No More Civilian Body Counts?

For the past several years, Adriana Lins de Albuquerque and Alicia Cheng have been publishing "Op-Charts" in the January NY Times with a visual representation of deaths in Iraq, with the deaths neatly broken down according to civilian, police, coalition troop, US troop, etc. This year's installment came out earlier this month.

Two interesting things about this year's chart.

[I always look for it because their use of symbols is a helpful tool in my Spring "Rules of War" class when I discuss civilian immunity. I want to get my students to recognize that adult men can be civilians too, and that there are many ways in which the use of language, symbols and social norms creates the impression that civilians = "womenandchildren." This argument is developed more fully in my 2006 book. As you can see from last year's chart, de Albuquerque and Cheng have been handing me a timely teaching tool for years.]

But this year, when I dug up the chart to update my Powerpoint, what do I find but the civilian icon missing altogether?!! Apparently, de Albuquerque and Cheng have stopped counting civilian casualties entirely in favor of disaggregating the uniformed dead.

This is to be explained by the second interesting difference in the Op-Chart, the fact that the analysts tallied deaths for the whole year rather than just for "30 Days in Iraq." And:

"Sadly, civilian fatalities in Iraq last year were simply too numerous to represent on a single newspaper page."

Call me kinda overcommitted to keeping civilians alive, but if I had to choose between doing a month with civilians included or a year with them dropped out of the equation altogether, I'd have used my commitment to civilians to bargain for multiple pages of space. Or something.

To view the entire 2008 chart click here.

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Interpreting the surge in Iraq

I have a longstanding apathy towards State of the Union addresses. If a President says anything important (like declaring states part of an "axis of evil"), then I figure that the text serves just as well. My actions are bipartisan -- I don't watch anyone named Bush give these addresses and I didn't watch Bill Clinton either. And I generally didn't watch Ronald Reagan's efforts.

However, there's a case to be made that I should have watched the address this year -- not because of what Bush said, but because of how specific members of the audience reacted.

After all, both of the remaining Democratic rivals for the presidential nomination are U.S. Senators and had the opportunity to agree or disagree with the current occupant of the White House. They could clap -- or not -- whenever the President made a policy point or arrived at a conclusion. In an extreme case, the candidate might even stand and clap. Arguably, such a move sends a clear signal to potential voters.

The Hill, January 29, provided this news about what I missed:

Obama and Clinton seemed to see eye to eye on Bush’s domestic agenda, sitting firmly on their hands through most of the first half of his speech...

Clinton and Obama’s divergent views on the troop surge in Iraq, however, were plainly visible.

When Bush proclaimed, “Ladies and gentlemen, some may deny the surge is working, but among terrorists there is no doubt,” Clinton sprang to her feet in applause but Obama remained firmly seated.

Kevin Drum is skeptical that this means anything, but Mark Kleiman believes it signifies a great deal.

I tend to side with Kleiman on this -- largely because I do not think the surge has been a success. Thus, I do not think that any public figure, but perhaps especially Hillary Clinton -- who already mistakenly voted for the war -- should be clapping about the continued prosecution of the war.

The post I've just linked mentions that the civilian violent death rate in Iraq has declined to 2005 levels, which were worse than 2004 levels. This month, about 24 people per day are dying violent deaths. The January 2008 number will likely be between 700 and 800 dead.

These numbers are dramatically down from the war's peak from June 2006 through August 2007 when more than 2500 people were dying each month.

The December 2007 civilian violent death toll in Iraq was 902.

Context: While the President defines that as success in Iraq, the former Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, has been trying to mediate an exploding crisis in Kenya. The US envoy to Africa has called the situation "ethnic cleansing." Yet, since December, "only" about 900 people have died. Press reports place the January death toll at around 800.

Do the math:

A good month in Iraq = a burgeoning political crisis in Kenya.

Since Kenya's population is about 10 million greater than Iraq's, the death toll in Iraq is a larger portion of the population.

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Obama on campus

A first hand account of my brush with Campaign 2008.

Barak Obama gave a big speech at American University today with the Kennedy's to receive the endorsements of Ted, Caroline, and Patrick Kennedy. The speech was announced to the campus community over the weekend, and it instantly cause a palpable buzz of excitement. Thousands converged on our campus to hear the speech.

The speech was scheduled for Bender Arena (our gym / all purpose room) at 12:15, doors opening at 10:30. I teach from 9:55 - 11:10. Over the weekend, several students in my morning class emailed to say that they were skipping our riveting session discussing David Kang's ISQ article on North Korea in favor of waiting in line to see Obama. I decided to have class anyway, figuring that a) the event didn't start until an hour after the class ended, and b) I (and anyone else from the class) could go over after class, jump in the line, and sneak into the back of the rally.

Oh how wrong I was. After class, myself and several colleagues walked over to the arena to scope the line. People were entering the arena, and we started to hike toward the end of the queue. (For those of you not familiar with AU geography, you can see a map here) We went from Bender arena, up the road to the main entrance to campus. The line then turned left, down Massachusetts Ave., down several blocks past the seminary, and then turned left onto University. At its height, I think it got to Quebec, and perhaps down that road as well. It was easily the longest line I'd ever seen for anything at our school.

We waited for a bit as the line filled up behind us and slowly started to move. After about 20 minutes, the line really started to roll and picked up pace. We hiked back up the hill, and as we got to the main gate of camps, people were saying that the doors to the event had closed 20 minutes ago with a capacity crowd inside. Overflow venues were full as well. A number of people went over to the outdoor amphitheater (and would eventually be rewarded when Obama and Kennedy would come out and greet them after the speech). My friends and I bailed at this point, and eventually returned to our office.

