on the ability of a leading state to combine power and legitimacy. Institutions are indispensable to that end.” In the face of “a more complex world, the US must cooperate with others, and use its soft power to attract their cooperation. America will need to exercise power with as well as power over others. The success of Joe Biden’s foreign policy will depend on how quickly we can relearn these institutional lessons.”
Biden plans to re-engage with traditional allies and has assembled an experienced team of foreign policy advisers. There are plenty of highly qualified and seasoned diplomats who left the administration after Trump gutted the State Department, leaving many overseas posts unfilled.
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Michael Public Nov 9, 2020

But China.
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