Germany: a few thoughts and impressions

https://markenglish.substack.com/p/brief-travel-update-germany?r=3knty7

A few thoughts and personal impressions garnered from my twelve-week stay.

Death and destruction

My analysis of the Ukraine situation has continued to attract criticism. I have been saying for some time that American and NATO strategies are fatally flawed and extremely dangerous. Responding to the latest episode of my podcast, Culture and Value, which was featured recently at The Electric Agora, Daniel Kaufman commented:

"The idea that somehow Ukraine is at fault for the prolonged death and suffering from the war – or those like the US, UK and others who are helping Ukraine – is not only a poor analysis of the situation, it represents what to my mind are really terrible values. Ukraine does not want to surrender. It does not want to hand over part – or all – of its country to Vlad the Impaler and his armies. It does not accept the rape and torture and mass murder that Russia has been inflicting on it. The idea that it should ... in order to satisfy your conception of proper geopolitical order – or that of Russia or any of the other murderocracies and kleptocracies on the planet – is just so out of whack, I don’t even know how to respond to it."

I question some of Dan's assumptions here and naturally reject any suggestion that my values are flawed or my motives tainted. My brief reply to his comment did not deal with Ukraine so much as with what arguably lies at the root of this and certain other international crises (or potential crises): the failure of those currently in power to see and come to terms with a changed geo-strategic environment.

I wrote as follows:

I am not talking about some desired political order. Rather I am noting, as carefully and accurately as I can, current geopolitical and geo-economic realities. I am making the point that the situation has changed over the last thirty years or so and not in ways which favour an overwhelming level of American dominance (such as applied immediately after WW2, and again after the break up of the Soviet Union) in the future.

For example, the US is no longer as economically dominant as it once was. Its share of the global economy has declined from about 40 percent in 1960 to about 24 percent today. This in itself is not necessarily a bad thing but it does mean that a broader range of countries will have a say in reshaping the financial system than was the case, say, in the immediate post-WW2 period.

This is important because economic factors underpin military power. And though the USD is strong at the moment, the widely-acknowledged fragility of the current debt- and derivative-based financial system – a system which creates demand for (and so guarantees the value of) the dollar – strongly suggests that the United States will not be able to continue to play, at least to the same degree, the dominant global role which it has played over the last three-quarters of a century.

Inertia

Even at the best of times I am not a model of decisive action, but I have to say that it feels more and more difficult to set goals and maintain personal momentum in the present environment.

It’s not just me. The bureaucracy in which we are all increasingly enmeshed is failing. A wave of indolence or “quiet quitting” is washing over the white-collar workforce.

Case in point: earlier this year I applied for a new passport. Since then I have rung the issuing office twice. Twice they apologized; twice I was told that the process would be fast-tracked. Nothing. No communication from them. When I handed in my application I was assured that the passport would be ready within six weeks. I have now been waiting more than four months.

I had hoped to begin my travels some time ago. The lockdowns, curfews and travel bans may finally have been lifted but it is difficult to make concrete plans without a passport – especially when one has no clear idea of what is causing the delay. Only when I have the new passport in my hands will I think seriously about booking flights, etc..

This passport business is relatively trivial – in my case at least. No grave implications. But it is certainly emblematic, and indicative of wider problems.

Here is a short list of some of my current (non-travel-related) preoccupations…

Health concerns are always there, even in the absence of (known) serious illness or disease. This is particularly so as one ages. Personally I am prone to health-related anxieties and, consequently, try to minimize my interactions with Dr. Google and the medical profession. So long as I can function more or less normally and have no new or alarming symptoms, I feel justified in putting my focus on other things than the inner workings of my body. One health-related area I do take an interest in, however, is preventive medicine, and especially the effect of diet on health.

I had expected (or hoped) that the SARS-CoV-2 virus would be fading from the scene by now but it continues to spread. Worse still, bad news is coming through on the long-term effects of COVID-19. If (as seems to be the case) the virus was a product of gain-of-function research conducted under the auspices of various national governments and official agencies, this is not only a tragedy of epic proportions (it obviously is that) but also a scandal which, by further undermining trust in ruling elites, will have deep and lasting political implications.