We decided to still watch the speech, however, as it seemed too big of a deal to miss. Plus, we were already invested and wanted to see how it went. So, we went to the new media lab next to our office and started to stream the feed on the very nice 30-something inch monitor they have. After about 30 minutes, nothing was happening and we almost gave up. They were just late in starting. Finally, the folks in the lab down the hall got the stream working from the local NBC website. They threw the image up onto the overhead projector and we had a movie-sized view of the speech. In all, there were about 20 of us from the floor in the lab watching the show.

After it was over, it was back to work.

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The emerging multipolar order

Parag Khanna has, in essence, a précis of his forthcoming book in today's New York Times Magazine. The article, entitled, "Waving Goodbye to Hegemony", contends that American hegemony is already over, that we're seeing the emergence of three new "empires"--complete with different imperial styles--centered around the US, the EU, and China. Khanna thinks the US needs to adapt soon to his new great game, in which the "second world's" orientation will determine the global balance of power, and, among other things, abandon the us-versus-them attitude which undermines its influence and makes great-power concert-style management difficult.

Khanna's put his finger on many key contemporary trends. Unlike Kagan, he doesn't try to interpret the new struggle for influence in quasi-Marxist terms, i.e., as a great ideological clash between liberal democracy and authoritarianism. Khanna understands that Kagan's view, if it drives US foreign policy, will prove counterproductive to US power and influence.

I only have a few criticisms, and they are largely those of an academic reading a work intended for a popular audience.*

1. I don't care for Khanna's "marketplace" analogy, which downplays the degree to which geopolitical competition for influence among clients and other weaker powers involves coercion, domination, and resistance.

2. Khanna is too dismissive of the implications of Russian assertiveness. He's right that the long-term trends--particularly demographic--don't favor Russian geopolitical influence, but we should be careful about projecting too much based on current trends.

And right now, the Russians are unhappy and resurgent; their capabilities far outmatch most of their neighbors, and they're starting to adopt more sensible development policies designed to diversify their economy.

3. I wish Khanna didn't fall into the trap of implying that the Shanghai Coopertation Organization (SCO) is a big deal because it might be like NATO some day. The SCO represents a strategy of "public goods substitution"--from its counter-terrorism to its election-monitoring activities--that seeks to undermines US influence. I doubt it will ever be upgraded to a NATO-like entity, and focusing on that question misses its significance.

4. I think Khanna's a bit too fast to declare the passing of US hegemony. This is less his fault than that of the "unipolar moment" crowd, many of whom overstated--and continue to overstate--the implications, as well as the degree, of American primacy.

American primacy never implied that the US could "make its own reality" or largely ignore resistance to its policies and position. US power depended, and continues to depend, as much on the micro-politics of its foreign relations as upon its raw military and economic might.

So while (a) the US has mishandled many of those micro-politics over the last decade, (b) current trends do point towards a power transition, and (c) the US faces serious counter-hegemonic challenges, we should be careful about equating diminished US primacy with some form of tripolarity.

That being said, the book is really excellent. I consider it one of the most important contributions to the debate over American grand strategy to make its way into the public sphere in quite some time.

UPDATE: Since Dan's called me out on this, let me clarify: I think this is a much better book than most of its rivals in the same market niche, and puts some very important issues on the table. I wasn't sure how to phrase my concluding praise, and opted for a possibly misleading statement about the "public sphere" as opposed to what might sound like a more backhanded compliment about, in effect, the "Tom Friedman/Benjamin Barber/Robert Kaplan genre."

If I do get around to a review, I intend to make clear that the book actually contains a number of distinct arguments, that these arguments do not depend upon one another, and that some of them are much more persuasive than others. Or, as I wrote on another blog, the "three empires" vision of the world should be seen as a possible, but unlikely, future. The important part of Khanna's argument is not, contra how many are reading it, the tag lines about the coming tripolar order and the central importance of a similarly-situated set of "second world states," but the more significant insights about the changing terms of US hegemony and the myriad challenges it faces as a result of, for example, enhanced exit options for second- and third-tier states.

*I should probably note two potential sources of bias. Khanna, who is currently pursuing a PhD from the London School of Economics, is one my former students. A lot of my current work, moreover, is premised upon a similar view of contemporary power-political developments and trends--although not in terms of his claims about the coming tripolar order.

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What if a Caliphate had a Seat at the UN?

So this past week I traveled to New York to conduct interviews with representatives of the Holy's See's Permanent Obverver Mission to the United Nations as part of my project into norm contestation among global civil society actors during multilateral treaty negotiations.

I found the papal diplomats to be informed, open-minded, friendly and intellectually engaged about human rights and human security. But they didn't at all like the idea that I was interviewing them as part of a project on "non-state" influences on UN treaty-making.

They imagined I'd be interviewing other governments as well, when in fact they're on a list otherwise filled by NGOs I'll be talking to, since the focus of my project is on "global civil society." (Though one source wittily pointed out that the NGO reps are the least civil actors out there, because they're not trained as diplomats.)

It's true the Holy See has the ostensible status of a state for the purposes of multilateral treaty negotiations. It sits on deliberations over UN treaty, declaration and resolution language, and though it doesn't vote on these documents the Pope chooses whether or not to sign them. Plus the fact that the culture at the UN strives for consensus means any individual actor has a fair amount of influence as a veto player, so the Holy See is in a great position to stick it out until other delegates are worn down and tired of arguing to get language into treaties that reflects its principled positions.

My project isn't about the Holy See's status, but these dialogues with my informants got me thinking about the issue. There's been a lot of criticism over whether the church should have this power relative to other non-state actors - other NGOs have the right to be in the building, and lobby delegates constantly in the hallways, but no other non-state actor has the right to actually sit at the table and negotiate with governments. One of the articles I read as I prepped for this trip suggested that either the Holy See should lose this status or, to be fair, other religions should be represented as well.

Interesting idea, eh? Suppose Saudi Arabia, for example, were to enter into a treaty with the city of Mecca similar to Italy's treaty with what is now the Vatican City State, and Sunni Islam were to re-establish a caliphate centered in Mecca but territorially distinct from any Muslim majority state, with transnational moral authority over all Sunni Muslims, and then it sent diplomats throughout international society on the model of the Catholic church. Shia Islam could create a parallel Imamte perhaps centered on Tehran.

