Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism, Volume 24 (Current Perspectives in Social Theory)

EDITOR Jennifer M. Lehmann University of Nebraska (Sociology and Women’s Studies)

SPECIAL VOLUME EDITOR Harry F. Dahms University of Tennessee (Sociology)

ASSOCIATE EDITORS Harry F. Dahms Florida State University (Sociology)

Timothy Luke Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Political Science)

Lawrence Hazelrigg Florida State University (Sociology)

Raymond Morrow University of Alberta (Sociology)

EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Grant Tietjen University of Nebraska

EDITORIAL BOARD Ben Agger University of Texas – Arlington (Sociology and Anthropology)

Molefi Kete Asante Temple University (African – American Studies)

Robert J. Antonio University of Kansas (Sociology)

David Ashley University of Wyoming (Sociology)

Stanley Aronowitz City University of New York – Graduate Center (Sociology)

Ward Churchill University of Colorado (Ethnic Studies)

vii

viii

EDITORIAL BOARD

Norman K. Denzin University of Illinois at Urbana – Champaign (Sociology)

John O’Neill York University (Sociology)

Nancy Fraser New School for Social Research (Political Science)

Moishe Postone University of Chicago (History)

Martha Gimenez University of Colorado – Boulder (Sociology)

Lawrence Scaff Wayne State University (Political Science)

Robert Goldman Lewis and Clark College (Sociology and Anthropology)

Steven Seidman State University of New York at Albany (Sociology)

Mark Gottdiener State University of New York at Buffalo (Sociology)

Frank Taylor Edinboro University of Pennsylvania (Sociology and Anthropology)

Douglas Kellner University of California – Los Angeles (Philosophy)

Stephen Turner The University of South Florida (Philosophy)

Lauren Langman Loyola University (Sociology)

Christine Williams The University of Texas at Austin (Sociology)

LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Robert J. Antonio

Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, USA

Alessandro Bonanno

Department of Sociology, Sam Houston State University, TX, USA

Meghan A. Burke

Department of Sociology, Loyola University, Chicago, USA

Harry F. Dahms

Department of Sociology, University of Tennessee, USA

Daniel M. Harrison

Department of Political and Social Sciences, Lander University, SC, USA

Larry W. Isaac

Department of Sociology, Vanderbilt University, TN, USA

Lauren Langman

Department of Sociology, Loyola University, Chicago, USA

Timothy W. Luke

Department of Political Science, Virginia Polytechnic Institute of Science and Technology, USA

Karen Monkman

Department of Education Policy and Research, DePaul University, Chicago

David Norman Smith

Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, USA

Barney Warf

Department of Geography, Florida State University, USA

ix

INTRODUCTION: ‘‘GLOBALIZATION BETWEEN THE COLD WAR AND NEO-IMPERIALISM’’ In early April 2004, a group of social scientists gathered at Florida State University, for an interdisciplinary conference on ‘‘Globalization and the Sedimentation of the Cold War.’’1 The papers and discussions centered around the following question: Has the configuration of business–labor–government relations that took hold in the West after World War II – during the so-called ‘‘Cold War’’ – become ‘‘sedimented’’ in ways that delimit the possible scope of choices and actions decision-makers in key institutions and organizations can make and engage in. Has it done so in a manner that resembles an underlying program which remains concealed from sight – perhaps more so, as time goes by? If we should need to answer this question in the affirmative, this program would predetermine both the confines of strategies institutions and organizations can pursue in their efforts to confront emerging challenges, and the nature of the results those strategies produce. While the configuration, as it took shape in western democratic societies – especially in North America and Western Europe, but also in Japan – was historically specific, it produced a condition that appears to perpetuate patterns established during, and characteristic of, the Cold War – beyond the official end of the Cold War. By implication, decision-makers in politics, business, and the policy apparatus would presume the prevalence of patterns that were endemic to the Cold War constellation of business, labor, and government, along with corresponding definitions of the functions and responsibilities of government, as integral to the design of early twenty-first century societies. Put differently, in the absence of a definite break with the political and economic patterns that took hold during the Cold War, the latter will remain as a central feature and organizing principle, continuing to define the perimeter of choices we perceive, the nature of goals we pursue, and the types of means we both employ and deploy. xi

xii

INTRODUCTION

Historians, as well as political scientists specializing in international relations, have a professional interest in identifying the impact the Cold War configuration has had on the ability of decision-makers to make choices that point beyond the configuration itself, especially in nation-states, multinational corporations, and international organizations. By contrast, until the end of the twentieth-century, sociologists barely had begun to acknowledge that the consequences of the Cold War period in politics, culture, business, and society warrant focused and critical attention. Indeed, sociologists have refrained from scrutinizing how the specific and unique circumstances of the Cold War configuration facilitated a period of unprecedented economic wealth creation, in a historical context that was characterized by stability in international relations among societies with democratic political systems – and the role this configuration played in preparing ‘‘globalization.’’ In addition, as during this period, civil rights, political rights, and social rights spread to more and more countries around the world, social scientists implicitly presumed that the configuration shaping developments during the decades following World War II, would continue to determine the thrust of social and political changes well into the twenty-first century, thus both sustaining and shaping ‘‘progress.’’ Attempts during the 1990s to determine the likely trajectory of social, political, and economic changes whose centrality to ‘‘globalization’’ is becoming ever more evident, revealed increasingly irreconcilable tensions within the very design of late-twentieth and early twenty-first century societies. Those tensions are most virulent between the integration of national economies around the globe into the global market, increasing inequality within and between nations, the spread of communication technologies, the growing autonomy of transnational corporations, and the related inability of national governments to track the activities of those corporations. For several years, social scientists either had not been willing or able to recognize, anticipate, or predict the irreconcilable nature of these tensions. There are proliferating indications that scrutinizing globalization in the interest of predicting the likely directions of social, political, and economic developments in the twenty-first century, may be the greatest challenge for social scientists to confront today. Accepting this challenge successfully would require that we jump beyond the shadow cast by the way in which the conflict between East and West during the second half of the twentieth century reduced further and further the options either system had in its endeavors to meet old as well as newly emerging contingencies and complexities, along with amplifying contradictions. Meeting this challenge in a constructive manner would depend on our willingness to reassess, critically, whether

Introduction

xiii

and how the research tools developed during the twentieth century might enhance, as well as impair, our ability to scrutinize the conflicted nature of globalization, and to predict its possible, as opposed to likely, future trajectories. Since sociology emerged as the social science of modern, capitalist society (see Dahms, 2005), it developed to provide the tools for illuminating how exactly the dominant features of societies in Western Europe and North America have been shaping increasingly rapid social changes since the nineteenth century. Both by design and by default, explicitly as well as implicitly, sociological labor to a large extent has been oriented toward producing theoretical, conceptual, and methodological tools for revealing how modern societies constitute a context for sustaining multifarious trends in an increasingly precarious balance. As the social scientists who rely on tools designed to facilitate research directed at identifying the tensions between different social, political, and economic value spheres and trends, sociologists are in a better position to scrutinize conditions of globalization, even and especially compared to economists and political scientists. In certain regards, these trends are highly compatible, in other regards, they appear to be in an uneasy balance, and in other regards still, they are characterized by a high degree of tension. While these trends produced historically unprecedented levels of wealth, stability, and security in the most ‘‘advanced’’ societies, an increasing number of social scientists have begun to point out that globalization is amplifying the move toward the achievements of the twentieth century being eclipsed further and further – with regard to wealth, stability, security, and social justice – during a period of time fraught with uncertainties, crises, and volatility, and whose duration is impossible to predict. Thus, before we endeavor to anticipate possible and likely trends in the twenty-first century, we must make efforts to illuminate the nature of the existence of, and – if applicable – the relationship between, the Cold War configuration and globalization. Grasping the nature of globalization and the present condition may require that social scientists spell out how the configuration that emerged after World War II, in light of its very successes, is likely to have been a model specifically tuned to the historical circumstances that emerged alongside the so-called Cold War, and the concrete needs and imperatives that came with it. The very success of the post-World War II configuration appears to have begun to impair the ability of decision-makers in key institutions and organizations in industrialized societies, to confront, and even to manage, newly emerging challenges and threats today – in ways that would contain, or reduce, their urgency and disruptive nature.

xiv

INTRODUCTION

It is important to keep in mind that the configuration never was intended to be a means to ‘‘solving’’ the array of structural problems whose maintenance was integral to social, political, and economic stability in the West, but rather, to contain their destructive potential, by postponing confronting them into the distant future. At the very least, it is possible for the postWorld War II configuration to continue well into the twenty-first century. At this point, it is most likely that the configuration will channel choices and strategies in a manner that will reduce further still available and conceivable options. It is also increasingly probable that continued reliance on the Cold War configuration will produce consequences detrimental to maintaining the pursuit of the social, political, cultural, and economic goals we identify with the ‘‘social modernism’’ of the same period (see Woodiwiss, 1993). This is especially true if reliance lacks reflexivity regarding the configuration’s most problematic features.2 If in the pursuit of the goals of the American and French Revolutions (in terms of ‘‘liberty, equality, and fraternity,’’ i.e., solidarity), social scientists should fail to draw attention to, and to make explicit, the potentially destructive implications of continued adherence to the Cold War configuration, departure from the choices and strategies central to the configuration, along with related practices in all spheres of social life, is bound to become ever more difficult – despite the fact that twenty-first century conditions and challenges, in many different ways, are of a qualitatively different nature and urgency, compared to those that were prevalent during the second half of the twentieth century. Without determined efforts, in the pursuit of the espoused values basic to western societies, to move choices and strategies to a higher level of ‘‘mediating facts and norms,’’ via efforts to reconcile the need to maintain order, with shared values emphasizing social justice – the development of means and tools to confront imminent domestic and international challenges and threats will be in peril. Social scientists must begin to determine how the successes of the configuration relate to the ability of institutions developed after World War II, to contain complexities, contingencies, and contradictions inherent in industrialized societies, in the interest of facilitating greater wealth, stability, security, and social justice for all. Only then will we be able to ascertain whether the Cold War configuration, along with its successes, precipitates trends that will imperil those successes, or whether it is possible to return to the developmental trajectory that had determined, and defined, the quality of progress, before the rise of totalitarianism, during the second quarter of the twentieth century, and its obscured continuation during the decades after World War II. The introductory chapter by Robert J. Antonio and Alessandro Bonanno provides a theoretically oriented, historical overview of the period of time

Introduction

xv

comprising the formation of the Cold War and developments up to the very present. David Norman Smith’s chapter is an in-depth study of the concept of empire and its history and uses in recent decades, including the very present. The chapter by Larry Isaac and Daniel Harrison examines the increasing reliance of the US military, on private contractors as armed forces, along with resulting implications. Lauren Langman and Meghan Burke’s chapter on American exceptionalism is a study of the historically constructed formation of the American national character, and its entwinement with dominant features of current national and foreign policies, in terms of imperialism. Timothy W. Luke’s chapter, presented at the Annual Meeting of the Global Studies Association of North America in 2005, scrutinizes the link between 9-11 and the current debate about ‘‘empire.’’ The final two contributions are responses to three of the chapters included in this volume.

NOTES 1. The conference took place at Wakulla Springs State Park, located south of Tallahassee, Florida, as what turned out to be the fourth and final Social Theory Workshop at Florida State University. The earlier workshops had taken place in 1995, 1996, and 1998, respectively. The participants of the 2005 conference included Robert Antonio (University of Kansas), Detlev Claussen (University of Hannover, Germany), Larry Isaac (Florida State University, now at Vanderbilt University), Lauren Langman (Loyola University, Chicago), Karen Monkman (Florida State University, now DePaul University), Moishe Postone (University of Chicago), Jill Quadagno (Florida State University), David Norman Smith (University of Kansas), and Barney Warf (Florida State University). The conference was supported by Florida State University’s Office of Research (Council on Research and Creativity), the Mildred and Claude Pepper Endowment, and the Department of Sociology, which hosted the event. Two contributions that have not been included in this volume, have since appeared elsewhere: ‘‘Moishe Postone, (2006). History and Helplessness. Mass Mobilization and Contemporary Forms of Anticapitalism,’’ Public Culture, 18(1), 93–110; and Jill Quadagno and Debra Street, (2005). ‘‘Antistatism in American Welfare State Development,’’ Journal of Policy History, 17(1), 57–75. I would like to thank Jason Eastman for helping to organize the conference. 2. For a compelling analysis of the specific nature of the strategies employed during the Cold War, and the successes attained, see Cyr (1997).

REFERENCES Cyr, A. I. (1997). After the Cold War. American foreign policy, Europe, and Asia. New York: New York University Press.

xvi

INTRODUCTION

Dahms, H. F. (2005). Globalization or hyper-alienation? Critiques of traditional Marxism as arguments for basic income. Social theory as politics in knowledge, Current Perspectives in Social Theory (Vol. 24). Woodiwiss, A. (1993). Postmodernity USA. The crisis of social modernism in postwar America. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Harry F. Dahms

PERIODIZING GLOBALIZATION: FROM COLD WAR MODERNIZATION TO THE BUSH DOCTRINE$ Robert J. Antonio and Alessandro Bonanno ABSTRACT We address here how the U.S. neoliberal policy regime developed and how its reconstructed vision of modernization, which culminated, under the rubric of globalization, was neutralized by 9/11 and neoconservative geopolitics. We analyze the phases in the rise of neoliberalism, and provide a detailed map of its vision of global modernization at its high tide under Clinton. We also address how the Bush Doctrine’s unilateral, preemptive polices and the consequent War on Terror and Iraq War eroded U.S. legitimacy as the globalization system’s hegmon and shifted the discourse from globalization to empire. Cold War modernization theorists, neoliberal globalization advocates, and Bush doctrine neoconservatives all drew on an American exceptionalist tradition that portrays the U.S. as modernity’s ‘‘lead society,’’ attaches universal significance to its values, policies, and institutions, and urges their worldwide diffusion. All three $

The core ideas of this paper were presented at the ‘‘Globalization & The Sedimentation of the Cold War: An Interdisciplinary Conference’’ (Florida State University; April 1–2, 2004).

Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 1–56 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24001-5

1

2

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

traditions ignore or diminish the importance of substantive equality and social justice. We suggest that consequent U.S. policy problems might be averted by recovery of a suppressed side of the American tradition that stresses social justice and holds that democracy must start at home and be spread by example rather than by exhortation or force. Overall, we explore the contradictory U.S. role in an emergent post-Cold War world.

‘‘What is freedom and why is it prized?’’ (John Dewey, [1939] 1988a, p. 65)

NEOLIBERAL GLOBALIZATION AND THE COLD WAR SYSTEM What is the principal aspect of the past decade? Put briefly, it can be defined as the virtually uncontested consolidation, and universal diffusion, of neoliberalism. (Perry Anderson, 2000, p. 10)

Globalization is not a new event.1 However, recent development of the neoliberal policy regime marks a new phase of the process. Globalization has many sides and its advocates and critics have taken varied stances toward it (e.g., Mann, 2001; Henwood, 2003, pp. 145–148; Lechner & Boli, 2004). This paper will not address the overall process; we employ the term globalization to refer to neoliberal globalization.2 We stress the U.S. role in developing and spreading a policy regime that advocates a worldwide freemarket, or deregulation, privatization, securitization, free trade, minimal taxation, and, in general, reduction of the state’s role in social regulation. Neoliberals call for export-led growth in poorer nations and for austerity programs to deal with debt crises (but not in the U.S.). They facilitate more rapid, unregulated movement of capital, commodities, and people across national borders, an expanded world market, foreign-direct investment, and a global system of production and division of labor. Neoliberals champion the free-market, but often employ ‘‘neomercantilist’’ tactics, favoring active state intervention in behalf of U.S. business (e.g., employing barriers against foreign imports, providing subsidies for producers, ‘‘socializing risk’’ in bailouts to save hedge funds, currency speculators, and rich investors, and increasing the tax load on poorer people; see Phillips, 2002). Globalization has been a U.S. state project, framed at the behest of U.S. corporate elites,

Periodizing Globalization

3

allied policy-makers, and regime intellectuals. It is a mode of justification, or ideology, with an Anglo-American template as well as a complex of policy ideas, institutions, practices, and processes. Neoliberaism has been hegemonic in U.S.-led international regulatory institutions, such as the World Bank, World Trade Organization (WTO), and International Monetary Fund (IMF), and it has been embraced, at least, in part, by the G8 nations and by worldwide business and political elites.3 This paper builds on our earlier work focusing on the erosion of the postWorld War II ‘‘structure of accumulation’’ or ‘‘system of regulation.’’4 We address how the U.S. neoliberal policy regime developed and how its reconstructed vision of modernization, which culminated, under the rubric of globalization, was neutralized by 9/11 and neoconservative geopolitics. We analyze the phases in the rise of the neoliberalism, and provide a detailed map of its vision of global modernization at its high tide under Clinton. We also address how the Bush Doctrine’s unilateral, preemptive policies and consequent War on Terrorism and Iraq War eroded U.S. legitimacy as the globalization system’s hegmon and shifted the discourse from globalization to empire. Cold War modernization theorists, neoliberal globalization advocates, and Bush doctrine neoconservatives all drew on an American exceptionalist tradition that portrays the U.S. as modernity’s ‘‘lead society,’’ attaches universal significance to its values, policies, and institutions, and urges their worldwide diffusion. All three traditions ignore or diminish the importance of substantive equality and social justice. We suggest that consequent U.S. policy problems might be averted by recovery of a suppressed side of the American tradition that stresses social justice and holds that democracy must start at home and be spread by example rather than by exhortation or force. Overall, we explore the contradictory U.S. role in an emergent post-Cold War world.

COLD WAR MODERNIZATION THEORY AND THE WINDING DOWN OF THE LONG POSTWAR EXPANSION The United States y has become y the leader of the modern system, not in the usual political sense but through structural innovations central to the main course of modern social development. (Talcott Parsons, 1971, p. 122)

Post-WW II era American liberals held that Keynesian policies, which employed state spending and modest regulation, produce steady economic

4

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

growth, unparalleled abundance, and a near full-employment, low-inflation economy. They argued that postwar corporations were run by socially responsible, technically efficient managers, who mesh profit-seeking with the broader needs of labor and citizens. Liberals believed that postwar capitalism’s greatly improved living standards and opportunities for upward mobility were creating a ‘‘middle-class society’’ based on substantive equality and just meritocracy. They saw the main challenge to be the external threat posed by expansionary communism (e.g., Hodgson, 1978, pp. 67–98). Leading American social theorist, Talcott Parsons held that democratic ‘‘structural innovations’’ made the U.S. the ‘‘leader of the modern system’’ – nations, wishing to be modern, would have to follow its path (1971, p. 122). He thought that even communism, pressed by the need to rationalize production and complex organization, would converge with the U.S. model. Liberals held that U.S. capitalism, with minimal planning, balanced expanded production with expanded consumption and the demands of the market with increased labor and welfare rights and greatly expanded individual freedom (i.e., especially consumer freedom). Parsons’ vision of ‘‘progressive modernization’’ portrayed U.S. democracy as having transcended earlier capitalism’s class divisions and economic cycle. He acknowledged the existence of a racial divide, poverty, and other social problems, but held that continued modernization would erase these lingering facets of the old system. Identifying modernization with Americanization, Parsons saw the postwar, U.S. system to be an evolutionary advance with universal significance. American modernization theorists did not all agree with his scenario, but most held that the U.S. version of democratic capitalism was spreading and generating greater equality, abundance, and freedom worldwide. Less confident about progress and more wary of the communist threat, U.S. policymakers employed proactive means to remake the world according to their views of capitalism and national interest. Postwar modernization theory’s overblown optimism was fanned by the era’s long economic expansion, which raised substantially most Americans’ living standards. Real wages of average U.S. workers rose sharply during the 1950s through the early 1970s (peaking in 1973), and the enlarged middle class shared in the very ample postwar consumer package (Harrison & Bluestone, 1988, pp. 3–10; Hodgson, 1978, pp. 48–64, 2004, p. 93). Worker benefits and public entitlements also expanded. The civil rights movement and Lyndon Johnson’s ‘‘Great Society’’ and ‘‘War on Poverty’’ elevated hopes for social progress and increased inclusion. However, by 1968, Americans were bitterly divided over the Vietnam War. Other events that year, such as the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert

Periodizing Globalization

5

Kennedy, race riots, student rebellions, battles between police and antiwar protesters at the Chicago Democratic Convention, and the expanded hippie counterculture, eroded the liberal consensus. Post-war modernization was at its high point, but social conflict, inflation, and eroded corporate profits raised doubts about permanent growth and social progress. The election of Richard Nixon politicized the divide between the ‘‘silent majority’’ of middle-class, white Americans and minority groups, youth culture, and progressive liberals, starting a right turn that eventually ended the New Deal coalition and social liberalism.

THE RISE OF THE POST-COLD WAR SYSTEM: GLOBALIZATION AS AMERICAN–LED MODERNIZATION Phase 1: Crisis of the Cold War System and Neoconservative Mobilization There is no question that in the immediate future the majority of the American population will be faced with declining living standards. Any serious effort to reduce inflation or increase funds available for investment will involve considerable economic sacrifices. (David Vogel, 1980, p. 56)

In the 1970s, the racial tensions, oil crisis, recession, Watergate crisis, lost Vietnam War, Iran-hostage crisis, tax rebellion and stagflation, and other problems increased polarization and pessimism. Critics spoke of the ‘‘end of consensus,’’ ‘‘decline of American morale,’’ ‘‘erosion of American power,’’ or ‘‘end of the American Century.’’5 Conservative groups decried liberal permissiveness, liberal court decisions, and legislation (e.g., Roe versus Wade, the ban on prayer in public schools, Equal Rights Amendment), and liberal laxity about national security issues. Corporate leaders called for new strategies to deal with increased global competition and other, serious economic problems (e.g., recession, resource shortages, inflation). Mobilizing politically and culturally against Keynesian economics, social liberalism, and union power, they aimed to abrogate the postwar ‘‘capital–labor accord’’ – stem wage and benefit growth, weaken unions, and assert increased workplace control. The new Business Roundtable brought together CEOs from major U.S. corporations to formulate and lobby for a unified promarket agenda (Akard, 1992). Well-funded conservative foundations and think-tanks, such as the American Enterprise Institute and Heritage Foundation, initiated an effective ideological offensive against regulation, unions,

6

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

redistribution, taxation, and Great-Society programs (Steinfels, 1980, p. 11). Social expenditures, union membership, and wages declined (Brenner, 1998, pp. 138–142, 158–159). Corporations moved or outsourced to regions and nations with lower wage, benefit, and regulatory costs or, in other ways, with better ‘‘business climates’’ (Harrison & Bluestone, 1988, pp. 26–27). They used the threat of moving to increase their leverage over labor. Globalization was not yet a direct part of policy debates, but emphases on increased capital mobility, free trade, global competition, and deregulation prepared the way for a broader policy discourse and new policy regime. Daniel Bell’s Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism ([1976] 1996) marked the change in political climate. He argued that hedonistic mass consumption and popular culture demolished Puritan morality; undercutting the character structure that once constrained desires unleashed by capitalist acquisition and that undergirded capitalist labor discipline and productive organization. The youthful counterculture revolt against bourgeois culture, Bell held, forged a ‘‘postmodern’’ version of avant-garde aestheticism that popularized artistic alienation and shock, exhausted modernism’s creative impulses, and neutralized the workaday values of rationality, prudence, and responsibility. He saw the entertainment industry’s ‘‘cultural class’’ to be the leading edge of an ascendent ‘‘new class’’ of knowledge and communication workers, who make ‘‘everything permissible’’ (Bell, 1980, pp. 154–164). Although eschewing the term, Bell was a leading theoretician of the ‘‘neoconservatives,’’ an influential group of Cold War liberals, who had long been staunch anticommunists and who moved rightward in reaction to 1960s and early 1970s student activism, antiwar protest, black power demonstrations, celebrations of the hippie and drug counterculture, and other aspects of New Left politics and social liberalism (e.g., welfare rights protests, affirmative action). They aimed to restore respect for authority, patriotism, JudeoChristian values, civility, meritocracy, self-discipline, and workaday values. They also wanted to cut social programs, reduce regulation, moderate minority expectations for increased equality, participation, and inclusion, and strengthen the military (Steinfels, 1980; Gerson, 1997, pp. 73–142).6 Neoconservatives charged that a ‘‘New Class’’ of liberal intelligentsia, in academe, think tanks, public policy, and media, exerted cultural hegemony, encouraging irresponsibility and self-indulgence while pursuing their ideological and material self-interests. Neoconservatives held that liberals supported the ‘‘adversary culture’’ of young radicals, whose excessive demands for selfexpression, participation, rights, and social reform overloaded the state, rewarded free-riders, wasted scarce resources, and eroded authority, civic morality, and labor discipline. Stressing the limits of regulation, planning,

Periodizing Globalization

7

and public policy, they argued that New-Class social programs worsen the problems that they claim to solve. For example, they argued that liberals dismissed prematurely ‘‘culture of poverty’’ arguments (i.e., poor people are lazy, irresponsible, defective, and at fault), and created costly welfare programs that create dependency and perpetuate poverty. Neoconservatives also held that liberals undermined patriotism and national defense, criticizing their opposition to the Vietnam War and accusing them of a lack of firmness in their policies toward the Soviet Union and enemies of Israel. Neoconservative anticommunism and antiegalitarianism converged with the views of Leo Strauss and his supporters. Straussian political philosophy advocated strong leadership, obedience anchored in patriotism and religion, and readiness to employ force to defend national interests. Contributing significantly to the later 20th century right turn, Straussians strengthened the right’s intellectual respectability, influenced neoconservatives, and created a cultural climate receptive to their ideas and politics.7 Many neoconservatives embraced ‘‘supply side’’ economics, formulated by Robert Mundell and Arthur Laffer and popularized by Jude Wanniski, Jack Kemp, and George Gilder. Supply siders argued that high taxes discourage work, decrease capital investment, cause job loss, and, ultimately, reduce the tax base. They held that excessive worker power, wages, and benefits squeezed profits and that the Keynesian emphasis on demand, elevated wages and state expenditures, should be replaced by a stress on supply that would provide investors needed capital (i.e., which they alleged was depleted by the profit squeeze, over-taxation, and social programs). They argued that smaller government, deregulation, and, especially, reduced taxes for the upper income and wealth brackets would spur investment, invigorate entrepreneurship, and increase employment. Supply side doctrines were compatible with cultural arguments calling for increased worker discipline and reduced worker expectations. Countering left-leaning criticism of capitalism, neoconservatives argued that markets not only enrich wealthy people, but they cut poverty, create countervailing power (i.e., prevent authoritarian state centralization), generate virtuous habits and values (e.g., diligence, discipline, enterprise, cooperation), and favor an open, compassionate, democratic culture (e.g., see Gerson, 1997, pp. 199–265). By means of this humanistic idiom, they revived Social Darwinist emphases on natural inequality, unregulated capitalism, and upward redistribution of wealth. By the end of the 1970s, Neoconservatives fused cultural conservatism with free-market ideology, preparing the ground for a hegemonic bloc that would dominate U.S. politics for decades. Their nascent reconstructed idea of modernization made free markets the motorforce of social progress and

8

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

New-Deal welfare provision, Keynesian regulation, and liberal weakness and imprudence the primary blockages to be overcome. Phase 2: The Reagan Revolution: Money Culture and Victorious Neoliberalism Money changes everything; Money changes everything; We think we know what we’re doing; We don’t know a thing (The Brains)8

From the mid-1960s to the end of the 1980s, Ronald Reagan was, perhaps, the most charismatic voice on the American right. Supporting Barry Goldwater’s1964 presidential bid, he praised the virtues of reduced regulation, decreased welfare, lower taxes, a strong military, and aggressive anticommunism. Borrowing from the 17th century Puritan, John Winthrop, Reagan declared, in his 1974, ‘‘Shining City Upon a Hill’’ speech, that the U.S. was ‘‘not a sick society’’ and that God’s ‘‘divine plan’’ for American global leadership will be realized once Americans broke with the New Deal and Keynesianism and recovered their ‘‘moral and patriotic feeling.’’ Gesturing to Christian conservatives, he added that Americans’ compact with God was in tact ‘‘even if He is temporarily suspended from the classroom.’’ Following more than a decade of problems at home and abroad, the Iran-Hostage crisis typified what neoconservatives had portrayed as the U.S.’s humiliating impotence. Carter’s presidency was already perceived to be weak and ineffective, but its geopolitical low point provided the perfect moment for Reagan’s message to reach much wider non-Republican and non-conservative circles. The failed helicopter rescue of the hostages set the stage for Reagan’s ascendence to power. Accepting the Republican presidential nomination, he repeated his old message about shrinking government, cutting taxes, expanding the military, and restoring the U.S. to its rightful dominant position in the world. He asserted that it was time for Americans to recapture their ‘‘destiny,’’ set by ‘‘divine Providence.’’ At the speech’s end, he called for a silent prayer to begin the ‘‘crusade.’’9 His message resonated with the neoconservatives, who enthusiastically supported his election. Reagan’s big electoral victory brought Republicans to power in the Senate for the first time in 25 years, and provided national and international impetus to the rightward turn begun by Margaret Thatcher. ‘‘Reaganomics’’ began during the second half of the Carter presidency. The Humphrey–Hawkins bill, initially proposed, in 1974, as social-democratic, full -employment legislation, was stalled and then diluted by Congress, who were under pressure from a well-organized corporate opposition that pushed hard

Periodizing Globalization

9

for deregulation and tax relief. Congress passed the Revenue Act of 1978 on the same day that Carter signed the eviscerated Humphrey-Hawkins bill. Building on growing antitax sentiment in the wake of California’s Proposition 13, the new federal tax legislation cut sharply the capital gains tax and corporate taxes. It was the first regressive general tax legislation since the early 1960s. This move followed a hike in Social Security taxation a year earlier. Carter’s appointee to head the Federal Reserve, Paul Volcker declared that American living standards were too high (i.e., for the working class and lower middle class). He raised interest rates substantially to reduce inflation, which generated a recession that reduced industrial overcapacity, favored creditors, and disciplined labor (Akard, 1996, pp. 129–130; Henwood, 2003, pp. 207–208). The changes under Carter created a climate ripe for supply side views. Reagan’s highly touted, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, David Stockman was appointed to slash nonmilitary spending. He belonged to a new generation of conservatives who embraced F. A. Hayek’s view that the social state is the greatest internal threat to freedom and capitalism and that the market is democracy’s heart. They were also influenced by Milton Friedman and other Chicago School economists who opposed social spending and saw unregulated markets to be the model for all institutions. However, Stockman asserted that ‘‘supply side’’ ideas were the ‘‘ideology,’’ ‘‘gospel,’’ or ‘‘Grand Doctrine’’ of Reaganism’s libertarian wing to which he belonged. These free-market ideas animated Reagan’s ‘‘antistatist’’ rhetoric, stressing big tax cuts for the wealthy and amputation of the state’s social regulatory and welfare arms. Stockman and his allies wanted to dismantle Social Security and Medicare and cut business subsidies and porkbarrel projects. In response to political pressure, however, Reagan softened his stance toward the most expensive programs targeted for cuts. Thus, even his major reductions in programs for the poor could not balance the very large tax cuts and big increases in military spending. Reagan fired Stockman for criticizing the policies that created a large federal deficit. Although failing to complete the supply side program, Reagan still cut the welfare state by 9% and Great-Society programs by 25% during the administration’s first 6 years (Stockman, 1986, pp. 30–31, 40–50, 376–411). The administration deployed free-market ideas to rally support for the ‘‘Reagan revolution,’’ but it departed from them when needed to hold on to political power, subsidize corporate interests, or fashion a general probusiness climate. During the 1980s, U.S. corporations employed Japanese methods of ‘‘lean production,’’ dispensed with less profitable operations, and increased outsourcing, which reallocated labor to nonunion operations and gave capital much increased leverage over labor. In 1981, Reagan fired striking

10

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

air-traffic controllers, providing strong federal support for corporate efforts to roll back union membership and power. His tax and regulatory policies weakened anti-trust legislation and favored the rise of the ‘‘multilayered subsidiary form’’ of corporate structure, providing new means to centralize control, reduce taxes and liability, and promote organizational restructuring and flexibility. The organizational changes facilitated increased merger activity and growth of finance capital (Prechel, 2000, pp. 209–216, 255–265). New information technologies connected dispersed productive networks and computerized production and design rationalized and reduced whitecollar jobs as well as blue-collar jobs. From 1979 to 1989, the lower 70% of the U.S. labor force experienced a reduction in real wages, and the lower 40% suffered a very substantial 9% loss. Reagan’s deregulation of finance stimulated growth of the finance, insurance, real estate sector, benefitting investors (Brenner, 2002, pp. 74–84).10 Reagan’s economic policy redistributed wealth upward. He increased middle-class and working-class taxes and reduced sharply taxes on upper income and wealth brackets.11 This regressive tax policy did not boost investment, improve economic performance, or pay for the cuts as supply siders promised (Economic Policy Institute, 2004a). Excluding Social Security and Medicare, the portion of the federal budget spent on human resources declined from about 28% in 1980 to slightly less than 22% in 1987, while national defense expenditures grew by about the same amount. Reagan’s sweeping deregulation increased capital mobility and reduced business costs. The greatest benefits went to the upper strata, while the middle and poorer classes bore the most of the costs from reduced health, safety, workplace, and environmental regulation. Financial deregulation favored speculative investment. Reagan’s uses of tight money and high real interest rates to reduce inflation rewarded wealthy creditors and bond owners (who reaped the interest from the federal deficit that was created by tax cuts, which already gave them windfall benefits) (Phillips, 1991, pp. 91–115). Financialization and major tax cuts on investment income increased the emphases on the stock-market gains and on short-term return on invested capital and promoted, overall, what critics called the ‘‘Casino Society.’’ Reagan expanded military spending, initiated extensive new weapons systems (e.g., the ‘‘Strategic Defense Initiative’’), ordered several military interventions, expanded covert operations, and took a hardline stance against the Soviet Union. His young neoconservative, foreign-policy cadre, such as William Kristol, John Bolton, Elliot Abrams, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, and Douglas Feith, later ascended to power under George W. Bush and framed the Bush Doctrine.12 However, when Reagan’s popularity

Periodizing Globalization

11

fell during the ‘‘Iran-Contra scandal,’’ he fired Casper Weinberger and some of his neoconservative appointees. Ultimately, he broke with their view that communism could not be changed from within. After Mikhail Gorbachev began his reforms, Reagan opened a dialogue with him and supported further liberalization and peaceful regime change (Blumenthal, 2004). Although making major tax cuts and extending the power of capital over labor, Reagan backed off the radical supply side agenda (Stockman, 1986, pp. 329–411). He disappointed some supporters, but he exerted symbolic leadership, which mobilized public support for a sea change that ended New Deal politics (Foner, 1998, pp. 320–332). Reagan provided primarily rhetorical support for the ‘‘Moral Majority’’ and other cultural conservatives (Francis, 2004). However, he fostered a cultural climate favorable to them. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the only other 20th century president to orchestrate such a radical change of political and cultural climate. Both presidents had a capacity to communicate and employ mass media to garner public support for their agendas. Reagan played a major role in resymbolizing democratic ideals in a rightward direction; shifting: freedom from a language of civil rights, free expression, and equal opportunity to a rhetoric of tax cuts, deregulation, and military superiority; selfish special interests from a critique of financial and corporate elites to a broadside against supporters of welfare, environmental groups, unions, and other social causes; democracy from a complex of publics, public goods, and citizens to a private domain of markets, property, and entrepreneur-consumers; and liberalism from a positive term, stressing tolerance and social justice, to an obscenity, standing for the ‘‘nanny state’’ at home and weakness abroad, that nearly all U.S. politicians abjure. Reversing New-Deal sensibilities, Reagan forged a Center-Right vision in which increases in the numbers and wealth of millionaires is seen as progress while poverty is disparaged as a character flaw. He contributed fundamentally to the ascendance of a neoliberal money culture centered in possessive individualism (Phillips, 2002, pp. 88–98, 333).13 Phase 3: The New World Order: Neoliberalism on the Road to Global Hegemony What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War y but the end of history as such: that is the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government (Francis Fukuyama, 1989, p. 4)

George H. W. Bush (1989a) claimed to stress ‘‘values’’ over material issues. His first act, during his inaugural address, was to ask people to join him in

12

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

prayer. He then held that ‘‘we are not the sum of our possessions’’; friends, children, neighborhoods, and citizenship come before money and citizens need to mobilize these sensibilities to create a ‘‘kinder’’ and ‘‘gentler’’ world. Rather than unwieldily state bureaucracy, private organizations and individual volunteers – a ‘‘Thousand Points of Light’’ – should take responsibility for solving social problems. In an address, later that year at Budapest’s Karl Marx University, Bush praised Hungarian culture, berated Marxist materialism, and declared that people ‘‘are not driven by impersonal economic forces.’’ However, the rest of his speech focused almost exclusively on passing free-market reforms, opening doors to foreign-direct investment, learning English to do business, and joining the global market (G. H. W. Bush, 1989b). At home, he made religious references in speeches, spoke in favor of the ‘‘right to life’’ movement, called for a reversal of ‘‘Roe versus Wade,’’ and appointed Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court. Yet Bush senior was never a convincing cultural conservative, and delivered little to the religious right (e.g., Hodgson, 2004, p. 41). Bush pushed forward the neoliberal economic agenda without the cloak of supply side rhetoric, which he had once called ‘‘Voodoo economics.’’ He dealt with the Savings and Loan Crisis early in his administration, which resulted, largely, from deregulation implemented by Carter and Reagan. Bush orchestrated a two hundred and fifty billion dollar bailout for S&L’s.14 Bailouts usually have covered losses from high-risk, speculative financial ventures, which have increased sharply with deregulation of financial markets. Critics say that such actions entail a ‘‘moral hazard’’ (i.e., knowing that the government will cover losses in a crisis, investors put prudence aside) and favor development of a Casino Society in which short-term stock values, speculative investment, and pyramid schemes hold sway over prudent, long-term investment in the ‘‘real economy.’’ Neoliberals’ ‘‘simplistic’’ free-market view provides a ‘‘curtain’’ that hides how state power and international governance institutions serve plutocratic financial interests (Stiglitz, 2002a, p. 207, 2003a, pp. 228–240). Bush preached free-market virtues to former communist regimes and poor nations and embraced IMF and World Bank policies in support of free trade, debt reduction, unregulated foreign-direct investment, and reduced social expenditures. But at home his deficit spending, bailouts, subsidies for home producers, and use of non-tariff barriers reflected different rules. However, Bush will be remembered most for his foreign policy and the geopolitical events that ended the Cold War and extended the reach of liberal democracy and capitalism. Shortly after he took office the Soviets ended their 9 year occupation of Afghanistan. In June, student democracy protests in Tiananmen Square were suppressed by the Chinese government. In later

Periodizing Globalization

13

summer and fall the ‘‘Velvet Revolution’’ ended communism in Eastern Europe, and 2 years later the Soviet Union disintegrated. Moreover, during Bush’s reign: Chile and Brazil had their first free elections in many years; the Sandinistas were defeated in Nicaraguan elections; Haiti had its first democratic election; the 12 year El Salvador civil war ended peacefully; and South Africa ended Apartheid. In December 1989, Bush sent American troops to Panama to oust General Noriega, who surrendered a few weeks later and was tried and imprisoned in the U.S. for drug trafficking. In 1991, when Bush sought U.N. support for sanctions against Iraq, after its invasion of Kuwait, he said that the end of the Cold War allowed the U.N. to assume the role for which it was originally designed – a ‘‘center for international collective security’’ (G. H. W. Bush, 1990).15 The U.S. led a 28 nation, U.N.-sanctioned coalition to war against Iraq (which included nations from five continents, including the Soviet Union and Arab League members) (G. H. W. Bush, 1991a). At the start, Bush asserted that ‘‘this will not be another Vietnam,’’ implying that overwhelming force would put a fast, decisive end to Saddam Hussein’s occupation (1991b). Announcing victory, Bush declared that the ‘‘The first test of the new world order has been passed’’ (Bush, 1991c). In his view, the new post-Cold War, global system includes all forward-looking nations, embracing democracy, human rights, and, especially, markets, and is coordinated largely by trade relations, economic regulatory institutions, and the richest nations’ trade ministers and bankers. The only superpower and hegemon, the U.S. leads and protects the system with help from the U.N. and multilateral coalitions. Peace based on economic interdependence rules.16 Francis Fukuyama’s ‘‘end of history’’ thesis heralded the dawn of an everlasting, U.S.-led, New World Order. He revived triumphal postwar ideas of progress and of the end of ideology, but based on a minimalist view of neoliberal democracy. He declared a ‘‘total exhaustion’’ of all other modern alternatives to liberal democracy, speculating that we are likely ‘‘at a point where we cannot imagine a world substantially different from our own, in which there is no apparent or obvious way in which the future will represent a fundamental improvement over our current ordery’’ (1989, p. 3, 1992, p. 51). Fukuyama stated that he employed ‘‘a strictly formal definition of democracy’’ and that the substantive version, stressing social equality and equal participation, opens the way for ‘‘infinite abuse of the democratic principle.’’ In his view, postwar liberalism’s egalitarian, social-engineering is prone to authoritarian abuses parallel to communism. Fukuyama held that ‘‘human beings are inherently unequal’’ and that competitive U.S. capitalism allows the most able, ambitious people to rise to the top and create wealth that benefits everyone (1992, pp. 43, 289, 316). In his view, economic

14

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

inequality follows inevitably from people getting their just deserts; thus, populist reactions to increased inequality, following free-market reforms, does not call for economic reform or redistribution, but for efforts to shore up the system’s political and cultural legitimacy. However, Fukuyama held that free-market abundance – ‘‘easy access to VCRs and stereos’’ – fosters and stabilizes liberal democracy (1989, p. 8). Cushioning the impact of inequality, the globalization system increases availability of inexpensive commodities. Winning the applause of fellow neconservatives and covered widely in the popular press, Fukuyama’s work expressed cogently sensibilities of a convergent U.S. Center-Right and U.S. Center-Left. Late 1980s and 1990s, American social critics provided a dark vision of the nascent neoliberal consensus, holding that increasing inequality was foreclosing the American Dream of an abundant middle-class society.17 But even they agreed tacitly with Fukuyama’s claims about the lack of alternatives. Endings discourses spread globally – the’’end of alternatives,’’ ‘‘end of left and right,’’ ‘‘end of history,’’ and ‘‘end of politics’’ – implying that non-reactionary options to neoliberalism were nil.18 Addressing global consolidation neoliberalism, David Harvey (1989) held that technologically based, ‘‘time-space compression’’ has accelerated the turnover time of capital and eased the profitability crisis. His analysis of the connections between new information and communication technology, increased capital mobility, spatially reconfigured social life, restructured organizations, and fragmented culture set the stage for later critical discussions of globalization. He argued that neoliberalism favors finance capital and the rich, weakens unions and working-class political parties, reduces workers’ wages, benefits, and job security, and erodes welfare rights. Harvey held that the classic postmodern movie, Blade Runner’s bleak dystopian vision of Los Angeles in 2019, held a mirror up to the times. Paralleling Ridley Scott’s nightmare fantasy, Mike Davis’ (1992) analysis of neoliberal capitalism’s reconfiguration of Los Angeles, described a ‘‘spatial apartheid’’ of upscale privatization, gentrification, and high-tech surveillance alongside deindustrialized wastelands, ridden with gang violence and patrolled by police helicopters. Neither Harvey nor Davis hinted at alternatives to neoliberalism. Phase 4: Globalization and ‘‘Third Way’’ Politics: Neoliberalism with a Human Face? We were groping for a third way, a way between socialism and its overly intrusive government and the Reagan–Thatcherite minimalist governments of the right. (Joseph Stiglitz, 2003a, p. 281)

Periodizing Globalization

15

After the Democratic Party lost its third consecutive presidential election in 1988, a ‘‘New Democratic’’ coalition formed to ‘‘modernize’’ the party and stem erosion of its white working-class and white middle-class base (Galston & Kamarck, 1989). New Democrats argued that their party’s losses resulted from their ‘‘too liberal’’ stances on welfare, tax, crime, foreign policy, and culture and consequent too narrow political base (i.e., left-leaning white intelligentsia and racial and ethnic minorities). They asserted that they favored expanding economic growth rather than redistributing wealth, cutting crime rather than encouraging permissiveness, strengthening families rather than cultivating welfare dependency, embracing what people have in common rather than emphasizing differences, and working actively to spread global free markets and democracy rather than passively accepting dictatorships. Like 1970s neoconservatives, they aimed to shed the liberal label. However, New Democrats held that they did not accept supply side economics, cultural conservatism, and nationalism and that they still supported social justice, inclusion, and multilateralism. Bill Clinton’s victory over George H. W. Bush was seen to be a triumph for New Democrats’ ‘‘Center Left’’ or ‘‘Third Way’’ strategy.19 On the campaign trail Clinton spoke about ‘‘putting people first,’’ but his administration did not follow through on achieving this aim or balancing the roles of government and the market. As Stiglitz, argued they stressed ‘‘deregulation and deficit reduction’’ and let the social-regulatory agenda languish (2003a, pp. 12–17, 281). Their effort to create a new majority was also frustrated by the Newt Gingrich-led, 1994 Republican takeover of Congress and success of the Republicans’ activist right-wing base (assisted by flourishing right-wing foundations and talk radio), which moved American political culture to the right. The changed climate, midway in Clinton’s first term, blunted what remained of his social agenda. However, New Democrats still held that the market, enriched by globalization and the New Economy, could serve social purposes as well as economic ends. Clinton presided over continuous economic expansion, with low unemployment, low inflation, and income growth, which, by the later years of his administration, benefitted even the middle and lower brackets. He also exercised fiscal restraint which, along with economic growth, allowed him to pay off the big federal deficits from the Reagan and Bush administrations. Thus, the former Clinton administration economists Alan Blinder and Janet Yellen (2001) portrayed the 1990s as the The Fabulous Decade. Clinton helped fuel wider public interest in globalization and the new information economy, stressing that they were the chief engine of economic growth. In his first inaugural speech, he acknowledged lingering domestic problems and new international threats, but he stressed that Cold War splits were being replaced

16

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

by global economic integration and that sustainable economic growth was on the horizon. Even before the mid-term Republican victory, his main concerns were financial markets, free trade, and lower deficits.20 He signed and praised the benefits of the North American Trade Agreement (NAFTA). He also supported the concluding Uruguay Round of international trade agreements, embracing the new World Trade Organization (WTO) and helping make it a major vehicle for exporting neoliberalism. Clinton championed globalization and the Washington Consensus and generally pursued policies that strengthened capital’s leverage over labor. Goldman Sachs’ Robert Rubin first headed the National Economic Council and later served as Clinton’s Treasury Secretary. Forging close ties with Wall Street, Rubin was the primary architect of economic policy during the market boom (see Rubin & Weisberg, 2003). Clinton retained Leonard Greenspan as head of the Federal Reserve, who shared the administration view that stability and growth of financial markets is the chief priority of economic policymaking. Financial booms derive from diverse factors, but Clinton’s economic policies contributed substantially to the massive expansion of the markets. Stiglitz said that finance ruled during the 1990s; the Clinton Administration thought that the financial markets were a disciplining and signaling force that would enhance the efficiency of the entire economy and create prosperity. He held that their reigning idea was that ‘‘what is good for Goldman Sachs, or Wall Street, is good for America and the world’’ (2003, pp. 275–276).21 Under Clinton, stock values rose at unprecedented rates and faster than ever before above the ‘‘real economy’’ or Gross Domestic Product (Pollin, 2003a, pp. 38–42). In November 1995 the Dow Jones Industrial average closed at 5,023.55 and it peaked at 11,497.10 on January 14, 2000. Expanding at even more rapidly over roughly the same period, the NASDAQ reached its highest point in March 2000. The boom climate and easy gains for most of the decade sparked claims that the market had reached a permanently high level (some pundits held that the Dow Jones would rise above 30,000). Many thinkers in the financial community attributed the gains to a fundamentally restructured global economy and radical innovations in the telecommunications sector, especially Internet. Since the late 1980s, globalization had been replacing postmodernism as the big interdisciplinary academic discourse, but public discussion and popular literature about globalization peaked during the boom market. New York Times and Washington Post articles mentioning globalization and the New Economy grew explosively from 1995 to 2000 (Henwood, 2003, pp. 4, 146). Globalization discourse was not merely optimistic about exponential market growth and the prospects for lucrative investment, but many advocates implied that the New Economy was creating

Periodizing Globalization

17

wealth with such unparalleled speed and volume that a new ‘‘age of prosperity’’and post-scarcity culture was on the rise. Utopian scenarios abounded.

PROGRESSIVE MODERNIZATION REDUX: THE NEW ECONOMY AS DAWN OF THE POST-COLD WAR ERA When your country recognizes y the rules of the free-market in today’s global economy, and decides to abide by them, it puts on what I call the Golden Straightjacket y. The Cold war had the Mao suit, the Nehru Jacket, the Russian fur. Globalization has only the Golden Straightjacket. If your country has not been fitted for one, it will be soon. (Thomas L. Friedman, 2000, p. 104)

Rather than the austere, history-ending, democratic minimalism of Fukayama or the postmodern apocalypse portrayed in City of Quartz or Blade Runner, globalization advocates revived the idea of progressive modernization. Their post-Cold War vision portrayed a globally consolidated, affluent, spontaneous, efficient, participatory, socially conscious, informational capitalism. However, the new system, like the one that Parsons described 30 years before, was still American-led. As Thomas Friedman said: ‘‘It’s a postindustrial world, and the U.S. is good at everything that is postindustrial’’ (2000, p. 376). In one of the first New Economy studies, Paul Leinberger and Bruce Tucker (1991) explored the Boomer Generation offspring of the Cold War era ‘‘organization men.’’22 They portrayed mangers with an individualistic, ‘‘enterprise ethic’’ that contrasted with the conformist, risk-aversive style of their postwar parents. Leinberger and Tucker held that, after flirtation with alternative life-styles, Boomers entered highly competitive labor markets and restructured workplaces, which lacked the security of their parents world and cultivated a bold, creative orientation to work and life. They argued that the Boomer managerial ranks, which include many women and minorities, share liberal socio-cultural values, which, nurture autonomy and difference. Leinberger and Tucker spoke glowingly about ‘‘decentered,’’ inclusive organizations, ‘‘flattened’’ hierarchies, flexible ‘‘networks,’’ and empowered workers. In their view, fast-moving, wired, ‘‘centerless capitalism’’ and ‘‘urban villages’’ afford unlimited opportunities for individual movement, advancement, and success. Especially when the boom was peaking, books, such as The Long Boom (Schwartz, Peter, & Joel, 1999), Dow 36000 (Glassman & Hassett, 2000), and Cluetrain Manifesto (Levine, Locke, Searls, & Weinberger, 2000) and magazines, such as Fast Company and Wired, expressed even more effusively

18

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

utopian optimism. Globalization advocates argued that the New Economy democratizes organizations, upgrades the quality of work, cultivates more self-directed yet spiritual individualities, and reduces geopolitical conflict. Friedman’s best-selling Lexus and the Olive Tree (2000) is the most widely read, celebrated expression of this optimistic perspective.23 The book’s back cover bears Fukuyama’s declaration that the work ‘‘comes as close as anything we now have to a definition of the real character of the new world order.’’ Although this claim has been contested, Friedman provides a comprehensive expression of the neoliberal policy regime that has been spread under the rubric of globalization. Perry Anderson has called Friedman’s book ‘‘the most ambitious and intransigent theorization of ultra-capitalism as a global order’’ and, as well, ‘‘a brazen paean to U.S. world hegemony, and an unconditional advocacy of Clintonism y ‘‘(2000, pp. 11–12). Many other writers, especially on the left, have attacked scathingly Friedman’s unvarnished support of neoliberalism. However, they imply frequently that he offers insight into the way globalizers construct and justify their efforts. Friedman mentioned often his interactions with globalization elites and thanked specifically a broad range of these leaders for brainstorming sessions, conversations, and other contributions to his book.24 Some empirical work also suggests that the core libertarian views portrayed by Friedman are shared by U.S. globalizers.25 We employ his work to illustrate the reconstructed view of modernization shared by globalization advocates. Recall our restricted focus on neoliberal globalization; thus when we speak of ‘‘globalization advocates’’ we are referring expressly to supporters of the neoliberal policy regime. The points below manifest frequently expressed themes, not a consensus among these thinkers. After the Cold War Era: A Global Stockholder’s Republic Incipient Statelessness: A World Without Walls Globalization advocates held that the Cold War era’s East–West split blocked development of global capitalism and hardened political barriers to free trade and economic enterprise. Although acknowledging Capitalism’s long-term trend toward internationalization, they argued that late 20th century globalization has ushered in a new global order that has ‘‘replaced the old Cold War System.’’ They saw the collapse of the USSR and its satellites to have ignited a worldwide evaporation of political constraints. Stressing nascent global ‘‘integration’’ and ‘‘dynamism,’’ Friedman contended that globalization enables ‘‘individuals, corporations and nation-states to reach around the world farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before, and

Periodizing Globalization

19

in a way that is enabling the world to reach into individuals, corporations and nation-states farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before’’ (2000, pp. 7–9). Globalization advocates argued that nation-states are so closely linked by myriad cooperative relationships that their borders are porous and their sovereignty is limited. Consequently, they held, the nation state is ‘‘a weakening, even vanishing institution’’ (e.g., Hunter & Yates, 2002, p. 343). Friedman portrayed globalization’s neoliberal deregulation and employment of new communication technologies as tearing down political ‘‘walls’’ (2000, pp. 44–72). He and other Globalization advocates implied that classical libertarian predictions about the future are finally being realized. In the 19th century, Herbert Spencer argued that social evolution would erode states and create spontaneous orders, which eliminate political constraints and provide the widest possible scope to individual choice and agency. Spencer saw the market to be the engine and prototype of spontaneous orders. Building off Spencer, Hayek added that their unparalleled capacity to absorb and utilize information effectively make them the most efficient as well as the freest type of organization. Globalization advocates held that spontaneous orders, fluid networks and informational Webs, are erasing political borders and making world approximate Internet. Globalization’s Lead Society Reviving Parsons’ view of the U.S. as the model regime and impetus for worldwide progress, Friedman held that ‘‘Globalization is Americanization’’ and employed the term ‘‘Americanization-globalization’’; the postCold War system is ‘‘dominated by American Power, American Culture, the American dollar, and the American Navy.’’ However, he argued, this dominance is neither aggressive nor total; global consumers choose freely American goods, which augment, but do not destroy local cultures (Friedman, 2000, pp. xix, 292–297, 383). Describing the U.S. as the most advanced society, Friedman said that ‘‘there is no better model... on earth today than America’’ (Friedman, 2000, p. 475). Even a ‘‘visionary geoarchitect,’’ he held, could not have made a better model than the millennium U.S. to ‘‘compete and win’’ in the post-Cold War system; e.g., it has the most transparent companies, best protections for property rights, most effective tax, accounting, and regulatory laws, most creative entrepreneurial culture, and most flexible political system. Friedman explained that 1980s U.S. ‘‘downsizing, privatizing, networking, deregulation, reengineering, streamlining, and restructuring’’ tailored the society to globalization and gave it a substantial edge over most other rich nations, which failed to reform their bloated welfare systems, too powerful labor unions, and overly regulated

20

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

workplaces and markets. He lauded the U.S. for framing policies that make it easy to fire workers and, thus, to adopt quickly new labor-saving technologies, maximize efficiency, and restructure companies to meet the demands of global competition. Because of this flexibility, he held, U.S. companies produce more new jobs and rehire people much more quickly than foreign firms. Countering Greenspan’s warning about the overheated stock market, Friedman held that the design of American Society, which fits perfectly globalization, is reason for ‘‘rational exuberance’’ about continued meteoric growth of U.S. financial markets and overall progress of its economy and society (2000, pp. 368–375). Globalization advocates saw the U.S. stock-market boom to indicate the start of a global economic revolution; qualitative changes, which had impetus in the U.S., yet were in early stages elsewhere, multiplied future prospects for investment and economic growth. Globalization as Democratic Revolution Friedman contended that the rise of the globalization system was based on a four-part democratic revolution that dismantled the rigid, Cold War-system’s top-down structure: ‘‘Democratization of Technology’’ (e.g., miniturization, digitalization, telecommunications, computerization, and compression technology) provided new means of communication, information, and other tools of wealth creation to a wider range of globally dispersed individuals than ever before; ‘‘Democratization of Finance’’ shattered the insurance company, investment bank, and commercial bank monopoly of lucrative financial instruments, making easy credit and easyaccess investment means (e.g., cut-rate brokers, online-trading, 401 K pension plans) widely available; ‘‘Democratization of Information’’ (e.g., cable-TV, satellite dishes, DVD players, mobile phones, e-mail, and especially Internet and its hyperlinks) increased radically the availability of information and cut sharply the costs of creating, gathering, storing, and transmitting it. Friedman held that the technical, financial, and informational changes produced a fourth democratization; power, information, and decision-making were decentralized into flat, participatory forms of wired, cooperative networks (2000, pp. 44–72, 86). Globalization advocates believed that the process removes power from government and empowers individuals as global investor-consumers (Hunter & Yates, 2002, p. 345). Investor-Voters and Electronic Participatory Democracy As securitization advances, Friedman held, the ‘‘Electronic Herd’’ of investors, employing the new technologies, financial instruments, and sources of information, exert control over the direction of social and political development

Periodizing Globalization

21

by their individual purchasing and selling decisions in the financial markets. They are the advanced guard of wider free-market democracy in which all consumers vote by their purchases. The floating of currencies after Bretton Woods allowed investors to have nearly daily ‘‘votes’’ on the management of the society, and a sharp rise or drop in financial markets and currency values usually disciplines political leaders and, if not, negative consequences often lead citizens to get rid of them. Friedman saw the democratic revolutions, mentioned above, to have forged a broad-based, well-informed, wired mass of investor-voters, who respond immediately to important signals. He acknowledged that this electronic democracy sometimes errs, includes big corporate and institutional investors, and is based on ‘‘one dollar, one vote.’’ However, he argued, the various types of investors react to the same signals, share common information, and, on average, make prudent decisions in the best interest of everyone. Friedman asserted that ‘‘Fast Capitalism’s’’ ‘‘Joe Sixpack and Billionaire Bob’’ watch CNBC daily for information on their portfolios and Electronic Herd ‘‘stampedes’’ are usually started by the moves of smaller local investors (2000, pp. 126–127). He and other globalization advocates held that transactions have become so transparent that secrecy is difficult; thus, actions based on privileged information almost immediately become signals for all other investors. Acknowledging, at least tacitly, that most investor-voters are American, they hold that global investment decisions are geared to signals rooted in local knowledge of the localities, serve common interests there, and promote global democracy. Friedman saw electronic traders turning the ‘‘whole world into a parliamentary system’’ – because power is dispersed among millions of traders, ‘‘the most basic truth about globalization is y No one is in charge’’. ‘‘Now the power is in your [the reader-investor’s] hands’’ he said. Globalization is radical democratization! (Friedman, 2000, pp. 72, 112, 137, 168). Neoliberalism – the Engine of Globalization and Progress Friedman declared that ‘‘globalization is globalizing Anglo-American-style capitalism and the Golden Straightjacket’’ (2000, p. 380). He argued that the free-market regime, initiated by Thatcher and Reagan, is the only way to produce rising living standards. Parallel to communism, socialism, and fascism, he held, Cold War democracies’ Keynesian and social-democratic regulatory and redistributive policies fed corruption, blocked dynamism, and distorted growth. He said that globalization ‘‘blew away all the major ideological alternatives’’ to the Anglo-American way; this ‘‘one-size-fits-all’’ model smashes political constraints on the market and accelerates greatly economic growth. In Friedman’s view, donning the Golden Straightjacket

22

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

reduces ‘‘political choices y to Pepsi or Coke,’’ but rejecting the new clothes dooms a nation to backwardness (even moderate deviations have a ‘‘steep price’’) (2000, pp. 101–109). Incurring costly inefficiencies, he contended, Asian, state-centered capitalism and northern European, welfare-state capitalism will soon face ‘‘no-confidence votes’’ by the Electronic Herd of global investors and by their general citizenry, who will recognize that their standard of living will fall if their nation does not make the needed neoliberal reforms to keep pace with global competition (2000, pp. 379–382). In his view, nations seeking abundance, freedom, and progress must liberalize, privatize, and securitize, giving the Electronic Herd a voice in nearly all major policy decisions. Globalization advocates argued that: ‘‘If you don’t ‘get on board,’ you’ll be left behind.’’26 The New Economy: Globalization’s New Laws of Motion Friedman argued that, today, the ‘‘key to wealth is how your country or company amasses, shares, and harvests knowledge’’ and that leaders in ‘‘information technologies and services’’ provide their people the highest standard of living (2000, pp. 219, 224). Globalization advocates held that cutting-edge nations and corporations focus on ‘‘product design, marketing, and financing’’ and leave raw materials production and manufacture to others (Rosecrance, 1999, p. 8). They argued that the highest-value informational products are exchanged almost instantly on global markets. Friedman pointed to Enron’s ‘‘online marketplace’’ as a prime example of fast-moving ‘‘cyber-exchange’’ and ‘‘E-commerce.’’ Globalization advocates held that ‘‘weightless’’ goods, combined with the major political and technical changes mentioned above, overcome ‘‘old capitalism’s’’ socio-political and spatio-temporal constraints. They contended that the consequent ‘‘New Economy’’ approximates the neoclassical ideal of perfect markets. In their view, the knowledge-based commodities’ nearly frictionless exchange and drastically reduced transaction costs result in qualitatively transformed ‘‘Fast Capitalism.’’ Rather than a product of boom psychology, Globalization advocates held, the Clinton-era combination of high employment and low inflation and the rise of financial markets far above GNP growth and corporate earnings manifest the New Economy’s normal workings. They held that the New Economy’s ‘‘virtual’’ means of production, forms of exchange, and commodities neutralized the old economy’s dichotomy between ‘‘real economy’’ and ‘‘financial economy,’’ forged new economic relations, and generated fresh patterns of exceptionally accelerated growth. They contended that the advances are still in an early stage and, thus, promise a very long boom and, possibly, the end of the economic cycle.

Periodizing Globalization

23

The Market as the Matrix of Social Progress Friedman held that declining unions and welfare states are progressive trends of the post-Cold War world that will continue. He implied, however, that he shared Clinton’s and Blair’s ‘‘Third Way’’ politics. Asserting that globalization cannot be sustained (i.e., avert crippling backlash) without a social safety-net, Friedman declared himself to be a ‘‘social democrat’’ as well as an advocate of the global free market. He advocated scaled-down versions of U.S. entitlement programs for people who simply cannot adjust to the ‘‘Fast World.’’ He also called on government to retrain technically displaced workers and to ‘‘democratize access to capital’’ to help create ‘‘owners and successful free-marketers’’ (Friedman, 2000, pp. 444–451). He also advised social activists to rely on the market and its new technologies. For example, Friedman spoke of environmentalists who have succeeded without government intervention, using Internet, working with friendly businesses, and forging global alliances (2000, pp. 283–291). Like earlier free-market liberals, globalization advocates saw the market to be a neutral playing field, but they held that globalization increases greatly diversity, transnational ties, and communication, making markets much more inclusive and facilitating efforts to define and secure common values. They also held that the left-leaning Boomer generation fuses free-market ideas with progressive cultural views and that workers in E-industries and E-commerce and young people, who have grew up in the wired world, usually embrace nonhierarchical arrangements and liberal values. Globalization advocates argued that brave New-Economy workers reject Cold War bureaucratic, conformist, Luddite ways and that dynamic, open markets now provide social critics wider purview and ample resources to reach global audiences and forge progressive social change. However, they held that the critics should accept globalization’s inevitability and work in concert with, not against, the neoliberal regime (Friedman, 2000, pp. 327–347; Leinberger & Tucker, 1991; Brooks, 2000; Schwartz et al., 1999; pp. 65–89; Levine et al., 2000; Borsook, 2000, pp. 46 – 51; Micklethwait & Woolridge, 2000, pp. 271–292). All Boats Rise in the Winner Take all Society Globalization advocates acknowledged that the process increases economic inequality. But they saw the problem as an inevitable cost of providing just rewards to meritorious people and denying the slothful and incompetent undue encouragement. Friedman spoke of the huge income gap between super-rich Michael Jordan and his marginally skilled teammate, Joe Kleine, who received the National Basketball Association minimum salary. Friedman

24

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

held that Jordan’s eighty-million dollar salary reflects the very ample rewards that global capitalism provides its most-talented people, but he reported that Klein, who earns more than $270,000 a year, said that Jordan boosted greatly the NBA’s worldwide audience and benefited all players in the league. Thus, Klein was not troubled by Jordan’s great wealth. Arguing that globalization’s ‘‘winners take all society’’ benefits everyone, Friedman implies that substantially increased, U.S. economic inequality likely has legitimacy with all but the least-able, displaced, or warped workers. His revision of the functional theory of stratification held that the globalization system provides exceptional rewards for exceptionally skilled people, but that the benefits of their labors flow down to persons with average abilities (Friedman, 2000, pp. 306–324). Friedman admitted that poor countries, on the margins or outside of the globalization system, suffer extreme inequalities and misery, but he said that only the neoliberal regime offers any hope for improvement; the benefits of the neoliberal regime, which make the rich richer, will flow downward with technology transfers and consequent growth. Friedman argued that the only other ‘‘option’’ for poor countries, a Cuban-style managed economy, impoverishes everyone.27 Since there is ‘‘no alternative’’ except ‘‘to go backward,’’ he declared, they must put on the Golden Straightjacket and use it to their advantage (2000, pp. 355–357). Globalization advocates held that two broad, tiers of nations arise – ‘‘head’’ countries, which are largely ‘‘virtual,’’ knowledge-based, service economies, and ‘‘body countries,’’ which specialize in manufacture (Rosecrance, 1999, pp. 43–55). In their view, however, the long-term trend for all participants in the globalization system is toward expansion of the virtual economy and growth of wealth and living standards, which will diminish substantially the significance of increased inequality over the long run. Globalization’s Peaceful Integration Globalization advocates held that the process reduces the likelihood of military conflict. Speaking metaphorically, Friedman argued that countries that have McDonald’s franchises do not go to war with each other. He contended that people in rich service economies, who enjoy consumption and longer lives, do no want to fight and suffer casualties. Friedman also argued that the global trade, production, finance, and foreign-direct investment rely on social connections and mutual interests, which war disrupts (2000, pp. 248–256). Herbert Spencer held that capitalist economic intercourse and free-market policy transform ‘‘military societies’’ into peaceful ‘‘industrial societies.’’ Building on this 19th century view, Globalization advocates held that today’s new paradigm of international relations diminishes significance

Periodizing Globalization

25

of territory and stresses, instead, a nation’s location in the globalization system (Rosecrance, 1999). In their view, the post-Cold War system’s globally interdependent, complexly integrated postindustrial order, raises the costs of war to the highest level ever. They contended that global peace can be secured if all nations joined the globalization system. Globalization’s Enemies Although holding that globalization can coexist with and even help preserve traditional culture, Globalization advocates claimed that it accelerates greatly capitalism’s ‘‘creative destruction’’ (i.e., fashioning ever-more efficient production, ever-better products, and ever-improved institutions and living standards), stimulates more wide-spread, sudden disruptions of everyday life than ever before, and, thus generates serious social tensions and occasionally extreme resentment and anger. For example, they portrayed antiglobalization protest (i.e., decrying environmental damage, opposing outsourcing, or criticizing the spread of U.S. popular culture) as a revanchist backlash by people lacking the skill, discipline, courage, and imagination to adjust to post-Cold War realities. They argued that the movement lacks an alternative program that can improve living standards and, thus, its exploitation of the tensions inhering in globalization simply disrupts progress and hurts the poorest people most in need of its benefits.28 Globalization advocates warned especially about the dangers of populist and religious opposition. Friedman spoke of ‘‘Super-Empowered Angry Men,’’ such as Osama bin Laden, who employ globalization’s democratized telecommunication technologies to fan resentment, terror, and genocide. He argued that anticapitalist regimes, beyond the control of the Electronic Herd, pose serious external threats to the globalization system (e.g., Iraq, North Korea, Afghanistan, Sudan, and Iran). Suggesting that the system needs a sheriff, Friedman described the U.S. as the ‘‘ultimate benign hegemon and reluctant enforcer’’; it has legitimacy because it unselfishly secures peace and stabilizes the globalization system, cooperates with international governance institutions (e.g., the UN, IMF, NATO, World Bank), and employs multilateral negotiations, coalitions, and actions. Although having no imperialist aims, Friedman contended, the U.S.’ dominant global role makes it and its allies prime targets of resentful outliers (Friedman, 2000, pp. 11, 258, 327–347, 466–467; Micklethwait & Wooldridge, 2000, pp. 271–292).29 God in the Globalization Machine Globalization advocates spoke of the neoliberal regime as if its primary purpose was to spread the good tidings of Anglo-American civil

26

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

religion – freedom and democracy. A quasi-religious fervor about global markets suffused Friedman’s book. At the end, he posed a question he said his readers stirred – ‘‘Is God in cyberspace?’’ Thanking his Rabbi for helping him grasp the relation of God and globalization, he assured his readers that religion is compatible with electronically mediated investment and global capitalism (Friedman, 2000, pp. 468–475). The Economist writers, Micklethwait’s and Wooldridge’s (2000) A Future Perfect waxed eloquently about globalization’s spirituality. Criticizing Bill Clinton’s overly worldly defense of globalization (i.e., it expands U.S. exports), they urge globalization advocates to mount a spiritual defense of neoliberalism, recommending an updating of Sir Robert Peel’s 19th century laudation of free trade and capitalism fulfilling ‘‘the beneficent designs of an all-seeing Creator’’ and ‘‘Christian Duty.’’ They portray libertarianism’s core beliefs (i.e., ‘‘rights belong to individuals rather than to governments or to social groups’’ and the ‘‘essence of freedom lies in individual choice’’) as a ‘‘broad church’’ (Micklethwait & Wooldridge, 2000, pp. 335–336, 343). Libertarian hymns about electronic markets pervaded New Economy magazines, such as Wired or Fast Company, and books, like Telecosm (Gilder, 2000) or Cluetrain Manifesto (Levine et al., 1999). Their New Age theology, implies that the market, or Father, is the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent source of globalization’s divine rationality; the investor-consumer, or the Son, is its worldly carrier and engine, and the Web, or Holy Ghost, is God’s immanence. The religious tone implies that neoliberalism manifests a universal human psychology and universal values and norms, which flourish when the state’s and traditional culture’s suppressive force is removed. American globalization advocates saw the U.S. to be the chief carrier of this universalism. The last paragraph of Friedman’s book testifies to his American exceptionalist faith, holding that the U.S. is a ‘‘beacon to the whole world’’ and, it ‘‘must be at its best – today, tomorrow, all the time y not to squander its precious legacy’’ (2000, p. 478). Gathering Clouds of Post-Cold War era Modernization Globalization advocates reconstructed Cold War modernization theory. Like the earlier conception, the neoliberal version held that a U.S.-led social transformation overcame earlier capitalism’s contradictory features, provided resources for continuous growth, stimulated global democratic revolutions, ended ideological discourse, and offered the only path to social progress. Globalization critics acknowledged neoliberal hegemony, but portrayed it in a contradictory light. For example, Anderson (2000, p. 11) argued that

Periodizing Globalization

27

Clinton–Blair ‘‘Third Way’’ politics sealed neoliberal dominance by providing ‘‘the placebo of a compassionate public authority, extolling the compatibility of competition with solidarity.’’ He held that the ‘‘softer rhetoric’’ facilitated the continued, effective pursuit of the ‘‘Reagan–Thatcher’’ legacy. But the soaring optimism about the new phase of modernization crashed when the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, the NASDQ and stock market plummeted, and recession proved that the economic cycle was not over.30 Critics argue that the Clinton administration helped generate the speculative bubble by failing to enact regulatory legislation to deal with new financial instruments and by employing imprudent forms of deregulation. For example, former Clinton economic advisor, Joseph E. Stiglitz holds that stock options were a major part of CEO compensation, but they were assumed, for accounting purposes, to have no value and, thus, led to overvaluation of other stockholder shares and reduced transparency. When the Financial Accounting Standards Board proposed to change this, Stiglitz says, Wall Street and Corporate insiders got the Treasury and Commerce Departments to force regulators to back down. The lack of regulation led to increased use of stock-option compensation as market values boomed. Also, Stiglitz holds that accounting firms provided consulting services to the same businesses that they were supposed to audit, investment firms recommended stocks that they represented, and the Glass–Steagall Act, which separated commercial and investment banking, was eliminated. This type of regulatory laxity helped create the climate for the Enron, WorldCom, and other corporate scandals (Stiglitz, 2002b, 2003a). Long before, critics warned that the big six accounting firms were cooking the books (e.g., Sternberg, 1992). But regulators and administration officials lacked the will to make needed changes. The administration provided support for financial hedge funds, which were often located in offshore tax havens where they were safe from regulatory oversight. They also pressed other countries to reduce their regulation of trade and finance capital. Rich investors speculated in the deregulated currency markets, sometimes destabilizing them and contributing little or nothing to the ‘‘real economy’’ (Stiglitz, 2001; 2002a, pp. 53–132; Johnson, 2000, pp. 207–215). Although stressing deregulated markets, the Clinton Administration provided generous corporate subsidies, including bailouts for Long-term Capital Management, the Bank of New England, Citibank, the Mexican Peso, and Asian currencies. Thus, critics charge that the administration practiced a ‘‘Crony Capitalism’’ or ‘‘Financial Mercantilism’’ that fueled the speculative frenzy.31 Critics of Clinton-era economic policy hold that wage growth was modest and short-lived,32 job and income growth was driven by the financial boom,

28

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

and gains from NAFTA and international trade went mostly to investors.33 They contend that inequality continued to grow and that productivity-gain benefits were monopolized by the wealthy. Most importantly, critics argue that Clinton-administration neoliberalism perpetuated later 20th century trends that hurt working people – e.g., declining job quality, security, and benefits, weakening unions, decreasing holidays, and increasing work hours. They say that 1990s income and productivity gains were no miracle, being far below those of the pre-1973 postwar boom and even below those of the crisis-ridden1970s.34 The critics hold that Clinton-era low inflation and high employment did not derive from a New Economy, but resulted from labor’s weakness; for example, low union membership and weak unions, the threat of capital flight, job insecurity, and global competition that kept wage pressures low (Pollin, 2003b).35 Overall, the critics see the meteoric growth of 1990s financial markets to have been a product of the boom mentality fanned by government and corporate policies and by the overblown claims of New-Economy business writers and globalization advocates.36

NEOLIBERALISM WITH AN IRON FIST: U.S. HYPERPOWER AND IMPERIUM An entire people which had imagined that by means of revolution it had imparted to itself an accelerated power of motion, suddenly finds itself set back into a defunct epoch y (Karl Marx [1852] 1979, p. 105)

After the Millennium, the U.S. faced a number of events that posed more challenges to the Clinton-era’s sunny scenario portrayed above. The financial markets and recession dragged on, and concern grew about job insecurity, increased costs of higher education, costly or inadequate health insurance, depleted pension funds, high household debt, fiscal crises of the states, and other problems. Corporate scandals neutralized claims that U.S. companies were the most ‘‘transparent’’ in the world and that deregulation and new technologies forge perfect markets. The contested presidential election of George W. Bush intensified an already sharp polarization of the political parties and challenged claims about the end of ideology. However, 9/11, the War on Terrorism, and the Iraq War intensified the other problems and raised fundamental questions about globalization. Although warning about backlash, Friedman and other globalization advocates still saw American culture to be hegemonic and U.S. power to have legitimacy

Periodizing Globalization

29

among most of the world’s forward-looking populace. Although warning about terrorism, they believed that peaceful interdependence would hold sway. The 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, foremost symbols of U.S.-dominated, global capitalism, brought a shift of regimes. After the Post-Cold War Era: Regime Change in the USA & Permanent War Redux In the wake of collapsing communism, Fukuyama argued that neoliberal democracy had near global hegemony and could not be superceded. But he also warned that this market-centered regime’s dominant economism was too prosaic to legitimate society and that it needs a broader mission. In his view, national identity is vital for binding democratic regimes and advancing their interests globally. He held that liberalism satisfies a need for equal recognition, but that people also need to be recognized as superior. He contended that the nationalist impulse and will to superiority had been so domesticated in the European Union that it is now home to Nietzsche’s ‘‘last men’’ or ‘‘men without chests.’’ Living at the end of history, they ‘‘have no large causes for which to fight’’ (Fukuyama, 1992, p. 311). In his view, such a workaday culture is vulnerable to totalitarian revival.37 His widely discussed thesis set the stage for 1990s arguments by second-generation neoconservatives about the need to reclaim national purpose. An important influence on Fukuyama and certain other neoconservatives, Leo Strauss held that philosophical leaderships construct ‘‘noble lies,’’ providing transcendental grounds that absolutize cultural ideals, constrain individual desire, and command dutiful action, consistent with one’s place in the social order. In his view, able political leaders help secure these ideals by cultivating patriotism and ‘‘military virtues,’’ which bind people into a nation. Strauss’ mentor Carl Schmitt held that national ideals are clarified, strengthened, and enlivened by ‘‘friend-enemy’’ dichotomies, which point to and construct opposing nations manifesting contrary beliefs and presenting clear and present dangers. The communist threat, axial to Cold War U.S. public life and to Strauss’s political thought, made irrelevant repeating Schmitt’s view.38 However, after 1989, neoconservatives feared that the collapse of communism blurred American moral bearings. Overemphasis on globalization, they thought, made matters worse, magnifying fragmentation that inheres in American consumerism, individualism, and rights discourses. They believed that assertion of U.S. global leadership and active opposition to its enemies would recover its historical mission, which languished under Bush senior and Clinton. They warned that continued passivity would allow