Though they don’t concern me in a direct or personal way, I am following geopolitical developments closely. I am concerned by the belligerent stances being assumed by all major powers, and by the lack of leadership and intelligent diplomacy being exhibited by major Western powers.

More generally, I am appalled by the transformation of our media into an integrated propaganda machine. News has always been propaganda to an extent but the balance between propaganda and hard (factual or critical) content varies from time to time and from place to place. What we are seeing now in the West is somewhat reminiscent of old communist and fascist models and of World War 2-era American and British newspapers and newsreels, etc.. But arguably the situation is worse now than it was back then because of the intrusive nature of current technologies. The combination of digital news services and social media has produced an integrated – and insidious – framework of communication which is being effectively exploited by governments, powerful corporations and other favoured organizations.

As a preparation for possible future writing on social, economic and geopolitical themes, I have been reading (or rereading) the work of some early 20th-century thinkers, including Louis Rougier. Born in Lyon in 1889, Rougier was an intellectual historian and social philosopher who, unlike many intellectuals, had a good grasp of fundamental social, political and economic principles. In his best writings (from the 1930s and 1940s especially) he takes a refreshingly down-to-earth and non-ideological approach to political and economic questions. More on him later perhaps.

Politics and personal values; the Taiwan question

Personal and political values can be intertwined in complicated ways. Even within close families, there are often serious, politically-driven divides. I talk here about the way my own foreign policy views and attitudes developed, referring to the influence of my father and also to bitter, politically-driven personal rifts which existed at one time within my father’s family.

The latter part of this episode of Culture and Value is devoted to a review of a recent discussion about China’s regional ambitions and to the dangerous game (as I see it) that the United States is currently playing in the Western Pacific, especially in relation to Taiwan.

Endgame

The foreign, defense and trade policies of the United States and the overt and covert operations designed to implement and support them have, over the last 80 years or so, had profound effects on the world. I used to think those effects were positive on the whole. Like so many other foreign consumers of American popular culture, I had absorbed from childhood the usual cinematic clichés concerning the fundamental probity of generations of US leaders and their agents, both civilian and military. Moreover, it was obvious that old empires had failed and it seemed reasonable to see the United States as having taken on the role of de facto imperial power, keeping the sea lanes open and stepping in where necessary to deal with threats to peace and security. The fact that many of us had family who had been saved or protected by US military operations further encouraged and reinforced such views.

What about the deliberate mass killing of civilians by Allied forces during World War 2, the firebombing of cities in Europe and Japan, the Hiroshima and Nagasaki catastrophes? We were inclined to see these as lapses and not representative of the true (and basically benign) nature of US interventions. But such an interpretation has become more and more difficult to sustain.

It is just possible that, for a time, there was some truth to the myth of the essential benignity of US power. But, since the Vietnam War, and certainly since the exposure of the egregious deceptions involved in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq, that myth has lost all plausibility.

In the course of a recent discussion at The Electric Agora, E.J. Winner claimed that people outside the US often fail to appreciate just how combative ordinary Americans are. Quoting General George S. Patton’s remark that “all real Americans love the sting and clash of battle,” he suggested that, “[d]espite the occasional revulsion against war, Americans are on the whole a violent people.”

On the whole? Violent, compared to which other nationalities? Forgive me for being skeptical. Such generalizations may sometimes be meaningful in respect of countries with relatively homogeneous cultures but not, I think, in respect of countries as large and diverse as today’s United States.

Nonetheless, my interlocutor had two specific, and not implausible, points to make regarding “the nuances of the context” in which American foreign policy develops and is carried out. Many Americans, he claimed, are brought up to believe “that they have a special place on this earth,” this feeling of specialness or exceptionalism being reinforced by the knowledge that “the US has the most powerful military the world has ever seen.”

His second point was that the governing elites have a responsibility to constrain and manage these unfortunate inclinations in the context of foreign affairs.

“[Hillary] Clinton may not have understood that, but her advisors would have. [...] Some of Trump’s original advisors understood that – so he got rid of them and surrounded himself with yes-men.”

