Evolving Global Governance

[Jaboney]

Given the title alone, I expect it’ll take days just to get double digit views, never mind a response. Whatever. It’s a major issue, if not exactly an exciting one.

It’s discussed in Foreign Affairs: The New New World Order"

Here’s the summary:

Controversies over the war in Iraq and U.S. unilateralism have overshadowed a more pragmatic and multilateral component of the Bush administration’s grand strategy: its attempt to reconfigure U.S. foreign policy and international institutions in order to account for shifts in the global distribution of power and the emergence of states such as China and India. This unheralded move is well intentioned and well advised, and Washington should redouble its efforts.

And for anyone ready to dismiss out of hand efforts to improve international governance, here’s a paragraph from p.2.

But in part, the effort to institutionalize a new great-power concert has been a long-standing component of the Bush administration’s foreign policy. And Washington-style multilateralism is above all a means to further U.S. goals. Accordingly, the Bush administration defers to institutions it sees as being effective (say, the WTO) and has consistently sought the enforcement of multilateral norms and decisions it deems important (be they IMF lending agreements or UN Security Council resolutions). But it scorns multilateral institutions that fail to live up to their own stated standards (such as other UN bodies). The 2006 National Security Strategy reiterates Washington’s dual position by arguing that great-power consensus “must be supported by appropriate institutions, regional and global, to make cooperation more permanent, effective, and wide-reaching. Where existing institutions can be reformed to meet new challenges, we, along with our partners, must reform them. Where appropriate institutions do not exist, we, along with our partners, must create them.”

For you information only… I really don’t expect any responses. :s

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Edit: Nix that. Base on the article I’ve got one clear cut, easily stated and answered question. And it applies to business as well as politics.[/color]

Q. Individuals and institutions invest in systems for the rewards they bring, only one of which is power. If you’re heavily invested in System X, and that system is potentially threatened by free radicals (outside agents), what’s your best bet for the future: diminish your own standing (power) within the organization in order to bring new players on board and protect the system from which you continue to benefit, or reinforce your position and try to compel the outsiders to join on your terms, thus risking the establishment of an alternative System Y?

[redandy]

My my, aren’t we pessimistic? I viewed the topic with interest, but I have held off bc right now I don’t have much spare internet time to read the article. Going by the selected quotes, I’ll say there may be valid reasons for supporting certain institutions but not others, and in light of the relative “newness” of the WTO as compared to the UN, it wouldn’t be surprising to find out that the UN structure needed reform, whereas the WTO didn’t. And as for these things being in American interests: well of course they are, it would be a deriliction of duty for the President not to act in the interests of the U.S. and its citizens. The question is whether they are a) violating standards of international law, and thus undermining U.S. credibility (which is possible), or b) violating what a consensus (or approximation thereof) of U.S. citizens would consider to be the standards of behavoir when dealing with foreign nations, if they had all the facts (also possible, but so far I haven’t had a chance to read the case as it were).

I’ll get back to you.

[Jaboney]

[quote=“redandy”]My my, aren’t we pessimistic? [/quote] Realistic. Nonetheless, I persevere in boring senseless as many as I can reach.

Here’s a nice, short (30 min) summation of the context in which Bush II adopted his particular stance on global governance. It’s by Strobe Talbott, president of the Brookings Institution.

iTunes Link: After the Revolution: The Next Phase of American Foreign Policy