Would a dynamic like this make for a moderating political Islam, capable of integrating into international society and institutions as the Catholic Church has done, separate from the politics of Islamic governments, though sometimes allied with them; and able to represent Islamic perspectives on issues like the laws of war, family policy, human rights, etc, from outside the politics of the nation-state system? Would it constitute a space from within which the silent moderate Islamic majority could exercise a greater influence on political Islam? Or, would such an institution be vulnerable to capture by extremists and bode ill for a pluralistic international society?

Thoughts?

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Government's Little Helper

Does the press often serve as "government's little helper"?

As you might guess, I am still thinking about the apparent failure of the public sphere (or "marketplace of ideas" if you prefer) to work properly during foreign policy crises. Many readers graciously provided interesting and helpful comments on my post from last week. Thank you! For now, however, I continue to explore the academic literature about the alleged timidity of journalists during such crises.

In 1990, University of Washington scholar Lance Bennett theorized that journalists "index" the slant of their news coverage to the range of opinion within the government.

One implication is clear -- when internal dissent is lacking, press reports will reflect fairly one-sided coverage. Bennett's latest book, When the Press Fails: Political Power and the News Media from Iraq to Katrina (Chicago, 2007), coauthored with Regina G. Lawrence and Steven Livingston makes this argument in the context of the current administration:

During the gravest moments of George W. Bush’s tenure—the response to 9/11, the buildup to war with Iraq, the Abu Ghraib scandal—the media largely reported reality as his administration scripted it. Why, in these times when we most need a critical, independent press, does this essential pillar of democracy fail us? ...When the Press Fails argues that reporters’ dependence on official sources disastrously thwarts coverage of dissenting voices from outside the beltway.

The result is both an indictment of official spin and an urgent call to action that begins by questioning why the mainstream press neglected to cover considerable evidence against the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Drawing on hard-hitting interviews with journalists and analysis of content from major news outlets, the authors show that such catastrophic blind spots, particularly during the Abu Ghraib controversy, have stemmed from a lack of high-level sources within government willing to question the administration publicly.

Much evidence suggests that "indexing" was a problem throughout the cold war.

Michael Schudson, a professor of communication at the Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University, and at the University of California, San Diego, wrote the following in The Nation, December 31, 2007:

A study of media coverage of forty-two foreign policy crises between 1945 and 1999 (written by political scientists John Zaller and Dennis Chiu) found the media to be consistently, as the article's title puts it, "government's little helper." The study suggests that docile news coverage was a result of "source indexing," in which news represents or "indexes" the range of opinions of leading government officials in the executive and the Congress, and "power indexing," in which news emphasizes most of all the views of those with the greatest capacity to "foretell future events." Coverage is normally docile, in other words, because it concentrates on the views of government officials whose hands are on or close to the levers of power.

Is the public sphere doomed to fail because of a subservient press -- particularly during crises?

Perhaps not.

To begin, Schudson's characterization of Zaller and Chiu is somewhat misleading. Zaller and Chiu actually find (p. 61 of the edited volume, Decisionmaking in a Glass House) that

"the dynamics of media politics, despite a strong indexing effect over the entire post-World War II period, have changed since the end of the Cold War. In particular, the media tend to be more independent of Congress and the president, though not necessarily more independent of government officials generally."

In the seven post-cold war cases they study, Zaller and Chiu (p. 77) find that "the news is more balanced, politicians are more fractious, and the slant of the news is more independent." In the 1990s cases of Somalia and Haiti, for instance, they found the media heavily reliant upon expert sources -- many of which were non-American.

As I addressed last week, it seems likely that the post-9/11 context is more like the cold war than the 1990s. The war on terror has re-militarized the public sphere. The deleterious implications, as noted above, are examined by Bennett and colleagues in their new book.

However, even in the most recent context, Bennett and colleagues find dissent. Hurricane Katrina -- which was, after all, a homeland security disaster -- featured "refreshingly critical reporting." This "rare event...caught officials off guard, enabling journalists to enter a no-spin zone."

Bennett et al conclude hopefully:

"if ordinary Americans start to hear alternative perspectives aired in the legitimizing arena of the mainstream press, they just might begin to act as a public."

That's interesting -- and seemingly consistent with my previous arguments about an open and inclusive public sphere.

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Realism and the balance of power: Deborah Boucoyannis weighs in

Not long ago, Charli posted about Deborah Boucoyannis' provocative Perspectives on Politics article, "The International Wanderings of a Liberal Idea, or Why Liberals Can Learn to Stop Worrying and Love the Balance of Power" (PDF). A number of readers and contributors commented on Charli's post and the article. Now, Deborah responds:

Note: I've put the original comments she's responding to in blockquotes. Her comments are formatted normally.

Yet her attempt to redefine realism as, in essence, hegemonic-order theory strikes me as strained.

Well, it’s not just hegemonic theory that I am defining it as; it is offensive realism too. In short, the theories that predict the opposite of a balance.

But she gives away a lot to rather weak arguments about the "degenerative" character of realism, and winds up treating a framework as a predictive theory (715). Realism is consistent with a range of distributions of power as outcomes, although particular predictive theories within the realist approach may not be.

Ok, I think here we are growing apart due to language. What is “Realism”? How do you define it? Any theory that talks about power and self-interest? But this cannot be a sufficient basis of differentiation as both factors are key, as I show, in classical liberalism. If we are to distinguish the theories, we need to point to where they differ. You do not specify this here, so I cannot say more.

This is frustrating, because her discussion of contemporary liberalism immediately prior is quite good. I guess one way of putting this is that "liberalism" and "realism" are simultaneously ideal-typical constructs and things that people call themselves.