There are many ways the facts can be analysed here. I would be more inclined to emphasize the isolationist and anti-imperial strands of American culture and to see particular (usually elite) interest groups as having manipulated public opinion in generally hawkish directions. The neoconservative movement, for example, has a well-documented history. Neoconservatives and others committed to various versions of American exceptionalism have profoundly influenced US foreign policy and encouraged high levels of military spending and extensive covert and direct military interventions under successive administrations.

Due to fiscal constraints such policies are clearly unsustainable however. US military power is inextricably bound up with – and dependent on – economic factors and the dominant role that the US dollar has played in world trade. The dollar-based financial system has been failing for years and now seems to be imploding.

I talked about some of these things on this site in January, as a novel coronavirus was silently spreading in the city of Wuhan and beyond. I discussed quantitative easing and the Fed’s failed attempts to wind this back. In the event of another financial crisis occurring, I wondered, what would happen?

Interest rates are extremely low and central bank options are limited. Defaults and/or falling equity prices would destroy large amounts of paper wealth. In the short term, this could lead to a period of dollar strength but – if the actions of the Federal Reserve in recent times are any guide – the money-printing would be stepped up. This could easily lead to serious inflation and an undermining of international confidence in the dollar. Of course, no one can predict exactly how (or when) the endgame will play out but there is little doubt that the US dollar’s days as world reserve currency are numbered.

That crisis is now upon us. For the time being the dollar is strong and analysts at Goldman Sachs and Bank of America recently predicted that it would strengthen further in the near term against most other currencies.

The larger question relates to the sustainability of the US dollar-based financial system. As this system underpins America’s prosperity as well as its geopolitical status and power, radical changes would have radical implications for America’s place – and role – in the world.


[This is a slightly modified version of an EA piece which was published early this month.]

America in decline

An American friend, who shares my views on global politics, diplomacy and foreign policy but not on economics or fiscal and monetary policy, recently wrote:

“I agree that the US is in decline. In theory I believe it can come back, but it is getting harder all the time (and the recovery process more painful). If Trump or Biden are elected this year I will give up on the US as it will not recover to a meaningful degree (if at all) in my lifetime.”

Here is the substance of my response…

Whoever wins the election, the country will remain divided. To an outsider, at any rate, the national symbols and myths no longer seem to be working to create the sense of cohesion which they once provided. America is not the nation it once was. I wonder if it is still a nation at all. (It remains a very powerful state, of course.)

In terms of comparative economic and military might and the diplomatic leverage associated with this, the decline is (I think) irreversible. This may not be such a bad thing, given the increasingly destructive nature of US foreign interventions.

The projection of US power has, at least since World War 2, been closely associated with, and facilitated by, the global role of the US dollar in trade and its status as a reserve currency. But the current US-based system is breaking down. This has implications for all countries, but especially for the US.

The Federal Reserve responded to the 2008 financial crisis by lowering interest rates and pumping hundreds of billions of dollars into the system. This was supposed to be a short-term emergency operation. But the expansionary policies continued. A precarious economy increasingly dependent on government spending and a financial system increasingly dependent on cheap credit led the Federal Reserve (and other central banks) to suppress interest rates by any means possible, including by injecting money directly into the financial system through the purchase of securities from commercial banks and other financial institutions (i.e. quantitative easing). Such policies have facilitated and encouraged further borrowing and malinvestment on an unprecedented scale. The problems are now systemic.

Price signals, which are key drivers of any functioning market, have become so distorted that they can no longer be trusted. Fixed-interest securities, shares and many other financial instruments appear to be massively overvalued. Government and central bank interventions are largely to blame for this but other factors – such as the rise of index funds and other forms of passive investing – have contributed to the problem.

I see it as extremely significant that attempts made in recent years by the Federal Reserve gradually to raise interest rates towards more normal levels and to wind back quantitative easing have failed. In both cases, the Fed has reversed course.

In the event of another financial crisis occurring, what would happen? Interest rates are extremely low and central bank options are limited. Defaults and/or falling equity prices would destroy large amounts of paper wealth. In the short term, this could lead to a period of dollar strength but – if the actions of the Federal Reserve in recent times are any guide – the money-printing would be stepped up. This could easily lead to serious inflation and an undermining of international confidence in the dollar. Of course, no one can predict exactly how (or when) the endgame will play out but there is little doubt that the US dollar’s days as world reserve currency are numbered.

