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Our World-Historical Gamble
Tech Central Station ^ | March 11, 2003 | Lee Harris

Posted on 03/11/2003 8:31:41 PM PST by beckett

1: THE PROBLEM

Of the many words written for and against the coming war with Iraq, none has been more perceptive than Paul Johnson's observation in his essay "Leviathan to the Rescue" that such a war "has no precedent in history" and that "in terms of presidential power and national sovereignty, Mr. Bush is walking into unknown territory. By comparison, the Gulf War of the 1990's was a straightforward, conventional case of unprovoked aggression, like Germany's invasion of Belgium in 1914 and Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor."

The implications of this remark - like the implications of the war with Iraq - are profound. The war with Iraq will constitute one of those momentous turning points of history in which one nation under the guidance of a strong-willed, self-confident leader undertakes to alter the fundamental state of the world. It is, to use the language of Hegel, an event that is world-historical in its significance and scope. And it will be world-historical, no matter what the outcome may be.

Such world-historical events, according to Hegel, are inherently sui generis - they break the mold and shatter tradition.

(Excerpt) Read more at techcentralstation.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: bushdoctrineunfold; hegel; iraq; kant; leeharris; liberalism; nationstates; newnwo; usa; wmds
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To: veryconernedamerican
I think you and I get it and I think that Bush gets it but I don't think my neighbors in Germany get it or their neighbors in France get it. In fact, it is pretty clear that our own democrats do not get it. None of these seem willing to accept an asymetrical power model. These Europeans actually think Bush is the greater danger to peace than, for example, Saddam.

They show absolutely no disposition to junk the "old Myths" for "new realities." While they show good cooperation against terrorism because there they can operate under the old paradigm, they cannot cooperate on Irak, Iran or Korea because that requires a new model.
21 posted on 03/12/2003 5:41:50 AM PST by nathanbedford
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To: beckett
The author makes some good points in describing the Islamists as delusional. He does better with philosophy, than history, IMHO. The nation state as a global entity is a relatively new idea. As Winston Churchill's grandson pointed out the other day in the WSJ - "my grandfather drew the lines on the map that created Iraq." What has existed in Europe since the (approximately) 16-17th century (not including Germany which unified in the 19th century) did not exist in Africa and the Middle East until the post-colonial era. Part of the problems in those areas is that the lines were drawn on the map, without regard to the religious and tribal makeup of the populations within the newly created "states." In this respect we are returning to a form of Hobbesian anarchy which has been with us for a very long time. We have has our vacation from history, with our "progressive international" institutions, now we are back to nature. Red in tooth and claw.
22 posted on 03/12/2003 5:56:58 AM PST by RKV
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To: beckett
Bump for the morning crowd.
23 posted on 03/12/2003 6:16:43 AM PST by Carolina
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To: SJackson; dennisw; knighthawk
Astonishing analysis by Lee Harris. Absolutely the best of 2003

Please, ping your lists. Thank you.

The complete text (besides the TechCentralStation itself) is in this locked, duplicate thread: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/862627/posts

24 posted on 03/12/2003 7:21:36 AM PST by Tolik
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To: dennisw; Cachelot; Yehuda; Nix 2; veronica; Catspaw; knighthawk; Alouette; Optimist; weikel; ...
If you'd like to be on or off this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.
25 posted on 03/12/2003 7:55:13 AM PST by SJackson
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To: nathanbedford
I think Mr. Harris' somehwat polite terminology is leading people astray. When he says "neo-sovereignty" I think he would like to say "neo-imperialism".

In the 19th century imperialism got a bad name because it was generally used for the economic advantage of the colonizer and they were some shamefully exploitave episodes during that era as well. On the other hand, however, 19th century imperialists did understand that part of their mission aside from trade was to bring the benefits of cvilization and good government to parts of the world that had known neither.

