Nation Building

OK, so I normally don't tread in political waters because I get very bored very quickly with political conversations if I feel there's no productive conversation and the talk turns into radically opinionated views. However, my mom forwarded me on an article that she read, and asked me what I thought about it. I ended up writing a bit of a response, and then Ryan chimed in. I thought it might be interesting to post our thoughts online, since I think it's a pretty nuanced topic. If you would like to share your own views, feel free to leave a comment. If you feel the need to rant and rave, please move on. :)

I don't want to violate any copyright laws by reprinting the article on my blog, so instead, to read the initial article written by Steven E. Meyer, Professor of Political Science at the National Defense University, you can download the PDF here: http://www.cpjustice.org/files/nationbuilding.pdf

My response to the article was this:

I think that there's some truth to the article.. (As an illustration, we told the Palestinians they needed to be a democracy, so they had a fair election and elected Hamas. I think that left everyone in the Bush administration scratching their head saying, "No, wait... that's not what we meant...")

I've always tended to fall on the non-protectionist side of things, though, I'd say. I see this in several ways:

1.) I do feel like God has blessed our country with amazing wealth and assets. In situations of genocide like Germany , Serbia , or Darfur , I do feel we have a moral obligation to not sit by. To say, "Well, the oppressive regime doesn't want us to inflict our ideals on them, so we'll sit home," is not a good answer, in my opinion. I don't call this evangelism, I call it being a responsible nation.

2.) Unfortunately, we live in world where people do bad things. It does seem to be true that in countries where people are poor and unemployed, they have a lot of anger and a lot of free time on their hands to think of bad things to do. In general, democracies are places where businesses thrive and people get jobs. In countries where people are working, they don't have time to think up plans about how to fly planes into buildings; they're too busy filling up the cars with gas and buying groceries. Simplistic, but true. In this sense, I think that spreading peace and stability throughout the world is the best way to keep people from hating us. Unfortunately, as we both know and the article points out, if you're spreading more war than peace, and fomenting instability rather than stability, this is going to back fire. But I would stick to the idea that sitting home and saying, "Well, we don't want to inflict our views on others" is very short sighted, if our neighbors are building rocket launchers in our back yard. Our government does have an obligation to protect the safety of our country, and I don't think it's ridiculous to say that investing money abroad can reap benefits at home.

3.) I started reading a book about a year ago published by a woman who worked for Gallup and specifically polled people in the Muslim world. One of the interesting points of the book is that, based on surveys of people in Muslim countries, people there actually do want more democracy. (They don't see democracy as being opposite of Sharia law, the way most Americans don't see basing laws on Biblical principles opposite to democracy.) I agree that shoving democracy down people's throats is not productive, but I also think we shouldn't neglect the fact that there are people in some of the countries we're involved with who really do want a stable democracy. I don't feel that it's our obligation to help them our per se, the way I feel it's our obligation to stop genocide, but I do think it could be in our best interest to back those people in those countries. That being said, however, I think President Obama did the right thing in Iran, namely not getting involved, because it didn't give the ruling regime any latitude for blaming the rebellion on interference from the U.S.; they had to face the fact that it was their own people who wanted it.

Here was Ryan's response:

At first glance, I disagree largely w/ the conclusions of the author, even though I agree w/ a few of his tenets. My first thought turns to our last successful nation building attempt and that was Japan after WWII. The biggest question lies in why it worked in the case of Japan and why not in most recent circumstances ( Somalia , Iraq , Afghanistan , Bosnia , etc…). I think the biggest reason is one in identity: the Japanese are a single race, religion and (largely) belief system. In Eastern Europe and the Middle East we are working w/ peoples who identify themselves as, for example, Sunni vs. Shiite, not Iraqi or Iranian. The state as a governing body (in this sense) isn’t the main governing body, culture or religion, anymore. I think the author fails to point that out. The reason that the rebuilding of Japan was a success (I believe) is because the US was able to rally the Japanese around a central figure, the emperor, who championed a Western style Democracy. A robust gov’t is a necessity for a functioning society whether that is Socialist or Capitalist, so I disagree w/ his first point; “in the rapidly globalizing world, the state is becoming less important as the only vehicle of political and economic organization and success.” I agree that not all countries will want a US style democracy and we need to accept that. Becky pointed that out w/ the democratic elections that brought Hamas to power in Palestine . I can’t remember the Bush administration’s position, but I re-call them being somewhat flabbergasted at the results. In that point I agree that it is the height of arrogance if we expect non-Americans to choose an American-like outcome. However, there is a STRONG connection between weak or unstable govt’s and terrorism. In a weak state, agent’s of terror reign at their own will; in a strong state, they are kept in check (by the degree the powers at be want to control them) by the governing authorities. Dictators who allow terrorists to operate in their country don’t do so willy-nilly b/c that is a risk to their own power. I think that is obvious in Iran . Counter that to weak states like Pakistan and Afghanistan and you see how the Taliban has carved out their own little piece of the country. I believe that nation building does work, however this is not an easy road. The Japanese took 20-30 years of re-building and progress to be able to start to become the 2nd largest economy in the world. It wasn’t until the late 80’s early 90’s when Japan arrived as the force they are today. If a common interest (or national moniker) can unite a people, whether that be their ethnic identity (the case of Japan), or the realized need to share resources in order to prosper (oil in Iraq, perhaps) something greater than the forces bringing all parties to the table must be present. This is the hope that democracy brings. To us democracy means that every man, woman and child has a chance no matter what their background is; right now people, in Iraq let’s say, only know dictatorial rule. Only through a long stable presence can a population see the long term benefits of change. I do believe that we will ultimately be successful in our current efforts, but it is not easy and it is far from over.

It sounds to me that the author is making broad generalizations about anyone who believes that nation building will work. France , England , Germany and the US are all democracies, but they are all very different countries and their political system reflects that. I would imagine that anyone who is seriously involved in this process understands how to allow cultural differences to shape another country’s style of democracy as it evolves. The author assumes that all who are for nation building support the solely an American version of it. I think that is rather naïve.

I agree that Christians are called to bring Christ’s message to the world, but Christ’s message was not the American Capitalist style of Democracy. A lot of Christian principles are reflected in our style of governing and why we want to spread something that has been good for our country to other countries. If you have something good, what is wrong with wanting to share that so other people can experience that? I think there is a fundamental split I ideology where either you think that people are either more similar or dissimilar from each other. If we believe people are dissimilar I guess it would be easier to reason that what is good for the goose isn’t necessarily good for the gander. I happen to believe that even across cultures people have more in common w/ each other than we have differences. That being the case, why not try and share something that works well w/ others who are suffering?

I think the author’s point about why we are where we are at is wrong: We are re-building nations in Iraq and Afghanistan b/c if we expel something evil and do not replace it with anything positive, the evil will return sevenfold. In order to maintain stability, we MUST rebuild any nation where we topple a dictator figure and maintain a presence until the country is stable. A strong stable gov’t will discourage lawless vigilantism and terrorism. One that listens to and respects its people is the form that we are seeking to spread. This is a principle straight from the Bible. I don’t know what the author would have us do instead. One thing I do recall is how shortly after the initial surge in Iraq did the Bush administration have to cobble together a plan for nation building. One thing was clear to me: we didn’t invade w/ any intent on trying to make Iraq be like the US . However, we found ourselves in the position that since we broke it, it was our responsibility to fix it. I think we’ve done a good job since then, but one thing that is forgotten here is how haphazard things were right after we realized that we were going to have to run another country.