Before confidence – and properly-functioning markets – can be restored, bad debts need to be recognized as such and written off. Zombie banks and zombie companies must be exposed and either allowed to fail or taken over. But, because of the extent of the problems, the system itself – the entire post-Bretton Woods, USD-based system – is now irredeemably compromised. There is no easy way out.

Though it may appear otherwise, my basic sentiments are not – and never have been – anti-American. I am not a US citizen but I love and value many features of 20th-century American culture. Many of these features are exemplified and live on in individual Americans even if they are no longer reflected in contemporary social structures and institutions.

The old ways are dying, the old institutions are gone or changed beyond recognition. Even so, I hold to a hope similar to one I have expressed regarding older European and British traditions: namely, that what is good in what has been lost will eventually be rediscovered and find new (and perhaps more enduring) forms of expression.

Investment decisions; geopolitics

In a letter to a friend I briefly outlined my current investment situation and strategy. It's important, I think, to maintain a steady and realistic perspective on the general situation in financial markets both for practical, investment-related reasons and also for understanding current affairs. Politics, economics and finance are inextricably intertwined.

It helps me to state my general position explicitly from time to time. Obvious facts can be vitally important yet they are often overlooked...

I am in a position where I am forced to bet on how the future pans out in terms of economies, interest rates and currencies. I find myself (for reasons I won’t go into) almost entirely in AUD cash. This is my starting point, for better or for worse. AUD is weak against the US dollar. So I am waiting for something to happen (stock market crash or bond yields spiking or AUD rising against USD or other assets becoming cheaper in AUD terms) so that I can make a move with some confidence that I am not being suckered by a fake market.

Nobody knows when things will blow up. But blow up they must given the absurdly high debt levels and low or negative interest rates which are causing massive malinvestment, destroying savings and pensions and destroying the faith that people once had that price signals and so on could be trusted to reflect actual economic realities.

Many companies are on credit-fueled life support: no prospect of ever turning a profit. That’s in large part why the powers that be have to keep interest rates low. If they rise the non-viable companies go bust. Many corporate bonds become worthless, etc.. And zombie companies are not a small percentage of the total these days. Banks are especially vulnerable.

The same logic applies to individuals and families with big mortgages or other debts. Rising rates will cripple them financially as residential real estate prices fall.

And, of course, governments are heavily indebted too. If rates go up, more of the budget must go to service that debt.

US authorities apparently want to weaken the dollar to stimulate exports etc.. The danger is that at some point the dollar will just suddenly start to lose purchasing power as other means of international payment come on stream.

Confidence in the system is rapidly eroding. There is a growing general realization that the current monetary and financial system is failing but it is impossible to know what exactly is going to replace it. Or when.

US policy on the Middle East (and the Far East) is driven mainly by economic and financial factors – and always has been. (Oil. The dollar.) As the petrodollar system breaks down, there are clearly increased risks of conflict between major powers.

A critique of neoconservatism

Here is an extract from my latest EA piece, on U.S. military adventurism.

"In many cases it’s hard to separate idealism from self-interest. In the case of a number of campaigning journalists and intellectuals with whom I am familiar (and their loyal readers and viewers) the real motivating factors are, I think, both personal and ideological. They see the institutions that reflect and support their personal value systems as being threatened from within their home countries (by the “deplorables” and their like) and also indirectly, by shifts in the geopolitical balance of power. As countries like China increase their economic and military clout, they will become more respected in cultural terms – and increasingly effective in projecting and promoting their value systems. Such qualities as loyalty and patriotism and competitiveness, for example, may be put above the sorts of concerns that usually come under the heading of “social justice.” The perception that the Western progressive agenda (which has been spectacularly successful in shaping social, cultural, legal and educational structures and institutions in North America and Western Europe in recent decades) is under threat seems like a fair reading of the current situation. But starting a world war to defend it is a thoroughly bad idea.