True. And the cause of this big mess we have in IR, I think, with people calling each other degenerate (well, that’s what they mean, really)! Identifying theories with what people claim to believe over the course of their careers is very problematic.

So it doesn't strike me as overly radical to point out that actual liberal and realist theorists share a lot of assumptions, both because we shouldn't expect them to be philosophically pure and because the source material for the traditions overlap and borrow from one another.

But again, if that is so, then what’s the difference between the two theories? Aren’t they supposed to represent alternative approaches to IR? Are we all the same after all? This is not right, it seems to me. There are fundamental differences in how Mearsheimer approaches problems and Keohane does. And this is not because Keohane is less “philosophically pure” (I’ve heard endless times he’s a confused realist). Keohane is absolutely consistent with the classical liberal tradition (he thanked me for noting that!). He shares many assumptions with realism, but he also believes, unlike realists, that institutions can make a difference. This has been, from the beginning, the hallmark of liberalism. And our IR theories should reflect that, I suggest.

Yes, both realists and liberals have argued that the creation of a balance of power checks domination and allows for the management of coercion. And some "realists" (e.g., Morganthau) argued that this would allow for the creation of robust, power-transcendent international orders. But other "realists" disagree, which has to do with how they break from contemporary "liberals."

Let me interject, in good spirit! Morgenthau is not a “Realist,” with all the nasty short-sightedness this habitually implies! Hoffman called him “a somewhat conservative liberal in revolt against other, imprudent liberals”. Nor is Carr a Realist. Carr was a reformed socialist. Neither was realist in any meaningful way that would put him in the same political category as Mearsheimer, or Kissinger (the practitioner, not the book-selling entrepreneur). Marx and Karl Schmitt had some pretty similar “realist” critiques of liberalism; this does not make them fellow travelers.

Just to be provocative, this is a bit of the Jonah Goldberg way of lumping people together: find one point of convergence, and they’re all one thing. Williams, in his wonderful book (which I wish I had read before I sent the article in—thanks to your blog for bringing it to my attention!), actually does call Morgenthau’s “realism” a form of liberalism (p.130), though he stops short from actually calling Morgenthau liberal, even though this is what he is trying to prove throughout the book.

But Morgenthau is a good old-fashioned liberal; this is clear throughout his work on domestic politics, he is committed to greater state power, which alone can combat private concentrations of power (Purpose of American Politics, 311-12), and to the institutional management of power. He supports the New Deal and even places Castro on the side of Eisenhower and FDR, vs. Battista and Trujillo on the narrow question of “justice” to the people, despite his autocracy (see the Lang book on Morgenthau’s lectures on Aristotle—fascinating!). He is a “realist” as far as “philosophy and method” were concerned: his dispute with “liberals” was on those levels, not on goals: he affirmed that, at least in the US, all sides were committed to progress and improvement. “Conservative in philosophy and method, revolutionary in purpose—such has been our political tradition from the beginning of colonization.” (Purpose of American Politics, 297). A statement that could perhaps confidently be made in 1960, though not so today. Just look at what he was telling students about racial and gender equality (in the Lang book). It is simply odd to think of Mearsheimer or Kissinger as part of a “revolutionary” political tradition (well, compared to the mullahs, Charles Taylor, or Putin, they are of course democrats, but within the democratic arena, they are not “revolutionary”). Reading Morgenthau’s “domestic” works is simply a revelation. As is Carr on “Nationalism and After”, or on “The Prospects of a New International Order” in the 20 Years Crisis.

We cannot ignore half of these men’s work, simply because they subscribe to a realist, “pessimist” approach to human nature or human affairs, seems to me. We need to understand what these thinkers actually meant when they said they were “realist”. And we have to take each at his word when, Carr e.g. wrote in The New Society, in 1951: “We are committed to mass democracy, to egalitarian democracy, to the public control and planning of the economic process, and therefore to the strong state exercising remedial and constructive functions.”

No, these are not “Realists.” No pun intended, but if it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck…

My whole point in the end is that having a “realist/pessimist” view of human affairs does not condemn you to blinkered views about the possibility of change or the institutional management of power; in fact, it can make you a prudent, responsible, and much more effective promoter of the collective good. Mearsheimer et al will always say they are prudent and more responsible, but they explicitly reject change and institutional management of power; Morgenthau and Carr defended both—and this is the key distinction between a conservative and a liberal/progressive.

Anyway, if this article is any indication of her depth of thought, I can't wait to read her multi-award winning dissertation

.That is really kind! And entirely reciprocated: we have been following parallel paths in, it seems, everything we do, from a dissertation on state formation in Europe to articles on how Waltz is ‘really not as bad as most people think!’ Yet always from slightly different angles. I greatly look forward to further exchanges of this kind, especially on our book projects!

And a few more points on comments posted, though I cannot do justice to all:

1. To LC: You’re not a weakling if you don’t predict or prescribe power balancing, but liberalism is weakened when it fails to make power a central concept, as it mostly does today. What I am saying is that the balancing hypothesis is the distinctive way liberals developed to deal with the problem of power, and contemporary liberals should recapture that.

2. To Matt: Points 1-6 deftly express the conventional wisdom, but are exactly what I spend the whole article arguing against. Point 7, on why the balancing idea does not transfer to the international level, what I am saying is that it has: this is what Waltz did, which is why the section on him is called “Adam Smith goes Security”. And as Richard Tuck and others have argued, the whole liberal turn to the individual received its theoretical foundation in treatments of the sovereign state system, so even if the balancing idea did not emerge in this context, the two realms have always been informing one another.

I've seen various iterations of Boucoyannis' article, although always through third parties. A really nice piece, but not entirely convincing. For example, Guicciardini gets labeled a "humanist" and Machiavelli a proponent of "realpolitik," but the reason for this distinction remains unclear.