30

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

U.S. enemies to get bolder and stronger and eventually to challenge or even overtake it (Kristol & Kagan, 2000; Kagan, 2000a, b). Although warning about Saddam Hussein and terrorism, they saw China to be the greatest threat to U.S. interests. The horror of 9/11, seen live and replayed over and over on TV, brought forth a new enemy.39 President Bush’s campaign rhetoric about ‘‘compassionate conservatism’’ had already faded, but 9/11 and the War on Terror shifted his focus squarely to national security. Calling for a second Iraq War, he declared: ‘‘The liberty we prize is not America’s gift to the world, it is God’s gift to humanity’’ (G. W. Bush, 2003, p. 9). The Bush administration brought a neoconservative resurgence. Transition team leader, Vice President Dick Cheney played a major role in placing neoconservatives in national security positions, especially in the Defense Department.40 Important appointees had served in the Reagan administration, and some participated in the Iran-Contra affair. Many of them were affiliated with the right-wing ‘‘Project For The New American Century,’’ which framed a ‘‘neo-Reganite’’ foreign policy, stressing the need for increasing military spending, expanding and modernizing the military, deploying it more boldly, establishing ‘‘moral clarity’’ in foreign affairs, and rallying ‘‘support for U.S. global leadership.’’41 The neoconservative proposals had some continuity with President Clinton’s and Madeleine Albright’s use of military power for ‘‘humanitarian’’ purposes and deployment of cruise missiles against suspected terrorists. However, neoconservatives called for more proactive use of military power. They criticized G.H.W. Bush and General Colin Powell for not eliminating Saddam Hussein or completing a ‘‘regime change’’ in the first Iraq War. They charged that Clinton underfunded and weakened the military and failed to deal firmly with American enemies, such as Iraq and China (Kagan, 2001a). They contended that Bush senior and Clinton stressed too exclusively increasing trade and commerce and too little realizing American ideals and greatness. They supported U.S.-led globalization, but held that its advocates, by holding that the process paves the way for global democracy (i.e., the ‘‘inevitability thesis’’), eroded the will to topple dictatorships (Kagan, 2000b). By contrast, neoconservatives called for the U.S. to overturn such regimes.42 Early in the Bush administration, however, they were countered by influential, Secretary of State Powell, who still embraced the Cold War strategies of multilateralism and containment. But after 9/11, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld took the lead in national security. He and his neoconservative allies implemented the ‘‘Bush Doctrine.’’ Even Powell joined them, making the case for regime change in Iraq to Congress and to the U.N.43 John Lewis Gaddis refers to the new strategy as ‘‘Fukuyama plus force’’ (Gaddis, 2004, p. 90).44

Periodizing Globalization

31

Leading neoconservative, Robert Kagan expressed the broader vision that underlies the Bush Doctrine. Fukuyama’s imprimatur – ‘‘brilliant’’ – is on the back of the book. Kagan held that Europeans’ geopolitical views bear the imprint of a ‘‘psychology of weakness’’ manifesting their actual military weakness relative to U.S. power and leading them to favor ‘‘soft power’’ (i.e., culture) and economics over military ‘‘hard power’’ (e.g., see Nye, 2002). Europeans spend too lavishly on ‘‘social welfare programs, long vacations, and shorter workweeks,’’ Kagan argued, and invest too little in military expenditures. He said that their ‘‘postmodern paradise’’ presumes a Kantian dreamworld of perpetual peace, but depends on U.S. military force to defend it from the all-too-real Hobbsian world (Kagan, 2003, pp. 37, 54, 73–75, 2002c). Lacking sufficient hard power, he asserted, Europeans urge the U.S. to favor multinational negotiation and use military force only as a last resort and only with the support of allies. He declared that the unified Cold War ‘‘West’’ has fractured and that the U.S. must now act in accord with its ‘‘psychology of power’’ and its hegemonic position in a ‘‘unipolar’’ world, employing its overwhelming power unilaterally and militarily when necessary to secure its interests and insure its permanent dominance. Kagan saw the post-9/11 Bush Doctrine to reaffirm the traditional U.S. ‘‘ambition to play a grand role on the world stage.’’ In his view, this attitude is central to American national character and reflects the nation’s belief that its founding values are ‘‘unquestionably superior’’ to those of all other nations ‘‘throughout human history.’’ Sharing this grandiose version of American Exceptionalism, Kagan contended that the U.S. is compelled to defend the ‘‘liberal international order,’’ the only one that Americans can imagine and one that benefits all other participant nations. In his view, the U.S. acts on values and interests that Europeans share, but are too weak to secure (Kagan, 2003, pp. 86–88, 91, 94). Ironically, a few years before, Kagan implied that Clinton suffered from a similar disease; his psychology of weakness sapped U.S. power and made the nation prey to its enemies.45 Neoconservatives framed their muscular military strategy in the 1990s.46 It was contested because it stressed emphatically all-encompassing, everlasting U.S. dominance and projected an imperial self-image. It also promised to be quite expensive. On the eve of the Bush presidency, Thomas Donnelly’s ‘‘Preserving Pax Americana’’ urged adoption of the tough neoconservative, national security policy.47 He conceded, however, that: ‘‘Absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event – a twenty-first century Pearl Harbor – the process of transformation [to the new policy] is likely to be a long one’’ (Donnelly, 2001, p. 5). Later that year, the 9/11 catastrophe ushered in his program. On that fateful day, Kagan (2001b) declared, in the

32

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

Washington Post, that the attack was ‘‘far more awful than Pearl Harbor’’ and, at that moment, ‘‘the Post-Cold War era ended.’’ He urged a declaration of war and a military build-up to execute it properly. On 9/11, President Bush took the first step in articulating the Bush Doctrine and his War on Terrorism, warning to use force against countries that harbor terrorists as well as against terrorists themselves. The new regime restored the ‘‘Permanent War’’ footing characterizing the Cold War. Once again, the public had to be mobilized against a new enemy posing a profound threat at home as well as U.S. abroad. The Bush Doctrine was described in a widely publicized, U.S. State Department (2002) white paper. It declared that the U.S. must widen its already massive military advantage over other nations, insure its permanence, and employ it proactively. To act any other way, it implied, would risk another 9/11. The first aim was restoring the Pax Americana, which was threatened by terrorists and ‘‘rogue states’’ (especially the ‘‘axis of evil’’ – Iraq, Iran, and North Korea). The Bush Doctrine promised to replace Friedman’s ‘‘benign hegemon and reluctant enforcer’’ with a resolute iron hand designed to kill terrorists, curtail the spread of WMD, and arouse ‘‘shock and awe’’ (i.e., warning potential enemies ‘‘don’t even think about it’’). The white paper held that the U.S. would exercise unilateral actions and ‘‘preemptive’’ strikes, without warning, against threats to its national security. The administration said that it would still seek multinational cooperation, but implied that any conjoint action must be U.S.-led. The transparent bottom-line was that U.S. interests must never be compromised. The administration argued, however, that U.S. power is deployed to defend ‘‘liberty and justice,’’ values that ‘‘are true for all people everywhere’’ (U.S. State Department, 2002, p. 3). ‘‘Bush’s revolutionary global strategy’’ justified the Afghanistan War, Iraq War, and War on Terrorism, as American gifts to all ‘‘civilized’’ humankind.48 It turned Cold War ‘‘Domino Theory’’ right-side up, proclaiming that massive military force, absolutely decisive victory, and rapid transition to neoliberal democracy in a few key nations, such as Iraq, would ignite similar regime changes worldwide. This optimistic scenario is based on a belief, or, at least, simulated Straussian version thereof (i.e., ‘‘noble lie’’), in the universality of American values.49 Regardless of differences, Kagan (2003, p. 94) holds, the Clinton and G. W. Bush policy regimes have shared the vision of the U.S. as the ‘‘indispensable nation’’50 Domestic policy was also altered by 9/11, the anthrax scare, and the Bush Doctrine. In a letter at the start of the national-security document, President Bush (2002) warned that ‘‘shadowy networks of individuals can bring great

Periodizing Globalization

33

chaos and suffering to our shores’’ and can ‘‘turn the power of modern technologies against us.’’ The white paper’s concluding section stated that the focus of intelligence has shifted from a ‘‘massive fixed object – the Soviet Bloc,’’ to elusive targets in a world with porous borders, where ‘‘the distinction between domestic and foreign affairs is diminishing’’ (U.S. Department of State, 2002, pp. 30–31). The ‘‘War on Terror’’ was to be fought at home as well as abroad. After the attacks, thousands of people were secretly detained, arrested, and questioned. The USA PATRIOT ACT gave government sweeping powers to detain non-U.S. citizens without counsel and to execute domestic surveillance of citizens, residents, and visitors. Many groups charged that the legislation was enacted hurriedly and lacked sufficient specificity or adequate protections for civil rights and privacy.51 Attorney General John Ashcroft, who desired stronger internal security even before 9/11, supported the changes without hesitation. The Bush administration consolidated a broad range of security activities in the new office of Homeland Security, which issued regularly color-coded terror warnings; people were told to watch for ‘‘suspicious activities,’’ but without specific information about the threat’s location or nature. Proposals were made to expand the Patriot Act’s already broad powers and to institute ‘‘Operation TIPS,’’ asking workers, who have access to private homes (e.g., cable installers) to report ‘‘suspicious activity.’’ Neither proposal was enacted, but they manifested the desire to bolster internal security, which had bipartisan support. The revelations about U.S. torture at Abu Ghraib and other locations, images of degraded victims, and release of documents demonstrating that the Bush administration entertained actively suspending torture laws did not seem to erode support for the new security measures at home and abroad. Gruesome stories and images of brutal killings and beheadings of American contractors countered the other revelations. Media coverage of 9/11, the War on Terrorism, and constant terror warnings cultivated a climate of fear.52 Stressing the enemy threat at home and abroad made Americans feel more vulnerable. New Rome’s Legitimacy Crisis: Geopolitics and the Globalization System Friedman portrays the U.S. as the ‘‘Michael Jordan of geopolitics,’’ arguing that ‘‘most of the world’’ sees its power as legitimate. Its effectiveness, he says, derives from its ‘‘benign’’ employment of power, utilizing transnational governance institutions and giving other nations ‘‘some sense that they have a voice in the decision-making’’ (Friedman, 2000, pp. 464–466). By contrast, Neoconservative supporters of the Bush Doctrine speak of the U.S. as if it

34

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

were the successor empire to ancient Rome, at the peak of its power, during the Pax Romana. Like Friedman, however, they contend that U.S. power has legitimacy and that most of the world, even if hesitant or a bit resentful, ultimately supports its efforts to secure global democracy and capitalism. Neoconservatives claim to favor multilaterial actions. For example, Kagan says that ‘‘material and moral support of friends and allies y is unquestionably preferable to acting alone y (2003, p. 103). However, neoconservatives insist that U.S. interests are not matters of conjoint decision. They are so certain of the rightness of American aims that they believe the ‘‘civilized world’’ will follow the U.S. lead, even when it makes decisions unilaterally or acts alone. By contrast, critics argue that U.S. advocacy of unilaterialism and preemptive force destroys its legitimacy. Michael Mann states: ‘‘Whereas in the recent past American power was hegemonic – routinely accepted and often considered legitimate abroad – now it is imposed at the barrel of a gun’’ (Mann, 2003, p. 252; see also 2001).53 Under the Bush doctrine, critics argue, the U.S. has become an imperialist power ruling by coercion rather than consent. Neoconservatives counter that the ‘‘US doesn’t dominate, it leads’’ and that comparisons to Roman imperialism are ludicrous (Schmitt, 2003a; Kagan, 2002b). Their denial, however, has not stopped them from speaking and acting in ways that other nations and that many American citizens perceive to be imperialist. About 2 months after 9/11, Ulrich Beck (2001) declared, in the Financial Times, that the attacks were ‘‘globalization’s Chernobyl.’’54 Many critics held that neoliberal hegemony has been replaced by a more coercive regime (e.g. Harvey, 2003, pp. 62–74; Johnson, 2004, pp. 255–281, Mann, 2003).55 They hold that policymakers, under Clinton and Bush, have failed to appreciate the globalization system’s dependence on states; i.e., that transnational production, distribution, and finance, regardless of their virtual informational and communicational facets, are still rooted in space and, thus, rely on extensive regional and local political mediation as well as that from the hegemon and global governance institutions (see Dicken, 2003, pp. 122–197). They argue that 9/11, the Bush Doctrine, and related threats have intensified contradictions inhering in global capitalism’s complex interdependence. Ellen Meiksins Wood holds that the globalization system is composed of ‘‘multiple states and local sovereignties, structured in a complex relation of domination and subordination’’ and, thus, ‘‘ultimately requires a single overwhelming military power.’’ She argues that the hegemon, under the best conditions, faces the very demanding task of orchestrating global governance, coping with conflictive interests, mediating conflicts, and managing local resistence. Wood contends, however, that 9/11 and its aftermath

Periodizing Globalization

35

have made the already extremely difficult coordinating and policing tasks even more, profoundly problematic. In her view, reliance on military force undermines the predictability upon which global capital relies and generates resistence on the local and regional levels (Wood, 2003b, pp. 141–142, 2003a, p. 81). Critics argue that the Bush Doctrine erodes the norms that govern the globalization system and, thus, threaten its reproduction (e.g., Johnson, 2004, p. 257). They also hold that the geopolitical contradictions magnify other problems of globalization. For example, Amy Chua (2004, p. 7) argues that globalization’s sharp economic inequalities had already polarized ethnic groups and intensified ethnic conflict in many parts of the world. She contends that ‘‘market-dominant minorities’’ are the object of majority resentment and violence. Chua says that ‘‘Americans today are everywhere perceived as the world’s market-dominant minority, wielding outrageously disproportionate economic power relative to our size and numbers’’ and that this view fuels a ‘‘global backlash against America,’’ which the Bush Doctrine likely has made much worse (2004, pp. 4, 229–258). Chalmers Johnson argues that U.S. strategists do not consider adequately the possible unintended negative consequences of foreign interventions, or ‘‘blowback.’’ He claims that U.S. military actions, covert operations, and its status as ‘‘lone imperial power’’ make it a prime target for blowback. For example, he says, past U.S. support for Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden and the Taliban, aid to repressive Mideast regimes (e.g., Saudi Arabia and Egypt), and a one-sided approach to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict generated serious blowback (Johnson, 2000, pp. 3–33). In his view, 9/11 has roots in these moves. Johnson and other critics argue that the Iraq War’s architects gravely underestimated the possible reactions to Iraqi deaths and injuries, destruction of Iraq’s infrastructure, and foreign occupation and the consequent blockages to efforts to win hearts and minds in Iraq and the region (e.g., Johnson, 2004). Critics also hold that the war created the type of ‘‘weak state’’ that neoconservatives say harbors terrorists. The widely publicized torture of Iraqi detainees has made matters much worse, affirming fears about the occupiers and spurring abductions and violence.56 Strong doubts have been fanned about U.S.’ claims to entirely benevolent intentions by facts that it waged preemptive war selectively against the weakest, but oil-rich member of the ‘‘axis of evil’’ and that the promised WMD have yet to be found. In the Pew Center Global Attitudes study, large majorities from the countries surveyed, except the U.S., believe that the Iraq War hurt global efforts to fight terrorism and that American claims to promote democracy are bogus. Majorities in most countries doubt the sincerity of the War on Terrorism and see its real aim to be control of Mideast

36

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

oil or U.S. world domination. The survey was completed before the revelations about U.S. torture (Pew Research Center, 2004). Bush Doctrine supporters’ rhetorical strategies may generate as much blowback as the policy’s implementation. The language of aggressive unilateralism is viewed to be threatening and condescending and, thus, generates suspicion and resentment about nearly all U.S. actions. For example, the highhanded declarations about the U.S.’ superior, divinely sanctioned values justifying unilateral intervention and preemptive war generates the anger of American allies and other friendly nations as well as that of the Iraqi resistence and its supporters. On the eve of the Iraq War, Donald Rumsfeld’s passing comment about ‘‘old Europe’s’’ unhelpful ways, paralleling Kagan’s earlier comments, stiffened French and German opposition to the war and strengthened their resolve to chart independent courses.57 Many people in Europe and elsewhere were taken aback by President Bush’s comments about God supporting the U.S. mission in Iraq. Similarly his occasional expressions of bravado, such as daring the Iraqi resistence to ‘‘bring ‘em on’’ affirmed his cowboy image abroad and drew criticism at home.58 The Pew Center research found that majorities in every country, but the U.S., had an unfavorable opinion of President Bush and in three of the four of the Muslim countries surveyed Bin Laden was rated much more favorably than the president (Pew Research Center, 2003, 2004). The American public has also become increasingly polarized about the Iraq War, the climate of fear, religious rhetoric, and President Bush. The very intense polar reactions to ‘‘Fahrenheit 9/11’’ and its Director Michael Moore manifest the magnitude of the split. The degree to which the American image in the world has been tarnished is a fluid matter. However, the view of the U.S. as a legitimate or a benign hegemon has been seriously shaken, seems implausible, and even is contested at home.59 The Stockholders’ Empire Under Siege After 9/11, geopolitical matters have overshadowed public discussion of globalization. However, the Bush administration has pursued the neoliberal agenda more single-mindedly than Clinton. Bush’s foreign policy officials see military power and economic power to be entwined, and they support U.S.-led globalization. The national security white paper’s section on global free markets follows the section on pre-emptive military strategy (U.S. Department of State, 2003, pp. 17–20). The document declared that ‘‘free trade’’ arose as a ‘‘moral’’ precept before it was formulated as an economic idea and that it constitutes ‘‘real freedom.’’ The white paper also held that free-markets are the only way to increase living standards and reduce

Periodizing Globalization

37

poverty and that U.S. development assistance should go exclusively to nations that conform strictly to the Washington Consensus. Although endorsing international governance institutions and cooperation, the Bush administration acts unilaterally when it chooses. For example, it rejected the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, declaring that it would be too costly to the American economy and, therefore, was not in U.S. interests. It also imposed a tariff on foreign steel to protect U.S. producers, until it was held in violation of international trade agreements.60 The Bush administration abandoned the Clinton administration’s stress on multinational cooperation and concern for the social and environmental impacts of globalization. Bush put the U.S. state more squarely and transparently behind American-based financial and corporate interests. President Bush has also pursued a hardline neoliberal agenda at home. With contrast to Clinton’s progressive tax policy, he initiated huge tax cuts favoring the richest Americans. On almost all facets of domestic policy he has striven unrelentingly to cut the state’s role in social, workplace, and environmental regulation and has employed state power consistently to facilitate Wall Street and big business interests.61 In the post-9/11 era of the Bush Doctrine, the sunny 1990s vision of globalization has crashed. The neoliberal regime has not given way, but it is embedded in a much more austere vision. For the time being, U.S. corporate profits have recovered, CEO compensation still soars, and the stockholders’ empire remains in tact. Under the Bush regime, wealth from property is favored more than ever and, given the higher costs health care, privatization of higher education, and continued erosion or elimination of traditional pensions (i.e., fixed annuities), middle-class stock-ownership and 401(k)s are more important than ever. However, the recent recession, post-9/11 fears about security, and the iron hand of political and military force has intensified uncertainties and cast a long shadow on the alleged New Economy’s seamless, self-regulating Web of dynamic, voluntary relations. The vision of a post-Cold War world without walls has been replaced by fears about a more elusive, fluid, and harder to manage divide between the ‘‘civilized’’ and ‘‘evil’’ parts of the world. The deterritorialized threat of terror hardens political subdivisions. The 1990s vision of globalization forging peaceful global integration, assuring higher living standards, generating marketbased means of social welfare, and creating an investor-run, electronic, participatory democracy seems more whimsical than it did when it was first proposed and it now gives way to the dystopian vision of the class-polarized garrison state. This ‘‘new’’ or postmodern version of the Permanent War machine seems to throw us back into Cold War times. Hopefully, political change will prevent a hardening of this scenario.

38

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

Erosion of the New Economy version of Spencerian or Hayekian spontaneous order cries out for a more Durkheimian, Polyanyian, or institutionalist emphasis on the need for a complex multilayered system of regulation. Durkheim warned that coercive control from the center, without sufficient local regulation, results in a ‘‘veritable sociological monstrosity.’’62 Although originally addressed to national capitalism, his point seems even more relevant for the relations of a hegemon to its global network of states. The aforementioned points about the difficulty of coordinating local states are reminiscent of Durkheim’s concern. Perhaps a recovery of critical institutionalism might offer useful reformist ideas. However, the problem of global inequality and polarization of life chances reflect a fundamental and ongoing neoliberal restructuring of American society and of the global order, which preceded George W. Bush. Although the Bush Doctrine gives this regime a harder, uncompromising, transparent edge, political support for it at its center, in the U.S., shows no sign of abating. Bush’s critics sing praises to the halcyon Clinton years, and pray for a return. The post-Cold War theory of modernization is in ruins. Today, after the Post-Cold War era, Marx’s ([1852] 1979, p. 106) comment about Louis Napoleon’s rule seems fitting: ‘‘Instead of society having conquered a new content for itself, it seems that the state only returned to its oldest form, to the shamelessly simple domination of the saber and the cowl.’’

BEYOND ARROGANT EXCEPTIONALISM: RECOVERING AMERICANA’S ‘‘SPIRITUAL SIDE’’ Our tradition, our heritage, is itself double. It contains in itself the ideal of equality of opportunity and of freedom for all, without regard to birth or status, as a condition for the effective realization of equality y [this] is the genuinely spiritual element of our tradition. (John Dewey, [1929] 1988b, pp. 48–49)

The national security white paper holds that U.S. geopolitical leadership reflects values that ‘‘are right and true for all people everywhere’’ and that the American version of free-market economics is the essence of human freedom and only workable model (Department of Defense, 2002, pp. 3, 17–18). This universalism has been a prime root of the U.S. failure to anticipate the complexity and costs of regime change and of the parallel lack of foresight in its prescription of ‘‘shock therapy’’ in the former communist regimes and of draconian structural-adjustment and austerity programs in

Periodizing Globalization

39

poor nations. Neoliberalism’s distinctly American, one-size-fits-all, ‘‘market fundamentalism’’ ignores unique circumstances, divergent cultural and institutional forms, and variable human costs, which are essential matters in efforts to generate socially beneficial economic growth (Stiglitz, 2002, pp. 23–52).63 The Bush Doctrine’s claims about the universality of American-style neoliberal democracy animated hopes about rapid pacification and wholesale political transformation of Iraq, regardless of the invasion, occupation, and cultural differences, The same universalism suffused justifications of 19th century ‘‘Indian removal,’’64 Cold War claims about modernization’s ‘‘lead nation,’’ and the multisided farce, tragedy, and human catastrophe of the Vietnam War. John Gray (2002, p. 132) chides: The contemporary American faith that it is a universal nation implies that all humans are born American, and become anything else by accident – or error. According to this faith American Values are, or will soon be, shared by all humankind.

This universalist view has roots in the U.S. founding period and even before. In crisis-ridden 1974, Ronald Reagan’s famous ‘‘Shining City Upon a Hill’’ speech, borrowed imagery from Reverend Winthrop’s 18th century sermon to remind Americans of our covenant with God and consequent enduring superiority of our culture. Against the wreckage of New Deal politics, Watergate, the lost Vietnam War, and exhausted Cold War modernization, President Reagan drew on the ever-repeated sermon to heal our wounded pride and pangs of conscience and call for an American renewal that foreshadowed the Washington Consensus and Bush Doctrine. Presidents G. H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and G. W. Bush all drew on the same Puritan fundament. American exceptionalism’s paradoxical universalism provides Americans moral certainty about our values and way of life and is an intoxicant that suppresses questions about consequent policy errors and human costs. Foreigners are bemused when U.S. Presidents or other dignitaries declare unabashedly that we live in the ‘‘best country on earth.’’ Although inspiring and comforting to many Americans, this intensely moralizing vision of our culture cultivates an arrogance and insouciance that results in shortsightedness, disastrous policy failures, and resentment and anger abroad. And, however quaint, its provincialism is also embarrassing to many Americans. The Bush Doctrine’s very assertive version of American exceptionalism has turned its universalist justification back against itself; many people outside the U.S. and a good number of Americans now speculate that claims about liberating Iraq and spreading freedom and democracy cover

40

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

parochial, selfish, and misguided U.S. interests (e.g., controlling Middle East oil, providing windfall profits for Halliburton, pandering to President Bush’s right-wing populist, evangelical base, seeking global domination, serving Sharon). In this climate, even well-intentioned policies are sometimes seen to serve narrowly, self-interested ulterior motives. Administration appeals about human rights often lack moral force, even when they are welldirected, because they are deployed selectively, and are not used to question dictatorships that support ‘‘vital’’ U.S. interests or the ‘‘collateral damages’’ of military interventions. Bob Dylan’s 1960s dirge about the violent side of American Exceptionalism is, today, more relevant than ever – he sang ‘‘you don’t count the dead y [and] you never ask questions when God’s on your side.’’65 Over 30 years ago John Kerry challenged the American people to question whether the Vietnam War’s costs – millions of lost lives and many more ruined lives – were too great. He has yet to pose the same question, today, about the thousands of lives lost or ruined in Iraq, justified by the same universal values of freedom and democracy. The two major political parties’ universalist claims about democracy and freedom are also problematic at home, ignoring economic injustice and its entwinement with racial, ethnic, and gender inequalities. For nearly 30 years, even ‘‘progressive’’ policymakers have treated routine social ‘‘planning’’ and ‘‘redistribution’’ to be bankrupt and unthinkable. They fear that calling for more than a ‘‘minimal’’ social-safety net or reduction of the ‘‘squeeze on the middle class’’ would make them damnable ‘‘liberals.’’ Opponents of the Bush administration hold that its electoral defeat and a return of multilaterialism would regain lost international respect. Although this may be true, the legitimacy of American democracy requires something more. At the end of the roaring 20s, John Dewey argued that free-market capitalism ‘‘obscured and crowded out’’ the spiritual facet of American culture and that its economic individualism justifies ‘‘inequalities and oppressions’’ ([1929] 1988b, p. 49). He believed that the booming financial markets, spreading electrical technologies and radio, and emerging consumer society (‘‘the highest living standard on earth’’) were too-easily seen to be the sum of U.S. democracy. The ruling ‘‘pecuniary culture,’’ Dewey held, suppressed the ‘‘prophetic’’ facet of the American democratic ideal, which calls for much more than formal equality or legal equality and much more than an investors’ and consumers’ republic. He contended that the tradition’s forgotten spiritual element stresses universal provision of the material and cultural means of individual development and social participation. He held that Americans’ were ‘‘bewildered’’ or ‘‘confused,’’ because their libertarian beliefs about unparalleled individual freedom did not provide cultural tools

Periodizing Globalization

41

to grasp the continuing status inequalities, growing economic inequality, and increasing corporate ordering of society. Quoting Jefferson, he held that ‘‘social intercourse’’ cannot be perpetuated ‘‘without a sense of justice’’ and that property rights are a ‘‘social compact’’ that should be modified when the requirements of social justice demand (Dewey, [1939] 1988b, pp. 173–188). Dewey stressed emphatically that the ‘‘democratic ideal’’ requires ‘‘working out in social practice and social institutions a combination of liberty and equality’’ (Dewey, [1936] 1987a, p. 368). He insisted that this suppressed ideal of Just Democracy still lived within U.S. institutions and attitudes and in the nation’s democratic social movements.66 He believed that it has potentially universal appeal, but he cautioned that its realization depends on historically variable conditions and, thus, it is grasped and institutionalized differently across different regions and cultures. A relentless critic of absolutism, Dewey believed that Just Democracy could only be spread by example, but not by moral exhortation or force. In his view, it is an experiment that must begin at home. Dewey held that universalization of U.S. democracy and freedom, absent the ideal of social justice and given a religious halo, is a naive, undemocratic, self-defeating ‘‘perversion.’’ Cold War modernization theory, neoliberal globalization, and the Bush Doctrine have all been consecrated by this problematic exceptionalist symbolism. For Dewey, escaping this view and reclaiming genuine democratic vision is a complex project that requires a sweeping cultural change of the Puritan roots of the American tradition as well as its existent institutions. His ambitious aim to forge Just Democracy is beyond the scope of this paper. However, his call to recover and employ critically this prophetic thread of American political culture provides the basis for an immanent critique of exceptionalist universalism and the current ways freedom and democracy are institutionalized. The idiom of social justice has not been absent from American life; it animated the civil rights movement and woman’s movement and is visible in today’s battles over the living wage and over same-sex marriage. But how can ‘‘social justice’’ be brought into the big discourse of U.S. politics to address the overall condition of American Democracy? What is its status after more than 25 years of neoliberal restructuring? Can democratic ‘‘alternatives’’ to neoliberalism be framed? Must it await a major crisis? Would that be too late? How does the ideal bear on the ‘‘Permanent War’’ culture and on regime changes? The collapse of Clintonism, climate of fear in the wake of 9/11, and the Bush Doctrine’s hard edge have made the Deweyan question of Just Democracy more poignant than ever. The disturbing facets of the historical moment provide a unique opportunity to come to terms with arrogant exceptionalism

42

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

and to recover our suppressed egalitarian ethic. Dewey ([1937]1987b, p. 236) offers a starting point: We have to ask what, after all, democracy is. Is it simply a form of government or is it a way of life? If it is a way of life, does it includey economic relations y the problem of employer and employee; of material security y. How far is a democratic government possible with great concentration on one side and economic insecurity on the other. Is y oligarchy compatible with democratic political government. We hear a great deal about ‘the American way of life’ and the forces that menace it. Are we clear what this American way of life is, and what forces threaten to undermine it?

NOTES 1. For example, Marx argued that capitalism has had expansionary tendencies from its earliest days. Recent thinkers have portrayed such expansionary spurts, or ‘‘spatio-temporal compression,’’ as inhering in capitalist development (e.g. Harvey, 1989, 2000, pp. 21–72). 2. On Neoliberalism, see e.g., Brohman (1996, pp. 64–70), Gray (1998), Friedman (2000), Stiglitz (2002a), Pollin (2003a, pp. 3–20). 3. However, globalization has not been embraced universally; it has been criticized and resisted, at least, in part, by many groups and nations. Southeast Asian capitalism has been state-centered, and Northern European social democracy and corporatism deviate from the neoliberal model. As, suggested above its implementation has often diverged from its stated principles. 4. See Antonio and Bonanno (1996, 2000). We refer here to the overall institutional and cultural complexes that facilitate accumulation during a particular phase of capitalist development. See, e.g., Gordon, Edwards, and Reich (1982), Aglietta (1979, 1982). 5. On the ‘‘end of consensus,’’ see the special issue of Daedalus (Summer, 1980); Hodgson (1976, pp. 263–499). 6. Neoconservatives, however, did not share homogenous beliefs. For example, Bell did not take up the free-market position shared by many other neoconservatives. The older generation of Neoconservatives, like Bell, were predominantly, but not entirely Jewish intellectuals. Many came from the New York area, studied at City College in the 1940s, and once embraced Marxism. In the 1950s, they were strong anti-communists, but many of them supported liberal social policies. Their movement rightward in the late 1960s was, in part, a response to militant student politics, to tensions with Afro-Americans, who they supported during the civil rights movement, and to left-wing criticism of Israel (see Gerson, 1997, pp. 157–165). 7. See Drury (1997, pp 136–178), Gerson (1997, p. 4), Lenzner and Kristol (2003), Antonio (2000). 8. These lines come from the popular song ‘‘Money Changes Everything,’’ written and first sung by the group ‘‘The Brains’’ and covered and made famous by Cyndi Lauper in 1984. 9. Playing again to Christian conservatives, Reagan said he was ‘‘a little scared’’ to ask the crowd to pray, but the ‘‘crusade’’ to restore American power was so

Periodizing Globalization

43

important that it demanded a prayer. For the three speeches mentioned above, see Reagan (1964, 1974, 1980). 10. David Harvey (2003, pp. 137–182) holds that, the wave of liberalization and privatization, started by Reagan and continued through the G. W. Bush administration, enhanced opportunities for ‘‘accumulation by dispossession’’ or appropriation of undervalued assets and labor, countering the impacts of global overcapacity and of limited opportunity for productive investment. 11. The Tax Acts of 1981 and 1986 dropped rates of the top bracket of income from rents and interest from 70% to 28 and cut capital gains taxes, which had been already reduced by the Carter administration, from 28% to 20%. The legislation also lowered average corporate taxes from 46 to 28%. By contrast, Social Security taxes, which had already been raised by Carter, were increased to 25%. The greatest tax benefits went to the top 10% and, especially, to the top 1%. See Brenner (1998, pp. 207–208, 2002, pp. 51–54, 87), Phillips (1991, pp. 76–86). 12. This second generation of neoconservatives generally did not start out as Marxists, and they were concerned primarily with development of a stronger military and more assertive American foreign policy, aimed at global leadership. 13. The top 20%’s income share increased sharply while that of the other four quintiles declined. From late 1977 to 1987, incomes of the top 1% grew by 74% and the top 5% received over 70% of the gains (Phillips, 1991, pp. 13–17). 14. Under Reagan, the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury bailed out Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, and Continental Illinois Bank. The Federal Reserve also intervened in the 1987 Stock Market crash. The Clinton administration also made similar bail-outs. This type of neo-mercantilist move protects U.S. corporations, banks, and big investors and creditors from competition and bad market outcomes. Phillips (2002, pp. 88–168), Harrison and Bluestone (1988, pp. 56–64), Stiglitz (2002a, pp. 201–213), Friedman (2000, pp. 53–142); Henwood (2003, pp. 118—127). 15. In Bush’s 1991 State of the Union Message, he declared ‘‘The end of the cold war has been a victory for humanity.’’ He stressed that U.S. leadership made it possible (G. H. W. Bush, 1991b). 16. By the end of Bush’s term, however, recession at home and humanitarian crises in the former Yugoslavia and in Somalia pointed to contradictions in the New World Order. 17. Many thinkers doubted the Reagan recovery. Paul Kennedy’s widely read Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (1987) raised serious questions about U.S. global leadership. He argued that the U.S. was overextended strategically, it faced serious problems home and abroad, and its power was waning while that of Japan and China was increasing. Moreover, Bennett Harrison and Barry Bluestone’s Great U-Turn (1988) held that neoliberal policies increased corporate profits, but favored too heavily finance capital, upper-income brackets, and owners of big wealth. They contended that the so-called American ‘‘great jobs machine’’ touted by economists did not reproduce postwar growth and abundance, creating far more low-wage than middle-class jobs and more part-time jobs, which lacked health-care and retirement benefits. They asserted that the middle-class was shrinking, inequality was growing, and the ‘‘American Dream’’ was withering. To reverse the U-Turn, they proposed industrial policy, workplace democracy, stronger unions, investment in public infrastructure, increased social spending, and managed international trade. But their

44

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

social democratic policy regime already had been defeated decisively by the Reaganite neoliberalism they were attacking. For critiques stressing the vanishing American Dream and shrinking middle class, see Newman (1989), Barlett and Steele (1992), Schor (1992), Frank and Cook (1996), New York Times Special Report (1996), Harrison (1994), Gordon (1996), Frank (1997). 18. On the endings discourses, see Antonio (1998). 19. Clinton and other New Democrats participated in a broader ‘‘Center-Left’’ or ‘‘Third Way’’ politics (e.g., Tony Blair and Gerhard Schroeder) that aimed to revive progressive liberal and social democratic parties, which had suffered electoral losses to a reinvigorated Center-Right (e.g., Thatcher, Reagan, and Kohl). Third Way politicians advocate increasing reliance on market mechanisms, scaling back planning, regulation, and welfare, and engaging traditional institutional, cultural, and geopolitical perspectives. But they also held that they support a social safety-net, tolerance, cultural pluralism, and global interdependence (Third Way International, 1998; Giddens, 1998). Clinton’s ‘‘New Covenant’’ (1991a, 1991b, 1991c) resonated with Third Way views; also see his, inaugural addresses (1993, 1997). New Democrats’ ‘‘Democratic Leadership Council’’ embraces Third Way politics, and their website (http://www.ndol.org) includes a link to the Third Way International. 20. Clinton signed the welfare reform bill, which shrunk the welfare rolls, but it lacked provisions to insure that new workers, moving from welfare to work, and their children would escape poverty or would have support if they could not find work 21. Stiglitz served under Clinton as a member and later as head of the Council of Economic Advisors (1993–1997) and then as a senior vice president and chief economist of the World bank (1997–2000). 22. The study began as an investigation of the later lives of the types of postwar managers and their families studied by William H. Whyte (1957) in his classic The Organization Man. However, during the research focus shifted to their offspring. 23. For a parallel British perspective, see Micklethwait and Wooldridge (2000). 24. His long list of corporate, government, and financial leaders and pundits include Larry Summers, Robert Rubin, Alan Greenspan, Jim Wolfensohn, Fareed Zakaria, Robert Kagan, and William J. McDonough (2000, pp. 477–479). Looking back on the Clinton years, Robert Rubin holds that the administration was concerned the financial markets soaring far above GDP and Corporate earnings and about popular writers and Business News fanning the boom mentality (Rubin & Weisberg, 2003, pp. 187–192, 320–350). Rubin argues that New Economy writers touched on underlying realities, but that their conclusions were ‘‘greatly overdrawn.’’ He also holds that markets cannot solve all problems. But he still stresses that the Clinton administration believed that globalization and market-based growth is the best and, really, the only means to deal with poverty. He mentions passingly the need for ‘‘broad-based sharing of growth,’’ but does not deal with the mechanisms to achieve this end or with the issue of increased inequality in rich nations as well as poor countries (Rubin and Weisberg, 2003, pp. 251, 326–327, 385–386). 25. In research on U.S. globalizing elites, James Davison Hunter’s and Joshua Yates’ portrayals of their globalizers’ views are reminiscent of Friedman’s positions. Pew Research Center (2002, 2003, 2004) studies offer some evidence that these views might be diffused even more widely in many nations. Interestingly, Hunter and Yates (2002, pp. 332–337) found that globalizers usually live ‘‘in a bubble’’ when they visit

Periodizing Globalization

45

other nations, often interacting only with English speakers and with like-minded people in familiar placeless, globalized, urban settings. 26. In empirical research on globalizing elites, Hunter and Yates (2002, pp. 340, 347, 354) found that globalizers, in nonbusiness organizations as well as in capitalist firms, shared a free market idiom that treats globalization as an inevitable progressive force and that sees nations to have little choice but to adopt its rules. Pew Center survey data about the general populace’s attitudes toward globalization present a somewhat ambiguous picture. Most people surveyed expressed favorable views of global interconnectedness, free markets and multinational corporations and negative views of antiglobalization protestors. However, in most countries, majorities expressed concern about the shrinkage of well-paid jobs, eroded work conditions, increased inequality, and impacts of consumerism and commercialism on their cultures. Most people also supported a strong safety-net. Thus, wider circles, supportive of overall globalization, may have doubts about the process’ neoliberal facets and their consequences (Pew Research Center, 2003). 27. Friedman does not mention that Cuba’s economic plight is, in part, a consequence of the U.S. trade embargo and efforts to isolate it economically and politically. Moreover, he does not mention Cuba’s delivery of health care, education, and general subsistence to a wider range of people than other poor countries. And he does not entertain the question whether Cuba’s internal problems may derive from dictatorship, rather than the managed economy per se. 28. The Economist (e.g., 2000a, 2000b, 2000c) often adorns the covers of its issues that deal with globalization and the antiglobalization movement with emaciated African children. The magazine’s writers argue that resistence to globalization hurts the world’s poorest people. 29. Portraying neoliberal nations to be peaceful people, who increase global wealth, promote human welfare, and promote democracy, Globalization advocates neither engaged seriously democratic critiques of globalization nor entertained the possibility that violent, antimodern movements might be, in part, sparked by the process’ excesses or repressive facets. 30. ‘‘The S&P 500 dropped from 1527 in early 2000 to 777 in the fall of 2002. The NASDQ went from 5049 to less than 1114–a drop of almost 80%. And the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell from a high of 11,723 to a low of 7286’’ (Rubin & Weisberg, 2003, p. 330). But most investors still believed that the markets would soon recover (Shiller, 2000, pp. 235–238). 31. See Shiller (2001), Stiglitz (2002a, 2002b, 2003a, 2003b), Phillips (2002, pp. 104–107), Henwood (2003). For the Clinton administration view, see Rubin and Weisberg (2003, pp.177–271). 32. The gains came after more than 15 years of stagnating or falling wages for the lower and middle brackets, and, in 2000, the median wage for males was still less than it was in 1979 even though productivity had increased by 44.5% in the same period and they likely have been eroded by the recession that began in 2001 (Economic Policy Institute, 2003, p. 4). From 2000 through mid-2004 wage growth slowed and benefits costs grew (Economic Policy Institute, 2004b). 33. Imports have exceeded exports, and all 50 states have had a net loss of jobs under NAFTA. Companies have employed NAFTA to threaten workers and to resist unionization drives. It has been estimated that increased trade is responsible for

46

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

15–25% of the increased wage inequality in recent years. By contrast NAFTA contained provisions to protect investors, and even to insure investment values due to changes in government regulation (Scott, 2000, 2003). 34. Inequality grew slower than it did in the 1980s, but the top income and wealth brackets pulled further away from the rest. From 1989 to 2000, CEO average salary grew 79% and average compensation increased 342%; in 1989 CEOs earned 72 times more than the typical worker and by year 2000 the figure was 310-to-1. Despite two 1990s hikes, the minimum wage, controlled for inflation, was still 21% lower 1999 than it was in 1979 (which was well below its 1968 peak) (Mishel, Bernstein, & Schmitt, 2001, pp. 186–188; Economic Policy Institute, 2003, p. 9). 35. Critics contended that neoliberals criticize other wealthy nations for failing to embrace the ‘‘free-market’’ agenda, but that, compared to them, the U.S. has had the highest level of economic inequality, deepest, hardest to escape poverty and, by far, the highest levels of child poverty. Moreover, other wealthy nations distribute health care, pension, job security, vacation time, and other social benefits more evenly throughout their populations. On this point and on the argument above see, see Mishel, Bernstein, and Schmitt (2001, pp. 1–28, 371–406), Phillips (2002, pp. 108–168), Henwood (2003, pp. 79–143). 36. For example, see Gray (1998), Shiller (2001), Phillips (2002), Stiglitz (2002a, 2003a), Henwood (2003), Pollin (2003a, 2003b), Johnson (2004, pp. 255–281) for critiques of neoliberalism and the New Economy; see Barbrook and Cameron (1996), Frank (1997, 2000), Brooks (2000), Boorsook (2000) for cultural critiques of 1990s business culture; see Johnson (2000) for 1990s U.S. geopolitics; Hodgson (2004) for historical context; Dicken (2003) for overall globalization; Brenner (2002) for economic analysis of the roots of the boom and bubble. See Yergin and Stanislaw (2002) and Rubin and Weisberg (2003) for neoliberal views of globalization. 37. See Fukuyama (1992, pp. 190, 206–207, 215, 234, 270–272, 311, 314–315, 336–337). In later work, he stressed capitalism’s need for cultural support of ‘‘social capital.’’ See Fukuyama (1996). 38. See Strauss ([1952] 1988) pp. 32–37 on ‘‘noble lies’’ and ‘‘noble truth.’’ His point is that only the philosophical elite, or ‘‘wise,’’ are strong and prudent enough to bear the truth of existence and that knowledge of the truth would harm the demos, or ‘‘vulgar,’’ and threaten social order. Strauss wanted the demos to be protected from the ‘‘alleged or real insight into the baseless character of everything thought to be noble’’ (i.e., Weber’s ‘‘noble nihilism’’–that truths are historical and without transcendental grounds). See Strauss ([1950] 1965, p. 48), see Schmitt ([1932] 1996) on the friend–enemy dichotomy and Strauss’s ([1932] 1996) critical points on Schmitt’s essay. 39. Samuel P. Huntington’s widely-read Clash of Civilizations portrayed China as the greatest threat to American global economic and military dominance and even imagined the possibility of a war between the two nations. Moreover, Huntington put the relationship in a friend–enemy framework (Huntington, 1996, pp. 128–130, 218–245, 312–321). The U.S. tensions with China were magnified in the early Bush administration by the collision of an American spy plane with a Chinese fighter jet. The Chinese pilot was presumed dead and the damaged American plane was forced to land in China where the crew was held for 10 days and the plane was released later. China’s qualified support and cooperation in War on Terror has moderated

Periodizing Globalization

47

tensions with the U.S., although the relationship between the two nations is fluid and complex (e.g., see Munro, 2000; Lampton & Ewing, 2004). See Kolko (2002, pp. 114–126) on the effort to construct China as a ‘‘credible enemy.’’ 40. For example, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, Elliot Abrams, Max Boot, Jeane Kirkpatrick, William Kristol, Irving Kristol, Frank Gaffney, Robert Kagan, Norman Podhoretz, Michael A. Leeden, and William Bennett served in or advised the second Bush administration. See Kagan and Kristol (2000) for an overview of neoconservative positions at the start of the administration. 41. See Project For The New American Century 1997, for its goals. This group borrowed the idea of ‘‘American Century’’ from Henry Luce, who during World War II, advocated that U.S. should share its ideals and institutions with the entire globe to avert a recurrence of the type of conditions that led to the spread of totalitarian regimes after World War I and to prevent another world war. See Luce (1941), Brinkley (1998, pp. 107–108), Kristol and Kagan (2000, pp. 10–11). 42. They did not advocate use of direct military force in every case, suggesting that the methods (e.g., covert actions, open or covert support of dissidents, use of economic power, diplomatic isolation) should depend on the circumstances (e.g., Kristol & Kagan, 2000, pp. 17–22). 43. Powell presented to the UN what he claimed to be incontrovertible evidence of Iraq’s WMD. The information he relied on is now known to have been bogus. Applauding Powell’s support for the ‘‘hard line,’’ Kagan (2002a) held that the general’s past dovish multilateralism and his military experience made him a better ‘‘salesman’’ (i.e., than Rumsfeld or Wolfowitz) for the administration position (i.e., who could ‘‘bend international opinion in Bush’s direction’’). 44. Although stressing the need for multinational alliances, Gaddis argues that the Bush Doctrine is rooted in past American strategies and was a prudent and reasonable response to 9/11. 45. Kagan implied that, under Clinton, the U.S. expressed a parallel lack of strength that was opening the way for its enemies to gain on it and to destabilize the global order (Kagan, 2000a; Kristol & Kagan, 2000). 46. A broad outline of the neoconservative strategy can be traced back to a 1992 document drafted by Paul Wolfowitz. The ‘‘Defense Planning Guidance’’ document stressed preventing the rise of a rival superpower, defending aggressively U.S. interests and values, and acting unilaterally if necessary. G.H.W. White Bush ordered then Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney to have the document rewritten. It was leaked to the New York Times and Washington Post. See Gellman (1992). For discussion on PBS Frontline’s ‘‘The War Behind Closed Doors’’ (2003) (http:// www.pbs). See Paul Wolfowitz’s (2003) comments on this matter. 47. See Donnelly (2001). For other pre-9/11 neoconservative views anticipating the Bush Doctrine, see, for example, Project for the New American Century (2000) and the symposium ‘‘American Power-For What?’’ in the January 2000, Commentary. See Donnelly (2003) for links between the earlier views and Bush’s version. 48. The quoted words are from Kagan (2002a). For post-9/11 views about what needs to be done to realize the proposed reform of the military, see Rumsfeld (2002) and Cohen (2002). 49. See Strauss ([1952] 1980, pp. 22–37) and William Kristol’s (2002) testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in support of the Bush administration’s

48

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

plan for going to war with Iraq. He reiterates a Bush speech stressing the global assertion of ‘‘‘true and unchanging’ American principles’’; regime change in Iraq would demonstrate the ‘‘fragility of dictatorship’’ and spur democratic revolution in Iran and in other radical regimes. See also Schmitt (2003b), Project for the New American Century (2003). 50. Kagan quotes Clinton’s Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright’s term ‘‘indispensable nation.’’ See Pfaff (2001), on convergences between the Clinton and G.W. Bush administrations. 51. For example, see the report on the impact of the USA PATRIOT Act for online activities by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (2003). 52. See The Hedgehog Review (Fall, 2003, 5, 1) on the post-9/11 culture of fear in the U.S. See http://news.findlaw.com for the Bush administration discussions about evading the laws against torture; see Seymour M. Hersh (2004a, 2004b, 2004c), on the torture at Abu Ghraib. 53. For parallel arguments, see Kolko (2002), Harvey, (2003), Wallerstein (2003), Johnson (2004). For a more optimistic pre-9/11 argument about empire, see Hardt and Negri (2000) and, for critical responses to this widely read work, see Balakrishnan (2003). 54. The U.S. state still played an important role in capitalism prior to 9/11, but its activities expanded in the attacks’ aftermath. President Bush’s popularity and confidence in government soared immediately after 9/11 and then receded. See Putnam (2002), Wroe (2002). 55. There is a good deal of disagreement about the prospects for perpetuating globalization and U.S. dominance. Certain critics hold that globalization is giving way to centrifugal nationalism (Saul, 2004) or, at least, to a more conflictive multipolar world (e.g., Kupchan, 2002), while others claim that U.S. power remains the basis for an empire of capital (e.g., Finnegan, 2003). 56. The groups usually have released tapes or pictures of the abducted people, dressed in the type of orange jumpsuit that U.S. military detainees have been forced to wear. 57. Rumsfeld made the statement on January 22, 2003 at a news conference (CNN, 2003; Deutsche Welle, 2003). Kagan’s provocative thesis on Europe’s weakness and the U.S. need for unilateral action was first published in Policy Review (2002c). 58. Bush made the comment to reporters at the White House on July 2, 2003 (Loughlin, 2003). 59. A group of former U.S. senior diplomats and military officials issued a statement holding that G. W. Bush has isolated the U.S., damaged its image, and weakened its national security. They called for its defeat. They hoped that a change of leadership could restore the U.S. image and its position of global leadership. A similar British group called for Tony Blair to break with Bush’s policies toward Iraq and Israel to restore British credibility in the world (Brownstein, 2004). 60. For example, the U.S. unilaterally declared Iran, Iraq, North Korea rouge states, held accused foreign fighters without rights at its Guantanamo Cuba base, broke the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, walked out the UN conference on racism in Durban South Africa, and refused to have Americans tried before the International Criminal Court (Johnson, 2004, pp. 67–95).

Periodizing Globalization

49

61. The new tax policies not only inflated the federal deficit, but cut resources for social programs and education. Bush wanted to make the huge tax cuts permanent, which would threaten Social Security and Medicare. His actions and rhetoric hardened antitax sentiment. Suffering from recessionary conditions and reductions of federal aid, governors and state legislatures refused to raise income or property taxes, running deficits, passing regressive sales and sin taxes, and cutting education and programs for the poor and needy. Large tuition and fee hikes for higher education increased the burdens for middle and low income families. The Bush administration’s Medicare prescription drug legislation gave up the government’s leverage (i.e., as biggest single buyer) to bargain on prices, providing a windfall for the pharmaceutical industry. The administration took many other steps to help big business and weaken labor; for example, eliminating overtime for many workers, proposing a 40 h workweek for welfare recipients and cutting educational programs for them, calling for oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and cutting and mining in the National Forests, and reducing safety standards protecting coal miners. For more on its neoliberal policies, see Mishel, Bernstein, and Boushey (2004). 62. Durkheim stressed the problematic issue of regulation in the preface to the second edition of his Division of Labor. However, in the overall text he provided a sharp critique of Spencer’s vision of society as an unregulated spontaneous order (Durkheim, [1902] 1984, pp. liii–liv, 141–175). 63. Hunter and Yates (2002, pp. 354–356) research found that American globalizers see their views in a universalistic fashion. 64. Supporters of the destruction of America’s indigenous people often claimed that the land was destined by God to be under the prudent stewardship of Christian European settlers. 65. The song ‘‘With God on Our Side’’ was written by Bob Dylan in 1963. 66. Dewey saw economic injustice to be central to divergent forms of social exclusion and to be a core facet of the dominant libertarian ideology. However, he argued that: ‘‘the struggle for democracy has to be maintained on as many fronts as culture has aspects’’ (1988a, p. 186, 1987b, p. 237). He did not reduce equality to economics or diminish the importance of other types of domination. He supported the rights of women, ethnic Americans, and Afro-Americans.

REFERENCES Aglietta, M. (1979). A theory of capitalist regulation: The U.S. experience. London: New Left Books. Aglietta, M. (1982). Regulation and the crisis of capitalism. New York: Monthly Review Press. Akard, P. J. (1992). Corporate mobilization and political power: The transformation of U.S. Economic Policy in the 1970s. American Sociological Review, 57, 597–615. Akard, P. J. (1996). The political origins of ‘supply side’ economic policy: The Humphrey– Hawkins Bill and the Revenue Act of 1978. Political Power and Social Theory, 10, 95–148. Anderson, P. (2000). Renewals. New Left Review (Second Series), 1, 5–24. Antonio, R. J. (1998). Mapping postmodern social theory. In: S. Alan (Ed.), What is social theory? The philosophical debates (pp. 22–75). Malden, MA and Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers.

50

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

Antonio, R. J. (2000). After postmodernism: Reactionary tribalism. American Journal of Sociology, 106, 40–87. Antonio, R. J., & Bonanno, A. (1996). Post-Fordism in the United States: The poverty of market-centered democracy. Current Perspectives in Social Theory, 16, 3–32. Antonio, R. J., & Bonanno, A. (2000). A new global capitalism? From Americanism and Fordism to Americanization–Globalization. American Studies, 41(2/3), 33–77. Balakrishnan, G. (Ed.) (2003). Debating empire. London and New York: Verso. Barbrook, R., & Cameron, A. (1996). The Californian Ideology. (http://www.hrc.wmin.ac.uk). Barlett, D. L., & Steele, J. B. (1992). America: What went wrong? Kansas City, MO: Andrews and McMeel. Beck, U. (2001). Globalisation’s Chernobyl. FT. Com (Financial Times), November 6. (http:// www.news.ft.com). Bell, D. ([1976] 1996). The cultural contradictions of capitalism (twentieth anniversary edition). New York: Basic Books. Bell, D. (1980). The winding passage. Essays and sociological journeys 1960–1980. Cambridge, MA: ABT Books. Blinder, A., & Yellen, J. (2001). The fabulous decade: Macroeconomic lessons from the 1990s. New York: The Century Foundation Press. Blumenthal, S. (2004). ‘‘The u-turn that saved the Gipper.’’ Guardian Unlimited, June, 10 (http://www.guardian.co.uk). Borsook, P. (2000). Cyberselfish: A critical romp through the terribly libertarian culture of high tech. New York: Public Affairs. Brenner, R. (1998). The economics of global turbulence. New Left Review, 229, 1–265. Brenner, R. (2002). The boom and the bubble: The US in The World Economy. London and New York: Verso. Brinkley, A. (1998). Liberalism and its discontents. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press. Brohman, J. (1996). Popular development: Rethinking the theory and practice of development. Oxford, UK and Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers. Brooks, D. (2000). Bobos in paradise: The new upper class and how they got there. New York: Simon and Schuster. Brownstein, R. (2004). Former top U.S. Diplomats call for Bush’s defeat. Los Angeles Times. June 14 (http://www.smh.com.au). Bush, G. H. W. (1989a). Inaugural Address. January 20 (http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu). Bush, G. H. W. (1989b). Remarks to students and faculty at Karl Marx University in Budapest. July 12 (http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu). Bush, G. H. W. (1990). Address Before the 45th Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, New York. October 1 (http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu). Bush, G. H. W. (1991a). Address to the Nation Announcing Allied Military Action in the Persian Gulf. January 16 (http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu). Bush, G. H. W. (1991b). Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress on the State of the Union. January 29 (http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu). Bush, G. H. W. (1991c). Radio address to the United States Armed Forces stationed in the Persian Gulf region. March 2 (http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu). Bush, G. W. (2002). Letter introducing, ‘‘The National Security Strategy of the United States of America,’’ U.S. Department of State. 2002. September 17 (http://www.state.gov). Bush, G. H. W. (2003). State of the Union. January 28 (http://www.whitehouse.gov).

Periodizing Globalization

51

Chua, A. (2004). World on fire: How exporting free market democracy breeds ethnic hatred and global instability. New York: Anchor Books. Clinton, W. J. (1991a). The new covenant: Responsibility and rebuilding the American Community. October 23 (http://www.ndol.org). Clinton, W. J. (1991b). A new covenant for economic change. November 20 (http:// www.ndol.org). Clinton, W. J. (1991c). A new covenant for American Security. December 12 (http:// www.ndol.org). Clinton, W. J. (1993). First inaugural address. January 20 (http://www.yale.ed/lawweb/avalon). Clinton, W. J. (1997). Second inaugural address. January 20 (http://www.yale.ed/lawweb/ avalon). Cohen, E. (2002). A tale of two secretaries. Foreign Affairs, 81(3), 33–46. CNN. (2003). ‘‘Rumsfeld: France, Germany are ‘Problems’ in Iraqi conflict.’’ January 23 (http://www.cnn.com). Davis, M. (1992). City of quartz: Excavating the future in Los Angeles. New York: Vintage Books. Deutsche, W. (2003). Rumsfeld repeats ‘Old Europe’ Comments. November 6 (http://www. dw-world.de). Dewey, J. ([1936] 1987a). Liberalism and equality. In: J. A. Boydston (Ed.), 1935–1937 of John Dewey: The Later Works 1925–1953 (Vol. 11, pp. 368–371). Carbondale and Edwardsville, IL: Southern Illinois University Press. Dewey, J. ([1937] 1987b). Education, the foundation for social organization. In: J. A. Boydston (Ed.), 1935–1937 of John Dewey: The Later Works 1925–1953 (Vol. 11, pp. 226–237). Carbondale and Edwardsville, IL: Southern Illinois University Press. Dewey, J. ([1937] 1988a). Freedom and culture. In: J. A. Boydston (Ed.), 1938–1939 of John Dewey: The Later Works 1925–1953 (Vol. 13, pp. 63–188). Carbondale and Edwardsville, IL: Southern Illinois University Press. Dewey, J. ([1929] 1988b). Individualism, old and new. In: J. A. Boydston (Ed.), 1929–1930 of John Dewey: The Later Works 1925—1953 (Vol. 5, pp. 41–123). Carbondale and Edwardsville, IL: Southern Illinois University Press. Dicken, P. (2003). Global shift: Reshaping the global map in the 21st century (4th ed.). New York and London: The Guilford Press. Donnelly, T. (2001). Preserving Pax Americana: Defense reform for the Unipolar Movement. Outlook: Ideas For The Future From Hudson Institute. January (3:1) (http://www. hudson.org). Donnelly, T. (2003). The Underpinnings of the Bush Doctrine. American Enterprise Institute. January 31 (http://www.aei.org). Drury, S. B. (1997). Leo Strauss and the American Right. New York: ST. Martins Press. Durkheim, E. ([1902] 1984). Preface to the second edition. In: The division of labor in society, translated by W. D. Halls (pp. xxxi–lix). New York: Free Press. Economic Policy Institute. (2003). Executive Summary: The State of Working America 2002-03. September 1 (http://www.epinet.org). Economic Policy Institute. (2004a). The lesson of the 1981 ‘supply side’ tax cuts (economic snapshots). June 16 (http://www.epinet.org). Economic Policy Institute. (2004b). Wages and salaries at unprecedented low growth rate (economic snapshots). August 4 (http://www.epinet.org). Electronic Frontier Foundation. (2003). EFF Analysis of the Provisions of the USA PATRIOT ACT That Relate to Online Activities. October 27 (http://www.eff.org).

52

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

Finnegan, W. (2003). The Economics of Empire. Harpers Magazine, May, 41–54. Foner, E. (1998). The story of American freedom. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. Francis, S. (2004). The Reagan Legacy – a mixed success. Chronicles Extra!, June 8 (http:// chroniclesmagazine.org). Frank, T. (1997). The conquest of cool: Business culture, counterculture, and the rise of hip consumerism. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Frank, T. (2000). One market under god: Extreme capitalism, market populism, and the end of economic democracy. New York: Doubleday. Frank, R. H., & Cook, P. J. (1996). The winner-take-all-society: Why the few at the top get so much more than the rest of us. New York: Penguin Books. Friedman, T. L. (2000). The lexus and the olive tree. New York: Anchor Books. Fukuyama, F. (1989). The end of history? National Interest, 16, 3–18. Fukuyama, F. (1992). The end of history and the last man. London: Penguin Books. Fukuyama, F. (1996). Trust: The social virtues and the creation of prosperity. New York: The Free Press. Gaddis, J. L. (2004). Surprise, security, and the American experience. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press. Galston, W., & Kamarck, E. (1989). The Politics of Evasion: Democrats and the Presidency (http://www.ppionline.org). Gellman, B. (1992). Keeping the U.S. first. Washington Post. March 11. (http://www.emjournal). Gerson, M. (1997). The neoconservative vision: From the Cold War to the Culture Wars. Lanham, MD: Madison Books. Giddens, A. (1998). The Third Way: The renewal of social democracy. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. Gilder, G. (2000). Telecosm: The world after Bandwith abundance. New York: Touchstone. Glassman, J. K., & Hassett, K. A. (2000). Dow 36000. New York: Three Rivers Press. Gordon, D. M. (1996). Fat and mean: The corporate squeeze of working Americans and the myth of managerial ‘‘Downsizing’’. New York: Martin Kessler Books. Gordon, D. M., Edwards, R., & Reich, M. (1982). Segmented worker, divided workers: The historical transformation of labor in the United States. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. Gray, J. (1998). False dawn: The delusions of global capitalism. New York: The New Press. Hardt, M., & Negri, A. (2000). Empire. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press. Harrison, B. (1994). Lean and mean: The changing landscape of corporate power in the age of flexibility. New York: Basic Books. Harrison, B., & Bluestone, B. (1988). The great U-turn: Corporate restructuring and the polarizing of America. New York: Basic Books. Harvey, D. (1989). The condition of postmodernity: An enquiry into the origins of cultural change. Oxford, UK and Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers. Harvey, D. (2000). Spaces of hope. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Harvey, D. (2003). The new imperialism. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. Henwood, D. (2003). After the new economy. New York and London: The New Press. Hersh, S. (2004a). Torture at Abu Ghraib. May, 10 (http://www.newyorker.com). Hersh, S. (2004b). Chain of command. May, 17 (http://www.newyorker.com). Hersh, S. (2004c). The gray zone. May, 24 (http://www.newyorker.com). Hodgson, G. (1978). America in our time. New York: Vintage Books.

Periodizing Globalization

53

Hodgson, G. (2004). More equal than others: America from Nixon to the new century. Princeton, NJ: Century Foundation. Hunter, J. D., & Yates, J. (2002). In the vanguard of globalization: The world of American globalizers. In: P. L. Berger & S. P. Huntington (Eds), Many globalizations: Cultural diversity in the contemporary world (pp. 323–357). Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. Huntington, S. P. (1996). The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order. New York: Touchstone. Johnson, C. (2000). Blowback: The costs and consequences of American empire. New York: Owl Books. Johnson, C. (2004). The sorrows of empire: Militarism, secrecy, and the end of the Republic. New York: Metropolitan Books. Kagan, R. (2000a). Strength and will: A historical position. In: K. Robert & W. Kristol (Eds), Present dangers: Crisis and opportunity in American foreign and defense policy (pp. 337–366). San Francisco: Encounter Books. Kagan, R. (2000b). Springtime for dictators. The Washington Post, January 25 (http:// www.newamericancentury.org). Kagan, R. (2001a). The Clinton legacy abroad. The Weekly Standard, January 15, 2001: 25–28. Kagan, R. (2001b). We must fight this war. The Washington Post, September 11 (http:// www.newamericancentury.org). Kagan, R. (2002a). Powell’s moment. The Washington Post, February 10 (http://www. newamericancentury.org). Kagan, R. (2002b). Reaction to ‘Bush’s real goal in Iraq. The Atlanta Journal and Constitution, October 6 (http://www.newamericancentury.org). Kagan, R. (2002c). Power and weakness. Policy Review. June. (http://www.newamericancentury. org). Kagan, R. (2003). Of paradise and power: America and Europe in the New World Order. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Kagan, R., & Kristol, W. (Eds) (2000). Present dangers: Crisis and opportunity in American foreign and defense policy. San Francisco: Encounter Books. Kennedy, P. (1987). The rise and fall of the great powers: Economic change and military conflict from 1500 to 2000. New York: Random House. Kolko, G. (2002). Another century of war? New York: The New Press. Kristol, W. (2002). Testimony to Senate Foreign Relations Committee. February 7 (http:// www.newamericancentruy.org). Kristol, W., & Kagan, R. (2000). Introduction: National interest and global responsibility. In: K. Robert & W. Kristol (Eds), Present dangers: Crisis and opportunity in American foreign and defense policy (pp. 3–24). San Francisco: Encounter Books. Kupchan, C. A. (2002). The end of the American era: U.S. foreign policy and the geopolitics of the twenty-first century. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Lampton, D. M., & Ewing, R. D. (2004). The U.S. China relationship facing international security crises: Three case studies in post-9/11 bilateral relations. The Nixon Center. January 29 (http://www.nixoncenter.org). Lechner, F. J., & Boli, J. (Eds) (2004). The globalization reader, (2nd ed.). Malden, MA and Oxford UK: Blackwell Publishers. Leinberger, P., & Tucker, B. (1991). The new individualists: The generation after the organization man. New York: Harper Collins.

54

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

Lenzner, S., & Kristol, W. (2003). What was Leo Strauss up to? The public interest fall (http:// www.thepublicinterest.com). Levine, R., Locke, C., Searls, D., & Weinberger, D. (2000). The Cluetrain Manifesto: The end of business as usual. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. Loughlin, S. (2003). Bush warns militants who attack troops in Iraq. CNN.com July 3 (http:// www.cnn.com). Luce, H. R. (1941). The American century. New York: Ferrar and Rinehart. Mann, M. (2001). Globalization and September 11. New Left Review (second series), 12, 51–72. Mann, M. (2003). Incoherent empire. London and New York: Verso. Marx, K. ([1852] 1979). The eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte. In: K. Marx & F. Engels, Collected works, 50 vols (Vol. 11, pp. 1851–1853, 99–197). New York: International Publishers. Micklethwait, J., & Wooldridge, A. (2000). A future perfect: The challenge and promise of globalization. New York: Crown Press. Mishel, L., Bernstein, J., & Boushey, H. (2004) (Forthcoming). The state of working America 2004–2005. Ithaca and London: ILR Press. Mishel, L., Bernstein, J., & Schmitt, J. (2001). The state of working America 2001–2001. Ithaca and London: ILR Press. Munro, R. H. (2000). China: The challenge of a rising power. In: K. Robert & W. Kristol (Eds), Present dangers: Crisis and opportunity in American foreign and defense policy (pp. 47–73). San Francisco: Encounter Books. New York Times Special Report. (1996). The downsizing of America. New York: Times Books. Newman, K. S. (1989). Falling from grace: The experience of downward mobility in the American middle class. New York: Vintage Books. Nye, J. S., Jr. (2002). The paradox of American power: Why the world’s only superpower can’t go it alone. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. Parsons, T. (1971). The system of modern societies. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall. Pew Research Center. (2002). What the world thinks in 2002: How global publics view: Their lives, their countries, the world, America. (Global Attitudes Project) December 4 (http:// www.people-press.org). Pew Research Center. (2003). Views of a changing world. (Global Attitudes Project) June 3 (http://www.people-press.org). Pew Research Center. (2004). A year after Iraq war: Mistrust of America in Europe ever higher, Muslim anger persists. (Global Attitudes Project) March 16 (http://www.people-press.org). Pfaff, W. (2001). The question of hegemony. Foreign Affairs, 80(1), 221–232. Phillips, K. (1991). The politics of rich and poor: Wealth and the American electorate in the Reagan aftermath. New York: Harper Perennial. Phillips, K. (2002). Wealth and democracy: A political history of the American rich. New York: Broadway Books. Pollin, R. (2003a). Contours of descent: U.S. economic fractures and the landscape of global austerity. London and New York: Verso. Pollin, R. (2003b). Clintonomics: A reappraisal – The hollow boom. Counterpunch. October 18/ 19 (http://www.counterpunch.org). Prechel, H. (2000). Big business and the state: Historical transitions and corporate transformations, 1880s–1990s. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Project for the New American Century. (1997). Statement of principles. June, 3 (http:// www.newamericancentruy.org).

Periodizing Globalization

55

Project for the New American Century. (2000). Rebuilding America’s defenses: Strategy, forces and resources for a new century. September (http://www.newamericancentruy.org). Project for the New American Century. (2003). Statement on post-war Iraq. March 19 (http:// www.newamericancentruy.org). Putnam, R. B. (2002). Bowling together. The American Prospect. February 11 (http:// www.prospect.org). Reagan, R. (1964). A time for choosing. October, 27 (http://www.reaganfoundation.org). Reagan, R. (1974). The shining city upon a hill. January, 25 (http://www.originofnations.org). Reagan, R. (1980). Time to recapture our destiny. July, 17 (http://www.reaganfoundation.org). Rosecrance, R. (1999). The rise of the virtual state: Wealth and power in the coming century. New York: Basic Books. Rubin, R. E., & Weisberg, J. (2003). In an uncertain world: Tough choices from Wall Street to Washington. New York: Random House. Rumsfeld, D. H. (2002). Transforming the Military. Foreign Affairs, 81(3), 20–32. Saul, J. R. (2004). The collapse of globalism and the rebirth of nationalism. Harpers Magazine, 308(1846), 33–43. Schmitt, C. [1932] (1996). The Concept of the Political, notes and translation by George Schwab [With Leo Strauss’s Notes on Schmitt’s Essay, translated by J. Harvey Lomax]. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Schmitt, G. (2003a). Response to Asmus and Pollack. Project for the New American Century. July 24 (http://www.newamericancentruy.org). Schmitt, G. (2003b). Power & duty: Action is crucial to maintaining world order. Los Angeles Times. March 23 (http://www.newamericancentruy.org). Schor, J. B. (1992). The overworked American: The unexpected decline of leisure. New York: Basic Books. Schwartz, P., Peter, L., & Joel, H. (1999). The long boom: A vision for the coming age of prosperity. Reading, MA: Perseus Books. Scott, R. (2000). The facts about trade and job creation (Issue Brief #139). March 24 (http:// www.epinet.org). Scott, R. (2003). The high price of ‘Free’ trade: NAFTA’s failure has cost the United States jobs across the nation (Issue Brief #139). November (http://www.epinet.org). Shiller, R. J. (2001). Irrational exuberance. New York: Broadway Books. Steinfels, P. (1980). The neoconservatives: The men who are changing America’s politics. New York: Touchstone. Sternberg, W. (1992). Cooked books. The Atlantic online. January (http://www.theatlantic.com). Stiglitz, J. E. (2001). Thanks for nothing (Note & Dispatches: Addis Ababa). The Atlantic online. October (http://www.theatlantic.com). Stiglitz, J. E. (2002a). Globalization and its discontents. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. Stiglitz, J. E. (2002b). The roaring 90s. The Atlantic online. October (http://www.theatlantic. com). Stiglitz, J. E. (2003a). The roaring nineties: A new history of the world’s most prosperous decade. New York and London: W.W. Norton & Company. Stiglitz, J. E. (2003b). Ethics, market, and government failure, and globalization. (Paper presented at the Vatican Conference at the Ninth Plenary Session of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences [Casina Pio, May 2–6]) (http://www.-1.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/stiglitz/). Stockman, D. A. (1986). The triumph of politics: How the Reagan revolution failed. New York: Harper & Row.

56

ROBERT J. ANTONIO AND ALESSANDRO BONANNO

Strauss, L. ([1950]1965). Natural right and history. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Strauss, L. ([1952]1980). Persecution and the art of writing. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Strauss, L. ([1932]1996). Notes on Carl Schmitt, (translated by J. Harvey Lomax). In: C. Schmitt (Ed.), The Concept of the Political (pp. 81–107). Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. The Economist. (2000a). Angry and effective. The Economist, September 23–29, pp. 85–87. The Economist. (2000b). Untangling e-conomics (A Survey of the New Economy). The Economist, September 23–29, 6–40 (insert). The Economist. (2000c). The real losers. The Economist, December, 11–17, p. 15. Third Way International. (1998). About the Third Way (http://www.ndolorg). U.S. Department of State. (2002). The National Security Strategy of the United States of America. September 17 (http://www.state.gov). Vogel, D. (1980). The inadequacy of contemporary opposition to business. Daedalus, 109(3), 47–58. Wallerstein, I. (2003). The decline of American power: The U.S. in a chaotic world. New York and London: The New Press. Whyte, W. H. (1957). The organization man. Garden City, NY: Doubleday Anchor Books. Wolfowitz, P. (2003). Interview with Sam Tannenhaus. Vanity Fair. May 9 (http://www. defenselink.mil). Wood, E. M. (2003a). Empire of capital. London and New York: Verso. Wood, E. M. (2003b). A manifesto for global capitalism. In: G. Balakrishnan (Ed.), Debating empire (pp. 61–82). London and New York: Verso. Wroe, A. (2002). Post 9/11: An analysis of political trust. Paper presented at the British Association for American Studies Annual Conference, University of Oxford, April 5–8. Yergin, D., & Stanislaw, J. (2002). The commanding heights: The battle for the world economy. New York: Touchstone Books.

RECOGNIZING EMPIRE: ALIENATION, AUTHORITY, AND DELUSIONS OF GRANDEUR David Norman Smith Since the invasion of Iraq by the United States and its allies in March 2003, the world has been abuzz with talk of empire. The Bush administration’s willingness to flex its superpower muscles on such a massive scale has sparked anger, dismay, and cascades of analysis. ‘‘Empire’’ is the favored analytic trope of most critics. This is not surprising. As the only truly Great Power in a world of mass-destructive weapons, the United States is the most powerful state in history. Yet there are curious aspects to American power that muddy the claim of empire. Unlike the brutal but calculating empires of old, the Bush–Cheney regime has seemed untroubled by the obstacles it faces. Bush’s proconsuls show blithe disregard for the world’s censure. They scoff at criticisms from allies, thumb their noses at protests, and dismiss rebukes from global tribunals. They were careless about the facts concerning Iraqi weapons and sent far fewer troops to Iraq than U.S. military strategists advised. They were undaunted by the hazards of occupation, truly believing, it appears, that a ‘‘shock and awe’’ bombing campaign would yield a victory in just weeks. They made no plans for a prolonged occupation or an ultimate exit. They diverted vast resources from fighting terrorism to the occupation of a former ally that, under pressure from the world community, had effectively disarmed. Domestically too they showed serene

Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 57–152 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24002-7

57

58

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

optimism. Saying he had earned ‘‘political capital’’ when he won 51% of the popular vote in 2004, George W. Bush announced that he planned to spend this capital in an effort to revamp Social Security.1 Just months later that campaign was in tatters. If this is a story of empire, it is a story unlike any other. My goal in what follows is probe some aspects of the reality behind this story. This reality, it will become clear, is ideological and even philosophical as well as political. An imperious regime, often accused of hubris, has, under the influence of ‘‘Straussian’’ philosophy, pursued a self-consciously Machiavellian course – a course of self-aggrandizing power, disguised as moral rectitude. Violations of national and global norms that might appear to reflect mere recklessness are, in fact, anything but arbitrary.

1. AFTER EMPIRE? Officially, of course, the world is now post-imperial. The Q’ing and Ottoman empires fell on the eve of World War I, and the last Leviathans of Europe’s imperial past, the Austro-Hungarian and Tsarist empires, lumbered into the grave soon after. Tocsins of liberation were sounded on all sides, in the name of democracy (Wilson) and socialism (Lenin). Later attempts to remake and proclaim empires – above all, Hitler’s annunciation of a ‘‘Third Reich’’ – now seem surreal, aberrant, and dystopian. The Soviet Union, the heir to the Tsarist empire, found it prudent to call itself a ‘‘federation of socialist republics.’’ Mao’s China followed suit. Now, only a truly perverse, contrarian regime would fail to deploy the rhetoric of democracy. In a word, the principle of empire has lost all legitimacy. The terrible, charismatic ‘‘greatness’’ of the old empires, which they ‘‘proved’’ by slaughtering all who resisted, is now deemed crime and pathology.2 International law prohibits what emperors once proclaimed. ‘‘Carthaginian solutions’’ to the quarrels between nations are now defined as genocides, crimes against humanity – as moral and legal stigmata.3 Even the unbound global hegemony of American power and products is now advertised as the opposite of empire. Especially since the fall of the USSR, the post-Cold War ‘‘new world order’’ has been stereotyped as a realm of reason and freedom, a federation of united nations, ruled by international law rather than by transgressive will. Thanks to the wave of decolonizations a half-century ago, the global situation is generally defined, even by its harshest critics, as postcolonial. Multinational capital, meanwhile, has radiated so far from its Euro-American origins, and has won so

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

59

much autonomous power, that globalization theorists have often held that ‘‘the state’’ itself is now a husk of its former power, reduced to a transit node for a web of transactions and corporations.4 It is frequently claimed, in other words, that the modern world has advanced decisively beyond the prehistory of empires and colonies that so marked, and marred, the world of the past. Unofficially, of course, the situation is very different. All of the great ‘‘post-imperial’’ powers (the United States, France, Russia, China, Britain) and even some lesser powers are now more decisively and regularly influential over the fate of other nations than the storied empires of old.5 The United States, especially, is ascendant on such a grand scale, so long dominant over the economic and moral intercourse of nations, that it often takes its virtual monopoly of power for granted. Indeed, no state has ever been more hegemonic than the contemporary United States. Even Britain at its peak did not wield as much influence over other nations, either directly as in Iraq and Kosovo, or indirectly via the UN Security Council, the institutions of the world financial order (particularly the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization), and such bodies as the ‘‘Group of Eight’’ great-power conclave.6 One consequence of the American ascent, not surprisingly, is that countless voices, of varying pitch and rationality, now cry empire. Some, sensing an occult truth beneath surface events, are demonological in their conclusions, ‘‘recognizing’’ empire in the stereotyped logic and language of conspiracy theory – obsessing, above all, over the alleged influence of ‘‘Jewish money.’’ These fringe theorists apparently intuit something of the colossal power of finance capital in world affairs, but they reduce this power to the paltry dimensions of a cabal of schemers, which, they imagine, is evil by racial heritage.7 Disoriented in a world of enormous and often publicity-shy private interests, and unable to rationally decode the mysterious hieroglyphs of finance, profit, and policy, they retreat to trite fantasies of ‘‘secret empires.’’8 Others, meanwhile, offer hard-headed rational exposes of the power and hubris of the post-Cold War American state, often saying that this power has risen to such stunning heights that it can only be deemed imperial. Many of these studies are superb, offering rich insight and information.9 But theoretically, what they mean by the word ‘‘empire’’ is not always clear or consistent – and what it implies to invite the reading public to recognize such an empire is not always clear, either. Indeed, the central idea in many of these studies is little more than descriptive – namely, that an ‘‘empire’’ is a state with impressively vast power and an arrogant disregard for other’s

60

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

rights and opinions. If, however, we approach the issue more analytically – perhaps defining empire, in Max Weber’s spirit, as a hegemonic power in a given territory that monopolizes the use of legitimate violence in a spectrum of territories – it would seem less clear that an ‘‘empire’’ in this stricter sense has re-entered the scene. Violence and the capacity for violence are clear; legitimacy, far less so. Others, finally, offer critiques of the new American hegemony that seek to give equal weight to capital and the state, often in the spirit of the Marxian theory of imperialism. Several of these theories are quite subtle and powerful.10 In what follows, however, my goal is not to join the debate over whether Bush’s America is an empire. Rather, my goal is to put this debate in perspective by considering what it means to ‘‘recognize’’ an empire. What difference does this singular word make? To whom does it matter whether a state is an empire, or whether an empire is ‘‘recognized?’’ Why, in the past, was the imperial mantle construed as a claim to legal authority? Why, now, is ‘‘empire’’ an epithet, and ‘‘recognition’’ more akin to a criminal conviction than a ritual of entitlement? By a stroke of luck, fresh light on these questions has recently become available from within the inner circles of American power. So great has this power grown, and so recklessly confident have the votaries of power become, that the veil of denial is now often cast aside. Empire, perhaps curiously, is now both denied and celebrated by strategists and publicists of the Bush millennium. Indeed, among key intellectuals in the Bush–Cheney– Rumsfeld milieu, the apologetic wish to refute the charge of empire is now tempered, and at times overwhelmed, by a contrary wish to exult openly in imperial power and privilege. What many have called an ‘‘inadvertent’’ empire is now openly heralded by literati of the ruling circle as what Hegel might have called an empire for-itself.11 To be sure, is still audible in the majority of sound bites intended for wide public consumption; these, as usual, aim to please and appease. But many less modest voices are now raised as well, particularly in venues and publications aimed at the elite. What we learn, when we eavesdrop on these voices, is that unbridled power remains as dangerous to democracy as ever. Perhaps surprisingly, we also learn that behind the power politics of the day there is an openly Machiavellian strategy and worldview, proudly proclaimed as such. This in turn is rooted in the philosophy of the ‘‘Straussians,’’ whose intellectual marriage with the neoconservatives of the Bush administration has been widely noted and yet remains little understood.12 There are, in short, Machiavellians in the White House – not merely figuratively but quite literally. Both the hubris of current American

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

61

power-politics and the eagerness of some of Bush’s acolytes to plead guilty to the charge of empire are linked, I believe, to this Machiavellianism. Of course, disingenuity and boldness verging on rashness are not unique to Machiavellians. But as it happens, many of the specific disingenuities and rash acts we have witnessed in recent years appear to be rooted, in part, in Machiavellian political philosophy. Grasping this may prove useful. I therefore seek to place this philosophy in context. That leads, to begin with, to a glance at the character of recent thinking on power politics, the state, and empire. Next, I offer a detailed pre´cis of the intellectual history of claims to empire in the Western tradition. I then examine the Straussian idea of a ‘‘tame’’ but imperious Machiavellian prince, the linchpin of a new age of empire. My conclusion, to anticipate, is that the Machiavellians in the White House gravely and perhaps fatally underestimate the power of consent in real-world politics. The empires of old were political and legal structures, designed, above all, to secure the consent of the governed. The new Machiavellians, however, like their notorious forebear, evidently believe that ‘‘the prince’’ can rule without worrying unduly about legitimacy. They may yet learn the error of their ways.