Making reasonable concessions to the independence and perceived security interests of countries like China, Russia and Iran, all of which have suffered from disastrous foreign interventions and invasions in the past, is obviously the right thing to do in the circumstances. But Western powers will not willingly give up the control of the framework of international relations that they currently exercise. As I see it, neoconservative writers and intellectuals are – knowingly or unknowingly – providing justificatory narratives for war-mongering politicians and ultimately serving nefarious purposes by promoting a distorted view of the world based half-truths and discredited myths.

The mainstream media’s fixation on Russia – the old Cold War arch-enemy – is both puzzling and concerning. Likewise, there seems to be very little questioning of the official line that Saudi Arabia is an ally whereas Iran is an implacable foe and fomenter of terrorism. How is it that such stories can go (relatively) unchallenged when Saudi Arabia’s track record on the terror front is so bad and so well-known?

There are certainly a lot of bad things happening in countries like Russia, China and Iran, but not all social evils warrant foreign military intervention."

[The case of North Korea is touched on in the essay. It is hard to see how this situation is going to resolve itself. The latest noises from China suggest that they will not stand for American-initiated regime change; though they can't have much love for the current leader.]

American exceptionalism and foreign policy

[This is a shortened version of my latest Electric Agora essay.]

I have previously drawn attention to the neoconservative elements of Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy orientation and spoken of the dangers (as I see them) of a resurgence of such policies. At the time I wrote my previous piece on this topic (before the first TV debate), the polls were narrowing and the trend favored Trump. Subsequently, things have not gone well for the Republican campaign.

Assuming Clinton does win, I sincerely hope that she changes tack on foreign policy because – given the epochal changes currently underway in the geopolitical and economic spheres – I just don’t see how neoconservative-style policies, based on an essentially imperial vision of America’s role in the world and coupled with a deeply adversarial approach to Russia and China, could possibly play out in a benign way.

There are different views on this, of course, and I am not entirely sure of my position. On NATO, for example, I tend to the view that it should have been gradually scaled back or unwound after the demise of the USSR and that its expansion eastwards (in spite of assurances given to Gorbachev that this would not happen) and current activities have made the likelihood of large-scale war more rather than less likely. Charles Moore, a British neo-conservative who has a very dark view of Putin’s ultimate intentions, has made a case recently for NATO’s continuing importance in constraining Russia. There is no simple answer here. Perceived weakness and confusion on the part of Western powers will no doubt be exploited by hostile forces. But it is also true that alliances which operate as vehicles for hegemonic powers can be very problematic.

The word ‘realism’ can mean many different things, depending on context. Often it is used rhetorically and lacks substantive meaning. In international affairs, however, it has a generally accepted meaning. It comes in different flavors, but its key defining elements are clear enough. Realism in international relations is associated with strong skepticism about all forms of ideological thinking; an acute awareness of the dangers of the unforeseen consequences of military interventions; and generally modest expectations about what can be achieved on the international front.

As I understand it, there are competing factions within the Obama administration, some (like Obama himself, perhaps) not so committed to neocon-style policies and some more committed to hawkish intervention. I think the election of Hillary Clinton will give comfort to the latter group, and there will be a policy shift in that direction.

Someone asked in the course of the discussion of my earlier piece whether I really thought that the Chiefs of Staff would accept a presidential order to do something likely to trigger war with Russia or China.

It would depend on the circumstances. But it seems obvious enough that to the extent that the US follows neocon-like policies, the prerequisites for a big war (as distinct from more limited, regional conflicts) are more likely to be in place. The worst situations arise when countries fall readily into blocs and particularly if the blocs are very large and very few. We know this from the Cold War. At times we were very close to the brink of a global catastrophe. It would be so, so stupid and reckless to return to such a state of affairs. But many of the neocons seem to want just that.

I happen to think our future is bleak, whatever happens with this election and whatever policies the new administration adopts. But a major nuclear war is by no means inevitable and in my opinion is less likely in a multipolar world in which political leaders see their role more in local and regional than in global and ideological terms.

The Cold War was about power blocs, but it was also about ideology. The old Marxist-Leninist, Maoist and related ideologies have faded from the scene. I say it’s time for all of these overarching narratives to be dropped, including the idea that America has some kind of imperial destiny (or responsibility) to fulfil.

