1.24.2005
Freedom Is Not a Doctrine (WashingtonPost.com)
Promoting Democracy Is the Wrong Priority for Foreign Policy
By Richard N. Haass
Monday, January 24, 2005; Page A15
The idea, stated forcefully by President Bush in his second inaugural, that the United States would henceforth support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture "with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world" is by any yardstick an important declaration. A foreign policy doctrine, however, it is not. This is not to suggest that democracy doesn't matter. There is, for example, considerable evidence suggesting that mature democracies tend not to make war on one another. Today's Europe best illustrates this phenomenon.
Promoting democracy can also be useful as one component of the campaign against terrorism. Young men and women who are more involved in their societies and less alienated from their governments might see more reason to live for their causes than to kill and die for them. With luck, they might choose to become teachers rather than terrorists.
But there are more reasons to conclude that it is neither desirable nor practical to make democracy promotion the dominant feature of American foreign policy. The bottom line is that while the nature of other societies should always be a foreign policy consideration, it cannot and should not always be the foreign policy priority.
To begin with, democracies are not always peaceful. Immature democracies -- those that hold elections but lack many of the checks and balances characteristic of a true democracy -- are particularly vulnerable to being hijacked by popular passions. Post-communist Serbia is but one illustration of the reality that such countries do go to war.
(More ... Freedom Is Not a Doctrine (washingtonpost.com)) ¶ 21:28
By Richard N. Haass
Monday, January 24, 2005; Page A15
The idea, stated forcefully by President Bush in his second inaugural, that the United States would henceforth support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture "with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world" is by any yardstick an important declaration. A foreign policy doctrine, however, it is not. This is not to suggest that democracy doesn't matter. There is, for example, considerable evidence suggesting that mature democracies tend not to make war on one another. Today's Europe best illustrates this phenomenon.
Promoting democracy can also be useful as one component of the campaign against terrorism. Young men and women who are more involved in their societies and less alienated from their governments might see more reason to live for their causes than to kill and die for them. With luck, they might choose to become teachers rather than terrorists.
But there are more reasons to conclude that it is neither desirable nor practical to make democracy promotion the dominant feature of American foreign policy. The bottom line is that while the nature of other societies should always be a foreign policy consideration, it cannot and should not always be the foreign policy priority.
To begin with, democracies are not always peaceful. Immature democracies -- those that hold elections but lack many of the checks and balances characteristic of a true democracy -- are particularly vulnerable to being hijacked by popular passions. Post-communist Serbia is but one illustration of the reality that such countries do go to war.
(More ... Freedom Is Not a Doctrine (washingtonpost.com)) ¶ 21:28