2. THE SPIRIT OF POWER POLITICS In 1966, at the height of the early Cold War, the sociologist and political theorist Raymond Aron argued that power politics had undergone a decisive shift over the course of the twentieth century. This shift, he said, was ‘‘chiefly a spiritual mutation.’’13 Power politics, at every juncture, is concerned with the balance of power between states.14 But on the eve of World War I, a ruthless ‘‘idealism’’ of state power, conflict, and war held center stage. Archetypally represented by the Machtpolitik of Pan-German chauvinists such as Heinrich von Treitschke and Friedrich Bernhardi, this worldview revolved around the wish to see the state supreme and unchallenged, unbound by international law and opinion, free to fight and conquer at will. By the postwar era, Aron said, this celebration of sheer force and self-interest had largely faded from view, replaced by a more chastened, balanced, mature outlook, that of American ‘‘realism.’’ In this perspective, classically represented by such figures as Hans Morgenthau, Reinhold Niebuhr, and George Kennan, the competition and conflict of states is still seen as an ineliminable reality, the foundation of real-world politics. But such competition is now considered, not a virtue, but a tragic necessity. For the

62

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

postwar realists, the goal of politics is not power alone, but power tempered by mutual deference and deterrence, by institutions of international law and order. States cannot be expected to give up their interests, or to lay down their arms. But power should be used as sparingly as possible, to defend rightful national interests, not to light-heartedly annex or annihilate others in a spirit of avarice, anomie, or narcissism. So Aron argued. Whether, in fact, the contrast between Machtpolitik and postwar realism is actually this great is, of course, debatable. But there is an ideal-typical clarity to Aron’s argument here that merits further attention. The extremes he affirms – war deterred and acclaimed, law avowed and disavowed, egoism bound and unbound – are, in reality, choices. These choices reflect underlying values and presuppositions, and even, at times, formal ideologies. Many people would say that, in the choices and values that are most vividly on display in world politics today, a kind of Machtpolitik appears to have been resurrected, displacing whatever realism survived the Cold War. This, in my opinion, is a credible claim, and one which is borne out by recent debates on empire and recognition. To pursue this theme, we will examine Aron’s account of the alternatives posed by twentieth-century power politics, idealism and realism; we will glance at recent claims about power and empire by leading figures in today’s power-political establishment; and we will delve into the ideologies that key decision-makers seem to be using to rationalize what is, quite literally, a new Machtpolitik. Let us review, then, what Aron says about the first Machtpolitik, that of Treitschke, whose University of Berlin lectures on Politics (published posthumously in 1895) are widely regarded as founding texts of Pan-German expansionism. 2.1. The State Unbound For Aron, Treitschke’s writings ‘‘illustrate one of the two possible attitudes towards power politics,’’15 namely, the idealization of power (as opposed to its merely prudent exercise). What is most striking in Treitschke’s Politics, Aron says, is the justification, indeed ‘‘almost the exaltation,’’ of three things: state sovereignty, the rivalry of states, and war, as the zenith of state rivalry.16 The state is Treitschke’s ultimate ideal. The German state, led by Prussia, is his first love. But Treitschke’s analytic priority is the ideal of the state per se. The state, he believes, is the leading actor and the supreme value in politics. And the state, he adds, ‘‘is power’’: Der Staat ist Macht. This power is both material (the power of arms) and moral (the will to grow, flower and

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

63

rule). It springs from the people and reflects their character; hence his conviction that ‘‘peoples achieve the form of state commensurate with their own moral substance.’’17 A strong people, in other words, gets a strong state. Unity begets a united state, and virtue is rewarded with a state in its own image. But Treitschke does not reduce the state to the Volk. On the contrary, he believes that the state ‘‘constitutes’’ the people, elevating their unity to a higher plane. The state is the people ‘‘legally united,’’ a ‘‘collective legal personality.’’ As such, it is endowed with a will – ‘‘the most authentic of all wills.’’ This will is ‘‘sovereign’’ – not merely strong, but legally and morally autonomous.18 Neither laws, creeds, or ‘‘societies of states’’ can bind it, or abridge its inalienable freedoms. Indeed, the only law to which the state is obliged to submit is its own inner law and truth – to stay strong and grow stronger, to defend its liberties and defeat its enemies. ‘‘Let us remember,’’ Treitschke counsels, ‘‘that the essence of these great collective personalities is power, and that, as a consequence, the moral duty of the state is to care [sorgen] for its power.’’ The weak, defenseless state is a patent absurdity, a contradiction in terms: ‘‘there is something undeniably ludicrous in the small state.’’19 So, too, the idea of an ‘‘Unterstaat,’’ a subaltern state, is ‘‘ridiculous.’’ No true state can be subject to a higher power. Thus, when a state is conquered or bows before international law, it forfeits all claim to sovereignty and thus statehood. The state that bends its knee to another is, on closer inspection, no state at all. Nor can law bind the state, he says. A sword, yes; a word, no. Treitschke’s core idea, clothed in many forms, is that the state can accept no fundamental limits on its autonomy. ‘‘Sovereignty in the juridical sense, the complete independence of the state in relation to every other power on earth, is so much the essence of the state that one might say that it constitutes the criterion of its nature.’’ The sovereign ideal of the state, selfassertion (Selbstbehauptung), requires freedom from other states, societies of states,20 international law and even treaty obligations. Treaties limit sovereignty, and should be discarded at will.21 They are made to be broken. Ultimately, the state’s autonomy is most fundamentally menaced by other sovereign powers, including other states. They may value friendship, but objectively states are competitors. Sooner or later they will have to fight over power and resources. Nor is this entirely a misfortune. ‘‘States realize their essence only when they come to grips with each other.’’ More prosaically, in other words, they test their mettle; in the colloquial idiom, ‘‘they find out what they’re made of.’’ War, as the ultimate test of sovereignty, is inevitable in a world of sovereign states, Treitschke believes.22 This necessity, he says, is also a virtue,

64

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

since victory in armed combat proves not only military might but the moral strength of the victorious people – their will, unity, and patriotism. War is also an irreplaceable source of virtue, since ‘‘a people,’’ he says, ‘‘becomes a people only in war.’’ It is in war that the nation learns to achieve and value its own solidarity. Settling disputes amicably, of course, is often the best option. But when a state finds its rights and aspirations infringed by a rival, it cannot safely or honorably permit foreign opinion or law to prevent it from going to war: ‘‘y a state, as sovereign, has the incontestable right to declare war when it wishes,’’ with or without the consent of the international community. The truly strong state proves its character, as well as its sovereignty, by refusing to accede to rules imposed by others. Resisting subjection, even to public opinion, is a moral imperative for the state, and war is ‘‘glorious’’ when it permits the state to prove its honor and preserve its unfettered autonomy. That, briefly, is the crux of Treitschke’s Machtpolitik. 2.2. Power Disenchanted For Aron, ‘‘realism,’’ the postwar American doctrine of power politics, was in many respects the dialectical opposite of prewar Machtpolitik.23 There is, Aron says, a vital ‘‘opposition of intellectual climate, of metaphysics, even of theology between the nineteenth-century German doctrinaire and today’s American theoretician.’’ Realism disenchants power politics, refusing the temptation of national vanity and rejecting the exaltation of might, of war as the path to unity and glory, of triumph in battle as the proof of merit. The realists know that states are driven by power motives and that they are inevitably rivals. But ‘‘they are not self-congratulatory about the situation. y The refusal of states to submit to a common law y seems to them incontestable, intelligible, but not sublime y’’ The realists, in other words, accept the tragic necessity of power and conflict, but they do not glorify this necessity.24 Aron sees Niebuhr as the leading spirit of the realist school. As a theologian, Niebuhr rejects all self-glorification, especially by nations. Individuals are sinful, but ‘‘the collective beings that constitute states’’ are far worse. Individuals ‘‘occasionally practice the Christian virtues, the latter never.’’ On this anti-Treitschkean ground, Niebuhr rejects all moralizing claims to virtue in power politics. War serves selfish national ends, and claims to the contrary are generally disingenuous or self-deceiving. Noble slogans (‘‘war

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

65

to end war,’’ ‘‘war to save democracy’’) are normally mere rationalizations for self-interest, permitting states to use violence in good conscience. Going to war on the basis of such self-indulgent, self-satisfied moralizing, Aron agrees, is ‘‘to engage in an enterprise which runs the risk of being all the more violent in that it professes its ultimate objective to be the elimination of violence y’’25 The realists mistrust idealism, then, because it is often a thinly veiled excuse for a self-righteous power politics that forgets its own ethical limits. Wars are most dangerous, they say, when they are fought as moral crusades rather than as rationally limited exercises in national egoism. Politicians who think that they are using force to smite the wicked are likely to feel relatively unconstrained by moral inhibitions.26 Similarly, politicians who see themselves as moral crusaders tend to systematically underestimate the virtues, abilities, and opinions of others. That is why Niebuhr, echoing the American founders, called upon the state to show ‘‘y a proper respect for the opinions of humanity, derived from a modest awareness of the limits of its own knowledge and its own power.’’27 Knowing and avowing your own limits is central to realism. Treitschke’s self-congratulating idealism, in contrast, vastly overstated Prussian power and virtue. His Machtpolitik was thus self-deceiving, imprudent, unwise. The realists strive to be far more disciplined – by reality. They concede the limits of national virtue and power. They serve but do not flatter the state. Opposing the pretense of national altruism, they advise states to plainly admit their egoism and to harm others as little as self-interest permits.28 Strive for power, yes; but responsibly, not wishfully. 2.3. Enchantment Reborn This is not to say that the postwar era, or the Cold War, was chastely and exclusively realist, and thus free of Wilsonian idealism. On the contrary, from the inception of the United Nations in 1945, Roosevelt’s new idealism was a recurrent motif in the rhetoric of postwar politics, a kind of revived Wilsonianism. Power, he preached, would be tempered by a pristine American democratism, which the U.N. would impart to the rest of the world.29 In this ideal new world, imperial hegemony over nations would give way to an alliance of nations. Though the American role in Vietnam and the Russian role in Afghanistan put considerable stress on the idealist anti-imperial rhetoric of the two superpowers, they both continued to evade recognition as empires. Both sought, rather, to have the end of empire recognized, in principle and as a

66

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

fait accompli. Both posed, in their very different ways, as paradigmatic postimperial societies in an Age of Actually Existing Democracy (or Socialism). But after the fall of the Berlin Wall, when Russia gave up its claim to a share of bipolar power, the United States kept the torch of superpower idealism burning by itself. Now, it was said, liberty is resisted only by our adversaries in the clash of civilizations. Rooseveltian rhetoric was ratcheted up as the U.N. and the U.S. divided the burden of ‘‘democratizing the world.’’ And what Clinton began in this respect was raised to an even higher level, and a higher decibel level, by the Bushite neoconservatives who descended on Washington at the start of the new century. Democracy, they said, is indeed on the march. One hallmark of the post-Cold War era, then, is that the sole remaining superpower has sought to monopolize the very definition of empire. The greatest of the ‘‘post-imperial’’ powers has sought to discredit even the implication of imperialite´. It wards off imperial ‘‘recognition’’ as if it were the evil eye, enshrining the orthodoxy that empires have shed their old clothes – that royal purple has given way, not to naked ambition, but to democratic denim. Until recently, in other words, the highest honor sought by the great postwar powers was homage for anti-imperialism. They demanded recognition for refusing to demand recognition. The thoroughly modern superpower, they said, shoulders the burden of leadership only to fight for an ideal, whether socialism or democracy. Lately, however, a shift of tone has become apparent. Indeed, one of the strangest features of today’s Zeitgeist is that, alongside the conventional rhetoric of anti-imperial rectitude, there is a triumphal, even gloating boastfulness. Pious denials of imperial intent are followed, in almost the same breath, by gleeful half-admissions (and often stunning exaggerations) of imperial power and entitlement.30 It is almost as if Wilson, after emerging victorious from World War I, had suddenly woven a strand of Treitschkean triumphalism into his democratic rhetoric. The United States is now said to be not only the greatest military power but the greatest moral authority. The underlying logic seems to be essentially this: ‘‘We can do whatever we want, and whatever we do is right.’’ Perhaps the most striking and renowned of the Bush administration’s triumphal claims was reported in the New York Times on October 17, 2004. The journalist Ron Suskind had been summoned to a meeting in mid-2002 by ‘‘a senior advisor to Bush’’ who was unhappy with an earlier Suskind article.31 In some ways, what Suskind heard exceeds Treitschke: ‘‘The aide said that guys like me were ‘in what we call the reality-based community,’

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

67

which he defined as people who ‘believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.’ I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ‘That’s not the way the world really works anymore,’ he continued. ‘We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality – judiciously, as you will – we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors ... and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.’ ’’32 This may sound merely irrationalist. But I will argue, below, that there are depths below this surface, that there is a history and a logic to this worldview, which reflects, in part, the influence of ‘‘Straussian’’ philosophy. And the current influence of ideas of this kind is hard to deny.33 To illustrate this point, in what follows I focus on the neoconservative ideologues who brought the notion of a new, world-changing empire to fruition, respectability, and – ultimately – power. 2.4. A Unipolar World Nearly every aspect of the neo-imperial foreign policy we now recognize as twenty-first century neoconservatism was advanced, in a series of provocative articles in the late 1980s, by the archconservative pundit Charles Krauthammer. The apex of Krauthammer’s literary campaign for a new foreign policy was reached in an article, in 1990, declaring the post-Cold War era the start of a ‘‘unipolar moment’’ in history.34 But unipolarity was not the only feature of the new order Krauthammer envisioned. He also argued with great force that the United States must be ready to disentangle itself from international institutions, from the World Court to the United Nations, and from any other force – ‘‘international law, world public opinion, and the public sentiments of our own allies’’ – which threatened to limit America’s free unilateral action.35 Krauthammer and his fellow neoconservatives also rejected the dry-as-dust rationalism of realist orthodoxy in foreign policy, preferring instead a new idealism, which some called ‘‘NeoManifest Destinarianism.’’ It was in this phase, too, that neoconservatives first began to speak regularly about the prospect of an enduring American hegemony, which several writers in this camp dubbed Pax Americana.36 A concrete step toward the realization of Pax Americana was taken in 1992, when a nucleus of neoconservative strategists working under Defense Secretary Dick Cheney in the office of Paul D. Wolfowitz, the third-ranking Defense Department official, produced a bluntly worded draft defense

68

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

policy statement advocating a new strategy aimed at ensuring unipolar American dominance for a long time to come.37 This statement was leaked to the press and provoked a firestorm of controversy, prompting Cheney to soften the final draft.38 But the temper of the times shifted during the 1990s. By 2000, Wolfowitz was able to celebrate the changed mood, which, in a perhaps surprising nod to Dr. Strangelove, he discussed under the heading ‘‘How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Pax Americana.’’39 Strangely, just seven years later many of these same critics y seem very comfortable with a Pax Americana.40

The prospect of this new imperial peace is now on the agenda, Wolfowitz said, ‘‘not so much because the United States y can dominate others in the way that Rome, for example, dominated the world for centuries,’’ but rather because the United States has become the hub of a new alliance system, showing a ‘‘Bismarckian’’ capacity to influence both sides in difficult disputes and to forge partnerships with other big powers. In the future, moreover, it is likely that ‘‘the U.S. will be the only game in town.’’41 What gave this vision its enhanced appeal by the end of the century? In part, this was the result of efforts by a circle of neoconservatives led by William Kristol and Robert Kagan who, in 1997, formed a major new lobbying group, the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) that included many leading neoconservatives, including most of the members of the Cheney–Wolfowitz network. The de facto manifesto of this circle was a 1996 essay by Kristol and Kagan, ‘‘Toward a Neo-Reaganite Foreign Policy,’’ which appeared in Foreign Affairs.42 This was a clarion call, a call to a conservative internationalism in the spirit of Krauthammer. The new goal of American foreign policy in the 1990s ‘‘ought to have been obvious,’’ Kristol and Kagan argued – namely, ‘‘to turn what Charles Krauthammer called a ‘unipolar moment’ into a unipolar era.’’43 The next year the duo formed PNAC. Since many of the major names associated with PNAC recur often in what follows, and since many are leading figures in the present American government – I will pause briefly to offer a group profile. Consider, first, the signatories of the original PNAC statement of principles, dated June 3, 1997. Of the 25 co-signers, notable figures included several who are now toplevel officials in the Bush administration, including Vice-President Dick Cheney; Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld; Deputy Defense Secretary (and now World Bank President) Paul Wolfowitz; Cheney’s chief of staff I. Lewis Libby; Peter Rodman, Assistant Secretary for International Security Affairs in the Defense Department; Paula Dobriansky, Under Secretary for

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

69

Global Affairs; Elliot Abrams, National Security Council; and Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq.44 Consider also the signatories of a PNAC letter sent to then-President Bill Clinton on January 26, 1998: besides Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Dobriansky, Khalilzad, Abrams, and Rodman, we find Richard Perle, former Chair of the Defense Policy Board; John Bolton, Under Secretary of Defense, Arms Control and International Security; R. James Woolsey, former CIA director; Richard L. Armitage, Deputy Secretary of State; and two of the central PNAC founders, William Kristol and Robert Kagan.45 Kristol was the Project’s founding chairman and still holds that position. Kagan and Bolton are among the small number of people, usually four at any given time, who have served as directors. Other key PNAC figures include Gary Schmitt, the founding executive director, and deputy executive director Thomas Donnelly. Kristol, significantly, is the son of neoconservative godfather Irving Kristol and the former student and colleague of the senior Straussian political philosopher Harvey Mansfield. In the early 1990s, Kristol had served as former Chief of Staff to Vice-President Dan Quayle, for whom the Straussian strategist Carnes Lord was National Security Advisor. (Lord, who has also followed in Mansfield’s footsteps, is discussed below.) Kagan, in turn, is both the son of Donald Kagan, the neoconservative Yale historian, and the brother of the military historian Frederick Kagan; all of the Kagans, as we will see below, are major PNAC supporters. Schmitt, meanwhile, has often collaborated with Abram Shulsky, who (like Wolfowitz, Khalilzad and the new Iraqi oil minister Ahmed Chalabi) studied with Strauss’s friend and colleague at the University of Chicago, the nuclear strategist Albert Wohlstetter. Both Schmitt and Shulsky, who specialize in intelligence,46 are also devout Straussians. Shulsky, most recently, has served as director of the Defense Department’s Office of Special Plans, a special intelligence bureau founded by Paul Wolfowitz which, journalist Seymour Hersh has said, was responsible for producing ‘‘a skein of intelligence reviews that have helped to shape public opinion and American policy toward Iraq.’’47 Each of PNAC’s two main founding documents attests to the tension at the heart of the current dialogue over American leadership. Is what Leo Strauss would call the American ‘‘regime’’ democratic or imperial? Does Bush’s United States accept or undermine the usual norms of international law and legitimacy? The 1997 founding statement is quite literally a call to arms: ‘‘We aim to make the case and rally support for American global leadership,’’ the signatories write. ‘‘As the 20th century draws to a close, the United States

70

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

stands as the world’s preeminent power. Having led the west to victory in the Cold War, America faces an opportunity and a challenge.’’ Specifically, the signatories call for increased defense spending, an effort to ‘‘challenge regimes hostile to our interests or values,’’ and a moral commitment to ‘‘accept responsibility for America’s unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles.’’48 Two other points in the 1997 statement foreshadow what would become central motifs in the Straussian and neoconservative literature on power politics: first, a spirit of activism, which, at its acme, spills over into impatience with ‘‘reality-based’’ politics: ‘‘the history of the 20th century should have taught us,’’ the authors write, ‘‘that it is important to shape circumstances before crises emerge, and to meet threats before they become dire’’;49 and second, a preoccupation with the profitable investment of political capital, a preoccupation that dates from the Reagan presidency, which the neoconservatives see as the fount of all political blessings: ‘‘We are in danger of squandering the opportunity and failing the challenge. We are living off the capital – both the military investments and the foreign policy achievements – built up by past administrations.’’50 The clear implication here, in 1997, is that Reagan earned this capital, and that the callow demagogue Clinton is spending it fecklessly. A fateful new motif appears in the 1998 letter to Clinton: ‘‘We urge you y to enunciate a new strategy that would secure the interests of the U.S. y That strategy should aim, above all, at the removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power.’’51 The authors say that, in their view, the United Nations would support such a step. But they add, in a now familiar tone, that even if this did not prove to be strictly true, ‘‘American policy cannot continue to be crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity in the UN Security Council.’’52 Equally telling is a PNAC report issued on the eve of the 2000 election, co-authored by Schmitt, Donnelly (the principal author), and Donald Kagan: Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces, and Resources for a New Century.53 The authors take, as their premise, the unrivalled power of the post-Cold War United States, and they sound a triumphal note: ‘‘The Cold War world was a bipolar world; the 21st century world is – for the moment at least – decidedly unipolar, with America as the world’s ‘sole superpower.’ ’’ Hence ‘‘America’s grand strategy should aim to preserve and extend this advantageous position as far into the future as possible.’’ The roots of this strategic commitment to hegemony lie, the authors say, in the post-Cold War era, which, as the dawn of Pax Americana, they

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

71

believe we owe to Ronald Reagan.54 But that Pax Americana, once achieved, has been allowed to erode. No new strategy adequate to the new period has been established. Reagan’s strategy made the U.S. the ‘‘sole superpower,’’ what Slavoj Zizek would call the ‘‘quilting point,’’ which condenses into a single unit all the contradictions of a newly unipolar world.55 In 1992, with the help of Wolfowitz and Khalilzad, Dick Cheney elaborated what the neoconservatives see as the necessary sequel to Reagan’s strategy, to ensure the permanence of this sole hegemony. But the Clinton White House had allowed Cheney’s ball to drop.56 2.5. Denial and Celebration of Empire On the subject of empire in particular, the neoconservatives have shown a curious ambivalence. At times they offer ringing denials of the accusation of empire, sounding much like any other representatives of power. But at other times they show unconcealed joy over the sheer reach and magnitude of America’s global power in this ‘‘unipolar moment.’’57 The denials are unsurprising; the joyous admissions, a new departure. Even before the invasion of Iraq, the Project for the New American Century had begun to attract attention with respect to the issue of empire. PNAC, we know, had declared the overthrow of Hussein to be an urgent priority as early as the January 1998 letter to Clinton. But in October 2002, Donald Kagan professed consternation over the fact that the study he had co-authored two years earlier, Rebuilding America’s Defenses, would inspire charges that PNAC favored ‘‘a full-fledged global empire.’’58 Responding to an article by Jay Bookman, Kagan denied the charge that ‘‘we ‘shy away from such terms as empire.’ ’’59 Quite the contrary: ‘‘We did not shy away from the term, we never thought of it.’’ As the author of many books on ancient war and politics, including volumes on the Roman and Athenian empires,60 Kagan objected with special fervor to Bookman’s comparison of the United States with the Roman Empire. He calls this comparison anything but apt: The Romans acquired the greatest part of their empire by direct military conquest, subjected their people to Roman law, and imposed taxes and compulsory military service under Roman command. They deprived their subjects of freedom and autonomy. With variations, such arrangements characterized the many empires that have existed over the centuries.61

Given these considerations, Kagan rejects the Roman analogy: ‘‘To compare the United States with any such empire is ludicrous. It holds no land outside the fifty states without the consent of its people.’’ The truth, he

72

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

insists, is that the United States ‘‘doesn’t dominate, it leads.’’ Nor would PNAC want domination of the old imperial kind: ‘‘We do not believe in an American empire. That is why the report speaks of American leadership, not domination.’’62 A year later, speaking to the American Enterprise Institute, Robert Kagan argued similarly: ‘‘There is a vital distinction between being powerful – even most powerful in the world – and being an empire. y America is not an empire, and its power stems from voluntary associations and alliances.’’ America may occasionally invade and occupy another country, but, because permanent annexation is not its objective, its global dominance and interventionism remain ‘‘relatively’’ legitimate: ‘‘American hegemony is relatively well accepted,’’ Kagan declares, ‘‘because people all over the world know that U.S. forces will eventually withdraw from the occupied territories.’’63 Now, however, Kagan sounds a new note – a note of prudence: ‘‘The effect of declaring that the United States in an empire would not only be factually wrong,’’ he adds, ‘‘but strategically catastrophic.’’64 The Straussian strategist Carnes Lord, who held senior national security positions in the Reagan and first Bush administrations, agrees. Loose talk of empire is ‘‘troubling because it manifestly injures the reputation of the United States abroad. We should not be surprised if foreigners – especially our post-bellic European allies – are alarmed at the prospect of an America whose political class shows signs of embracing a self-consciously imperial role in the contemporary world.’’65 That such allies may have cause for alarm is, however, quite clear. And not only ‘‘foreigners’’ are perturbed, as PNAC leader Thomas Donnelly made plain, in an essay entitled ‘‘The Free Man’s Burden,’’ in 2003. ‘‘A firstterm Republican president takes the country to war y Democrats cry imperialism, egged on by a ‘who’s who’ of celebrities and intellectuals. They claim the White House has committed an act of aggression on the basis of doctored intelligence and at the instigation of a group of irresponsible hawkish ideologues y Sound familiar? Present-day Iraq, of course, or the Philippines a century ago.’’66 Comparing Bush’s war in Iraq to Teddy Roosevelt’s imperialist conquest of the Philippines may seem imprudent, by Kagan’s standards, for someone as influential among neoconservatives as Donnelly, who was, of course, the senior co-author of Rebuilding America’s Defenses. But even straighter talk comes from Max Boot, who is a cosignatory of several PNAC documents, a contributing editor to Kristol’s Weekly Standard, and an Olin Senior Fellow in National Security Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.67 In a newspaper column that appeared

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

73

barely a week after Donald Kagan had sternly rejected the charge of empire, Boot took a strikingly different tack: ‘‘The United States spends more on its military than the next dozen or so nations combined,’’ he rejoiced. ‘‘This has brought unparalleled strength in every facet of warfare – full-spectrum dominance, in Pentagon lingo – that far surpasses the capabilities of such previous would-be hegemons as Rome, Britain and Napoleonic France.’’68 Emboldened by the forthrightness of Bush’s ‘‘National Security Strategy,’’ Boot dispenses with diplomatic niceties: The odd thing is that this dominance has occurred quietly and with little public debate. The British Empire was said to have been acquired in a fit of absent-mindedness. The same thing might be said about the American Empire.69

Writing seven months later, just weeks after the invasion of Iraq, Boot was even blunter: ‘‘The greatest danger is that we won’t use all of our power for fear of the ‘I’ word – imperialism.’’70 He scoffs at the old-fashioned reticence of Rumsfeld’s reply, when asked if the United States aims to build an empire, ‘‘We don’t seek empires. We are not imperialistic. We never have been.’’71 To this Boot responds: ‘‘That’s a fine answer for public consumption. The problem is that it isn’t true.’’72 The truth, for Boot, is that empire of the American type is a force for good: ‘‘It means imposing the rule of law y at gunpoint, if need be.’’ Hence his conviction that, for this reason among others, ‘‘U.S. imperialism has been the greatest force for good in the world in the past century.’’73 A similar claim is argued by William Odom, former director of the National Security Agency, and Robert Dujarric in a 2004 book praised by Carnes Lord as ‘‘y probably the best and most comprehensive account to date of ‘the sources of American power.’ ’’74 Odom and Dujarric flatly affirm that the United States ‘‘y has created, perhaps inadvertently, a new type of imperial regime.’’ It is ‘‘an empire of a new type,’’ a liberal system of states under the benign, albeit occasionally forceful leadership of an imperial hegemon of unprecedented power. This empire, they say, is a ‘‘money-making enterprise, not a money-losing one,’’ which states seek to join rather than fleeing.75 2.6. The Unilateral Mentality Examples of this celebratory spirit could be multiplied at will. But more interesting than unblushing use of the ‘‘I’’ word is what neoconservatives say about the substance of American hegemony in this unipolar moment. Here we enter a mental universe, a ‘‘unilateral moment’’ of the mind, which would

74

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

have been highly familiar to Treitschke and Bernhardi. The core premise of this unilateral mentality is that the world of power politics has changed so decisively in the age of American hegemony that the old rules of international affairs no longer apply. ‘‘As we see it,’’ Odom and Dujarric say, ‘‘the United States is in a strategic position for which history offers no precedent. The root cause of the change is the sheer magnitude of American power y’’ Some countries have amassed great empires, spanning large parts of the world, but none has come close to having either the quantity or the quality of American hegemony.76

So great is this power that, though the future is uncertain, ‘‘one is encouraged to believe that American hegemony can endure indefinitely. Outside challengers are not a serious threat to it – neither rising powers like China nor al-Quaeda and similar nonstate organizations.’’77 On this basis they conclude, in Lord’s paraphrase, that the very ‘‘extent of American superiority y makes it a phenomenon that is historically sui generis and alters the normal rules of international behavior.’’78 They brusquely deny the continuing relevance of realist theory a´ la Aron and Niebuhr, saying that, while realism offered a ‘‘reasonably satisfactory’’ account of the Cold War and European diplomatic and military history, it is powerless to explain ‘‘the unique qualities of American power in world politics.’’ Realism foundered, they say, because realist orthodoxy presumed that Cold War bipolarity would give way to a multipolar era of ‘‘counterbalancing alliances’’ that would ‘‘check and reduce American hegemony. Well over a decade after the disappearance of the bipolar balance of power,’’ Odom and Dujarric say with satisfaction, ‘‘they are still waiting, but the American empire looks more stable than ever y’’79 A new power-political idealism, presupposing the lasting hegemony of what Robert Kagan calls a ‘‘behemoth with a conscience,’’80 is thus offered as the acme of political wisdom. Many triumphal conclusions of equally idealist tone have emanated from neoconservative quarters in recent years. The ubiquitous Donnelly, for example, writing just weeks after the Iraqi invasion, said that the real issue even then was not victory in one war but, rather, how to sustain American hegemony indefinitely: ‘‘The real question now is how the United States can leverage its victory in Iraq to uphold, expand, and institutionalize the Pax Americana.’’ This will not only require ‘‘rolling back’’ radical Islamism and ‘‘containing’’ China, in the traditional idioms of foreign policy, but may also require radical change in the very structure of international law and the global community: ‘‘it is difficult to imagine,’’ Donnelly stresses, ‘‘how the United States can maintain global leadership without running the risks of ‘imperial overstretch’ unless it forges

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

75

a new set of international institutions, or at the very least, radically reforms the current ones.’’ Thus what is needed in the genuinely new world order of Pax Americana is a set of organizations that find legitimacy in their purposes rather than in their processes. A reformed United Nations – or a successor organization – would value liberty more than stability y81

Minor revisions of the global institutional order are not enough. Rather, ‘‘the challenge now,’’ Donnelly says, ‘‘is to weave a new fabric of international order y’’82 Richard Perle and David Frum add fine detail to this picture. The United Nations, they allege, has ‘‘traduced and betrayed’’ the dream of ‘‘a world at peace, a world governed by law.’’ If this dream is ever to be realized, ‘‘it will be brought into being by American armed might and defended by American might, too.’’83 Hence, these arch-neocons insist, any restriction on the free exercise of American power is virtual treason to America’s providential mission. The argument they mount on this foundation is classically idealist, with more than an echo of Treitschke. ‘‘America’s vocation,’’ they write in the closing lines of their book, ‘‘is not an imperial vocation. Our vocation is to support justice with power. y It is a vocation that has made us, at our best moments, the hope of the world.’’84 The United Nations is guilty in their eyes for placing restrictions on American power, with the support of global public opinion: ‘‘y in the opinion of a great many people around the world,’’ they lament, ‘‘a Security Council resolution has talismanic power. The United States itself has acknowledged that power many times since 1990. We asked the Security Council for permission to fight Iraq in 1991,’’ and made similar requests later with respect to Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Americans, they say, may see these requests as mere ‘‘perfunctory courtesies, like saying ‘Excuse me’ before you push your way onto a crowded subway car: You’d still board the car whether the other riders excused you or not.’’ But they complain that ‘‘UN enthusiasts in other countries’’ see matters differently: As they see it, when we ask the UN for permission, we accept the UN’s authority – and then we ought to be bound by the UN’s decisions. If we salute the UN when it supports us and disregard it when it does not, we open ourselves to the accusation that we are hypocrites or scofflaws.85

For Perle and Frum the solution, if the United Nations is to be retained at all, is to revise its rules so decisively that the United States can fight as it sees fit, without annoying hindrance. If others fear American unilateralism, so be it: ‘‘what some Europeans decry as ‘unilateralism’ many Americans regard

76

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

as leadership.’’86 Such leadership should not be multilaterally bound. Nor is the UN the only international body or law that the U.S. should revise or ignore. Part of the very intent of the Kyoto accord on global warming and of the International Criminal Court is ‘‘to entangle the United States in restrictions that restrain its power y’’87 Such restrictions cannot be countenanced. The neoconservative Prometheus, unbound, would not only bestride the globe but colonize space. According to Schmitt, Kagan and Donnelly in Rebuilding America’s Defenses, a major national goal should be to ‘‘pave the way for the creation of a new military service – U.S. Space Forces – with the mission of space control.’’88 In every vitally contested arena, even space, the U.S. must always assert itself. A retreat on any major front ‘‘y would call America’s status as the world’s leading power into question. As we have seen, even a small failure like that in Somalia or a halting and incomplete triumph as in the Balkans can cast doubt on American credibility.’’89 2.7. Pax Americana American credibility never seemed higher to Gary Schmitt than in the early days of the Iraqi invasion. The swift march of the war seemed to prove the power of the new unilateralism – the greatness of American arms and the weakness of world opinion. ‘‘As the war in Iraq unfolds, the awesome military power of the United States is on exhibit for the whole world to see.’’ The majesty of this display was heightened by the inability of a hostile world to stop the war: ‘‘America is exercising its power in the face of world opinion decidedly opposed to the war. In some respects, the very fact that the United States can do so is even more confirmation to its critics around the world that American power seemingly unhinged from all restraints – be it the United Nations or world opinion – is as much a danger to world order as perhaps Saddam Hussein himself.’’90 Schmitt answers that American power is not a menace to the world, but, rather, the key to preserving what he and his collaborators often call Pax Americana.91 Schmitt and Donnelly unembarrassedly used this metaphor on April 23, 2000, when they declared that ‘‘China looms as the barrier along the road from the current ‘unipolar moment’ to an extended Pax Americana.’’92 They implied the same metaphor several months later when, in Rebuilding America’s Defenses, they wrote, with Donald Kagan, that ‘‘the challenge for the coming century is to preserve and enhance this ‘American peace.’ ’’93 Donnelly made this challenge the focus of a tract entitled ‘‘Preserving Pax Americana’’ that appeared a few months later in a special issue

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

77

of Outlook, Ideas for the Future from the Hudson Institute.94 Since then, this metaphor has become a master trope in PNAC analysis of foreign policy. So standard has this become that Donald Kagan, writing to refute an accusation of empire in late 2002, felt free to stress, with no evident sense of self-contradiction, that unipolarity has made America ‘‘central and indispensable’’ as the guarantor of world peace.95 The rhetoric of Pax Americana rises on the foundation of a party-political interpretation of recent history. The implication of Rebuilding America’s Defenses, and of other texts representing neoconservative views, is that Pax Americana was Ronald Reagan’s achievement. Reagan laid the ground for unipolarity and the prospect of an enduring American Peace by spending the Soviet Union into bankruptcy in the final days of the arms race in the 1980s. The United States enjoyed a decade of glory living on the political capital accumulated by Reagan. But this capital, once spent, will not automatically renew itself. And the United States was jeopardized, they argued on the eve of the 2000 election, owing to Clinton’s willingness to spend but not to accumulate this capital. Since 1990, Schmitt, Kagan, and Donnelly argued, the strategic ‘‘failure’’ to extend Reagan’s achievement ‘‘has placed the American peace at growing risk.’’96 They stress, with just a touch of redundancy, that ‘‘the American peace has proven itself peaceful, stable and durable.’’ But the United States cannot rest on its laurels. Since ‘‘no moment in international politics can be frozen in time, even a global Pax Americana will not preserve itself,’’ they conclude, without the strategic efforts of planners at the commanding heights.97 Donnelly, a few months later, made the implication of this counsel of bold action explicit. Pax Americana must be preserved, if necessary, by war on all fronts. The U.S. is not only a global superpower but indeed ‘‘history’s global superpower.’’ To retain this preeminence, the United States must be prepared to ‘‘win multiple simultaneous large-scale wars.’’98 It is perhaps ironic that Kagan, Schmitt and the others, by speaking so openly of Pax Americana, signal a parallel to the very Roman empire that Kagan insisted bore no resemblance to ‘‘history’s global superpower,’’ unipolar America. Tacit in the very phrase is an allusion to the Pax Romana. This was a two hundred year’s peace, lasting from 27 BC to AD 180, which coincided with the first two centuries of the Roman empire. It dated from the proclamation of the empire, that is, from the end of the republic. It was brought into the world by Caesars and reigned under the imperial authority of their successors. The Pax Romana was thus a quintessential sign and artifact of empire.99 It was under imperial sway that Rome gave birth to the

78

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

law of empire and its recognition. Domination ceased to be viewed as a mere fact and became, in the eyes of the law-bound world, a formal legal status, an ‘‘auctoritas’’ vested with political legitimacy. Recognition conferred certain powers on the emperor that mere force alone could not attain. That made competition for recognition a central part of the story of empire. The issues raised in this competition remain central to the perplexities we face today. To these issues we now turn.

3. WHAT THE PEOPLE GIVE, THEY CAN TAKE AWAY The theme of imperial recognition was, for centuries, a standard part of the international law and philosophy of politics. The question was not whether empire existed, but whether, in any given case, it was legally valid and deserved recognition. Now, in many respects, the paradigm has been inverted. Given a growing conviction that imperium is illegitimate, there is a widening gulf between the rhetoric and reality of power. Until recently, and with relatively few exceptions, the modern theorists of power have resisted the imputation of imperialism. If the recent shift to a surprising mix of denial with celebration truly marks a sea-change, we need to understand what went before. That requires, besides attention to the recent past, insight into the norms that modernity inherited from the past. Once, nothing mattered more to empires than their imperial status – the monopoly of regional legitimacy, legal entitlement to the highest ordergiving office, the imperium. What rival dynasties and estates contested was not the fact or value of empire, but rather, its rightful possession. To whom was the imperial office granted? Was this grant perpetual or temporary, spiritual or temporal? In the Roman legal tradition that inspired European politics until the eve of modernity, these were the questions that stirred conflict and debate. Strong imperial claims were typically couched in the Roman vocabulary of ‘‘alienation’’ – the notion, briefly, that authority had been irrevocably transferred to the ruler by an act of public ‘‘alienatio’’ which was, for most purposes, equivalent to a contract of sale. In such cases recognition was mandated in perpetuity. But imperial claims were granted a weaker foundation when the imperial office was said to have been granted only temporarily, by an act of ‘‘concessio,’’ rather than indefinitely. In cases of this kind recognition was warranted only as long as the occupant of the imperial office proved ‘‘indelibly’’ worthy.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

79

The logic of these formulas is best grasped against the backdrop of the imperial past, which, for our purposes, presupposes Roman Law. It is well known that the Roman legal mentality pivots around concepts of property. This, in turn, is plainly revealed with respect to the core category of political sociology, ‘‘domination.’’ In what follows we sketch the aspects of this logic that bear on our interest in empire and recognition. 3.1. Alienation, Empire, and Consent100 For classical Roman jurists, such as Ulpian and Paulus in the third century, political powers were forms of property. Rulership (dominatio) was viewed as a form of ownership (dominium), and the order-giving office, the imperium, was the property of the rulers. The Roman emperors, that is, were legitimate in strictu sensu. Their office, their status, their authority, was rightfully owned in conformity with a law that was both constitutional and propertarian.101 Politically, the main aspects of Roman property law are the following.102 For Roman jurists, the realm of ‘‘things’’ (res) in the legal sense consisted of anything that could be owned, whether corporal or ‘‘incorporeal.’’ There were two basic rights over things: ownership, the ‘‘absolutely unlimited’’ right ‘‘to exercise control over a thing,’’103 and jura in re aliena, that is, claims to things owned by others. Examples of the latter right included ‘‘servitudes,’’ which were defined as claims to the services of entities, things or people, owned by others. ‘‘The subject of a servitude y is either a definite person, in which case we have a ‘personal’ servitude, or [a non-personal entity], in which case we have a ‘real’ or ‘prædial’ servitude.’’104 Not everything could be privately owned. Some things were said to be essentially public, outside the commercial realm (res extra commercium) and thus ‘‘inalienable.’’ But most things were defined as items available for sale (res mancipi). Sale, in turn, proves to be a category of crucial importance for both law and politics. The issue was how property could be validly transferred from one person to another. According to the classical jurists, the ownership of political powers and offices, like property in general, could be transferred in a number of ways. One option was simple customary transfer, which occured by means of traditio – transfer by informal accord.105 Another option was civil transfer (translatio),106 which required solemn rituals to legally formalize the result.107 Minute scrutiny of the latter, more binding procedure led the Romans to further distinguish between two basic subtypes of translatio: irrevocable sale (alienatio) and conditional, revocable grant (concessio).108 This distinction, as we will see, had fateful consequences.

80

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

Sociologically as well as legally, the question of how power transferred is essential. From whom does legitimacy spring, and how is it conferred? The answer, according to Roman law, is that authority is ‘‘translated’’ from the populus romanus to the emperor. At times this power is ‘‘conceded,’’ at other times it is ‘‘alienated.’’ Gierke, the greatest of legal historians, is still our primary source on what Goez calls Translations-gedankens.109 It is from Gierke (and to a lesser extent Carlyle, Tierney and Ullman, among others) that we obtain systematic insight into translatio as a political principle.110 Gierke shows that in the medieval era conflict over claims of alienatio and concessio ran parallel to every political and military battle between the papacy, the Holy Roman Empire, and the rising kingdoms of France, Spain, England, and the Netherlands. The intellectual heritage of these conflicts, in turn, infused modern political theory with a distinctive conceptual vocabulary and orientation, clearly evident in Bodin, Grotius, Hobbes, Locke, Pufendorf, and many others. To whom had power been granted? Was this grant permanent or temporary? These were the terms of a perennial dispute that raged from at least the papal and commercial revolutions of the eleventh century until the rise of absolutism in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It is to this that we now turn. 3.2. Authority in Question Originally, in most cultures, the concept of political power was more magical than legal, more communal than personal. This was true among the Germans when they first encountered the Roman Empire. The German word for king, we learn, sprang ‘‘from the word for kindred.’’ Kingship emerged as the supreme authority of a clan rather than of an individual ruler. Ancient pantheistic beliefs attributed supernatural powers to nature and within society to a kin group or clan (Sippe) endowed with special capacities that were attributed to blood relationships. The whole clan was thought to possess a god-descended power or mana which ensured good crops, victory in battle, and the power to heal certain diseases. Chieftains or rulers were distinguished by the singular luck associated with their clan.111

Something similar was true of the early Romans, for whom even the term imperium originally carried mana-like connotations.112 Max Weber observes, in fact, that Roman legalism and rationalism was itself a product, in part, of the decisively religious cast of the Roman worldview. ‘‘The religio of the Roman surrounded his entire daily life and his every act with the casuistry of a sacred law y’’

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

81

The Roman priestly lists (indigitamenta) contained an almost infinite number of gods, particularized and specialized. Every act and indeed every specific element of an act stood under the influence of special numina [spirits] y The Roman interest in keeping the numina satisfied had the effect of producing a conceptual analysis of all individual actions into their components, each being assigned to the jurisdiction of a particular numen whose special protection it enjoyed.113

This pervasively religious outlook gave the Roman Empire a special flavor. The cult of the Emperor that arose in the empire’s later years took on increasingly mystical and ritualistic trappings. At first the imperial role had been defined narrowly in terms reflecting the republican origin of the empire. ‘‘In theory, Augustus was not the master of the Roman state, but its agent, given special administrative powers. He y was merely the ‘leading citizen’ (Princeps).’’114 It was said that the imperium had been transferred to the emperor by the Senate, while he received other, so-called tribunitian powers from the people.115 Later, when perils from outside mounted, the empire grew centralized and cultic. By the third century, when Ulpian gave the idea of ‘translated’ imperial power its canonic form – in the lex regia – Rome had become a near absolute monarchy.116 This centralization was paralleled by the ritualization of the imperial cult. The legal fiction of the lex regia became a quasi-religious fiction as well, serving as the cornerstone of a genuine cult.117 Senatorial acclaim became a core element of the coronation ceremony, functioning, in effect, as a ritual re-enactment of the transfer of popular sovereignty which imperial apologists claimed as the basis of dynastic legitimacy. Other rituals communicated similar messages. Under Aurelian or Diocletian, it became protocol to ‘‘adore the purple,’’ i.e., to fall before the emperor and kiss the hem of his robe. Diocletian’s successor, Constantine, who adopted Christianity and moved the seat of empire to Byzantium, presided over a still higher development of the imperial cult. ‘‘The word dominus (‘master’) first appeared on coins in the fourth century. The vocabulary of religion came to be used, not only in flattering addresses to the emperor, but in the everyday terminology of the imperial administration.’’118 It was in this charged context that St. Ambrose (d. 397), Bishop of Milan, issued the first serious Christian challenge to the powers arrogated by the Emperor, claiming that ‘‘the emperor is within the church, not above it.’’119 Pope Leo I (440–461) extended this argument to say that God had endowed the papacy with a unique gift of grace, raising it above all other powers. Pope Gelasius (492–496) gave this argument a form that remained canonical until the eleventh century. Augustine, slightly earlier, had said that society is a unity, a universal ‘‘corporation’’ (universitas) or mystical body (corpus mysticum).120 Gelasius applied this argumentum unitatis to the sphere of

82

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

church and state. He posited ‘‘two swords’’: one spiritual, assigned to the pope, and the other worldly, credited to the emperor. Both served under Christ, with the pope granted auctoritas and the emperor restricted to regia potestas. The result, in theory at least, was a papalized empire redefined as ‘‘Christendom.’’ Christ, as Lord and King, was avowed the head and heart of a Holy Empire. The practical reality was that the papacy was still quite weak. It seems likely that Gelasius sought less to claim papal priority than to say that pope and emperor enjoyed a rough parity. But for centuries the disparity between emperor and pope remained considerable. Imperial Byzantium flourished while the Church played a relatively humble role. When the Western Church was given new prominence by Pepin, the king of the Franks, in 751–752, this proved to be shortlived. In fact, the power of the church authorities declined steadily for several centuries after the imperial coronation of Charlemagne in 800.121 At the same time, however, the Western empire also suffered a period of decline. The ruling forces of the late Carolingian era became less centralized as the nobles played a steadily larger role. The empire was not eclipsed, but its power was reduced. This was the situation when ‘‘the great quarrel over the right of investiture’’ prompted what Gierke calls the first flowering of modern political thought.122 It is widely agreed that a ‘‘papal revolution’’ occurred in the late eleventh century.123 Its source was a bold declaration of papal independence from secular control. ‘‘This was a revolution, declared in 1075 by Pope Gregory VII; the papal party and the imperial party fought it out in bloody wars for almost fifty years,’’ and the conflict was still unresolved in the fifteenth century.124 Hildebrand, the architect of the revolution, was Pope Gregory VII from 1073 to 1085. The impetus for his challenge to imperial hegemony came when Emperor Henry III (1039–1056) had deposed three popes earlier in the century. Hildebrand, after apprenticing as advisor to Pope Leo IX, turned aggressive after his own election as pope. A forceful figure, well suited for a fight against caesaropapism,125 Gregory sparked the investiture struggle by rejecting the emperor’s right to invest new bishops. The result was the outbreak of a war both military and intellectual. Allied with Norman nobles, Gregory fought bloody battles126 and a bitter polemical war. The memory of these polemics was still fresh when Jean Bodin and others redefined the issue as a conflict over ‘‘divine right’’ five centuries later. The details of Hildebrandine doctrine will be discussed later. For the moment, the main point is that Gregory breathed new life into the Gelasian doctrine of papal supremacy and stirred new interest in the ancient Roman

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

83

jurists.127 Jurisprudence had been in eclipse since the preparation of the Justinian Digest in the sixth century, but sprang to life again in the works of so-called ‘‘civilians’’ in the years after 1100. Law became a weapon in the battle over the respective rights and powers of the emperor, pope, and people. ‘‘Various concepts and rules of classical and postclassical Roman law were carried over, especially in matters of property y’’128 This revival of Roman law had a double significance. It marked the medieval rebirth of civil and political law (cast, once again, in the language of property) and it marked the dawn of canon law – that is, the first comprehensive ‘‘legalization’’ of the Church. Rudolf Sohm argued the latter point in several works.129 Until Gregory VII, he said, the altkatholische Church had been an assembly of local confessional groups. Loyalty to the popes reflected presuppositions about charismatic succession, not a binding church law. This changed abruptly in the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries. Where, previously, principles of church law had been inconspicuously mixed with liturgical and theological elements, canon law now emerged as a specific, sui generis doctrine with its own force. Especially influential was Gregory’s assertion that the pope is permitted to ‘‘create new laws in accordance with the needs of the times.’’130 For the first time the papacy asserted the right to act as a law-making body. Acting on this premise, Ivo of Chartres put together a Panormia, an ‘‘all-law,’’ in the 1090s. This jus canonicum was subsequently integrated into Gratian’s grand synthesis of church law (1140). Huguccio and others later carried this synthesis still further. The revival of Roman civil law also began around 1100, with the founding of the ‘‘civilian’’ Bologna school. Accursius (d. 1258), who was perceived as the civilian Gratian, systematized secular law in his Glossa Ordinaria.131 Eminent later civilians included Cynus (d. 1336) and the seminal thinkers in the tradition, Bartolus (d. 1357) and Baldus (d. 1400).132 To whom does power belong, pope or emperor? Civilians and canonists gave opposite answers. In the Epistola ad Gregorium VII. Papam of 1083, Wenrich of Trier sought to defend Emperor Henry IV (1053–1106) from the papal assault by means of an antipapal argument that anticipates the later claims of the Protestant Reformation. A reply to Wenrich, by Manegold of Lautenbach, is to this day a core text of political philosophy.133 Influenced by economic as well as political events – the late eleventh century saw a major expansion in trade – Manegold may have been the first writer to invoke the idea of a social contract for political purposes. Authority, he said, is given to the emperor by the public in return for specific services; the relationship between the ruler and his subjects rests on a reciprocal contract, not a unilateral transfer. If, then, the emperor should fail to honor this

84

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

bargain, the public would be perfectly right to see this violation of the social pact as an invitation to revolution. Papal and imperial lawyers argued this case for many years. The climactic phase of the struggle lasted from roughly 1250 to 1350, when a host of gifted publicists (including Aquinas, Marsilius, Dante, and Occam) entered the lists on both sides of the dispute.134 For the Carlyles, the struggle effectively ended with the defeat of Pope Boniface VIII by Philip the Fair in 1303.135 Many years were to pass, however, before this outcome became wholly clear. And later, the terrain of debate shifted to the church itself. Arguments couched in familiar terms were now advanced on both sides of a split between papalists and ‘‘conciliarists’’ (partisans of the super-papal authority of church consilia).136 Issues of popular sovereignty were acutely felt when Gregory opened this debate. The simultaneous decline of the papacy and the empire after Charlemagne had sparked a period of anomie, when ‘‘bands of robbers y roamed the countryside,’’ which was ‘‘also a time of collective freedom, of revenge by the free peasantry, and of reduced exploitation.’’ Around 900 there came ‘‘a unique moment when the ancient system of exploitation, based on slavery, had totally disappeared, and the new feudal system y had not yet been born.’’137 The rivalry of pope and emperor at this juncture reflected the uncertainty of public loyalties. Gregory would never have been able to fight the empire if the public had not been in turmoil: ‘‘Gregory VII was the first pope who dared to take extreme measures against a monarch. He could do so because the king in question was already opposed by a great part of his subjects.’’138 This interregnum concluded with a fateful return to servitude, both spiritual and secular. The rise of seigneurial lordship, in particular, requires explanation. ‘‘How was it possible for encastlement to spread over large areas? How could the lords have won, when the Carolingian reaction had failed to subdue the free peasantry y ?’’ At bottom, Docke`s concludes, ‘‘it is not wrong to say that in part the peasants came voluntarily to seek the refuge of the fortress y’’ Rather than contrast voluntary servitude with forcible constraint y one must understand that the violence of the lords found support in social groups bereft of stability and security and afraid of famine, in families which in the long run preferred order, security, and servitude to freedom y139

The lords, the popes, the empire, and the kingdoms of the later Middle Ages all fought bitterly to capitalize on this popular willingness to serve – to impose and defend their own version of ‘‘order, security, and servitude.’’ It was agreed that Christendom should be united – but under whose aegis?140

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

85

3.3. Conceptual Roots of Empire Many thinkers now saw society as a universal corporation (universitas) or mystical body (corpus mysticum).141 In question was the identity of the head of this body.142 In the Hildebrandine tracts the pope, as Vicar of Christ, was described as ‘‘the head of the mystical body’’ (caput in corpore mystico).143 The papacy was portrayed as the vital force (summum movens), the ruling part (pars principans) of ‘‘the Body Moral and Politic.’’144 Honorius Augustodunus (d. 1153) said that the priesthood vivifies the realm just as the soul animates the body.145 This became a standard phrase. A similar metaphor, introduced by Gerhohus of Reichersberg (d. 1169), became official under Innocent III – the claim that the priesthood is like the sun and the empire like the moon. The moon’s light, he added, is reflected from the sun. Innocent III himself called the Sacerdotium the imperishable fruit of God’s will, while the Regnum is, by contrast, frail and fallible, a human creation, ‘‘extortum ad petitionem humanam.’’146 At this stage few pro-imperial apologists were bold enough to make similar claims for the emperor, since they acknowledged that authority rests on God-given grace and that the pope is God’s apostle. But they held that the pope and emperor are equal before God, and that the emperor is in fact preeminent in temporal matters. The theopolitical ground for the latter claim was the argument that the emperor derives his authority directly from God, not through the intermediacy of the Church.147 In question was ‘‘true worldly dominion,’’ verum dominium temporalium. The papacy now claimed this for itself alone and scorned the claims of empire. In a letter to Bishop Hermann of Metz (1081), written shortly after he had excommunicated the Emperor Henry IV for the second time, Gregory insisted upon the supremacy of the papacy over the emperors. ‘‘There is a kind of fury in the way [Gregory] humiliates royalty before the priesthood, and ranks it so low that it is presented almost as a diabolical institution.’’ What was the reason, as he saw it, for the flagrant inferiority of the princes of this world? It was because, being laymen, they had no share in the supernatural graces. For what was an emperor or a king, however powerful he might seem on this earth, in comparison with a priest who ‘‘by a simple spoken word’’ could transform the bread and the wine ‘‘into the body and blood of our Lord?’’148

The Church and the Church alone could lay claim to the special gifts of the spirit. ‘‘Where shall we find among the emperors or kings a man,’’ he asks rhetorically, ‘‘who has equalled the miracles of St. Martin or St. Benedict, not to mention the apostles and the martyrs?’’

86

DAVID NORMAN SMITH What emperor or king has ever brought the dead to life, restored health to the lepers and sight to the blind? Look at Constantine of pious memory, Theodosius and Honorius, Charles and Louis, all of them lovers of justice, propagators of the Christian religion, protectors of the Church. The Holy Church praises them and reveres them, but does not invest them with the glory of any such miracles.149

The emperor’s charisma, Gregory argued, is borrowed and inferior, sacramentally conferred by the priesthood: ‘‘the sacerdotal dignity’’ of the Church, he wrote, ‘‘consecrates the royal power, both sanctifying it by blessing and forming it by institution.’’150 At times Gregory went so far as to stray into the realm of the Manichaean, reviving Augustine’s claim, for example, that earthly lordship is the product of sin and Satan.151 But the main burden of his argument was to refute the emperor’s specifically legal claim to parity with the pope.152 Gregory argued, on the contrary, that the pope is so much superior to worldly rulers that he is entitled, and indeed obliged, ‘‘to judge and punish Emperors and Kings, to receive complaints against them, to shield the nations from their tyranny, to depose rulers who are neglectful of their duties, and to discharge their subjects from the oath of fealty.’’153 Gregory rested this claim on the pseudo-historical argument that, in the days of Rome, Christ Himself had ruled in person, with Augustus serving merely as his executor; Peter had inherited Christ’s role and had conveyed it to the popes, for whom the emperors were little more than powerful servants.154 But the ultimate logic of this claim was legal. It was, briefly, an argument about rights. 3.4. Sovereignty and Alienation The protagonists of empire were quick to reply, in equally legal and pseudohistorical terms, that imperial power rested on the firm ground of the lex regia – the ‘‘translation’’ of power ‘‘from populus to princeps’’ which had received Justinian’s seal of approval in the Corpus Juris.155 This rooted the emperor’s power in the popular will, which was said to manifest God’s will: Vox Populi, Vox Dei. But the imperial apologists attached a crucial addendum to this claim, saying that the people’s will, once voiced, became irreversible. The implication of this addition was profound. Now, rather than simply crediting the ruler with the consent of the governed, the imperial lawyers say that he actually owns this consent. Rather than positing a mere concessio of power, the imperial apologists allege alienatio – permanent transfer via what is, in effect, the sale of authority. This placed the empire at loggerheads with advocates of popular as well as papal sovereignty. To secure their claims against the pope, the partisans of empire invoked the

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

87

authority of the popular will. But to seal their power from prospectively democratic interpretations as well, they sought to detach the popular will from the people per se. The people’s will, the imperial lawyers argued, was now vested in the emperor in perpetuity. Recognition of the imperium, in this worldview, requires recognition of the validity, and finality, of the transfer of power. What the public is asked to accept, in other words, is not merely the legitimacy of the ruler’s tenure in the imperial office, but also the inalienability of this tenure, once conferred. The issue is whether the public recognizes the rulers’ claim to occupy the imperium by perpetual right. Was the imperium sold to the ruler forever, or merely granted temporarily?156 Partisans of each theory offered legal and pseudo-historical ‘‘proofs’’ to legitimize their claims. Whether the public accepted these proofs was the decisive question.157 This shifted the terrain of the debate, and widened the circle of debaters. Many echoes of this debate remain audible today. The peculiar notion of a right to rule which has been irreversibly alienated to a single owner, and which the public is expected to accept, continues to resonate. Among the earliest partisans of this view were pro-imperial cardinals who argued that, ‘‘though the people can make a king, the will of the people, when once it is uttered, becomes a necessitas y’’158 Seeking to undermine Gregory’s claim to represent the will of the Church, the imperial camp also attributed a forged decree to an earlier pope, Leo VIII, who was alleged to have ruled that ‘‘the people cannot take away the power of a king’’ since ‘‘the transfer of power from the people to the monarch is irrevocable.’’159 This decree, if accepted as valid, would plainly have fortified the emperor against any rival, papal or otherwise, who might have wanted to compete for the people’s consent. This issue – alienation versus concession – was central to medieval politics. No one doubted, at this stage, that rulership springs from translatio. Irnerius, the first of the great civil lawyers to weigh in on the investiture quarrel, observed in about 1100 that, as everyone knew, ‘‘the authority to make laws belongs y to the Roman people, and to the prince to whom the people have given this authority.’’160 But about the nature of this transfer there were serious questions, which the investiture struggle had brought to the surface. Was the emperor still dependent upon the people’s approval, or did he truly monopolize authoritative power? The ancient lawyers, while stating that the people had conferred all their authority upon the emperor, do not expressly say whether, in doing this, they had renounced altogether their own authority, or whether they could possibly still exercise this either by direct legislation or by the force of custom.161

88

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

Justinian and Constantine had implied that the transfer of authority is irrevocable, but neither was definite about this. The lawyers hence divided on this question.162 Irnerius argued in favor of the alienation thesis. Citing a remark by the ancient jurist Julian that custom makes and unmakes laws, Irnerius argued that this may have been true ‘‘when the people had the power of making laws, but nowadays, when this power had been transferred to the emperor, the custom of the people can no longer abrogate law.’’163 Placentinus added that literally none of the authority transferred to the emperor remains in the hands of the people.164 Accursius, Roger, and the great later civilians Bartolus and Baldus supported this view, arguing, on behalf of the emperor, that the original translatio of power had been a fully legal alienation; otherwise, the emperor would be, not the people’s ruler, but their agent.165 Holding an opposite viewpoint were such civil jurists as Azo and Hugolinus. They, and others like them, ‘‘saw the translatio as a mere concessio, whereby an office and a right of use were conveyed, while the substance of the Imperium still remained in the Roman people.’’166 For Azo, ‘‘even today the Roman people can make law, for though its authority has been transferred or conceded to the emperor, this does not mean that the people has wholly abdicated it y’’167 Hugolinus agreed, adding that the emperor is a mere procurator ad hoc for the people, who never altogether give up the authority they entrust to him. Odofridus extended this viewpoint, telling Placentinus that ‘‘when it was said that the people transferred (transtulit) its ‘imperium legis condere’ to the prince, [this meant] that it granted [concessit] its authority to him, but did not abdicate its own power.’’168 Essentially this same argument was made three centuries later by Paulus de Castro, who said that there had been ‘‘a concessio of the usus, not a translatio of the substantia.’’169 Another fifteenth-century jurist, Porcius, echoed this, arguing ‘‘that the Roman people had not transferred its jurisdiction to the Emperor, but had only granted (concessit) this to him; the word ‘concessit’ signifies ‘translatio usus,’ not ‘dominium,’ and the people can revoke it.’’170 On both sides, the basic issues and terms of this debate varied little from Gregory’s day to the fifteenth century.171 It was so widely agreed ‘‘that the legal title to all rulership lies in the voluntary and contractual submission of the ruled’’ that this position was ‘‘propounded as a philosophic axiom.’’172 But debate remained lively over whether this pact of submission was revocable or irrevocable, a matter of alienation or concession. As this debate progressed, it grew even more polarized. By the eve of the modern era, partisans of the concession theory had become virtual democrats, and defenders of the alienation theory embraced the political theology of divine right.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

89

3.5. Not Two Swords, A Double-Edged Sword The most radical early version of concession theory came from the pen of a contemporary of Gregory’s, the monk Manegold of Lautenbach.173 Manegold is said to have been the first to generalize the idea of the contract embodied in the Roman concept of the societas.174 He held that papal authority is a divine gift, but that imperial dominio et subjectione rest on a worldly basis – a social pact between ruler and people.175 Decisively, Manegold held that this pact is only provisionally binding. If either party violates its terms, the covenant becomes null and void. In this way Manegold found ‘‘the vulnerable spot in the Lex Regia as used by the [imperial apologists], and y went armed with the doctrine of popular sovereignty into the field against his king.’’ He made his point concisely: No man can make himself emperor or king; a people set a man over it to the end that he may rule justly, giving to every man his own, aiding good men and coercing bad, in short, that he may give justice to all men. If then he violates the agreement according to which he was chosen, disturbing and confounding the very things which he was meant to put in order, reason dictates that he absolves the people from their obedience, especially when he has himself first broken the faith which bound him and the people together.176

Manegold scoffed at the idea that this transfer of power is irrevocable: ‘‘If the people transfer power to the monarch for a definite governmental purpose, what then is to prevent the people from revoking that power and giving it to a better governor, if the king fails to fulfil that purpose?’’177 His answer to this rhetorical question is to say that the surrender of authority is anything but irrevocable; it is, on the contrary, a simple and revocable business deal, reminiscent of the agreement a noble might make to pay ‘‘a fair wage’’ to ‘‘the shepherd he employs to look after his pigs.’’178 Can the sovereign people be prevented from treating the monarch in the same way as the farmer treats the swineherd who, if unfaithful, so far from being fed for the rest of his life, is chased from the farmyard without wages?179

Posing the question of rulership in this way was a new departure in political debate. Never before, it seems, had the idea of popular sovereignty been advanced in such unqualified terms. Manegold’s claims, as Bloch notes, ‘‘were particularly categorical; the author himself did not perhaps grasp their immense significance, though they certainly belonged to the deep logic of the movement of thought from which they had sprung.’’180 Few of the disputes of ensuing centuries were untouched by this logic. This was particularly evident in the fourteenth century, when the ideal of popular sovereignty began to win a wide audience.

90

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

It was in the context of the defining struggle between Boniface VIII and Philip the Fair, which reached its apogee at the beginning of the fourteenth century, that Manegold’s claims for the pope were effectively turned against the papacy itself. Especially important at this juncture were the works of Marsilius, William of Occam, and John of Paris. Where Manegold had wielded the notion of popular sovereignty against the empire – saying that the emperor owed his power to public recognition, and that this recognition can be rightfully withdrawn – the pro-imperial party now used the notion of popular sovereignty against papal pretensions. As John of Paris contended, papal authority springs from the ‘‘acclamante populo.’’181 The pope is not transcendentally independent of the people, but depends, like any other ruler, on popular acclaim.182 Similarly, Marsilius argued in 1325 that the pope rules as the mere delegate of the people. ‘‘The people may itself exercise the right of election, or may delegate that right to others.’’183 Marsilius also denied the Church any valid role in the legitimation of public authority. In the political realm, he said, God acts through the people, not the Church: ‘‘where men institute a king, God is causa remota.’’184 Marsilius held, further, that the effective Legislator is inevitably the majority of the qualified people; their law-making power is factually ‘‘inalienable,’’ even when they elect representatives: ‘‘y the will of the people is the efficient cause of the state.’’185 In the first place it erects the office of ruler for the discharge of such business as the universa communitas cannot itself undertake. But more: the matter, as well as the form, of the ruler’s office proceeds from this sovereign Legislator. The wielder of government is to be appointed, corrected, deposed by the Legislator ad commune conferens. The ruler himself is only a part of the whole and always remains inferior to the whole. By authority granted to him by the Legislator he is the state’s secondary and, as it were, instrumental or executive part.186

Occam added that the public, as Legislator, demeans itself when it consents too freely to the ruler’s whims. The Master in Occam’s Dialogus tells the Disciple that unconditional consent resembles slavery, and that ‘‘if the emperor should command anything which is contrary to the utility of the people, they are not bound to obey.’’187 The people did not grant the emperor ‘‘authority to rule despotically, nor did they abdicate their power of disposing of the empire in certain cases y’’ Had they done this, they would have ceased to be free, and would have made themselves slaves, and the emperor would have possessed a despotic and not a royal authority.188

Nicholas of Cusa generalized this argument in his Catholic Concordance, saying that the gifts of grace which are conventionally credited to the ruler

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

91

belong, in fact, to the people,189 and he viewed the community as the effective law-maker in church as well as in civil law:190 ‘‘all power in church and state,’’ he argued, ‘‘comes both from God and from man, for the voluntary subjection of men gives the material power and God grants the spiritual force.’’191 This puts the accent on the ‘‘voluntary subjection’’ of the people, not the inherent or transcendent rights of the ruler. The people per se are God’s agents. What they decree is divine. 3.6. Alienation as the Free Act of the People The implicitly democratic drift of this argument represented, in part, a return to the outlook that had prevailed before the rise of the papacy and the empire, and which remained implicit in imperial and papal law as well.192 It was agreed that power, once transferred, can be reclaimed. What was still open to dispute was the question of legitimacy. Can transferred power be rightfully reclaimed?193 According to the Carlyles, the pre-eminent medieval political conception ‘‘was the conception of the supremacy of law y which was the expression, not merely of the will of the ruler, but of the life of the community.’’194 The duty of the just ruler was conformity to moral principle and service to the community. It was agreed that rulers owe their dominion to the will of the community, and that rulers who violate this will (pursuing bonum privatum rather than the bonum commune) invite legitimate resistance.195 Prior to the imperial revival of Roman law, this view had long been widespread among Germanic peoples. Thus Visigothic, Anglo-Saxon and Frankish history ‘‘is full of revolts and forcible depositions.’’196 Rulership entailed mutual obligation, not just top-down command. ‘‘The subject y owed his ruler not so much obedience as fealty.’’ Fealty, in turn, ‘‘is reciprocal’’ and ‘‘contains the implicit condition that the one party owes it to the other only so long as the other keeps the faith.’’197 When papal lawyers broached the idea of a pact between ruler and ruled, they explained this in terms of fealty: ‘‘To the pope we owe obedience; to you we owe fealty.’’ So Bishop Wazo of Lie`ge told a king in 1045. A generation later a similar message became a central feature of Manegold’s anti-imperial tract.198 Nor did medieval thinkers accept the idea that the ruler is above the law. ‘‘Aegidius Colonna stands practically alone in suggesting that the king should rule according to his own will and the laws which he had made, and not according to the laws which the citizens had made.’’199 And even

92

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

Aegidius distinguished ‘‘the regimen regale y under which the prince rules according to his own will (arbitrium)’’ from the authentic ‘‘regimen politicum y where the prince rules, not according to his own will y but according to the law which the citizens have made.’’200 It was thus ‘‘with difficulty’’ that the doctrines of absolute monarchy, raison d’etat, and royal Divine Right emerged from medieval theory, Kern tells us. Prior to the sixteenth century, the few writers who spoke in absolutist terms were vulnerable to a democratic criticism that had traditional as well as proto-modern roots. But the Carlyles go too far, in my opinion, when they say that Marsilius was merely faithful to tradition when, in surprisingly ‘‘drastic and unqualified’’ terms, he advanced a largely democratic consent theory.201 There was, plainly, a traditional aspect to the Marsilian perspective. Even when power was granted to a ruler, it was understood to retain its popular roots. ‘‘Both monarch and community were ‘subjects’ of political rights and duties, and it was only in the union of the two that the organic whole consisted y’’202 At this comparatively early stage, it was always argued that the auctoritas of the ruler derived not directly from God, but mediately, from God through the people. This was true even in the charismatic rivalry of sacerdotium and imperium. Lordship therefore was never mere right; primarily it was duty; it was a divine, but for that very reason an all the more onerous, calling; it was a public office; a service rendered to the whole body. Rulers are instituted for the sake of peoples, not peoples for the sake of rulers.203

But as the political universe expanded, the claims of authority expanded as well. This was first true, as we have seen, in the sphere of papacy and empire. But it was not until the rise of the absolutist state in the early modern age that the doctrine of the ruler’s ‘‘Divine Right’’ acquired its full force. Only then did Justinian’s view that ‘‘the prince is above the law’’ (princeps legibus solutus) become a generally familiar claim. In some cases, this view was still stated with an essentially legal intent. Increasingly, though, arms were called upon to supplement the force of argument. Power became its own end. Nowhere was this clearer than in the works of Niccolo Machiavelli, for whom a brutal honesty was a corollary, it seemed, to a policy of brutal dominion.