After WWII, we pressured Britain and France to give up their colonies in Africa. In light of the post-WWII history in Africa and other former colonies can anyone honestly contend that these unstable governments have been a blessing to their people? According to Harris' criteria these nations had not earned their sovereignty through the struggle for national self-determination; their nationhood had been handed to them by their former colonial masters. The process of arbitrarily bestowing nationhood on a group of people because of guilt has not worked very well.

A neo-imperialist doctrine for the 21st century recognizes that democratic structures are not synonymous with good government. Societies lacking functioning civil institutions tend to evolve toward illiberal psuedo-democracies ("one man, one vote, one time"). In countries such as these a governmental structure that insures fundamental human rights but it is not wholly democratic would be preferable.

If a group of people is not yet ready to responsibly exersize the democratic franchise then obviously the possession of WMDs is a prescription for disaster. A neo-imperialist theory of international relations would redirect developing nations away from from acquiring WMDs for petty aggrandizement toward legitimate development projects.

In light of 20th century history, the British system of gradually developing sovereignty culminating in a new nation receiving commonwealth status seems enlightened. An updated version of the British system would mandate that the doctrine of national self-dtermination be abandoned. Given the problems that this doctrine has produced in being applied to the developing world we could scarely do any worse.
26 posted on 03/12/2003 10:23:06 AM PST by ggekko
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To: beckett
But all of this is lost on the man who simply pays another man to build his home for him. He is free to imagine his dream house, and to indulge in every kind of fantasy. The proper nature of the material need not concern him - gravity doesn't interest him. He makes the plans out of his head and expects them to be fulfilled at his whim.

"The Lesson of Marx," the author calls this. Have Freepers adopted Marx as a teacher? Then they are in for a surprise, since if we believe this teacher capitalism is another fantasy likewise doomed to failure. Perhaps we lost the Cold War, after all.

Our author does not tell us why this dream house description applies only to rogue states, and not to the pie-in-the-sky capitalists who brought us the dot-com boom-bust and the Enron economy. And what about the fantastic neo-Wilsonian imaginings of our own president?

At the heart of the dialectically emergent concept of neo-sovereignty is precisely the double standard that Mr. Butler denounced - a double standard imposed by the U.S. on the rest of the world, whereby the U.S. can unilaterally decide to act, if need be, to override and even to cancel the existence of any state regime that proposes to develop WMD, especially in those cases where the state regime in question has demonstrated its dangerous lack of a sense of the realistic.

At the heart of American governance is the principle that a just government derives from the consent of the governed--What touches all, must be approved by all. If America decides to declare itself the world governor described here, we are betraying our foundational principles. I suspect this author would argue that such principles are out of date, "concepts from another age." All the more reason to distrust his foreign policy recommendations.

We must not let our noble ideals betray us into betraying our very ideals... We must take a hard look at every idea we hold dear and ask, Does this idea even fit any more?

How easily we abandon self-evident truths for the pragmatic.

And does it any longer make sense to speak of conservatives in a world in which a catastrophic change of some kind looms, or liberals when it is the core liberal values of all of us - even the most conservative - that are being threatened?

I'd rather stick to my principles and die than submit myself into the Leviathan State and live.

For neither in war nor yet at law ought any man to use every way of escaping death. For often in battle there is no doubt that if a man will throw away his arms, and fall on his knees before his pursuers, he may escape death; and in other dangers there are other ways of escaping death, if a man is willing to say and do anything. The difficulty, my friends, is not in avoiding death, but in avoiding wickedness; for that runs faster than death.
-Socrates, in Plato's Apology

But to call the United States' response a bid for empire is simply silly.

So what do you call a government that arrogates to itself the right to control the military of every other nation, as this very author advocates?

27 posted on 03/12/2003 12:33:27 PM PST by Dumb_Ox
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To: dennisw; TopQuark; Alouette; veronica; weikel; EU=4th Reich; BrooklynGOP; Jimmyclyde; Buggman; ...
Middle East list

If people want on or off this list, please let me know.

