A Neocon in Realist's Clothing
By David J. Rothkopf
I think Paul Wolfowitz performs a useful service by thoughtfully and systematically examining the underlying flaws in the current conception of "realism" -- the hype surrounding it and the "policies" associated with it. If only someone had more effectively done the same with neoconservatism -- which, of course, was neither new nor, as it was practiced by the Bush administration, remotely conservative. (How could anything so politically and militarily risky, fiscally wasteful, and seemingly allergic to any principle, be called "conservative"?)
Reading Wolfowitz's piece, I kept thanking Providence for giving me a concentration in English in college rather than say, political science. I actually was taught what words mean. (In fact, being an English major taught me that "political science" may be the humdinger of all oxymorons ... even if calling "realists" realists and "neoconservatives" neoconservatives comes pretty darn close.) Economists have their "lies, damned lies, and statistics" and clearly, political scientists have their "lies, damned lies, and labels."
It's not just "neocons" and "realists" of course who are mislabeled or falsely advertising themselves. There is nothing "conservative" about the reckless fiscal policies of "conservative" champions like Reagan or Bush, nothing "progressive" about the New Deal nostalgia of many on the left, nothing "pro-life" about abortion opponents who also use a misreading of the Second Amendment to allow them stock up on assault weapons, nothing "liberal" about folks who think the answer to everything is greater government control of people's lives. Say what you may about the underlying beliefs, the labels are meaningless.
That said, if we can stipulate the labels are primarily forms of branding and positioning that are as related to the underlying realities as Madison Avenue claims of the health-benefits of smoking in the middle of the last century, then we can move on to the more relevant policy questions raised by Wolfowitz. These turn not on whether "realists" are more realistic than other policymakers but rather on whether the "realism" peddled to the public actually holds water as an approach.
Here I think Wolfowitz is at his most compelling. He frames the issue -- and some "realists" will no doubt dispute his approach but I think the issue he raises is worth discussing -- by observing that: "In the words of one leading realist, the principal purpose of U.S. foreign policy should be 'to manage relations between states' rather than 'alter the nature of states.'" He then goes on to point out that if your goal is to advance the U.S. national interest and to "manage relations between states," then you really need to consider from time to time altering the nature of states. Hard to argue with that, in my book.
If the objective is to advance the national interest and influence states and our ability to do so is limited and different from circumstance to circumstance, shouldn't we use every tool at our disposal to do so (assuming the use of the tool provides a net gain toward achieving our goals)? If so, influencing the nature of states or the internal workings of states is not off bounds for realism -- it is the beginning of realism -- it is the place where the effort to influence states begins.
But I would go further. I think this type of "realism" is founded on a false assumption and a fiction. The false assumption is that the central work involved in advancing the national interest involves relations between states. This ignores the fact that states are only one among the many types of actors in the world who can impact our national interests. The related fiction is that borders constitute a kind of sovereign bubble and that within that bubble there is a kind of magical unity. Or at least that within that bubble all disagreement is trumped by the sovereign power of the state. That is, of course, patent nonsense in a world in which non-state actors from giant corporations to terrorist groups act in their narrow self-interests and in ways that are often at odds with the policy of the states in which they are domiciled. In fact, I would argue that the vast majority of states are now so weak that they are much less influential than say the world's largest corporations on economic issues, the world's largest NGOs on key humanitarian issues, or the world's most notorious terror or criminal groups on security issues.
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