The main point still stands: Guicciardini supports a balanced internal order that does not seek expansion; in this, he is closer to the classical ideal. Again, this is a distinction that has been made before (Waltz and Butterfield did, and Deudney mentions it as well). Guicciardini has been seen in this to draw on humanists like Bruni; James Hankins has written a great paper on Bruni’s vision of the Italian system as a precursor to the federation of free republics in Montesquieu’s sense. So there is a family of ideas and Guicciardini is, in this, closer to the classical view, whereas Machiavelli is often seen to lean in the imperialist direction (though these are always crude simplifications).

It is also not true that Machiavelli lacks any notion of the international balance of power;

But I do not claim he does. Note, I am not using “balance of power” in the generic sense of the term (“what matters is power, so let’s see how it is distributed”), but in the specific one, that the individual pursuit of self-interest by all will/should prevent domination by one.

She notes, on at least one occasion, that bandwagoning produced the subjugation of Italy (this is the diagnoses of Guicciardini's History of Italy). While he does "opt" for imperialism, moreover, he also argues that republics *can* opt for a strategy of being armed to the teeth.

Well, I think Mac’s polarity is between imperialism and stasis. That said, the point is well taken, only I would add he claims that “Without doubt…if the thing could be held balanced in this mode, it would be the true political way of life and the true quiet city.” (Discourses I.6.) But then he admits that due to the inherent instability of human affairs, such a delicate balance over the long haul is simply unsustainable, and thus to preserve liberty states must be ready to expand and to be able to keep what they gain, so that the people do not become “effeminate or divided.”

In general, I think there's some important slippage between the valence of terms like "liberal" and "realist" in various philosophical traditions and the valence of those terms in contemporary IR theory. By much the same token, I am unconvinced by the dismissal of republican theory as an alternative root to the balance-of-power notion; but once republican theory can produce the balance-of-power notion, it follows that one need not be liberal to affirm it.

First, let me say that I understand the appeal of republicanism as an alternative to liberalism, especially in the impoverished way the latter is usually conceived. When I started, I was drawn to it too. But the republican version is very different. Republican theory states that the balance between different social orders will preserve liberty. This is to be achieved either through the mixed constitution or through the opposition/antagonism of the rich and the poor, as in Machiavelli’s famous formulation (which is of course a radical departure from the classical model, a departure that Guicciardini rejects, but I will lump them together for these purposes).

So, yes, a similar idea of balancing existed under republicanism. But every concept in the modern political vocabulary harks back to some ancient or medieval concept—we did have democracy with slaves, foreigners and women disenfranchised. Establishing familial origin does not mean we are talking about the same thing. What I am saying is that the relevant concept in IR, viz in Waltz, is drawn from the liberal transformation of the concept (via the Scots, private interest, division of labor etc). He is certainly not talking about a federation of republics.

Further, I don’t think we should be turning to republicanism; my reservations about it echo those of other liberals (as in “US Democrats”); see Ian Shapiro in Critical Review, 1990, “J.G.A. Pocock's Republicanism and Political Theory: A Critique and Reinterpretation.” As I said, I share the dissatisfactions with liberalism—the liberal order cannot survive without a host of other inputs (see e.g. footnote 40). But I think republicanism is not an adequate replacement.

This is a fascinating topic in its own right, but I’ll have to leave it at that for now.

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Mr. Olmert, tear down this wall!

It was the first thing that came to my mind when I saw this photo on the NYT site. Provocative (or maybe just dark humor), but potentially not that far off the mark.

My short take on this is that I don't think its good for the Olmert government and their Gaza policy at all, and its a big win for Hamas. If nothing else, it hands Hamas a major legitimacy claim as the one group who cares about the regular person enough to blow open a wall to Egypt so people can bring back to Gaza much needed food, tires, cigarettes, and cases of Coke.

First runner up for the headline: "Follow me! Follow me to freedom!"

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The Russians have NUKES! and they're willing to use them!

OK, so things are tense between Britain and Russia these days. But this breathless headline from the BBC is really over the top: "Russia warns of nuclear defence".

The meat of the article is only a little less hysterical:

Russia's military chief of staff has said Moscow is ready to use force, including pre-emptively and with nuclear weapons, to defend itself.

Under what conditions would Russia use nuclear weapons?

In a speech to a military conference broadcast on state-run cable TV, Gen Baluyevsky said there were potential threats to Russia from international terrorism or countries seeking global or regional hegemony.

"We do not intend to attack anyone, but we consider it necessary for all our partners in the world community to clearly understand ... that to defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Russia and its allies, military forces will be used, including preventively, including with the use of nuclear weapons," he said.

Now, where have I heard this before?

Oh, right:

The Pentagon has drafted a revised doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons that envisions commanders requesting presidential approval to use them to preempt an attack by a nation or a terrorist group using weapons of mass destruction. The draft also includes the option of using nuclear arms to destroy known enemy stockpiles of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons.

The document, written by the Pentagon's Joint Chiefs staff but not yet finally approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, would update rules and procedures governing use of nuclear weapons to reflect a preemption strategy first announced by the Bush White House in December 2002. The strategy was outlined in more detail at the time in classified national security directives.

OK, so the Pentagon document doesn't mention "territorial integrity" (which means that this statement may be a veiled warning to Georgia to cut out the hanky panky in the Caucasus). But, as we all know, the value of a nuclear deterrent rests on one's willingness to actually use the nukes in the circumstance you want to deter--what's the point of a Doomsday Device if you keep it a secret?

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Just Warrior or Just Misinformed?

So my Spring Semester class “Rules of War” has kicked off here at Pitt. I’ve been inspired by the Duck to foreswear Blackboard and get my students blogging (pseudononymously, of course) for their online participation grade. This week’s homework: evaluate whether Lieutenant Ehren Watada’s defense at his court martial last February constituted an accurate interpretation of the international rules derived from just war theory.