28 posted on 03/12/2003 12:47:11 PM PST by knighthawk
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To: xm177e2
I read "Fantasy Ideology" when it came out and learned a great deal from it. This new article promises to be equally thought-provoking.

But what I'd like to know is, who is Lee Harris? Did he serve in government at some point in his career? And what is TechCentralStation?
29 posted on 03/12/2003 1:19:14 PM PST by tictoc
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To: Dumb_Ox
Have Freepers adopted Marx as a teacher?

Harris is a scholar of Marx, as I learned when I read some of his other work, but not in the way you think. He is a highly skilled debunker of Marx and persona non grata in socialist circles. His point is simple and clear: There is no free lunch. Free rider systems cannot work. To suggest that the dot.com busts and Enron are analogous to the failure of free rider systems like communism and oil rich Arab tribal societies is deeply problematic, to say the least.

I suspect this author would argue that such principles are out of date, "concepts from another age."

You're right. That's why I said in my opening post that he's presenting us with a novel point of view. It will be no easy task for an American conservative, with an abiding commitment to American foundational, constitutional principles, to wrap his or her mind around the world-historical role for the country Harris lays out in the piece. But his central point should give pause to every serious person. Are we targeted? Can the weapons aimed at us cause mass destruction? How do we deal with the threat? How much of your disagreement with Harris grows out of a longing for the Fortress America that sadly disappeared in a miles long cloud of smoke and ash on a crystal clear September day?

So what do you call a government that arrogates to itself the right to control the military of every other nation, as this very author advocates?

I don't believe he is speaking as an advocate. I don't read the article as a work of advocacy. Harris wants us to think about these ideas, and, as he says in his final sentence, do so with some trepidation.

30 posted on 03/12/2003 8:11:39 PM PST by beckett
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To: section9
Check out this very interesting article.
31 posted on 03/13/2003 6:25:26 PM PST by Starrgaizr
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To: beckett
Compelling and profound! Captures the reasoned rationale behind the administrations' policy.

I read it via Best of the Web Today. Going for the other article referenced in the same section now.

Great post beckett!
32 posted on 03/13/2003 11:39:51 PM PST by bellevuesbest
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To: beckett
Your post is excellent, as is this article. I urge all to read this! And to send it to everyone who you think is smart enough to GET it.

It took me two nights to read it and then I had to read lot of it out loud to comprehend it. I am not smart enough to grasp this type of writing without effort. It does not help that we all have terrible colds here and I am drunk on NyQuil.

I am glad I preserved as it is an excellent! This is a thoughtfully laid out case for hitting Saddam hard and fast! We have allowed the Arabs to live in a fantasy world and it is going to kill us all. It really is imperative that we change the way we think about the world. I think that CPowell is a classic liberal, as outlined in this article,and he is in a kabuki dance with Bush,who is NOT! Hence the current situation with the UN and France.

We are really witnessing a world-historical event. It will change everything forever, regardless of the outcome. And we, as citizens of the world, must change the way we look at this. It is also an outline of why liberalism just does not work in the long run. It eats itself!

33 posted on 03/14/2003 9:31:19 PM PST by AlwaysLurking
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To: beckett
The surrealpolitik that characterizes the fantasy world of radical Islam is also seen in the mindset of the so-called intellectual liberals who love to hate everything American. Both groups despise technology but don't hesitate to use it for their ends. They both hate Christianity, individual liberty and capitalism. And like the rogue states run by self-indulgent dictators who gladly take the money given them by the US, liberals live free, comfortable lives made possible by our free enterprise system, while simultaneously working for its demise.

The analogy to a spoiled brat who lives off his parents' generosity while badmouthing them at every turn is apt. Fortunately, most surly, freeloading kids do not end up killing their parents, while leftists and radical Islamists will surely destroy us, unless we wake up.