4. THE PRINCE UNBOUND This is where the Straussians enter the picture. For Strauss and his followers, Marsilius represents the high point of medieval democratism, which was

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

93

soon to give way to tendencies marked by absolutism. The key figure in the transition, they say, was the Florentine realpolitiker Machiavelli. The difference between Marsilius and Machiavelli is fundamental, the Straussians stress, not merely for the history of political philosophy, but for the character of the modern state as well. The ‘‘Straussians,’’ for the purpose of this discussion, consist of three main figures: the school’s founder, Leo Strauss, whose 1958 book Thoughts on Machiavelli initiated the ‘‘Straussian’’ rethinking of Machiavellianism; Harvey C. Mansfield, whose many writings on Machiavelli culminated, in 1989, in the essential text Taming the Prince; and the Naval War College strategist Carnes Lord, whose 2003 book The Modern Prince brought the Straussian worldview from the academy to the war room. Also meriting attention is William Kristol, whose collection of ‘‘essays in honor of Harvey Mansfield,’’ Educating the Prince (co-edited with Mark Blitz, 2000), brought together most of the distinctively Straussian themes and most of the writers active in this field.204 Strauss broke new ground in this field, but Mansfield is the source of the most fully articulated Straussian perspective on Machiavelli and the modern state. Lord and Kristol are Mansfield’s heirs, and, as we will see, the influence both have enjoyed in leading governmental circles is evidence of the appeal of their shared neo-Machiavellian perspective. The point of origin for this perspective is the contrast Mansfield draws between Marsilian and Machiavellian notions of ‘‘executive’’ authority. Marsilius, like Occam and so many others, held that the authentic ruler is, above all else, the ‘‘executor’’ of a will from an external source. Whether this source is construed as the people or God, and whether the ruler is defined as prince or priest, the relationship is clear: the ruler does not decide and act independently but is, rather, the ‘‘representative’’ of a higher authority. The will of God or the people may be conceded or even alienated to the ruler, but this will is still, in origin at least, theirs; and rulers are legitimate only to the extent that their authority is thought to derive from this will. The ruler, in short, is ‘‘executor,’’ not autocrator. The democratic implication of this worldview is clear. Even when, in some variants of this outlook, authority is said to reveal the voice of God, it is still just one short step to the democratizing conclusion that the voice of the God is most clearly heard when the people speak: Vox Populi, Vox Dei. In this worldview, dominatio is just executio and power is reduced to ‘‘authority,’’ that is, to legally authorized rule. In the Marsilian worldview in particular, the prince has no inherent right to rulership and cannot rule above or against the legislated will of the people. Sovereignty belongs ultimately to

94

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

the people alone, whose legitimacy, unlike his, is innate. The prince thus ‘‘rules,’’ but on sufferance. He rules indirectly, ‘‘for the people,’’ rather than directly as an autocrat. The will he imposes is not his own. Machiavelli, Mansfield tells us, changed all that. While still very much a partisan of the concept of governmental ‘‘esecuzioni,’’ Machiavelli gave this notion a decisively new cast. What the prince ‘‘executes,’’ Machiavelli tells us, is ‘‘necessity,’’ not another’s will. This necessity is ascertained not by the public but by the prince. That is, the prince does what he wishes, with only necessity as his guide. He need not consult the public or have his decisions legitimated by public consent. On the contrary, the prince ‘‘executes’’ only his own decisions. He may simulate indirect rule, prudently, when the appearance of democracy serves his interests; but in reality he rules directly, bound as little by law as by poplar legitimacy. In this anti-Marsilian worldview, executio is actually dominatio and power is unfettered, not scaled back to popular-legal niceties of indirect rule and ‘‘authority.’’ Machiavelli thus exploits the vocabulary of execution, but utterly inverts its meaning. Rather than implying democratism, Machiavelli’s ‘‘execution’’ suggests an emergent absolutism. Little in this account is surprising with respect to Machiavelli alone. But Mansfield adds a critical proviso, namely, that Machiavellian esecuzioni is among the guiding principles of ‘‘the modern executive.’’ The American president in particular, as head of the executive branch of government, is the Machiavellian prince ‘‘tamed.’’ The president is the prince, born again, in constitutional dress. Mansfield’s account here is worth retracing. Political philosophy, he says, was never the same after Machiavelli, whose most notable successors (starting with Bodin and Hobbes) were indelibly marked by his shift from medieval democratism to statist realpolitik. Crucially, even political theorists who may appear to be outside the orbit of pure power politics were often Machiavellians under the skin, he argues. Locke and Hamilton are the pivotal figures here – and since both were prime influences on American constitutionalism, they are highly relevant as well. Locke in particular is central to this case. The true Machiavellian prince, Mansfield explains, must act autocratically in crises, indifferent to law and legitimacy. In Locke’s view – that even constitutional rulers must have the ‘‘prerogative,’’ indeed, Locke says, the ‘‘arbitrary’’ prerogative – to decide in crises, Mansfield detects a Machiavellian note. Hedged in with further restraints, including checks, balances and the separation of powers, Locke’s vision of an almost kingly constitutional ruler, fused with Hamilton’s ideal of the ‘‘energetic executive,’’ yielded an executive just as close to the Machiavellian

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

95

ideal of esecuzioni as to the Marsilian ideal of the prince as ‘‘executor’’ as the people’s will. That, briefly, is the sense in which, for Mansfield, Machiavelli is legitimately viewed as one of the wellsprings of ‘‘the modern executive’’ – which Lord now calls simply ‘‘the modern prince.’’ We will turn to Carnes Lord and The Modern Prince shortly. But first, to grasp the import of the larger Straussian view of Machiavelli and modern executive power – we need further clarity about what Mansfield once called ‘‘Strauss’s Machiavelli.’’205 4.1. In the Beginning was the Sword Strauss, who is famously esoteric, and seldom more so than in his Thoughts on Machiavelli, often finds shade and obscurity where Mansfield sees only light.206 But Mansfield, in most basic respects, is a faithful executor of the Straussian bequest. We begin with Strauss. Only Machiavelli’s ‘‘teaching concerning morality and politics,’’ Strauss says, ‘‘can be considered wholly new.’’207 The crux of his originality, the freshness of what Machiavelli called his ‘‘new modes and orders,’’ is the rigor of his reliance on hard facts of power and coercion. Machiavelli simply ignored the Platonic, Aristotelian, and scholastic teleologies of his forebears, which revolved around such notions as Logos, jus natural, and the divine: ‘‘y Machiavelli teaches y that fear of God’s or the gods’ power and wrath can be very useful; [but] he is silent as to whether God and the gods are powerful or exist.’’208 Rather than grounding power in ‘‘God’’ or divine ‘‘nature’’ Machiavelli spoke simply of force and chance.209 No prince can put ‘‘the will of God’’ into effect if that will does not exist. What, then, of the popular will? Once again, Machiavelli’s originality is clear. Unlike medieval consent theorists, Machiavelli offered a vision of the prince unbound, the creator, not executor, of the people’s will (to put this point in Mansfield’s language). The prince can and must tame the people – by war, religion, rewards, punishments, and the pose of virtue.210 Once tamed, the people execute the ruler’s will, not vice versa. That the state could ever merely execute the public will Machiavelli denies. ‘‘The majority,’’ in Strauss’s paraphrase, ‘‘cannot rule. In all republics, however well ordered, only a tiny minority ever arrives at exercising functions of ruling. For the multitude is ignorant, lacks judgment, and is easily deceived; it is helpless without leaders y’’211 This is not to say that the multitude cannot be induced to act prudently. On the contrary, Machiavelli has high hopes about what talented leaders can induce the public to do. But as before, these expectations reflect the core premise that subjects execute

96

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

the will of the prince, not vice versa. Again, Strauss puts this well: ‘‘Contrary to Aristotle’s view according to which multitudes have a natural fitness for being subject to a despot or for a life of political freedom, fitness for either form of life can be artificially produced if a man of a rare ‘brain’ applies the required degree of force to the multitude in question y’’212 Indeed, if Machiavelli is right, the leader of rare brain can literally change hearts and minds: ‘‘y a prince of sufficient ability can transform any nation, however pampered, into a race of warriors.’’ This claim is the corollary of an even bolder and more general thesis, namely, that ‘‘compulsion can bring about a ‘change of nature.’ ’’213 Strauss, interestingly, does not question the evident utopianism of this claim.214 But it should be noted that this claim does not, strictly speaking, contradict the idea that the leader should cultivate consent through war and public piety, since Machiavelli does not claim a ‘‘rare brain’’ for every ruler. Only extraordinary princes have the rare power to compel consent.215 Nor does Machiavelli claim extraordinary moral qualities for rulers. In fact, Machiavelli scorns the very idea that a prince could be a figure of moral purity, in contrast to the tyrant. The ‘‘virtuous prince’’ is a fairy tale character, crafted to please a public that ‘‘longs for kindness, liberality, gentleness, humanity, and compassion in the great men’’ who rule them.216 The truth, Machiavelli says, is that the great cannot afford to be good. To preserve and extend their power, they must be cruel and ruthless. This has always been so. ‘‘Not semi-divine or divinely inspired benefactors of the human race but men like Cesare Borgia and especially the criminal emperor Severus reveal to us the true features of the first founders of society.’’217 The notorious Jesuit maxim that ‘‘the end justifies the means’’ is no less applicable to the founder of a republic than to a tyrant. ‘‘If one says that the tyrant must use fraud in order to rise to power, Machiavelli replies to him that the model king Cyrus and the model republic Rome rose to greatness in no other way.’’218 Lest this be taken as carte blanche for every evil, Strauss hastens to add, on Machiavelli’s behalf: ‘‘Still not all tyrannies are defensible. It makes a difference,’’ he explains, whether a tyrant cuts the nobility ‘‘to pieces’’ with sufficient reason. Foolish tyrants, blinded by unreasoning passion, commit crimes that are unsuited to attain the ends sought. What is truly indefensible, in other words, is an irrational choice of means, not the illegality or immorality of the tyrant’s aims.219 That is why, Strauss says, for Machiavelli ‘‘there is no essential difference between the public-spirited founder of a republic and the selfish founder of a tyranny: both have to commit crimes y’’220 Successful tyrants, in fact, are often

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

97

remembered as virtuous princes: ‘‘Tyrants who have succeeded y are remembered as princes by a grateful, if hypocritical, posterity. What name or title is more glorious than ‘Caesar,’ and Caesar was the first tyrant in Rome.’’ Caesar was ‘‘a typical tyrant’’ who ‘‘usurped’’ power by force, ‘‘prompted by ambition.’’ Yet, as ‘‘the first emperor’’ in Rome, he had the good fortune to lay the foundation for the ensuing Pax Romana: that is, ‘‘y the peaceful reign of Augustus and the golden times of the good Roman emperors. Considerations like these,’’ Strauss adds, ‘‘induce Machiavelli frequently to use ‘prince’ and ‘tyrant’ as synonyms y’’221 Nor does Machiavelli try to exempt republics from the charge that, like empires, they often pursue policies so ambitious and self-aggrandizing that they can be called ‘‘imperial.’’ On the contrary, Machiavelli is happy to concede that republics are often imperial in their deeds and ideals. For states, like individuals, are driven by ambition – ‘‘the desire to acquire, to have more than one needs, not to be inferior to others, to be superior to others’’ – as if by natural necessity.222 Acquiring power and property is their inner nature.223 Even Aristotle, despite his natural-law outlook, had known that, ‘‘to the extent to which actual states have any single and supreme end, that end is lording it over their neighbors without any regard to right or wrong.’’224 Is this true even for republics? Machiavelli evaluates this question carefully. ‘‘At first glance,’’ Strauss says, it might appear that even by Machiavelli’s criteria the best option would be a policy seeking ‘‘the preservation of what [the republic already] possesses’’ rather than a policy ‘‘devoted to acquisition, i.e. to the acquisition of what belongs to others.’’225 But selfpreservation alone is unattainable in a world of ambition and its corollary, competition. The state that seeks to abstain from competition will wind up as prey rather than predator: ‘‘One must choose,’’ Strauss warns, ‘‘between losing to others what one possesses or taking away from others what they possess.’’ One must not only surrender ‘‘the virtue of giving; one must choose the vice of rapacity.’’226 It is, in fact, precisely this necessity – the necessity of rapacity – which impels the republican ruler to cultivate popular consent and share power, ‘‘in due proportion,’’ with the nobles and plebs. ‘‘What that proper proportion is,’’ Strauss explains, ‘‘depends decisively on whether the republic in question wishes to found an empire or is content with preserving itself.’’227 The latter option is, of course, not truly an option at all: ‘‘In fact, republics are not free to choose between a policy of aggrandizement or one of mere preservation.’’ Every republic can expect at some point to be ‘‘compelled by circumstances to engage in a policy of aggrandizement and must therefore

98

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

prepare itself for such contingencies by enlisting the fervent cooperation of the common people.’’228 Republics thus tend to become ‘‘imperial republics’’ by a kind of necessity. And both halves of this seemingly amphibious identity are necessary, since success in the imperial-republican endeavor requires an ambidextrous mastery of two arts: military conquest abroad and the conquest of public opinion at home. On this ground, Strauss pronounces Machiavelli the greatest Machtpolitiker: ‘‘He has stated the case for imperialism or for ‘power politics’ more clearly than any earlier or later thinker.’’229 Unlike many others in this tradition, Machiavelli does not focus narrowly on foreign affairs. By arguing, rather, that the success of the republic’s imperial calling requires enthusiastic public support, he affirms a kind of Machtpolitik of ruler and ruled.230 Here too force and fraud are preeminent. The ruler must conceal his cynicism, but rely on little else. Machiavelli’s advice on this subject is memorably candid. He preaches, not reverence, but prudence. For Machiavelli, the best ruler is ‘‘a prince who prudently uses his moral virtue and vice according to the requirements of the situation. y In other words,’’ Strauss notes, ‘‘a prince need not be religious and ought not to be religious, but it is most important for him to appear to be religious.’’231 Prudence, not reverence, is the prince’s cardinal virtue. But since prudence dictates a show of reverence, the ruler strikes a pious pose.232 The pose of virtue works for the ruler, in the most narrowly pragmatic sense, because the public is easily deceived. ‘‘The many are good, or they can be good and ought to be good, because, being more or less downtrodden, they are satisfied with little y In order to rule them, the great men must somehow conform to the people’s notion of goodness: they must appear to be free from selfish desires y’’233 The ruler’s good fortune is that the public is predisposed to think well of the wealthy and powerful. Inclined, themselves, to ‘‘goodness, contempt for the yvile, and religion,’’ the many are inclined to see the same virtues writ large in the few; and further, ‘‘impressed by the dignity and the lofty bearing of the most venerable members of the ruling class,’’ the many believe in their goodness and generosity. ‘‘One is tempted to say,’’ Strauss remarks, seemingly in his own voice and with a hint of scorn, ‘‘that the goodness of the plebs consists in its belief in the goodness of the ruling class, or that goodness exists only in men’s thoughts about other men.’’234 Machiavelli’s ‘‘truth,’’ of course, is that the prince and the ruling class from which he hails can afford only the semblance of virtue. The successful ruler must be strong, and strength requires ‘‘self-reliance and self-love,’’ not piety or selflessness;235 exploitation, not generosity.236 As exploiters, of

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

99

course, the rulers should strive to conceal their selfishness.237 But only the exploited can truly afford virtue.238 Many would object, of course, that this formula blurs the line between good and evil and ‘‘abolishes the essential difference between civil societies and bands of robbers y Machiavelli is not deterred by this consideration. He compares the Roman patricians, the most respectable ruling class that ever was, to small birds of prey, and he quotes Livy’s observation that a certain chief of pirates equalled the Romans in piety.’’239 The brutal truth is that there is only ‘‘a difference of degree between the best republic and the worst tyranny.’’240 The implication of this view, Strauss says, is that we have a fateful choice: Either we reject the ruthlessness of the power politics which sustains republics, in which case we can affirm only ‘‘imagined republics’’; or we accept this ruthlessness, which means that we ‘‘cannot radically condemn tyranny.’’241 4.2. The Good Cannot Be Good Strauss was not an apologist for Machiavelli.242 At the end of Thoughts on Machiavelli, he offers a sharp critique of Machiavelli’s corrosive cynicism about religion and philosophy.243 The cost of focusing so minutely on the particulars of power is a loss of faith and perspective.244 What Machiavelli offered was original, Strauss says, only in its stress on the ‘‘diabolical’’ at the expense of the divine. And his worldliness, his proud embrace of this-worldly acquisitiveness, was at bottom a flight from philosophy. True philosophy, Strauss says, rejects the plebeian world and its grasping eudaemonism. ‘‘The philosophers and the demos y are separated by a gulf: their ends differ radically,’’ Strauss insists. ‘‘The gulf can be bridged only by a noble rhetoric,’’ which philosophers sketch and orators ‘‘execute.’’245 Machiavelli’s descent from the sublime to the worldly, from the heaven of philosophy to Plato’s cave, was thus a descent from philosophy to the demos. Even the prince is ‘‘demotic’’ in this worldview, a procurer of public goods, stripped of all true nobility. His philosophy becomes a banausic ‘‘science,’’ shorn of mystery and the esoteric; and his rhetoric falls into debasity and disuse, ‘‘except insofar as the goods which it procures must still be advertised in order to be sold.’’246 At the same time, Strauss also admires Machiavelli. The ‘‘sobriety’’ of his thought, and his ability to confront the diabolic, were remarkable, Strauss says; and even though, in the final few pages of his book, he unleashes a volley of criticism, until then he had recounted the Florentine’s cynical

100

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

counsel with zest, unsparing harshness, and barely a hint of demurral.247 Strauss may have disliked Machiavelli’s willingness to appease the demos, but he saw more than a few grains of truth in his scrupulously unscrupulous realpolitik. This fact is still pertinent, with respect to the question of Machiavelli’s persisting influence among ‘‘Straussians,’’ because, at the very end of his closing critical dissent, Strauss suddenly leaves the door open to a modified Machiavellianism. The occasion for this change of tune is a meditation, obliquely expressed, on the exigencies of the Cold War.248 Even the classical political philosophers, Strauss said, who resisted new inventions as forces of instability, nevertheless ‘‘were forced to make one crucial exception. They had to admit the necessity of encouraging inventions pertaining to the art of war.’’249 This was true even in ‘‘cities’’ – that is, states or kingdoms – which opposed war on moral grounds. The fact that other, less scrupulous cities would not hesitate to arm themselves forced their hand. The ‘‘good and wise city is necessarily limited,’’ they knew, ‘‘by the need of adaptation to the practices of morally inferior cities y’’250 This means, Strauss concludes in his own voice, that in this one decisive respect ‘‘the good city has to take its bearings by the practice of bad cities, or that the bad impose their law on the good.’’251 The clear implication, Strauss admits, is that Machiavelli was not wrong about the necessity of force and fraud in politics. Politics, in a world of states racing to arm themselves, can only be power politics. Nuclear fire must be fought with nuclear fire. Strauss tries to soften this implication by saying, apologetically, that ‘‘Only in this one point does Machiavelli’s contention that the good cannot be good because there are so many bad ones prove to possess a foundation.’’ This single admission, he hastens to add, ‘‘is the only one which supplies a basis for Machiavelli’s criticism of classical political philosophy.’’252 But this one admission suffices. The proverbial cat is out of the bag. For Strauss, writing in the Eisenhower years, the Cold War with the USSR is proof that ‘‘the good cannot be good.’’253 Classical political philosophy is not enough. Now, Machiavelli must be heard as well. 4.3. The Outsized Executive That ‘‘Strauss’s Machiavelli’’ is still alive and well, and may have taken up residence in Washington, DC, is clear from the writings of Mansfield and Lord. The modern executive they praise is Machiavelli’s prince, ‘‘tamed’’ and ‘‘educated.’’ Strauss, to be sure, is not the source of every nuance of their views, and other Straussians have espoused other views on Machiavelli and the presidency. But Mansfield and Lord are faithful to their teacher.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

101

When they are less subtle than Strauss, this is largely because they are willing to say openly what Strauss merely intimated. Emboldened by the U.S. victory in the Cold War and contemplating present as well as future dangers, they seem to feel even more strongly now than before that ‘‘the good cannot be good.’’ Paul Wolfowitz, writing on statesmanship in 2000, quoted Orwell’s dictum that, given ‘‘the ghastly history’’ of recent times, ‘‘Machiavelli seems a serious thinker’’ once again.254 Taming the Prince, written in the waning years of the Reagan presidency and the Cold War, is the unofficial manifesto of the neoconservative return to Machiavelli.255 Mansfield’s turn to Machiavelli is so blunt and ardent that some Straussians have sought to shield Strauss from guilt by association. Political theorist Robert Eden, who studied with Mansfield at Harvard, has said that Mansfield’s ‘‘restatement of the effectual truth of Machiavelli’s executive teaching is bound to strike many of Strauss’s students as a reversal of his principle of emphasis.’’ Strauss, Eden says, sought to ‘‘repel’’ Machiavelli’s ‘‘ferocious assault’’ on conventional pieties, while Mansfield, in striking contrast, ‘‘appears to reinforce and further Machiavelli’s challenge y’’256 The principal ground Eden offers for this claim is what he calls the ‘‘remarkable contrast’’ between Taming the Prince and a line, early in Thoughts on Machiavelli, where Strauss says, with clear conventional piety, that the United States ‘‘may be said to be the only country in the world which was founded in explicit opposition to Machiavellian principles y At least,’’ Strauss says, ‘‘to the extent that the American reality is inseparable from the American aspiration, one cannot understand Americanism without understanding Machiavellianism, which is its opposite.’’ This might seem to be sufficiently clear: Americanism and Machiavellianism are opposites. ‘‘But,’’ Strauss adds, in the very next line (which Eden omits), ‘‘we cannot conceal from ourselves the fact that the problem is more complex than it appears in the presentation by Paine and his followers.’’ The lines that follow are so revealing that I quote them in full: Machiavelli would argue that America owes her greatness not only to her habitual adherence to the principles of freedom and justice, but also to her occasional deviation from them. He would not hesitate to suggest a mischievous interpretation of the Louisiana Purchase and of the fate of the Red Indians. He would conclude that facts like these are an additional proof for his contention that there cannot be a great and glorious society without the equivalent of the murder of Remus by his brother Romulus. This complication makes it all the more necessary that we should try to reach an adequate understanding of the fundamental issues raised by Machiavelli.257

This is very much the spirit, I would argue, in which both Mansfield and Strauss approach Machiavelli and modernity. Just as Rome was founded,

102

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

according to the legend of Romulus, by a defining act of violence between brothers, so are modern republics born, and built, by force. A good part of the account of Machiavelli in Taming the Prince recapitulates views familiar to us from Thoughts on Machiavelli.258 But there are also innovations and significant differences of emphasis. One central innovation is Mansfield’s attention to the theme of esecuzione. Unlike Marsilius and Aristotle, who are said to have been guilty of ‘‘belittling y the executive in favor of law,’’ Machiavelli reversed the equation. ‘‘That the law cannot attain what it attempts,’’ Mansfield stresses, ‘‘is the problem to which the modern notion of executive power is a solution.’’259 The law is too universal to specify what is needed in many contexts, and often what it prescribes is precisely the opposite of what is needed. Hence what is required is a ‘‘determined executive,’’ uno ostinato esecutore, who will do what is necessary rather than what the law dictates, even when this is ‘‘against the spirit as well as the letter of the law.’’260 Rather than a leader who merely represents or enforces the law – like Moses, whom Machiavelli belittles as a ‘‘mere executor of the things that had been ordained by God’’ – the determined executive must resemble a ‘‘prince’’ in Machiavelli’s sense: ‘‘y we shall find,’’ Mansfield promises, ‘‘that the ways of the prince are essential elements of the modern executive.’’261 The prince, as executor of an ulterior necessity, must break or enforce the law as he sees fit. He is a dark hero, who in extraordinary times must depart from ordinary law and morality.262 ‘‘Seven elements of the modern executive,’’ Mansfield tells us, ‘‘originate in Machiavelli.’’263 The first, ‘‘the political use of punishment,’’ is the primal necessity of modern politics that makes the need for ‘‘an outsized executive’’ plain to start with. Interestingly, and in contrast to Strauss, Mansfield lays special stress on the sense in which ‘‘execution’’ implies, not merely implementation, but capital punishment. The modern executive is the executioner who metes out punishment – above all, death – whether the law approves or not. This may be Mansfield’s most distinctive contribution to the Straussian reading of Machiavelli. Upon reviewing the passages in which Machiavelli discusses esecuzione, he arrives at a striking conclusion: ‘‘In sum,’’ he says, ‘‘these uses of execute add up to an outsized executive who, because the function of punishment must be understood politically, is not confined to carrying out the law.’’264 Imposition of the death penalty may conform to or prompt obedience to the law. ‘‘But legal executions do not suffice and law must accept the help of illegality to secure its enforcement.’’265 Machiavelli’s logic is simple. Many kinds of regimes, including republics, need periodic well-advertised executions to purge them of weakness and

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

103

corruption. Only spectacular, terrifying punishments truly catch the public’s eye, so executions must be ‘‘excessive and notable.’’266 The main aim, in other words, is not to enforce law but to shock and awe. The straight-talking Mansfield does not shy away from the plain implication of Machiavelli’s point. ‘‘Thus, criminal justice is used – why not say perverted? – for political effect. The effect,’’ he contends, ‘‘is not marginal: we would lose something significant by foregoing executions for the sake of legality; memorable executions are crucial to the salvation of the regime.’’267 What terrifies, edifies – whether legally or not. So committed was Machiavelli to the idea of the terrifying spectacle that ‘‘he praises the greatness of the Roman republic and ‘the power of its executions,’ among which the decimation of a multitude’’ – that is, the execution of a randomly chosen tenth of the group – ‘‘was ‘terrible,’ ’’ and hence, effective: ‘‘y when a tenth selected by chance are killed, and all deserve it, the punished lament their bad luck and the unpunished are afraid to misbehave the next time.’’268 The second Machiavellian tenet that persists in the modern executive, Mansfield says, follows from the first: ‘‘Once execution is liberated from its clear subordination to law and its connection to justice, it becomes available as a remedy for emergencies generally, not merely for the exigencies of law enforcement.’’269 Since crises are always likely in the contentious sphere of foreign affairs, the state must be ready to apply ‘‘executive’’ force in the form of war. Such war-fighting may be strictly defensive, ‘‘dealing with emergencies that may arise from the state minding its own business,’’ but Machiavelli is happy to extend the notion of emergencies ‘‘to those a state with imperial ambitions necessarily seeks out or creates to serve as pretexts.’’270 War is the ‘‘execution’’ of those who stand in the way of national and governmental self-interest: ‘‘y the common good of a republic does not extend to its neighbors.’’271 And Machiavelli adds that crises demand crisis leadership, which is almost always the rule of ‘‘one alone,’’ uno solo. He thus ‘‘praises the Roman practice of creating a dictator in emergencies,’’272 which Machiavelli defines as giving ‘‘power to one man who could decide without any consultation and [who] could execute his decisions without any appeal.’’273 Under several headings Mansfield amplifies on the need for solo decisionmaking and for ‘‘extraordinary’’ action to refresh or extend authority.274 He stresses the need for secrecy and ‘‘conspiracy’’ to enable rulers to deal with grim necessities by grim means, while concealing the unpalatable truth from the public ‘‘so that they are happy and innocent.’’275 And he dwells at length on the need for ‘‘indirect rule,’’ by which he means the simulation of democracy by an essentially autocratic state. The public, unhappily, does not

104

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

wish to be ruled; ‘‘nonetheless the people must be ruled. This difficulty sets the problem of government: to rule the people without their developing the intolerable sensation that they are being ruled.’’ Machiavelli’s views on this subject are ‘‘Machiavellian’’ in the classic, colloquial sense. What he proposes to the prince is a strategy of deception based on what Mansfield calls a ‘‘comical maxim of human perception.’’ In Machiavelli words, ‘‘Wounds and every other ill that man causes to himself spontaneously and through choice, hurt much less than those which are done to you by someone else.’’276 Mansfield amplifies this point in a crucial passage: Why should kicking oneself hurt less than being kicked? And yet self-imposed taxes will be consented to more willingly than taxes imposed from above. Government should contrive, then, to let its exactions and especially its punishments seem to come from the people y , at their behest or with their consent. Thus although the people as such never rule and democracy strictly speaking is impossible, all government y must appeal to the people in the manner of the Roman method of accusation, which makes the people responsible for the attribution of guilt and execution.277

For Machiavelli, it is acceptable to pursue this objective by any and all means. To ‘‘make government seeme to come from the people and its wounds seem self-inflicted,’’ he advises fraud as well as conspiracy, not exceptionally but as a regular part of the state’s repertoire.278 Ultimately, only one can and should rule, ‘‘not because he necessarily knows better than the many, but because it is better to have one opinion than many.’’ This ‘‘only one’’ must, ‘‘like Romulus, contrive to get all authority for himself even if he has to dispose of a wiser brother y’’279 One last point deserves mention before we turn to Carnes Lord, c. 2003. Mansfield, like Strauss, stresses that the prince must act swiftly and decisively. But where Strauss justifies this claim on largely pragmatic grounds – stressing that model prince must court a reputation for decisiveness – Mansfield goes further. In a section on Machiavelli’s praise of ‘‘suddenness’’ (that is, swift and surprising action), Mansfield remarks that audacious action not only ‘‘seizes our attention’’ and overawes the public but also creates entirely new realities. ‘‘At a stroke the forceful executive can change a situation.’’ Thus, Mansfield stresses, ‘‘Machiavelli goes beyond responding to necessity, advising that one create necessity for others.’’280 This key point we owe to Mansfield more than to Strauss.281 Yet it is clearly one of the signature themes of latter-day Straussianism. Recall how odd it seemed to Ron Suskind when a Bush aide told him in 2002 that ‘‘we make reality’’ by decisive action, unlike those in the ‘‘reality-based community’’ who act only after they have sifted every nuance of fact.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

105

Voluntarism, marked by overconfidence, seems to be a defining feature of what we can call ‘‘the Machiavellian temptation.’’ Carnes Lord, even more than Mansfield, makes this very clear. 4.4. Machiavelli in the White House Mansfield, like Strauss, distances himself from Machiavelli in the end. From the constitutional standpoint, he says, ‘‘Machiavelli seems to have gone too far.’’282 Yet Mansfield, like Strauss, seems ambivalent: ‘‘His statements ring true, but his conclusions seems exaggerated y We would like to believe that his insights can be retained and his extremism discarded, that his notion of esecuzione can be absorbed into the modern liberal constitution without the tyrannical requirement of uno solo that may give us a shiver y’’283 That, he says, is essentially what Locke and Hamilton achieved, in the form of a constitutional republic which relies in part on the ‘‘energy’’ and ‘‘prerogative’’ of a strong executive. ‘‘But it is not clear,’’ Mansfield cautions, in the last paragraph in the chapter, ‘‘that the development of a doctrine improves it.’’ With the same hindsight from constititutionalism, Machiavelli might not have chosen to retract. He could have noted that we have found no substitute for virtuous princes (in his sense) and that every successful organization in our self-congratulating democracy is run by a chief executive officer.284

Or, Mansfield speculates, perhaps not: ‘‘After our experience of totalitarian tyranny, however, he might have shivered himself.’’285 On this equivocal note Mansfield concludes his review of Machiavelli and the strong modern executive. This is the juncture at which, fifteen years later, Carnes Lord enters the story, as Mansfield’s heir apparent. ‘‘This wonderful book,’’ Mansfield enthuses about The Modern Prince, ‘‘covers everything you need to know about politics today – and don’t learn from political science today. Modelled on Machiavelli’s Prince and focused on America. y Carnes Lord shows statesmen what they must think about and the rest of us how to assess them.’’286 Lord repays the compliment with interest, calling Taming the Prince ‘‘a pathbreaking work to which the present study is much indebted’’287 and citing Mansfield at what is perhaps the most consequential point in Lord’s argument: the claim, namely, that the strong executive, allegedly Machiavelli’s legacy to modern constitutional regimes, is increasingly usurping the function of the legislative branch of government; that liberal republics are increasingly turning to the executive for law-making as well as administration, with the result that the ideal of an independent legislature, shielded from an encroaching strong executive by a firewall of checks and

106

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

balances, is falling into desuetude: ‘‘This development may vindicate Machiavelli’s fundamental argument concerning the indispensability of princely rule in a republic. But it does so,’’ Lord says, ‘‘at the expense of the liberal constitutional solution to Machiavelli’s challenge – and perhaps of the very idea of constitutional government.’’288 Lord credits this point to Mansfield. ‘‘Consider,’’ he says, Mansfield’s claim that, in modern republics, the rivalry between branches of government tends to redound ‘‘to the advantage of the power closer to the deed,’’ that is, the executive. Everywhere the executive has been able to annex the rhetoric of democracy and the separation of powers so effectively that, despite its great and growing power, it has managed to evade the stigma of the autocrat. ‘‘As a sign of this universal tendency,’’ Lord cites Mansfield, ‘‘one may remark that is quite possible to use the term ‘leadership’ without seeming to favor monarchy.’’ Yet in a sense, monarchy is precisely the hidden truth of the modern executive: In executive leadership, bygone partisans of monarchy do not quite have all they ever wanted, but they have enough to satisfy them that modern republicans have unwittingly admitted much truth in the monarchist cause.289

The modern executive, in other words, is a quasi-monarch – a modern prince. And the powers of this prince, Lord and Mansfield agree, are not only encroaching upon the rest of government, but should encroach still further. How this happy prospect can be engineered is the didactic point of Lord’s book. If subtlety and obliqueness are Straussian virtues, Lord may not be the most Straussian of thinkers.290 But in substance he resembles Strauss and Mansfield closely. He opens his Preface bluntly: ‘‘The theory of democracy tells us that the people rule. In practice, we have leaders who rule the people in a manner not altogether different from the princes and potentates of times past.’’291 The truth of today’s politics, below the froth of propaganda, is that ‘‘princes under other names once again vie for power with theoretically sovereign popular bodies. And as often as not, they appear to enjoy the upper hand. How to explain all this?’’292 Lord poses this question with more than simply academic intent. He is, to be sure, an academic. But Lord has also walked the halls of power. He was a senior National Security Council official during the Reagan years and advised Vice-President Dan Quayle on National Security Affairs in the first Bush administration.293 It is thus not surprising to hear him speak in the accents of power, without equivocation or jargon. A year before Bush II famously crowed, the day after the 2004 election, that he had ‘‘earned political capital’’ in the election and planned to spend it, Lord advised his modern prince to ‘‘be prepared to expend political

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

107

capital’’ in the effort to remake government.294 This ‘‘investment’’ is worth the risk and effort, Lord said, not only to expedite top-down management in crises, but also, in ‘‘normal times,’’ to overcome the routinizing inertia of bureaucratic, legislative, and judicial forces that otherwise stifle presidential initiative. The prince must be prepared to scare and scourge all who obstruct him, even at the highest levels of military or intelligence bureaucracy. ‘‘For one can say this generally of men,’’ Lord quotes Machiavelli – ‘‘that they are ungrateful, fickle, pretenders and dissemblers, evaders of danger, eager for gain.’’295 This ‘‘observation is no less true within the rational-legal framework of the modern administrative state’’ than it was in the turbulent late medieval Italian city-state.296 How, then, can the prince wrest ‘‘hands-on’’ power from the routinizing forces of inertia and timidity? Machiavelli offers the hint that ‘‘it is better for princes to be feared than loved. This maxim,’’ Lord predicts, ‘‘will find little favor with y political scientists. [But] unfortunately for them, it has a large element of truth.’’ The quirky frankness of Lord’s conclusion at this point may surprise some readers; ‘‘This is not to say that modern leaders can or should act with the ferocity of princes of old,’’ he says; rather, ‘‘contemporary pieties must be observed; and there are many ways of slipping in the poisoned stiletto.’’297 Cesare Borgia would approve. 4.5. Herrschaft und Knechtschaft The prince may be alone at the top, but he is also the leader of an elite. So Lord broaches the issue of elites per se. Affecting the contrarian stance of a tough-minded enemy of political convention, he asks: ‘‘Are elites actually necessary? This is a question not often raised, even in our pervasively egalitarian culture, but one worth pondering.’’298 He dismisses the idea of answering No, but affirms two possible senses in which the answer can be Yes: ‘‘There seem to be two answers to it: elites are needed in order to rule (or in more acceptably democratic language, to provide political leadership); or they are needed in order to satisfy a fundamental human impulse.’’299 Lord considers both answers plausible. Elite leadership is needed not only to efficiently steer the ship of state between the shoals of anarchy and tyranny, but also to satisfy needs that spring irrepressibly from human nature itself. ‘‘Status, prestige, recognition and honor are motivations unlikely to be expunged from the human spirit, however much they may be driven underground by the culture of egalitarianism.’’300 Hence ‘‘even in a society of perfect abundance, it would be unreasonable to expect (to adapt Marx’s formula) a withering away of elites.’’301

108

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

Lord also contests the notion, ‘‘pervasive’’ in both popular culture and academic fashion, that elites are ‘‘necessarily malign.’’ This is an egalitarian bias, he says, reflecting ‘‘the persisting influence of progressive liberalism, with its emphasis on the corrupting impact of the barons of commerce and industry y’’302 Objections to class rule reinforce this egalitarian bias. But Lord rejects the view that class elites are always odious: ‘‘Elites may oppress. They may also demonstrate farsighted leadership, engage in heroic selfsacrifice, and provide competent and honest administration y’’ So it would be wrong and unfair, he stresses, to say that history is ‘‘simply the history of class struggle. It is also a history of bargaining, accommodation, and cooperation among classes.’’303 In the worst cases, elites do oppress the people they rule. But in the best of times they rule wisely and well. The apparent balance of this formula is called into question if, with Strauss, we stress the prestige of the ruling class in the eyes of the public. ‘‘Cooperation’’ is one-sided if the public simply follows the lead of its rulers. Lord addresses this question in an essay, ‘‘Thoughts on Strauss,’’ published in 1999. Here, rather delicately, he responds to the charge that Strauss was an elitist. What Strauss favored, Lord explained, was not that just any elite should rule, or even that a ‘‘right-minded’’ philosophic elite should rule ‘‘without reference to the wishes of the people.’’ He said ‘‘rather that elites set the tone for the larger society, exemplifying a way of life and nurturing ideas and values y that pervasively affect the character of the nation as a whole.’’304 Elites rule by ‘‘cooperating,’’ in other words, with people whose ideas and values they have ‘‘pervasively’’ shaped. It is easy to see why Strauss or Lord would see one-sided ‘‘cooperation’’ of this kind as an aspect of elite leadership, for which the leaders, in particular, deserve credit. If, in fact, elites ‘‘set the tone’’ for society, then it matters greatly which ideas and values they espouse. On this subject Lord shows signs of worry. In 1999, he was particularly concerned that popular cynicism about elites (fed by ‘‘Congress and an increasingly countercultural press,’’ an academy serving a ‘‘multicultural agenda,’’ and the lasting legacies of Vietnam and Watergate) would ruin the morale of ‘‘America’s Cold War national security establishment.’’305 By 2003, the scope of his concern was far wider, and his tone had turned belligerent. ‘‘The radically egalitarian culture that looms on the historical horizon,’’ he cautioned, ‘‘may destroy the very psychological conditions necessary for the nurturing of leaders.’’306 Elites must thus ‘‘set the tone’’ for resistance to such egalitarianism. To do so they must resist the ‘‘femininization’’ of latter-day rulership. It is legitimate ‘‘y to wonder,’’ Lord says, ‘‘whether leadership can really be leadership if it is wholly lacking in such traditionally manly qualities as competitiveness, aggression, or, for

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

109

that matter, the ability to command.’’ Whether Lord truly means to imply that the ability to command is a masculine trait is unclear. But his ensuing remarks are quite clear: ‘‘Women of course have no monopoly on compassion, it is a distinctive feature of our politics generally. It is the democratic virtue par excellence.’’ The problem is that it is not a political virtue, and, in fact, tends to be at cross purposes with the requirements of prudent and effective political leadership. Leadership that is not prepared to disadvantage anyone is hardly leadership at all.307

Elites must be ready to command, without disabling compassion. They must be ready to ‘‘disadvantage’’ their subjects, without egalitarian or democratic scruples. They must be forceful, not ‘‘feminized.’’ The elite, in short, must be anything but effete. The good news, Lord says, is that modern leaders have many strengths and strategies at their disposal. The leader’s strengths, in particular, fall under two broad rubrics, charisma and force. Charisma is ‘‘a kind of personal dynamism,’’ Lord says, an ability to inspire trust. It is this dynamism, this gift, that sets leaders ‘‘apart from ordinary people.’’308 On this point, Lord affirms what he regards as the crux of Max Weber’s theory of charisma. ‘‘That Weber points to an important dimension of political reality is undeniable. Those who come face-to-face with politicians are often struck by their extraordinary energy and vitality.’’ The gifted leader has a great capacity to ‘‘mobilize and inspire.’’309 And if charisma alone does not suffice, coercion is available. On this Lord cites Machiavelli, who said, in his famed tribute to the armed prophet, that weapons ensure consent when prophecy falls short. ‘‘For y the nature of peoples is variable; and it is easy to persuade them of something, but difficult to keep them in that persuasion. And thus things must be ordered in such a mode that when they no longer believe, one can make them believe by force.’’310 As many scholars have noted, charisma is a specifically extra-legal power. Whether construed as a personal or a transcendental gift, charisma, like force, is a means of securing an objective without the benefit of law. Taken together, Lord says, charisma and force are formidable. Xenophon’s account of the emperor Cyrus, which greatly influenced Machiavelli, offers the example of a prince who was ‘‘undeniably a charismatic figure’’ and yet relied on coercion as well as suasion; ‘‘his example,’’ Lord notes, ‘‘shows how men can be recruited, motivated, and used by a leader through a calculated combination of rewards and punishments and be motivated to fight and die for his greater glory.’’ Such leadership unto death is especially

110

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

necessary if we want to revive the martial spirit that compassion and materialism eclipse. Comfortable in our bourgeois democracies – where war is abhorred and military leaders are rarely anything more than bureaucrats in uniform, where we are taught as children that force never solves anything and as young people can easily avoid military service – we are no longer in touch with these elemental realities.311

Strong leaders who do not hesitate to use force and fraud can overcome popular squeamishness about war, death, and military service. They have at their disposal means both charismatic and coercive to transform an excessively soft, peace-loving public into a nation of militarists. They get results the law could not achieve. 4.6. Master of All He Surveys The Modern Prince rehearses many familiar Machiavellian themes. The prince, Lord quotes Machiavelli, should ‘‘appear all mercy, all faith, all honesty, all humanity, all religion. And nothing is more necessary to appear to have than this last quality.’’ But it is also Machiavelli’s ‘‘plausible teaching’’ that ‘‘humane and admirable’’ statesmen can be liabilities in crises. Leaders should be decisive and unwavering, ‘‘even at the price of appearing egotistical or irrational.’’312 Nor does Lord shy away from the core Machiavellian premise, namely, ‘‘the inadequacy of laws and the need for princes – or the equivalent of princes – in all states at all times.’’313 This core premise, Lord freely admits, ‘‘frontally challenges the theoretical outlook of all today who profess attachment to constitutional democracy. But is it so remote from contemporary practice?’’ On the contrary, he argues, this premise is implicit in politics today, especially in the executive. Leadership ‘‘y seems increasingly to mean executive leadership.’’ In the modern chief executive, he writes, we discover ‘‘a surprising persistence of the great Florentine in our own political universe.’’ 314 What is most surprising in The Modern Prince is not that Lord echoes Mansfield in this way. What is startling, rather, is that he is willing to translate Mansfieldian and Machiavellian theorems into directly practical terms, without circumlocution. Lord names names. He tells us who should receive the poisoned stiletto, and why. In the ‘‘Exhortation’’ that closes The Modern Prince,315 Lord stresses that, ‘‘most critically, leaders should work to ensure the proper functioning of the legal system and the constitutional order supporting it.’’ This requires ‘‘rhetorical and symbolic’’ gestures by the ruler to foster reverence for the ‘‘political religion’’ of constitutionalism.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

111

It may also include extraordinary political action intended to remedy potentially regimethreatening developments in the legislative or judicial branches, even where this might carry some risk of overstepping accepted boundaries of executive power (as in Roosevelt’s ‘‘court-packing’’ scheme of 1937).316

Evidently, like Mansfield and many other conservatives, Lord believes that only the executive branch of government should be ‘‘activist.’’ Congress and the courts should restrict themselves to reproducing the status quo, functioning in a largely caretaking capacity.317 Judicial and legislative activism should be reined in, by ‘‘extraordinary’’ means if necessary. So, too, Lord denounces the ‘‘opportunistic’’ activism of trial lawyers, whose ‘‘barely disguised schemes of legalized extortion, especially against wealthy and politically vulnerable targets such as the big automobile manufacturers or drug or tobacco companies,’’ have encouraged the public ‘‘to enrich themselves’’ at the expense of business.318 The modern executive, whether in politics or business, should be free of undue restraint. The law, exploited by plaintiffs in suits against cigarette and drug companies, is one such restraint. Similarly, Lord is harsh in his criticism of the media. Journalists, he writes, ‘‘condescend to and diminish the nation’s political leadership in the eyes of the public.’’ Reflexively ‘‘suspicious of government and of traditional elites,’’ they trust only ‘‘the bien-pensant liberalism of the universities and of academic social science.’’ They are, he thunders, ‘‘an active impediment to prudential decision making and effective governance.’’319 To deal with this obstruction, the chief executive and his senior aides must cease the ‘‘continuing appeasement of their media tormentors.’’ They should feel free to ‘‘personally intervene with journalists (or their editors or publishers) to try to affect the way a story is handled.’’ If liberals object, so be it: y there is no reason why official complaints should not be registered in public or private about skewed media coverage of any important policy issue. The idea, tirelessly promoted by media spokesmen, that government is fair game for comment of all kinds while government is barred from defending itself because of a supposed ‘chilling effect’ on free speech is hard to take seriously.320

Lord, at least, is not chilled. Others whose activism or ‘‘barbarism’’ attract Lord’s attention range from ‘‘unassimilated minorities’’ to ‘‘presumed’’ scientific experts.321 The latter, interestingly, occupy his attention in the final paragraph of The Modern Prince. The experts, he complains, often ‘‘have heavy axes to grind. There is thus no escaping the need for an active exercise of prudential judgment by political leaders.’’ Soon leaders may be compelled ‘‘to take a less deferential approach to the scientific-technical establishment as a whole y’’322 The plain implication is that modern executives should have

112

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

no more respect for expert opinion than for public opinion. Politics, not science, should command. The origin of this willingness to deprecate journalists, judges, legislators, lawyers, and scientists – and the truths they sometimes defend against wealth and power – may lie in utopian overconfidence. Lord, like many of his colleagues, thinks the prince can rule with or against the people, with or against the truths disclosed by science, the law and the media. This is what I call ‘‘the Machiavellian temptation.’’ Strauss, yielding to this temptation, held that rulers have almost boundless moral credibility. Mansfield stressed Machiavelli’s belief that swift, spectacular action can ‘‘create necessity’’ for others, rather than simply responding to necessity. Lord, echoing Mansfield, amplifies this point.323 I believe that the underlying logic of this position, laid bare, sheds light on the ulterior logic of contemporary power politics in general. This in turn helps us better understand the significance of the ongoing debate over empire. 4.7. The Machiavellian Temptation With unerring instinct, Lord dramatizes what he calls the ‘‘epochal challenge’’ inherent in Machiavelli’s perspective. The underlying assumption and implication of this challenge, Lord says, is that the prince has far greater power to shape reality than people think. He bases this claim on Machiavelli’s ‘‘final judgment,’’ near the end of The Prince, ‘‘that it is better to be impetuous than cautious, because fortune is a woman; and it is necessary, if one wants to hold her down, to beat her and strike her down.’’ Fortune favors those, Machiavelli says, who are ‘‘less cautious, more ferocious, and command her with more audacity.’’324 This claim, Lord holds, ‘‘needs to be seen for what it is. The model leader for Machiavelli is no longer the grave senator or wise king prudently taking counsel from the great of the land and ruling with a benevolent hand. Rather, it is the brash young prince or aspiring prince, ambitious of glory and gain and willing to act ruthlessly and alone to achieve it. Caution, calculation, and moderation are displaced by enterprise, energy, daring.’’ The deep message is that princes cannot afford to follow cautious or passive courses because the world is more easily shaped to human purposes than hitherto believed. Energetic leaders project an image of strength that overawes and impresses, that succeeds by its own success.325

This is a kind of catechism, bringing to the surface the core Machiavellian premise – that the world is more plastic than the ‘‘reality-based community’’ of grave senators and fact-parsing advisors could ever imagine. Bold action

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

113

informed by resolve makes its own realities.326 The founder of neoconservatism, Irving Kristol, gave this idea pure expression when he wrote, in 1989, that ‘‘if the president goes to the American people and wraps himself in the American flag and lets Congress wrap itself in the white flag of surrender, the president will win y’’ He cites Reagan’s invasion of Grenada as decisive evidence for this proposition: ‘‘The American people had never heard of Grenada. There was no reason why they should have. The reason we gave for this intervention – the risk to American medical students there – was phony but the reaction of the American people was absolutely and overwhelmingly favorable. They had no idea what was going on, but they backed the president. They always will.’’327 The candor of this statement is almost as striking as its overconfidence. Reagan, and other princes of the realm, will always prevail against the gullible plebs – and against cautious senators, too. Lord, also, takes Reagan as his exemplary modern prince:328 ‘‘y there is a sense,’’ he argues, ‘‘in which Reagan’s achievement surpasses even FDR’s.’’ In 1932, since ‘‘almost everyone agreed’’ that far-reaching change was needed, FDR could swim with the tide, rather than against it. But Reagan ‘‘y lacked a clear popular mandate for fundamental change and was navigating into a strong headwind of political and intellectual resistance.’’329 The true measure of Reagan’s greatness, in other words, is that he was able to catalyze change without a mandate. He was able to rule despite an unruly opposition. By many means – draping himself in the flag, decrying the USSR as an ‘‘evil empire,’’ invading Grenada, and much else – Reagan was able to overwhelm strong resistance. Many of his admirers believe that he won the Cold War and fathered Pax Americana almost single-handedly. Lord appears to belong to their number.330 Perhaps the main lesson that we can learn from cases of exemplary leadership, he says, ‘‘is how much difference a single great leader can make in shaping a regime and, through it, the character of a nation.’’331 When we supplement this proposition with the corollary claim put forward by many neoconservatives – namely, that the main lesson of American hegemony is how much difference a great nation can make in shaping a new world order, and through it, the character of a civilization – we begin to see the full import of this worldview. The prince, as the great leader of the greatest nation, can remake the world in the image of his ambition. That, plainly, is power writ large. In 2002, in a major essay, which has since been republished as a small book, Robert Kagan expanded on the implications of this worldview. Extolling both the power and the providential mission of the American

114

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

‘‘behemoth with a conscience,’’ Kagan elaborates an almost Manichaean contrast between ‘‘Kantian’’ Europe and the ‘‘Hobbesian’’ United States – a contrast he also characterizes, less grandiloquently, by saying that ‘‘Americans are from Mars and Europeans are from Venus.’’332 Europeans, feeling relatively weak and defenseless, hope for peace and count on the rule of law. This is naive and utopian, Kagan says. Fortunately, Americans are strong enough to face the truth. They are far too realistic to trust in trust alone. They know that power obeys laws of its own, not laws of philanthropic design. Unlike ‘‘postmodern,’’ humanistic Europe, the United States is still ‘‘mired in history, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and the defense and promotion of liberal order still depend on the possession and use of military might.’’333 One of the few Europeans who grasps this hard truth, Kagan says, is Robert Cooper, Director-General for External and Politico-Military Affairs in the European Union Council Secretariat. Cooper, who has also been influential in British policy circles, has famously argued that Europe can afford to shelter in the ‘‘postmodern’’ bubble of peace and altruism, where ‘‘raison d’etat and the amorality of Machiavelli’s theories of statecraft y have been replaced by a moral consciousness,’’ only because America remains on duty in the bloody conflicts of the ‘‘modern and pre-modern’’ world.334 Cooper urges Europe to rally to the American viewpoint, recognizing that, while Kant’s dream of ‘‘perpetual peace’’ may be possible on a small scale within civil society, Hobbes and Machiavelli are better guides to an incorrigibly war-torn world. To fight our enemies, Cooper says in Machiavellian tones, ‘‘we need to revert to the rougher methods of an earlier era – force, preemptive attack, deception, whatever is necessary.’’ His maxim, Kagan says, is simple: ‘‘Among ourselves we keep the law, but when we are operating in the jungle, we must also use the laws of the jungle.’’335 Implicit in this maxim, plainly, is the Social Darwinist premise that, in the struggle for existence, the fittest survive. America’s strength, always prodigious, has now reached ‘‘unprecedented’’ levels.336 As the strongest of nations, America is thus destined not merely for survival but for triumph. This kind of vaulting confidence, Kagan says, is the ‘‘entirely natural and predictable consequence’’ of America’s rise to hegemony. The fall of the USSR ‘‘made the United States more willing to use force abroad’’ – so much so that there were few restraints left: ‘‘With the check of Soviet power removed, the United States was free to intervene practically wherever and whenever it chose y’’337 There are, he acknowledges, nay-sayers who fear that the United States may again be ‘‘a Gulliver tied down by Lilliputian

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

115

threads,’’ bound by European rules and norms. But the truth, he maintains, is quite the reverse: ‘‘American leaders should realize that they are hardly constrained at all, that Europe is not really capable of constraining the United States.’’338 Even bolder affirmations of America’s unbounded capacities come from neoconservatives who focus primarily on war. Donald and Frederick Kagan, in a major statement of neoconservative aspirations on the eve of the second Bush presidency, complained that the Clinton administration, though rhetorically correct on some foreign-policy issues,339 had only been ‘‘pseudoengaged’’ with the world. Clinton, ‘‘paralyzed’’ by the Vietnam syndrome, was simply unwilling to commit ground troops to battle.340 He was too afraid that the American public would react badly to the sight of young people returning home in body bags. The Kagans stoutly object: ‘‘There is no reason to believe that the American people would not, in fact, accept casualties, even large casualites, in a war they understood and supported, but America’s political leaders refuse to take the risk y’’341 Max Boot erects an elaborate edifice on the foundation of this premise in his summa bellica of 2002, The Savage Wars of Peace. Here, in a final chapter entitled ‘‘In Defense of Pax Americana,’’ Boot brings the lessons of American imperial history to bear on the prospect of future small wars, finding that such wars are, in fact, highly ‘‘doable.’’342 History teaches us, he concludes, that such wars can be prosecuted even under highly uncertain and, at first glance, unpromising circumstances. In what seems almost uncannily like the statement of a credo that was soon to be tested in Iraq, Boot lists seven characteristics of small imperial wars that, he says, do not pose insurmountable problems for the imperial rulers. Wars of this type can have the following attributes.343 They may be: 1. ‘‘Wars without a declaration of war,’’ that is, wars ‘‘undertaken under executive authority.’’ 2. ‘‘Wars without exit strategies.’’ The United States stayed in Haiti for nearly two decades, in Nicaragua for nearly a quarter of a century, in the Philippines for almost half a century, in China for nearly an entire century. 3. ‘‘Wars that are fought less than ‘wholeheartedly,’ ’’ that is, for very limited objectives and without deploying overwhelming force. 4. Wars where soldiers undertake substantial ‘‘occupation duty, y to impose the victor’s will on the vanquished,’’ rather than focusing on combat alone. ‘‘Only boots on the ground can guarantee a lasting peace,’’ he says without irony.

116

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

5. ‘‘Wars in which America gets involved in other countries’ internal affairs.’’ Boot denies that this would undermine Westphalian principles of international comity, since, he says, these principles are now just pretty words, ‘‘often traduced in Europe and seldom considered binding by either Europeans or Americans in their dealings with less developed parts of the globe.’’ 6. ‘‘Wars without a ‘vital national interest.’ ’’ Wars are often fought and should be fought for idealistic as well as realistic motives. A century ago, ‘‘Americans talked of spreading Anglo-Saxon civilization and taking up the ‘white man’s burden’; today they talk of spreading democracy and defending human rights.’’ 7. ‘‘Wars without significant popular support.’’ A modest amount of ‘‘domestic sniping’’ won’t affect relatively small military forces. Only big wars require mass mobilization, and that can be obtained, if necessary. This remarkable credo was greeted with enthusiasm by Thomas Donnelly, who wrote a glowing review of The Savage Wars of Peace in Foreign Affairs, in which, parodying an epigram from Kipling cited by Boot, he enunciated the thesis of the ‘‘Free Man’s Burden’’ for the first time.344 When Donnelly used this phrase again sixteen months later, the war in Iraq had been raging for many months, and it was beginning to seem that the mission might not be as easily accomplished as Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz had initially believed.345 Seeking to buck up a possibly downcast president, Donnelly and Serchuk urged Mr. Bush to ‘‘procure an advance copy’’ of Choosing Your Battles, by Peter D. Feaver and Christopher Gelpi, a book that was to appear the following year:346 ‘‘In it,’’ Donnelly and Serchuk report, ‘‘Gelpi and Feaver argue persuasively that the American public is more ‘defeat-phobic’ than ‘casualty-phobic.’ ’’347 In fact, Choosing Your Battles is a powerfully ideological tract, arguing a position which is almost indistinguishable from the views voiced by Donnelly, Boot, the Kagans, and Wolfowitz, among others. Feaver and Gelpi interpret a few meager and ambiguous research findings as if they proved the neoconservative point: Decision makers, especially presidents, have a great ability to shape perceptions about military events and, in so doing, to create support for an operation in a skeptical public y348

Now, well over two years into the occupation, the Bush administration shows many signs of believing precisely this. That may be partly because the administration has followed Donnelly’s advice. ‘‘When President Bush confidently predicts victory in Iraq and admits no mistakes, admirers see steely resolve and critics see exasperating stubbornness,’’ the Washington Post

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

117

recently reported. But the actual truth is more complex – namely, that ‘‘White House officials have drawn on the work of Duke University political scientists Peter D. Feaver and Christopher F. Gelpi y’’349 In June, Peter Feaver joined the National Security Council as special adviser for strategic planning and institutional reform. And so the drumbeat continues. By now, we have seen triumphal optimism voiced in many different idioms, from the prophetic to the social scientific. This sense of optimism is not a secondary or extraneous matter. Rather, a kind of overconfidence appears to be intrinsic to the ‘‘idealism’’ of the realpolitiker. As we saw earlier, Odom and Dujarric even go so far as to contemplate, not Kant’s perpetual peace, but rather a permanent Pax Americana: ‘‘y one is encouraged to believe,’’ they say, ‘‘that American hegemony can endure indefinitely.’’350 What we discern in this, and in many similar remarks, is a sense of invincibility bordering on the utopian. For those who yield to the Machiavellian temptation, America’s destiny to lead has never seemed more manifest. There is, further, a typical attitude at the base of this optimism. We observe an air of buoyant, strutting certainty, of self-righteous defiance toward the wishes of others. Even Robert Kagan admits that ‘‘the Bush administration came into office with a chip on its shoulder.’’351 Indeed, top officials often act aggrieved, as if they were being bullied, when they are forced to reckon with other people’s concerns. Many people have felt puzzlement over the curious tone of rebelliousness that marks so much official rhetoric.352 Administration officials run the biggest government in history, and yet they often sound like libertarians fighting against government to deregulate industry.353 They revel in their overwhelming power, and yet resent all restrictions, even the slightest, from global warming protocols to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. Even the expectation that the United States would seek UN support for a military invasion galls them. Why? 4.8. The Will to Power An unexpected source of insight comes from a pamphlet written by E´mile Durkheim in 1915, anatomizing the logic of Pan-German political theory. Focusing primarily on Treitschke’s Politics, Durkheim points out that people often blame Pan-German extremism ‘‘on Germany’s exaggerated estimate of its own importance and civilization. It is supposed that, if Germany has come to arrogate to herself a sort of innate right to rule the world, it is because, owing to some inexplicable illusion, Germany has made of itself an idol before which the whole world is invited to prostrate itself.’’354 But this

118

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

thesis is, ‘‘in fact, not very illuminating,’’ Durkheim says; ‘‘for a nation may consider itself morally and intellectually superior to others without wishing to dominate them.’’ Germany might believe herself to be of divine essence without aspiring to conquer the world. Megalomania does not necessarily entail a taste for hegemony, though it tends to reinforce this after the event. The fundamental thing is her need to assert herself, to feel nothing above her, her impatience of all limitation and dependence, in a word, her ‘‘will to power.’’

This will to power, Durkheim adds, is a corollary of how Pan-Germans feel about the German state. What they prize more than anything is the ‘‘integral autonomy’’ of the state. ‘‘It is of the very essence of the State,’’ in Treitschke’s phrase, ‘‘that it cannot recognize any force above itself.’’ The state is the highest possible terrestrial power, objectively real in a way that ‘‘international law’’ and ‘‘global community’’ can never be. The state is a physical force, a cultural truth, the legal unity of a people. The global community, in contrast, is a medley of peoples, a cacophony of discordant voices. International law is a mere collation of treaties and other expressions of transitory will. The state cannot remain true to itself and submit to a superior power, whether another state or a community of states. And the surest way to resist ‘‘dependence on other states’’ is to make the others dependent. ‘‘If [the state] cannot dominate [others],’’ Durkheim explains, ‘‘it runs the risk of having to submit to them.’’ If, to adopt Treitschke’s formula, there is to be no power greater than its own, it must make its own superior to all others. The absolute independence to which it aspires can therefore only be ensured by its supremacy.

By this logic, ‘‘universal hegemony is the goal to which the State must press forward. It cannot tolerate equals, or at least, it must seek to reduce their numbers; for equals are rivals whom it must outstrip, if it is not to be outstripped by them.’’ This, plainly, resembles closely what we have heard from PNAC strategists and pundits about the ‘‘unipolar moment’’ and the need to preserve and indefinitely extend Pax Americana. So, too, we have often heard affirmations of the virtue and necessity of American hegemony. This, too, is consistent with Machtpolitik, which, Durkheim argues, presupposes a central moral maxim: ‘‘To work to make itself as powerful as possible, so that it may impose its will on other states, is [the state’s] highest good, and all that serves to attain this end is legitimate and morally good.’’ It is in the light of this commitment that Treitschke sketched a portrait of the ideal statesman. This, too, may sound familiar: ‘‘Above all,’’ Durkheim explains, ‘‘he must have great ambition. For, as the State is essentially

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

119

ambitious, as it aspires to become ever greater and more powerful, a man too modest in his designs could not help it to fulfill its destiny.’’ Successful ambition, in turn, requires an inflexible will and an ‘‘iron character.’’ ‘‘A statesman’s function is to dominate, to master, to coerce both his compatriots and foreign states; it might almost be said that his activity is exercised against the nature of things; on every hand he meets with resistance, the selfishness of individuals, the rival ambitions of other states, against which he has to struggle. To triumph over them, he needs indomitable energy. This is why, when he has once set an end before him, he goes towards it undeviatingly y’’355 There is, Durkheim adds, a kind of ‘‘morbid enormity’’ to this will to power. Unwilling to accept limits, the prince denies, and defies, the stubborn intractability of the world, rejecting the binding power of laws, treaties, and assemblies: ‘‘y what we find at the base of the mentality we have been studying,’’ Durkheim concludes, ‘‘is precisely a sort of attempt to rise ‘above all human forces,’ to master them and exercise full and absolute sovereignty over them y’’ The state, in its pride, takes a kind of perverse pleasure in defying its rivals, daring them to incur its wrath: ‘‘To affirm its power more impressively, we shall even find it exciting the whole world against itself, and lightheartedly braving universal anger.’’ And there is a morbid, fantastic quality to the state’s vision of space and time, reflecting the fathomless depth of its resistance to any kind of submission and surrender: The projects for invading England by aircraft, the dream of cannon, the projectiles which are to be almost exempt from the laws of gravity, recall the romances of a Jules Verne or a Wells. They seem to transport us into an unreal world, where nothing can any longer resist the will of man.

In all this, finally, Durkheim finds the influence of Machiavelli, whom Treitschke avowed as his master.356 ‘‘It was he,’’ Durkheim quotes Treitschke, ‘‘who formulated the idea that, when the salvation of the state is concerned, no question ought to arise concerning the purity of the means employed. Save the state first, and afterwards everyone will approve the means used.’’357 4.9. Recognition Denied In my opinion, the essential point here can be stated briefly. The modern prince, in the Machiavellian vision, is in active rebellion against many of the world’s leading forces, which he experiences as unbearable constraints. Put in legal terms, the prince refuses to recognize the ultimate validity of world

120

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

law, the concert of states, and public opinion.358 The media, science, and other branches of government are denied their usual claims as well. The prince, in other words, recognizes no limitation on the empire of his will. But there is a price to be paid for disavowing recognition. Scornful of the very idea of seeking approval from others, unwilling to bind himself to friend or foe, the prince is reluctant to seek global recognition even for the state. He prefers to fly solo, whenever deference to others could deflect him from his chosen path. And he is willing to risk everything, including the planetary disaster that so many scientists now foresee in global warming, to pursue his ends. In the short run, this autarkic attitude may be a source of strength, as Machiavelli believed. The unbound prince is free to act, swiftly and unilaterally, without time-consuming diplomacy. Ruthless and spectacular deeds, which others might slow or veto, can be prosecuted instantly. But empires sought recognition in previous times because they wanted the willing compliance of voluntary servitors. They believed that, ultimately, enduring power requires legitimacy as well as arms. The refusal to seek recognition is a gamble that force can prevail without consent. Even the Roman and Holy Roman empires doubted this, seeking recognition from many peers and subalterns. But today’s sole superpower is apparently willing to seek leadership without equivalent legitimacy. Durkheim predicted that this gamble would fail. ‘‘There is no State so great,’’ he wrote, ‘‘that it is not merged in the vaster system formed by the agglomeration of other States, that does not, in other words, form part of the great human community, and owe respect to this. There is a universal conscience and a universal opinion, and it is no more possible to escape the empire of these than to escape the empire of physical laws; for they are forces which react against those who transgress them; a State cannot subsist when all humanity is arrayed against it.’’

NOTES 1. For the history of Bush’s infatuation with the notion of political capital, see Chris Suellentrop, ‘‘America’s New Political Capital,’’ Slate, November 30, 2004, available online at http://slate.msn.com/id.2110256/#ContinueArticle. 2. For historical background, see David B. Abernethy, The Dynamics of Global Dominance: European Overseas Empires, 1415–1980 (New Haven, 2000). For the intellectual background, see David N. Smith, ‘‘The Rhetoric and Reality of ‘Mass Destruction’: How Genocide Became an International Social Problem,’’ in the International Handbook of Social Problems (London & Beverly Hills, 2003).

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

121

3. The phrase ‘‘Carthaginian solution,’’ referring to the Roman annihilation of Carthage, was a euphemism for the projected destruction of the Jews in the writings of Eugen Du¨hring, an early racial antisemite. See D. N. Smith, ‘‘Genocide,’’ Encyclopedia of Sociology (New York & San Francisco, 2000). 4. For discussion of this point, see ‘‘Periodizing Globalization,’’ elsewhere in this volume, by Robert J. Antonio and Alessandro Bonanno. 5. Every American president, no matter how gifted, wields vastly greater power than did Akhenaten, Sargon, Antiochus, Constantine, Charlemagne, Kublai, Catherine, Napoleon, and so on. 6. See my discussion of the effects of IMF and World Bank policies on sub-Saharan Africa in ‘‘Globalization and Genocide: Inequality and Mass Death in Rwanda,’’ in Isidor Wallimann and Michael N. Dobkowski, eds., On the Edge of Scarcity (Syracuse, 2002). For valuable perspective on the commercial relations of the major powers, see Stephen F. Diamond, ‘‘The PetroChina Syndrome: Regulating Capital Markets in the Anti-Globalization Era,’’ Journal of Corporation Law, 29, 2003. 7. Since recognized empires are nowhere to be found, people sometimes seek, and think they find, secret empires in hidden domains. (The biases and conspiracy theories that fuel these conclusions, of course, are readily available in the public domain.) So antisemites typically blame the world’s problems on ‘‘Jewish conspiracy’’ or a ‘‘Zionist Occupation Government.’’ 8. The charge that Jews and bankers (whose images often fuse in the antisemitic imagination) rule the world as a kind of ‘‘Bankenstein’s monster’’ is now more common than ever. The kernel of rationlity in these absurd theories is the inchoate sense that the new globalizing world is invisibly ruled by giant, obscure forces – by esoteric trade regimes, corporate cartels, secret accords, and financial wizards. See Moishe Postone, ‘‘The Holocaust and the Trajectory of the Twentieth-Century,’’ in Postone and Eric Santner, eds., Catastrophe and Meaning (Chicago, 2003); Postone, ‘‘Anti-Semitism and National Socialism,’’ in Anson Rabinbach and Jack Zipes, eds., Germans and Jews Since the Holocaust (New York, 1986); Chip Berlet and Matthew N. Lyons, Right-Wing Populism in America (New York, 2000); and D. N. Smith, ‘‘The Social Construction of Enemies: Jews and the Representation of Evil,’’ Sociological Theory, 14 (3), November 1996. 9. From a wide array of positions, ranging from far-right to quite far-left, these texts probe deeply into the facts and rationales behind American power. See Andrew J. Bacevich, American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy (Cambridge, MA, 2002); Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Choice: Global Domination or Global Leadership (New York, 2004); Amy Chua, World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability (New York, 2003); Ivo H. Daalder and James M. Lindsay, America Unbound: The Bush Revolution in Foreign Policy (Washington, DC, 2003); Niall Ferguson, Colossus: The Price of America’s Empire (New York, 2004); Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke, America Alone: The Neo-Conservatives and the Global Order (Cambridge, 2004); Michael Hirsch, At War with Ourselves: Why America is Squandering Its Chance to Build a Better World (New York, 2003); Chalmers Johnson, Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, revised edition (New York, 2004); Chalmers Johnson, The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (New York, 2004); Rashid Khalidi, Resurrecting Empire: Western Footprints and America’s Perilous Path in the Middle East (Boston, 2004); Robert Jay Lifton,

122

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

Superpower Syndrome: America’s Apocalyptic Confrontation with the World (New York, 2003); John Newhouse, Imperial America: The Bush Assault on the World Order (New York, 2003); Joseph S. Nye Jr., The Paradox of American Power: Why the World’s only Superpower Can’t Go It Alone (Oxford, 2002); Clyde Prestowitz, Rogue Nation: American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions (New York, 2003); Claes G. Ryn, America the Virtuous: The Crisis of Democracy and the Quest for Empire (New Brunswick, NJ, 2003); and Emmanuel Todd, After the Empire: The Breakdown of the American Order (New York, 2003). This is just a sampling of the more notable works on the subject. 10. Neo-Marxist and other radical critiques of imperialism today are widely available. See, for example, Carl Boggs, Imperial Delusion (Lanham, MD, 2005). Noam Chomsky, Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest for Global Dominance (New York, 2003); John Bellamy Foster and Robert W. McChesney, eds., Pox Americana: Exposing the American Empire (New York, 2004); David Harvey, The New Imperialism (Oxford, 2003); Michael Hudson, Super-Imperialism: The Origin and Fundamentals of U.S. World Dominance (London, 2003); Leo Panitch and Colin Leys, eds., The Empire Reloaded: Socialist Register 2000 (New York, 2005); Leo Panitch and Colin Leys, eds., The New Imperial Challenge: Socialist Register 2004 (New York, 2004); Immanuel Wallerstein, The Decline of American Power: The U.S. in a Chaotic World (New York, 2003); and Ellen Meiksins Wood, The Empire of Capital (London, 2003). 11. See the discussion of America’s Inadvertent Empire by Odom and Dujarric, below. 12. Even the many recent studies of contemporary neoconservatism have relatively little to say about Straussian thought. Many Straussians figure in these accounts, but the authors seldom pause to delve into the significance of their ‘‘Straussianism.’’ This is true even of the best accounts, including those by Gary Dorrien and James Mann. Dorrien, Imperial Designs: Neoconservatism and the New Pax Americana (New York, 2004), mentions Strauss just once, to say that Paul Wolfowitz attended the University of Chicago largely because Strauss was there (p. 44). In other respects his account of neoconservatism could hardly be richer, but this, plainly, is a lacuna. See also James Mann’s valuable study, Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush’s War Cabinet (New York, 2004). Mann probes the core members of the Bush team: Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, etc. And while he too mentions Strauss and the Straussians when he discusses Paul Wolfowitz, his interests lie elsewhere. Andrew J. Bacevich, meanwhile, devotes a chapter (‘‘Left, Right, Left’’) to neoconservatism in The New American Militarism (Oxford & New York, 2005), but discusses only Strauss’s friend and colleague Albert Wohlstetter (pp. 152ff.), not the Straussians. That, in part, is my mission here. 13. Raymond Aron, Peace and War: A Theory of International Relations (Garden City, NY, 1966), p. 592. All citations from Aron and Treitschke in this section are from Aron (1966), pp. 586–596, and will not be itemized separately. Aron, in turn, cites exclusively from Heinrich von Treitschke, Politics, Vols. 1 and 2 (London, 1916; the edition cited by Aron was published by Max Correlius in Leipzig, 1897). For further details and page references, see Aron, whose book was first published in French in 1962. 14. There was also a rising tide of pacifist, legalist, and humanitarian sentiment, as evidenced by the Hague peace congresses of the immediate prewar period. But Aron

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

123

plainly does not regard pacifism or any other absolutist ethical stance, such as anarchism, as ‘‘power-political.’’ The refusal of state power would be, not ‘‘power politics,’’ but rather the rejection of power politics. 15. Italics in the original. Aron does not view antiwar teachings, a´ la Kant’s famed defense of perpetual peace, as power-political positions. 16. There is also, Aron says, a dimension of German and Eurocentric vanity, and hence of volkish racism, in Treitschke’s politics. But as a Machtpolitiker above all else, Treitschke gives far more weight to ‘‘the state’’ than to peoples or races. Indeed, as we will see below, Treitschke explicitly subordinates peoples to states, and finds the source of popular virtues – brotherly unity, martial spirit, discipline, obedience – not in nature but in the state. 17. The state, he feels, is ‘‘the external and necessary form taken by the inner life of a people.’’ 18. In a passage not cited by Aron, Treitschke says that the sovereign state is endowed with what Aristotle called autarkeia, that is, ‘‘the capacity to be self-sufficing.’’ See Treitschke, Politics, Vol. 1, op. cit., p. 32. 19. ‘‘Weakness is not ludicrous in itself,’’ Treitschke writes, bur rather ‘‘when it seeks to assume the style of power.’’ Claiming the mantle of a state is precisely such an act, since the weak state claims a status it can defend neither militarily nor, hence, logically. 20. For Treitschke, the ‘‘society of states’’ is not a collective personality endowed with will. Only the state can, in fact, claim this distinction. That is why, in his eyes, the state is entitled to enact law at home while breaking law abroad. 21. On this point Treitschke invokes a classic legal principle, Rebus sic stantibus. This is the notion that, since any contract is accepted under specific given circumstances, it becomes null and void when these circumstances change qualitatively. This is the ‘‘reservation’’ which is said to be implicit in every contract. 22. As Aron puts it: ‘‘y this society of peoples, as long as states survive and history continues, will have no higher tribunal than that of arms.’’ 23. ‘‘In crossing the Atlantic, in becoming power politics, Treitschke’s Machtpolitik underwent a chiefly spiritual mutation’’ (Aron, p. 593). 24. ‘‘I would be tempted,’’ Aron writes, ‘‘to summarize the opposition between the German doctrinaires of Machtpolitik and the American theoreticians of power politics by citing the celebrated formula invented by Max Weber to illustrate the contast between the Puritans at the dawn of capitalism and the men of today: ‘The Puritan willed to be the vocational man that we have to be.’ The German nationalists desired power politics for itself. The American realists believe they are obliged to acknowledge its existence and accept its laws.’’ The latter, in other words, feel that they must recognize but not celebrate the necessity of war; in their outlook, the use of force is neither ethicized nor charismatized, but simply and reluctantly acknowledged. 25. Unlike Treitschke, who favors war on moral as well as pragmatic grounds, the realists accept war but only because they agree that perpetual peace is impractical. As Aron writes, they ‘‘do not exalt the ‘sacred selfishness’ of states.’’ They fear that selfishness disguised as altruism will shed all moral restraints, justifying violence as virtue. ‘‘On the pretext of punishing the aggressor, the state carries war to extremes’’; the war-making state is ‘‘all the more immoral as it believes itself moral, all the more egoistical as it supposes itself obedient to transcendent principle.’’

124

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

26. Here, as in so many other realms, an excess of zeal can inspire an excess of force. 27. Aron, p. 594, citing Reinhold Niebuhr on Politics, ed. Harry Davis and Robert C. Good (New York, 1960), p. 332. 28. This, of course, is easier said than done. Since ‘‘what self-interest permits’’ is open to many interpretations, realists of varying tendency can counsel many policies, from quite predatory to quite restrained. But the realistic premise of acting circumspectly, within the constraints of the situation soberly appraised, gives realism at least some impetus toward moderation. For insight into the second ‘‘spiritual mutation’’ that gave later realist doctrine a decidedly less theological, metaphysical cast, see Duncan S. A. Bell, ‘‘Anarchy, Power and Death,’’ Journal of Political Ideologies, 7 (2), 2002, pp. 221–239. 29. See Franz Schurmann, The Logic of World Power (New York, 1974). 30. Michael Mann argues powerfully, on many grounds, that contemporary unilateralists radically overestimate the absolute magnitude, structural stability, and apparent unchallengeability of American power. See Incoherent Empire (London, 2003). Mann also offers good insight into neoconservativism. 31. This meeting took place, in other words, at about the time of the Downing Street Memo. In this now notorious document, which comprises the minutes of a meeting of Britain’s top foreign policy decision-makers on July 23, 2002, Richard Dearlove, the chief of the MI6 intelligence agency, is quoted as saying that the Bush team now regarded military action against Iraq as ‘‘inevitable’’ and that they ‘‘had no patience with the U.N. route.’’ Dearlove added that ‘‘the intelligence and facts were being fixed around this policy.’’ See Glenn Frankel, ‘‘From Memos, Insights into Ally’s Doubts on Iraq War,’’ Washington Post Foreign Service, A01, June 28, 2005. The full text of the memo is available in The New York Review of Books, June 9, 2005, p. 71. 32. Ron Suskind, ‘‘Without a Doubt,’’ New York Times, October 17, 2004, pp. 8–9. This passage is now cited all over the web, and by many print journalists and commentators. See, e.g., Hal Foster, ‘‘Yellow Ribbons,’’ London Review of Books, July 7, 2005, p. 29, and Mark Danner’s discussion of the Downing Street Memo in The New York Review of Books, June 9, 2005, p. 73. In tone this remark is very reminiscent of the classically American ‘‘power of positive thinking’’ mentality; about which, see the outstanding study by Donald Meyer, The Positive Thinkers: Popular Religious Psychology from Mary Baker Eddy to Norman Vincent Peale and Ronald Reagan, revised edition (Middletown, CT, 1988; first published in 1966). 33. James Atlas wrote a much-noticed New York Times article (‘‘A Classicist’s Legacy: New Empire Builders,’’ May 4, 2003, Section 4, pp. 1, 4) in which he asked whether it is far-fetched to give Strauss’s philosophy credit for influencing the course of American foreign policy. ‘‘For those who believe in the power of ideas, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch’’ to say ‘yes,’ he concluded. He also asked William Kristol if Strauss’s hawkish disciples actually understand Strauss very well. ‘‘It’s an opaque and difficult question,’’ Kristol answered. 34. See Charles Krauthammer, ‘‘The Unipolar Moment,’’ Foreign Affairs, 70 (1), 1991; and see also his earlier article, ‘‘Universal Dominion: Toward a Unipolar World,’’ National Interest, 18 (Winter 1989). For rich detail on this phase of neoconservative thought, see Gary J. Dorrien, The Neoconservative Mind: Politics, Culture, and the War of Ideology (Philadelphia, 1993), especially Chapter 7.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

125

35. With a tone of ruthless honesty, Krauthammer also brusquely acknowledged that a globalizing mission leads to centralized authority and ‘‘a diminution of democracy.’’ See Dorrien, The Neoconservative Mind, op. cit., pp. 330–340 for this and the other lines cited here. And see also the parallel passages in Dorrien’s latest book, Imperial Designs, op. cit., which offer a very rich account of the whole panoply of post-Cold War activities and strategies of the rising neoconservative foreign policy hawks. See Chapter 3 for data on Krauthammer and others in the late 1980s and early 1990s. 36. See Ben J. Wattenberg, ‘‘Neo-Manifest Destinarianism,’’ National Interest, 21 (Fall 1990); Joshua Muravchik, Exporting Democracy: Fulfilling America’s Destiny (Washington, DC, 1991); Muravchik, ‘‘At Last, Pax Americana,’’ New York Times, January 24, 1991; Michael Novak, ‘‘Pax Americana,’’ Forbes, 147, April 29, 1991, and many similar articles by other authors, all of whom are cited by Dorrien (2004, pp.75f.). Dorrien notes that these authors, and others of similar inclination like Richard Perle, all worked for the ‘‘corporate funded, media-connected’’ American Enterprise Institute (ibid., p. 77). 37. Zalmay Khalilzad, now ambassador to Iraq, was the main author of this draft statement. Wolfowitz, his chief assistant Lewis Libby, Richard Perle and Wolfowitz’s teacher Albert Wohlstetter, all contributed to the formulation of the argument. See Dorrien, Imperial Designs, op. cit., p. 39. 38. Dick Cheney, Defense Strategy for the 1990s: The Regional Defense Strategy (Washington, DC, 1993). 39. This is the first heading in Paul D. Wolfowitz, ‘‘Statesmanship in the New Century,’’ in William Kristol and Robert Kagan, eds., Present Dangers: Crisis and Opportunity in American Foreign and Defense Policy (San Francisco, 2000). The eccentricity of this jesting choice of terms is accentuated by the fact that Wolfowitz’s mentor Albert Wohlstetter was a famed nuclear strategist who was often accused of Strangelovian tendencies. 40. Ibid., p. 310. 41. Ibid., pp. 323, 317, and passim. 42. In the July/August issue. Also meriting attention is Zalmay Khalizad’s Rand Corporation study, From Containment to Global Leadership? America and the World after the Cold War (Santa Monica, 1995), which takes similar stands in more circumspect terms. 43. This is the summary Kagan and Kristol offer in their ‘‘Introduction: National Interest and Global Responsibility’’ to the volume Present Dangers, which they also edited (op. cit., p. 6). The goal, that is, should have been to extend what the first President Bush ‘‘rightly called a ‘new world order’ ...’’ They add that America should see itself ‘‘as at once a European power, an Asian power, a Middle Eastern power, and of course, a Western Hemisphere power.’’ ‘‘In Europe, in Asia and in the Middle East, the message we should be sending to potential foes is: ‘Don’t even think about it’ ’’ (pp. 6, 16). 44. Khalilzad, who was posted to Iraq in 2005, was ambassador to Afghanistan from 2003 to 2005. Other notable signatories of the original PNAC letter include former Vice-President Dan Quayle; Florida Governor Jeb Bush; Fred Charles Ikle, Undersecretary of Defense in the Reagan administration; Donald Kagan, Joshua Muravchik, Francis Fukuyama, Frank Gaffney, and William J. Bennett.

