MAKING THE WORLD SAFE FOR THE U.S.: the cultural roots of interventionism
Cliff DuRand
INTRODUCTION
I'm interested in exploring some of the cultural roots of US interventionism and the critique of that culture. But I need to begin by being clear about one thing. I am not suggesting any kind of cultural determinism. I am not suggesting that certain cultural values or ideas are the cause of interventions. It seems to me that economic interests are more often what lies behind such actions; the culture provides the ideology with which those actions are legitimated by opinion makers or accepted by an acquiescing public. The decisions to intervene are not made by the public; they are invariably made by what C. Wright Mills called "the power elite". That elite, however, generally requires some degree of support from the public. The relevance to radical philosophers of a critique of culture then lies in the fact that culture is important in enabling elites to obtain the public support required for interventions undertaken for different reasons. There are three basic groups that come into play here: the public, political elites, and the capitalist class. In the model I am employing, most interventions are in support of the interests of the capitalist class as the embodiment of capital. Since the function of the state is to protect the existing class relations in which that capitalist class is dominant, the political elite seeks to promote the interests of the capitalist class either as a whole or the more dominant sectors of it. Thus, when the political elite speaks of "the national interest", it is invariably referring to the interests of that class, because it identifies the nation with its dominant class. Policy decisions, including those involving interventions in other countries, are made in terms of the interests of capital, especially corporate capital. The "public" essentially plays a supporting role in this.
Nevertheless, that support is important. When there is strong opposition from within the public, the elite enjoys less freedom of action. Consider the substantial opposition to the Reagan administration's efforts to overthrow the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. While that placed legal barriers in the way of the elite's policy decisions, it only meant they had to resort all the more to illegal covert, off-the-books activities. The elite finds at least a minimum level of support or acquiescence by the public far more preferable. It is there that as radical intellectuals opposed to pro-capitalist interventions, it is there that we can enter the scene. As critics of the culture that sustains a supporting or acquiescing public, we can limit the elites freedom of action. While that may be a modest accomplishment, it is not unimportant.
I. INDIVIDUALISM AND THE PRIVATIZATION OF LIFE
It was well over a century and a half ago that the Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville wrote his seminal study of the American character, a character that he saw as sustaining democracy in this new nation. But he also saw something that, if left unchecked, he feared would undermine democracy. He called it 'individualism' and described it as follows:
Individualism is a calm and considered feeling which disposes each citizen to isolate himself from the mass of his fellows and withdraw into the circle of family and friends; with this little society formed to his taste, he gladly leaves the greater society to look after itself.
Over the ensuing years, this privatizing individualism has grown to become the dominant feature of American culture, as Robert Bellah and his co-authors have documented in their Habits of the Heart. Philosophically this goes back to John Locke's atomistic individualism and the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham. It is based on an asocial concept of the human being: the view that I am what I am independent of society or even against society, in egoistic pursuit of self interest, a self interest that under capitalism tends to be defined in commodified forms.
As de Tocqueville feared, this utilitarian individualism privatizes life, "turning one's attention inward on self" in his words. It is profoundly anti-civic and thus anti-democratic. The increasing predominance of individualism in American culture has been a major factor in the collapse of the public sphere. The good life is seen as laying either in the acquisition of consumer goodies or the spiritual development of an inner self. No longer is the good life thought to be found in the polis, in pursuit of a common good in association with others, in the quest for a good society.
As people have retreated from public life into their individualistic pursuits, there has been an impoverishment of politics. When it occupies one's attention at all, politics is seen as a further means for the pursuit of self interest. A public issue is one's concern only when and as far as it affects one's own well being. It is thus that politics becomes interest group politics -- an extension of private life into public life.
It is only a small step from this to the dismantling of public institutions altogether. This neo-liberal agenda has become the dominant theme of Republican George W. Bush's electoral campaign. Proposals to marketize what have been public goods -- "give the people's money back to them", "privatize social security", "improve education by issuing school vouchers" -- all these promises resonate with sectors of the American people because they appeal to individualistic sentiments. It appeals to the "middle class" ideal of being able to look after one's own needs. In the words of de Tocqueville, such folk owe no man anything and hardly expect anything from anybody. They form the habit of thinking of themselves in isolation and imagine that their whole destiny is in their hands.
II. MESSIANISM
The political culture I have been describing is conducive to interventionism, if only because it leaves political elites relatively free to pursue their own projects, particularly if they minimally affect the private lives of a largely passive citizenry. In a moment I will address the question of how elites mobilize the necessary level of public support for such ventures. But first, a caveat.
American culture is multidimensional. In addition to the dominant individualism, there also are present older civic republican and biblical traditions. These communitarian traditions are bearers of different values: civic mindedness, compassion for one's fellow man, and a concern for social justice and the common good. These solidaristic values are also present in the culture today, though often dormant. On occasion they have become a powerful motivating force for social movements. They even show through the appeals to a crass self interest politicians often make. For example, in the face of large tax surpluses, many politicians have advocated large tax cuts -- something normally very popular with voters. But this time, such promises have not played so well. Opinion polls show that most would like to see those surpluses used to meet pressing social needs. In other words, common goods are being preferred over individual self interest.