34 posted on 03/15/2003 11:32:10 AM PST by giotto
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To: ggekko; beckett
Long and thoughtful article, but it still doesn't fly. Awfully roundabout way of coming to a conclusion that strikes me as being perilously close to "might makes right" ;)

With the phenomena of radical Islam, however, we are confronted with the phenomena of individuals and groups who value a self-destructive fantasy more than their lives and interests. The presumption self-intrest is no longer valid when dealing with many parts of the Islamic world. This realization is tremendously disorienting for a typical Westerner

I disagree. The problem with the critique of realpolitik in this article is that it takes a much more narrow definition of "rational actors" than is really necessary. "Rational actors" are basically defined as "people like us", or more specifically, people who will ultimately value self-preservation above all else, just as we do.

Which is, to be sure, pretty much what the classic notion of realpolitik was based on - you could bluster people into submission, because you knew that, faced with the choice of accepting defeat or dying, they would accept defeat and opt for self-preservation. But that's no reason to think that the concepts can't be expanded to encompass what we're facing now.

And what we're confronted with now is a culture that has arrived at precisely the opposite set of values than what we're used to - given the choice between submission (i.e., failing to advance their own interests) and death, they would rather die. But this is a value choice, and no more or less rational than the opting for self-preservation in the face of certain defeat that we would choose. Admittedly, it's very much an all-or-nothing proposition for them - either they get what they want, or die trying - but it's a perfectly rational calculus at work here, albeit not the sort of calculus we are used to dealing with.

So we're still confronted with rational actors, but actors for whom submission is not an option. And it goes too far to define that sort of value choice as prima facie "irrational", IMO - all value choices are, to some extent, not subject to rational bases. We tend to think that it's better to be alive than dead, but I think that given a moment's reflection, you might find that it's actually very difficult to put together a rational foundation underlying that choice other than that it's simply your personal preference - in a very real sense, saying that being alive is better than being dead is not at all different than saying that chocolate ice cream is better than vanilla. No matter how much poking and prodding you do, you're going to end up with the same basis in purely personal preference for both of those choices.

So where do we go from here? Well, realpolitik is far from dead - we just have to recognize and understand the sorts of rationality at work in the minds of those who would destroy us. They still have interests, and act in furtherance of those interests, but part of their rational calculation is the conclusion that it's better to be dead than submit. And so if deterrence won't serve to rein in their actions, then we simply take the next logical step and kill them before they kill us - which was always a final option held in reserve under the notion of realpolitik. QED.

So, although it may very well appear that I end up in much the same place as the author, I think I do so by rather a different route. I very much dispute the notion that a "new paradigm" is necessary or desirable, particularly when the old one is still perfectly serviceable, given a bit of tweaking. And isn't that the essence of conservatism? ;)

35 posted on 03/16/2003 11:35:36 PM PST by general_re (Non serviam.)
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To: tictoc
Thanks for the "Fantasy Ideology" link - good read - I hadn't seen it before.
36 posted on 03/17/2003 12:46:53 AM PST by ThePythonicCow (Mooo !!!!)
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To: nathanbedford
May God help us if Bush is replaced by a democrat before he can get us to the Promised Land.

And maybe that's all us common folk need to keep as our prayer.

You have stated the situation well for us simpler folk who survey the view from our present outlook and are hoping that someone can find us a way.

37 posted on 03/17/2003 1:40:25 AM PST by happygrl
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To: beckett
An excellent read, albeit long.

I have lifted a few of the points that I found to be quite enlightening.

"The motivations of those who want to murder us are not complicated: To watch an American city go up into a fireball is its own reward.

This is the lesson that 9/11 should teach us in dealing with the fantasists of the Islamic world. A fantasy does not need to make any sense - that is the whole point of having one.

.....