126

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

45. See Elliot Abrams et al., ‘‘A Letter to the Honorable William J. Clinton from ‘The Project for the New American Century,’’ January 26, 1998, posted at www. theindyvoice.com/index.blog?entry_id-417960. 46. The pair have written both textbooks and neoconservative challenges to realist intelligence orthodoxy. Among the latter is a contribution to a 1999 volume on Strauss; See Gary J. Schmitt and Abram N. Shulsky, ‘‘Leo Strauss and the World of Intelligence,’’ in Kenneth L. Deutsch and John A. Murley, eds., Leo Strauss, the Straussians, and the American Regime (Lanham, MD, 1999). Among the former is Shulsky and Schmitt, Silent Warfare: Understanding the World of Intelligence, revised edition (Washington, DC, 2002). 47. Seymour M. Hersh, ‘‘Selective Intelligence,’’ The New Yorker, May 12, 2003. It is perhaps not coincidental that, in their paper on Strauss, Shulsky and Schmitt stress the role of the regime in shaping public opinion, writing that, for Strauss, ‘‘the regime shapes human political action in so fundamental a way that the very souls appear different’’ (ibid., p. 409). 48. See Elliot Abrams et al., ‘‘Statement of Principles, Project for the New American Century,’’ June 3, 1997, posted at the PNAC website, www.newamerican. century.org/statementofprinciples.htm. The cited line is from the printout, pp. 1–2. (Note, by the way, that all page numbers listed for articles posted at websites refer to the page numbers of the printouts from these websites, not to the original publication, which is often a newspaper or magazine article.) 49. Ibid., p. 1. 50. Ibid., p. 1. 51. Ibid., p. 1. 52. Ibid., p. 2. 53. Thomas Donnelly (principal author), Gary Schmitt and Donald Kagan (project co-chairmen), Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces, and Resources for a New Century (Washington, DC: Project for the New American Century, 2000). 54. The authors hesitate to credit Clinton for any of this. But clearly, as they directly imply, this triumphalism is, in part, an extension of the giddy utopianism of the globalization years, the result of Clinton’s long boom: ‘‘Today the United States has an unprecedented strategic opportunity. It faces no immediate great-power challenge; it is blessed with wealthy, powerful and democratic allies in every part of the world; it is in the midst of the longest economic expansion in its history; and its political and economic principles are almost universally embraced’’ (ibid., p. iv). 55. See Slavoj Zizek, The Sublime Object of Ideology (London, 1989), and many later Zizekian texts. 56. The authors say that, besides Reagan’s example, they are ‘‘building upon the defense strategy outlined by the Cheney Defense Department in the waning days of the Bush administration. The Defense Policy Guidelines (DPG) drafted in the early months of 1992 provided a blueprint for maintaining U.S. preeminence, precluding the rise of a great power rival, and shaping the international security order in line with American principles and interests’’ (ibid., p. ii; and see the discussion of these guidelines, above, in connection with Paul Wolfowitz’s remarks). The authors lament that the Cheney-Wolfowitz plan was ‘‘buried’’ by the Clinton administration. Now, they say, a decade of post-Cold War experience has strengthened and enriched their

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

127

determination to resurrect Cheney’s vision (p. iii). Max Boot echoes this point and notes that, as reported by Andrew Bacevich in American Empire, op. cit., that Senator Allan Cranston had objected at the time (adapting John Ehrlichman’s famous phrase) that Wolfowitz’s plan would make the U.S. the ‘‘global Big Enchilada.’’ Says Boot, ‘‘An embarrassed administration hastily retracted this indiscreet language.’’ But now, he exults, ‘‘the Big Enchilada doctrine is back.’’ See Boot, ‘‘Doctrine of the ‘Big Enchilada,’ ’’ Washington Post, October 14, 2002, posted at the PNAC website, www.newamerican.century.org/iraq-101402.htm. 57. Neoconservatives were pleased to hear Senator John McCain echo their views, saying, in 1999, that America ‘‘is experiencing a unique ‘unipolar moment’ in world affairs,’’ and that the objective of United States policy should be to ‘‘extend this moment as long as we possibly can.’’ See Gary Schmitt, ‘‘Memorandum to: Opinion Leaders. Subject: Defense,’’ December 9, 1999, posted www.newamerican. century.org/defdec0999.htm. 58. Donald Kagan, ‘‘Reaction to ‘Bush’s Real Goal in Iraq’: Comparing America to Ancient Empires is ‘Ludicrous,’ ’’ Atlanta Journal and Constitution, October 6, 2002, posted at the PNAC website, www.newamericancentury.org/defense-20021006.htm. 59. Ibid., p. 2, at the PNAC website cited above. Here Kagan is quoting an article by Jay Bookman, which had appeared in an earlier issue of the Atlanta Journal and Constitution. 60. Donald Kagan, The Fall of the Athenian Empire (Ithaca, 1987); and Donald Kagan, ed., The End of the Roman Empire: Decline or Transformation? (Lexington, MA, 1978). Kagan is Sterling Professor of History and Classics at Yale. 61. Donald Kagan, op. cit., p. 2. 62. Ibid., p. 2. 63. Cited by Gary Schmitt, ‘‘Response to Asmus and Pollack,’’ July 24, 2003, posted at www.newamerican.century.org/iraq-20030724.htm, p. 2. Schmitt gives no specific reference to a publication by Kagan. 64. Ibid., p. 2. Schmitt adds an apologia here, objecting to a Washington Post article saying that ‘‘neocons revel in the US acting as a rogue Behemoth – talking about ‘empire and American primacy as a legitimate goal,’ ’’ etc. Schmitt objects. This is, he says, ‘‘a way of suggesting neo-cons want America to be an empire but without actually saying so. And while there has been some loose talk about empire and imperial requirements by some within the neo-con ranks, the reality is, no one is actually suggesting the U.S. assert its permanent sovereignty over foreign lands and peoples to create a real empire’’ (ibid., p. 2). 65. See Carnes Lord, ‘‘Dreams of Empire,’’ posted September 8, 2004, at the Claremont Institute website, www.claremont.org/writings/crb/fall2004/lord.html, p. 1. Lord is candid about America’s imperial past: ‘‘The acquisition of Hawaii through a rather sordid political intrigue in 1893 marked the beginning of an openly imperialist phase.’’ He takes seriously Niall Ferguson’s claim, in Colossus, that Americans are (in Ferguson’s words) ‘‘imperialists ‘in denial’ ’’; clinging ‘‘to an antiquated vision of their country as the slayer of empires’’ (p. 2). 66. Tom Donnelly and Vance Serchuk. ‘‘U.S. Counterinsurgency in Iraq: Lessons from the Philippine War.’’ Posted online at the PNAC website, www. newamericancentury.org/defense-20031103.htm. First published in the American Enterprise Institute’s National Security Outlook, November 3, 2003, p. 2. This

128

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

scenario appears under the complacently un-ironic heading ‘‘Free Man’s Burden,’’ which Donnelly and Serchuk, in a mood both defiant and pedantic, say was inspired by Rudyard Kipling’s notorious poem ‘‘White Man’s Burden’’ (1899); this was, as we will see below, the second time Donnelly had used this Kiplingesque phrase. Donnelly was at this juncture both a PNAC senior fellow and a resident fellow of the American Enterprise Institute. Serchuk was an AEI research assistant. 67. Boot was also formerly editorial features editor at the Wall Street Journal. 68. Max Boot, ‘‘Doctrine of the ‘Big Enchilada,’’’ op. cit., pp. 1-2. 69. Ibid., p. 2. The National Security Strategy was released in September 2002. 70. Max Boot, ‘‘American Imperialism? No Need to Run away from the Label,’’ USA Today, May 6, 2003, p. 2. Reprinted as ‘‘U.S. Imperialism: A Force for Good’’ in the National Post, May 13, 2003. Posted at the Council on Foreign Relations website, www.cfr.org/pub5934 (see also pub5959). 71. Ibid., p. 1. 72. Ibid., p. 1. America, Boot adds, has been an imperialist power for over two centuries, and it remains so now. To illustrate this point he cites many episodes, with heavy emphasis on the conquest of the Philippines. He adds that recent occupations and interventions have merely been ‘‘imperialism under another name’’ (p. 1). For further details, see Boot, The Savage Wars of Peace: Small Wars and the Rise of American Power (New York, 2002). And for a critique of Boot and others who use America’s imperial past as a legitimating device to justify twenty-first-century wars, see John Judis, The Folly of Empire: What George W. Bush Could Learn from Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson (New York, 2004). 73. Ibid., pp. 1, 2. Not long afterwards, Boot advocated an ‘‘enlightened imperialism’’ for ‘‘Liberia and other failed states,’’ which, he said, should be compelled by the United States to become international protectorates. See Max Boot, ‘‘Enlightened Imperialism Could Save Liberia,’’ USA Today, July 28, 2003, p. 2. Posted at the Council on Foreign Relations website, www.cfr.org/pub6162. 74. Lord, ‘‘Dream of Empire,’’ op. cit., p. 3. Odom is a retired Army lieutenant general who was director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988. Now a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, he recently published a column in the Washington Post arguing that the FBI has failed and must be replaced by ‘‘a separate agency, equal to the CIA’’; to doubters ‘‘who say the public won’t tolerate a ‘domestic spy agency,’ ’’ he replies: ‘‘This is simply untrue.’’ See ‘‘The FBI Can’t Be Reformed,’’ Lawrence Journal-World, July 1, 2005, p. 7B. 75. Odom and Dujarric, America’s Inadvertent Empire, 2004, pp. 5, 39, and passim. Odom and Dujarric, in turn, name Geir Lundestad as a central influence, finding inspiration in his two books on American empire: Empire by Integration: The United States and European Integration, 1945–1997 (Oxford, 1998), and The American ‘Empire’ and Other Studies of U.S. Foreign Policy in a Comparative Perspective (Oxford, 1990). 76. Ibid., p. 3. 77. Ibid., p. 7. 78. Lord, op. cit., p. 3. 79. Odom and Dujariic, op. cit., pp. 48–49: ‘‘notwithstanding,’’ they say, ‘‘some of the shocks President George W. Bush gave U.S. allies in 2001–2003 and the resulting anti-American sentiment y’’

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

129

80. Robert Kagan, ‘‘Power and Weakness,’’ Policy Review, June 2002, p. 7. Posted at www.newamerican.century.org/kagan-20020520.htm. 81. Thomas Donnelly, ‘‘Preserving American Primacy, Institutionalizing Unipolarity,’’ National Security Outlook, April 22, 2003, pp. 1, 4, 5. Available online at the American Enterprise Institute website, www.aei.org/publicationsID.16999,filter./ pub_detail.asp. 82. Ibid., p. 6. 83. Richard Perle and David Frum, An End to Evil (New York, 2003), p. 279. John Bolton, whose nomination to serve as UN Ambassador stalled briefly amid the controversy over his anti-UN sentiments, is both spiritually a partisan of this viewpoint and also, as we have seen, one of the handful of people to serve as a PNAC director. 84. Ibid., p. 279. 85. Ibid., pp. 267–268. 86. Ibid., pp. 243, 269. They continue, on the latter page: ‘‘The concept of leadership implies a willingness to act in a good cause, even – indeed, especially – when others are reluctant to do so.’’ 87. Ibid., pp. 245, 246. 88. Rebuilding America’s Defenses, op. cit., p. 5. This would entail an effort to ‘‘control the new ‘international commons’ of space and ‘cyberspace’ y’’ 89. Ibid., p. 5. 90. Gary Schmitt, ‘‘Power and Duty: U.S. Action is Crucial to Maintaining World Order,’’ Los Angeles Times, March 23, 2003. Posted at www.newamerican.century. org/global-032303.htm. 91. Ibid., p. 1. Sounding just like Perle, Odom and the others, Schmitt insists that ‘‘The unavoidable reality is that the exercise of American power is key to maintaining what peace and order there is in the world today. Imagine a world,’’ he boldly invites the reader, ‘‘in which the U.S. didn’t exercise this power.’’ 92. Gary Schmitt and Thomas Donnelly, ‘‘Arms and Taiwan: Our Interests Lie with Theirs,’’ Washington Post, April 23, 2000. Nearly two years later, Donnelly (now identified as PNAC deputy executive director) felt obliged to rebuff the ‘‘hysteria’’ of Chinese charges that the US seeks ‘‘unipolar hegemonism,’’ that is, a quest ‘‘to consolidate its position as the sole global hegemon.’’ Tom Donnelly, ‘‘China’s Persecution Complex: They Think We’re using September 11 to Encircle Them,’’ The Weekly Standard, February 4, 2002, pp. 19, 20. 93. Rebuilding America’s Defenses, op. cit., p. iv. Elsewhere, the authors speak similarly of ‘‘America’s global leadership, and its role as the guarantor of the current great-power peace y’’ (p. 5). 94. See Tom Donnelly, ‘‘Preserving Pax Americana: Defense Reform for the Unipolar Moment,’’ Outlook, Ideas for the Future from the Hudson Institute, 3 (1), January 2001. 95. ‘‘The current world situation,’’ Kagan writes, ‘‘assigns America a central and indispensable role in the establishment and preservation of peace.’’ Donald Kagan, ‘‘Reaction to ‘Bush’s Real Goal in Iraq,’ ’’ op. cit., p. 3. The reference to ‘‘indispensability’’ is an obvious allusion to the reference, by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, to the United States as ‘‘the indispensable nation.’’ Neoconservatives often cite this line as one of the few nuggets of truth to have emerged from the Clinton years. 96. Rebuilding America’s Defenses, op. cit., p. iv.

130

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

97. Ibid., p. 1. The implication seems to be that, if Reagan was playing the part of Julius Caesar in the formative days of the American peace, then George W. Bush has the chance to play his Augustan successor. That would make Bush, not Bush II, but Reagan II. 98. Donnelly, ‘‘Preserving Pax Americana,’’ January 2001, op. cit., pp. 2, 3. As Max Boot argues in a recent book, preserving Pax Americana does indeed require ‘‘savage wars.’’ Donnelly agrees wholeheartedly, in a fulsome review of Boot’s book, which he describes as nothing less than ‘‘An Imperial Manual’’; see Donnelly, ‘‘The Past as Prologue: An Imperial Manual,’’ Foreign Affairs, July–August 2002. 99. See Augustine’s sharp moral-political critique of the pretensions of the Pax Romana, which, he argued, had been extolled to justify untold suffering under the hypocritical aegis of a ‘‘peace’’ which served only its Roman masters; his position, which ascribed Roman rule in part to the libido dominandi, clearly prefigured twentieth-century realism in many respects, as Niebuhr and many others have noted. On this, see Jean Bethke Elshtain’s excellent summary in Augustine and the Limits of Politics (Notre Dame, 1995, pp. 105ff.). 100. In what follows I rely extensively on two standard sources, which I will cite under abbreviated titles. These are Otto von Gierke, Political Theories of the Middle Age (Boston, [1883] 1958), which I cite as Political Theories; and A. J. and R. W. Carlyle, A History of Mediæval Political Theory in the West, Vols. 1–6 (Edinburgh & London, 1903–1936), which I cite as Medieval Political Theory (A. J. Carlyle, by the way, is the sole author of Vols. 1–4). 101. Some of the subtlest writing on these themes was produced over a millenium after Ulpian by Marsilius of Padua and Johannes Wyclif. For details, see the survey by Charles Howard McIlwain, The Growth of Political Thought in the West (New York, 1936); Marsilius with John of Jandun, Defensor Pacis; and Wycliffe’s treatises De Civili Dominio and De Dominio Divino. ‘‘What does Wycliffe mean by ‘dominium’? It must first be observed that he sometimes uses it with reference to political authority, sometimes to property.’’ Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 57. 102. For a useful survey of Roman property law in the wider context of Roman law per se, see Rudolf Sohm, The Institutes of Roman Law, fourth edition (New York, 1892), pp. 225ff. 103. Rudolf Sohm, The Institutes of Roman Law, op. cit., p. 231. 104. Ibid., p. 259. 105. Other kinds of ‘‘natural acquisition’’ are subsidiary: for example, occupatio (occupying something that belongs to no one) or usucapio (acquiring ownership via continuous possession). Sohm identifies still another form of natural acquisition, legacy, which is even more clearly a tributary of traditio. As the willed but informal transfer of posthumous ownership, legacy is a subset of willed informal transfer per se. See ibid., pp. 234–238. 106. All the usual categories of ownership were applied to rulership. Rights of dominium were clearly distinguished from rights of usus immediatus, as in rental or lease agreements. Ownership was divided into dominium directum and the more limited dominium utile. A similar distinction was drawn between the possession of powers habitu (by right) and the possession of powers actu (in practice). 107. A Latin near-synonym for translatio (transferre) was used by many writers, including the fifteenth-century church lawyer ‘‘Panormitanus,’’ Nicholaus de Tudeschis.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

131

108. A third major subtype – conditional sale or mancipatio – played a lesser conceptual role in subsequent political thinking. Other, lesser forms of translatio included the magisterial grant (assignatio), award (addictio), and judicial award (adjudicatio). 109. See Werner Goez, Translatio Imperii (Tu¨bingen, 1958), pp. 4ff. The reference to Gierke is from Harold Berman’s Law and Revolution: The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition (Cambridge, MA, 1983), p. 217. 110. Gierke wrote two systematic works on the idea of popular sovereignty, Die deutsche Genossenschaft (of which Part 11 of Vol. 3 is available under the title Political Theories of the Middle Ages, op. cit.) and Johannes Althusius, 1880, which is available as The Development of Political Theory (New York, 1939). The former is a goldmine of data on medieval politics; the latter carries the story beyond the sixteenth century. A. J. and R. W. Carlyle, also cited above, are perhaps even more informative than Gierke but are less sensitive to technical questions of language and concept. Few others have yet given this topic more than cursory attention. 111. Reinhard Bendix, Kings or People: Power and the Mandate to Rule (Berkeley & London, 1978), p. 25. A point very much like this one was central to Gierke’s argument about the German Genossenschaft. Marx was also deeply impressed by the ‘‘primitive communism’’ of the early Germans; he placed great value on the evidence presented both by Tacitus and by the historian Maurer. 112. This is the main thesis of Hendrik Wagenvoort’s Imperium, which his translator retitled Roman Dynamism (Oxford, 1947). The wider applicability of this point is brilliantly argued by Arthur Maurice Hocart in Kings and Councillors: An Essay in the Comparative Anatomy of Human Society (Chicago, [1936] 1970). 113. Max Weber, Economy and Society, Vol. 1 (Berkeley, [1922] 1978), pp. 408–409. Note, too, that the legal idea of ownership has deep roots in the idea of spirit–possession. It is not an accident that the most important word for legal sale, alienatio, derived from the Greek ekstasis, which denotes the departure of the spirit from the body when an alien spirit enters; on this, see Nathan Rotenstreich, Alienation: The Concept and its Reception (Leiden, 1989). Note also that, in the Crito, Socrates refers to the nomos (the laws) as spirits much like the Roman numina. 114. Jane F. Gardner, ‘‘Introduction,’’ in J. F. Gardner, ed., Leadership and the Cult of the Personality (London & Toronto, 1974), p. xxix. In Durkheimian terms, Augustus was the ‘‘principal’’ of the Roman state rites as well as the agent of prime political rights. 115. See Le´on Duguit, Law in the Modern State (New York, 1919), p. 2. An early expression of an idea of this kind (later viewed by the Holy Roman emperors as a kind of founding precedent) was the Vulgate version of a line in the Book of Daniel, ‘‘Dominus transfert regna atque constituit.’’ See Werner Goez, op. cit., p. 5. 116. ‘‘The Principate’’ had evolved first (under Hadrian) into ‘‘the Monarchy,’’ and then – under Diocletian and Constantine – into ‘‘the Dominate.’’ 117. There were other dimensions to the religious legitimation of the Roman emperors as well. These fell, as Max Weber indicated, into a pattern typical of patrimonial states of this kind: ‘‘Wherever the patrimonial rule of the royal household developed, the ancestors, the numina, genii or personal gods of that most powerful household took place beside the domestic gods belonging to subject households and thus lent a religious sanction to the position of the ruler. This was the case in the

132

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

Far East, as in China, where the emperor as high priest monopolized the cult of the supreme spirits of nature. The sacred role of the genius of the Roman ruler (princeps), which resulted in the universal reception of the person of the emperor into the lay cult, was calculated to produce similar results.’’ See Economy and Society, Vol. 1, p. 412. 118. Jane F. Gardner, ‘‘Introduction,’’ in J. F. Gardner, op. cit., p. xxx. 119. Cited in Reinhard Bendix, Kings or People, op. cit., p. 31. 120. Political Theories, p. 6. 121. Charlemagne was a defender of the Church, but the later empire was less friendly. An occasional pope might still speak boldly – e.g., Nicholas 1 (858–867) – but otherwise the evidence of real papal decline was all too apparent. 122. Political Theories, p. 1. 123. See, e.g., the chapter ‘‘Revolution’’ in Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity: Prophecy and Order (Arlington Heights, 1968), pp. 113–133. 124. Harold Berman, Law and Revolution, op. cit., p. 50. 125. The nineteenth-century historian Ferdinand Gregorovius conveys this point in melodramatic tones. ‘‘Gregory was the heir of the ancient aims of the papacy. But his unexampled genius as ruler and statesman is his own, and no one, either in ancient Rome or in modern times, has ever attained to his revolutionary daring. This monk did not shrink from the thought of overthrowing the order of things existing in Europe, in order to raise the papal throne upon its ruins,’’ etc. See Gregorovius, Rome and Medieval Culture: Selections from History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages, 1871 (Chicago and London, 1971), pp. 111–112. For more recent and restrained accounts – which do, nevertheless, echo Gregorovius in substance – see Wilhelm Wu¨hr, Studien zu Gregor VII (Munich and Freising, 1930), and A. J. MacDonald, Hildebrand (London, 1932). 126. Gregorovius gives a graphic if characteristically picturesque account of Gregory’s conquest of the city of Rome; see ibid., pp. 106–107. 127. For details on the Roman jurists, see Rudolf Sohm, The Institutes of Roman Law, op. cit., pp. 62ff. Sohm considers Papinian, a Greek who served Marcus Aurelius, to have been the greatest of the jurisconsults; his Canaanite pupil, Ulpian, codified the ideas which Papinian and his precursors had established. 128. Berman, op. cit., p. 200. 129. See, e.g., Rudolf Sohm, Die altkatholische Kirchenrecht und das Dekret Gratians (Leipzig, 1914). Sohm’s claim about the non-bureaucratic, spiritual unity of the Roman and early medieval church is clearly kindred, in a way, to Gierke’s claim about the spirit of fellowship in the Germanic Genossenschaft. For both Sohm and Gierke, it seems, hierarchy arose with the superimposition of Roman law. 130. Gregory VII, Dictatus Papæ, in S. Ehler and J. Morrall, Church and State through the Centuries (London, 1954), p. 43. 131. For a fascinating portrait of Accursius as a precursor of absolutism, see Brian Tierney, ‘‘ ‘The Prince is not Bound by the Laws.’ Accursius and the Origins of the Modern State,’’ Comparative Studies in Society and History: An International Quarterly, 5 (4), July, 1963. 132. Montaigne indicated their stature, and their omnipresence in sixteenth century debate, when he wrote: ‘‘We doubted of Ulpian, and are now perplexed with Bartolus and Baldus.’’ Cited by C. N. S. Woolf, Bartolus of Sassoferrato (Cambridge,

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

133

1913) on the title page. Woolf’s book is a treasure trove of subtle reasoning on popular sovereignty and the translation of authority. 133. Manegold’s Tract against Wenrich (1085) is discussed at length by Gierke, Carlyle, and several specialists, including Georg Koch, Manegold von Lautenbach und die Lehre von der Volkssouvera¨nita¨t unter Heinrich IV, 1902 (Lu¨beck, 1965). See also Gierke’s sources, P. Ewald, Forsch. zur Deut. Gesch., vol. 16, pp. 383–385; extracts in Floto, Heinrich IV, vol. II, pp. 299–303, and information in v. Giesebrecht, Magister Manegold v. Lautenbach, Sitzungsberichte der Bair. Akad. 1868, II, pp. 297–326 y [and] F. v. Bezold, ‘‘Die Lehre von der Volkssouvera¨nita¨t wa¨hrend des Mittelalters,’’ Hist. Zeitschr. vol. 36, 1876, pp. 340ff. 134. Key figures in this phase included the papal extremist Innocent IV (1243–1254): Aquinas (d. 1274); Tholemy of Lucca, author of De regimine principium (c. 1298), who continued the work of Aquinas; Aegidius Colonna (1247–1315); Boniface VIII (1294–1303); Dante Alighieri, author of De Monarchia (1300); Augustinus Triumphus, the author of the Summa de potestate ecclesiastica (1320–1328); Marsilius of Padua (d. after 1342), who wrote the famous Defensor Pacis around 1325 (with John of Jandun); the polymathic Franciscan, William of Occam (d. 1347); Alvarius Pelagius, another contemporary of Marsilius and Occam; Lupold of Bebenburg (d. 1363), whose De jure regni et imperii appeared around 1339; and Petrarch (1304–1374). 135. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. x. 136. Key figures in this debate included Johannes Wycliff (1324–1387), Johannes Gerson (1363–1429), Johannes Hus (1373–1415), and Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464). For accounts of these debates, see the many books of Walter Ullman, including Medieval Papalism: The Political Theories of the Medieval Canonists (London, 1949); The Growth of Papal Government in the Middle Ages (London, 1955 – a study of ‘‘the hierocratic idea,’’ with extensive analysis of Hildebrand and his heirs); and Principles of Government and Politics in the Middle Ages (New York, 1966). See also Michael Wilks, The Problem of Sovereignty in the Later Middle Ages (Cambridge, 1963), a massive study of Augustinus Triumphus, and Francis Oakley, Natural Law, Conciliarism, and Consent in the Late Middle Ages (London, 1984). 137. The first of these quotes is from Pierre Docke`s, Medieval Slavery and Liberation (Chicago & London, 1982), pp. 104–105. The second is cited by Docke`s from P. Bonnassie, ‘‘De l’Esclavagisme.’’ 138. Fritz Kern, Kingship and Law in the Middle Ages (Oxford, [1914] 1968), pp. 107–108. Kern’s is a superb account of ‘‘the divine right of kings and the right of resistance in the early Middle Ages.’’ 139. Docke`s, op. cit., pp. 107, 110. 140. Max Weber conveys the sense of this concisely: ‘‘In the Occident authority was set against authority, legitimacy against legitimacy, one office charisma against the other, yet in the minds of rulers and ruled the ideal remained the unification of both political and hierocratic power’’ (Economy and Society, Vol. 2, p. 1193). In theory, the Augustinian argumentum unitatis had won the day; in fact, however, Christendom was deeply divided. ‘‘All in all,’’ says Weber, ‘‘the specific roots of Occidental culture must be sought in [this] tension and peculiar balance y At least from a sociological viewpoint, the Occidental Middle Ages were much less of a unified culture (Einheits-kultur) than the Egyptian, Tibetan and Jewish cultures after

134

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

the hierocracy’s victory, or than China since the triumph of Confucianism, Japan y since the victory of feudalism, Russia since the rise of caesaropapism and state bureaucracy, and Islam since the definite establishment of the caliphate and the prebendalization of domination; finally, even Hellenic and Roman culture were more unified than medieval Europe’’ (ibid., Vol. 2, pp. 1192–1193). 141. Political Theories, p. 6. 142. An absurd organicism ensued in which writers equated every social role to a part of the anatomy. Nicholas of Cusa went to medical extremes in this thankless task, and even Marsilius was not immune to the allure of organic metaphors. 143. Political Theories, p. 107, fn. 12. This is a citation from Tholemy of Lucca. 144. This was a phrase introduced by the Abbot Engelbert of Volkersdorf. The idea itself dates back at least to Gelasius and Augustine. 145. Cited by Gierke from the Summa Gloria de Apostolico et Augusto sive de præcellentia sacerdotii præ regno (J.-P. Migne, Patrologiæ Cursus Completus. Series Latina, Vol. 172, n.d., pp. 1263–1265). 146. Political Theories, p. 110, fn. 16. 147. In this, it seems, we anticipate one key theme of the Protestant reformation, which, if generalized (from emperor to empire), undermines the Church’s spiritual authority as well. The imperial version of the Gelasian idea, meanwhile, was ‘‘that the two swords are potestates distinctæ, that Sacerdotium and Imperium are two independent spheres instituted by God himself.’’ This argument rested on the claim that the imperium proceeds immediately from God and hence enjoys an inherent authority not derived from the church (imperium non dependet ab ecclesia). Prior to Gregory this had been Church doctrine as well. Henry IV commented on this in 1076, Wenrich argued similarly in 1083, and others followed suit. Most civilians and the earlier canonists echoed Henry, and Dante and Occam argued this point with minute subtlety: Dante asked whether God should be presumed to have given two fundamental directives, and Occam asked whether or not God would allow the unification of the two powers (Political Theories, pp. 38, 40). 148. Marc Bloch, The Royal Touch: Sacred Monarchy and Scrofula in England and France (London, [1924] 1973), p. 71. The original title conveys the focus and intent of Bloch’s book more clearly: Les rois thaumaturges: e´tude sur le caracte`re surnaturel attribue´ a` la puissance royale, particulie`rement en France et en Angleterre (Paris, 1924). 149. Gregory VII, letter to Hermann, Bishop of Metz, March 15, 1081; cited in The Royal Touch, p. 71. 150. Hugo a S. Victore (d. 1141), paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 110, from Migne’s collection. Honorius added that ‘‘it is by [the Pope’s] act of unction and coronation that the Emperor Elect first acquires imperial rights’’ (ibid., p. 32). Gierke quotes a characteristic passage from Honorius: ‘‘Imperator Romanus debet ab Apostolico eligi consensu principum et acclamatione plebis, in caput populi constitui, a Papa consecrari et coronari’’ (ibid., p. 117). This phrasing was echoed by Thomas a` Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury (1116–1170); Alexander Halensis (d. 1245); Aegidius Colonna; and Boniface VIII. It was systematized by Alvarius, who said that temporal lordship owes its origin to ‘‘sacerdotal consecration and unction’’ (paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 113, fn. 21). The result, Alvarius concluded, is that ‘‘the spiritual is efficient and final cause of the temporal power, and only in this way

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

135

has the otherwise sinful terrene realm a share in the sanctity of the celestial’’ (cited in Political Theories, pp. 110–111; translation emended). 151. ‘‘Who does not know,’’ he asked, ‘‘that kings and rulers took their beginning from those who, being ignorant of God, have assumed, because of blind greed and intolerable presumption, to make themselves master of their equals, namely men, by means of pride, violence, bad faith, murder and nearly every kind of crime, being incited y by the prince of this world, the Devil?’’ Cited in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 3, p. 94; the original Latin is cited in Political Theories, p. 109, fn. 16: ‘‘Quis nesciat reges et duces ab iis habuisse principium, qui Deum ignorantes, superbia, rapinis, perfidia, homicidiis, postremo universis sceleribus, mundi principe diabolo videlicet agistante, super pares, scilicet homines, dominari cæca cupiditate et intolerabili præsumtione affectaverunt?’’ See the discussion of this passage in Sabine’s history of political theory, pp. 234ff. Gregory’s incendiary Manichaeanism was a recurring theme of extremist papalism for many years. In the fourteenth century, e.g., Alvarius called lordship an institution diabolicum, while a century later Johannes Gerson called innate human sinfulness ‘‘the efficient cause of dominatio and of coercitivum dominium y’’ (paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 110, fn. 16.). Salisbury and others, meanwhile, blamed the Jews, calling all regna ‘‘iniquity’’ and tracing it to Saul. 152. Once, for example, he drew out the latent theocratic logic of the Gelasian ‘‘two swords’’ doctrine, saying, in Gierke’s words, that ‘‘Both swords had been given by God to Peter and through him to the Popes, who are to retain the spiritual sword, while the temporal they deliver to others. This delivery, however, will confer, not free ownership, but the right of an ecclesiastical office holder. As before the delivery, so afterwards, the Pope has utrumque gladium. He has both powers habitu, though only the spiritual power actu. The true ownership (dominium) of both swords is his, and what he concedes in the temporal sword is merely some right of independent use, which is characterized as usus immediatus, or perhaps as dominium utile.’’ Political Theories, pp. 13–14. For references, see Gierke, n. 22. John of Salisbury endorsed this view in his Policraticus, saying that the Church uses its temporal sword per principis manum (by the hand of the prince), to whom it has given this sword and from whom it can retake it. Anselm supported this view, and the popes Innocent III and IV and Boniface VIII made it official doctrine. Several emperors also accepted this view, including Otto IV, Frederick II, and Albert. Many canonists refused to relinquish this view even after the defeat of Boniface VIII had made the practical untenability of this view apparent. Augustinus Triumphus, for example, said in his Summa de potestate ecclesiastica (1328) that all regal authority is transferred from the pope (regnormum omnium translatio auctoritate papae facta fuit vel alicuius qui ipsum figurabat). Shortly afterwards, in the Aristotelian language favored at the time, Alvarius Pelagius argued concisely that ‘‘the Pope is always primum movens, even when the Prince is proximum movens.’’ (This was in 1332; Gierke cites Alvarius in Political Theories, p. 114, n. 22.) Many canonists wrote commentaries on these concepts, and ‘‘the arguments pro and con are collected by Occam, who distinguishes with exactitude various nice shades of the doctrine ‘Imperium a Papa.’ ’’ Cf. Occam Octo quaestiones, 1339–1342. i. c. 2, 18–19 and c. 6–17; also see ii. c. 1–4, 12, 15, and c. 6–14; viii. c. 1; Dialogus iii. tr. 2, l. i, c. 18–25. Aristotle’s Politics had been translated into Latin by William of Moerbeke in the 1260s, a fact of great

136

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

importance for his contemporary, Aquinas, and for many of the great fourteenth century jurists, including Marsilius, Occam, Bartolus, and Baldus. 153. Political Theories, p. 15. Many canonists elaborated this viewpoint. Tholemy, Augustinus, and Alvarius, for example, assigned the church the right to revise or cancel any existing methods or results of worldly election. ‘‘Augustinus and Alvarius say straight out that y if the Emperor is chosen by the Prince-Electors, this is a practice which rests solely upon a concession which the Pope has made and might for good cause revoke. It is he that is and remains the true Imperial Elector’’ (ibid., p. 31). In line with this principle, the popes Innocent IV and Clement V (1305–1314) insisted that in the event of a ‘‘vacancy or if the temporal ruler neglects his duties, the immediate guardianship of the empire falls to the Pope’’ (ibid., p. 33). By acting on this principle, Clement V prompted the ‘‘deposed’’ Emperor Ludwig of Bavaria to retaliate by naming a pope of his own. A long quarrel between pope and ‘‘anti-pope’’ ensued. On this, Gierke cites several sources, notably Ho¨fler’s Kaiserthum und Papsthum (Prague, 1862) and Aus Avignon (Prague, 1868). The relevant writings of Innocent III are collected in Migne’s Patrologiæ Cursus Completus, op. cit., Vol. 5, pp. 214–217. 154. A second ‘‘historical’’ claim – that the empire had been ‘‘translated’’ from Byzantium to the west by the Church – was advanced by Gregory VII and made canonical by Innocent III. The main principle of this claim was that the Pope ‘‘for good cause may y withdraw and confer the Imperium from and upon peoples and individuals; and indeed it was by his plenitude of power that the Imperium was withdrawn from the Greeks and bestowed upon the Germans y’’ (ibid., pp. 28–29). See Gregory’s 1080 letter in Jaffe´, Bibliotheca rerum Germanicarium, II, Monumenta Gregoriana (Berol, 1865). The essence of this idea clearly derives from Roman jurisprudence; for details, see Goez, Translatio Imperii, op. cit., especially the excursus ‘‘ ‘Translatio imperii’ und Volkssouvera¨nita¨t,’’ pp. 386–393. Among those who supported Gregory’s claim were Bernard of Clairvaux (1091–1153) in his Epistolæ; Innocent III; Tholemy of Lucca; Landulfus de Colonna in De translatione imperii (c. 1310/1320); Konrad of Megenberg (1309–1374) in his Tractatus de translatione imperii (c. 1354); and the inquisitor Johannes a Turrecremata (Torquemada), d. 1468. Criticism of this idea came from Occam and Marsilius, who argued that the transfer of the empire from the Greeks to the Germans was effected by the people: ‘‘the consensus populi y was the true act of transfer, and the pope merely declared and executed the will of the people’’ (Political Theories, p. 41). In one of his Octo Quæstiones, Occam ‘‘argues that this was not done by the pope, but by the Roman people: it was to them that from the beginning the ‘Imperium’ belonged, and it was from them that the emperor received it, for they transferred their authority to him for the common good y’’ (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 49). 155. Another precedent was identified in the ‘‘contract made at Hebron between David and the people of Israel, and [in] a principle, proclaimed by the jurists, which told that, according to the jus gentium, every free people may set a superior over itself y’’ (Political Theories, p. 39; cf. p. 139). Gierke identifies Engelbert, Lupold, Occam, and Baldus as partisans of this argument. 156. This question, in turn, is linked to what theologians, after Irenaeus, called the ‘‘indelible character,’’ the character indelebilis, of office.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

137

157. Empirically, the public could recognize (that is, accept as valid) either the alienation theory or the concession theory – or choose, rather, to view the ruler as illegitimate. 158. Political Theories, p. 151, fn. 164. ‘‘See Sudendorf, Registr. II. 41. So also Baldus; but compare his Cons. v. c. 325–6.’’ 159. Cited in Kingship and Law, op. cit., p. 117. 160. Irnerius, Summa Codicis, paraphrased in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 2, p. 58. 161. Paraphrased in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 2, p. 59. The text of the relevant passage in the Corpus Juris reads as follows: ‘‘Quod principi placuit legis habet vigorem; utpote cum lege regia, quæ de imperio eius lata est, populus ei et in eum omne suum imperium et potestatem conferat’’ (cited in Political Theories, p. 142). Many glosses were written on this text. That of Innocent is concise: ‘‘y papa habet imperium a Deo, imperator a populo.’’ Dante, Occam, Lupold, Baldus, Aeneas, and Antonius Rosellus also wrote commentaries. 162. Only Aquinas and a small number of diplomatic centrists defended the idea that a carefully crafted balance could exist between prince and people, in which political power exists in ‘‘duplici modo.’’ Joannes Faber, a French civilian of the early fourteenth century, made a comic distinction, saying that the power to make general laws has been entirely alienated, but that the people retain some sovereignty over municipal laws (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 22). 163. Irnerius used the phrase ‘‘potestas translata est in imperatorum’’ in his gloss on Justinian’s digest. This is paraphrased in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 2, p. 60, fn. 1, from the classic by Karl von Savigny, Geschichte des Ro¨mischen Rechts im Mittelalter, Vol. 4, Chapter 27, fn. 49 (reprint edition, Aalen, 1986; Savigny was Gierke’s early nineteenth-century predecessor). 164. ‘‘Nam populus in principen transferendo communem potestatem, nullam sibi reservavit y’’ (cited in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 2, p. 61, fn. 1). 165. Gierke paraphrases Baldus as follows: ‘‘the translatio was an alienatio pleno jure; otherwise the Emperor would be, not dominus, but commissarius populi.’’ Baldus also said that, in principle, the prince is above the people (‘‘princeps major populo’’). See Political Theories, p. 150. 166. Political Theories, p. 43. This position was taken by Occam, Cinus and Zabarelli, among others. 167. Cited in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 2, p. 64, from Azo’s Summa Codicis, viii. 53. 6. Azo used the terms translata, transtulerat, concessa, and abdicaverit. A. J. Carlyle calls this ‘‘a passage of much importance: ... it carries much further the conception that all political authority ultimately rests with the people’’ (ibid., p. 65). Azo also adds that the Senate derives its authority from the people. This was an innovation. Although Gaius had intimated this, the jurisconsults had not otherwise made this plain. Azo thus generalized the idea of election in a way that now seems obvious, arguing that the election of Senators had become necessary thanks to the increasing size of the society and the resulting impossibility of assembling the people in immensum. 168. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 5, p. 66, digesting Distinctiones, 148.34, and Odofridus’ Commentary on Digest, i. 3, 32.

138

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

169. Paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 150. De Castro maintained, however, that the Church now ‘‘represented’’ the people in matters of this kind. 170. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 145; see Christophorous Porcius, Commentary on the Institutes (i. 2, 6, referring to Bartolus and others). 171. The important fifteenth-century canonist Zabarella, for example, argued that the Roman people retained the power of revocation since it was beyond them to make a law they could not revoke. This gives the idea of ‘‘inalienability’’ a literal meaning. Zabarella also contended ‘‘y that he had seen in the Church of the Lateran a brazen table which described the powers given [translatam] by the Roman Senate and people to Vespasian, and he says that it was clear from this tablet that the people had not transferred [translationem] all their power to the prince, but had retained the power of making laws y’’ (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, pp. 165–166). 172. Political Theories, pp. 39–40. Marsilius, Occam, Aeneas, and Nicholas of Cusa spoke of voluntary submission, which Nicholas called ‘‘voluntaria subjectionis et consensus’’ and ‘‘concordantia subjectionalis’’ (see Political Theories, pp. 142, 147). While it was acknowledged that conquest and coercion often play a role in the formation of rulership, it was often argued that legitimacy is possible even for such domination – courtesy of consent ex post facto! 173. This, clearly, is a big if unintended step in the direction of democracy. According to Manegold: ‘‘Nonne clarum est, merito illum a concessa dignitate cadere, populum ab eius dominio liberum existere, cum pactum pro quo constitutus est constat illum prius irupisse?’’ 174. ‘‘Societas is a contract whereby two or more persons bind themselves to the mutual performance of certain acts with a view to a common purpose, e.g., to carry on a business or make a journey in common’’ (Sohm, Institutes of Roman Law, op. cit., p. 313). 175. The phrase ‘‘dominio et subjectione’’ appears in a passage noted by Kern. 176. Manegold, Ad Gebehardum (written between 1080 and 1085); cited in George Sabine, A History of Political Theory (New York, 1937), p. 235, from Monumenta Germaniæ historica, 500–1500: Staatsschriften des spa¨teren Mittelalters (many volumes, many publication dates), Libelli de lite, Vol. 1, pp. 300ff. 177. Paraphrased in Kingship and Law, op. cit., p. 119. Kern emphasizes Manegold’s ‘‘crude violence’’ and ‘‘coarse fanaticism,’’ but he also makes it clear that Manegold’s views represented a vital turning point in political thought. 178. Cited from Ad Gebehardum in The Royal Touch, op. cit., p. 70. I would be interested to know how familiar the phrase ‘‘a fair wage’’ was at this time. 179. Paraphrased in Kingship and Law, pp. 119–120 (Kern reproduces the original passage in a note). Arnold of Brescia and his followers were so literal about the idea that the populus Romanus is the subject of ultimate sovereignty that in 1152 they tried to ‘‘claim for the city a right to bestow the vacated Empire’’ (Political Theories, p. 41). See Gregorovius, op. cit., for details. 180. The Royal Touch, pp. 70–71. 181. Cited in Political Theories, p. 148. 182. Marsilius, in 1325, disputed the very divinity of the papacy – a step logically akin to Manegold’s but politically contrary. Marsilius found divinity only in the ruling bodies of the church, to which he subordinated the pope as an executive agent.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

139

Occam, who agreed, listed many objections to papal divinity. Similar objections were voiced by Wyclif, Nilus, Randuf, and Hus. See the work by Nilus, Archbishop of Thessalonica, De primatu Papæ Romani, 1438; cf. Randuf, De modis uniendi ac reformandi ecclesiam in concilio universali, 410; and Hus in the same year, Determinatio de ablatione temporalium a clericis. Torquemada led the opposition in the name of the sacred papacy, denouncing popular sovereignty as ‘‘radically false and impossible.’’ 183. Political Theories, p. 42. Delegation is also a kind of translatio – sovereignty goes first to the delegate or delegates (the Prince-Electors or the Pope) and then proceeds from these Electors or the Pope to the ultimate Sovereign. Like any other translatio, delegation too can be a form of either concession or alienation. 184. Marsilius, paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 146. 185. Paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 47. 186. Marsilius, paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 47. 187. Summarized in Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 46. 188. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 49. Occam denies that, hitherto, the pactum subjectionis has resulted in the self-enslavement of the people, but he concedes the possibility. Marsilius also decried the ‘‘slavish dominion’’ of the pope, and wondered aloud about ‘‘excessive obedience on the part of Christians.’’ Defensor Pacis, I, XII, 6, p. 47. Many others argued similarly, saying that, when kings grow tyrannical, it is appropriate to revoke their powers (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 5, p. 67). Andreas de Isernia and Jacobus Butrigarius were prominent among the civilians who argued in this way. Bartolus noted these positions and also the similar views of Martin Silimani, a thirteenth-century jurist, and William of Cuneo, an early fourteenth-century jurist (see ibid., Vol. 6, p. 17, and compare the phrase by Butrigarius: ‘‘revocata jurisdictione translata in principem,’’ Vol. 6, p. 23). Salisbury, Occam, and Jean Petit defended the right to rebellion, even tyrannicide. Wyclif agreed, saying that the people are entitled to correct a delinquent master at their pleasure. Wyclif: ‘‘populares possunt ad suum arbitrium dominos deliquentes corrigere’’; see Political Theories, p. 152, fn. 167. 189. Gierke summarizes: ‘‘In his eyes, all earthly power proceeded, like man himself, primarily from God (principaliter a Deo); but a God-inspired will of the community was the organ of this divine manifestation. It is just in the voluntary consent of the governed that a government displays its divine origin: tunc divina censetur, quanto per concordantiam communem a subjectis exoritur. Therefore all jurisdictio and administratio are based upon electio and upon a freely willed transfer of power made by the community or its majority or representatives. There is no rightful and holy species dominandi that is not founded per viam voluntariæ subjectionis et consensus in præsidentium prælationes concordantiales y. The function of making laws [legislatio] is by its very nature reserved for the community, since all the obligatory force of laws proceeds from the express or silent consensus of those who are to be bound. Therefore, the ruler is also bound by the laws. He only receives jurisdictio and administratio within the scope of his mandate. Even in his jurisdiction and administration he is subject to constant supervision, and, in case he transgresses the limits of his power, he may be judged and deposed by the people. And all this is imprescriptible and inalienable right bestowed by the law of God and Nature’’ (Political Theories, pp. 47–48).

140

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

190. Views like this became common in the fifteenth century. Nicholas was echoed by Gerson, Zabarella, and Randuf. Though it had been common before to argue that the pope’s authority exceeded that of even the broadest council of cardinals, there had also been a tradition identifying auctoritas consiliorum as one of the sources of papal power. 191. Political Theories, p. 146, emphasis mine. Similar points are made by a variety of writers. James Almain agreed, saying that ‘‘God gives the power to the communitas in order that this power may be transferred to the Ruler’’ (De auct. eccl. c. I., paraphrased in Political Theories, p. 146). Similarly, John of Paris said that ‘‘the people make and God inspires’’ (populo faciente et Deo inspirante). Cynus of Pistoia, the teacher of Bartolus, held ‘‘that the ‘imperium’ is from God, but ... that this is not inconsistent with the principle that the prince was created by the lex regia ...’’ In a nutshell, that is, ‘‘the emperor derives his authority from the people [but] the imperium is from God’’ (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 13; this paraphrases Cynus, Commentary on the Digest). The Spanish Dominican Franciscus Victoria later argued that while potestas emanates from God, authority is transferred from the people; see his Relationes de Potestate Civili, viii. Plainly, God is central to this theory, but effective action is credited to the public. 192. The legal debate over whether sovereignty has been granted to the ruler permanently or conditionally focused entirely on questions of right. Few if any of the debaters cast doubt on the idea that the people have the power to reclaim sovereignty; the bitterly contested issue was whether they have the right to reclaim this power. The ancient conception was that this right was ‘‘natural,’’ self-evident. The issue of power per se tended to be raised in the form that Marsilius gave it, namely, that the size of the populace simply makes it difficult for ‘‘the people’’ to act ‘‘as a body.’’ 193. If we say, instead, that servitude is involuntary – that the ruling powers of society spring not from consent but from purely objective external sources – these ruling powers could be said to be forever unconquerable. If coercion or structural limits on popular power endow rulers with powers entirely independent of the will of the people, then changes in the popular will would be of utter inconsequence. Sovereignty, defined in Bodin’s phrase as ‘‘that absolute and perpetual power vested in a commonwealth,’’ would rest inalienably with an autocrat. See Jean Bodin, Six Books of the Commonwealth (Oxford, [1578] 1955), p. 25. 194. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 3. ‘‘y the normal conception of the Middle Ages was that law is the custom or the declared will of the whole community’’ (ibid., Vol. 5, p. 64). 195. Note the intriguing related point made by Franz Alexander and Hugo Staub about the ‘‘constitutional’’ premises of psychoanalytic theory, which they portray as a kind of psychic social contract theory. ‘‘People, according to this theory, seek to establish equilibrium between the demands of the id and the pressures of the superego; and they make a concession to the social order. Albeit reluctantly, they renounce instinctual needs, hoping for compensatory gratification. But they retain the ‘right of revolution’ (as in the Declaration of Independence); and, when gratification (justice) is not forthcoming, they consider the contract broken. Instinctive drives then operate without restraint.’’ Paraphrased by Don Haussdorf in Erich Fromm (New York, 1972), pp. 21–22, from F. Alexander and H. Staub, The Criminal, the

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

141

Judge, and the Public (New York, 1928). Franz Alexander was a leading psychoanalyst and a prime mover in the founding of psychosomatic medicine. 196. Kingship and Law, op. cit., p. 86. A Germanic king could be deposed for many reasons: above all ‘‘lawlessness,’’ but also ‘‘bodily or mental incapacity, cowardice or political ineptitude, defective kin-right or the lack of other legitimation, and even the anger of the gods as manifested in bad harvests or military failings.’’ Kern adds: ‘‘A formal condemnation of the monarch by legal proceedings was unknown. The people simply abandoned their king; they absolved themselves from obedience, and chose a new ruler’’ (p. 86). 197. Kingship and Law, p. 87. As Hilton notes, the parties to the oath of fealty ‘‘y were bound together vertically by ties of loyalty, support and dependence sometimes described by the term ‘vassalage’ y The ‘classic’ form of the relation between lord and vassal in feudal Europe was that which involved the vassal’s doing homage and swearing an oath of fealty to the lord, in return for which he received a fief (feodum) from the lord y’’ Rodney Hilton, Bond Men Made Free (New York, 1973), p. 45. The vassal, who was often a minor notable, owed the lord military service, garrison duty in his castle, and emergency monetary help when needed. The lord, in turn, owed the vassal legal and military support and patronage for his sons. 198. Kingship and Law, pp. 87–88, 89. 199. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 10. ‘‘The position of Aegidius Colonna is, as we have said, remarkable, and different from the normal medieval tradition’’ (Vol. 5, p. 77). 200. Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 5, p. 74. Aegidius also agrees that tyrants can be legitimately deposed. John of Paris, a partisan of Philip the Fair against Pope Boniface VIII, used this distinction to argue (a´ la Wenrich) that the royal power springs directly from God (not from God via the pope). Even on this basis, though, it was never said that the royal power is absolute. Far more typical were legalistic claims like those of Nicholas of Cusa, who divided ‘‘rule’’ into legislatio, administratio and jurisdictio (judgement in disputes), saying that only administration and jurisdiction are transferred to the ruler. A similar point was made by Pillius in the late twelfth century: namely, that a prince can free slaves, ennoble the humble, legitimize the illegitimate, enrich the poor, and interpret the laws; but that he may not annul a sale, confer a monopoly, or enact laws contrary to established law (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 2, p. 71). 201. ‘‘[Marsilius was not] setting out some new and revolutionary democratic doctrine, but is rather expressing, even if in rather drastic and unqualified terms, the normal judgment and practice of the Middle Ages: he represents not the beginning of some modern and revolutionary doctrine, but the assertion of traditional principles’’ (Medieval Political Theory, Vol. 6, p. 9). My sense is that this overstates the point. 202. Political Theories, p. 123. 203. Ibid. At the Councils of Paris and Worms of 829, kingship was called a ‘‘ministerium a Deo commissum’’ (ibid., p. 141). Manegold used the phrase vocabulum officii, and many others reiterated this idea, including Dante. Salisbury, Aquinas, Tholemy, Engelbert, Occam, and Dante were among the writers who stressed the anti-authoritarian implications of this precept. Occam argued that ‘‘the best form of government y should promote the liberty and exclude the slavery of the subjects’’ (ibid., p. 142). Occam, like Dante and Marsilius, was pro-imperial but not absolutist.

142

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

204. The full titles of these books, respectively, are: Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., Taming the Prince: The Ambivalence of Modern Executive Power (New York, 1989); Mark Blitz and William Kristol, eds., Educating the Prince: Essays in Honor of Harvey Mansfield (Lanham, 2000); and Carnes Lord, The Modern Prince: What Leaders Need to Know Now (New Haven & London, 2003). Kristol and Steven Lenzner, in a 2003 article called ‘‘What was Leo Strauss up to?’’ (Public Interest, Fall), point out that Machiavelli was ‘‘one of only two thinkers’’ whom Strauss viewed as a ‘‘problem’’ (the other was Socrates). But they say almost nothing about Strauss’s specific view of Machiavelli, other than to note, blandly, that Strauss regarded Thoughts on Machiavelli as a contribution ‘‘towards the recovery of permanent problems.’’ Clearly, more could have been said. See http:// www.thepublicinterest.com/archivs/2003fall/article1.htm. 205. In the account that follows, my focus is not on Machiavelli per se, but on Machiavelli as interpreted by Strauss. Hence, to the extent that ‘‘Strauss’s Machiavelli’’ parallels the actual Machiavelli, this is also a report on Machiavelli. But my main concern is the Straussian notion of the modern executive, and for that purpose it is convenient to view Machiavelli exclusively through the Straussian lens. Therefore, all quotes in the next section, unless explicitly credited to Machiavelli, are Strauss speaking as Machiavelli’s expositor. The phrase ‘‘Strauss’s Machiavelli,’’ meanwhile, is taken from the title of a famous 1975 essay by Mansfield, ‘‘Strauss’s Machiavelli,’’ Political Theory 3 (4), November 1975. See also the criticism of Strauss, and Mansfield, by J. G. A. Pocock, ‘‘Prophet and Inquisitor: Or, a Church Built Upon Bayonets Cannot Stand: A Comment on Mansfield’s ‘Strauss’s Machiavelli,’ ’’ Political Theory, 3 (4), November 1975. Pocock’s sharp attack on Strauss appears to have been motivated, in part, by the wish to defend Machiavelli from Strauss’s relentlessly anti-republican interpretation; that is, to save Machiavelli from Strauss, to defend Machiavelli’s ‘‘republican and patriotic’’ honor. See ibid., p. 398. 206. One of the eccentricities of this text is Strauss’s attempt, in the chapters before his discussion of Machiavelli’s politics, to find a numerological key to what he believes is Machiavelli’s esoteric message. Pocock is just one of many who find this puzzling. 207. Thoughts on Machiavelli, p. 232. For now, plainly, this is novelty enough. 208. Ibid., p. 208. Strauss adds that one of the rare occasions when Machiavelli refers to God is in connection with the slogan Vox Populi, Vox Dei (p. 209). 209. Ibid., pp. 222, 280, 290. 210. See ibid., pp. 278, 281, 287. 211. Ibid., p. 260. 212. Ibid., pp. 252–253. 213. Ibid., p. 253. Fifteen pages later Strauss refers, even more strikingly, to ‘‘the almost infinite malleability of [human] ‘matter’ and the almost infinite power of ‘brain’ y’’ (p. 268). 214. Strauss’s insensitivity on this subject, I will argue shortly, is indicative of a certain utopianism and capacity for contradiction on his part, which is reflected in the predilections of contemporary Straussians more generally. 215. That is why, to offer another example, Machiavelli praised the Roman nobility for being ‘‘shrewd enough to realize that it serves its own interest best by restraining its desire to command and by making judicious concessions to the plebs’’ (p. 270). What the nobles wanted from the plebs, he continues, was their cooperation

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

143

in wars of conquest against neighboring peoples. To win dominion over other peoples, they realized that they needed to share this dominion to some small extent with their own lower orders: As Strauss puts it: ‘‘What made the Roman nobility tolerably humane towards the plebs was,’’ besides fear that the plebs would accept the blandishments of a tyrant, ‘‘calculation of the profitable character of cooperation with the plebs at the expense of foreign cities y’’ (p. 270). 216. Ibid., p. 264. Strauss amplifies Machiavelli’s point: ‘‘The people wishes to be certain that its rulers are fully dedicated to the common good and in no way prompted by ambition, to say nothing of avarice.’’ That is why, ‘‘in order to rule them, the great men must somehow conform to the people’s notion of goodness: they must appear to be free from selfish desires’’ (p. 264). 217. Ibid., p. 255. In fact, Machiavelli believed, the public may well prefer a tyrant to an oppressive nobility. 218. Ibid., p. 271. 219. Ibid., pp. 271–272. See, e.g., what Strauss reports concerning Machiavelli’s view of Manlius Capitolinus, ‘‘who sought supreme glory without considering the ‘matter’ with which he had to deal; his unwise cupidity to reign, his blindness of mind led to failure’’ (p. 251). 220. Ibid., p. 273. 221. Ibid., p. 272. Successful conspiracies, like tyrannies, acquire iconic virtues in the public eye, effacing their bloody roots, Machiavelli thinks. Their successes can be so spectacular that ‘‘their very notoriety contributes to the extinction of their criminality and may carry with them rewards surpassing by far the rewards to be hope for from any other action’’ (p. 195). 222. Ibid., p. 251. 223. It is an open question whether this can be squared with Strauss’s previously cited assertion that Machiavelli substitutes the notion of chance for teleological notions of nature and law. Plainly, Machiavelli’s ‘‘nature’’ is not as obviously teleological as traditional natural-law theories. But readers will have to judge for themselves whether or not Machiavelli’s ‘‘natural necessity’’ of ambition and avarice conceals a latent teleology. The following passage from Strauss is pertinent: ‘‘Machiavelli’s praise of necessity, which surpasses in emphasis everything he says in praise of choice, would be untenable if he had not seen his way toward conceiving of ambition y as a form of that necessity which makes men operate well.’’ Self-aggrandizing ambition, he adds, arises for Machiavelli ‘‘with necessity as soon as the primary wants are satisfied and exerts a compulsory power’’ (p. 251). 224. Ibid., pp. 255–256. 225. Ibid., p. 239. 226. Ibid., p. 240. Strauss adds, interestingly: ‘‘Or, if one prefers, one may say that true liberality or the virtue of giving consists in giving away what one has taken from strangers or enemies; the virtue of liberality is grounded in the vice of rapacity: the model prince Cyrus was liberal only in this sense.’’ 227. Ibid., p. 260. 228. Ibid., p. 260. 229. Ibid., p. 293. Xenophon, Strauss says, is Machiavelli’s preeminent teacher in the field of power politics. He leaves unexplored the question of who would count as Machiavelli’s main disciples.

144

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

230. That is, in some ways, what is most distinctive about ‘‘Machiavellianism,’’ which can be seen as the application of cynical raison d’etat not merely to other nations, but to ‘‘the people’’ itself. ‘‘For if deception is laudable and glorious when practiced against foreign enemies,’’ Strauss notes, ‘‘there is no reason that it should not be permissible against actual or potential domestic enemies of the fatherland, i.e., of the republic y’’ (p. 258). 231. Ibid., p. 217. Elswhere Strauss makes the same point coyly, with a sly wink. ‘‘The wise rulers who act with a view to their own benefit will enlist the cooperation of the ruled y in such activities as cannot but be detrimental to others. Since the many can never acquire the eternal glory which the great individuals achieve, they must be induced to bring the greatest sacrifices by the judiciously fostered belief in eternity of another kind’’ (p. 282). 232. This is particularly true in a republic, Machiavelli says, where the prince is less likely to rule by fear alone than in a principality. The details of this argument need not detain us, since we are focusing here on an avowed republic. But see Strauss, e.g., pp. 217, 266. 233. Ibid., p. 264. 234. Ibid., p. 263. ‘‘But this,’’ he adds, ‘‘would be an unbearable exaggeration.’’ 235. Prudence and strength, Strauss says, are not optional; ‘‘whereas in the case of the moral virtues it suffices for the prince to possess the appearance of them, in the case of prudence and strength of mind or will he needs the substance’’ (p. 242). 236. Ibid., pp. 189–190. For the strong, he adds, pride ‘‘must take the place of consciousness of guilt or sin.’’ 237. Theirs, it would seem, cannot be a telltale heartlessness. 238. Good conscience, in other words, is a luxury that only the weak and poor can afford, not the wealthy and powerful. This is true not only for paupers and princes, Strauss says, but more broadly as well: ‘‘If we look back to Machiavelli’s analysis of republics, we see at once that there is no essential difference between the motives of the prince and the motives of the ruling class’’ (ibid., p. 269). 239. Ibid., p. 259. Machiavelli adds that some men are ‘‘genuinely kind and humane, not from fear or calculation but by nature; yet,’’ Strauss adds, ‘‘he contends that such men when entrusted with high office can become a public menace’’ (p. 265). 240. Ibid., p. 278. He continues: ‘‘This difference of degree is of the utmost importance, as no one knew better than Machiavelli. But a difference of degree is not a difference of kind.’’ 241. Ibid., p. 274. Machiavelli does, however, manage to find what may be called (with apologies to Hegel) a kind of ‘‘cunning of avarice’’ in the chilly heart of Machtpolitik. He argues that ‘‘the desire for perpetual or immortal glory is the link between badness and goodness’’ (p. 286). His implication is that the prince, enamored of the glory of appearing to serve the common good, may actually seek to accomplish this. And even should this not prove to be the case, there is still a kind of grandeur in the quest for glory: ‘‘It liberates men,’’ Strauss summarizes, ‘‘from the desire for petty things – comfort, riches and honors – as well as from the fear of death’’ (p. 286). 242. The erudite Straussian Thomas Pangle observes that accounts of Strauss’s Machiavelli vary widely. Pangle cites two accounts in particular – one saying that Strauss took an ‘‘inquisitorial’’ stance toward Machiavellians, and another, a decade

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

145

later in the same journal, saying that Strauss used Machiavelli as his ‘‘mouthpiece’’ – both of which he views as evidence of ‘‘the height and thickness of the wall of hostile prejudice that blocks access to Strauss’s thought.’’ See Pangle’s introduction to The Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism: Essays and Lectures by Leo Strauss (Chicago & London, 1989), p. xi. I am not convinced that Pangle’s evidence proves his point about anti-Straussian hostility, but I agree that Strauss was neither a classic anti-Machiavellian nor a Machiavellian true believer. Strauss seems rather to have concluded that Machiavelli was, unhappily, largely right in some situations, and that the Cold War was one such situation. 243. Machiavelli’s ‘‘assertion that there is no good without its peculiar evil amounts to the absurdity that God cannot be the most perfect being because he lacks the specific excellences of which created beings are such are capable’’; ‘‘he analyses the political as if it were not ordered toward the supra-political or as if the suprapolitical did not exist’’ (ibid., p. 295). 244. ‘‘A stupendous contraction of the horizon appears to Machiavelli y as a wondrous enlargement of the horizon’’ (ibid., p. 295). 245. Ibid., p. 296. This rhetoric, Strauss says, can best be described as ‘‘accusatory and punitive.’’ 246. Ibid., p. 296. 247. ‘‘To recognize the diabolical character of Machiavelli’s thought would mean to recognize in it a perverted nobility of a very high order’’ (p. 13). Also ‘‘truly admirable in Machiavelli,’’ Strauss adds, is ‘‘the intrepidity of his thought, the grandeur of his vision, and the graceful subtlety of his speech’’ (p. 13). 248. For a much less oblique pledge of Cold War faith, see the dyspeptic ‘‘Epilogue’’ (pp. 203ff.) in a later book, Strauss’s Liberalism Ancient and Modern, foreword by Allan Bloom (Chicago, [1968] 1995). The passage of a decade and the rise of the New Left had made Strauss much less diplomatic than he had been in 1958. 249. Ibid., p. 298. 250. Ibid., p. 298. 251. Ibid., pp. 298–299. 252. Ibid., p. 299. These lines are from Strauss’s very final paragraph, which closes on an equally unsentimental note: ‘‘It would seem,’’ he writes in the penultimate line, ‘‘that the notion of the beneficence of nature or of the primacy of the Good must be restored by being rethought through a return to the fundamental experiences from which it is derived.’’ Whether ‘‘the primacy of the Good’’ would truly be restored, once it had been ‘‘rethought’’ in semi-Machiavellian terms with the nuclear arms race as its existential ground, may well be doubted. Could Strauss have believed this? 253. It is in the light of this point that Strauss’s remarks on Machiavelli’s notion of ‘‘honorable evil’’ are perhaps most relevant. If the good cannot be good, must they be ‘‘unqualifiedly evil?’’ Machiavelli answers No. Any prince or tyrant who commits a crime to obviate a greater evil is, in the classic sense of lesser-evil ethics, steering a course between vice and virtue. The best path for a prince, he suggests, is not virtue, but the ‘‘the mean between virtue and vice’’ (pp. 240–241). Whether this notion is coherent is beside the point, for our purposes; its interest lies, rather, in its possible exculpatory uses by Machtpolitiker who hesitate to embrace evil fully. 254. Wolfowitz, ‘‘Statesmanship in the New Century,’’ op. cit., p. 316. Wolfowitz gives no source or page reference here.

146

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

255. For a direct Mansfieldian appreciation of Reagan, see Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., America’s Constitutional Soul (Baltimore & London, 1991). The title of Chapter 5 conveys the flavor of the volume: ‘‘The 1988 Election: Another Reagan Triumph.’’ 256. Robert Eden, ‘‘Executive Power and the Presidency,’’ Leo Strauss, the Straussians, and the American Regime (Lanham, MD, 1999), p. 352. 257. Thoughts on Machiavelli, op. cit., p. 14. The murder of Remus might, in a way, qualify as an early instance of ‘‘execution.’’ 258. Mansfield’s chapter on Machiavelli in Taming the Prince is a revised version of an essay published a year earlier, under the title ‘‘Machiavelli and the Modern Executive,’’ in Catherine H. Zuckert, ed., Understanding the Political Spirit: Philosophical Investigations from Socrates to Nietzsche (New Haven, 1988). My citations from Mansfield are drawn from this essay, rather than from the corresponding chapter in Taming the Prince. 259. ‘‘Machiavelli and the Modern Executive,’’ p. 296. 260. Ibid., pp. 296, 298. 261. Ibid., p. 298. 262. Mansfield does not romanticize this point. ‘‘Whereas in Aristotle,’’ he writes, ‘‘what is beyond law is above it, in Machiavelli what is beyond law is below it’’ (p. 297). But carnal motives are not to be disdained, since the world is carnal. ‘‘Higher’’ ideals, for Machiavelli, are but conventional pieties. 263. Ibid., p. 298. These, it would seem, are the seven habits of the highly effective executive. Machiavelli, seen in this light, is a kind of proto-management guru, akin to Stephen Covey; and there is something peculiarly apropos about this image, since, alongside the proud tough-mindedness of Mansfield’s Machtpolitik there is also a characteristically eager kind of ‘‘positive thinking.’’ Mansfield’s Machiavelli, like Straussian neo-Machiavellians in general, seems to have a touch of Norman Vincent Peale, Dale Carnegie like Donald Trump in its psychological make-up, a rah–rah nationalism and pom–pom idealisms alongside its Treitschkean cynicism. 264. Ibid., p. 302. 265. Ibid., p. 302; italics in the original. It is a curious law, of course, which accepts the help of illegal executions to sustain itself. Many would say, rather, that ‘‘law’’ in cases of this kind is rather a weapon of power, which illegality accepts to sustain itself. 266. Ibid., p. 299. 267. Ibid., p. 299. 268. Ibid., pp. 299, 300–301. 269. Ibid., p. 302. 270. Ibid., p. 302. 271. Ibid., p. 304. 272. Ibid., p. 302. 273. Ibid., p. 302, citing from Machiavelli. 274. See, e.g., pp. 303–306. 275. Ibid., p. 311. 276. Ibid., p. 307; and Machiavelli, cited on p. 307. 277. Ibid., p. 307. Strauss, it will be recalled, characterized the ‘‘noble rhetoric’’ which philosophy uses to bridge the gap between itself and the people as ‘‘accusatory or punitive.’’

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

147

278. Ibid., p. 311. 279. Ibid., p. 312. 280. Ibid., p. 309. 281. Robert Kraynak stresses that Mansfield, especially, is likely to arouse consternation among ‘‘modern democrats’’ for ‘‘statements ... that openly challenge the deepest prejudice of our age – the unexamined assumption that democracy based on human rights is the only legitimate form of government.’’ ‘‘The Care of Souls in a Constitutional Democracy,’’ in Educating the Prince (Lanham, MD, 2000), p. 275. Yet there is more than an echo of Strauss’s optimism about ruling the plebs in the premise that Kraynak finds at the bottom of Mansfield’s approach, namely, the notion of a constitutional regime ‘‘imposed’’ by a ‘‘ruling group’’: ‘‘Every constitutional regime,’’ Kraynak summarizes Mansfield, ‘‘whether it acknowledges the fact or not, is a ‘regime’ in the classical sense: a comprehensive social order imposed by a ruling group that reflects its views of the good life. As a regime, the constitution shapes the souls of its citizens in accordance with its ruling principle y’’ (ibid., p. 270). This practically reinvents Marx’s famed notion that the ruling ideas of the day tend to be the ideas of the ruling class. The difference is that Kraynak, like Strauss, considers this all to the good, and seeks to defend Mansfield from democratic critics who think otherwise. 282. Thoughts on Machiavelli, p. 314. 283. Ibid., p. 314. 284. Ibid., p. 314. 285. Ibid., p. 314. 286. ‘‘Our politics,’’ William Kristol adds, ‘‘will be a lot healthier if our politicians can be persuaded to read Carnes Lord’s engaging and penetrating book. And even if the politicians don’t take Lord to heart, we should, so we can learn how to select better leaders.’’ This blurb, like the opening clause of Mansfield’s quote, appears as ad copy on the dust jacket of Lord’s book (the full quotes appear on the publishers’ website). Mansfield is listed in both places as ‘‘Harvey Mansfield, Harvard University,’’ and Kristol is listed as ‘‘William Kristol, editor, The Weekly Standard.’’ Other paragraphs of praise come from a variety of Straussians and Reaganites, including Nathan Tarcov, Thomas Pangle, and Walter Mead Berns. The blurb from Fred Charles Ikle´, Undersecretary of Defense in Reagan’s administration and a key PNAC activist, is typical: ‘‘Carnes Lord’s profound understanding of history beautifully illuminates the relationship between leaders and their advisors. The authors government service, close to the President’s immediate advisors, makes his book relevant for here and now.’’ 287. The Modern Prince, p. 243, n. 22. Lord adds, in his acknowledgements: ‘‘That Machiavelli is a key figure in the evolution of modern political thought I learned originally from the late Leo Strauss. Harvey C. Mansfield Jr., helped me understand how this influence had made itself felt in our political practice. My debt to both is greater than can be easily stated’’ (p. 265). 288. Ibid., p. 85. 289. Ibid., p. 243, n. 27, citing Mansfield, Taming the Prince, pp. 293–294. 290. Mark Lilla, a former Straussian who holds Strauss in high regard, takes pains to dissociate Strauss from the comparatively unsubtle Lord, whose Modern Prince he calls ‘‘a small monument’’ to the effort to adapt Straussian doctrine ‘‘to

148

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

comport with neoconservative Republicanism.’’ ‘‘Straussians have indeed become central to that world,’’ Lilla acknowledges, in an essay that conveys much of the subtle flavor of the Straussian world and mentality, ‘‘but it is mistaken to think Strauss’s ideas govern it’’ (‘‘The Closing of the Straussian Mind,’’ New York Review of Books, November 4, 2004, p. 58). I believe, on the evidence given here, that Lord is considerably closer to Strauss than Lilla wants to admit. 291. The Modern Prince, p. xi. 292. Ibid., p. 70. 293. Specifically, Lord was director of international communications and information policy for the National Security Council under Reagan. Interestingly, Nicholas Xenos says that Myles Burnyeat’s stinging critique of Strauss’s views on Platonic political philosophy (‘‘Sphinx without a Secret,’’ New York Review of Books, 32 [9], May 30, 1985) was inspired in part ‘‘because he knew there were influential Straussians in Washington. In the Reagan administration where were [Nathan] Tarcov, Carnes Lord, who was a member of the National Security Staff, and Paul Wolfowitz.’’ See ‘‘Leo Strauss and the Rhetoric of the War on Terror,’’ Logos, Spring 2004, p. 7 posted at http://www.logosjournal.com/xenos.htm. 294. The Modern Prince, p. 122. 295. Ibid., p. 123; cf. Machiavelli’s Prince, 17. 296. Ibid., p. 123; cf. Machiavelli’s Prince, 17. 297. Ibid., p. 124. 298. Ibid., p. 53. 299. Ibid., p. 53. 300. Ibid., p. 54. 301. Ibid., p. 54. 302. Ibid., p. 54. 303. Ibid., p. 55. 304. ‘‘Thoughts on Strauss’’ op. cit., p. 415. 305. Ibid., pp. 414–416. 306. The Modern Prince, p. 3. 307. Ibid., p. 5. So much, it would seem, for ruling-class good will in ‘‘accommodating’’ the plebs. Apparently, those whom the rulers accommodate can be ‘‘disadvantaged’’ just as legitimately. 308. Ibid., p. 21. 309. On this point Mansfield and Lord part company. ‘‘‘Charisma,’ ’’ Mansfield wrote in Taming the Prince, was a concept invented by Max Weber in the spirit of Nietzsche’s revolt against rationalism. Its current use ‘‘constitutes an unconscious return to the Machiavellian appetite for the sensational y’’ Furthermore, ‘‘as a concept, charisma is scientific neutrality bored with itself and looking for excitement from any direction’’ (p. xxx). Max Weber was not, in fact, the originator of the term charisma, nor did he mean by it what Mansfield and Lord think he meant; on this, see Economy and Society, Vol. 2, op. cit., pp. 1111ff. But the conventional notion that there is a ‘‘sensational’’ personal dynamism which gives rulers power over their subjects is, in fact, consistent with the Machiavellian temptation to think that consent is easily won or coerced. The common denominator is the belief that rulers have unbridled power over unresisting masses. 310. Ibid., p. 22, citing Machiavelli’s Prince, 6.

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

149

311. Ibid., p. 63. 312. The Modern Prince, pp. 64, 65, 212. 313. Ibid., p. 67. 314. Ibid., pp. 67–68. Italics mine. 315. This is Chapter 26, which is entitled, in imitation of Machiavelli, ‘‘Exhortation to Preserve Democracy from the Barbarians.’’ 316. Ibid., pp. 229–230. 317. Lord’s position is the antithesis of the old laissez faire motto that the state should be merely a ‘‘night watchman.’’ But in a curious way he resurrects this passive role for the courts and the legislature. We find little support here for ‘‘limited government,’’ but a limited judiciary and legislature is a key premise of this new conservative statism. 318. The Modern Prince, pp. 131–132. Trial lawyers, he complains, have ‘‘reaped literally billions of dollars in profits’’ from the ‘‘virtual judicial expropriation of the tobacco industry’’ (ibid., p. 132). 319. Ibid., p. 186. 320. Ibid., p. 188. 321. Ibid., pp. 227, 231. The Bush government, as we know, has been far from deferential to the scientific community with respect to issues ranging from global warming to stem cell research. 322. Ibid., p. 231. Once again, Lord appears in the hitherto unfamiliar guise of a rebel against profiteering and vested interests. His challenge to the scientific ‘‘establishment’’ is rooted, he explains, in suspicion that ‘‘it appears to have a vested interest in the essentially unchecked march of scientific technical progress.’’ Lest anyone think that scientific progress may be an outright good, he offers human cloning as an example of ‘‘morally monstrous’’ science, warning: ‘‘If scientists are incapable of making the judgment that human cloning is a morally monstrous undertaking (as many of them evidently are), politicians will have to exercise bold leadership to ensure that we do not take that fateful step.’’ 323. Lord’s discussion of Machiavelli’s hypertrophied vision of princely power, as cited below, immediately follows his clearest paraphrase of Mansfield’s core argument. ‘‘Executive power,’’ Lord explains, ‘‘... is a modern invention, and its lineaments are already visible in Machiavelli’’ (ibid., p. 208). 324. Ibid., p. 208. 325. Ibid., p. 208. 326. The true leader doesn’t wait for the perfect moment. First you act, as Napoleon once said, and then you see: ‘‘On s’engage et puis on voit!’’ http://www. corporate-partnering.com/info/strategic-alliances-and-partnerings-quotes2.htm. 327. Robert Devigne, Recasting Conservatism: Oakeshott, Strauss, and the Response to Postmodernism (New Haven & London, 1994), p. 186, citing Irving Kristol, ‘‘Commentary and Exchanges on Politics and Public Debate,’’ The Fettered Presidency (Washington, DC, 1989), p. 317. See also the discussion (pp. 181ff.) of Carnes Lord’s Reagan-era views on the energetic executive. Even in 1987, the author shows, Lord favored ‘‘restricting the media’s access to foreign and defense matters,’’ and wanted to ‘‘increase the autonomy and authority of the presidency within the executive branch.’’ Specifically, Lord advocated giving the National Security Council heightened authority over other strategic planning agencies, and said that the NSC

150

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

should report to the president, not to Congress. ‘‘The NSC,’’ Lord wrote, ‘‘can only function properly if it acts as an immediate extension of the president.’’ See Lord, ‘‘Executive Power and Our Security,’’ The National Interest, 7, Spring 1987, p. 7. Cited by Devigne, ibid., p. 181. 328. Lord praises others as well. He takes pains, in particular, to defend the longtime ruler of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew, from liberal criticism. ‘‘Most of what Singapore is today it owes to one man’’ (The Modern Prince, p. 101). This of course is high praise only if Singapore is not what its critics generally imagine: ‘‘... puritanical, harshly punitive in its approach to law enforcement, and politically authoritarian if not simply antidemocratic’’ (ibid., pp. 100–101). While Lord assures us that the truth is quite otherwise, Anne Norton begs to differ. She devotes a full chapter of her most recent book, Leo Strauss and the Politics of American Empire (New Haven & London, 2004) to a withering critique of Lord’s view of ‘‘The Stateman.’’ 329. The Modern Prince, p. 8. 330. Lord calls Dinesh D’Souza’s Ronald Reagan: How an Ordinary Man Became an Extraordinary Leader ‘‘a useful appreciation’’ of Reagan’s leadership qualities (New York, 1997). Upon inspection, this turns out to be a testimonial to Reagan’s courage and wisdom in ignoring polls that revealed public disapproval for actions he was determined to take, including invading Grenada, backing the contras in Nicaragua, dissolving the professional air traffic controllers’ union, and (‘‘in the face of universal resistance’’) visiting the Waffen SS graveyard in Bitburg, Germany. See D’Souza, pp. 229–237; the phrase about Bitburg is from p. 234. 331. The Modern Prince, p. 104. 332. Kagan, ‘‘Power and Weakness,’’ op. cit., p. 1. This essay has subsequently been reprinted, in expanded form, as a small book, Of Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order (New York, 2003). Interestingly, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 3, 2003 – shortly after the start of the occupation of Iraq – Kristol praised the argument of ‘‘my colleague and Project co-founder Robert Kagan’’ about the gulf between American and European mentalities. Kristol concluded at that time that, though naturally ‘‘No one thinks it a good idea for the U.S. to go it alone,’’ still, ‘‘at times, we may have to act with fewer friends than one might wish.’’ (This is a statement posted at the PNAC website, pp. 1, 3.) More recently, Kagan himself has taken a somewhat more balanced position, arguing, in a number of places, that the Bush administration has taken European anger toward the United States too lightly. On this see Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke, ‘‘Twilight of the Neocons,’’ Washington Monthly, March 2004, and Robert Kagan, ‘‘America’s Crisis of Legitimacy,’’ Foreign Affairs 83, March–April 2004. 333. Ibid., p. 1. 334. Ibid., pp. 10–11, 16. The passage on Machiavelli and amorality is cited by Kagan from an article by Cooper in The Observer (April 7, 2002). 335. Ibid., p. 16; Kagan again cites Cooper’s article in The Observer, op. cit. For a revealing specimen of Cooper’s recent thinking on these subjects, see ‘‘Imperial Liberalism,’’ The National Interest, 79, Spring 2005. 336. Ibid., p. 5. Kagan writes: ‘‘By historical standards, America’s military power and particularly its ability to project that power to all corners of the globe remain unprecedented’’ (p. 5).