There is much that is good in the American character. The American people can be a generous and caring people. It is precisely these sentiments that the elite appeals to when it needs to mobilize support. Many respond positively when called on to "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." They rally behind a noble cause, something larger than self that they believe can make the world better. It is through appeals to a higher national purpose that elites are able to draw people out of their private lives and enlist them in their projects.
However, all too often, those projects turn out to be not in the interest of the nation, but of those special interest groups the elite is tied to. The language of national purpose used by elites turns out to be a cover for very different purposes. The U.S. military intervention in the Persian Gulf was undertaken not to defend the principle of sovereignty and the freedom of the people of Kuwait, as George Bush The Elder told us; it was to protect the interest of big oil. Similarly NAFTA promoted not so much the national interest (as both Bush and Clinton administrations told us) as the interests of transnational corporations. And this list could go on and on of cases where the elite sought to sell the public on projects that served economically dominant classes by camouflaging them as efforts "to promote our national interests and our values."
Our criticisms of those interventions are most effective when we embrace those older civic and biblical traditions that the elite appeals to and show how their projects are actually a betrayal of those values. When they speak of "our national interest", we must ask "who are we?" Who is the nation -- the corporations or the people? When they speak of "our values", we must ask whether it is really common values that are being advanced, or financial values?
But beyond that, we must also question the messianism implicit in the view that it is somehow our responsibility to make the world better by making it more like us. From the Wilsonian call to "make the world safe for democracy" to FDR's call to defend freedom and the Cold War era's calls to defend free enterprise, the national elite has been able to mobilize the nation not just to defend values that were seen as under threat, but to save the world by remaking it. After a century of such messianism, the received wisdom is that the U.S. has the responsibility to be the world leader ... and policeman, and judge and jury, and (if necessary) executioner. Anything less is branded as "isolationism". It is assumed that "we" have the right and duty to guide the world as "we" see fit. And who is this "we"? The political elite, of course, acting in the interest of capital.
However, to challenge the arrogant assumption that it is the role of the US to save the world from itself, does not imply there is no responsibility to others. It is possible to act in solidarity with others without imposing one's own model. This requires dialog and practicing the virtues of humility, respect for others, and openess to learn. These are virtues preserved in the civil and biblical traditions. And it is those that we must appeal to as we seek to construct an alternative to the interventionism of our elites.
Cliff DuRand
INTRODUCTION
I'm interested in exploring some of the cultural roots of US interventionism and the critique of that culture. But I need to begin by being clear about one thing. I am not suggesting any kind of cultural determinism. I am not suggesting that certain cultural values or ideas are the cause of interventions. It seems to me that economic interests are more often what lies behind such actions; the culture provides the ideology with which those actions are legitimated by opinion makers or accepted by an acquiescing public. The decisions to intervene are not made by the public; they are invariably made by what C. Wright Mills called "the power elite". That elite, however, generally requires some degree of support from the public. The relevance to radical philosophers of a critique of culture then lies in the fact that culture is important in enabling elites to obtain the public support required for interventions undertaken for different reasons. There are three basic groups that come into play here: the public, political elites, and the capitalist class. In the model I am employing, most interventions are in support of the interests of the capitalist class as the embodiment of capital. Since the function of the state is to protect the existing class relations in which that capitalist class is dominant, the political elite seeks to promote the interests of the capitalist class either as a whole or the more dominant sectors of it. Thus, when the political elite speaks of "the national interest", it is invariably referring to the interests of that class, because it identifies the nation with its dominant class. Policy decisions, including those involving interventions in other countries, are made in terms of the interests of capital, especially corporate capital. The "public" essentially plays a supporting role in this.
Nevertheless, that support is important. When there is strong opposition from within the public, the elite enjoys less freedom of action. Consider the substantial opposition to the Reagan administration's efforts to overthrow the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. While that placed legal barriers in the way of the elite's policy decisions, it only meant they had to resort all the more to illegal covert, off-the-books activities. The elite finds at least a minimum level of support or acquiescence by the public far more preferable. It is there that as radical intellectuals opposed to pro-capitalist interventions, it is there that we can enter the scene. As critics of the culture that sustains a supporting or acquiescing public, we can limit the elites freedom of action. While that may be a modest accomplishment, it is not unimportant.
I. INDIVIDUALISM AND THE PRIVATIZATION OF LIFE
It was well over a century and a half ago that the Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville wrote his seminal study of the American character, a character that he saw as sustaining democracy in this new nation. But he also saw something that, if left unchecked, he feared would undermine democracy. He called it 'individualism' and described it as follows:
Individualism is a calm and considered feeling which disposes each citizen to isolate himself from the mass of his fellows and withdraw into the circle of family and friends; with this little society formed to his taste, he gladly leaves the greater society to look after itself.