Facts of the matter: Lieutenant Watada joined the US Army after 9/11 but refused to deploy to Iraq with his unit because in his view, the war was illegal. He has since faced courts-martial by the US Government on charges of conduct unbecoming an officer, among others. The original case ended in mistrial; the USG is attempting to court-martial him again, though he is now claiming double-jeopardy. If convicted, he faces six years in prison and a dishonorable discharge. A grassroots campaign entitled "Thank You, Lt. Watada," largely peopled by anti-war activists, has cropped up in support of his claims.

Is Watada a “just warrior” as his supporters claim or does the logic of his defense represent a misunderstanding of international law? I would argue (in case my students wonder post-hoc how I would have answered the homework question) that both are the case.

Just war theory is a moral tradition comprised of two distinct strands: jus ad bellum, dealing with resort to war (whether or not the war is justified) and jus in bello, dealing with conduct during war. (Like, whether or not you shoot surrendering soldiers.) The two are distinct insofar as it’s possible to fight a just war unjustly or an unjust war justly.

Correspondingly, two distinct international legal regimes govern the initiation and conduct of armed violence. The UN Charter regime outlaws interstate war with certain exceptions corresponding roughly to just war principles. The law of armed conflict codified in the Hague and Geneva conventions spells out jus in bello rules, including how armed force may be used and how non-combatants must be treated if they come under the power of an enemy force. Whereas the UN Charter Regime applies to states only, individual soldiers may be prosecuted for grave violations of the Hague and Geneva Conventions, or jus in bello rules.

This distinction matters a great deal in evaluating the merits of Watada's case.

Let me be clear: I greatly admire Watada's principled stand. But his defense hinges on the idea that if he fought “an illegal war” he would be party to "war crimes." That’s not true. He’d only be party to war crimes if he fought a war using illegal means. Had Watada gone to war, he would have been morally and legally required to disobey unlawful orders, such as orders to torture prisoners or shoot at unarmed civilians. Were he tried for insubordination, he could then defend himself in terms of the Geneva Conventions and Hague Law, which prohibit war crimes.

But no soldier has the right under international law to critique his/her government’s decision to go to war, whether legal or not. Going to war illegally is not a war crime and is not the responsibility of the individual soldier. It's a whole separate category of crime for which civilian leaders are (supposed to be) held accountable. Watada’s claim otherwise simply shows that he was never properly trained in the laws of war.

Was the Iraq war illegal? As far as I can tell, yes, since the US was neither defending itself against an attack nor acting under the authority of the UN Security Council. Perhaps then it’s fair to call Watada a “hero” for taking this stand. Certainly he’s not a coward, as his detractors claim, since he requested to be sent to Afghanistan instead, and since there’s really nothing more courageous than standing up to your government on principle in a time of war.

Does any of this constitute a legal defense for Watada’s refusal to deploy? Not at all.

Watada may be a just warrior in the moral sense, but the law itself is not on his side. The law protects only those soldiers who resist violations of jus in bello rules, or “war crimes,” not “crimes against the peace” – it’s diplomats who make those decisions.

One can admire Watada’s moral courage. But he should accept the consequences of his civil disobedience as Dr. King would have. And he would do the general public a service if he would demonstrate and disseminate an understanding of the international laws he claims to uphold.

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Why So Little Citizen Input In Security Policy?

This week I visited the Kennedy School to attend a symposium on Security Sector Reform (SSR). SSR aims to bring organizations with the authority to use or order the use of force better in line with the rule of law and the needs of ordinary people.

The speakers at the symposium were particularly concerned with how to make security forces – police, peacekeepers, soldiers, the judiciary – more accountable to women’s needs, so that for example private military contractors wouldn’t get off scot free after trafficking women and girls in Kosovo. And they were particularly concerned with how human rights advocates could better access security institutions so as to press claims on behalf of individual citizens.

All this talk about citizen input and private contractors in particular got me thinking about the DoD’s rule-making process. Though no one I spoke to at the Kennedy school seemed aware of it, the Federal Times reported Tuesday that the DoD has proposed a new rule regarding private military contractors in the hire of the US government: that they be required to train in the laws of war before deployment.

Now, you might very well question whether such a rule goes far enough in governing the conduct of these individuals. (Gender-mainstreaming advocates up at the Kennedy School, for example, would want to know whether the training will explicitly incorporate information on rape and sexual exploitation).

The important thing, and what many people seem not to understand, is that if you have such questions or wish to suggest modifications to the rule, you can write the DoD and tell them so, and they are required by law to consider your point of view.

Yes, the DoD is a Federal Agency, and like other regulatory agencies that translate law into specific rules governing the conduct of various actors under US jurisdiction, the DoD is required under the Administrative Procedures Act of 1946 to notify the public of proposed rules and entertain public comment about their content.

This “notice and comment” process is arguably the most truly democratic, deliberative process in America today (outside of the caucus system). It is, essentially, town hall meetings on issues at a federal level. Federal civil servants are required not only to receive public comments, but actually to read them and consider them before finalizing a rule.

The process should be quite familiar to anyone who follows environmental or health policy – citizens are frequently asked by special interest groups to send comments in to the Fish and Wildlife Service when it considers whether to put polar bears on the endangered species list, to the Food and Drug Administration when it considers whether food containing GMOs should be labed “Organic,” to the Federal Communications Commission when it considers censorship rules for television, or the Department of Transportation when it considers whether to increase the CAFÉ standards for automobiles.

But very few American citizens seem to realize that the same process applies to the US national security sector. In the past year, for example, the DoD has proposed or finalized rules regarding radio frequency identification tags on supply shipments, the implementation of the Freedom of Information Act with regard to classified information, and what rules apply to private military contractors in stability and support operations.

The public has the opportunity to affect these rules. But unlike rule-makings in other issue areas, defense rules seldom garner much public comment. For example, the 2005 rule governing civilian contractors deploying with the military in Iraq (where it was determined that they should be allowed to carry weapons, though they remain civilians in terms of the laws of war) received only 22 public responses during the “notice and comment” period. Compare this to 282,992 comments submitted to the Fish and Wildlife Service over whether to take the grey wolf off the endangered species list, and 536,967 submitted to the EPA over whether mercury should be considered a hazardous air pollutant.