Recognizing Empire: Alienation, Authority, and Delusions of Grandeur

151

337. Ibid., p. 5. He continues with a recital: ‘‘... a fact reflected in the proliferation of overseas military interventions that began during the first Bush administration with the invasion of Panama in 1989, the Persian Gulf War in 1991, and the humanitarian intervention in Somalia in 1992, continuing during the Clinton years with interventions in Haiti, Bosnia, and Kosovo.’’ 338. Ibid., p. 19. 339. Donald Kagan and Frederick W. Kagan, While America Sleeps: Self-Delusion, Military Weakness, and the Threat to Peace Today (New York, 2000). They praise Albright for recognizing that the United States is the ‘‘indispensable nation’’ (p. 434), but otherwise find little to like in Clintonism. 340. Ibid., pp. 424–425. 341. Ibid., p. 426. ‘‘Opponents of such deployments always argue that things will get out of hand, that the United States cannot be the world’s policeman, that the war will bog down, drag out, and expand, and American forces will have to ‘be there’ for forty years or forever’’ (p. 425). But in fact the United States has no choice but to be a global policeman: ‘‘If the United States will not take the lead, spend its treasure, and risk its sons and daughters to maintain stability and peace in the world, who will?’’ 342. Boot, The Savage Wars of Peace, op. cit., p. 243. 343. Ibid., pp. 236–240. Boot says that wars of this kind are often ‘‘desirable’’ as well. He says that mishaps and losses should not dissuade anyone ‘‘bent on imperial policing.’’ When British colonialists were attacked by rebels, they responded with a ‘‘hunger for vengeance.’’ Americans need ‘‘a similarly bloody-minded attitude.’’ They must be willing to pay the price of empire in casualties, not, of course, for merely ‘‘ephemeral goals,’’ but to preserve Pax Americana. War is ‘‘a very ugly business,’’ and in any war ‘‘blood will be shed’’ among both combatants and noncombatants; hence the US must be prepared to ‘‘get its hands dirty’’ (pp. 247–248). 344. Donnelly, ‘‘The Past as Prologue,’’ op. cit. 345. See Tom Donnelly and Vance Serchuk, ‘‘U.S. Counterinsurgency in Iraq,’’ op. cit. November 3, 2003. 346. Peter D. Feaver and Christopher Gelpi, Choosing Your Battles: American Civil-Military Relations and the Use of Force (Princeton, 2004). 347. That is, as Donnelly and Serchuk helpfully explain (ibid., p. 7), ‘‘they are more worried about losing a war than losing soldiers to win a war.’’ 348. Feaver and Gelpi, op. cit., p. 101. Space constraints preclude detailed attention to these findings. That awaits another occasion. But for now, the point is less the credibility of the claim that the public is putty in the president’s hands than the fact that key strategists and others seem to believe this. 349. Peter Baker and Dan Balz, ‘‘Bush Words Reflect Public Opinion Strategy,’’ Washington Post, June 30, 2005. 350. As cited above. Odom and Dujarric reject realist theory quite specifically on the ground that realism predicts that unipolarity will ultimately give way to multipolarity. 351. ‘‘Power and Weakness,’’ op. cit., p. 19. 352. One author, in fact, aptly entitled a recent critical study of the current administration Sore Winners. See John Powers, Sore Winners: (And the Rest of Us) in George Bush’s America (New York, 2004).

152

DAVID NORMAN SMITH

353. I owe this insight to Laura Bennetts. 354. All of the citations from Durkheim are taken from ‘‘Deutschland u¨ber Alles,’’ in The Realm of the Social: Classical Readings, edited and abridged by David N. Smith (New York, [1915] 1994), pp. 99–116; separate citations will not be separately itemized. This essay first appeared in English in the now-rare pamphlet, Durkheim’s ‘‘Germany Above All’’: German Mentality and War (Paris, 1915), which has not yet been reprinted in full. Similar statements, of course, are often made now with respect to the United States. 355. Durkheim continues: ‘‘The idea of the State, always present to his mind, must prevent him from allowing himself to be softened by considerations of private morality, or by the suggestions of sensibility; philanthropy and humanitarianism are not his business. Of course it is inevitable that, under these conditions, his personality should be marked by something harsh, caustic, and more or less detestable. But this is of little moment to him: his task is still the noblest that can fall to a human being. 356. Treitschke, like Mansfield, saw Machiavelli as ‘‘one of the precursors’’ of modern politics. 357. Durkheim cites Treitschke’s Politics, op. cit., vol. I, p. 89. Durkheim adds, in paraphrase of Treitschke, ‘‘It was he who delivered the State from the Church and who was the first to proclaim this fundamental principle of all political life: Der Staat ist Macht, the State is Power’’ (ibid., vol. I, p. 90). At times, Durkheim says, Treitschke sought to render his ‘‘Machiavellism ... more palatable to the modern moral conscience by certain apparent concessions.’’ But that was ultimately more a matter of tact than of conviction. 358. Tom Farer gives rich evidence of the many ways in which neoconservative strategists and pundits have pared back, or proposed paring back, on American commitments to international norms, institutions, treaties and duties. Farer also expressly notes the parallel between this program and Treitschke’s Machtpolitik. He takes pains, appropriately, not to overstate this parallel. But if the core of Machpolitik is a determined refusal to accept constraints imposed by or in negotiation with others, Farer provides a great deal of evidence to show that this is precisely what gives contemporary neoconservatism many of its signature themes. See Farer, ‘‘Toward an Effective International Legal Order: From Coexistence to Concert?’’ Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 17 (2), July 2004, pp. 222–228.

CORPORATE WARRIORS: THE STATE AND CHANGING FORMS OF PRIVATE ARMED FORCE IN AMERICA$ Larry W. Isaac and Daniel M. Harrison ABSTRACT In recent years, and especially with the war in Iraq, the U.S. military’s reliance on private contractors as forces in the theater of war has grown and become increasingly clear. We critically evaluate some of the best literature on the emergence of this phenomenon – especially Ken Silverstein’s Private Warriors and P. W. Singer’s Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry – and find a neglect of the historical pathdependent character of the rise of the new corporate armed forces. In particular, we concentrate on American experience and two silences that are integral to understanding the path-dependent character of this process: (1) earlier historical reliance on private armed force to suppress the labor movement in America, the template for this new form of irregular armed force and (2) the ghost of Vietnam as a continuing political liability in the mobilization of sufficient troop levels under neo-imperialist aspirations and $

The base title, ‘‘Corporate Warriors,’’ was borrowed from P. W. Singer’s, Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry (2003).

Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 153–188 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24003-9

153

154

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

‘‘the global war on terror,’’ as the main condition for the rise of the new private military form. Both elements suggest the theoretical importance of state strength/weakness in any explanation of private armed force. We discuss several important political implications of our findings.

The U.S. war in Iraq, ostensibly part of the ‘‘global war on terrorism,’’ has brought important features of U.S. armed force into clearer relief. One significant revelation is the increasing reliance of U.S. military on private corporate-supplied fighting forces, otherwise known as ‘‘private contractors.’’ While this shift has occurred gradually over the last decade (Singer, 2003), it took the U.S. invasion of Iraq to bring it to general public attention. Private companies have long been integral to supplying the non-human means of destruction, so much so that at least since the early years of the Cold War an extensive ‘‘military–industrial complex’’ has been deeply embedded in the economic, political, and cultural fabric of America. But private companies in the business of supplying fighting troops and executing other aspects of American foreign policy ‘‘by proxy’’ raise new theoretical questions and important political implications. Contemporary corporate warriors, especially in the American case, are very much an outgrowth of post–Cold War neo-imperialism in which the military plays a crucial, but constrained role in the business of Empire1 (Silverstein, 2000; Kaplan, 2003; Harvey, 2003; Johnson, 2004; Boggs, 2005). With the passing of the Cold War between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., the U.S. was faced with the problem of how to reconfigure its hegemonic global position. What broad, even universalistic (not simply narrow national) interests were now to be represented in the absence of the communist threat? The ‘‘New World Order’’ concept was advanced for precisely this purpose (e.g., Biel, 2000; Boggs, 2005; Pieterse, 2004). ‘‘According to this vision, the USA is benevolently protecting the world against the instability threatened by post-bipolar regional strongmen. The Gulf War was a demonstration of its determination to do so’’ (Biel, 2000, p. 258). Since September 11, 2001, the rhetoric has shifted to the ‘‘War on Terrorism’’ but the new imperialist regime (a term that is as much absent from American public discourse as it is present in American foreign policy; Kaplan, 2003, p. 56) is still heavily shaped by Cold War practices and, as we shall see, Cold War ghosts. Cold War interests and practices remain ‘‘sedimented’’ (see Dahms, this volume) because a small number of powerfully situated Cold War hawks continue to have a significant influence on defense policy (e.g., Silverstein,

Corporate Warriors

155

2000; Wallerstein, 2003). These practices continue under the rubric of New World Order and War on Terrorism because (1) Cold Warriors remain entrenched in government agencies and still shape policy as if the Cold War never ended; (2) entrenched private arms dealers still reap large profits providing the military machine at home and abroad with the tools of the trade; (3) private mercenary industry thrives on sensitive Pentagon operations; (4) Cold Warriors who continue to work as consultants and lobbyists for the armaments industry; and (5) Cold War strategists situated in consulting firms and think tanks contribute to continuing the intellectual frameworks to support the continuity of Cold War policy. All of these forms of ‘‘‘Private Warriors’ have a financial and career interest in war and conflict, as well as the power and connections to promote hard-line policies’’ (Silverstein, 2000, p. ix). Their collective influence is one reason that the U.S. seemed unable or unwilling to make the transition to a post–Cold War world even prior to September 11th (Silverstein, 2000, pp. viii–x; Greider, 1998). In the post–Cold War world there has been an enormous flood of commentary on its consequent ‘‘globalization,’’ which is remarkable not only for its volume (e.g., Fiss & Hirsch, 2005) but also for its silence on the role of military and coercive force in which global markets are celebrated and ‘‘the U.S. military winds up invisible within an otherwise massive, worldwide power structure’’ (Boggs, 2005, p. xxxii). This gloss is not unlike the discourse on republican free-markets during the 19th century when military coercion, both public and private, was integral in the making of America’s ‘‘free’’ markets (Montgomery, 1993), yet is ignored in mainstream historical and economic accounts. Conventional assessments miss the fact that American militarism is not a radical break from a long-term trajectory but rather a deepening extension of many patterns that have become a more aggressive, globalized form of military-backed Empire (Boggs, 2005, p. x). This increasing use of military force illuminates the fragility and weakness of U.S. global hegemony more than its presumed potency (Wallerstein, 2003), and the limits of empire at home. The role of private corporate warriors has begun to draw scholarly attention. Ken Silverstein’s Private Warriors is one of the first major statements. He presents one chapter (‘‘Mercenary, Inc.’’) containing mostly descriptive information on this phenomenon that he sees as part of a wider constellation of private military players and interests that have helped extend American Cold War policy far beyond the end of the Cold War. P. W. Singer’s Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry (2003) provides a more thorough treatment of the recent emergence of private armed force in America and around the world. It is impressive in scope

156

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

and important in substance. However, both Silverstein and Singer ignore two crucial empirical dimensions that substantially weaken their accounts of the rise of private corporate warriors. First, in attempts to locate historical roots, both authors miss the early and lengthy history of private armed force that developed as part of the capitalist countermovement to suppress the labor movement in America between 1877 and World War II. From this early experience, the organizational and industrial template for the contemporary private military firm (PMF)/industry was established; that is, a model was created in which the commodity being sold on the market (basically to establish the market writ large under particular terms) by a private firm was armed force or coercion. Second, these authors are surprisingly silent on the role of the Vietnam legacy in shaping the contemporary climate for the re-emergence of private armed force in America. Silence on both of these significant historical facts of military force erases the path-dependent2 character of American political–military culture in shaping the contemporary private armed force industry. The lack of a cross-temporal comparison of private armed force in the U.S. case also misses an opportunity to understand what such forces signal about the state, its legitimacy and strength. Others have addressed private military forces and transition to citizensoldiers armies in the history of European state-building (e.g., Avant, 2000; Thomson, 1994; Tilly, 1990). Here we concentrate exclusively on historical and contemporary experience of the U.S. In the first major part of the paper, we review the process by which U.S. military force for both domestic and international purposes became larger and more centralized. Moving from a small central army with decentralized militias (some private) to a highly centralized military apparatus that was the key to U.S. economic and industrial policy (‘‘permanent war economy’’ (PWE)) with the inauguration of the Cold War, the U.S. state had developed the world’s most powerful military and was engaged in a global hegemony based on the protection of the ‘‘free world’’ from the forces of Soviet domination. The second major portion of the paper addresses the social conditions that gave rise to a call for ‘‘flexibility’’ in U.S. international war-fighting growing out of the Cold War. Vietnam was not only to be a demonstration of U.S. resolve to contain Communism (Karnow, 1982), but also a testing ground for this new flexible mode of military response (Kaufman, 1964), one designed for international counterinsurgency expected to increase in Cold War context. Current privatization in the U.S. military, therefore, can be understood in two main ways. On the one hand, it has been driven by legacies of the Cold War – in the war-fighting strategy of ‘‘flexible response’’ and in the collective memory of problems of political will that this response strategy generated

Corporate Warriors

157

with the outcome of the Vietnam War. On the other hand, it is also being driven by the right-wing push to privatize as much of the public sector as possible since the end of the Cold War. The use of private military contractors is an attempt to build flexibility (i.e., to circumvent constraints that the military now faces in Empire duty) into U.S. military operations that has roots in earlier American history (private security formations), while also deeply rooted in the institutions, politics, and culture of the Cold War. Traveling this historical path allows for an interesting optic on the forms and meanings of private armed force, the construction of the public/private spheres of influence, and the character of the state.

BUILDING THE LOCAL STATE: CAPITALIST FLEXIBILITY AND IRREGULAR ARMED FORCE As America went through a major transformation from an agrarian to a class-divided industrial society, businessmen found that their needs for local security were not being adequately met by the government – i.e., by municipal, state, or federal policing institutions. In various localities across the northern industrial regions, business elites (‘‘leading citizens’’ in their selfdesignation; see Isaac, 2002) turned to the use of irregular armed force – often in the familiar organizational form of the militia – to protect their businesses and to secure the public order against what they saw as an increasingly menacing working-class (Leach, 1993; Isaac, 2002). We do not have to point to the Roman military or the development of European states for examples of private armed force in politics and state development (Singer, 2003; Tilly, 1990; Thomson, 1994); private armed force was integral to state formation in America, too. Before Empire can be built, the state must bring its own domestic territory under control. The early private elite militia (staffed and financed by wealthy industrialists and bankers; Isaac, 2002), then the National Guard were part of the process of securing the domestic order and providing ‘‘homeland security’’ for elite classes, among other things.3 Independent Militias: Early Industrialists as Corporate Warriors In the aftermath of the Civil War, the Union Army had been demobilized to approximately 25,000 troops (Skowronek, 1982), and the militias mobilized by the Northern states during the war had largely disbanded (Cooper, 1997, p. 23). Historically, U.S. armed force was rooted in provincial republican tradition – the locally based militia system – that depended on the amateur

158

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

citizen-soldier. Within this tradition, strong citizen’s militias were considered the essential bulwark against the dangers of an independent, sovereign and centralized state (Skowronek, 1982). Early militias were organized through regionally based voluntary social clubs differentiated along ethnic and status lines, fused with state and local political machines through patronage networks, and were minimally subsidized by the federal government (Reinders, 1977; Skowronek, 1982; Montgomery, 1993). Militias had historically consisted of two basic types. Common militias were those that were mobilized and operated under the auspices of a government authority, at the municipal or state-level; and Independent militias were organized, financed, and operated by private individuals. During the last several decades of the 19th century, armed force in America went through a major transformation. Part of that institutional change revolved around the development of the militia system into a truly national guard, a permanent state-supported institution (Cooper, 1997, p. 31). But that national development did not follow a smooth trajectory that eliminated independents and added regular common militia units under nationally integrated state command structures. Between 1877 and the end of the 1880s, independent militias grew in some cities and were reconstituted in others. This chapter in armed force history is largely connected to the economic, industrial, and class reconfiguration that the nation was undergoing. While class conflict was growing more intense and widespread, the institutional ability to police labor uprisings as largescale regional or national phenomena had not changed much from the antebellum period. Large economic organizations – employing thousands of men, extending across vast areas – made it increasingly difficult to put down strikes and other contentious collective actions. The first national labor uprising in summer 1877 made the gap between working-class formation and policing institutions clear to elites for the first time. The uprising began as a railroad strike at the Baltimore & Ohio (B&O) depot in Martinsburgh, West Virginia in the context of repeated wage cuts and work speed-ups. The strike spread quickly along the B&O and other rail lines igniting actions in scores of cities from Baltimore to San Francisco. Mass actions overflowed the rails as the rail strikes served as a symbolic flashpoint to mobilize miners, some factory workers, cigar workers, masses of unemployed, and others sympathetic to the struggle and resentful of rails, banks, and the oligarchical character of the newly emerging political economy (Stowell, 1999; Isaac, 2002). The big lesson for elites – businessmen, politicians, military leaders – was that the existing local militia apparatus was inadequate in size and ill-prepared

Corporate Warriors

159

to deal with such mass collective actions. In the aftermath of the 1877 uprising, the press was peppered with editorials regarding the unreliable character of the volunteer forces (Isaac, 2002). Federal troops eventually crushed the uprising in most major urban centers, but it had taken weeks to do so, given limited troop strength, preparation, the widespread character of the uprising, and transportation difficulties. Some business leaders (Thomas Scott, Pennsylvania rails; Marshall Field, Chicago retail; Amasa Stone, Cleveland manufacturing and rails) unsuccessfully agitated for Congress to provide appropriations for expanding the army and creating permanent garrison outposts at critical locations across the urban, industrial heartland (Isaac, 2002). Under the very realistic belief that the 1877 uprising was no fluke but would likely happen again, given an inadequate/unreliable local militia and an army insufficient in scale to respond to all areas quickly, some ‘‘leading citizens’’ took matters into their own hands and self-organized. Local elite counter-organization followed two major paths. In some urban areas (e.g., Chicago) existing independent militias were recomposed with elites eliminating potentially unreliable ethnic (especially German or Irish) and working-class types from their ranks. Industrial elites and their wealthy associates followed a different approach in other cities (e.g., Cleveland) and formed their own independent militia anew.4 The key to this self-formation of independent elite militia armed force was its flexibility in solving a variety of problems of order that other institutions and the state were unable or unwilling to confront. As Isaac (2002, p. 393) put it: ‘‘Proper military training would ensure skill and readiness, clearly something that had been missing from traditional militia response in summer 1877. Self-organization rooted in local friendship, family, neighborhood, and business networks and autonomy from state-affiliated militia would ensure independence from unreliable (classes) and ill-trained militias, as well as from ‘corrupt’ unreliable municipal politicians and police. Local (neighborhoodbased) militia could be relied upon to protect not only private industrial properties of members and their friends, but also neighborhood and homesy.’’ Industrial elites of the Gilded Age felt besieged by evil in a variety of forms – labor movement and unions, immigrant working-class hordes, demagogues and riotous urban mobs, corrupt municipal politics that mobilized the votes of masses of working-class and immigrant voters, the corrosion of morality, feminization of society, and concerns over weakening manliness – all of which had a common denominator: the threat ‘‘to the rightful, natural position of power and authority that belonged to elite Victorian men’’ (Isaac, 2002, p. 392). The first ‘‘corporate warriors’’ of modern industrial America undertook to arm themselves and organize collectively in the name of public

160

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

order and welfare. That they did so was a sign of structural state weakness, one that they helped shore-up with their own private armies. The National Guard eventually absorbed these independent militias, or they withered and died off (Cooper, 1997). As the Guard became a more established institution in the early 20th century, the U.S. military forces went through a re-organization that made them more professional, centralized, and institutionally stable (Skowronek, 1982). In this process, the state acquired a contentious legitimacy over the use of force that was centrally controlled. The standard view was that this armed division of the state existed to defend the nation against external threats, but the development of the National Guard was fueled, in part, by class-based threats within the domestic arena (e.g., Montgomery, 1993; Cooper, 1997; Isaac, 2002). Overlapping with and extending beyond the independent elite militias of the Gilded era were a variety of other ‘‘corporate warriors’’, hired guns for corporate use, usually in contention with labor. The self-organization of wealthy corporate elite increasingly gave way to state-organized garrison outposts in the form of the National Guard and their armories that dotted large industrial cities (Fogelson, 1989) and wage warriors hired by corporations to do various sorts of ‘‘security work.’’ Between the Gilded Age and World War II these two forms of domestic armament constituted a powerful armed force aimed primarily at the labor movement. Private Industrial Police: Mobilizing Corporate Warriors through the Market During the last quarter of the 19th century, business turned to the market to hire private armed forces. These consisted of various ‘‘mercenary contingency forces’’ (Isaac, 2002, p. 391) or what others have simply called ‘‘private police’’ (Johnson, 1976). One type of market-based armed force came in the form of corporate provision of hired guns, originally known as ‘‘detective agencies,’’ like the Pinkertons (Harrison, 1996), and their competitors (e.g., A. A. Anher, Baldwin-Felts, Bergoffs, Burns, Corporations Auxiliary Company, National Corporation Service, Railway Audit and Inspection Company, among many others). Business owners could contract with an agency to do a particular policing or undercover job, infiltrate a union, or break a strike. American labor history is, unfortunately, rich with such examples (Fusfeld, 1984; Norwood, 2002; Smith, 1993, 2003). A second form of private policing was acquired through full-time wage workers on a company’s payroll. Some companies maintained their own full-time police or army, sometimes called ‘‘merchant police.’’ Among the

Corporate Warriors

161

more infamous examples of this type of armed force were the ‘‘Coal & Iron Police’’ widespread in Pennsylvania (also known as the ‘‘Pennsylvania Cossacks’’) (Norwood, 2002). Pennsylvania and other states, in effect, handed over policing powers to private company forces (Johnston, 1992, p. 20). The Ford Motor Company was also notorious for its company police squad (see Johnston, 1992, p. 19; Norwood, 2002, Chapter 5). The major distinction between these two forms was in the character of the armed agent’s contract: In the first instance, a company would contract with another company (hire a detective agency like the Pinkertons) to do a particular job (e.g., break a strike, undermine a unionization drive); in the second form company forces would be maintained as full-time ‘‘security’’ employees of particular mining, railroad, or automobile companies. These forms of private police specialized in providing armed guards, stockpiling weapons, breaking strikes, union-busting, propaganda services, and different aspects of industrial (class) espionage, including spies and agents provocateurs used against labor (Johnson, 1976; Fusfeld, 1984; Smith, 1993; Harrison, 1996). Federal troops and militias (both common and independent) played a heavy role in the repression of strikes and unemployed mobilizations between 1877 and the turn of the century (Hacker, 1969; Cooper, 1977; Adams, 1995), but such private police forces were widespread until the Second World War (Johnson, 1976). For example, in 1929 when union membership was 3.4 million, there were also about 200,000 labor spies at work (Johnson, 1976, p. 100). While likely overstated, ‘‘in 1936 a member of the NLRB [National Labor Relations Board] estimated that American industrialists spent over $80,000,000 a year for espionage services’’ (Smith, 1993, p. 70). Between January 1934 and July 1936, General Motors alone spent almost one million dollars on undercover agents, employed 14 different anti-labor detective agencies, and had as many as 200 labor spies embedded in its plants (Smith, 1993, p. 70). Detective agencies not only infiltrated organized labor but also acquired leadership positions: ‘‘Of the 304 industrial spies employed by the Pinkerton Agency at the time of the LaFollette hearing [in 1937], nearly one-third held important union positions’’ (Smith, 1993, p. 72).5 The United States is said to have experienced the most contentious (Filipelli, 1990) and bloody (Taft & Ross, 1969) labor history of any industrialized nation. Whether it was actually at the very top of the heap is unclear; what we do know is that it was extremely violent. ‘‘Labor wars,’’ a term used by Sydney Lens (1973) to describe the violence that the early labor movement encountered, was no exaggeration. Between 1877 and the end of World War II, there were more than 240 strikes in which at least one person was killed and a total death count from strikes of at least 1,086 people

162

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

(Lipold, 2003). Most of the fatalities were from the working-class (Wallace, 1970–71; Johnson, 1976, p. 96; Lipold, 2003). Corporate warriors, public and private, were responsible for much of this violent history and, as consequence, suppressed the development of free labor unions in the world’s leading democracy. They also served as a prototype for private corporate armed security forces that would appear a century later.

BUILDING A MASSIVE WARFARE STATE \By the end of World War II, privatized armed forces in the form of domestic corporate warriors had largely disappeared6 and the U.S. was on its way to building a massive warfare state. The massive warfare state, or PWE as economist Seymour Melman (1974) termed it, is important to our story because, while the Cold War that helped bring this PWE into existence has ended, the PWE has not. Moreover, as we discuss below, legacies of the Cold War era are integral to understanding how the contemporary ‘‘private military industry’’ (Singer, 2003) and the new corporate warrior have emerged. Throughout American history, military build-ups during wartime would be followed by troop demobilizations when hostilities ended. This was not the case after World War II. Each major war has altered to some degree the culture, structure, and size of the U.S. state, but the Second World War mobilization fundamentally transformed the state with the forging of the military–industrial complex – the large, defense-oriented bureaucratic sector (Hooks, 1991, p. 225). Demobilization was partially set in motion after the war, but the structural changes in the state as a result of the global conflict, elite political fears about the new post-war world, and unfolding events in the immediate postwar years, all combined to push demobilization off the agenda. Between the latter part of World War II and 1950, the United States launched a massive re-structuring of international and domestic institutions and policy. For policymakers seeking to construct an institutional environment conducive to mass production-based capital accumulation on a global scale, three major destabilizing concerns loomed large: economic depression (the fear that massive economic stagnation on the scale of the 1930s would return when war production and conscription ended); ascendancy of a militant organized labor movement at home and abroad (especially in western Europe); and the threat of external enemies, especially the Soviet Union and ‘‘global communism.’’ In general these fears were legacies of the Great Depression and World War II, but they were quickly underscored by events unfolding in the

Corporate Warriors

163

years following the war: in 1946 a major wave of labor militancy erupted in the mass production industries (Davis, 1986); three years later the first postwar recession occurred along with ‘‘the fall of China’’ (Wolfe, 1979). Containment and stabilization became the key policy watchwords designed to: (1) facilitate economic growth while averting crisis-level downturns and stabilizing the macro-economy by smoothing out or containing wild swings in the business cycle; (2) contain the labor movement by regulating and channeling labor into ‘acceptable’ (conservative) forms of unionization that would minimize shop floor militancy and foster productivity growth; and (3) stabilize the international capitalist political economy (especially monetary and trade relations) while containing threats to the system from ‘‘global communism’’ (Isaac & Leicht, 1997, p. 33). Key institutional re-structuring and policy change came in the form of: increased advocacy for Keynesian macro-economic stabilization policy; the Taft–Hartley Act of 1947; and international institutions – the Bretton Woods Accords (1944), United Nations (1945), National Security Act and National Security Council (1947), economic containment in the Truman Doctrine (1947) and Marshall Plan (1948–1951) (see Block, 1977). These laws and institutions would be either supplanted or augmented by military containment that would feed a massive PWE – an economy that was either at war or continuously mobilized for war (Melman, 1970, 1974; Boggs, 2005). Cold War containment policy has typically meant policy designed to contain Soviet influence and communism from spreading. This was, indeed, an important part of containment policy, but we believe it was more multifaceted. In the name of national defense against the communist threat in general and the Soviets in particular, defense spending as containment militarism eventually became the key to: (1) economic growth (Wolfe, 1981); (2) implicit national industrial policy through the Pentagon (Hooks, 1991); (3) maintenance of an ‘open’ global political–economic system favorable to U.S. trade and investment (Block, 1977, 1980); (4) economic stabilization against large corporate profit squeeze in the form of Pentagon – arms industry ‘‘military procurement Keynesianism’’ (Isaac & Leicht, 1997); and (5) was integrated into household, domestic culture in the post-war feminine mystique (Rosen, 2000). The broad strategic outlines for this massive military political economy were first crudely expressed in the top secret planning document known as National Security Council (NSC)-68 written in 1950 for President Truman. With the actions in Korea, the hypothetical plans in NSC-68 would be put quickly into action (Wolfe, 1979; Block, 1980; Isaac & Leicht, 1997). By 1951, the U.S. was on its way to becoming a PWE with its mass military preparedness, and a ‘‘bastardized (military) Keynesianism’’ deployed to

164

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

varying degrees by different administrations (Turgeon, 1996). Military logic and culture became firmly integrated into the fabric of American economy, politics, and culture, even to the extent of shaping gender roles, motherhood, family, and the cult of domesticity during the post-war years (Rosen, 2000). Cold War containment doctrine was an important part of the rationale that took the U.S. deeper and deeper into war in Vietnam. But there were other pieces to the rationale. One was the development of the Kennedy– McNamara war-fighting strategy variously known as ‘‘flexible response/deterrent’’ (see McNamara in U.S. Department of Defense, 1963, 1965) or the ‘‘multiple options’’ approach (Kaufman, 1964). This strategy followed closely the recommendations of the 1957 Gaither Report that sounded a fabricated warning that there was a ‘‘missile gap’’ between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. Flexible response called for expanding the nuclear arsenal, stockpiling conventional weapons, and maintaining conventional forces. With Vietnam shaping up as the next major test for containment policy, a new emphasis was being placed by the administration on highly mobile conventional and special forces for counterinsurgency and ‘‘low intensity’’ engagements (Sanders, 1983, p. 130). Flexibility meant that there needed to be an enlargement of military options (Melman, 1970, p. 140) beyond that of the conventional war-fighting strategies of the world wars, leading to a greater range of variation in military strategies, capabilities, and intensity levels that could be prescribed for a particular conflict situation (Isaac & Leicht, 1997, p. 37). President Kennedy, Secretary of Defense McNamara, and General Maxwell Taylor were all anxious to try out in Vietnam the new quickhitting, mobile strategy, while also demonstrating U.S. resolve to stop communism (Karnow, 1983). As we will argue below, the need for flexibility has grown dramatically with the post-Cold War global war on terrorism. Operating under the political constraints produced by the legacy of Vietnam, the U.S. military requires a new form of flexibility to augment troop strength for the war on terrorism. Private military firms have become an important part of this new flexibility formula.

THE NEW CORPORATE WARRIOR IN THE PRIVATE MILITARY INDUSTRY Private Military Firms and Global Security The private military industry, comprised of more than 70 companies by 2002 (see Singer, 2003, Appendix I), is estimated to be over a $100 billion per year

Corporate Warriors

165

business (Keefe, 2004). PMFs have been deployed by a variety of clients, including the U.S. military on an increasing scale. Ken Silverstein’s (2000) Private Warriors was the first major study to describe some aspects of the private military industry, ‘‘Mercenary, Inc.’’ (Chapter 4) in his terms. But in Corporate Warriors, P. W. Singer tells a more comprehensive story of the private military industry – what happens when the military, ‘‘the force that protects society’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 7) becomes deeply commodified. At the heart of the matter is the question of private corporations, many of which are made up of former government officials and ex-military personnel (and who owe their very success to this experience in public service), offering private military service for governments, and often at the public’s expense. PMFs are involved in ‘‘combat operations, strategic planning, military training, intelligence, military logistics, and information warfare’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 73). In the extreme, entire national militaries (e.g., Saudi Arabia) are managed and controlled by private companies. Although the industry was well established by the end of the 1990s, the 9/11 attacks and subsequent ‘‘war on terror’’ insure plenty of work (and profits) for these firms over the coming decades. Singer gives us an idea of the breadth and significance of the industry when he writes that, in the war in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks, private employees were ‘‘deployed with U.S. forces on the ground, maintained combat equipment, provided logistical support, and routinely flew on joint surveillance and targeting aircraft.’’ He also notes that ‘‘Hamid Karzai is protected by a DynCorp security force, made up of roughly forty ex-U.S. special forces troops,’’ and that the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which is housing enemy combatants picked up during the war in Afghanistan was ‘‘built not by U.S. soldiers, but by Brown & Root for $45 million’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 17), and is serviced, in part, by Wachkenhut Corrections Corporation (White, 2004). PMFs are, in effect, an arm of U.S. foreign policy, ‘‘foreign policy by proxy,’’ as one defense expert put it (quoted in Silverstein, 2000, p. 145). The fact that private warrior firms can be used by the U.S. to pursue geopolitical interests without deploying U.S. military forces is especially convenient when it comes to training fighters in regimes with poor human rights records (Silverstein, 2000, p. 145). Not just a product of Republican administrations, the industry grew during the Clinton Presidency.7 PMFs offer another way to get things done without the publicity, accountability, and political consequences that often accompany official military actions. The industry is attractive to firms because there is an enormous amount of money to be made, from top executives to contractors in the field. Firms generate profits by using ‘‘cost-plus’’ contracts. These funding formulas guarantee ‘‘profits for a firm

166

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

even if costs escalate y’’ (Sennott, 2004, A1). Workers in the field can make upwards of $100,000 annually and often get paid generous overtime wages (Silver, 2003). They are also eligible to get ‘‘danger pay’’ that can range from 20 to 30 percent (Bredemeier, 2003) of their base pay. Cost-cutting and efficiency rationales are the usual explanations for reliance on private contractors (Wayne, 2002; Brooks, 2005). In 2002, Secretary of the Army, Thomas White claimed that ‘‘as much as a third of [the Army budget] was going on private contractors’’ (Leigh, 2004, p. 4). Singer raises a number of questions about and provides a way to understand the role of contractors in the war in Iraq. The private military presence there is significant. PMF employees ‘‘operate communications systems, repair helicopters, fix weapons systems and link the computers with the troops to command centers’’ (Bredemeier, 2003, p. E1). In May 2004, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld produced a list of ‘‘60 companies, half a dozen of them British’’ (Leigh, 2004, p. 4) then doing business in Iraq. In August 2004, it was estimated that there were 20,000 armed contractors in Iraq working with American forces, and another 10,000 working in a non-combatant capacity (Keefe, 2004), and the demand is growing for civilian warriors in war zones. Since the invasion of Iraq, the private military industry ‘‘has been on steroids,’’ according to Singer (quoted in Fidler, 2005, p. 2). The Iraqi Department of Interior claims about 50,000 contractors in Iraq as of spring 2005 (Levinsky, 2005). Blackwater Security recently estimated (early 2005) that ‘‘We will probably require at least 3000–4000 professionals above and beyond what we have in the Blackwater employment and resource system’’ (quoted in Townsend, 2005). As of this writing, somewhere between 240 and 300 military contractors (from a variety of nationalities) have died in Iraq (Levinsky, 2005; PBS-Frontline, 2005), approximately 15 percent of U.S. military casualties. More than a dozen contractors have been beheaded. Civilian personnel have been employed as interrogators and translators during the Iraqi conflict and that PMF employees were involved in the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal. According to the Toronto Star: ‘‘Of the 37 interrogators at Abu Ghraib prison, 27 did not belong to the U.S. military but to a Virginia private contractor called CACI International. Twenty-two linguists who assisted them were employed by California-based Titan International’’ (Hurst, 2004, p. F3). The ‘‘Taguba Report,’’ which investigated abuses at Abu Ghraib, noted that ‘‘contractors in civilian clothes roamed freely in the prison, answering to no one, and [were] effectively outside the chain of command’’ (Keefe, 2004, p. 49). The U.S. military command finds PMFs advantageous but their use has generated serious problems (Wayne, 2002) with the potential for much more

Corporate Warriors

167

damage. PMFs and their employees have been accused of not having the requisite integrity for combat operations, of overcharging clients, of corruption, and of war profiteering. Singer (2003) also criticizes PMFs for not being subject to the normal pressures of market competition, and also for contractors’ ambiguous legal status (Singer, 2004) that affords them immunity from virtually all forms of prosecution. Moreover, the need to protect corporate ‘‘proprietary information’’ makes the Freedom of Information Act largely useless (Silverstein, 2000, p. 145). Some military spokespersons claim that there are sufficient review mechanisms in place to ensure that the military contractors are doing their jobs. For example, Major General Geoffrey D. Miller said the following of civilian interrogators: ‘‘They appear to me to doing work to standard y . If they do not follow our standards, then we discharge them. If there are acts that are beyond the level of discharge, then we will take appropriate action to hold them accountable’’ (Washburn & Bigelow, 2004, p. A1). Singer argues the opposite – that there is not nearly as much accountability and regulation of this industry as there should be. As he puts it, the private military field ‘‘has virtually no laws, oversight or any public understanding of how to deal with it’’ (quoted in Collier, 2004, p. A1). Nation States and the Use of Force Corporate Warriors presents itself as a more accurate description of the realities of global (in)security than one finds in much contemporary international relations theory. The main difference in the current situation, Singer tells us, is that it is no longer nation states and agents of governments that can legitimately exercise the use of force. Sociologist Max Weber, in his 1918,‘‘Politics as a Vocation,’’ defined the modern state as an entity that ‘‘claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory’’ (Weber, 1959[1918], p. 78, emphasis in original). Singer’s big theoretical claim is that this is no longer the case. With the rise of PMFs, it is clear that Weber’s claims that ‘‘force is a means specific to the state’’ and that ‘‘the state is considered the sole source of the ‘right’ to use violence’’ (Weber, 1959[1918]) are simply no longer accurate. PMFs ‘‘deliver to consumers a wide spectrum of military services,’’ which were previously ‘‘generally assumed to be exclusively inside the public context’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 8). However, Singer does seem to overstate the novelty of this claim. In the same passage from which the above quotations were drawn, Weber writes, ‘‘at the present time, the right to use physical force is ascribed to other institutions or to individuals only to the extent to which the state permits it’’

168

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

(Weber, 1959[1918], p. 78), that is to say that the state’s imprimatur has been acquired. Here it seems that Weber is still partially correct, after all. For example, the U.S. government, as the leading client for these privatized military services, obviously knows (although its accounting seems quite poor (Price, 2005)) that these firms exist and it allows them to operate. Singer’s larger point, of course, that today ‘‘the state’s hold over violence is broken’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 18) is beyond dispute. In the past and, we would argue, today that privatization of force signals a serious weakness in the state itself. The U.S. in the Global Military Services Industry The private military industry spans the globe and includes virtually every country concerned with security. Britain, Israel, South Africa, Russia, and the United States are some of the countries that are most involved in the field. The position and power of U.S. firms in particular is significant. Paul Bremer, former head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, was protected in Iraq by guards from the Blackwater corporation, a leading U.S. firm.8 In terms of Singer’s (2003, p. 93) ‘‘Tip of the Spear’’ typology, Blackwater (as well as DynCorp, another substantial and controversial U.S. firm) would be an example of what Singer calls a ‘‘military provider firm.’’ These entities ‘‘engage in actual fighting, either as line units or specialists’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 92). According to Blackwater’s company website (blackwaterusa.com), the firm can ‘‘customize and execute solutions for our clients to help keep them at the level of readiness required to meet today’s law enforcement, homeland security, and defense challenges.’’ Blackwater’s clients include ‘‘federal law enforcement agencies, Department of Defense, Department of State, and Department of Transportation, local and state entities from around the country, multi-national corporations, and friendly nations from all over the globe’’ (blackwaterusa.com). The second type of PMF Singer classifies as a ‘‘military consulting firm.’’ Such firms ‘‘provide advisory and training services’’ and ‘‘offer strategic, operational, and/or organizational analysis’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 95). A U.S. exemplar of this type is MPRI (Military Professional Resources Incorporated), which was founded in 1987. MPRI’s ‘‘employee pool draws from the highest levels of retired U.S. military personnel’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 119). Headquartered in Alexandria, VA, MPRI is active both domestically (e.g., in helping to ‘‘administer the ROTC and Staff College programs’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 121)) and globally. At the international level, MPRI offers clients ‘‘doctrinal development, re-structuring defense ministries, advanced war gaming, training on every types of weapons system, and military instruction

Corporate Warriors

169

down to squad-level tactics’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 142). The firm has been credited with ‘‘helping to alter the entire course of the war’’ in the Balkans (Singer, 2003, p. 123). More recently, MPRI has been awarded millions of dollars by the U.S. government to help in the fight against narco-terrorists and Marxist guerillas in Colombia. Singer refers to the third type as the ‘‘military support firm.’’ Activities in this sector ‘‘include nonlethal aid and assistance, including logistics, intelligence, technical support, supply and transportation’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 97). Brown & Root Services (BRS, a subsidiary of Halliburton) is an example of a prominent firm of this type. Founded in 1919 as an ‘‘oil well cementing company’’ the Texas company ‘‘transformed the oil well construction and service industry’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 137) for the next half century. Halliburton gained exposure during the first Persian Gulf War in helping to ‘‘bring 320 burning oil wells under control’’ while BRS ‘‘was selected to assess and repair all the damaged public buildings in Kuwait’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 138). Headed by Dick Cheney in the 1990s, ‘‘a major boost to BRS came from the crisis in former Yugoslavia’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 143) where the company played numerous military logistics roles. It continues to be a major player in military operations in the post 9/11 environment. One important characteristic of these firms is that many of them operate ‘‘virtual companies,’’ as Singer calls them. They ‘‘save by limiting their expenditure on fixed (‘brick and mortar’) assets’’ and ‘‘do not maintain large numbers of permanent employees [or] ‘standing forces.’’’ Instead, many PMFs rely on electronic ‘‘databases of qualified personnel and specialized subcontractors’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 75). This allows teams of contractors to be deployed very quickly and in a manner specifically crafted to the conflict at hand. Many corporate warriors, then, are contingent workers for the private military industry. Most PMF employees ‘‘have served at least some time in the public military’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 76). This affords PMFs a number of advantages: they have plenty of ex-military personnel to choose from; their new employees have already been trained and pre-screened; and their former military status can increase a firm’s legitimacy in the military services market.

THEORIZING THE RISE OF THE NEW CORPORATE WARRIOR Why the rise in private armed force in recent history? What sort of theories are offered by these two leading studies?

170

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

The Silverstein Thesis The purpose of Silverstein’s study is primarily to demonstrate how various forms of private military interests rooted in the Cold War era have furthered their own interests and, as a result, preserved a Cold War military culture long after the Cold War has ended. One of those many forms is the private ‘‘Mercenary, Inc.’’ industry. While he does not attempt a systematic theorization of this phenomenon, he does make a claim about the central driving force. The chief factor pushing the expansion of corporate mercenary firms, according to Silverstein (2000, p. 144), has been the cutbacks in U.S. armed forces personnel since the end of the Cold War. So the post-Cold War ‘‘peace dividend’’ has found its way into the bottom lines of PMFs. The Singer Thesis Like Silverstein, much of Singer’s book is also descriptive. But one chapter in Corporate Warriors is devoted to explaining the rise of recent security privatization. The argument has three main dimensions and hinges on: (1) security problems accompanying the end of the Cold War; (2) changes in the nature of warfare; (3) the pressures of privatization. Security Issues in the Post–Cold War Era The first dimension to Singer’s explanation is the security vacuum that occurred with the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War. Cold War bi-polarity created a form of international conflict containment, conflicts confined to separate spheres of influence. With its demise, however, these conflicts have released ‘‘unresolved tensions and new pressures’’ and have led to a ‘‘resultant massive increase in instability’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 51) around the world. The implosion of once stable nation states, renewed cross-border conflicts among states, and growing inequalities from globalization (aka, neo-liberal economic policies) all feed the conflicts that have led to the emergence of the privatized military industry. In addition to new conflicts in a post-Cold War landscape, the contemporary period has given rise to what Singer calls ‘‘non-states in violence.’’ It used to be the case that warfare occurred simply between representatives of nation-states. Battlefield identity is no longer so easily determined, and Singer argues that the ‘‘lines between civilian, soldier, guerilla, terrorist, or criminal have become more blurred than ever, and small numbers of individuals can now embody greater threats than entire armies’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 52). There are myriad examples of non-states engaging in violence, from

Corporate Warriors

171

the actions of al Qaeda and the Washington Snipers to groups in Colombia and Chechnya. Singer claims that ‘‘the PMF industry benefits from the business opportunities that open up as a consequence of the actions of these new conflict groups y and the failure of the world community to regulate them’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 52). A third element to the changing parameters of conflict in the post-Cold War situation involves the downsizing of military personnel either through government cost-cutting measures (echoing Silverstein) or through the implosion of national militaries. The upshot has been large numbers of military personnel pushed onto the labor market looking to practice their trade. Most people who work for these PMFs are ‘‘retired military personnel or former special forces’’ (Van Dongen, 2003, p. 6). Some claim that governments have no other choice but to rely on PMFs because there are no longer people within the regular military who are capable of doing the work. The armed forces are simply leaner than in other periods and budget cuts especially in the 1990s have deteriorated the skill base for many operations. For example, a spokesman for the Army, Major Gary Tallman, commented: ‘‘The Army is much smaller than in the past y When you run out of soldiers and they don’t have an expertise [sic], one way to put capability on the battlefield is to contract it’’ (Washburn & Bigelow, 2004, A1). Others suggest that the new division of labor makes sense in that ‘‘American soldiers are expensive and uniformed military don’t want to be cooking food or doing lots of other tasks, so PMCs are more efficient’’ (Kurlantzick, 2003, p. 17). Contracts can be very lucrative for firms and their employees. Singer writes that salaries for private soldiers can be ‘‘2 to 10 times as much as in the official military and police’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 74). More senior employees can stand to earn a great deal of money, too. Singer claims that ‘‘in developed regions many ex-soldiers are drawn into the industry by the prospect of combining their public retirement pay with a full private salary. Occupational stability and corporate rewards (including stock options in the more established firms) are further draws’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 74). Singer argues that a fourth change that has happened to global security in the post–Cold War period that has spurred the development of this industry is that the tools of national security, the ‘‘primary means of warfare’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 55) have, like soldiers, also appeared on the global marketplace. Outdated and surplus Soviet era weaponry has been bought up by PMFs as states sell munitions to survive or to get rid of inventory. Firms have also benefitted from the technological development in the weapons industry more generally, which has seen weaponry become much more

172

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

inexpensive, sophisticated, and increasingly available to private customers on the open market. As a fifth plank in his argument about the changing nature of security in the post-Cold War period, Singer suggests a host of fundamental changes in the power of the nation state and its role in international affairs. He describes ‘‘the striking weakness of the majority of states in the present world system y . Most are so enfeebled as to be incapable of carrying out their most basic functions’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 55). As a state becomes weak, so does its military, which creates a power vacuum that PMFs can fill. Interestingly enough, the role of state weakness plays a part in explaining the demand for private warriors in Third World regions, for Singer, but not in his account of the U.S. experience we return to this issue below. There is also a reluctance on the part of powerful nation states to intervene in world affairs. Although Singer notes that ‘‘when terrorists strike directly at the United States, it is easy to ramp up unified public backing for troop deployments’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 58) he says that a more typical response is for great powers to not get involved. It is also becoming clear for a number of reasons that the United Nations also lacks the ability to effectively intervene in theaters of conflict. Singer claims that the UN does not have the financial backing to be successful, that the organization is simply not ‘‘designed for fighting wars’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 59) and that there are also many internal organizational difficulties that limit its efficiency. These developments, when combined with the fact that regional and neighboring powers are also too often anemic and ineffectual, all serve to create market openings for military firms and the outsourcing of war. Changes in the Character of Warfare The second major dimension that Singer argues is responsible for the growth of the private military industry ‘‘is that warfare itself is under going revolutionary changes’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 60). It is simply possible now for ‘‘smaller organizations to wage war’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 61). The types of skills needed to defend states today no longer require huge deployments and massive use of force. The changing nature of military technology, especially in fields such as ‘‘microelectronics, software engineering and biotechnology’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 62) has altered the playing field substantially, and most breakthroughs in these fields have come from the private sector. Singer also contends that many conflicts in the present era have become ‘‘criminalized’’ in that some states are ruled by criminals and are simply incapable of proper government. PMF ‘‘professionalism stands in sharp contrast to local irregular forces’’ (Singer, 2003, p. 66).9

Corporate Warriors

173

The Privatization Revolution The third dimension that Singer points to as crucial in explaining the rise of the new PMFs is the privatization revolution that has been sweeping across developed countries since the late 1970s and early 1980s. The public sphere is becoming obliterated as government contracts outsource more and more of state functions to private firms.10 Singer writes that ‘‘governments have found it expedient to transfer some of their public responsibilities to the private sector y [b]ecause of issues of cost, quality, efficiency, or changing conceptions of governmental duties y . The ideas of garbage collection, prison administration, and even public schools being run by for-profit firms have all become generally accepted as ways to make public services more competitive’’ (Singer, 2003, pp. 7, 213). Military services are just one more area of public life commodified, contracted out to private firms for profit. The Weakness of the U.S. State as a Weakness in Singer’s Argument Singer recognizes state strength (or lack thereof) as an element in the rise of the new private armed force industry. However, his recognition congers up images of ‘‘enfeebled,’’ small Third World states, not that of Empire. This may be, in part, the result of his breadth of coverage rather than in-depth historical analysis of the relevant U.S. history. Singer misses the significance of state strength/weakness and, thereby, weakens his own explanation for the recent significant reliance on private armed force by the United States. The current weakness of the U.S. state is, at root, a limitation of militaryenforced Empire; its abstract roots are in Cold War containment policy, manifested concretely in Vietnam. Private armed force was a central part of the capitalist countermovement to suppress the labor movement in America between 1877 and the Second World War. This early capital–labor history indicates how capital, when faced with constraints of a weak state, improvised to create its own local (flexible) armed force. This was particularly relevant during a period when the labor movement was being framed as ‘‘outlaw’’ and even terrorist in character. Private purchase of armed force was relied upon when public mobilization through state institutions was insufficient to provide the ‘‘security’’ that private businesses desired. These private armed forces served as a form of local quasi-state: they were typically sanctioned, often informally, by existing state officials (e.g., municipalities or governors) and functioned as an extension of the state apparatus. But the building of these local quasistate forms had a powerful class character for two important reasons: they targeted and sought to undermine the labor movement and as these private

174

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

armed forces came to be selectively sanctioned by state officials, ethnicbased and/or workers’ militias that were unexceptional prior to the early 1880s became increasingly repressed out of existence. What is the significance of these observations? It was not only in early European state formation (that Singer points to) that irregular, private armed force played a significant role in the character and making of state power, it was central in 19th and early 20th-century U.S. experience, too. Importantly, this early experience trained both private and public (army) armed forces on elite concerns with domestic ‘‘order.’’ What this suggests is that if the threat is sufficient and private resources are available, private mobilization of armed force will emerge to ‘‘patch’’ (Skowronek, 1982) or fill the vacuum in public state provision. In the current period, private armed forces are being relied upon, in part, by the U.S. military because of constraints on the state’s ability to mobilize military forces at sufficient troop strength levels. In other words, the U.S. is faced with drawing on private warriors because it lacks a sufficient supply of public ‘‘citizen soldiers’’ (‘‘regulars’’) to handle self-imposed fighting obligations, especially in Iraq. Singer builds supply and demand of military forces into his explanation, but he fails to link these concerns to conditions of state strength, especially in the form of political– cultural constraints. In short, the U.S. has been and still is constrained, and in some sense weakened, by the misadventure in Vietnam, and the related abolition of the draft. As Roxborough (2003, p. 348) claims: ‘‘Any assessment of the modern American military must start with Vietnam’’. Yet Singer never even mentions Vietnam. An important dimension of the meaning of state strength rests with state capacity to mobilize against external threats to its territorial integrity and to its citizenry. A strong state demonstrates its military capacity through its pre-existing legitimacy and the legitimacy of its campaigns, and mobilizes the military forces it needs either through conscription and volunteers or through a combination of the two. Before the Vietnam War was ever over, conscription ended as a vehicle for mobilizing U.S. armed forces personnel. With the extraction of U.S. troops by 1973 and the collapse of Saigon by 1975, Vietnam became the major constraint on the military branch of the U.S. state apparatus. The legacy of Vietnam was not only a constraint on the military, but also a constraint on politicians seeking to mobilize extensive military forces for less than direct threats. Those that lamented this constraint most keenly gave it a name, ‘‘the Vietnam Syndrome,’’ which stated simply is ‘‘the American public’s disinclination to engage in further military interventions in internal Third World conflicts’’ (Klare, 1982, p. 1).

Corporate Warriors

175

This is, of course, especially the case if such interventions were of sufficient magnitude to require conscription to fill manpower obligations. The ‘‘Vietnam Syndrome’’ shaped the politics of the U.S. military. For many military leaders the big lesson of Vietnam was to never again get into a situation where the nation cannot be fully mobilized behind a declared war and all-out, high-intensity fighting. Once national support was realized, it would also be absolutely necessary to have clear goals and clear exit strategy. ‘‘No more Vietnams’’ meant no more low-intensity quagmires with unclear goals (Roxborough, 2003). It also meant the avoidance of a draft and reliance on an all-volunteer military to minimize over-politicization of military ventures.11 Even before the Iraq quagmire, the U.S. was having difficulty sustaining the all-volunteer force. In fact, a group of military experts met for a symposium in the summer prior to 9/11 to discuss changing citizenship, military service, and problems with the all-volunteer force (Abrams & Bacevich, 2001; Burk, 2001; Moskos, 2001; Cohen, 2001; Morgan, 2001). One of the major points of consensus from this group was that the sixties cultural revolution and the Vietnam War changed the relationship between citizen and state – ‘‘the federal government has effectively forfeited its ability to compel citizens to serve in the military. Conscription has become and will remain implausible’’ (Abrams & Bacevich, 2001, pp. 19–20). Prior to 9/11 and the expanded ‘‘war on terror’’ that moved into Iraq, some observers were already calling the Army’s manpower levels and recruitment difficulties ‘‘desperate’’ (Morgan, 2001). Military sociologist Charles Moskos (1999, p. A19) stated that ‘‘no problem is more serious in an armed forces than recruitment shortfalls.’’ Now deep into the Iraq campaign, the manpower problem has been seriously exacerbated. Signs of the times in the first quarter of 2005 include: (1) the Army, Army Reserves, and National Guard have missed monthly recruitment targets for several months in a row;12 (2) recruiters are under extraordinary pressure to produce new bodies, with all sorts of physical, psychological fallout, including illegal exit; since October 2002, 37 members of the Army Recruiting Command have gone AWOL (Cave, 2005a); (3) standards for recruitment have been lowered and while the cost of each successful recruit increases (Herbert, 2005); (4) combat rotations are longer, while promises to new recruits are for shorter tours (Herbert, 2005); (5) the Reserve is over-deployed; and (6) some military analysts like Michelle Flournoy of the Center for Strategic and International Studies concluded recently that U.S. policy is currently in the process of ‘‘breaking the army’’ (also see Krugman, 2005; Clarke, 2005). Many authorities have worried about the disconnect, the civilian–military gap (Morgan, 2001). This military–civilian cultural gap is manifested in a

176

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

variety of different ways, but most significantly in growing difficulties with recruitment and retention even before the problems created by the Iraq War. For instance, during the mid-1990s, the number of junior officers who left the military after one term of duty increased 50 percent; and surveys of young people indicate that the number of those saying that they ‘‘definitely will not serve in the military’’ is going up, from 40 percent in 1980 to 63 percent in 1999 (Moskos, 2001, pp. 39–40). This is not just a youthful opposition to military service either. It has been growing among parents too.13 This ‘‘disconnect’’ is the manifestation of the limits of Empire coming home to roost. Empire involves much more than just global military strategy and foreign policy. It carries with it accumulated culture – images, symbols, stories, heroes, villains, fools – all legacies of earlier military adventures and with an all-volunteer force we are finding a political, cultural, and psychological divide, a lack of identification of young people with the military. Kaplan (2003, p. 56) puts it this way: An empire is defined not only by its foreign policy, but also by the style and psychology of its military. The military expert Eliot Cohen notes that a mass conscription army of citizen soldiers are people who fight in a war in which you can make a distinct separation between good and evil, as in World War I and World War II, in which soldiers fought, for example, to make the world safe for democracy or to eliminate fascism and Japanese militarism. He defined an imperial soldiery, who likes the soldiering life for its own sake y . This is their job, and they enjoy it. They are always looking forward to the next mission, and they find themselves increasingly separated psychologically from civilian American society.

It is not only that ‘‘the cause’’ is different now (Empire requires a different kind of military outlook), but fighting for a cause in which elites do not spill the blood of their young becomes less and less acceptable for everyone else. As Charles Moskos (2001, p. 46) put it: ‘‘The advent of the all-volunteer force in 1973 [generated by Vietnam] ensured that the children of our national elites would not be found in the military, especially in the enlisted ranks.’’ ‘‘In the case of the true citizen-soldier, military service is either an obligation imposed by the state or the result of mobilization for some pressing cause’’ (Cohen, 2001, pp. 23–24). Currently in Iraq, we have neither. Therefore, we have a lower tolerance for combat casualties due to the cause and expectations about who should fight for it. Class inequality in combat casualties is always bad for a democracy, so much more so when it is in the service of Empire. The post-September 11th ‘‘global war on terrorism’’ has, because of the way it has been constructed politically, brought the U.S. military back to those very conditions that in the post-Vietnam era it had sought to avoid: vague and ill-defined goals, lack of exit-strategies, and the need for

Corporate Warriors

177

low-intensity counter-insurgency war-fighting. With direct attacks on the U.S., like the 9/11 assaults, the U.S. has no difficulty ramping up support at home or abroad. But incursions like the current war in Iraq (unlike the previous Gulf War) with its chief characteristics – long duration, low-intensity, unclear goals, and lack of exit strategy, nation reconstruction, and growing body counts – are a different story. Our central point is this: A major pressure on the U.S. military to move to private armed forces in the current period is due to state weakness, its inability to mobilize sufficient fighting forces for the Iraq campaign, and ostensibly other engagements, through the regular public military. The global war on terror as launched by the U.S. government and the Bush administration in particular has an important path-dependent quality – what we as a nation can and cannot do today is, at least in part, shaped by what we as a nation did yesterday – has been ignored in the major accounts of the rise of the corporate warrior industry. The war on terror, with its immense and amorphous global implications, in the shadow of the Vietnam Syndrome has put serious limits on what the U.S. military has been able to do in terms of manpower obligations. Numerous experts, including high-ranking military officers, have pointed to the insufficient troop strength in Iraq.14 This insufficiency is manifested in heavy reliance on National Guard and reserve units, their extended stays, and the feeble ‘‘coalition of the willing’’ international forces. A significant part of the demand pressure for private warriors is due to echoes of Vietnam, as the denouement of Cold War containment militarism’s long legacy continues to shape the current supply of volunteers for the ‘‘war on terror’’ through regular military service. This is the central condition that operates as constraint because the state is unwilling and/or unable to build sufficient troop strength through a combination of conscription and volunteers for wars like the one in Iraq. These circumstances have generated considerable debate among military experts, some of which has appeared in the mass media, about what might be done to bolster U.S. troop levels. But most of these debated approaches – e.g., slick advertising, removal of recruitment competition among military branches, linking military service to basic citizenship rights (Cave, 2005b) – are not likely to be sufficient under current conditions. Instead, the U.S. will be faced with more of the same: (1) an inadequate level of volunteers through the regular military, to be supplemented by, (2) private warriors from military contractor firms, and (3) the ‘‘sepoy strategy.’’ Sepoy is a traditional imperial approach to training ‘‘native’’ soldiers to do the brunt of the military work (Johnson, 2004, pp. 134–135), used by earlier empires (e.g., British), by the U.S. in Vietnam, and is currently underway in Iraq.

178

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

The private warrior approach has certainly been stimulated by relatively recent events (e.g., Vietnam Syndrome, privatization revolution), but its organizational template was cast over a century ago in the form of the corporate security services (read: union-busting) industry. Both forms of private irregular armed force signal symptoms of state weakness.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS Numerous analysts have concluded that the U.S. is currently engaged in a clear effort of Empire-building, a high-risk neo-imperialism designed to shape a new global hegemony in the aftermath of the Cold War and to stave-off accumulating problems at home (e.g., Biel, 2000; Harvey, 2003; Wallerstein, 2003; Johnson, 2004; Boggs, 2005). Harvey (2003, p. 75) claims that the U.S., no longer dominant in the realms of production or finance, must expand its Empire to maintain hegemony. As he puts it: ‘‘The Bush administration’s shift towards unilateralism, towards coercion rather than consent, towards a much more overtly imperial vision, and towards reliance upon its unchallengeable military power, indicates a high-risk approach to sustaining U.S. domination’’ (Harvey, 2003, p. 75). The concept of ‘‘preventive war,’’ now claimed as a special ‘‘right’’ held in Washington, destroys the notion of international law (Amin, 2003).15 The new corporate warriors are an integral part of America’s new imperialism that is being extended under the guise of fighting the war on terror. In The New Imperialism (2003, p. 3), Harvey quotes Michael Ignatieff writing in The New York Times: ‘‘America’s entire war on terror is an exercise in imperialism. This may come as a shock to Americans, who don’t like to think of their country as an empire. But what else can you call America’s legions of soldiers, spooks and special forces straddling the globe?’’ Certainly PMFs, given that they are, in part, supplying the very ‘‘soldiers, spooks and special forces’’ to which Ignatieff alludes, must be understood as agents of the new imperialism currently underway. Military force is increasingly important for U.S. Empire (Boggs, 2005) because ‘‘military muscle’’ is ‘‘the only clear absolute power [the U.S.] has left’’ (Harvey, 2003, p. 77). But, as we have argued, even this military muscle is encountering its own problems that stem largely from the limits of Empire, the cultural aversion to on-going wars of Empire that involve no real direct threat to nation. Private military forces are part of the stop-gap solution to these limits of Empire associated with maintaining a sufficiently large standing army from volunteer sources. The corporate warriors of the private military industry are, therefore,

Corporate Warriors

179

integral to neo-conservative dreams of withering away the state through privatization while it extends its platform for corporate Empire abroad. Private corporate warriors have existed in earlier American history. One of the key conditions motivating their emergence then was a state that was not sufficiently omnipresent and strong in the face of domestic industrial disorder. During the Gilded Age, the U.S. state was weak in this structural sense. Contemporary private corporate warriors are also, in part, a product of a weakened U.S. state. In the current case, the weakness stems from the need to mobilize enormous military personnel for a continuous global war on terror under the political constraints of the weighty ghost of the Cold War, Vietnam. Today it is a weakness of political–cultural will that forms part of the limits of military-enforced Empire. Historical comparison of different forms of private armed force in America suggests several important implications about the understudied role of irregular forces in understanding the state-as-process.16 Our analysis suggests at least two key theoretical implications. First, the notion of state held force monopoly, per the Weberian ideal-typical nation-state, is more fluid and flexible than most scholars have typically assumed. The state can re-allocate and decentralize its force authority into private forms in ways that reconfigure the very location and meaning of public/private boundaries. But when the state does so, it quite likely signals a form of weakness in its power and authority. Second, theories of the state and of capitalist markets would benefit from greater attention to the role of military force (including irregular armed force) in their explanations for how states and markets develop. Military force, both public and private, was integral to the making and consolidation of the national market economy during America’s late 19th-century industrial revolution. Today there is a parallel deployment of armed force, both public and private, in the project of U.S.-led globalization and Empire. There is every reason to expect the use of private corporate warriors to expand. This is the case because there are no other clearly superior (i.e., politically feasible) alternatives under current conditions.17 And the U.S. military has built the use of private contractors into its new global military base strategy (Klare, 2005). Given the likely growth in private warriors, what are the major political implications? Most significantly, far from spreading democracy and reducing terrorism, increasing reliance on PMFs is likely to exact just the opposite. Democracy will suffer for several important reasons. First, this private military industry adds a whole new layer to the Cold War military–industrial complex. When President Eisenhower warned the American public of the potential threat of the ‘‘military–industrial complex,’’ he was warning of the

180

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

power that was being accumulated and could be turned against domestic citizenry. The growth of the contemporary private military industry raises important questions about the power of these companies and political–economic interests influencing U.S. policy. That early Cold War military–industrial complex that Eisenhower worried about was primarily focused on the production of inanimate commodities of warfare. In the cozy relationship that developed in this ‘‘complex,’’ large military contractors actually came to shape Pentagon actions and policies (Melman, 1974; Hooks, 1991; Isaac & Leicht, 1997). The growth of the new privatized military industry creates the potential for a new source of profit demand, from war-fighting experts, on public policy, and an expanded conflict of interest between military officers and private industry (Silverstein, 2000; Kelty, 2004). Currently, most private military activity has been in the tactical realm. However, experts in the industry are predicting an increasing role for private sector input on strategic planning (Fidler, 2005). If this comes to pass, the private military industry will gain an even greater influence on U.S. military policy and operations – one in which war is viewed as a good – independent of Congressional oversight. The increase in access to and control over the means of violence by the private military industry will likely serve to further erode state power (Kelty, 2004, p. 19). Second, the power associated with these PMFs is a concern because of the potential for it to be used against domestic and international forms of dissent, like the labor movement. We have drawn a historical link between the anti-union corporate security industry that formed in the 19th century and the contemporary private military industry, two forms of irregular armed force. Some of these contemporary military firms are flexible enough in the services they offer (e.g., ‘‘asset protection’’) to allow for a wide range of security services against defined ‘‘insurgents.’’ This is especially troublesome when some of these companies have horrific anti-democratic and anti-labor records. Executive Outcomes (EO) from the pro-apartheid regime in South Africa was especially notorious (Singer, 2003, Chapter 7). But there are U.S. firms that are also viciously anti-labor, too. A prime example is the Vance International Protection Team recent merger with Decision Strategies (DS) and Fairfax Consulting to form DS Vance Iraq, operating under U.S. military contracts in Iraq.18 Vance International was one of the most aggressive union-busting specialists in the U.S. over the last two decades (Smith, 2003; White, 2004).19 Another case in point is the Seattle-based Stevedoring Services of America (SSA). SSA is a notorious anti-union company with a record of union-busting among west coast dockworkers in the U.S. and in Bangladesh. It was recently awarded a $4.8 million military contract to manage the crucial seaport of Umm Qasr (Mattera, 2003).

Corporate Warriors

181

Third, the use of PMFs allows for greater secrecy in military operations, less openness in an arena where citizens are already sadly under-informed. It permits the executive branch to: (1) evade Congressional limits on troop strength and (2) carry on low-level conflicts around the world without concern over media attention that would be generated when regular soldiers are sent home in body bags (Wayne, 2002). Moreover, it is currently not clear how many or what sort of contracts exist between the private military sector and the Pentagon. A report released in April, 2005 by the Governmental Accountability Office stated that ‘‘federal record-keeping on the contracts was so poor that there were not enough data to determine how many contractors are working in Iraq or how many had been killed there’’ (Price, 2005, A6). The fact that these are private contracts will make the Freedom of Information Act of little use. So rather than making the most serious business in which a democratic state can become involved subject to political scrutiny, it helps occult and depoliticize warfare. Fourth, there are differential rules for regular and private military forces. Private contractors are not obligated to take military orders or to be bound by military codes of conduct. Their obligation is to the private employment contract, not to their country (Wayne, 2002; Fidler, 2005). To make matters worse, private warrior contractor firms often hire, both knowingly and unwittingly, highly unsavory ex-military personnel. Sometimes private firms recruit from anti-democratic regimes from around the globe.20 Lack of accountability connected to private warriors with questionable positions on human rights being deployed in sensitive regions where the U.S. is claiming to be planting the seeds of democracy is likely to undermine democratic culture and inflame more terrorist ambitions. Private warriors are in a different legal status than regular military and negative fall-out from these differential rules and legal statuses is not just likely, it has already happened in at least several notorious cases: DynCorp employees running a sex-slave ring of young women in Bosnia; local troops trained by MPRI in Croatia using their new skills to undertake a massive ‘‘ethnic-cleansing’’ operation (Wayne, 2002) and the Abu-Ghraib prison, torture scandal in Iraq. No private military employee has been charged in any of these incidents; the worse that has happened is that an employee has been discharged from their employment contract and sent home (Wayne, 2002; Fidler, 2005). Congress passed the Military Extraterritorial Act (MEJA) in 2000, which is designed to impose some accountability on military contractors. But so far it appears to have had little impact (Singer, 2003; Yeoman, 2004). Present conditions, sustained over time, could also have serious negative effects on the regular military. First, the growing introduction of private

182

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

providers into the formal hierarchical military system, especially in the theater of war, will likely pose significant logistical, technical, and organizational (including cohesion, discipline, morale) problems (Kelty, 2004, pp. 9–18). Second, the continual military personnel squeeze generates conditions under which large numbers of soldiers face the harrowing experience of repeated combat tours in an unending war for Empire. This could force young officers to reconsider their military careers. A mass exodus of midcareer military professionals, like that of the Vietnam era, could produce another layer of deep and long-lasting damage to the military (Krugman, 2005; Burns, 2005; Clarke, 2005). The contemporary large-scale corporations that provide fighters are similar to early mercenaries because they are guns for hire. But they are also different in important ways because of the institutional relations in which they are embedded. Just how different modern corporate commodification of the warrior is and what it will mean for American politics, war and peace, is a significant question that deserves further attention.

NOTES 1. By ‘‘empire,’’ we mean most centrally the aggressive use of military unilateralism to shape world affairs in line with administrative construction of U.S. interests. Pieterse (2004, p. 41) describes the current phase as a ‘‘neoliberal empire, a me´lange of political-military and economic unilateralism, and attempt to merge geopolitics with the aims and techniques of neoliberalism.’’ Boggs (2005, p. x) underscores the fact that this aggressive globalizing empire ‘‘flows from y a growing mood of American exceptionalism in international affairs, the primacy of military force in U.S. policy, arrogation of the right to intervene around the world, the spread of xenophobic patriotism, further consolidation of the permanent war system.’’ Significantly, ‘‘the new empire is founded on the rule of power, not the rule of law’’ (Pieterse, 2004, p. 43). 2. We use ‘‘path dependency’’ in a probabilistic rather than a deterministic sense. 3. The National Guard was also used during this period in international conflicts like the Spanish–American War (Cooper, 1997, pp. 97–107). 4. The Chicago militia case in point was the ‘‘Chicago First Regiment’’ (Turnbaugh, 1979). The newly founded (in 1877) Cleveland militias were ‘‘The First City Troop of Cleveland’’ (a calvary troop) and ‘‘The Cleveland Gatling Gun Battery’’ (a machine gun unit) (see Isaac, 2002). 5. The LaFollette Committee launched Congressional investigations into unfair labor practices and violations of worker civil liberties between 1936 and 1940. The LaFollette-Thomas bill (aka, the ‘‘Oppressive Labor Practices Act’’) passed the Senate, prohibiting industrial espionage practices, strikebreaking, the purchase and use of military-like weapons, and deployment of private armed guards by industrialists beyond corporate premises. However, the bill was never enacted (Smith, 2003, pp. 91–96).

Corporate Warriors

183

6. This is important because it creates a break with the more distant history of, hence America’s amnesia about, the domestic form of corporate warriors used in America’s internal class warfare. 7. However, the Clinton administration invoked OMB A-76 (the bureaucratic vehicle for cost-benefit logic to shift to privatization) far less than either Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush (Kelty, 2004, pp. 3–4). 8. Blackwater Security recently made the news for a memo issued by its corporate president to employees stating that ‘‘actually it is ‘fun’ to shoot some people’’ referring later in the memo to terrorists (Townsend, 2005). 9. This was also a claim made by the private independent elite capitalist militia during the Gilded Age – their professionalism, skill, training would produce ‘‘reliable’’ force not achieved by existing irregular (common militias) manned by suspect working-class and ethnic members (Isaac, 2002). 10. This ethos of privatization can be seen in the discourse of contemporary conservative politicians. For example, Jeb Bush, Governor of Florida, giving his second inauguration speech, surrounded by throngs of government workers and others stated: ‘‘In the past, our response has been to raise more taxes, grow more government, and embrace the thin fiction that if only we can hire one more social worker or complete one more form then we can somehow reverse these corrosive trends and salvage these lives y [W]e can embed in society a sense of caring that makes government less necessary. There would be no greater tribute to our maturity as a society than if we can make these buildings around us empty of workers; silent monuments to the time when government played a larger role that it deserved or could adequately fill’’ (Bush, 2003). 11. While President Bush proclaimed that we had kicked the Vietnam Syndrome with the Persian Gulf War, he knew he could not restore the draft even if he wanted to do so (Burk, 2001, p. 48). 12. Even the Marine Corp. missed their recruitment targets in January 2005 (then again in April) for the first time in a decade (Cave, 2005a, 2005b). 13. As part of the ‘‘No Child Left Behind’’ Act (passed in 2001), military recruiters must get equal time with college recruiters if schools want to receive federal aid. But recruiters are facing increasing parental resistance on this front. The latest Department of Defense survey (November 2004) indicates that only 25 percent of parents would recommend military service to their children, a steep drop from the 42 percent level in August 2003 (Cave, 2005c). 14. Early in the Iraq campaign, military experts and commanders were calling for greater troop levels. But after Army Commander John Riggs paid with a forced retirement at a reduced rank for a public disagreement with Defense Secretary Rumsfeld over this point, military commanders have been less vocal in public forum. But their concern is still there. For instance, a Marine major in Anbar Province, speaking anonymously, said: ‘‘Basically, we’ve got all the toys, but not enough boys’’ (quoted in Krugman, 2005). 15. ‘‘Preventive war’’ or ‘‘pre-emptive military action’’ is a foundation for the current transformation in U.S. global military basing strategy (see Klare, 2005). 16. Davis and Pereira (2003) is a major exception on the politics of irregular armed forces, but their excellent volume does not deal with contemporary corporate warriors as a form of irregular armed force.

184

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

17. Others agree that private military contractors will continue to grow, but often see force reductions and high technology warfare as the causes (e.g., Kelty, 2004), as if these were somehow independent of the politics of strategic selection. 18. This merger is owned by SPX Corporation that trades on the New York Stock Exchange (White, 2004). 19. The Vance website lists ‘‘Labor Unrest Protection’’ as one of their specialties and boasts that: ‘‘Consistently providing security and guidance in the face of adversity, Vance has supported more than 1,500 labor unrest situations, providing a range of solutions for small, family-owned businesses to Fortune 1000 companies nationwide.’’ 20. For example, the London-based Hart Group hired from South Africa’s apartheid personnel for a big contract in Iraq (see Yeoman, 2004).

ACKNOWLEDGMENT The authors thank Harry Dahms for useful suggestions on an earlier version of this paper. This paper was presented at the American Sociological Association Meetings, Philadelphia, August 2005. This work was supported, in part, by a Vanderbilt University research leave to the senior author.

REFERENCES Books and Journal Articles Abrams, E., & Bacevich, A. J. (2001). A symposium on citizenship and military service. Parameters: U.S. Army War College Quarterly, 31(Summer), 18–22. Adams, D. (1995). Military intervention in the United States. Journal of Peace Research, 32(2), 197–211. Amin, S. (2003). Confronting the empire. Monthly Review, 55(July/August), on-line. Avant, D. (2000). From mercenary to citizen armies: Explaining change in the practice of war. International Organization, 54(Winter), 41–91. Biel, R. (2000). The new imperialism: Crisis and contradictions in north/south relations. London: Zed Books. Block, F. (1977). The origins of international economic disorder. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Block, F. (1980). Economic instability and military strength: The paradoxes of the 1950 rearmament decision. Politics & Society, 10, 35–58. Boggs, C. (2005). Imperial delusions: American militarism and endless war. New York: Rowman & Littlefield. Burk, J. (2001). The military obligation of citizens since Vietnam. Parameters: U.S. Army War College Quarterly, 31(Summer), 48–60. Cohen, E. A. (2001). Twilight of the citizen-soldier. Parameters: U.S. Army War College Quarterly, 31(Summer), 23–28.