For years I bought into this narrative to some extent. But for a state to fulfil this kind of imperial role effectively, its strength and dominance and underlying economic health must be unquestioned. The state in question must also be widely trusted and respected. Arguably these conditions applied to the United States in the not-too-distant past. But today?

In America – and even to some extent in Britain – both neoconservatism and liberal interventionism are associated with the idea of American exceptionalism: that the United States has a special status amongst the nations, moral as well as military, and that from this status flow certain unique rights and responsibilities relating to global order and governance. In the past this myth has facilitated some very unfortunate actions – and maybe some good ones as well. But in current circumstances it can only be extremely dangerous.

Geopolitics and the US presidential election

"Could fear of Trump rattle Stoics, while fear of death finds no purchase?”

Dwayne Holmes was alluding to self-styled Stoic Massimo Pigliucci's readiness – in the face of the possibility of a Trump presidency – to endorse over-the-top, emotion-driven political analysis. There is certainly a lot of panic in liberal and progressive circles.

Here Holmes summarizes his own take on the upcoming election:

“We are down to haggling over whether it is a moderate pro-business southern Democrat (aka conservative) or extreme right wing ... reality TV star [and] pro-business conservative who sits in the office. Both are hawks (with Trump more blustery but less hawkish) …”

He is right in that Trump is certainly less hawkish in terms of foreign policy. Trump is not a neocon.

On the issue of conservatism and the left/right divide you’d have to say that these terms are getting more difficult to apply in the normal way. This is partly because across the Western world a lot of people – including many traditional conservatives, classical liberals and previously apolitical folk – are becoming disgusted with the status quo and so are voting or threatening to vote for candidates outside the mainstream or otherwise in quite radical ways (e.g. Brexit).

Hillary Rodham was a keen Goldwater supporter before she went to Wellesley College and was introduced to left-wing thought. She wrote her senior thesis on Saul Alinsky. But she certainly seems to have moved away from Alinsky’s ideas (apart perhaps from his ideas on lying). She is a neocon and supported by neocons. But many conservatives now clearly hate the neocons and are strenuously resisting their foreign policy prescriptions.

Why is it that President Dwight D. Eisenhower's prescient warnings about the American military-industrial complex (often now conceptualized in terms of the broader concept of the deep state) are only now becoming mainstream in conservative circles? The reasons are complex but certain things stand out.

For one thing, the recent track record of American interventions has been quite disastrous. But, more importantly, associated with these failures has been a loss of confidence in America's future prospects in terms both of prosperity and (partly as a consequence of this) of geo-strategic power. The centre of gravity of the world's wealth is reverting to a more normal historical pattern, balanced between the Eastern and Western hemispheres. There even seems a real prospect that the West is entering a period not just of relative decline in economic and social terms but of actual decline. And, of course, those overseeing this difficult period – the promoters and implementors of recent and current financial, monetary and foreign policies in the West – have lost or are rapidly losing credibility.

My main concerns regarding this election are geopolitical. Clinton’s general foreign policy orientation (and she has form on this front, remember) strikes me as a greater danger to world peace than Trump’s.

And if she has serious health problems (as appears increasingly likely), that would only add to the danger/instability. I could easily imagine a situation in which, if her health holds out until the election and there are no more ill-timed coughing fits or physical stumblings and she manages to get elected, that she would be not be at all inclined to step aside in favour of the Vice-President even in the face of very serious health concerns.

There is at least one precedent of this happening in America: Woodrow Wilson had a severe stroke and stayed in office. And there have been many cases in other countries. Some occurred in the old Soviet Union. There was, for example, Leonid Brezhnev who had severe arteriosclerosis which affected his speech and other aspects of neurological functioning. His immediate successors were almost as bad but didn't take so long to die.

And then, of course, there was the sad case of the bloated-looking and alcohol-fuelled Boris Yeltsin in post-Soviet Russia.

Clinton would be more Brezhnev than Yeltsin, you'd have to say.

Some thoughts on political idealism and America's role in the world

From time to time I will be posting either here or at Language, Life and Logic (as appropriate) essays or extracts from my essays or selected comments from The Electric Agora. My latest piece, Science and Disenchantment, was published there a day or so ago. I may repost it here after the comments have closed in a couple of weeks.