There is no reason why US citizens shouldn’t take as active a role in communicating to the security sector our expectations regarding important issues such as how to hold private military contractors accountable.

To review the proposed rule on training PMCs in the Geneva Conventions, go to the Federal Register.

To submit comments to the DoD on this rule, email dfars@osd.mil and include DFARS Case 2006-D035 in the subject line of the message, or visit the federal government’s erulemaking portal here.

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Conservative Fascism

Goldberg's definition of fascism:

Fascism is a religion of the state. It assumes the organic unity of the body politic and longs for a national leader attuned to the will of the people. It is totalitarian in that it views everything as political and holds that any action by the state is justified to achieve that common good. It takes responsibility for all aspects of life, including our health and well-being, and seeks to impose uniformity of thought and action, whether by force or through regulation and social pressure. Everything, including the economy and religion, must be aligned with its objectives. Any rival identity is part of the "problem" and therefore defined as the enemy.

Goldberg on Edmund Burke.

Well, we know he was a hoss. We know that he was the founder of modern conservatism. We know that he was the Nostradamus of the Right, anticipating the success of America, the futility of slavery, the French Reign of Terror (no, not Jerry Lewis, the original one), Indian autonomy, and the rise of Bonapartism, years and years ahead of time.

Burke on the relationship between state, society, and individual:

Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure—but the state ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico or tobacco, or some other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on with other reverence; because it is not a partnership in things subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable nature. It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born. Each contract of each particular state is but a clause in the great primæval contract of eternal society, linking the lower with the higher natures, connecting the visible and invisible world, according to a fixed compact sanctioned by the inviolable oath which holds all physical and all moral natures, each in their appointed place. This law is not subject to the will of those, who by an obligation above them, and infinitely superior, are bound to submit their will to that law. The municipal corporations of that universal kingdom are not morally at liberty at their pleasure, and on their speculations of a contingent improvement, wholly to separate and tear asunder the bands of their subordinate community, and to dissolve it into an unsocial, uncivil, unconnected chaos of elementary principles. It is the first and supreme necessity only, a necessity that is not chosen, but chooses, a necessity paramount to deliberation, that admits no discussion, and demands no evidence, which alone can justify a resort to anarchy. This necessity is no exception to the rule; because this necessity itself is a part too of that moral and physical disposition of things, to which man must be obedient by consent or force; but if that which is only submission to necessity should be made the object of choice, the law is broken, nature is disobeyed, and the rebellious are outlawed, cast forth, and exiled, from this world of reason, and order, and peace, and virtue, and fruitful penitence, into the antagonist world of madness, discord, vice, confusion, and unavailing sorrow.

Clearly, conservativism spawned fascism.

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Patriot games

In preparation for a conference paper (warning: large pdf) due in a couple of months, I've been carefully reading a number of academic articles about the failure of the public sphere (or if you prefer, the "marketplace of ideas") to function effectively during periods of foreign policy crisis. The post-9/11 period featured limited debate about many foreign policy choices -- leading to the Iraq war, for example.

Keep in mind that I'm a proponent of deliberative democracy and would like to see "the" public sphere function effectively in all political contexts. If national or global public spheres break down during periods of foreign policy crises, then there's almost no hope of achieving a communicatively rational outcome. The discussion would simply be too distorted by power and barren of truly open and inclusive debate.

Political scientists Ron Krebs and Jennifer Lobasz have argued that political opponents could not effectively challenge the proposed Iraq war during 2002 and 2003 because the Bush administration had effectively fixed the meaning of 9/11 in the public debate. In other words, the "war on terror" frame was overwhelming and political opponents had been rhetorically coerced into acquiescence with it.

My ongoing research into counterpublic spheres potentially offers a means for public sphere theory to survive this challenge. Based on some recent research, even scholarly critique could offer a means to resist the hegemony of war and security frames.

However, much of the literature on foreign policy debate is quite pessimistic -- the public sphere all-too-often seems threatened even during periods of normal (non-crisis) policy.

For example, interesting research published by sociologist Steven Clayman and colleagues, which examined presidential press conference questioning from 1953-2000, found that the press, which is an important institution in a functional public sphere, is generally much more deferential about foreign policy than about other issues. The scholars studied more than 4600 press conference questions through that time (Clayman and colleagues are only now updating their data to account for the post-2000 era).

The Columbia Journalism Review had a note about the study's conclusion in May/June 2007:

White House journalists were twice as likely to be ”cautious and deferential”on foreign and military affairs as on domestic matters, a finding that held through periods of war and peace, recession and prosperity.

Another blurb about the Clayman et al study appeared in Utne in the November-December 2007 issue. This note speculates on possible explanations for the failure to question presidents on foreign policy:

while economic developments, such as spikes in unemployment, have historically spurred journalists to ask adversarial questions, administrations’ edicts on foreign policy tend to go unchallenged. The researchers speculate that journalists’ timidity might stem from their limited access to independent information on foreign affairs, or it could be that their patriotism has a tempering effect.

While my own work on transparency speaks to the secrecy issue, I've linked also to an academic article by Jane Kellett Cramer, which finds that "norms of militarized patriotism" served to limit debate in the leadup to the Iraq war.

Cramer suggests that a "militarized political culture" was established in the US during the cold war era (receding somewhat during the Vietnam era), which means that virtually all foreign policy debate in the US was artificially limited for decades -- whether during crisis or not.

And now this form of militarization is arguably back.

Hmmm.

Discussion?

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Social Construction of Popular Wisdom

A friend recently forwarded me this online essay by Martin Porter, compelling me to reconsider one of the quotes I had blithely posted on my website.