Over the ensuing years, this privatizing individualism has grown to become the dominant feature of American culture, as Robert Bellah and his co-authors have documented in their Habits of the Heart. Philosophically this goes back to John Locke's atomistic individualism and the utilitarianism of Jeremy Bentham. It is based on an asocial concept of the human being: the view that I am what I am independent of society or even against society, in egoistic pursuit of self interest, a self interest that under capitalism tends to be defined in commodified forms.
As de Tocqueville feared, this utilitarian individualism privatizes life, "turning one's attention inward on self" in his words. It is profoundly anti-civic and thus anti-democratic. The increasing predominance of individualism in American culture has been a major factor in the collapse of the public sphere. The good life is seen as laying either in the acquisition of consumer goodies or the spiritual development of an inner self. No longer is the good life thought to be found in the polis, in pursuit of a common good in association with others, in the quest for a good society.
As people have retreated from public life into their individualistic pursuits, there has been an impoverishment of politics. When it occupies one's attention at all, politics is seen as a further means for the pursuit of self interest. A public issue is one's concern only when and as far as it affects one's own well being. It is thus that politics becomes interest group politics -- an extension of private life into public life.
It is only a small step from this to the dismantling of public institutions altogether. This neo-liberal agenda has become the dominant theme of Republican George W. Bush's electoral campaign. Proposals to marketize what have been public goods -- "give the people's money back to them", "privatize social security", "improve education by issuing school vouchers" -- all these promises resonate with sectors of the American people because they appeal to individualistic sentiments. It appeals to the "middle class" ideal of being able to look after one's own needs. In the words of de Tocqueville, such folk owe no man anything and hardly expect anything from anybody. They form the habit of thinking of themselves in isolation and imagine that their whole destiny is in their hands.
II. MESSIANISM
The political culture I have been describing is conducive to interventionism, if only because it leaves political elites relatively free to pursue their own projects, particularly if they minimally affect the private lives of a largely passive citizenry. In a moment I will address the question of how elites mobilize the necessary level of public support for such ventures. But first, a caveat.
American culture is multidimensional. In addition to the dominant individualism, there also are present older civic republican and biblical traditions. These communitarian traditions are bearers of different values: civic mindedness, compassion for one's fellow man, and a concern for social justice and the common good. These solidaristic values are also present in the culture today, though often dormant. On occasion they have become a powerful motivating force for social movements. They even show through the appeals to a crass self interest politicians often make. For example, in the face of large tax surpluses, many politicians have advocated large tax cuts -- something normally very popular with voters. But this time, such promises have not played so well. Opinion polls show that most would like to see those surpluses used to meet pressing social needs. In other words, common goods are being preferred over individual self interest.
There is much that is good in the American character. The American people can be a generous and caring people. It is precisely these sentiments that the elite appeals to when it needs to mobilize support. Many respond positively when called on to "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." They rally behind a noble cause, something larger than self that they believe can make the world better. It is through appeals to a higher national purpose that elites are able to draw people out of their private lives and enlist them in their projects.
However, all too often, those projects turn out to be not in the interest of the nation, but of those special interest groups the elite is tied to. The language of national purpose used by elites turns out to be a cover for very different purposes. The U.S. military intervention in the Persian Gulf was undertaken not to defend the principle of sovereignty and the freedom of the people of Kuwait, as George Bush The Elder told us; it was to protect the interest of big oil. Similarly NAFTA promoted not so much the national interest (as both Bush and Clinton administrations told us) as the interests of transnational corporations. And this list could go on and on of cases where the elite sought to sell the public on projects that served economically dominant classes by camouflaging them as efforts "to promote our national interests and our values."
Our criticisms of those interventions are most effective when we embrace those older civic and biblical traditions that the elite appeals to and show how their projects are actually a betrayal of those values. When they speak of "our national interest", we must ask "who are we?" Who is the nation -- the corporations or the people? When they speak of "our values", we must ask whether it is really common values that are being advanced, or financial values?
But beyond that, we must also question the messianism implicit in the view that it is somehow our responsibility to make the world better by making it more like us. From the Wilsonian call to "make the world safe for democracy" to FDR's call to defend freedom and the Cold War era's calls to defend free enterprise, the national elite has been able to mobilize the nation not just to defend values that were seen as under threat, but to save the world by remaking it. After a century of such messianism, the received wisdom is that the U.S. has the responsibility to be the world leader ... and policeman, and judge and jury, and (if necessary) executioner. Anything less is branded as "isolationism". It is assumed that "we" have the right and duty to guide the world as "we" see fit. And who is this "we"? The political elite, of course, acting in the interest of capital.
However, to challenge the arrogant assumption that it is the role of the US to save the world from itself, does not imply there is no responsibility to others. It is possible to act in solidarity with others without imposing one's own model. This requires dialog and practicing the virtues of humility, respect for others, and openess to learn. These are virtues preserved in the civil and biblical traditions. And it is those that we must appeal to as we seek to construct an alternative to the interventionism of our elites.