For now, here is something based on an exchange that took place earlier this month...

Commenting recently at The Electric Agora, David Ottlinger accused me of "defeatism" because I expressed reservations about his optimistic and idealistic ideas about the possibility and scope of democratic debate and public advocacy.

Here is a (slightly revised) extract from my response:

... The thing is, you seem to want to speak for 'reason' or some such, to rise above the fray. But my gut feeling, at any rate, is that in the end one has to bite the ideological bullet and – well, join the fray (if one wants to be an activist, that is). But then, unfortunately, you leave the high ground of reason behind for something like rhetoric. (Like that opinion piece [an article by Conor Friedersdorf criticizing outspoken conservatives] you referred me to: it was nicely done, but quite polemical and tendentious.*)

I am not a natural activist. That may be why you see me as defeatist, but I've got nothing against activists – at least not against those who are not engaged (as many of them are, as it happens) in trying to undermine the things I hold most dear.

You obviously hold certain things dear, not just abstract ideals but some good things about the culture you grew up in and are committed to. I too can see some good in American culture, but simply don't share your belief that the political structures can be made to work again as they once did. The economy, as I see it, is also a problem.

Regarding the New Republic article [a piece by Heather Hurlburt defending military humanitarian interventionism]: the issues are difficult, and have (as the author suggests) been made more difficult by previous flawed interventions. Part of the tragedy is that the US, by over-reaching and over-promising and by its perceived hidden agendas and very mixed motives, is rapidly losing respect in the world. Not so long ago you could still see it (or at least I could) as the cavalry riding to the rescue. Not any more. That myth has soured.

What I see now is a rapidly fading superpower with looming budgetary and social problems trying to maintain its geopolitical sway in a changing world and, to that end, involving itself in various far-away regions like Ukraine, for example, and the South China Sea (as well of course as the Middle East). NATO expansion (was it really necessary?) has arguably exacerbated tensions in Eastern Europe and pushed Russia in an unfortunate direction. American activities in the Western Pacific/South China Sea could be seen as an attempt to retain a role the U.S. once had and which China is now seeking to take up. These are dangerous times.

Which brings me back to that article. Was the author suggesting that the US should send troops into Burma?!

I don't deny that there have been effective humanitarian military interventions in the past and that there will be more in the future. But one important determinant of success is that the flag of the intervening power should inspire respect and trust.


* For example, you can't just dismiss the notion (as Friedersdorf appears to do) that immigration alters the ethnic balance of a country and that these changes (in America and most other Western countries) have generally been encouraged by and worked to the benefit of the left.

And this is an earlier comment of mine on that thread (which prompted David Ottlinger's reference to the article by Heather Hurlburt):

[Quoting him] "... I believe you severely underestimate the extent to which we are dependent on experts to make determinations about serious issues."

My views on expertise probably differ from yours more on the issue of 'moral expertise' than in other areas.

"The question of whether economic history since 1960 is more consistent with monetarism or Keynsianism or whether the history of various military interventions is more consistent with limited interventionism or isolationism is just going to be too complicated, way too complicated, for voters to make determinations on without experts."

Or even with the assistance of 'experts': because in a sense there are no experts here. Let me explain.

Macroeconomic theory is a contested area, and moral and ideological commitments clearly come into it. I think it was Wilhelm Röpke who said that inflation is a 'moral problem'. And this goes to the heart of my response. In decisions concerning choices between various economic approaches or frameworks both factual (relating to whether descriptions and predictions map onto the real world) and moral/ideological factors come into play.

Similar factors apply to judgments about military interventions. There are practical questions about consequences, and then the moral dimension. To a large extent the question of whether to launch a military attack on Iraq and kill its leader (or do the same in Libya) could be seen as a moral problem. And moral problems simply cannot be dealt with in an objective or fine-grained sort of way like we deal with technical or scientific problems. I must confess that before the Iraq war, I was undecided about it: it was only after the event that it became clear to me that it had been a mistake. The predictions of the advocates of intervention were all proven to be wrong. And I think most people don't need the help of experts to see this. There were no WMD. Iraqis did not embrace democracy and live together in prosperity and harmony. Likewise the disastrous intervention in Libya.