Corporate Warriors

185

Cooper, J. M. (1977). The army as strikebreaker: The railroad strikes of 1877 and 1894. Labor History, 18(Spring), 179–196. Cooper, J. M. (1997). The rise of the national guard. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press. Davis, D. E., & Pereira, A. W. (Eds) (2003). Irregular armed forces and their role in politics and state formation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Davis, M. (1986). Prisoners of the American dream. London: Verso. Filipelli, R. (Ed.) (1990). Labor conflict in the United States: An encyclopedia. New York: Garland. Fiss, P. C., & Hirsch, P. M. (2005). The discourse of globalization: Framing and sensemaking of an emerging concept. American Sociological Review, 70(February), 29–52. Fogelson, R. M. (1989). America’s armories: Architecture, society, and public order. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Fusfeld, D. R. (1984). Government and the suppression of radical labor, 1877–1918. In: C. Bright & S. Harding (Eds), Statemaking and social movements: Essays in history and theory (pp. 344–377). Ann Arbort, MI: University of Michigan Press. Greider, W. (1998). Fortress America: The American military and the consequences of peace. New York: Public Affairs. Hacker, B. C. (1969). The United States Army as a National Police Force: The Federal Policing of Labor Disputes, 1877–1898. Military Affairs, 33(April), 255–264. Harrison, D. M. (1996). Pinkerton turns post-industrial. Unpublished M.A. thesis, Department of Sociology, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL. Harvey, D. (2003). The new imperialism. New York: Oxford University Press. Hooks, G. (1991). Forging the military–industrial complex: World War II’s battle of the Potomac. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press. Isaac, L. (2002). To counter ‘the very devil’ and more: The making of independent capitalist militia in the Gilded Age. American Journal of Sociology, 108(September), 353–405. Isaac, L., & Leicht, K. T. (1997). Regimes of power and the power of analytic regimes: Explaining U.S. military procurement Keynesianism as historical process. Historical Methods, 30(Winter), 28–45. Johnson, B. C. (1976). Taking care of labor: The police in American politics. Theory and Society, 3, 89–117. Johnson, C. (2004). The sorrows of empire: Militarism, secrecy and the end of the republic. New York: Henry Holt and Company. Johnston, L. (1992). The rebirth of private policing. London: Routledge. Kaplan, R. D. (2003). America and the tragic limits of imperialism. The Hedgehog Review, 5(Spring), 56–67. Karnow, S. (1983). Vietnam: A history. New York: Viking. Kaufman, W. (1964). The McNamara strategy. New York: Harper & Row. Kelty, R. D. (2004). Increased dependence on civilian contractors in the U.S. military: Consequences and implications for power relations among the state, military, and society. Paper presented at the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, San Francisco. Klare, M. T. (1982). Beyond the ‘Vietnam Syndrome:’ U.S. interventionism in the 1980s. Washington, D.C.: Institute for Policy Studies. Leach, E. E. (1993). The literature on riot duty: Managing class conflict in the streets. Radical History Review, 56, 23–50. Lens, S. (1973). Labor Wars. New York: Doubleday & Company.

186

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

Lipold, P. F. (2003). Laying it all on the line: The configuration and causes of strike fatalities within the United States, 1877–1947. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Sociology, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL. Melman, S. (1970). Pentagon capitalism: The political economy of war. New York: McGrawHill. Melman, S. (1974). The permanent war economy. New York: Simon and Schuster. Montgomery, D. (1993). Citizen/worker. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Morgan, M. J. (2001). Army recruiting and the civilian–military gap. Parameters: U.S. Army War College Quarterly, 31(Summer), 1201–1218. Moskos, C. (2001). What ails the all-volunteer force: An institutional perspective. Parameters: U.S. Army War College Quarterly, 31(Summer), 29–47. Norwood, S. H. (2002). Strikebreaking and intimidation: Mercenaries and masculinity in twentieth-century America. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press. Pieterse, J. N. (2004). Globalization Or empire? London: Routledge. Reinders, R. (1977). Militia and public order in nineteenth-century America. Journal of American Studies, 11(1), 81–101. Rosen, R. (2000). The world split open: How the modern women’s movement changed America. New York: Viking. Roxborough, I. (2003). The ghost of Vietnam: America confronts the New World Order. In: D. E. Davis & A. Pereira (Eds), Irregular armed forces and their role in politics and state formation (pp. 346–384). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Sanders, J. W. (1983). Peddlers of crisis: The committee on the present danger and the politics of containment. Boston: South End Press. Silverstein, K. (2000). Private warriors. New York: Verso Press. Singer, P. W. (2003). Corporate warriors: The rise of the privatized military industry. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Skowronek, S. (1982). Building a new American state: The expansion of national administrative capacities, 1877–1920. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Smith, R. M. (1993). Spies against labor: Industrial espionage agencies, 1855–1940. Labor’s Heritage, 5(Summer), 64–77. Smith, R. M. (2003). From blackjacks to briefcases: A history of commercialized strikebreaking and unionbusting in the United States. Athens: Ohio University Press. Stowell, D. O. (1999). Railroads and the great strike of 1877. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Taft, P., & Ross, P. (1969). American labor violence: Its causes, character, and outcome. In: H. Graham & T. Gurr (Eds), Violence in America (pp. 281–395). New York: Bantam. Thomson, J. (1994). Mercenaries, pirates, and sovereigns: State-building and extraterritorial violence in Early Modern Europe. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Tilly, C. (1990). Coercion, Capital, and European States, A.D. 990–1990. Cambridge, Mass: Blackwell. Turgeon, L. (1996). Bastard Keynesianism: The evolution of economic thinking and policymaking since World War II. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Turnbaugh, R. (1979). Ethnicity, civic pride, and commitment: The evolution of the Chicago militia. Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, 72, 111–122. U.S. Department of Defense. (1963). Annual report for fiscal year 1962. Washington, DC: GPO. U.S. Department of Defense. (1965). Annual report for fiscal year 1964. Washington, DC: GPO. Wallace, M. (1970–71). The uses of violence in American history. American Scholar, 40, 81–102.

Corporate Warriors

187

Wallerstein, I. (2003). U.S. weakness and the struggle for hegemony. Monthly Review, 55(July/ August), on-line. Weber, M. (1959/1918). Politics as a vocation. In: H. Gerth & C. W. Mills (Eds), From Max Weber: Essays in sociology (pp. 77–128). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Wolfe, A. (1979). The rise and fall of the ‘Soviet Threat. Washington, DC: Institute for Policy Studies. Wolfe, A. (1981). America’s impasse: The rise and fall of the politics of growth. New York: Pantheon.

Press and Web Sources Bredemeier, K. (2003). Thousands of private contractors support U.S. forces in Persian Gulf. The Washington Post, final edition, p. E1. Brooks, D. (2005). Private security contractors are key to making recovery efforts possible in Iraq. The Financial Times, May 12, USA edition, p. 12. Burns, J. F. (2005). Choose: More troops in Iraq will (Help) (Hurt). The New York Times, June 19, section 4, pp. 1, 4. Bush, J. (2003). Governor Bush’s 2003 Inaugural Address. Document located at: http:// www.myflorida.com/myflorida/government/mediacenter/news/speeches/inaug-01-07-03. html. Accessed: January 8, 2005. Cave, D. (2005a). For recruiters, a hard toll from a hard sell. The New York Times, March 27, pp. 1, 21. Cave, D. (2005b). Uncle Sam wants you. But he needs to adapt. The New York Times, May 8, p. 3. Cave, D. (2005c). Growing problem for military recruiters: Parents. The New York Times, June 3, on-line. Clarke, R. A. (2005). War and weakness. The New York Times Magazine, June 19, p. 18. Collier, R. (2004). Global security firms in as private armies. The San Francisco Chronicle, p. A1. Fidler, S. (2005). Operating in a troubling legal and regulatory vacuum. The Financial Times, May 9, p. 2. Herbert, B. (2005). Someone else’s child. The New York Times, June 20, nytimes.com Hurst, L. (2004). The privatization of Abu Ghraib. The Toronto Star, May 16, p. F3. Keefe, P. R. (2004). Iraq: America’s private armies. New York Review of Books, August 12, pp. 48–50. Klare, M. T. (2005). Imperial reach: The Pentagon’s new basing strategy. The Nation, April 25, pp. 13–18. Krugman, P. (2005). Too few, yet too many. The New York Times, 30; http://www.nytimes.com/ 2005/05/30/opinion Kurlantzick, J. (2003). Outsourcing the dirty work. The American Prospect, p. 17. Leigh, D. (2004). Who commands the private soldiers? The Guardian, Final edition, May 17, p. 4. Levinsky, D. (2005). Researcher: Contractors face great danger in Iraq. Burlington County Times, May 17; http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/112-05172005-490453.html Mattera, P. (2003). The next wave of invaders: U.S. hires anti-union company to run key port in Iraq. Corporate Research E-Letter EXTRA, March 25. http://www.corp-research.org/ archives/extra_32503.htm. Accessed: January 3, 2005. Moskos, C. (1999). Short-term soldiers. The Washington Post, March 8, p. A19.

188

LARRY W. ISAAC AND DANIEL M. HARRISON

PBS-Frontline (2005). Private warriors. June 21. http://www.pbs.org/frontline/ Price, J. (2005). Military contractor data found lacking. The News and Observer, April 30, p. A6. Sennott, C. M. (2004). Security firm’s $293 M deal under scrutiny. The Boston Globe, (Third edition, June 22), p. A1. Silver, V. (2003). Corporate deals include hands-on help for military. The Seattle Times, (Fourth edition, March 21), p. D3. Singer, P. W. (2004). Above law, above decency. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 9, p. B1. Townsend, M. (2005). Fury at ‘Shoot for Fun’ memo. The Observer (London), April 3; http:// www.observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1451137,00.html Van Dongen, R. (2003). U.S.’s ‘Private Army’ grows. Christian Science Monitor, Wednesday, p. 6. Washburn, D., & Bigelow, B. V. (2004). Debate on military contractors heats up. The San Diego Union-Tribune, p. A1. Wayne, L. (2002). America’s for-profit secret army. The New York Times, October 13, Sect. 3, pp. 1, 10–11. White, J. (2004). Private security company in Iraq suppressed labor struggles in U.S. World Socialist Web Site, May 7. http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/may2004/vanc-m07.shtml Yeoman, B. (2004). Dirty warriors. Mother Jones, November/December, pp. 30–35.

FROM EXCEPTIONALISM TO IMPERIALISM: CULTURE, CHARACTER, AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY Lauren Langman and Meghan A. Burke ‘‘For all their freedom and democracy, Americans seem to be a very unhappy people’’ Alexis De Tocqueville ‘‘I have always believed that this anointed land was set apart in an uncommon way, that a divine placed this great continent here between the oceans to be found by people from every corner of the earth who had a special love of faith and freedom’’ Ronald Reagan

INTRODUCTION Arthur Schlessinger (1983) suggested that the contradictions and paradoxes of American foreign policy reflected contradictions and paradoxes in the underlying character of the people. We would go further to suggest that the early years of colonial life, much like the early years of a person’s life, had major consequences ever since. The intersection of Puritanism, available land, and eventually the rise of a commercial culture would forge a unique trajectory of what would be called ‘‘American Exceptionalism’’, reflecting an ‘‘American character’’, which itself is subject to three paradoxes or Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 189–228 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24004-0

189

190

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

polarities, individualism vs. community, toughness vs. compassion, and moralism vs. pragmatism. The effect of this legacy and the dialectical aspect of American character were first evident when Winthrop proclaimed the city on the hill as the new Jerusalem. The legacy of that vision is taking place today in Iraq. Close to 400 years ago, a small group of staunchly religious, persecuted ‘‘outcasts’’, Puritans, wandering through Holland and England, set sail aboard the Mayflower. They landed in New England and founded a number of small agricultural communities. The early years of those settlements were quite harsh given the topography and climate. Yet they survived, indeed they would prosper and grow. And in the course of history, the small isolated communities would become towns and cities, its rigid Calvinism would moderate, and eventually, New England would become a major center of commerce, secular learning, and anti-British sentiments that first led its elites to launch the Boston Tea Party, and eventually segments of the bourgeoisie, carries of the Enlightenment, often Freemasons, initiated the American revolution. Not withstanding however, the legacy of the early colonial experiences, mediated though individual psyches and collective values, would not only become hegemonic, but endure, and continue to have a major impact and give that society a distinctive hue, it would be seen as ‘‘exceptional’’. It would have a historical trajectory that would be quite different than any other society. In the earliest observations and accounts of Hector St. John Crevecoeur and Alexis De Tocqueville, it was noted that America, ‘‘the first new nation’’, was qualitatively unique; ‘‘American Exceptionalism’’ was clearly evident (Lipset, 1960, 1990). As shall be argued, Puritan religion interacted with the material conditions of the New World, from its cash based farming to ship building, whaling, and shipping to shape ‘‘American character’’ in distinctive ways. A unique cluster of individualism, moralism, and valorized violence has long shaped and yet impacts our consciousness, our values, understandings, identities, and even our geopolitics. Illuminating this legacy can help us understand the basis of much of our recent and current foreign policies – and why so often they are failures. Bellah (1975) argued that the Pilgrims on the Mayflower, united by a formal covenant, were closely bound together by faith and necessity; yet when their colony did eventually survive and prosper, the influx of wealth and possibilities of mobility, unleashed an individualism that while rooted in Puritan religion, shattered that covenant. In his oft-cited letter of 1630, John Winthrop proclaimed that in this new land, blessed by the Lord, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

191

superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities. We must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience, and liberality. We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own y where all would work, rejoice and mourn together, people would see His wisdom and goodness, when 10 of us could resist 1,000 enemies, and we will be as a ‘‘city on the hill’’, with the eyes of everyone upon us, but if we turn away, we would surely perish. Therefore, let us choose life. And so the Puritan founders of New England escaping the religious intolerance of Europe proclaimed that the ‘‘city on the hill’’, the ‘‘new Jerusalem’’, would shine as a beacon of hope for the rest of the world. God had given America a special mission in the world. But what was the actual mission that would unfold? Little noted at that time, but the New England colonies were as much beacons for ‘‘unclaimed’’ land and natural resources like timber, as a place where the Puritans were free to practice their Puritanism. And while his exhortation included the importance of communal ties, instead, the emergence of individualism, tempered by Christian moralism, would impact the US till the present time. In the course of the next few centuries, from these humble beginnings, the colonies of New England as well as the Southern colonies would become the most formidable Nation-State, if not Empire in the history of the world. And for reasons that shall be explicated, this ascent to world domination was seen as a sign of God blessing the ‘‘city on the hill’’. From the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the 1600s through a young nation’s westward expansion to the two world wars of the 20th century, the belief that American purposes reflect a divine will and blessing has served to inspire, sustain and, in the eyes of critics, to warp American views of the world.1

Moreover, as we shall attempt to argue, this legacy of divine blessing has had a major impact on post WWII geo politics. The US has, like most nations, sought policies to secure its power and profits. But unlike most, it has also attempted to see the world as a Manichean stage where the US as the ‘‘good’’, as God’s emissary, was impelled to eradicate ‘‘evil’’. When this moralism became intertwined with a valorization of ‘‘toughness’’ as masculinity, we have seen a long history of fool hardy policy decisions with adverse consequences ranging from the elimination of modernist, progressive forces in the Middle East, the odious war in Vietnam – including the genocide of Pol Pot, the support for murderous South American dictators, and as this paper is being written, the war in Iraq. How did what had been a rural backwater make the ascent to world domination in which its national formation and subsequent trajectory

192

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

would radically diverge from its European roots. That difference would take many forms, for example why did 13 English colonies unite to form the ‘‘first new nation’’? How and why did a new American type of person emerge? How did that new nation so rapidly become scientifically advanced and its technologies world dominant. While its history would begin with its revolution and the establishment of democracy, how come there have never been either ‘‘Tory’’ or ‘‘socialist’’ parties. Why has the US been relatively Spartan in the allocation of welfare benefits such as health care, which is part of all other industrial societies? But for our purposes, the most important question concerns the persistence of religious values, mediated through character structure and hegemonic ideologies to inform social and political agendas. More specifically, the early years of colonial New England consisted of small, highly cohesive communities, in which strict religious codes regulated social life – with harsh punishments for offenders, ranging from pillories and stocks to banishment. Yet the individualism within Protestantism, together with its stress on education that would open minds and expose them to European ideas, and the decentralized nature of its churches disposed the very democracy that would rent communal bonds. Engeman (2004) argues: Protestant thought had come to accept a more rational and less moralistic view of human nature y. Enlightenment rationalism persuaded New England’s established leadership to shuck off Calvinism for the more prestigious and rational religions of the deists and Unitarians. Indeed, the utopian Calvinists had abandoned their hope that small communities of believers could find perfection in a ‘‘shining city on the Hill,’’ and sought, according to Michael Zuckert, a ‘‘natural rights republic.’’ But within fifty years the new natural rights republic increasingly understood itself in religious terms – as the Redeemer Nation. Speaking at Peoria, Abraham Lincoln compares the sanctity of the Founders’ republic to the purity of Christ, warning that the once pure republic has fallen into sin y. Our republican robe is soiled, and trailed in the dust. Let us repurify it. Let us turn and wash it white, in the spirit, if not the blood, of the Revolution. Let us turn slavery from its claims of ‘‘moral right,’’ back upon its existing legal rights, and its arguments of ‘‘necessity’’ y. If we do this, we shall not only have saved the Union; but we shall have so saved it, as to make, and to keep it, forever worthy of the saving.

But what has made the US ‘‘exceptional’’ has been the strong persistence of these religious values despite the Enlightenment that extolled Reason and legitimated its bourgeois revolution, its constitution, democracy, and its religious toleration. Further, despite industrialization, consumerism, and globalization, there has been a persistence of an individualistic religious moralism, combined with ‘‘toughness’’ as masculinity. This pattern was evident when religious-based values have legitimated economic actions fostering territorial expansion and displacement of native populations as early as

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

193

the colonial era, it further informed the westward expansion from the Louisiana Purchase to the annexation of Texas, the conquest of what had been northern Mexico and the Spanish American War. But not only has this combination legitimated economic action, but so too has it prompted a variety of interventions.

PART I: AMERICAN CHARACTER American Exceptionalism There has been a waning of academic concerns with ‘‘national character’’. This reflects academic critiques of the concept as perhaps too far reaching in scope with too little explanatory power, changing academic fashions such as postmodernism with its valorization of multiculturalism and the pluralization of decentered identities and proliferations of free floating signifiers of subjectivity. While perhaps the concept was most closely tied to the ‘‘culture and personality’’ traditions of anthropology, it was a part of some of the early work of the Frankfurt School. Although authoritarianism is found in a number of cultures, it was said to be especially typical of the German lower middle classes in which there were strong sadomasochistic tendencies for submission to authority and domination from above, and domination and aggression to those lower in the social hierarchies (Smith, 2004). Furthermore, Fromm’s work on ‘‘social character’’, e.g., the receptive, hoarding, marketing, and productive character types, suggests that each character type was more typical in certain eras. More recently, this concept has been applied to the ludic, carnivalesque character of the present age (Langman, 1998). Notwithstanding the empirical critiques of the validity of the concept and the waning of academic fashions, we would like to suggest that it remains a valuable hermeneutic for understanding politics in the present age.2 For us, we would suggest that a national character be considered as an abstract social psychological pattern of clusters of certain motivations, defenses, identities, and frames of understanding, which if not ‘‘typical’’ of a group is at least highly over represented in some groups and quite rare in others. Thus for example, while individualism, first described by De Tocqueville, is especially typical of North Americans, it is less often found in Asian societies. Moreover, even within a society, it may be more typical of some classes than others and in America, it would be most typical in the haute bourgeoisie. Character structure, from a psychoanalytic point of view, as the totality of a person is an expression of the ways s/he learned to adapt to his/her

194

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

world. It is the organization of his/her motives and desires, modes of reflexive self-awareness – and forms of repressions and defenses against selfawareness, one’s values and goals that both regulate desire and give one a moral aspect of identity, and finally, the patterns of interaction that express and gratify one’s desires, both overt and covert. National character is an abstraction, an ideal typical formation in the Weberian sense that is more or less distinctive about a particular group. While individual character development looks at the person’s adaptation to his/her unique family constellations and dynamics, a national character can be seen as adaptation to the historicity of the political economy and the social location of the person. Much as Mills saw biography located in history, so too is a national character formed within a historical context. But unlike an individual, a national character has the ability to persist for generations beyond the conditions of its origins. Furthermore, insofar as it becomes systematically reproduced, if not interpolated, by various ideological state apparatus, e.g., schools, mass media, work organizations, churches, etc., it can in time become incorporated by other groups. Further, it can become a central element of hegemony and social reproduction, about which we shall say more later. Among the earliest commentators on American character was Henri de Crevecoeur (1798) who noted the conditions of equality among a nation where most were farm owners, there were no titles of rank and deference. Regardless where they came from, they were animated by a spirit of unfettered industry, because each person worked for himself. The laws were mild and just. He is an American, who leaving behind him all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new mode of life he has embraced, the new government he obeys, and the new rank he holds y. Here individuals of all nations are melted into a new race of men, whose labours and posterity will one day cause great changes in the world y. The American is a new man, who acts upon new principles; he must therefore entertain new ideas, and form new opinions. From involuntary idleness, servile dependence, penury, and useless labour, he has passed to toils of a very different nature, rewarded by ample subsistence – This is an American.3

Crevecoeur also noted the toleration for religious diversity and the number of faiths that were practiced in close proximity.4 About 30 years later, another Frenchman, Alexis de Tocqueville (1945) came to America and scripted what may well be the most insightful analysis of American Character. He was the first to use the term individualism, which he saw as one of the primary characteristics of the people living in the new democracy. His analysis noted a number of polarities, not the least of which was between equality and freedom. On the one hand, given the abundance

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

195

of land, at least after the native populations were removed and displaced, there was an equality of rank unknown in Europe. But at the same time, there was an unprecedented amount of freedom, at least economic freedom, which in turn promoted inequality and class differences. Thus, on the one hand, this atmosphere was highly conducive for the ambitious and there was a great deal of social mobility. There seemed to be a casual ease between a boss and a worker, since one day they might be partners or equals in civil organizations. But indeed due to the ease of social ties, this freedom did not extend to the realm of ideas, Americans were very conformist and what would later be called ‘‘other directed’’, they were quite fearful to stand out intellectually and perhaps disrupt fragile social bonds. They much preferred the practical to the theoretical, ‘‘hardly anyone in the United States devotes himself to the essentially theoretical and abstract portion of human knowledge’’ (Book II, Chapter 1). This anti-intellectualism would remain an enduring part of American character (see below p. 209). Many feared that without a state religion, e.g., mandated by the state, people would not voluntarily choose to be members in a church, nor would they maintain religious zeal. But Compte had noted how religion was not only about State power, but social solidarity. And thus De Tocqueville noted that religion like marriage held more allure when it was voluntary, thus church membership remained robust, even if denominational choice was free and could be changed. In the vast land of the socially mobile, this membership was often the primary basis of social networks and community organization. Moreover, as De Tocqueville noted, Americans, despite their democracy, freedom, and wealth, were a sad and anxious people. But he could not explain why. That would be the role of psychoanalysis and critical sociology. There were other aspects of American character he noted that would become relevant. Perhaps one of the most noteworthy patterns was the extent to which Americans, generally remote from a strong, central government, organized themselves for community projects from building roads, bridges, or maintaining law and order. This ‘‘civic activism’’, in lieu of governmental programs, was quite unprecedented in the European world. That people could both influence their government, and do for themselves what had been the functions of government, would gradually meld into one of the unique aspects of American politics, populism, and distrust of government. While the power of individualism was so ingrained a part of American society that socialism could never develop, seeing social conflicts as the ‘‘elites’’ vs. the ‘‘people’’, has at times been a progressive force, at other times a regressive force, but at all times it has been a hegemonic quality mystifying the actual operations of class.

196

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

The founders, given both participation in government, many had served in colonial parliaments, and distrust of government, did not want a strong central government, in part for fear that such a government might be prone to get involved in European wars. De Tocqueville felt America had been blessed by geography and insulated from the religious and political conflicts of Europe. Echoing Jefferson, he feared that industrialization might foster a new ‘‘aristocracy’’ of industry, a stronger central government, and tendencies to go to war. This would establish a fundamental dilemma of a ‘‘peaceful’’ country, unwilling to go to war, yet one that has a long history of aggressive foreign policies backed by military power (see below). To resolve this contradiction, we would cloak our policies with a moral justification, fighting evil in the name of a higher good, if not God, and a psychological defense consisting of projection of aggression to a demonized enemy, a rationalization of an aggressive response coupled with massive denial of unstated, if not unconscious intent.5 Thus Americans see themselves as a ‘‘peaceful’’ people neither as Spartans nor Prussians. But the other side of this contradiction is the toleration, if not active encouragement, of violence, hatred, brutality, and cruelty and indeed war. These wars began in 1622 with an Indian attack on Jamestown, then came the Pequot War, King Phillips War, four imperial wars between 1689 and 1693, major rebellions, then the war for Independence, the War of 1812, conflicts with Mexico over Texas and much of the West, the civil war, Spanish American War, etc. There have been hundreds of directed military actions and military interventions throughout the Caribbean.6 And this does not even include the ‘‘covert’’ interventions. The German attack on the Lusitania was based on its military cargo. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor came after FDR had threatened to embargo oil and other materials to Japan. And meanwhile, America had been arming and sustaining the British in their fight against Hitler.7 The various factors that came together in the New World would result in a very unique combination that would become the American character, and in turn shape what would be considered, American Exceptionalism. For De Tocqueville, there were five aspects of American society that he saw as distinctive: (1) its freedom, the liberty of its people, and mildness of its laws; (2) it was highly egalitarian, there were few differences of rank between people; (3) the people prized their ‘‘individualism’’, they were self-reliant; (4) the people became engaged in government, what would become known as populism; and finally (5) its laissez-faire economy was conducive to economic growth. Thus, he described America as ‘‘exceptional’’ following a course quiet different than other European countries, he foretold America’s

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

197

greatness in the future. But that Exceptionalism would have two central moments. On the one hand America provides for equality of opportunity in that anyone can become rich or president, ok at least governor for the foreign born, if they work hard enough and long enough. Individual rights, in a laissez-faire economy, allow various people to ‘‘get ahead’’ in America; there are opportunities unknown in many of their home countries. Thus, we find many small businesses are owned by immigrants who have succeeded in ways not possible in their own countries.

The Polarities of ‘‘American Character’’ Psychoanalysis, as a critical depth psychology, has provided us with a dialectical theory of character structure shaped by a need to adapt to a society whose social demands, for work, community and cultural attainments, beauty, cleanliness, and orderliness stood in marked contrast to the ‘‘natural’’ tendency of the person to seek his/her self-interested forms of pleasurable gratifications. Freud argued that civilization demanded repression of desire for the sake of civilization’s needs for people to cooperate with each other and to work, it was a zero sum game. In the course of individual development, a part of the character, the superego, as the parentally mediated, leads to a double contradiction, internal conflicts over the choices of action or inaction, and a fundamentally contentious relationship between the individual and the society. If the potential relationship between the person and his/her society was variable, character, as a compromise formation, stood as a tentative resolution between conflicting desires, and between the desire and the social demands or conditions. As will be noted, we regard American character in terms of three polarities, ambivalent tendencies, but what is most important is to know that polarities of character, reflecting underlying desire, can easily shift from one pole of the equation to the other. Moreover, for the sake of our argument, the most important determinant of which aspect of the polarity is most salient is anxiety. Individualism/Collectivism One of the most fundamental dualisms of human life is the tendency to assert and develop one’s self, to differentiate one’s self from the group (Bakan, 1966). But at the same time, people want connections with others, membership in groups of people that provide warmth, comfort, and connection. The cultural origins of individualism can be seen in the 11th century when the Church institutionalized confession making the person responsible

198

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

for his/her own sin and salvation. In many European societies, as well as other traditional societies, responsibility as well as justice had been collective. A family was seen as a juridical unit, the theft by one member meant others were equally guilty. It might be noted that along with the Crusades and the expansion of trade, we would see changing material conditions that would prove fertile to the growth of urban commercial centers, where in turn, an emergent market economy would be conducive to the pursuit of economic self-interest. This was evident with the rise of the Italian city states, the emergence of humanism in philosophy, Pico Della Mirandola, and perspective in art, which individualized the gaze of the view and in turn the view itself.8 The Renaissance marked the beginning of the end of the hegemony of the Church over Western Thought, more specifically, it would mark the emergence of a trading class whose very existence was a product of as well as critique of the feudal class system and the relative isolation of its manors. Moreover, with the rebirth of Greco-Roman culture, including its sciences, as well as the exposure to the far more advanced Islamic sciences, we would see the very beginnings of the conflicts between science and religion. Thus, Galileo and Copernicus were less heartily embraced by the Church. As the bourgeois class of traders began to grow, the contradictions between their economic interests and that of the Church grew more and more evident. At the time of the Avignon papacy, we might note the emergence of theological challenges to the Church, as well as perhaps more important, critiques of its corruption, e.g., Jan Huss and John Wyclif. Huss, with few followers and little power were indeed burned at the stake. But 100 years later a Dominican monk named Luther, in his critique of the commercialization of grace by the church, posted his 95 theses on the door of the Wittenberg Church. But meanwhile with the invention of the printing press, and growth of a literate population, there were large numbers of people who would embrace Luther. In 1517, the Reformation began and given the nature of the population, it quickly spread wide and far. The media explosion brought on by the printing press spread his message much further than it otherwise might have gone, and made him the focus for all sorts of religious, spiritual, political, and economic discontent. The right to read and interpret scripture lead to the throwing off of the chains of papal and ecclesiastical authority; and taking this to mean political and economic freedom as well, there were widespread revolts among the German peasantry.9

And this was soon followed by John Calvin’s critiques in France and Switzerland, his The Institutes of the Christian Religion was published in 1536. The Reformation would radically change Christendom in many ways, not

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

199

the least of which was creating the very conditions for challenges to religion on the basis of science. It was in this context that there was a great deal of religious ferment and various movements emerged. Most important for our purposes, there were two major consequences. Firstly, Protestantism encouraged literacy and in turn the individual could read scripture on his/her own, without the mediation of the Church. Thus, Protestants founded public schools and even universities – and this took place in the New World as well. This individualism, and ideological expression of an emergent market society, needed legitimation, and Protestantism would not only provide it, but once emergent, would further act as a motive, a ‘‘calling’’ as Weber put it. Those likely to embrace Protestantism were typically peasant land owners or artisans and learned professionals living in the towns rather than in the countryside including workers in new fields like printing, bookselling, and new manufacturing technologies like silk making. Thus, given the occupation-based ‘‘elective affinities’’ of those more likely to embrace Protestantism that legitimated and motivated work, we would see the growth of new, commercial classes. And given the asceticism of early Protestantism, the economic fruits of labor were not seen as the goals or rewards, but perhaps, and only perhaps, a subtle hint at salvation. Work itself served as a counter-phobic mechanism suppressing anxiety, while ‘‘success’’ further lessened anxiety. Among the many Protestant denominations would emerge the ‘‘Puritans’’, the name given in the 16th century to the more extreme Protestants within the Church of England who thought the English Reformation had not gone far enough in reforming the doctrines and structure of the church; they wanted to purify their national church by eliminating every shred of Catholic influence. In the 17th century many Puritans emigrated to the New World, where they sought to find a holy Commonwealth in New England. Puritanism remained the dominant cultural force in that area into the 19th century.10 Given an individualist religion, a land in which there was no existing social structure or institutions of government, and instilled with a powerful work ethic (undergirded by ‘‘salvation anxiety’’), and expectations of literacy, they would eventually prosper in commerce. And while the early years of the community were characterized by strong community ties and covenants of mutual aid and obligation, as they prospered and grew, and expanded to the West, the covenants of communal obligation waned, indeed were broken (Bellah, 1975). Within 200 year of landing at Plymouth Rock, a highly motivated, highly individualistic ‘‘American character’’ had been forged – that would be little change for the next 200 years.

200

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

The valorization of the self-made, independent person is one of the staples of American society seen in its meritocratic evaluations of people, and its literature, its high culture (Transcendentalism), its social policies, and its popular culture. America has been the place where individualism has thrived and complex social issues are personalized. Psychoanalysis found its greatest support, academic psychology is the most popular social science, and the myriad of self-help books or programs. For example, the self-made man, and now even woman, is one of the highly valued character types and mythologies of success. Notwithstanding their inherited class privileges, men like Bill Gates, Donald Trump, or Michael Eisner are lionized as self-made men. Films like Its a Wonderful Life, High Noon, the Western in General, a character like Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry, John Wayne throughout his career, Rick in Casablanca all speak in terms of the individual alone meeting the odds and conquering them. Pushed to an extreme individualism becomes a character like Dirty Harry, Gecko in Wall Street, or at a more disturbing level members of a militia. But American individualism has always had a problematic, ambivalent relation to community as both something to be desired, yet feared. It is rooted in the most basic fear of abandonment or being swallowed up by someone more powerful (Salerno, 2004). The community would give us social support and connections, yet always threaten to engulf, limit freedom, stifle individuality, and swallow up the person. The Puritans seemed most aware of this problem, before setting foot on land, they signed a covenant that would bind them together. Yet within a few generations, between prosperity and ever-new horizons to the west, or the cities, the covenant was rent asunder (Bellah, 1975). Yet there endures that desire and fear of isolation. Communitarianism was seen as a solution to the retreat to lifestyle enclaves and/or exaltation of self (Bellah et al., 1985), or the demise of civil groups that might leave one ‘‘bowling alone’’ (Putnam, 2000). Salerno captured that paradox: A history of the American community is the story of escape and hope. It is a tale of leaving home and starting anew. It is a story of fear and bloodshed, slavery and war. But it is also a quest for regaining something that had been lost – the pastoral ideal y. They want to be engaged with their physical and social environment but also want considerable independence from it. Working against the building of viable communities was their fear of losing themselves in sameness – becoming nothing. While the desire for community is expressed in the arts, theater, cinema and novels, individuals pursue loneliness and privacy in their personal lives: private homes, gardens, separate rooms, and separate schools. There is a desire to be free from commitment to others, a quest for isolation, yet a simultaneous unconscious yearning to be a part of something bigger than oneself. Again, it is the self-other borderline that is most relevant in the struggle for both community and identity (Salerno, 2004).

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

201

For Marx, one of the central moments of modern alienation was the break down of community and loss of species being, people were inherently social. But indeed, as Fromm showed, insofar as capitalism created demands for individualism and individual freedom, but at the same time, people felt anxiety and loneliness, they sought to escape from their freedom and solitude. As Slater (1970) argued over 40 years ago, people yearned for community, engagement, and dependency, yet they had come to be defined as weak, passive, and indeed, feminine. He suggested that the lure of communalism with stable social ties, together with the ressentiment over sexual freedom, bred a powerful reaction formation against such groups as communists, socialists, and hippies. [And today we would add, the Orientalist constructions of Muslims as communal-as Said (1986) has argued.] One resolution to this paradox has been to create homogenous, Utopian communities and so 100+ years after Thomas More imagined such a place, the Puritans constructed their utopias, replete with the suppression of individualism and a distrust of others that indeed would characterize the Puritan communities. It was not by chance that the main victims accused of witchcraft were outsiders like Tituba, a woman of color. The Puritan settlement became the quintessential narrative of American community. It was a place wherein rugged individuals confronted the ravages of untamed nature, where the mass slaughter of indigenous peoples gave testimony to Puritan religiosity. It was a place of fence building and church going, a place of repressed sexuality and intolerance of difference. It was a place of sacred covenants between settler and settler and settlers and God. The Puritan community placed the church at the center of social life and the patriarchal family as the first locus of control. Without the church and without the family, there was no community. The early New England settlement was an outpost: a bastion of God in a godforsaken land (Salerno, 2004).

But as we noted, with land to the West and growing cities, the Puritan communities waned and in their place a ‘‘new’’ form of community emerged – the frontier town. While these may seem opposites, the chaos, freedom, and sexuality of the frontier town is the realization of the order, control, and repression of the Puritan community. Frontier communities were structurally diverse; many were short-lived, others continued and prospered. Compared to the early Puritans, many of whom had been college educated abroad, these new western settlers were unrefined, mostly uneducated and illiterate. Still, there was an emphasis on the elimination of otherness y. There were no covenants holding people together. The early history of the American frontier is in part a history of daily violence and vanishing ghost towns: the exploitation of resources until the land no longer provided a basis for livelihood – the bleeding dry of mines and oil fields – the raping of earth – a kind of slash and burn rampage. Christopher Lasch (1979) has noted: ‘‘Whereas the pioneer gave vent to his violence and murderous cruelty, he saw

202

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

the result as a goal of community – a safe place for his wife and children (39).’’ The loner-bandit was romanticized in the tabloids as the true heroic man. Jesse James and Billy the Kid, murderous and heartless as they were, became romantic icons. The range cowboy was the rugged individualist – the non-reflective, quick shooting, hard drinking, untamed individual. Separated from the laws of the land, proudly alienated from his own humanity, he was reckless and wild (Salerno, 2004).

Following upon the insights of Davis (1990) and Sennett (1970) on the city, Salerno goes on to say ‘‘that Americans as considerably paranoid, feeling menaced by strangers and needing to be both protected and insulated. Security becomes a central political theme. However, the failure to understand otherness intensifies the sense of personal vulnerability which in turn leads to a need for guns, high fences, barbed-wire, and more police.’’ Thus much like Fromm observed 60 years ago, there is a fundamental conflict between seeking close, intimate relationships and ties to communities, and at the same time, a desire and social rewards for freedom and independence. All too often, if faced by stress and anxiety, we fear being alone and would escape our freedom and seek solace in ambivalent attachments to groups. But all too often that escape from freedom leads us to further fear freedom and we submerge ourselves into a group where we do lose individuality, freedom, and creativity. Instead we fall prey to groupthink and paranoia. Moralism/Pragmatism One of the factors leading to ‘‘American Exceptionalism’’ was the fact that Puritans founded the ‘‘new nation’’. More specifically, a group of ‘‘separatists’’, rejected the Church of England, seen as incapable of being reformed. Instead, they chose total separation and formation of their own, autonomous congregations. They came to be known as Pilgrims. In 1608 they went to Holland, in 1620 they arrived in Massachusetts and as they say, the rest is history. Puritanism, which came out of the English Reformation, rested on four basic convictions: (1) that personal salvation was entirely dependent on God, (2) that the Bible provided the indispensable guide to life, (3) the church should reflect the express teaching of Scripture, and (4) that society was one unified whole. Most of these [Puritan] men [Richard Mather, Thomas Hooker Roger Williams and John Cotton] held ideas in the mainstream of Calvinistic thought. In addition to believing in the absolute sovereignty of God, the total depravity of man, and the complete dependence of human beings on divine grace for salvation, they stressed the importance of personal religious experience. These Puritans insisted that they, as God’s elect, had the duty to direct national affairs according to God’s will as revealed in the Bible. This union of church and state to form a holy commonwealth gave Puritanism direct and exclusive

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

203

control over most colonial activity until commercial and political changes forced them to relinquish it at the end of the 17th century. 11

People were seen as wicked, evil, and corrupt, one could little change that except by Divine grace. Yet people were duty bound to do God’s will as revealed in scripture, the very word of God, which explained creation, and gave laws and meanings to life. Further, as a result of this theology, their child-rearing practices tended to be harsh and intolerant, they were a ‘‘spare the rod, spoil the child-rearing philosophy’’ (Greven, 1991). The child was seen as possessed of ‘‘will’’ that needed to be broken, and physical punishment was seen as the means to ‘‘beat the devil out the child’’. (This would have important consequences.) During the colonial period Puritanism had direct impact on both religious thought and cultural patterns in America.12 It provided a Christian vision for America. From John Winthrop’s vision of the new land as the ‘‘city on the hill’’, to Cotton Mather’s exhortations, there has been an element of Manichean thinking in America, typically concerned with notions of salvation, sin, and redemption, that are often tied to purity and danger (Douglas, 1984). Their isolation, the harshness of survival, and their sense of being a chosen people, made their religious convictions especially severe and intolerant of either criticism or sin. There is no doubt that the moralism of the Puritans, together with their worldviews, and zeal to realize those views, would have great impact on the subsequent course of the nation, long after its waning and demise. For example, from the time of Hester Pryne to the recent affaires Nipple-gate or Stern mouth, part and parcel of this Puritanical moralism has been concerned with the control and repression of desire in general, and sexuality in particular.13 Dialectically understood, the Puritan emphasis on individualism, however suppressed by the need for solidarity in the early years, its value of literacy, education, and hard work would interact with the material conditions and available raw materials of New England, and the colonies would survive, grow, and grow prosperous. As this happened, the religious fervor waned, the covenant would be broken and by the 18th century a new kind of elite, the businessmen scholars, more likely Deists or Freemasons, students of the Enlightenment, would become the dominant social force – while the puritanical moralism waned in some places or migrated to rural areas when it changed labels from Congregationalism to Baptism. ‘‘In the 19th century its influence was indirect, but it can still be seen at work stressing the importance of education in religious leadership and demanding that religious motivations be tested by applying them to practical situations’’. Yet in face

204

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

of social change and crisis, we would often see religious awakenings and/or the proliferation of religious such as Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Christian Science, and Mormonism. As shall be argued, a conservative Christian moralism remains an undercurrent in contemporary understanding, and domestic and foreign policy. Much like individualism and violence, it would endure long beyond the conditions of emergence. This is especially vivid in the leadership of the United States. Howard Zinn (2005) has documented instances of American Exceptionalism and the legacy of divine ordination, especially by recalling the racist era of Manifest Destiny, the colonization of the Philippines, and more recently the war in Iraq. Zinn cautions: Divine ordination is a very dangerous idea, especially when combined with military power (the United States has 10,000 nuclear weapons, with military bases in a hundred different countries and warships on every sea). With God’s approval, you need no human standard of morality. Anyone today who claims the support of God might be embarrassed to recall that the Nazi storm troopers had inscribed on their belts, ‘Gott mit uns’ (‘God with us’). Not every American leader claimed divine sanction, but the idea persisted that the United States was uniquely justified in using its power to expand throughout the world. In 1945, at the end of World War II, Henry Luce, the owner of a vast chain of media enterprises – Time, Life, Fortune – declared that this would be ‘the American Century,’ that victory in the war gave the United States the right ‘to exert upon the world the full impact of our influence, for such purposes as we see fit and by such means as we see fit.’

Zinn goes on to caution that thinking about this aspect of American culture in terms of partisan politics is a dangerous thing. Like the Puritan asceticism, its legacy endures even when the historical context has changed. As has been noted, between the legacy of scriptural literalism, the ecology of its rural life, and fear of articulating ‘‘lofty’’ ideas, America was the fertile ground for pragmatism. Long before Pierce, James, Dewey, or Mead scribed its foundational texts, ‘‘Yankee ingenuity’’ had become a part of its culture, the inventor or tinkerer or manufacturer came up with brilliant inventions and or solutions to problems. Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Eli Whitney, Oliver Winchester (repeating rifle), Sam Colt (revolver), Dr. Richard Jordan Gatling (machine gun), Cyrus McCormick, Alexander Bell, and Louis Armour. In the 20th century Orville and Wilbur Wright, Henry Ford, Ray Kroc, and Bill Gates are as much a part of America as its Puritan founders.14 The major American contribution to ideas has been pragmatism, which has generally been a secular philosophy. Pragmatism is not easily defined, but one might start by noting its rejection of abstract and absolute truth

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

205

whether religious, scientific, or humanistic. It sees usefulness or practical consequences as the basis of truth claim. It clearly opposes any kind of supernatural, authoritarian set of absolute and enduring truths, values, and ideas, affirming instead, various kinds of individualism, empiricism, or temporalism (constant change so that the ‘‘truth’’ of one time is likely to be replaced by another). At one extreme James saw personal experience as the basis of truth, while Pierce, anticipating Habermas, argued that a community of minds that held a belief over time, established a truth. Eventually, we could see how Rorty, flirting, if not in bed with postmodernism, at least Lyotard’s version, would reject all grand narratives in favor of local knowledges and personal experiences. Common to this substantial core of pragmatism is an opposition to the absolute separation of thought from action, of pure from applied science, of intuition or revelation from experience or experimental verification, of private interests from public concern concrete applications of older philosophical problems concerning the relation of universals to particulars. It will also be evident that each alleged historical example of pragmatism shows a wide variety of individual ways of resolving these problems, especially when we include the outer fringe of those calling their very personal effusions pragmatic.15

While the roots of pragmatism might include the Greeks, Compte, Kant, and even Hegel via Dewey, what is important to note that it would most flourish on American soil, and by American philosophers and social scientists like James and Mead. James (1898) defined pragmatism as: The whole function of philosophy ought to be to find out what definite difference it will make to you and me, at definite instants of our lives, if this world-formula or that worldformula be the true one (1898, p. 50). Thus, when one is confronted with the evidence in favor of the formula ‘‘the human soul is immortal’’, and then turns to the considerations put forward by the skeptic in favor of the formula ‘‘the human soul is not immortal’’, what is he to do? If he is a Pragmatist, he will not be content to weigh the evidence, to compare the case for with the case against immortality; he will not attempt to fit the affirmative or the negative into a ‘‘closed system’’ of thought; he will work out the consequences, the definite differences, that follow from each alternative, and decide in that way which of the two ‘‘works’’ better. The alternative, which works better, is true. The attitude of the Pragmatist is ‘‘the attitude of looking away from first things, principles, categories, supposed necessities; and of looking towards last things, fruits, consequences, facts’’ (1898, p. 55).

At the personal level, this polarity of character reflects a fundamental conflict between a repressive, punitive superego fearing aggression, and a more relaxed, open ego ideal based on hope. In the former case, there are moral absolutes that are fixed and unchangeable, in the latter case, there are no permanent absolutes.

206

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

Toughness/Compassion One consequence of the Puritan emphasis on sexual repression, indeed the general repression of erotic desire, has disposed a great deal aggression that has long been a part of American character, though often disavowed, denied, and projected to the Other. This can be seen in such diverse forms as the high American crime rates, the popularity of violent games – football as its most popular sport, and as noted above (p. 5), a long history of war and conflict. In his classical analysis of ‘‘American Tough’’, Wilkinson (1984) argued that toughness, a combination of masculine strength and bravery, if not bravado is a very American quality. Compare Dirty Harry to Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot. This toughness is not simply an aggressive predisposition, but a resolute form of strength as much based on self-assurance and conviction as on physical power. It suggests that the person can not only express aggression, but endure pain at the hand of a brutal enemy, he can take it like a real man (but the enemy’s aggression will be avenged). This toughness is associated with individualism, the tough guy can handle himself, he does not need anyone to tell him what to do. Conversely, nobody can push him around, no body tells Fred C. Dobbs what to do. ‘‘You can’t catch me sleepin’y Don’t you ever believe that. I’m not that dumb. The day you try to put anything over on me will be a costly one for both of youy Any more lip out of ya and I’ll pull off and let ya have it. If ya know what’s good for ya, ya won’t monkey around with Fred C. Dobbs!’’ Toughness was an essential quality for survival in the early years of colonial life and westward expansion. It was as essential for the Puritan village as the frontier town. And of course it was essential for the frequent military actions that were earlier noted. Whenever power was threatened or challenged the response was likely to toughen, standing tall in face of adversity. In the course of history, whenever America was challenged, its response was to hang tough, stand tall. An interesting example of this was the emergence of football as a college sport. It grew at a time in the 19th century when the toughness of elite males was problematic in face of the changing economy and slight entry of women into universities and the work force (Langman, 2003a). Stephen Ducat has explored this insecurity and its tie to political and cultural life in his (2004) ‘‘The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, & the Politics of Anxious Masculinity’’. He has found, in the tradition of Adorno and Altemeyer, that the need for security and the perception of strength is central to both modern consciousness and political leanings. In particular, he states: ‘‘Since the U.S. national election of 1980, right-wing political propagandists have

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

207

relentlessly, and with great success, linked liberalism to weakness, dependency, and helplessness – qualities seen by most male-dominant societies as feminine’’ (p. 6). His argument is similar to Arlie Hochschild’s (2004) when exposing the ironic support of the Republican party among white workingclass men, whose economic vitality is directly threatened by right-wing policies. Where Hochschild wonders about the class element of this support, Ducat probes further to ask: ‘‘Why men? Why are males particularly susceptible to this manipulation?’’ (p. 171). Ducat’s analysis documents the ways that the left has been equated to weakness, femininity, and ultimately a lack of security. This security is precisely what Ducat argues many men seek in a time when their male dominance and economic security are being undermined. He notes: ‘‘Conservative talk shows are filled with denunciations of ‘latte-liberals’ and the ‘Volvo-driving, New-York-Times-reading liberal elite’. This rhetoric, combined with the regular-guy persona of George W. Bush – his inarticulateness and anti-intellectual presentation – has successfully disguised the president’s own partisan roots’’ (p. 172). He is tough on the economy, but at least he is tough. One of the most salient ways this toughness has been expressed in family drama that contrasts the strict father with the warm, nurturant mother. Lakoff (2002) suggests, because we tend to match our view of good politics with our image of a good family. The appeal of any political leader, he believes, lies in the way he matches our images of the father in the ideal family. There are two main pictures of such an ideal American family, Lakoff argues. According to a ‘‘strict father family’’ model, dad should provide for the family, control mom, and use discipline to teach his children how to survive in a competitive and hostile world. Those who advocate the strict father model, Lakoff reasons, favor a ‘‘strict father’’ kind of government. If an administration fits this model, it supports the family (by maximizing overall wealth). It protects the family from harm (by building up the military). It raises the children to be self-reliant and obedient (by fostering citizens who ask for little and speak when spoken to). The match-up here is, of course, to Bush Republicans. Then there is the ‘‘nurturing parent family’’ model in which parents don’t simply control their children but encourage their development. The government equivalent would be offering services to the citizenry, funding education, health, and welfare, and emphasizing diplomacy on a global stage. The core values here are empathy and responsibility, not control and discipline, and the match up is to the pr-public sector Dean/Kucinich Democrats. Studies have shown that blue-collar ideals are closer to the strict father than to the nurturing parent model. But that’s been true for a very long time, while the blue-collar vote sometimes

208

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

goes left as in the l930 s, and sometimes goes right as it’s doing now. So we can’t simply pin the pro-Bush Nascar Dad vote on a sudden change in blue-collar family ideals. Appealing to the ‘‘forgotten American’’ Maybe, however, something deeper is going on, which has so far permitted Bush’s flag-waving and cowboy-boot-strutting to trump issues of job security, wages, safety, and health – and even, in the case of Bush’s threats of further war – life itself. In an essay, ‘‘The White Man Unburdened,’’ in a recent New York Review of Books, Norman Mailer (2003) recently argued that the war in Iraq returned to white males a lost sense of mastery, offering them a feeling of revenge for imagined wrongs, and a sense of psychic rejuvenation. In the last thirty years, white men have taken a drubbing, he notes, especially the three quarters of them who lack college degrees. Between 1979 and 1999, for example, real wages for male high-school graduates dropped 24 percent. In addition, Mailer notes, white working-class men have lost white champs in football, basketball, and boxing. (A lot of white men cheer black athletes, of course, whomever they vote for.) But the war in Iraq, Mailer notes, gave white men white heroes. By climbing into his jumpsuit, stepping out of an S-3B Viking jet onto the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, Bush posed as – one could say impersonated – such a hero. Mailer is talking here about white men and support for the war in Iraq. But we’re talking about something that cuts deeper into emotional life, and stretches farther back into the twin histories of American labor and Republican presidencies. For Republicans have been capturing blue-collar hearts for some time now. In the summer of l971, Jefferson Cowie (2002) tells us in a recent essay, Richard Nixon worked out a semi-clandestine ‘‘blue-collar strategy.’’ Nixon instructed Jerome Rosow of the Department of Labor to draw up a confidential report, only 25 copies of which were circulated. One of them got into the hands of a Wall Street Journal reporter who exposed it under the banner, ‘‘Secret Report Tells Nixon How to Help White Workingmen and Win Their Votes’’. What is being suggested is that to grow up in a strict father household, what used to be called authoritarian, means having an elective affinity for certain kinds of perception. More specifically, there is likely to be an intolerant authoritarian logic of black and white, the tendency to projection of aggression outward, and hyper conformity. More recently, Ducat (2004) has argued that American politics has valued the phallic aggressive male Dirty Harry, Dirtier Ronnie, The Gropinator, and now Bush the lesser as ‘‘real men’’ who can wield a big stick– their own to stick it to others. When it was obvious that president Billy Bub was doing what real men gotta do, his popularity swelled and kept going up and up.

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

209

Anti-Intellectualism Anti-intellectualism connotes a disdain, mistrust, if not hatred of ideas, intellectuals, and those with such pretensions that would stand out from ‘‘ordinary’’ folks. On the one hand, as we noted, for De Tocqueville, it was based on a fear of standing out, being different from others. But we feel it has deeper roots. Culturally, anti-intellectualism is rooted in (1) religion, (2) populism, and (3) a commercial culture. In 1642, Puritan writer John Cotton wrote ‘‘The more learned and witty you bee, the more fit to act for Satan will you bee’’. The Puritans, many of whom were highly educated in England, soon created schools and even religious colleges, Harvard being one of them. But the dominance of theological literalism limited scholarship to largely religious commentary. While that would change over time as intellectual and literary classes would flourish in cities and university towns, it would not so much disappear as it migrated away from commercial cities and centers of learning and cosmopolitanism, to more rural, less educated locales. (This is not to suggest that cities are without major enclaves of antiintellectualization.). In more recent times, perhaps especially since the Cold War and more recent rise of religious conservatism, utilized by the economic elites to secure political power, we have seen a number of religious based expressions of anti-intellectualism especially the growing power of literalism. This includes the televangelists stressing faith and emotion over logic and asking folks to close their minds, open their hearts to Jesus, and open their wallets to them. The ‘‘prominence’’ of fundamentalists, greatly exaggerated by the media, has aided and abetted anti-intellectualism as a political agenda, in which conservative political elites encourage populist sentiments that serve to nevertheless sustain their power. Anatol Lieven (2004) has explored these traditions in ‘‘America Right or Wrong: An Anatomy of American Nationalism’’. In particular he highlights two legacies of American culture. One is the rhetoric and ideals of American democracy, liberty, equality, and justice. Alongside this rhetoric comes the propensity toward imperialism and domination that we explore in this paper. This couples with the second legacy discussed by Lieven – a Jacksonian nationalism centered on almost pathological defensiveness and insecurity. Lieven argues that understanding how these legacies work in tandem is vital to understanding our national character, and as this paper attempts, our foreign policy. The legacies of popular democracy and ‘‘civic activism’’ resulted in a common belief that ordinary folks did not need the aid of fancy ‘‘experts’’ who ‘‘knew it all’’. In 1843, Bayard R. Hall wrote of frontier Indiana, that ‘‘(w)e always preferred an ignorant bad man to a talented one, and hence

210

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

attempts were usually made to ruin the moral character of a smart candidate; since unhappily smartness and wickedness were supposed to be generally coupled, and incompetence and goodness.’’ Over a 150 years later, this sentiment endures – now often a staple of mass media. Mark Crispin Miller has been one of the strongest critics of contemporary anti-intellectualism. He has argued that, as: Fox chief Roger Ailes concedes: ‘‘There’s a whole country that elitists will never acknowledge. What people deeply resent out there are those in the ‘blue’ [Democratic] states thinking they’re smarter. There’s a touch of that in our news.’’ The same seething ‘‘touch’’ pervades every offering from the GOP’s immense semi-official agitprop machine, from multi-millionaire Big Liars like Rush Limbaugh down to all the local yokels fulminating on the air from sea to shining sea.16 The anti-intellectuals are finally on the side of power at its most unforgiving and voracious. And so they give a pass to those professors who are at the service of such power, while jeering anyone – inside or outside the Academy – who thinks to raise a fuss about how wrong it is. For them, this isn’t something to discuss, because discussion is itself suspicious, even dangerous – the sport of jerk-offs and Prevaricators. Thus there is no point in arguing with them – and yet no wisdom in attempting to ignore them. And such is true not only of the Bush regime’s most unrestrained supporters, but of the Bush regime itself – a fact that now requires a lot of careful thought, and something more.17

Intellectuals are often disdained as not only arrogant, but prone to trick and hoodwink ordinary, decent folks with their fancy words and high falutin ideas. Bill Clinton was often condemned for being ‘‘too smart by a half’’. Moreover, they are likely to embrace critical if not subversive foreign ideas like communism that could bring harm to the ordinary folks. For example there is a great deal of suspicion about folks who want to understand the causes of nationalism, communism, or jihad, rather than fight them. From the condemnations of ‘‘nuttering nabobs of negativity’’ attacked by Spiro Agnew (before going to jail), to the denigrations of Gore as ‘‘high-school teacher’’ and more recently the impending critiques of John Kerry as an effete snob who dares to speak French and write poetry, anti-intellectualism has shown itself to be alive, well and an enduring legacy of early Puritanism. We would finally note, again following De Tocqueville, the critique by commercial interests, largely concerned with making money, that regard classical education, and indeed sociology or political science would be included, as expensive wastes of money, self-indulgent pursuits of the ‘‘ivory tower’’ without any practical import – that is make money.18 There is a hidden agenda in that those with commercial interest do not want to see people with critical capacities.

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

211

Paranoid Style One of my favorite items from the F-Scale warns of secret plots and sex orgies taking place in high places. One of the central elements of authoritarianism is the projection of either sexuality or aggression; endless accusations of the ‘‘evil of the enemy’’, often combined with his/her deviant and wonton sexuality, are a staple of authoritarian thought. Hitler, its best exemplar, saw the world filled with enemies, Jews, Communists, Poles, Homosexuals, etc. Psychologically, we know that the greater the repression, the greater the aggression and/or sexual desire and the more likely it will be projected away from the in-group to a malevolent out-group. In some cases this out-group is often so well disguised and hidden, as to be invisible to most. In Hofstadter’s (1965) classical analysis, there has long been a ‘‘paranoid style’’ in which complex events, or often expectations of events that are quite unlikely, are explained by conspiracies, of which the worst kinds consist of ‘‘traitors’’ or ‘‘imposters’’ from within. The legacy of equality and democracy, in face of achievement based inequality and the emergence of power elites, has given the US a legacy of populism, in which the ‘‘ordinary people’’ face oppression and duress at the hands of a ‘‘greedy’’ conspiracy of secretive elites and subversive elements come to personalize events and offer explanations for these events. But while many populist mobilizations ranging from Huey Long to George Wallace and more recently even Pat Buchanan have muted religion appear secular, and typically aimed at political elites, the central role of religion in America has often given populist movements a messianic hue and framed the contestation of people and elites as a Manichean battle of good and evil. In the course of time, the evil cabals have included Catholics and the Pope, Jews and the Elders of Zion, Nazis, Communists, and today, the evil cabal of choice is the Muslims. While populism in general, and especially its apocalyptic, millenarian versions are typically marginal within the larger society, their presence helps transform a geopolitics of conflicting interests into conflicts of theologically based good and evil.

The Reproduction of Character and Ideology How does a national character persist over time? How could the legacies of small group Puritan New England colonies, founded almost 400 years ago, both wane and endure. One of the ways in which individual character, psychologically understood, is reproduced over time, might be called the psychosocial mediation of culture. At the same time cultures and cultural

212

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

values are in shared narratives those that are systematically transmitted from one generation to the next. While certain more overt aspects of narrative will change over time, its underlying themes are often remarkably persistent. De Tocqueville’s portrait of America has been remarkably stable over time. Indeed perhaps the only fundamental change has been the liberalization of values over sexuality. Psychosocial Mediation The earliest hints on the psychosocial mediation of culture came from Freud who argued that the resolution of the [boy’s] Oedipal complex concluded with the identification with the father, which in turn laid the groundwork for the emergence of the superego, the internalized voice of social norms and demands. But Freud carefully noted that the child’s identification was actually with the father’s superego, suggesting an unconscious mediation of values. The understanding of the superego became the foundation for Wilhelm Reich’s attempt to integrate psychoanalysis and Marxism in order to understand the lure of fascism for the working classes of German. Two aspects of his analysis are salient. Firstly, much anticipating what would be central to the ‘‘authoritarian character’’ research, he argued that the repressive superego, as mediator of bourgeois ideology, by suppressing sexual freedom and behavior, fostered the docility and passivity of the working classes to their oppressors. Arguing that early sexual liberation would lead to later political emancipation, he started his Sex-Pol movements encouraging teenagers to have sexual relations. Further, he argued that the formation of the superego revealed how ideology became a material force. In their classical analysis of the family and authority, Horkheimer and Adorno first noted that the family, and its structure, and patterns of authority were historically variable. The primary determinants of the superego they claimed were the authority relations in the family. But these relations were historically variable and related to the material conditions. Now it is crucial they note that given what Freud said, the material conditions and authority relations that may give rise to a certain characterological pattern can often endure long after those material conditions have changed. Thus, as character endures while metamorphosing its appearance, so too will cultural themes endure over time. The American ‘‘Monomyth’’ The basic elements of American character that have been described, individualist, tough, yet moral, are clearly embodied in the American Monomyth. For Northrop Frye, the hero, on a quest to realize a vision of a free

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

213

society with desire fulfilled and/or virtue restored, is of the most fundamental human archetypes. Surely found in the Bible, perhaps Moses or Jesus best qualify as examples of loss, the recovery of identity, and redeeming the people. In Greek mythology, Perseus, Jason, or Thesius are its exemplars. Joseph Campbell found this theme so often, he refers to it as the ‘‘monomyth’’. Campbell’s description is an enlargement on the basic formulae represented in the rites of passage: separation-initiation-discovery-return. The quest of the hero is an extented search for something that has been lost or taken away from him, something that ought to have been his birthright. He encounters fabulous forces and wins a decisive victory. The successful completion of this search reveals to the hero the secret of his true identity and enables him to return from his mysterious adventure and take his rightful position in society.19

In its American versions, the lone hero, who ventures forth into the wilderness, the frontier, or even the seas, alone to face adversity in a struggle of good and evil and seek redemption and restoration, has long been a staple of literature from the time of James Fennimore Cooper’s Deerslayer. In Hawthorne and Melville, the hero faces a darker universe, for example as Ahab seeks his personal revenge against the ‘‘great white one’’. That same theme echoes through Thoreau, Emerson, and Whitman. Hemmingway, Faulkner, Stienbeck Wright, and Updike describe that hero in the 20th century. From what has been said about the polarities of American character, we would suggest that there are three important dimensions of American character, rooted in its early colonial history, that inform the present reality. While the mythical hero is a staple in every culture, it is the particular elements of each exemplar that represents on the ideal level, the real. In the American version of the monomyth, the hero, as avatar of cultural values, embodies and realizes individualism. In their discussion of the American Monomyth, Jewett and Lawrence (1988), the tale begins with A community in a harmonious paradise is threatened by evil; normal institutions fail to contend with this threat; a selfless superhero emerges to renounce temptations and carry out the redemptive task; aided by fate, his decisive victory restores the community to its paradisiacal condition; the superhero then recedes into obscurity.

This is the archetypical theme of heroic redemption as a religious allegory rooted in the Bible. The hero is typically innocent (virginal), America was seen as the new Eden and second chance for humanity after Europe screwed it up. He is independent, self-reliant. The fundamental theme is that a stable, peaceful, moral community is beset with a problem they cannot

214

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

solve, typically an evil person or group of persons. The people are rendered helpless in the face of this adversity. From out of nowhere, comes forth a special hero, unusually talented in the use of violence to restore harmony, the bliss of Eden having been ripped asunder. Whether the characters of John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, or Mel Gibson, or fictional characters like Lone Ranger, Superman, Shane, Travis Bickel, or Captain James Kirk, the hero uses his skills in dealing with violence, to annihilate or otherwise rid the community of its malevolent evil doers, and restore its pristine, Edenic harmony. Despite exhortations to remain, and often promises of erotic love, social esteem, and/or political power, he dashes off into the wilderness at sunset, perhaps with his trusty companion Tonto, Lt. Spock, or Captain Renault. For Biryal: Heroes in their own quests, took them into garden-like places where they sought to preserve the vision of America’s destiny. Soon, however, time and space brought an end to the vision of innocence and newness. America was moving west, and conflict inevitably arose at the point where the advancing frontier and the wilderness collided. It is from the opposition of city and country, of civilization and the wilderness, of the restraint of custom and the freedom of the Western expanses that the American heroquester emerges. What the hero did when he could no longer retreat into the womb-like world of Thoreau’s Pond, but had to step into the breach between the new and the old set the pattern for the American literary experience to the present day y. If Perseus is the prototypical hero-quester of Classical heroic literature, Superman certainly fulfills that role in modern society. He is the perfect ‘‘middle class’’ hero. His history closely duplicates that of Perseus. Not only is his birth special, but he updates the tradition by coming from outer space. Like Perseus, Superman was orphaned shortly after his birth, and brought up in obscurity. When he reaches his majority he sets out on his journey to recover his rightful inheritance. For Superman, this takes the form of knowledge of his true identity and purpose on earth, which he gains before taking his place in the world. Like Perseus, Superman undergoes trials, battles powerful opponents, and rescues maidens in distress. Both Perseus and Superman are model heroes; their goals are noble, and their values, at least for Superman, are not complex. Superman is always on the side of goodness; his enemies are always evil, monsters in the sense that their malignant motives have rendered them inhuman. The one important difference that exists between the two is the matter of romance. One of Perseus’ triumphs was to win Andromeda, after slaying the dragon. Superman, on the other hand, for all his conquests, never wins Lois Lane. His sexual purity remains intact, with all his energies directed toward his singleminded purpose of preserving the American way.20

It is most troubling that despite the Enlightenment notions of law, the heroes of the monomyth, vigilante’s, often clearly break the laws and standards to save the otherwise impotent community. Dirty Harry finds Miranda laws too confining to save the moral order, he bids the evil doers to ‘‘make his day’’, meaning he becoming judge, jury, and executioner. This

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

215

notion of frontier justice has informed American foreign policy long before George W. Bush asked to ‘‘bring them on’’. There have been some few changes to the monomyth over time, but the basic theme remains intact. Under pressure from feminists, we now have women such as Janice Starling (Jodie Foster) or Lt. Ripley (Signory Weaver) who also master the use of violence to rid the community of serial killers or aliens, but these heroines, like their male counterparts, never become part of the community restored. Further, in deference to contemporary mores, sometimes the monomythic hero/heroine can get laid, but s/he can never marry, settle down, and become a part of the community that s/he saved from evil.

PART II: AMERICAN CHARACTER AND POSTWAR GEOPOLITICS For the most part, nations act on the basis of furthering their material and political interests. They seek resources from other nations; they see other nations as markets. They seek safety and security; they enter into political and/or military alliances with other countries. They may compete over status and honor. Surely they may go to war to enhance their economic interests. Thus for example, in WWII, Germany claimed to need room for its people, lebensraum and oil for its industries. Japan needed raw materials for its growing industrial power. But while geopolitics has also informed much of US policy, as a result of American character, religious themes of fighting to defend and preserve good against evil and redeem the world have often been insinuated within foreign policy. Notwithstanding the formal separation of Church and State, the State has often acted as the vehicle for the realization of the religious vision of the early colonies. The characterological factors that we have earlier noted found an ‘‘elective affinity’’ with theologically based ideological positions resting on populist sentiments in which the political was intertwined with the religious. Moreover, given its role as ‘‘Chosen People II’’ who would do God’s will, we would see implicit religious justifications for certain policies – THAT DATE FROM THE VERY FOUNDING OF THE NATION. More specifically, from the Monroe Doctrine to invasion of Spanish Florida, peremptory attack, unilateralism, and the desire for hegemony have been parts of American history (Gaddis, 2004).21 Moreover, these positions have been justified by a religious undertone. As Schlessinger put it: The Calvinist cast of mind saw America as the Redeemer nation. It expressed itself in the 18th C in Jonathan Edwards theology of Providence, in the 19th C as Calhoun’s

216

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

theology of slavery, in the 20th in Woodrow Wilson’s vision of a world order and in John Foster Dulles summons to a holy war against Godless Communism. (1983, p. 2)

To this litany we would update his analysis and add the ‘‘war’’ against Islamic terrorism and the invasion of Iraq. In both cases, the US was not only engaged in defending its ‘‘interests’’ – namely hegemonic control of the world economy, but as we shall argue, defending God against evil. Thus by 1898 and the Spanish American War, the growth of economic power, and eventually the most powerful military in the world, confirmed the messianism of those who believed in America’s divine appointment (Schlessinger, 1983). Wilson saw the US as the only idealistic nation in the world, endowed with the infinite privilege of fulfilling her destiny, and saving the world. The United States, as a happy empire of perfect wisdom and perfect virtue, was commissioned to save all mankind (Schlessinger, 1983). The overt religious message of Christian redemption is often disguised as ‘‘universal’’ or ‘‘higher’’ values as the implicit telos of existence. When foreign policies are guided by moral ideologies they are not only dangerous, but however gratifying an ideology might be, it get things wrong, it typically distorts reality and leads to ill advised strategies and hence outcomesyIdeology summons the true believer to a jihad, a crusade of extermination against the infidel (Schlessinger, 1983). While this has often been self-serving, it has quite often been at the cost of inflicting great pain, misery, and death upon vast populations.22 A long tradition of anticommunism in this country has indicated the role of character and ideology, in shaping ‘‘interests’’ – and in many cases these ‘‘interests’’ to seemingly resolve an immediate problem would lead to long-term disasters, if not for the US, for many people affected by the pursuits of American interests. Thus the attempt to ‘‘contain’’ the ‘‘evil’’ USSR by military means served the interests of their hawks and prolonged the decay of their empire, it was almost as if the general at the Pentagon and Soviet Defense Ministry colluded with each other to get more money. Moreover, a foreign policy shaped by ideology, and a religiously informed one at that, often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. (The attempts to stem Islamic extremists, typically through military means, often through support of repressive governments, has more often than not fostered greater resentment and fueled jihadis.) American character, despite freedom and prosperity, was described as ‘‘sad and anxious’’ by De Tocqueville and thus found solace in Christian salvation religion that provided a veneer of moral certitude overlaying a character structure rendered anxious by fragile social ties, insecurities over status in an achievement oriented society without a stable and recognized

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

217

class system, and the fear of aggression from the Other. Further, as a nation of immigrants and highly mobile people, religion played a very important role in American life, giving it community solidarity and legitimacy of purpose – when both were problematic. Thus a key element of American national culture has been its sacralization of itself as what Bellah (1975) has called American ‘‘civil religion’’. But at the same time, this sacralization has depended on differentiation from the profane and impure doing battle against unholy enemies – sinners of various stripes from witches to Native Americans to African Americans. As was earlier noted, America has had an affinity to war and violence even before the colonials declared their independence. With its ascendant power as actor on the world stage in the 20th century various external ‘‘Others’’ have been constructed as enemy, from the Axis to the Communists and today, Islamic terrorists. The Puritan founders saw themselves at the beginning of a new history. God’s chosen people, whose city on the hill beamed throughout the world, would become the savior Nation and redeem the corrupted world. In this way, America thinks itself as the ‘‘end of history’’, and that it has achieved the endpoint to which other nations strive – democratic government, free markets, material abundance, human rights, and personal freedom. Not overtly stated, but these values are seen as both desirable and ‘‘universal’’, everyone should have them, whether they want them or not. The overt religious message of Christian redemption is often disguised as ‘‘universal’’ or ‘‘higher’’ values as the implicit telos of existence. This has been recently theorized as the ‘‘clash of civilizations’’ (Huntington, 1996), in which the good guys won, their values universal, and we have reached the ‘‘end of history’’ (Fukuyama, 1992).

In the Name of God With entry into WWII, fighting genuinely evil, fascist enemies, genocidal monsters, a clear moral purpose that united the country. But following the war, with victory as a sign of God, and with its huge arsenal and unprecedented economic power, there was a belief of divine appointment and America having a messianic role in shaping the destiny of the world (Schlessinger, 1983), a friend turned foe and a demonized communist Russia took center stage as the designated enemy.23 That together with its God appointed mission has long been an underlying theme in the cultural politics that had secured hegemony for its post–Breton Woods globalized capitalism in which the communist enemy, not only threatened capitalism, freedom,

218

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

democracy, and God, but its decadent atheism supposed sexual freedom threatened ‘‘proper morality’’. And when that system imploded, within a short time, a new enemy was needed. And while to a large extent Cold War policies of support for ‘‘friendly’’ states with repressive governments paid for the US, and support for Mujahadeen created ‘‘Islamic fundamentalism’’, the new enemy on the block to promise a cohesive community, the umma, replete with harems, polygamy, and instant, ‘‘short-term marriages’’ was constructed as the new enemy to not only serve psychological functions, new justifications for imperialism, and bloated defense budgets, and most of all, continue the religious struggle between good and evil. As has been long noted, American anticommunism of the postwar era, from the elitist position of containment crafted by Kennan in 1947, to the McCarthyist populism of the 1950s, the support for unilateral, naked aggression against communist States such as North Korean or Viet Nam, has been not only a matter of geopolitical competition, but a moral crusade against Godless atheism. A favorite propaganda theme shown to millions of school children had Russian soldiers invading an Orthodox Church and smashing icons.24 A central premise of America’s theologically inspired populist tinged anticommunism is that if and when that bastion of evil was conquered, then goodness should prevail. But after 1989, it was soon obvious that the demise of communism would not usher the Promised Land. Indeed many military interventions have ill served what would be regarded as national interests. The period after WWII was a period of rapid change and realignments. Many former colonies began to seek independence, India of course being the largest such country. In many cases, nationalist and/or peasant struggles for independence and self-determination were often couched in a Marxist rhetoric that leaders typically learned in the mother country. The actual struggles were not between the relatively few people that might have been members of bourgeois or proletarian classes. Rather, as Eisenstadt suggested, in traditional societies characterized by communal organization, the Marxian language of class struggle against domination had more appeal to traditional peoples than might the lure of self-interested gain. Furthermore, given the geopolitical struggle between East and West, communism–capitalism, the USSR was more likely to support independence struggles with material and moral support, and further, provide a great deal of aid to newly independent, new allies. Thus the Soviet support of Nasser’s pan Arab socialism, or Castro’s Cuba was not simply a matter of realpolitik, but given the ways American character interpreted the world, part of a greater cosmic struggle between good and evil, the US as God’s chosen redeemer of the world, was locked in holy struggle against the USSR, the very embodiment of evil,

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

219

indeed according to Reagan ‘‘the focus of evil’ in the world. ‘‘The world struggle is between write and wrong and good and evil’’. When there is evil lose in the world, ‘‘We are enjoined by scripture and the Lord Jesus to opposite it with all our might’’.25 Moreover, the USSR was seen as the root of all the problems of the world, as if there were no indigenous, local factors that might cause discontent and discord – for example the many corrupt and repressive dictators supported by the United States. This included support for anticommunist coups in places like Honduras, or support for, if not the creation of anticommunist forces in Nicaragua, Afghanistan, etc. When the USSR collapsed in 1989, the messianic role of American virtue was confirmed, at least in the eyes of the true believers. Just as the divinity of Jesus is fundamental for Christians, the fall of the USSR as a result of American policies is gospel for both the religious and political right. They claim that between Reagan’s arms budget that they could not match, the defeat in Afghanistan by the Thomas Jeffersons of Islam (Mujahadeen), and Reagan’s alliance with the Pope to support Solidarity’s struggle against communism, that America and the American way of life were blessed by God as the major force for good in the world.

The Rise of the Christian Taliban In 1964, Barry Goldwater, the conservative candidate lost his presidential bid. But a new political realignment was in the offing, it was evident that his style of principled conservatism, laissez-faire trade, minimal government, either isolation in foreign affairs, minimal concern with welfare and/or entitlement programs, and noninvolvement in personal life, yet fiercely anticommunist and supporting a strong military, had little appeal outside business or managerial classes. It should be noted that the country was at ‘‘war’’ at the time, in large part due to the factors noted, the fear of communism. At that time, many ‘‘experts’’, more driven by ideology than facts or logic, proposed the ‘‘domino theory’’, if Viet Nam became communist, then so too would Mexico become the next Cuba. (As has been reiterated, one danger of ideology is that it ‘‘gets it wrong’’.) That said, there was nevertheless a wide spread fear of communism and a nuclear war. Goldwater was painted as ‘‘reckless’’, a mad bomber who might believe a nuclear war winnable and likely to start one. In the larger world, not really evident at that time, the impact of globalization started becoming evident as many main line, heavy industries faced decline if not demise. These changes, the growth of a rustbelt across

220

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

the Midwest was seen as the ‘‘de-industrialization of America’’ and in its stead, a vast ‘‘industrial wasteland’’ was growing. Finally, in face of the war in Viet Nam and the early indications of a world historical political economic change, there was a growing counterculture of hedonistic youth whose ‘‘hippie’’ life styles rejected work, propriety, and acceptable standards of demeanor, and instead seemed to be solely concerned with drugs and sex and rock and roll. They clearly rejected the demands of ‘‘civilization’’ for the repression that enabled work, as well as beauty, order, and cleanliness. They were excoriated by Phillip Reiff who lamented the erosion of religious based constraints on impulse expression (Langman, 2003b). At the same time, their life styles were celebrated by Slater (1970) who saw them as expressing not only the repressed erotic, but the desire for community (see above p. 197). These various factors, seemingly unrelated, acted as a perfect storm for cultural and political realignment. More specifically, we could not see the resurgence of religious sentiments as with the first signs of a worldwide movement toward fundamentalism. In this country, angry, yet dedicated, charismatic, telegenic televangelists moved from marginal obscurity to center stage and indeed began to influence political leadership. Thus for example, we began to see the beginnings of the popularity of ‘‘ends of days’’ theologies, apocalyptic warnings of impending doom. A number of Protestant evangelicals became active politically hoping that with the right laws, they could stop people from having sex, and perhaps even bathe. In 1968, Richard Nixon was able to create and mobilize his ‘‘Southern strategy’’ that would yield a new coalition of mainstream conservatives, disgruntled blue-collar men, often angry at the ‘‘unpatriotic’’ unwashed, drug using youth, and Southerners who had been incensed at the Democrats attempt to integrate their schools and ruin their ways of life. Thus a number of factors that were nascent were summoned forth by fear and anxiety. The only forces for love and salvation were to be seen in the masses of the great unwashed. The underlying economic fears, the uncertainty of the geopolitical situation vis-a`-vis confrontation with the USSR, and the challenges from the counterculture, had a major impact – shifting the polarities of national character toward individualism, toughness, and moralism.