An empire acts to insure its own self-interest. But, in this case, the U.S. is rather acting as an agent for the interests of others at precisely the same time it is acting to insure its own national interests. Indeed, this is what Hegel meant by the cunning of reason. No matter how cynically one might choose to view American motives, what matters, at the world-historical level, is the objective consequence. Interpret America's true motives as cynically as you please - let it be the defense of the interest of big business in the stability of world markets - it makes no difference. What counts in the long run is the kind of world that arises out of this subjective intent. And this is where the enormous difference between the obsolete concept of empire and that of the emergent neo-sovereignty becomes strikingly clear. For in its role as neo-sovereign the United States, in pursuing its selfish policy, is also forced to increase the general level of security throughout the world.

.....

(speaking of the islamists)Success comes when we have created a higher degree of pragmatic realism on their part; failure comes when we have simply encouraged them in their fantasies.

And judged by this criterion, much of American policy toward the Islamic fantasists has been a signal departure from the American tradition of realism. For so much of our policy, from the Iran hostage crisis up until the events of 9/11 have almost been designed to encourage the growth of fantasy thinking among the most dangerous social forces in the Islamic world. Their policy has been to make us fear them through displays of force, whether in taking the staff of our embassy hostage or by flying airplanes into our buildings. And we have given our enemy the ultimate satisfaction - we have shown we are afraid. We have displayed how much their acts have devastated us, and our grief has provided a sickening opportunity for Schadenfreude on the part of far too much of the Islamic world. We must learn not only to exact a price for those who murder our citizens - but for those who, though technically innocent of the crime, dance in the streets to celebrate its consequences. This thirst for the indulgence of bloody fantasies at our expense must be brought to an end by whatever means it takes. Indeed, in the long run the greatest danger we face comes not from the terrorists of today, but those being bred for tomorrow - the children who are being inducted and brainwashed into the terror cult that is at the heart of the fantasy ideology of Islamism.

.....

But it is equally critical that we are not misled into trying to win the hearts and minds of the Islamic fantasists. We must not set about trying to convert them in believing in our principles and accepting our values, however noble and lofty these values might be. Nor must we be seduced into believing that we are in a popularity contest, as if we were trying to sell Western values as if it were a consumer product. If it should happen to come about that these values make inroads in the Islamic world, fine and good. But it must not became our aim.

Our aim is simple. It is to make the Islamic fantasists respect the dictates of reality. If they wish to compete with us, if they wish even to be our enemies, we will accept that, as we accepted this situation with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. But they must be made to accept the basic rules of play - rules that are accepted by the rest of mankind, from the U.S. to Communist China.

And that is why, in order to achieve our end of heightening their grasp on reality, no means should be ruled out. We must be prepared to use force "unstintingly," as Woodrow Wilson declared on America's reluctant entry into World War I. On this count, we must have no illusions. Until they are willing to play by our rules, we must be prepared to play by theirs."

Again thank you for posting this illuminating article!

38 posted on 03/17/2003 2:35:49 AM PST by ImpBill ("You are either with US or against US!")
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To: nathanbedford
The reason Germany, France, and even Democrats don't get it is that they TOO are operating under a fantasy ideology-- i.e., that political power can be exercised without military power, and that "peace" is possible without a strong, effective, rational Peace-keeper (i.e., the U.S.). They want the fantasy institution of the U.N. to be effective (that is, they want the picture of the U.N. that they have in their heads to be true and to fulfill this role)-- they continualy disconnect from reality in refusing to examine the history of U.N. actions and failures to act in assessing whether their wish for U.N. effectiveness is realistic.
39 posted on 03/17/2003 5:40:16 AM PST by walden
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To: Dumb_Ox
You are missing something here-- nothing in this changed world-view requires any change at all in the relationship between U.S. government and American citizens-- it relates not at all to anything domestic. It is a super-structure for dealing with the world out there, and in my opinion, it is absolutely correct. You don't have to get it, you don't have to agree with it if you do get it, and you don't have to worry about it.
40 posted on 03/17/2003 5:45:47 AM PST by walden
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