Other 'interventions' in the past have been arguably even more clearly morally flawed. Take the Allied bombing campaigns in Europe towards the end of World War 2 directed at civilian targets (e.g. Dresden) or the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I don't think we need to call in the experts here. I know where I stand.

I also know where I stand on economic questions (though I am not an economist). It may be that I have chosen to believe the wrong set of experts. Time may tell. General predictions have been made (you can never give precisely timed predictions in this area). How it finally plays out will not necessarily clearly validate or vindicate (or invalidate) any particular framework, but some predictions will be shown to have been more accurate than others.

The personal and the political

Just over a week ago The Electric Agora published a piece of mine (entitled Passionate Thinking) on social and political convictions. In the course of the article, I sketched out how my personal perspectives have changed over the years, especially in terms of my view of America's role in the world. I could no longer, I explained, accept the standard, more-or-less conservative myth of the US and its close allies being basically a force for good.

I also referred to the ideas of Isaiah Berlin, linking to an essay about Berlin's politics by Christopher Hitchens.

The reaction was interesting. Virtually no one seemed interested in looking at the broader political and geopolitical questions which were my focus. The bulk of the comments related instead to an almost parenthetical comment about – feminism!

Of all the '—isms' one might conceivably want to question or dismiss (in the context, at any rate, of certain intellectual circles) this one is the most awkward to deal with. Militarism and pacifism, socialism and capitalism and anarchism, pragmatism and Platonism, modernism and postmodernism: all are fair game. Even perhaps Darwinism. But feminism, it seems, is in a special category. Certain strands of feminism may be criticized or dismissed – but not feminism per se.

A commenter suggested that I was driven by resentment in suggesting that much feminism was mean-spirited and driven by resentment. I don't think I was (or am), as it happens. And the brief remark on which he was basing his suggestion or its context certainly did not reveal any as far as I can see. [See the extract quoted below.]

Given the relatively provocative nature of some of my claims, I was expecting some criticism, and was pleased in fact that various commenters showed a degree support for my views.

The latter part of the comment thread developed into an intense discussion of Joan Didion's take on the women's movement of the early 1970s – she talked of resentment also, by the way – and the surprising relevance of some of her ideas to recent social and cultural phenomena. The thread is well worth a read.


Here is the section from the essay in which I try to sum up my general outlook:

I don’t know that I can satisfactorily describe the social vision or ideal that drives me. It’s a personal thing and I would probably need to draw on certain literary or cinematic sources to make it plain, books and films* which others may not have read or seen. Unfortunately (from my perspective), it just happens to be an ideal which is not celebrated in contemporary Western culture.

I value self-control, a balance between asceticism and sensuality, a non-religious (or anti-religious) stance, good manners, self-reliance, intellectual curiosity, passion – and compassion (and practical help) for those who cannot cope.

I am generally repelled by contemporary progressive thought, by feminism (which all too often is mean-spirited and driven by resentment), and by the current obsession with ‘rights’. The dominant strand of organized secular humanism strikes me as a pale religion-substitute; a watered-down and sentimentalized version of Kantianism or Christianity; a front for progressive politics; a pretext for tedious and superficial moralizing.

These attitudes of mine are largely, no doubt, a function of biological predispositions and a particular upbringing. But the same applies to everyone. The trick is to take one’s deep feelings and intuitions seriously, but not too seriously; to maintain a critical distance. (My dislike of feminism, for example, does not entail a reactionary position or a belief that girls should be discriminated against in terms of education or anything else).

* Someone asked about films in a comment. My response:

I wouldn’t really know where to start (or stop) listing [the films] that were important for me. Old films, focussed on the small-scale and the personal mainly.

Three at random: Victoria in Dover (1954, German-language); A Kid for Two Farthings (1955, Jewish-themed, written by Wolf Mankowitz, dir. by Carol Reed); La nuit de Varennes (1982, includes some marvellous bits, including a scene involving the king's ceremonial cape: it is the symbolism that counts, not the man).

[...] [M]y strongest values are more personal than political – but the personal projects to the political of course.