My quote, attributed to Edmund Burke, read “the only thing necessary for the persistence of evil is for good people to do nothing.” It is commonly quoted by human rights scholars and activists to caution against the bystander effect.

Porter’s essay, replete with exhaustive sources from multiple websites, is a genealogy of the use of this supposed Burkeism, but Porter concludes form his analysis that Burke never actually wrote anything like this:

“There is no original. The quote is bogus, and Burke never said it. It is a pseudo-quote, and corresponds to real quotes in the same way that urban legends about the ghost hitch-hiker vanishing in the back of the car and alligators in the sewers correspond to true news stories.”

Well, at least I’m in good company at having been duped about the source of this quote.

I found Porter’s analysis mildly convincing and wholly entertaining, and so I’ve replaced Burke’s name with “commonly attributed to” Burke on my site, and I’ve replaced the word “persistence” with “triumph,” which seems to be the more common usage, and I’ve included a footnote on my website which qualifies the use of term “person” since the oft-cited quote actually refers to men, not people.

But Porter would seem to prefer I get rid of the epigram entirely, and here I draw the line:

Porter: “The pseudo-quote is therefore without authenticity or meaning, and is just another of those political slogans which are used not as an assistance to, but as a substitute for real thought. It is not a deep truth, although it is constantly treated as one. Burke incidentally hated such things. He thought that cheap political slogans, or ‘maxims’ as he called them, enabled politicians to invoke principles of expediency, so they could pursue their own selfish interests instead of fulfilling their obligations to country, party and people.”

My question is, what is so wrong with “cheap political slogans” that favor the cause of human rights? Few people outside the sheltered world of academia have the time or inclination for the kind of “real thought” Porter is talking about, and all are surrounded by a regular diet of “cheap political slogans” inclining them to acquiesce to the horrors of war. I’ll take a pseudo-maxim that reminds me how to contribute to the collective good over a lot of pedantry any day.

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Syria covers up

The saga continues…

(Updated to included the photo, from Saturday's Washington Post)

Back in October, Israeli jets bombed a mystery site in Syria. While it was clearly a major operation, the silence by all parties was remarkable, and heightened the mystery. Some claimed it was a terrorist arms shipment, some claimed it was a nuclear site, and others thought it was a practice-run / signal for Iran. But, with everyone remaining silent, the story slowly faded away.

The NYT is reporting that recently released satellite photos show that Syria is rebuilding a structure on the suspect site.

The puzzling site in Syria that Israeli jets bombed in September became more curious Friday with the release of a satellite photograph showing new construction there that resembles the site’s former main building.

Israel’s air attack was directed against what Israeli and American intelligence analysts judged to be a partly constructed nuclear reactor. The Syrians vigorously denied the atomic claim.

Before the attack, satellite imagery showed a tall, square building there measuring about 150 feet on a side.

After the attack, the Syrians wiped the area clean, with some analysis calling the speed of the cleanup a tacit admission of guilt. The barren site is on the eastern bank of the Euphrates, 90 miles north of the Iraqi border.

The image released Friday came from a private company, DigitalGlobe, in Longmont, Colo. It shows a tall, square building under construction that appears to closely resemble the original structure, with the exception that the roof is vaulted instead of flat. The photo was taken from space on Wednesday.

Several clues emerge here. First, the NYT seems rather confident in asserting the US / Israeli analysis that it was a nuclear site. This was hotly contested back in October, but is taken for granted here.

Second, the article goes on to report that the IAEA asked to inspect the sight, again indicating that there was some nuclear suspicion to clear up. Syria refused, and the rebuilding will make it more difficult to ever figure out what was there.

My question is—what’s the back story? An airstrike this big, nuclear proliferation in a country that was, once, “next” up on the axis of evil (and borders Iraq), and nothing happens?

Note to self: in 10 years or so, submit a FOIA on this and find out what the heck was going on.

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Surge impedance

Over at Foreign Policy Passport, Blake Hounshell quotes John McCreary:

Several retired US military officers explained in an interview on NPR yesterday that the success of the surge is economic, not military. The US pays the 70,000-80,000 fighters better than the tribal elders and al Qaida. Al Qaida tends to pay based on piece work – per operation -- whereas the US has put the tribal youth on salary. Retired General McCaffrey is quoted as saying at $10 per day per fighter the US can pay that indefinitely.

The payments began in May and the attacks declined shortly thereafter for the first time in three years. In this interpretation, it appears the US won the bidding war in a labor auction in a depressed economy where unemployment is about 50%. That at least makes sense in tying together all the other explanations.

Blake thinks this presents major problems for the United States. Eric Martin at Total Information Awareness discusses his qualified disagreement:

Let's look first at #1. Blake worries about our ability to maintain payments to former Sunni insurgents once we remove our troops from the arena, and that this could lead to a spike in the number of attacks. But the obvious rebuttal is: We won't have to pay Iraqis not to attack us once we leave, because we won't be there to attack! Money saved, problem solved - at least one third of the way.

"What about attacks against Iraqi government forces/civilians?," one might ask. "Shouldn't we stick around in large numbers to keep paying for Sunni forbearance along these lines?" I'm not so sure. Blake himself observes that the Iraqi government shows no interest in paying Sunni forces from government coffers. There are generally two possible reads for this stinginess - each of which, again, points in the direction of a common solution to Blake's conundrum.

First, the Iraqi government values the recent reduction in violence, but knows that it doesn't have to incorporate Sunni militant forces and/or pay them for civilian jobs while the US is around to foot the bill. If this is the case, then fear of a resumption of violence once we leave will force the Iraqi government to divert real assets to Sunni areas upon our exit.

Second, the Iraqi government has no intention of ever paying money to, or incorporating, armed Sunni groups for fear (imagined, though likely real) that those Sunni groups will turn against the Shiite led Iraqi government at some point in the near future. But if that is the case, what does our presence really accomplish?

We will be occupying a countr