The Current Great Awakening We have argued that despite the ebbs and flows throughout its history, religion has played a major role shaping American character and political

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

221

policy. Moreover, the massive changes due to globalization have fostered a more religious moment. Consider for example, Mel Gibson’s movie, the Passion of the Christ, oft described as the Jesus Chainsaw Massacre, has become one of the most profitable movies of all times. It is estimated that half of all Americans would have seen it. (Stay tuned for the sequel, Resurrection: Return of the Jesus.) At the same time, Rev Tom LeHaye’s books, the Left Behind series, by and large novels concerning the Last Days and the impending Rapture, have become among the best selling books in the nation. In a recent Alternet piece, Steven Pizzo (2004), described the Bush Administration as Christian Taliban, stern, uncompromising, and desiring to control all aspects of people’s lives, including how, when, and why they screw: But even as President George W. Bush denounced the brutal Islamic fundamentalist regime in Kabul, he was quietly laying the foundations for his own fundamentalist regime at home. For the first time far right Christian fundamentalists had one of their own in the White House and the opportunity to begin rolling back decades of health and family planning programs they saw as un-Christian, if not downright sinfulySince 2001 dozens of far-right Christian fundamentalists have been quietly installed in key positions within the Department of Health and Human Services, the Federal Drug Administration and on commissions and advisory committees where they have made serious progress. Three years later this administration has established one of the most rigid sexual health agendas in the Western world.26

In a number of agencies, commissions, etc., Bush has installed Christian Taliban in positions where their values, held by only a minority of Americans, many of whom are known hypocrites, impact not only the lives of American, but aid a number of international health and family organizations throughout the world. A number of people in important policy positions believe that sex should be reserved solely for reproduction, ‘‘I would like to outlaw contraception...contraception is disgusting – people using each other for pleasure.’’ Joseph Scheidler, Pro-Life Action League. Bush, God, and Iraq In the very recent past, we have seen how the legacies of character weigh down upon the present. People on the left often wonder whether or not G. W. Bush is a cynic who knowingly deceives people as to his genuine motives, or sincerely believes that he is carrying out a greater purpose than swelling corporate coffers and extending political influence. We are reasonably convinced that while many of the people in his government are quite cynical, but that he himself is really quite sincere in his convictions. That is

222

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

surely more dangerous since if he feels that he is on a religious quest to God’s will and to bring virtue to the world, he is not capable of rational discussion and compromise with his view of ‘‘evil’’. (Cynicism requires intelligence for the sake of duplicity_.) The President told Bob Woodward in ‘‘Bush at War’’ that Kim Jong Il’s massive prison complex ‘‘appalls me’’. He added: ‘‘It is visceral. Maybe it’s my religion, maybe it’s my – but I feel passionate about this’’. Toying with the idea of toppling Kim, Bush said, ‘‘I just don’t buy’’ the argument that we need to worry about the financial burdens South Korea might have to assume if North Korea collapses. ‘‘Either you believe in freedom, and want to – and worry about the human condition, or you don’t,’’ he said. ‘‘Yet I know that liberty is not America’s gift to the world – liberty and freedom are God’s gift to every man and woman who lives in this world’’. God is calling America to free the world, and Bush himself is heeding that call. ‘‘America is a nation with a mission,’’ Bush said, not afraid, in this crowd, to connote the crusade he is on. ‘‘We’re called to fight terrorism around the world’’. A number of ‘‘spokespersons’’ have seen the current war in Iraq a war of good Christian warrior against evil Muslims working with Satan. John Ashcroft declared that ‘‘Islam is a religion in which God requires you to send your son to die for him. Christianity is a faith, in which God sends his son to die for you.’’ Franklin Graham, Billy Graham’s son called Islam an ‘‘evil religionyI think it’s {terrorism} more mainstream. And it is not just a handful of extremists. If you buy the Quran, read it for yourself, and it’s in there. The violence it preaches is there’’. Jerry Falwell said he thought Prophet Muhammad was a terrorist. Televangelist Jimmy Swaggart in a November 10, 2002 interview with the Toronto-based station CFMT referred to Prophet Muhammad as a ‘‘sex deviant and pervert.y We ought to tell every other Moslem (sic) living in this nation that if you say one word, you are gone.’’ (Recall that Swaggart was arrested for paying prostitutes to masturbate while he photographed them.) General Boykin is often quoted as telling the Muslim captive that his God Christ was a real god unlike the phony god of Islam. ‘‘I knew my god was bigger than his. I knew that my god was a real god and his was an idol.’’ Our good general has further said.27 Why do they hate us so much? I will tell you this. This is my own personal belief. One of the most fundamental reasons they hate us is (a) because we are a nation of believers, and (b) because we support Israel. Now, if you don’t believe that this nation was founded on Christian beliefs, Christian values, then go back and read the writings and the orations of the founders of this nation, read what they said. Every man that signed

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

223

the Constitution of the United States was of the Christian faithy. We as Americans, we as Christians, need to understand that that’s not the enemy that America’s up against. In fact, the enemy that we’re up against is called the principality of darkness, he’s called Satan. We are in fact in a spiritual battle, ladies and gentlemen, more than we are in a physical battley. But why is George W. Bush in the White House? yYou must recognize that we as Americans saw a miracle unfold with the election of George W. Bush. Whether you voted for him or not is irrelevant. The fact is he is there today not only to lead America, but to lead the world, and that is what he is doing. Where does he start his day? He starts his day in the Oval Office at 4:30 with a Bible in his hand.

John Winthrop in the War Room In a compendium of revelations, much like the Pentagon Papers, following her working back to sentence in the secretary of Defence Office for Near East Affairs, Karen Kwiatkowski (2004) wrote: The education I would receive there was like an M. Night Shyamalan movie – intense, fascinating and frightening. While the people were very much alive, I saw a dead philosophy – Cold War anti-communism and neo-imperialism – walking the corridors of the Pentagon. It wore the clothing of counterterrorism and spoke the language of a holy war between good and evil. The evil was recognized by the leadership to be resident mainly in the Middle East and articulated by Islamic clerics and radicals. But there were other enemies within, anyone who dared voice any skepticism about their grand plans, including Secretary of State Colin Powell and Gen. Anthony Zinni y. I observed firsthand the formation of the Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans and watched the latter stages of the neo-conservative capture of the policy-intelligence nexus in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. This seizure of the reins of U.S. Middle East policy was directly visible to many of us working in the Near East South Asia policy office, and yet there seemed to be little any of us could do about ity. I saw a narrow and deeply flawed policy favored by some executive appointees in the Pentagon used to manipulate and pressurize the traditional relationship between policymakers in the Pentagon and U.S. intelligence agencies y. I witnessed neoconservative agenda bearers within OSP usurp measured and carefully considered assessments, and through suppression and distortion of intelligence analysis promulgate what were in fact falsehoods to both Congress and the executive office of the president.28

In God We Trust The presence of US soldiers in Iraq further exemplifies the extent to which a dichotomized worldview fostered the American Exceptionalism. A cover piece to the pop-news weekly ‘‘USA WEEKEND’’ on March 12–14 highlighted the case of five soldiers serving in the US military in Iraq whose faith had deepened as a result of their work there.29 The five soldiers profiled, of which one is Jewish and four are Christian, all espouse the view that ‘‘the war

224

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

has made them better, more enlightened people’’. Yet this enlightenment does not come with a deepened perspective on world affairs, intellectualism, balance of perspectives, or even ambivalence. Instead, we see a strengthened, toughened-up belief that the US’s mission in Iraq is unquestionably pure, and that indeed, they are not only protected by God’s grace, but doing his very work. One theme that emerges from this profile piece is the resolve of those soldiers who embrace their faith and beliefs as indeed tough, rather than soft and compassionate. Says Sgt. Edward Parker Gyokeres, ‘‘I’m no longer ashamed to say my strength comes directly from God’’ (p. 7). Another soldier, Cpl. Damian Luten, who had ministered to a fellow soldier prior to his death, ‘‘It fills my heart with pride that I did what I could for him, to help him find his way. I know he’s in heaven now’’ (p. 7). What these tales seem to indicate is a defensive statement about the toughness connected to faith in the service, a pre-emptive strike against the claim that espousing this perspective is somehow weak, compromising, or too nurturing. Yet what is perhaps most telling is that all five soldiers profiled embraced an unquestioning belief that their mission was inextricably tied to goodness, righteousness, salvation, and purity. It is indeed the notion of Manifest Destiny on a global scale. All of the soldiers profiled, and by extension the masses of people who read and cherished this article when it was published, clarified that their work was indeed God’s work, and that they were serving not only the United States, but also directly serving God. Some excerpts: ‘‘It helped redefine my trust in God, whom I was struggling to understand because of the things I had seen.’’ ‘‘It was no mystery to me: God healed my leg.’’ ‘‘He was meant to stay alive for a reasony. That’s what it’s all about: serving your God and your country.’’ ‘‘It’s through this experience that I realize, with a deeper understanding than ever, that I’m intensely involved in God’s work. At our Sunday services, there are Iraqis just beginning to know Christ. I consider myself more blessed than ever. yI know God is keeping us safe.’’ ‘‘On April 10, we went to Baghdad for what would become the war’s most decisive battle. Ambushes came from everywhere. Thousands of bullets pierced the air. Our truck was hit by one blast that should have killed or wounded us all. We barely got scratched. After the long day of fighting, only one of the 1,500 Marines in the battalion was killed. ‘How could that be?’ I wondered. It could only be that God had decided that, for all but one of us, it wasn’t our time.’’

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

225

We see here, in the only five examples presented to this audience, a pervasive belief that the soldiers are doing God’s will, combined with an anti-intellectualism that sustains it. It couldn’t be an ill-equipped army of Iraqi soldiers, rallying in isolation to resist an occupying force with different views of liberation! It is clearly God’s will that the US soldiers prevailed. We argue, again, that this fosters a clear relationship to the identity of the soldiers and their mission in the Middle East. Searching for meaning amidst the complications of war, falling back on the ‘‘hand of God’’ mentality provides for a clearly defined set of answers, as well as a secure post to tie identity to. Some, as would be expected, were seeking these answers and secured identities before the invasion of Iraq: ‘‘Training in Bridgeport, Calif., I watched on TV as the World Trade Center went down on Sept. 11, 2001, and realized I needed more spirituality in my life to help me make sense of this world’’ (p. 10). Attempting to understand the world events, as we could come to see all too clearly, was un-American. What is American, as we argue in this paper, is to shut up, be tough, and serve God. Toward an Epilogue of Hope Is there any hope? Schlessinger (1983) argued that ideologies, typically constructed and/or promulgated by elites to legitimate their economic, political, or cultural power are fundamentally antidemocratic. It is clear that the Christian Taliban of today does not command the loyalties of more than perhaps 20–25% of the population. We previously argued that the rise of fundamentalism was in part due to the rapidly changing world of today. Yet as that world has changed, one of these changes has been a number of democratic and democratizing trends. When the USSR imploded, the US had achived it triumphalist moment. But in only a brief time, the contradictions of its ideologically driven foreign policies, supported by its particular character structure had led it to imperial overreach with a quagmire in Iraq and a weak economy that portends attenuation of its power and ability to shape the world. Let us hope.

NOTES 1. http://www.edifyingspectacle.org/gullibility/blog/archives/christian_fundamentalism/ american_exceptionalism.php 2. There have been questions as to its uniqueness in a distinct population, its class specificities, frequencies, and distribution in a population. As we will argue, we do not believe that a particular character type is the most frequently found in a society,

226

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

but that rather certain constellations of the polarities of character are especially typical-of certain class locations. 3. From Letter III of What is an American. 4. Of course he was writing in 1798, long after the religious intolerance of the New England colonies had waned. 5. We don’t necessarily mean intent in simply a psychologically based volition. Indeed more often than not, certain policies and actions, cloaked in the most lofty moral guise, serve material ends. Consider abolition, the movement to universalize wage labor and maintain a large market for growing, Northern Industry. 6. Leonard, Ira. Violence is the American Way, http://alternet.org/ print.html?StoryID=15665. April 16, 2003. 7. We are not trying to suggest that somehow America was the aggressor in these conflicts, only that it had in fact engaged in acts that were clearly aggressive in the eyes of the people who were objects of these actions. 8. Masaccio, Giotto and Cimabue were among the earliest to initiate the move from 2 dimensional Byzantine representations to 3 dimensions, leading to a distant point. Thus each viewer would have a different perspecitive. 9. http://www.lepg.org/religion.htm 10. http://mb-soft.com/believe/txc/puritani.htm 11. http://mb-soft.com/believe/txc/puritani.htm 12. http://mb-soft.com/believe/txc/puritani.htm 13. This was perhaps most evident in the Monicagate episode, where the conservative right, misjudging the actual support they had from American, thought that they could impeach Clinton, the Christian Taliban’s worst fear. 14. It is not by accident that we see American inventors developing some of the essential weapons of modern war. 15. http://www.pragmatism.org/companion/pragmatism_wiener.htm 16. Mark Crispin Miller, http://www.centerforbookculture.org/context/no9/ miller.html 17. Mark Crispin Miller, http://www.centerforbookculture.org/context/no9/ miller.html 18. Sociology might aid consumer research and marketing to niche audiences, but too much of it is critical of big business. 19. Robert Lyman Biral, The American Hero-Quester. http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/ curriculum/units/1979/1/79.01.01.x.html#d 20. Robert Lyman Biral, The American Hero-Quester. http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/ curriculum/units/1979/1/79.01.01.x.html#d 21. Anytime the US has sought alliances or multi-lateral agreements, it has simply been that it did not have the power to act alone, eg WWII or Cold war. 22. Perhaps 2 million Cambodian died after we destabilized Sihanouk’s fragile coalition, perhaps as many Vietnamese, as well as many being wounded or tortured. Then our support of Suharto in Indonesia, and Marcos in the Philippines probably led to another million deaths, and then of course the small change numbers of Latin and Central Americans that died in Argentina, Brazil, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala at the hands of American supported, and often trained, good Christians fighting the evil communists-proxies for the USSR designs on world domination. Or is that a projection of the US.

From Exceptionalism to Imperialism

227

23. It should be recalled that the wartime alliance with Russia was purely strategic, the US has after all sent an expeditionary force to Russia to fight against the Bolsheviks. 24. We also got instructions on surviving nuclear bombs, go to wall furthest from window, lie down, cover your head and kiss you ass good bye. 25. Cited by Schlessinger, (p. 5). 26. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=18259 March 28, 2004. 27. Quotations from CBS news. http://www.cbn.com/CBNNews/News/ 031030b.asp 28. http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/03/10/osp_moveon/print.html 29. The article presupposes that their views stand in contrast to most of the other troops, but we would argue that this is an example of making the case to the American public of the merit of such a view, rather than the exceptionalism of the views themselves.

REFERENCES Bakan, D. (1966). The duality of human existence. Chicago, IL: Rand McNally. Bellah, R. N. (1975). The Broken Covenant: American civil religion in a time of trial. New York: Seabury Press. Bellah, R. N., et al. (1985). Habits of the heart: Individualism and commitment in American life. Berkeley: University of California Press. Cowie, J. (2002). Nixon’s class struggle: Romancing the New Right worker, 1969–1973. Labor History, 43, 257–283. Davis, M. (1990). City of quartz. New York: Vantage Books. de Crevecoeur, H. (1798). Letters from an American farmer and sketches of 18th-century America. London: Penguin Books. Douglas, M. (1984). Purity and danger: An analysis of the concepts of pollution and taboo. London: Ark. Ducat, S. (2004). The wimp factor. Boston: Beacon Press. Engeman, T. S. (2004). Protestantism and the American founding. Notre Dame: Notre Dame Press. Fukuyama, F. (1992). The end of history and the last man. New York: Free Press. Gaddis, J. L. (2004). Surprise, security, and the American experience. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Greven, P. J. (1991). Spare the child: The religious roots of punishment and the psychological impact of physical abuse. New York: Knopf. Hochschild, A. (2004). Let them eat War. Published October 2, 2003. http://www.commondreams. org/views03/1003-12.htm Hofstadter, R. (1965). The paranoid style in American politics, and other essays. New York: Knopf. Huntington, S. P. (1996). The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order. New York: Simon & Schuster. James, W. (1898). The varieties of religious experience. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

228

LAUREN LANGMAN AND MEGHAN A. BURKE

Jewett, R., & Lawrence, J. (1988). The American monomyth (2nd ed.). Lanham, MD: University Press of America. Kwiatkowski, K. (2004). The New Pentagon Papers. Salon.com. Published March 10, 2004. http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/03/10/osp_moveon/ Lakoff, G. (2002). Moral politics: How liberals and conservatives think (2nd ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Langman, L. (1998). The carnival character of our present age. http://www.angelfire.com/or/ sociologyshop/langfr1.html Langman, L. (2003a). Culture, identity and hegemony: The body in a global age. Current Sociology, 51(3/4), 223–247. Langman, L. (2003b). Philip Reiff’s mission. Journal of the History of Social Theory, 3, 279–295. Lasch, C. (1979). The culture of narcissism: American life in an age of diminishing expectations. New York: Norton. Lieven, A. (2004). America: Right or wrong: An anatomy of American nationalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lipset, S. M. (1990). Continental divide: The values and institutions of the United States and Canada. New York: Routledge. Mailer, N. (2003). The White Man Unburdened. New York Review of Books, 50(12), p. 4. Pizzo, S. (2004). The Christian Taliban. AlterNet. Published March 28, 2004. http://www. alternet.org/story/18259 Putnam, R. D. (2000). Bowling alone: The collapse and revival of American community. New York: Simon & Schuster. Said, E. (1986). Orientalism. New York: Pantheon Books. Salerno, R. (2004). Alienated communities: Between aloneness and connectedness. In: L. Langman & D. Kalekin-Fishman (Eds), Trauma, promise, and the Millennium: The evolution of alienation. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Schlessinger, A., Jr. (1983). Foreign policy and American character. Foreign Affairs, 62(1), 1–16. Sennett, R. (1970). The uses of disorder: Personal identity and city life. New York: Vintage Books. Slater, P. (1970). The pursuit of loneliness: American culture at the breaking point. Boston: Beacon Press. Smith, D. (2004). The Manichaean Vision Anti-Semitism as ‘Pseudo-Orientation in an Estranged World’. In: L. Langman & D. Kalekin-Fishman (Eds), Trauma, promise, and the Millennium: The evolution of alienation. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Tocqueville, A. (1945). Democracy in America. New York: Vintage Books. Wilkinson, R. (1984). American tough: The tough guy tradition and American character. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group. Zinn, H. (2005). The power and the glory: Myths of American exceptionalism. http:// bostonreview.net/BR30.3/zinn.html

9.11.01 AND ITS GLOBAL AFTERMATH: EMPIRE STRIKES BACK? Timothy W. Luke ABSTRACT This critique asks how much allegedly ‘‘transnational terrorist threats,’’ as framed by the events of 9.11.01 and their aftermath, are a displaced struggle for global social justice mediated through cultural, religious, and ethnic conflicts. The loosely articulated transnational networks of antiWestern Islamic fundamentalists, which appear to be behind the attacks of 9.11.01 as well as many previous incidents, have concentrated their efforts on finding vulnerabilities in several major Western nation-states, even though many of their attacks have been directed mostly against highprofile U.S. targets. A major focus of analysis for this study is asking to what extent Hardt’s and Negri’s ‘‘Empire’’ vs. ‘‘the Multitude’’ thesis is, or is not, substantiated by the nature of the 9.11.01 terrorist actions. The post9.11.01 global response to these attacks, the multinational invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, the new opening of the NATO alliance to Russia with operations outside of Europe, and the anti-terrorism campaigns inside many nation-states are signs of a different approach to national and transnational security that reflects a global struggle between newly found enemies and newly affirmed allies. On balance, there are Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 229–257 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24005-2

229

230

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

many indications that these terrorist attacks are aimed at the U.S., but the role of the United States in the workings of what Hardt and Negri call ‘‘Empire’’ does lend support for seeing some Islamic terrorist networks as a counter-globalizing, anti-empire resistance movements that express class, cultural, religious, and ethnic conflicts caused by enduring economic inequalities in today’s grids of globalization. Nonetheless, the battleground of this unusual struggle continues to be found in nation-states, so their crosscurrents of social justice need to be addressed. Here the paper will look very closely at the outsourcing of military services in Iraq and Afghanistan to private contractors, foreign coalitional allies, and foreign national recruits in the U.S. military as another sign of class, gender, ethnic, and racial inequalities.

1. INTRODUCTION Almost all the mythography centered on the violent events of 9.11.01 in the USA has concentrated upon creating rhetorical frames that transform these attacks into an essentially American tragedy. This move is, at best, factually incorrect, and, at worst, politically motivated. Of course, the strikes themselves were felt in the United States of America – in New York City, Northern Virginia, and rural Pennsylvania. Many, if not most of the victims on United Airlines Flight 179 and at the Pentagon were American citizens. However, they also were members of the world’s multinational multitude, whose daily needs for care and feeding, security and housing, transport and protecting, work and consuming, all circulate daily into and out of the world’s space of flows. Still, at the World Trade Center (WTC) in New York City, which was in many ways one of the planet’s largest centers of world trade, this transnational multitude and its global victimization were undeniably plain. Nonetheless, from the moment that he stood on the rubble of WTC with a bullhorn in hand and promised violent retribution against evil-doers to the hardhats and first responders still looking for survivors, President George W. Bush’s largely has ‘‘Americanized’’ the human and material losses suffered on 9.11.01. During 2002, from the President’s State of the Union address through the mid-term elections for Congress and many state government offices, many mythographers were especially busy at keeping this mythos of America’s victimization active and intense by ceaselessly wailing over ‘‘the more than 3,000 Americans’’ killed on that day. In 2003, it enabled Al Qaeda and the Taliban to be eclipsed, first, by ‘‘the axis of evil

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

231

states,’’ and then, more recently, by Iraq along with Saddam Hussein as the White House worked to rid Baghdad as well as Kabul of its home-grown radical secular and Islamicist rulers and their various foreign fellow-travelers. Ultimately, the Americanization of 9.11.01, in part, enabled the Bush administration to pull off one of the most successful electoral victories in the republic’s history during 2004. One, then, should question such political maneuvers and the mythography behind them for at least three reasons. First, with globalization, the targets and victims on 9.11.01 were not only Americans – hundreds who died were Mexicans, Pakistanis, Britons, Australians, Germans, Canadians, Indians, or nationals from dozens of other nations. Second, many of the tensions leading up to these attacks in the USA have root causes in other struggles, contradictions, and antagonisms that reach deeply into many other regions of the world. And, third, the post–Cold War era perhaps has not been the birth date of unipolar American national hegemony, but rather the origin of something, as Hardt and Negri argue, like ‘‘Empire,’’ whose structures of governance perhaps truly are repolarizing, post-American, transnational, but not yet entirely hegemonic. Ironically, this overnationalized image of Empire, as essentially or even exclusively an American enterprise, is perpetuated by both supporters and critics of America’s place in the New World Order after 1991 (Kupchan, 2002; Johnson, 2000). Those who accept tout court the overnationalized assessments of 9.11.01, as made by either Tom Ridge, Rudy Giuliani, and Jim Gilmore or Condi Rice, Dick Cheney, or George W. Bush, will miss the much broader implications of those attacks for what might be Empire, because ‘‘the war on terrorism’’ gets wrapped up, once and for all, in the mythographic trappings of American exceptionalism.

2. EMPIRE AND EMPIRE Others, like Mohammed Bamyeh (2000), Francois Debrix (1999), Gearo´id O´ Tuathail (1998), or Arjun Appadurai (1996), have sought to map the contours of the post–Cold War era, and their evenhanded analyses have many merits. Yet, with an audacity that few other recent books readily display, Empire came out on the boards from stage left in 2000. Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri claim they began their work ‘‘well after the end of the Persian Gulf War,’’ but finished their analysis ‘‘well before the beginning of the war in Kosovo’’ (2000: p. xvii). Amidst the dot-com boom of the 1990s, they thought one could detect something new ‘‘materializing before

232

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

our very eyes,’’ namely, ‘‘Empire,’’ or ‘‘an irresistible and irreversible globalization of economic and cultural exchanges,’’ out of which has emerged ‘‘a global order, a new logic and structure of rule – in short, a new form of sovereignty,’’ and it now is ‘‘the political subject that effectively regulates these global exchanges, the sovereign power that governs the world’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xi). Dismissing those who see all sovereignty dissipating in the magic of markets, Hardt and Negri assert that only the peculiar sovereignty of territorialized nation-states is eroding away in the spaces of global flows. Bigger changes allegedly are now at work, and the forces of sovereignty survive within ‘‘a decentered and deterritorializing apparatus of rule that progressively incorporates the entire global realm within its open, expanding frontiers,’’ which leaves the 21st century discovering ‘‘sovereignty has taken a new form, composed of a series of national and supranational organisms united under a single logic of rule’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xii). Empire, therefore, is, has been, and will be erasing the pre-1914 social individuality of territorialized nation-states and their older imperialisms as well as effacing the Cold War’s pre-1989 tripartite zoning of the planet into the First, Second, and Third Worlds (Agnew & Corbridge, 1995). Moreover, these political trends match up closely to the dominant informational transformation in the world’s productive processes themselves, leading to many sites of industrial factory labor eclipsed by communicative, cooperative, and affective forms of labor. With this shift, or ‘‘the postmodernization of the world economy,’’ Hardt and Negri maintain ‘‘the creation of wealth tends evermore toward what we will call biopolitical production, the production of social life itself, in which the economic, the political, and the cultural increasingly overlap and invest one another’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xiii). At some level, if Hardt and Negri are correct, globalization-from-above and globalization-from-below represent a struggle over how biopower is generated, shaped, and managed in which spatial registers as well as by whom and in whose interests (Bourdieu, 1998). The exercise of governance, whether it proceeds under the horizons of self-rule or not, entails a measure of governmentality entrusted to experts and elites charged with the generation and management of biopower. Questions about who, where, when, why, and how such governance will be done are all now vitally important issues to the multitude. As power has evolved from coercive into productive forms, then who surveys populations, inventories their energies, enhances their capabilities, and enforces their norms becomes critically significant. The concrete materialities of biopower – national or global, territorial or telematic, statal or imperial – rest at the heart of a global population’s, or

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

233

‘‘the multitude,’’ unrest or passivity. With globalization, ‘‘the right of the social body to ensure, maintain or develop its life’’ (Foucault, 1980, p. 136) becomes a key point of contestation. However, what is the social body of the multitude, who exercises its rights, and where does its life arise and go? Today in 2003, for the multitude, does Empire or some agency closer to them, now work ‘‘to incite, reinforce, control, monitor, optimize, and organize forces under it: A power bent on generating forces, making them grow, and ordering them, rather than one dedicated to impeding them, making them submit, or destroying them’’ (Foucault, 1980, p. 136). Empire in some sense may represent a new planetary ‘‘field of intervention’’ (Foucault, 1991, pp. 92–93) for systems of governmentality to unfold and operate on a worldwide scale, albeit in a still discontinuous and unequal manner (Kaplan, 1996). Through CNN, the UN, McDonald’s, the Web, and Wall Street, new institutions to order, organize, and operate the social body are now at work. But the culture and constitution of this social body is deeply contested. Even though they approach the issues from opposite directions, if not from parallel universes, Michel Foucault with his analysis of biopower seems to be pushing down the same paths as Joseph Nye (1990, 2002) and his accounts of ‘‘soft power.’’ While the widespread resentments against the USA can be chalked up to its apparent preference for using ‘‘hard power’’ assets, like B-2 bombers, cruise missiles, and C.I.A. special ops teams, in times of crisis, the war on terrorism cannot be easily disentangled from America’s ‘‘soft power,’’ like the workings of Wall Street, Hollywood, Silicon Valley, and Disney World. Nye’s analysis of ‘‘the paradox of American power’’ (2002) leads him to chastise Washington for relying too frequently upon its hard power, because he believes that America’s soft power is the genuine basis of its global pre-eminence. Those who share Nye’s more liberal international views have a hard time disagreeing with his claims, but things might not be this simple. Even though the United States is not the center of Empire, it plays an important role within it by inspiring other ‘‘national and supranational organisms’’ around the world to emulate its ‘‘formal constitution, which is a written document behind a legal apparatus, and material constitution, which promotes the continuous composition and reorganization of global social forces’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xv). The on-going operation of Empire’s loose formal and material constitutions gives rise, at the same time, to ‘‘the creative forces of the multitude that sustain Empire,’’ and these continuously forming, and reforming, social forces actually are also capable of autonomously constructing a counter-Empire, and alternative political

234

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

organization of global flows and exchanges’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xv). The multitude, as a result, can remake the world through, around, and beyond Empire. In the meantime, ‘‘Empire’s rule has no limits,’’ and it is ‘‘characterized fundamentally by a lack of boundaries’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xiv). Ultimately, Empire’s apparatus of economic productivity calls forth the disruptive diasporas of the multitude’s movements to sustain the material and immaterial commodity chains of the aggregate global product. Every path is forged, mapped, and traveled. It seems that the more intensely each is traveled and the more suffering is deposited there, the more each path becomes productive. These paths are what bring the ‘‘earthly city’’ out of the cloud and confusions that Empire casts over it. This is how the multitude gains the power to affirm its autonomy, traveling and expressing itself through an apparatus of widespread, transversal territorial reappropriation (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 398).

Thus, as Palestinians and Pakistanis produce Saudi oil, as Mexicans and Canadians labor in American workplaces as one people under NAFTA, and as Egyptians, Algerians, and Kuwaitis sign up for graduate studies in Germany, France or California, the multitude’s movements as well as capital’s commodity chains help break down the territorial regime of states and nations. These complex movements of the multitude, which groups like Al Qaeda utilize to their advantage, clearly do, designate new spaces and its journeys establish new residences. Autonomous movement is what defines the place proper to the multitude. Increasingly less will passports or legal documents be able to regulate movements across borders. A new geography is established by the multitude as the productive flows of bodies define new rivers and ports. [T]he cities of the earth will become at once great deposits of cooperating humanity and locomotives for circulation, temporary residencies and networks of the mass distribution of living humanity (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 397).

Recognizing this, countries like the USA, Australia, France, or Great Britain push forth their own visions of ‘‘homeland security,’’ but Empire’s movements suggest that they will always be too little, too late. The cities and countrysides of the earth already always are intertwined by transport, communication, and production networks by ‘‘the productive flow of bodies’’ that are, in many ways, far beyond their real ability to control effectively now (Kennedy, 1992). This analysis is innovative, critical, and problematic – all at the same time. Hardt and Negri have their advocates and detractors. Nevertheless, one must ask: what do the events of 2001 and 2002 mean if Hardt and Negri are right about Empire? Are the conflicts of the New World Order after 1991 increasingly those of the multitude in, about, through, and against Empire?

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

235

As a sovereign force, the national and supranational organisms that Empire’s powers flow through have many qualities that obviously can promote and exacerbate continuous conflict. First, more concretely, The concept of Empire posits a regime that effectively encompasses the spatial totality, or really that rules over the entire ‘‘civilized’’ world. No territorial boundaries limit its reign. Second, the concept of Empire presents itself not as a historical regime originating in conquest, but rather as an order that effectively suspends history and thereby fixes the existing state of affairs for eternity. From the perspective of Empire, this is the way things will always be and the way they were always meant to be. In other words, Empire presents its rule not as a transitory moment in the movement of history, but as a regime with no temporal boundaries and in this sense outside of history or at the end of history. Third, the rule of Empire operates on all registers of the social order extending down to the depths of the social world. Empire not only manages a territory and a population but also creates the very world it inhabits. It not only regulates human interactions but also seeks directly to rule over human nature. The object of its rule is social life in its entirety, and thus Empire presents the paradigmatic form of biopower. Finally, although the practice of Empire is continually bathed in blood, the concept of Empire is always dedicated to peace – a perpetual and universal peace outside of history (Hardt & Negri, 2000, pp. xiv–xv).

Empire, then, is many things, but it most importantly appears to operate in a fashion that suspends time, works outside of history, pushes beyond historical practices, or breaks temporal boundaries. Fixing ‘‘the existing state of affairs for eternity’’ is a threatening political project, especially those who are ‘‘the losers’’ in today’s world system. Empire’s peculiar technocentricity, ethnocentricity, and chronocentricity beggar many critics’ imaginations. So perhaps the ‘‘new cartography’’ for an alternative global society really ‘‘is being written today through the resistances, struggles, and desires of the multitude’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xvi). Unfortunately, the ‘‘broadly interdisciplinary approach’’ of Empire to the project of Empire is one whose merits tend to be lost upon most readers. The blinkered empiricism of middle-of-the-road liberal democratic capitalist reasoning coupled with the aggressively atheoretical orientations of many schools of mainstream social, political, and economic science today, particularly in North America, make reading Hardt and Negri a hard reach. Few readers today have the taste or training to fathom arguments that are ‘‘equally philosophical and historical, cultural and economic, political and anthropological’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xvi), and many of those few who can cover such scope soon are hobbled in their reactions by the ‘‘trained incapacities’’ needed to survive successfully in the small conversations sustaining contemporary university scholarship. Hardt and Negri believe that they have afforded the multitude with ‘‘a toolbox of concepts for theorizing

236

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

and acting in and against Empire’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. xvi). This faith is admirable, and the high sales of Empire (which remains, for example, at sales rank 17,985 in May 2006 of the three million plus books available on Amazon.com) might even lead others to believe this toolbox of concepts is being used. Empire, however, still seems unfazed by Empire. Taking this premise of Empire seriously, however, leads one to reconsider the position of ‘‘the multitude’’ within the workings of Empire. At the end of the day, the multitude stands in the extraordinary position of what should be regarded as an identical subject/object. Such entities, as Hardt and Negri (2000, p. 63) assert, move in realms of practice in accord with a ‘‘materialist teleology.’’ Hardt and Negri indicate that ‘‘when we speak about a materialist telos we are speaking about a telos that is constructed by subjects, constituted by the multitude in action. This involves a material reading of history which recognizes that the institutions of society are formed through the encounter and conflict of the social forces themselves. The telos in this case is not predetermined but constructed in the process’’ (2000, p. 470). Consequently, one can track these many new subjects as well as their political ends and institutional means in the affairs of states and nations. While their allusions are overblown, Hardt and Negri gin up their odd vision of today’s New World Order from an analysis of the doppelko¨pfiger Adler in the Hapsburg royal crest. As claimants to the aura of the Holy Roman Empire, and as the occupants of Mitteleuropa, the Hapsburgs designed their crest to feature the two crowns on a two-headed eagle – one German and one Magyar – facing apart – one West and one East. Above them die Kaiserkrone of Empire ties two states, two ruling houses, and many people into one realm. Today’s much less choate global order – due to ‘‘the new terrain mobile in space and flexible in time’’ (2000, p. 60) Empire’s globality rests upon – has two heads facing each other, as Hardt and Negri claim, ‘‘each attacking the other’’ (2000, p. 60). As soon as they launch their metaphor, they admit it breaks down as any sort of adequate representation, because, in part, Hardt and Negri position the two heads as equal, continuous, and one, and, in part, because where die Kaiserkrone rests cannot be found despite all of their talk about sovereignty. Nonetheless, this confusion throws forth-intriguing concepts that must be confronted. To the one side, ‘‘the first head of the imperial eagle is a juridical structure and a constituted power, constructed by the machine of biopolitical command. The juridical process and the imperial machine are always subject to contradictions and crises. Order and peace – the eminent values that Empire – proposes can never be achieved but are nonetheless continually reproposed’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 60). To the other side, Hardt

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

237

and Negri argue ‘‘the other head of the imperial eagle is the plural multitude of proactive, creative subjectivities of globalization that have learned to sail on this enormous sea. They are in perpetual motion and they form constellations of singularities and events that impose continual global reconfigurations on the system. This perpetual motion can be geographical, but it can refer also to modulations of form and processes of mixture and hybridization’’ (2000, p. 60). From this ontopolitical frappe, permanent revolution seems to bring continuous struggle between the ‘‘system’’ and ‘‘asystemic movements,’’ which spring forth from the ‘‘radical contingency’’ embedded in the unforseeability of the ‘‘sequence of events’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 61). Thus, the new figures of resistance surface from the multitude. In fact, ‘‘this is another fundamental characteristic of the existence of the multitude today, within Empire and against Empire. New figures of struggle and new subjectivities are produced in the conjuncture of events, in the universal nomadism, in the general mixture and miscegenation of individuals and populations, and in the technological metamorphoses of the imperial biopolitical machine’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 61). How does resistance by the multitude become political? For Hardt and Negri, the street battles in Seattle as well as the mountain skirmishes in Afghanistan are decisive signs of the multitude politicized. That is, ‘‘the action of the multitude becomes political primarily when it begins to confront directly and with an adequate consciousness of the central repressive operations of Empire’’ (2000, p. 399). Arguably, the efforts of neither John Zerzan and his neo-Luddite circle of ecoanarchists nor Osmana bin Laden and the Al Qaeda network have failed to check ‘‘the central repressive operations’’ of Empire, missed changes to prevent Empire ‘‘continually to reestablish order,’’ but these groups, and many others, are gathering together their experiences of resistance to strike against ‘‘the nerve centers of imperial command’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 399). With a certainty that reaches beyond the evidence at hand, Hardt and Negri also claim these new resistances are full of sublative potentialities. While they are anti-systemic, they are much more than forces striking blows against Empire. Consequently, the metaphor brings Hardt and Negri to see the multitude as forces that also, yexpress, nourish, and develop positively their own constituent projects; they work toward the liberation of living labor, creating constellations of powerful singularities. This constituent aspect of the movement of the multitude, in its myriad faces, is really the positive terrain of the historical construction of Empire. This is not a historicist positivity but, on the contrary, a positivity of the res gesta of the multitude, an antagonistic

238

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

and creativity positivity. The deterritorializing power of the multitude is the productive force that sustains Empire and at the same time the force that calls for and makes necessary its destruction (2000, p. 61).

Once here in their brief, Hardt and Negri are forced to release their metaphorical two-headed eagle, seeing that tremendous hierarchies and discontinuities actually define the Empire/Multitude relation. Hence, ‘‘the multitude is the real productive force of our social world, whereas Empire is a mere apparatus of capture that lives off the vitality of the multitude – as Marx would say, a vampire regime of accumulated deal labor that survives only by sucking off the blood of the living’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 62). Now, as Empire morphs from what was cast as a noble two-headed eagle into an ignoble autophagous vampire, many readers will scratch their heads in wonder. Still, perhaps there are some nuggets of valuable insight to be pulled from the metaphysical rush of Hardt’s and Negri’s rhetoric by turning to materials questions of political economy. In absolute terms, once adjusted for inflation, oil prices today in the USA are still about only half what they were during the OPEC oil embargo years of 1973–1979. Moreover, the U.S. overall is slightly less dependent on oil than it was during the 1970s for its economic well being. Nonetheless, gasoline at $2.00, or $3.00, a gallon pinches American consumers, so it now is easy to force open the Artic National Wildlife Reserves (ANWR) in 2005 ‘‘to solve’’ this problem. Of course, the solution is illusory, because ANWR fully on-line as a petroleum source would reduce America’s dependence on imported oil from 68 percent to only 65 percent a year in 2025 – one or two decades from now (Boot, 2005, pp. H1, 4). Nonetheless, the utter unwillingness to remake the nation’s energy ecologies over the past generation highlights instead the petropolitical economy of the American republic within Empire. Recognizing that access to, and control over, oil is a vital strategic goal, Washington has chosen for three decades to leverage its military assets and geopolitical primacy to maintain a petropolitical economy of on-going oil consumption. Much of its foreign policy in the Middle East since the 1970s, if not the 1930s, has had this essentially petropolitical objective, and those ends, sustain the Empire’s larger economy in both the USA and abroad. The oil shocks of the 1970s brought this petropolitical economy into full relief; and, in many ways, politics in the USA since the Carter years have been about oil dependency. The USA holds 2 percent of the world’s oil reserves, but it uses 25 percent of its annual oil consumption (Boller, 2005, p. V9). Hence, it must import energy, and this causes a trade deficit that, in turn, requires the USA to sell its goods and/or assets abroad. Since its

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

239

industrial goods or agricultural products do not cover the bill, the USA sells assets, but that move creates investment deficits or capital shortages. To attract new investment or keep capital in the USA, the government has cut taxes on firms, investment, and the super-rich to keep capital under American control. This fiscal policy creates budget deficits, and both real wages and social wages stagnate, or even fall. The trade deficit, however, also leads government to tax consumption even as a wage deficit causes households to expand credit borrowing on houses and daily purchases. With cheap energy, people expand their communities, and buy cheaper, bigger, but more remote housing to maintain standards of living as they cash out of mature neighborhoods. Yet, commuting culture only consumes more energy, so the entire cycle of interlocking deficits behind the petropolitical economy renews itself as each new household forming generation has these deficits dumped on them. As Newberry (2005) observes: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Energy deficit creates trade deficit. Trade deficit creates investment deficit. Investment deficit creates budget deficit. Investment deficit and budget deficit create wages and wealth deficit. Wages and wealth deficits create pressure to use energy to generate housing wealth, which starts the cycle over again.

Thus far, the USA successfully has securitized these deficits in financial markets with treasury bills, mortgage backed securities, new economy shares, and real estate investment trusts in addition to manipulating the value of the dollar to sustain liquidity and manage inflation. At the end of the day, this house of cards rests on American energy dependence, and it also promotes its borrow and burn conservatism. Since 1990, then, the USA has fought three-and-half or four wars in the Middle East. The so-called Gulf War was conducted in 1990–1991 to oust Iraqi invaders from Kuwait, the half (or perhaps a full) war was the ongoing aerial policing of Iraq’s ‘‘no fly zones’’ from 1991 to 2003, the second war was the quick invasion of Afghanistan in 2001–2002 to oust the Taliban regime and its Al Qaeda allies, and the third was the full-bore invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003 that continues into the present. Of course, this fifteen-year history of military action was undertaken, in part, against tremendous global resistance. Washington has worked assiduously to wrap these events up in narratives about the onward ‘‘march of freedom’’ and the ‘‘virtues of democratic self-rule’’. In practice, however, the realties on the ground do not appear to include much genuine self-rule, full democracy, or authentic freedom. Instead the Gulf War helped trigger Al Qaeda’s terrorist

240

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

attacks around the world, and violent insurgencies are still simmering in parts of Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2001, the USA invaded Afghanistan, and it quickly toppled the radical Islamic Taliban regime. Beginning in 2002, it set about rebuilding the Afghan state by organizing a new national assembly, putting in place procedures to elect Hamid Karzai President of Afghanistan in 2004. While all of these mostly Kabul-based advances are laudatory, in 2004 it also appears that Afghanistan produced an estimated 87 percent of the world’s illegal opium crop (New York Times, April 5, 2005). President Bush clearly has successfully extended his all-important ‘‘zone of freedom’’ in anchoring America’s petropolitical economy, as he understands its ambiguous promise, but this action also has made democratic Afghanistan mostly safe for a new narco-feudalism, narco-capitalism, or even narco-republicanism. Parliamentary elections are set for September 2005, but drug traffickers have filled much of the social, political, and economic vacuum left in the countryside by the Taliban. Nonetheless, at the current conjuncture, it must be noted that American military, political, and economic capabilities have been entrenched very deeply into this part of the world, which is important for other material reasons, like oil. Some experts believe the world is nearing its point of ‘‘peak oil’’ production, or that turn in output trends when oil output slowly declines. Having a say over what is left, therefore, is imperative. The Gulf War brought the USA more directly into the Persian Gulf, and the Straits of Hormuz where 40 percent of the world’s daily oil exports move to market. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates hold more than half of the planet’s known oil reserves. Iraq alone possesses an estimated 115 billion barrels of oil, and it is now centrally under American oversight. Only Iran, and its estimated reserves of 125 billion barrels stands outside of American control. Of course, the axis of evil rhetoric spun up by President Bush in 2002 named Iran as one of the world’s three most threatening powers, because of these powers’ nuclear energy and strategic weaponry programs that led to the hunt for ‘‘weapons of mass destruction’’ (WMD) in Iraq. Never to be found in Iraq, the White House has been covertly surveilling, and closely studying Iran’s alleged WMD sites since 2003 in preparation apparently for a similar incursion there. Iran maybe is plainly more significant to the USA for its hydrocarbon WMDs, or ‘‘wells for massive depletion,’’ than its possible CBN (chemical, biological, nuclear) WMDs. Saudi Arabia is already lifting nearly 10 MBD (million barrels a day) of oil, which is near its maximum sustainable output. Iran, however, is only

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

241

producing 4 MBD, and it could eventually increase this output to 7 MBD. Moreover, Iran has about 940 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, or 16 percent of the world’s known reserves, which are exceeded only by Russia’s. Today Iran produces only 2.7 trillion cubic feet, so it easily could increase this level of output. Global oil output probably will peak in 2010, if not soon before or thereafter. Consequently, it is important to know how Iran will sell what to whom, at which costs, and for how long, particularly as more and more demand is exerted by China, India, or other developing economies. China already is a big customer of Iran’s, and India’s hydrocarbon orders are growing. To protect, police, and perpetuate the world economy, and maintain much of its off-shore consumer and producer goods output in China and other developing economies, the USA may well push into Iran, searching for one sort of WMDs only to gain oversight over those other ones that truly matter (Klare, 2005). This new strategy, in fact, could follow from the last war in Iraq. With U.S. oil consumption equaling 19.7 MBD, and with 53 percent of this figure coming from overseas, and oil from the Persian Gulf region equaling 14 percent of all American oil consumption, it is vital that this flow be sustained for the future; and, in turn, it must never be interrupted today. The tacit understandings between Iraqi exiles and Washington for a quid pro quo granting American firms privileged access to Iraqi oil in exchange for Saddam’s ouster have turned to ashes. The expectations of another 2 MBD of oil from Iraq on the world market have crashed, and output from there in 2005 has yet to equal 2003 levels before Saddam fell (Rutledge, 2005). Even so, the petropolitical economy, as it now stands, makes some strategic sense. To sustain its own development, the USA needs oil, and this is true for its homeland as well as its off-shore economic networks. In some places, this input is less critical, like Japan. Japan’s ratio of energy consumption to GDP fell 33 percent between 1973 and 2000; and, as a percentage of nominal GDP, the amount of energy derived from oil has fallen from 5 percent to about 1 percent of GDP from 1980 to 2005 (Bremner & Carey, 2005, p. 51). Yet, in other countries, like China, oil is becoming a major question. By 2020, China’s GDP could equal $5 trillion, and this activity will require around 900 gigawatts of electricity, 100 airports with at least 2,500 airliners, and 16 million new automobiles in the world’s largest car market (General Electric, 2005, p. 35). Also, by 2020, China will see its automobiles on the road rise from 24 million in 2005 to 100 million, causing transportation to account for 60 percent of China’s energy use as opposed to 33 percent in 2005. In 2004, the People’s Republic imported 2.4 MBD of oil, but it will

242

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

need around 8.4 MBD in 2030. Today 70 percent of China’s energy comes from coal, and only 3 percent from natural gas use; yet, this latter figure will increase to 10 percent by 2020 (Bremner & Carey, 2005, p. 51). Still, in 2005, it takes China 800 grams of crude oil to produce $1 of GDP, but it requires only 130 grams to produce the same output in Japan (Tashiro & Dawson, 2005, p. 51). Positioning the USA to oversee world petroleum output and transport, then, does constitute a peculiar, but also not insignificant, mode of Empire’s petropolitical economy. Right now, China spends three times the world average on energy, and its wasteful energy habits along with the rise of automobility in its cities and towns guarantee the geostrategic importance of Washington’s petropolitical economy in the Middle East and Central Asia. If Saudi Arabia’s main fields were destroyed, or degraded, 6 MBD would be lost to the world market. The USA cannot allow this disruption to occur, so Empire must police this region.

3. EMPIRE EVOLVING In fact, the resistance of the multitude, now and perhaps back for years, if not decades, may well be an insurrection against the ‘‘soft power’’ and a reaction to ‘‘hard power’’ politics behind the petropolitical economy of Empire. Of course, when confronting a major threat, common sense suggests that U.S. should take its allies into consideration, co-align Washington’s interests with those of foreign capitols, and engage in closer consultations. Engaging in these maneuvers makes it more likely to accentuate the allegiance of allies as well as to reduce their resentment. Yet, diplomacy usually is pitched at inter-elite relations in which diplomatic and military leadership groups allegedly must show greater sensitivity about the values, opinions, and cultures of others in framing American foreign policy. Such tolerance also might play well out on the street, in people’s living rooms or amidst conversations in the market. Nonetheless, the axes of soft power turn upon admiration, allure, and attraction. And, what American soft power represents, despite what many Americans believe, has real limits. Not everyone wants what Hollywood and Silicon Valley or Disney World and Wall Street have to offer. The goals of consumerism, the attractions of media entertainment, or the persuasions of affluence, as popularized by transnational businesses for upwardly mobile North American suburbanites, can be easily rejected by many among the world’s multitude. And, if their localist efforts to deflect American soft power are matched by more intrusive hard power supplements, then the

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

243

multitude’s resistance can quickly deepen, broaden, and stiffen. Whether it is Jose´ Bove´ in his localist resistance against McDonald’s to defend ‘‘culinary sovereignty,’’ Jodie Williams in Vermont mobilizing millions of moms over the Internet along with Princess Diana to ban the profligate use of landmines, or Osama bin Laden issuing videotaped communique´s over Al Jazeera’s global media links, the allure of America, and therefore the extent of its soft power, clearly is shown to have real limits. Plainly, these ideas are not widely shared in the USA, so Hardt’s and Negri’s heterodoxy can be salutary. In many ways, what is treated as Empire by Hardt and Negri has been evolving, at least, since the mid-1960s as the last pretense of radical resistance against global capitalism by Marxism– Leninism died out, once Brezhnev and Kosygin throttled Khrushchev’s unfocused efforts at a sort of consumer-oriented ‘‘perestroika’’ and Mao Zedong sparked years of internal war during the Cultural Revolution in China. The West’s struggle with the East revitalized corporate science and technology, transformed classical bourgeois society, and weakened state socialism by waging low-intensity warfare for a generation out in the peripheries of the capitalist and communist zone-regimes. By 1968, as the last big anti-bourgeois bout of street-fighting fizzled out in Paris, actually existing socialism proved it had to be kept in place by tanks in Prague, and most peasant revolutions no longer sought guidance for their national liberation from either Moscow or Beijing. Instead, communist states increasingly operated as sub-imperial adjuncts of the rising powers of transnational global exchange, as Yugoslavia, Hungary, East Germany, and even North Korea engaged in more and more overt and covert interactions with the West (Luke & Boggs, 1982). During the 1970s, Nixon and Kissinger accepted nuclear parity with Brezhnev and Kosygin, Brandt and Honecker enacted Ostpolitik, and the capitalist roaders returned from their rustication in the Peoples’ Republic of China after Mao’s death to launch ‘‘the four modernizations.’’ By the time that Gorbachev entered office in 1985, it was even obvious in Moscow to the CPSU’s apparatchiki that the incipient New World Order required restructuring, democraticization, and openness of all those who hoped to profit from its powers and privileges by becoming tributaries in this new space of flows (Luke, 1994). 9.11.01, then, strangely overlaps the Cold War’s death throes with the post–Cold War era’s birth pangs. Yet, in many places, the anchor points of a new geopolitics for the 21st century are hard to find. The unipolar moment in American history, if this analysis holds, was not long-lasting. Events set into motion during 1989 led to the U.S.S.R. collapsing on December 25, 1991, which many marked as a victory of the West

244

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

over the Eastern bloc. Within weeks, however, another Western-led bloc of states launched, fought, and won a war to liberate Kuwait from Iraqi occupation. After turning its back on the mujahedeen who allied with it during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the USA now greatly aggravated and further alienated many Islamic groups by stationing troops in Saudi Arabia, aiding Israel against Iraqi attacks in the Gulf War, and failing to accommodate Palestinian interests in the struggles for statehood and territory to the fullest possible extent. By February 23, 1993, when the first attack on the WTC took place, the unipolar moment in American history was clearly in crisis, if not beginning to end. If that attack showed the limits of American ‘‘soft power’’ in a time of uncommon hegemony, September 11, 2001 simply underscored how fragile and contestable soft power actually is (Bauman, 2002; Agnew, 1998).

4. EMPIRE AS NEW WORLD ORDER Rather than being a ‘‘break,’’ ‘‘crisis,’’ or ‘‘rupture’’ in modernity, the vision of post-modernization in Empire presents global change as a ‘‘turn’’ in the existing routines for already modernized forms of being (Ohmae, 1990; Reich, 1991; Poster, 1995). By making the consumption of commodities a way of everyday modern life, the post-modernity of Empire essentially mimics the ‘‘fast capitalism’’ (Agger, 1989) of markets: it rejects older notions of ‘‘the political’’ (Schmitt, 1996) with their closed structures, fixed meaning, and rigid order in favor of chaos, incompleteness, and uncertainty (O´ Tuathail, 1999; Thrift, 1998; Rosenau, 1990). Empire’s politics apparently repudiate fixed territories, sacred spaces, and hard boundaries in favor of unstable flows, proliferating all of the nonplaces used to channel secularized practices, and permeable borders (Diebert, 1997; Auge´, 1995; Agnew & Corbridge, 1995). Post-modernity is not a wholly new social order, but under Empire the production and reproduction of an almost totally commercialized way of life has become generalized on a transnational scale (Luke, 1999; Bourdieu, 1998; Greider, 1996; Harvey, 1996; Appadurai, 1996). It is upon this terrain that resistance by the multitude operates, finding both the tools of assault and their targets for destruction in the mass-produced non-places of criss-crossed borders and rushing flows of global exchange (Luke & O´ Tuathail, 1997). Some argue that destroying the WTC and damaging the Pentagon were futile efforts to topple the global economy and American military power. In some ways, they are right. World trade now really has no single center, and

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

245

the armed forces of the U.S. can be controlled from many different points scattered all around the nation, as the air and ground war in Afghanistan conducted from Tampa, Florida since October 2001 easily demonstrates. Nonetheless, the multitude recognizes such iconic buildings are signs, as well as sites, of wealth, power, and culture for Empire. Directing such dramatic violence against those centers of today’s transnational ways of life, and then destroying or damaging significant buildings, constitutes a very successful first strike in a war against Empire. 9.11.01 represents many forms of anonymous resistance by the multitude as its opposition nests in networks, struggles against systems, and probes into processes. This insurgency is simultaneously underground, on the ground, and ungrounded in many different locales (Cooley, 2000; Bowden, 2000; Rashid, 2000). Transnational ethnonational diasporas and ragged failed states shelter its militants, mobilize its supporters, and nurture its many streams of discontent. Because so many of the mechanisms, structures, and links in world capitalism must be essentially unsecure to operate optimally, defense against the insecurities of all, who now live amidst these linked aggregates in Empire’s big market-driven systems, is neither certain nor final. Such uncertainty and contingency, once again, characterize today’s post-modern times. Organized stateless violence emerged from the multitude during the Cold War in wars of national liberation, narcocapitalist crime syndicates, ethnic secessions, and shadowy counter-intelligence units (Luke, 1993; Walker, 1993). Tolerated by the superpowers from the 1940s to the 1990s, these entities often proved to be reliable tools in the border conflicts between the capitalist and the socialist zone-regimes that once were tied to Washington and Moscow (Kaldor, 1999). In the political vacuum created in many countries after 1989–1991, however, these entities acquired quasi-sovereign powers in far too many territorial areas across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and even parts of the former Soviet Union. Therefore, one finds small, organized war machines with varying levels of capability, but not true control over entire territories and populations, demodernizing many different places around the world in pursuit of their contrasovereign illegitimate power (Bowden, 2000). From the Congo, Somalia, Liberia, and Sierra Leone to Afghanistan, Iraq, Chechnya, and Palestine, there are many demodernized wildzones in Empire where these stateless formations for organized violence play out their quest for institutional power on both a local and a global level (Rashid, 2000; Agnew, 1998; Huntington, 1998; Doty, 1996). Mostly dismissed as insignificant vortices of minor turmoil when their first effects were registered on 2.26.93 in the U.S.

246

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

at the WTC, such operations could be regarded as sources of resistance by the multitude after 9.11.01. Instead of considering this condition a historical oddity, however, Empire needs to ask what strategic failures, political inconsistencies, or economic discontinuities now plague its global regimen because these stateless war machines as well as other resistances are striking back.

5. EMPIRE: CULTURE WAR+POST-MODERN GEOPOLITICS A culture war perhaps does rest at the core of 9.11.01, but it is not one between Islam and Christianity, even it can be tied to the incommensurability of secularism and devotion in many respects of Empire’s everyday life (Barber, 1995; Appadurai, 1996; Huntington, 1998). Liberal ideologies rest at the core of modern consumer society for the multitude. Without the codes of conduct that channel everyday human behaviors through codes for autonomous rational agency, the technics that underlie market exchange, instrumental action, and personal happiness would grind to a halt (Crang & Thrift, 1999; Harvey, 1996). Empire’s biopolitics subsist upon a simple directive: to live is to consume, and to consume is to live (Davidson, 1997). By these lights, few individuals even can imagine how one could decide rationally and choose freely, not to consume or to die. Consequently, the sensibilities of some public, for example, have been shocked from the first big airline hijackings in 1970 by Palestinian fighters to the WTC bombings in 2001 by Al Qaeda when they face those whose dedication to violence, committed in accord with illiberal visions of existence, is steadfast. Empire cannot easily accept how readily some will put other non-imperial collective goals ahead of the individual right to consume, work, or acquire property. Believing God, History, or Nature is on their side, those ‘‘others,’’ like radical Islamic jihadi, willingly can sacrifice themselves, their families, and their riches to attain long-term strategic goals (Mayer, 2001; Rashid, 2000; Halberstam, 2001). While destroying the Pentagon or WTC might not seem to offer many strategic benefits, the audacious devotion to such violent goals always can, first, confuse, and, then, shock liberal understandings of the self and society down to their core. Empire fosters a frightening insularity, and it is shared by most average consumers in the rich OECD countries as they aspire to buy more and more of the world product at their local Walmarts. Unfortunately, too many remain utterly clueless about how those goods are

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

247

so abundant, cheap, and endless. Nor do they know why their credit is so steady, sound, and bottomless; or whose welfare elsewhere in the world is not as solid, certain, and strifeless. In this respect, Islamic fundamentalists are most coherently united, however, in their being ‘‘resolutely opposed to modernity and modernization’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 147). This opposition is pitched most intensely against social modernization as it comes with global markets. Yet, their allegedly fundamentalist reactions only highlight the importance of returning to the Qur’an and the Sunna for truly legitimate foundational principles. For all other purposes, Islamic fundamentalism stresses a form of conventional discourse in Islamic scholarship, ijtihad, or ‘‘original thought.’’ Like Christian, Jewish, Hindu, or Buddhist fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalism represents, as Hardt and Negri argue, ‘‘the invention of original values and practices, which perhaps echo those of other periods of revivalism or fundamentalism but really are directed in reaction to the present social order’’ (2000, p. 149). Instead of continuing to stand resolutely for modern ideals, like democracy, equality, and freedom, Empire left tyrants like Saddam Hussein in place after Kuwait’s oil was once again secure, permitted gangster capitalism to establish itself securely in places as varied as Russia, Columbia, Romania, Congo, and Ukraine, and temporized as horrendous civil strife racked Yugoslavia, East Timor, Sri Lanka, Rwanda, Bosnia, Congo, Iraq, and most of former Soviet Central Asia as well as Afghanistan (Luke, 1996). At the same time, Washington ineffectively brokered a flawed peace process between Israel and the Palestinians that only increased tensions between Jews and Arabs as more militant groups on both sides pushed more and extreme measures to attain their goals after the Oslo peace accords (Masalha, 2000). The difficult detail, then, that most overlook in the putative triumph of ‘‘the West’’ over ‘‘the Rest’’ in the 1990s is how fully Empire coexists with another vast global modernity of failure beneath, behind, or beside the modernizing successes brought on by globalization through transnational corporate commerce (Greider, 1996; Harvey, 1996). For every Hong Kong, Singapore, Frankfurt, or San Jose in the 1990s, there were five Groznys, Kabuls, Luandas, Mogadishus, Sarajevos, or Kinshashas (Power, 2001; Gourevitch, 1999). As the 21st century dawned in some places, many others slipped back into 17th or 19th century conditions of demodernizing disintegration (Luke & O´ Tuathail, 1997). Large parts of the world now do not have effective territorial governance by modern nation-state institutions (Debrix, 1999). Under Empire’s watch, many regions of the world have slid

248

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

back into early modern relations of trade in which black markets for gems, oil, weapons, drugs, timber, or even people clearly eclipse the open exchange for legitimate goods and services (Martin & Schumann, 1998). Sudan, Somalia, Nepal, Niger, Columbia, Chad or Peru, Philippines are only some of the more obvious cases in point. Amidst this chaotic flux, the modernity of failure suffered by many is easily blamed upon a modernity of success enjoyed by the few as Empire apparently favors the USA and its network of supranational organisms among other highly modernized nation-states (Barber, 1995; Bourdieu, 1998; Friedman, 1999). Therefore, any defense of Empire’s supposedly liberal capitalist ways of life always will require an uncomfortable on-going effort to comprehend the radical indifference to its codes of conduct, which illiberal ways of acting and thinking generate (Campbell, 1992). Radical Islamism obviously fills this bill as its advocates allege a New World Order tied to liberal capitalist values, and the American society and state that stand behind them, are threatening Islam as a whole (Friedman, 1999; Griffin, 2001). Moreover, in the eyes of Islam’s faithful during the 20th and 21st centuries, the U.S. in Iraq, Serbs in Bosnia, Hindus in Kashmir, Russians in Chechnya, French in North Africa, or Israelis in Palestine are all working to destroy the faith. Hence, dispossessed radical followers among the world’s multitude easily will swear allegiance to ‘‘defeat the mightiest military power of modern times’’ by trusting, as bin Laden maintains, how fully ‘‘your lives are in the hands of God’’ (Newsweek, September 24, 2001, p. 44). What is most remarkable about Islamic fundamentalism, according to Hardt and Negri, ‘‘is really the refusal of the powers that are emerging in the new imperial order,’’ so instances of its politicization, like the Iranian revolution, the Algerian civil war of the 1990s, or the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, represent ‘‘a powerful rejection of the world market’’ that might be thought of ‘‘as the first postmodernist revolution’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 149). An absolute profession of religious faith keeps radical Islam disciplined and resourceful, but its origins also highlight how easily everything has soured under Empire in the poorer, less developed regions of the world from Morocco to Indonesia as the peaceful followers of the faith struggle to coexist with fundamentalistic radicals (Wright, 2001). Moreover, the generic forms of liberal capitalist life brought to millions by transnational firms now compete on the same terrain with Al Qaeda not only in Egypt or Sudan, but also in Russia or Bosnia as well as Ontario or Florida. In many ways, it is clear that the biopolitical terms of Empire’s normalizing generic liberalism, resting at the core of modern markets, technics, and societies, is what radical

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

249

Islamicists reject. Nonetheless, the ‘‘Westoxification’’ that Islamic critics and clerics have been decrying since the 1970s is not entirely focused on the ‘‘Disneyfication’’ in everyday life that America has represented for antiglobalization campaigns. Instead what many radicals among the multitude appear more deadset against are older modern principles in Empire that derive from the enlightenment: the separation of religion and government, basic natural rights to life, liberty, and property, the emancipation of women, even scientific reason. For Al Qaeda, a perceived threat in the prophet’s homeland triggered bin Laden’s jihad against the USA. These kinds of threats are what globalization often portends for ‘‘the Rest’’ as they confront ‘‘the West’’. If Empire’s sovereigns wish to resist this new opposition, they must decide which foundational practices in what was once regarded as ‘‘Western modernity’’ are worth reaffirming. Yet, they must also be aware of how much those principles aggravate the anxieties of many among the multitude who see their values smothered by a civilization of cultural clash that constantly inundates them with unpalatable changes. Of course, Islam can coexist, and has done so in the past, with scientific skepticism, the freedom of women, basic natural rights, and a separation of the faith and the state. Today, it is mostly religious fundamentalists in Islam who assail only these principles, but the multitude remains suspicious of Empire almost everywhere.

6. EMPIRE: GLOBALIZATION AFTER THE COLD WAR For many, globalization is the key trope tying together Empire’s neo-liberal capitalist rationalization, informational technics, mass consumption culture, and integrated world markets of a post-modern geopolitics (Rodrik, 1997). Yet, militant resistances mounted by the Al Qaeda terrorist networks also are in many ways the epitome of Empire’s forms of life for contemporary globalization. Whether it is the easy facility of these radical cadres with global finance, world travel, or international communication, one must not mistake the sectarian traditionalism of Al Qaeda’s mujahedeen for some sort of technological unsophistication or political obtuseness. Indeed, the loosely articulated cellular structures of these networks are highly specialized ‘‘virtual organizations,’’ pulling people, money, resources, and tactics from different places at different times into single teams for cohesive task performance without necessarily following any overly centralized strategy.

250

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

Whether it is truck bombs, hijacked airliners, ship bombings, individual murders, or seizing symbolic buildings, global means of communication, organization, and transportation make it easier to refunction embedded technical assets as tools of terror against Empire by using such loosely coupled, flexible means of destructive organization. This resistance by some of the multitude only mirrors how fully global power is being recast in an informatic manner (Kaplan & Lo¨o¨w, 2002). Many aspects of Americanized ‘‘soft power’’ (Nye, 1990) are what threatens the world’s radical Islamicists and surviving state socialists in President Bush’s bizarre visions about ‘‘axis of evil’’ states. Under Empire’s rule, antisystemic threats now are acquiring their own destatalized, dematerialized, and deformalized configurations as networks. Whether it is the unknown hacker, a faceless narcocapitalist, or Islamic underground terrorist cell, today’s threats to Empire take more deterritorialized and decentered forms in their networked assaults. This struggle against terrorists will continue because the global economy simultaneously creates many probable weapons, and angers many possible enemies, for deployment against Empire. The ongoing processes of globalization as such, and the persistent diffusion of neoliberal ideologies of Empire per se, will almost certainly continue creating new resentment against the U.S. and the West (Herod, O´ Tuathail, & Roberts, 1998). Rather than trusting entirely in the Royal Marines, NATO’s navies, or U.S. B-2 stealth bombers, Empire’s sovereigns need to ask to what extent today’s globalist ideologies with their neo-liberal systems of industrial production, cultural reproduction, and public administration are sparking the bitter conflicts they currently face with terrorism (Bowden, 2000). Empire is failing in too many places around the world, and its misplaced faith in neoliberal economics and class-biased politics are not blameless as the exploited and ignored multitude arrive at their breaking point. President Bush’s new hot-and-cold war against both anti-statal terrorism and the ‘‘axis of evil’’ states could prove to be – as the war loomed against Iraq in 2003 suggests – a unilateral gambit for recharging modern notions of territory, sovereignty, and nationality for the USA against Empire’s post-modern multilateralist tendencies. Yet, his ultimate prospects for success remain to be seen. Without the Cold War to constitute a common enemy, and without the requisite acceptance for all of the ways of life embedded at the heart of American soft power, the USA increasingly has turned to unilateralist action rather than nurturing the multilateralist institutions it has sought to construct since 1918. These tough-talking independent moves are possible because of the considerable economic, military, and technological power of

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

251

the USA now. Nevertheless, they also seem impermissible when put up against the historical ideals of democracy, equality, and freedom at the root of American soft power. Here is where the battle over hearts and minds for Empire is being met as other forms of soft power contest American globalism – radical Islamicism, Chinese nationalism, racialist fundamentalism – all question America’s unilateralism and offer an alternative to the soft power of corporate capitalist consumerism. From the first military campaigns against Baghdad in 1991 to the current one after 2003, the USA has worked, at some times, through consensus and compromise and, at other times, by fiat and force. Yet, the trends are toward unilateralism, coupled with ill-considered moves in Iraq, are eroding the hard-won multilateralism anchoring the post-WWII global order. Most of those practices are running along mostly on momentum. The insular turn by Washington toward homeland security and the aggressive use of B-2 bombers, cruise missiles, and Predator drones by the Bush White House does not bode well for the future, even though these moves seem to sell effectively in American elections. As Kupchan observes, When management of the international system depends on consensus and compromise rather than on American leadership, the United States will lament that it taught by example norms of self-interest rather than norms of reciprocity. When the dollar is no longer the dominant reserve currency, Washington will wish that it could turn to an international institution to help stabilize the international financial system. When America’s military is busy meeting challenges in the Middle East or Asia, and ethnic conflict again breaks out in Europe, the United States will want an EU force capable of operating independently of NATO. When the coal-and-oil-burning industries of emerging economies are operating at full capacity a decade or two from now, Americans may well regret that their government, when it had the leverage to do so, failed to take decisive steps to shape an effective global environmental regime to contain pollution (Kupchan, 2002, p. 295).

Much of what has developed after the Cold War soon contradicted what many feared outside of the USA and others believed could not happen within America itself. Globalization can occur without Americanization, capitalism can unfold without bringing prosperity or equality, growth can happen without creating a better way of life, and freedom can come without enhancing many individual or collective opportunities (Rodrik, 1997). All of these disruptive forces are at work producing new, larger, and more diverse multitudes. Yet, the architectures of the nation-state system are throttling the opportunities to generate a truly world political system. Resentment, in turn, is becoming rife as the poor and powerless recognize they live in states with only de jure sovereignty, economies with little room for improvement, and environments with spreading deterioration caused both

252

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

internally and externally. Those few states with true de facto sovereignty, functioning economies with some advancements, and environmental conditions that are, at least, stable seem to accede to world governance, by and large, by bowing to Empire’s ambiguous Kaiser und Ko¨nig compromise lying beyond the self-help regime of neorealist sovereignty. At the same time, Empire abroad is warping some Americans’ sense of themselves and the republic for which they believe they stand. The nebulous nature of the radical Islamicist networks threatening the USA has led the American legislative and judicial branches to let their leash over the executive branch go almost completely slack. American nationals, like Yasser Esam Hamdi and Jose Padilla, who are caught abroad or at home, and accused of being enemy combatants, can be detained indefinitely without any constitutional rights. These actions come on the heels of the administration’s detention of over 600 foreign nationals on Cuba at the Guanta´namo Naval Base as well as a broad crackdown on immigration violations, foreign travel surveillance for U.S. citizens, and tougher oversight of almost all domestic air travel. While those events are remarkable for many reasons, they are not an unquestionable example of American hegemony at work. Too many actors with too many local, regional, and global connections are at play in these events to make them somehow comparable to Cold War era exploits when C.I.A. operatives did ‘‘wet work’’ in many Third World trouble spots. Instead the November 18, 2002 strike in Yemen of by Predator drone against a single automobile to pre-empt a possible Al Qaeda operation represents a new stage in the evolution of Empire, and its technological ability to strike anyone anytime anywhere – even an American national – in defense of its transantional prerogatives. In Iraq after 2003, Empire remains a wreck through American and coalition forces by further globalizing Empire’s transnational authority and renationalize even as it struggles to Iraq’s territorial control under a new ‘‘democratic regime.’’ These aggressive allied actions by the coalition’s forces appear to be in full accord with Hardt and Negri when they observe how Empire uses its powers to manage nationalism and fundamentalism. It is important for Empire to ‘‘deploy its military and police powers to bring the unruly and rebellious to order....All these repressive actions remain essentially external to the multitude and its movements. Empire can only isolate, divide, and segregate’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 399). Kupchan’s report on a conversation in Beijing, for example, seconds these geopolitical observations. Because of its hard power capabilities and soft power capacities, the USA all too often seems to lack restraint and humility.

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

253

As a senior diplomat in China observed in this regard, ‘‘We do not expect equality, but we do expect respect. We could accept an America that treats China like a rich man treats a poor man. But we cannot accept an America that treats China like a rider treats a horse’’ (cited in Kupchan, 2002, p. 276). Such comments show how both hard and soft powers can fail the USA Having SAC and Disney World leaves many in Washington believing that everyone wants to visit Orlando, and those who do not easily can be bombed into oblivion during transoceanic flights by B-2 bombers from Whiteman Air Force Base in former Attorney General John Ashcroft’s home state. America, then, now mistreats much of the world as a rich man might dismiss a beggar for both being poor, and not worthy of any acts of charity, and then Washington chooses to act like an abusive rider of a mistreated horse by forcing others to only do its bidding on its own terms for its exclusive benefits. At this moment, when the USA does appear to be something like a ‘‘hyperpower,’’ Empire also could push its leadership to choose to exercise greater measures of ‘‘strategic restraint.’’ As Kupchan frames this idea, To exercise strategic restraint is to withhold power, to give ground, to make room for others. It is a strategy that is by no means universally applicable. To demonstrate restraint when dealing with an implacable enemy would be an act of folly and an invitation to exploitation. Britain, for example, had no business appeasing Nazi Germany during the 1930s – and suffered for doing so. The United States today confronts a serious threat from terrorism – and should show no restraint in meeting that threat. But America does not currently face a major adversary. Instead, it confronts an array of potential challengers whose intentions are still in their formative stages. The United States therefore has a rare opportunity to help shape those intentions, push them in a benign direction, and channel rising strength so as to dampen the competitive effects of new fault lines. In this context, to exercise strategic restraint is to give ground in order to gain ground, to expend less power, but paradoxically to realize more influence in doing so (Kupchan, 2002, p. 264).

Once again, from a commonsense perspective, a policy of strategic restraint by the sovereigns of Empire has much to recommend it. Although it too focuses perhaps too heavily upon inter-elite transactions, this program might pay off in less conflict, fewer tensions, and more trade. Indeed, Kupchan sees the years under the Concert of Europe as a model for strategic restraint. Nonetheless, the soft power underpinnings of this approach could shake loose, as they seem to be doing now under President George W. Bush, and push strategic restraint into the new shapes of unrestrained aggressive strategizing, such as one sees now in the grandiose plans for bringing what was believed to be liberal capitalist democracy to Baghdad in 2003 on the model that it was brought Berlin and Tokyo in 1945. It is unclear that the

254

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

world’s multitude, and all of its many militants, will accept these plans, as the vast anti-war rallies of February 15, 2003, and scores more since 2003, demonstrated all around the world. Hardt and Negri, of course, celebrate the Industrial Workers of the World, or IWW, as the archetype for their new form of militancy. Their reading depicts the Wobbly as a revolutionary agent, who constructed ‘‘associations among working people from below, through continuous agitation, and while organizing them gave rise to utopian thought and revolutionary knowledge’’ (2000, p. 412). An Al Qaeda militant, as a castoff organization from a Cold War era war machine, now seeking meaning in jihad against ‘‘the Crusaders’’ of Empire, seems far removed from Hardt’s and Negri’s optimistic vision of the present. But, all resistances have many chords in the notes being scored out on the streets for revolutionary change. And, in many ways, Al Qaeda is a creation of a world that knows ‘‘only an inside, a world that knows no outside,’’ but its militancy neither is ‘‘positive, constructive and innovative activity’’ nor is it what ‘‘makes resistance into counterpower and makes rebellion into a project of love’’ (Hardt & Negri, 2000, p. 413). To conclude, the events of 9.11.01 are incidents of incredible violence, which Empire – if it exists as Hardt and Negri maintain – helped to make possible, then practicable, and finally probable. Al Qaeda and other fundamentalisms are echoes of the multitude’s resistances, but they do not, in and of themselves, constitute what can destroy and then displace Empire’s sovereignty. However, the nature of sovereignty in Empire remains quite mysterious when all is finally said and done in Empire. Instead the multitude’s resistances are providing a pretext for Empire to repoliticize the conduct of everyday life, as the USA has done with its Patriot Act since 2002, by asking who is friend, and who is foe (Schmitt, 1996). With 9.11.01, elements of the multitude struck back against Empire. After 9.11.01, Empire has sought to root out those whom would destroy it. Thus far, neither side has succeeded, and in the fog of failure clouding this Sitzkrieg, the USA has dragged much of the world’s older multilateral architectures for statecraft to the brink of dissolution in its unilateralist quest to find, isolate, and then break what President Bush regards as the ‘‘axis of evil.’’ On this terrain, Empire’s conclusion sounds both utterly anachronistic and extremely attractive, because Hardt and Negri decide to see not ‘‘a coming anarchy’’ but rather a time when ‘‘cooperation and revolution remain together, in love, simplicity and also innocence’’ (2000, p. 413). Passages from this paper appear in Telos, 120 (Summer 2001), and Political Theory, 34 (June 2006).

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

255

REFERENCES Agger, B. (1989). Fast capitalism. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Agnew, J. (1998). Geopolitics: Re-visioning world politics. London: Routledge. Agnew, J., & Corbridge, S. (1995). Mastering space. London: Routledge. Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at large: Cultural dimensions of globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Auge´, M. (1995). Non-places: Introduction to an anthropology of supermodernity. London: Verso. Bamyeh, M. (2000). The ends of globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Barber, B. (1995). Jihad vs. McWorld. New York: Times Books. Bauman, Z. (2002). Society under siege. Cambridge: Polity Press. Boller, B. (2005). Vulnerable to economic attack. Roanoke Times, April 19, V9. Boot, M. (2005). Empowering what we already have. Roanoke Times, April 17, H1, p. 3. Bourdieu, P. (1998). Acts of resistance: Against the tyranny of the market. New York: The New Press. Bowden, M. (2000). Black hawk down: A story of modern war. New York: Penguin. Bremner, B., & Carey, J. (2005). Wasteful ways. Business Week, April 11, 50–51. Campbell, D. (1992). Writing security. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Cooley, J. K. (2000). Unholy wars Afghanistan, America, and international terrorism (2nd ed.). Cherndon, VA: Pluto Press. Crang, P., & Thrift, N. (1999). Thinking space. London: Routledge. Davidson, J. D. Lord. W. R.-M (1997). The sovereign individual: How to survive and thrive during the collapse of the welfare state. New York: Simon & Schuster. Debrix, F. (1999). Re-envisioning peacekeeping. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Diebert, R. (1997). Parchment, printing and hypermedia: Communication in world order transformation. New York: Columbia University Press. Doty, R. (1996). Imperial encounters. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Foucault, M. (1980). The History of sexuality, Vol. I. New York: Vintage. Foucault, M. (1991). In : B. Graham, C. Gordon & M. Peter (Eds), The foucault effect: Studies in governmentality. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Friedman, T. (1999). The lexus and the olive tree. New York: Knopf. General Electric. (2005). Our time: GE 2004 annual report. Fairfield, CT: General Electric Company. Gourevitch, P. (1999). Tomorrow we wish to inform you that we will be killed with our families: Stories from Rwanda. New York: Picador. Greider, W. (1996). One world, ready or not: The manic logic of global capitalism. New York: Simon & Schuster. Griffin, M. (2001). Reaping the whirlwind: The Taliban movement in Afghanistan. Herndon, VA: Pluto Press. Halberstam, D. (2001). War in a time of peace: Bush, Clinton, and the Generals. New York: Scribner. Hardt, M., & Negri, A. (2000). Empire. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Harvey, D. (1996). Justice, nature and the geography of difference. Oxford: Blackwell. Herod, A., O´ Tuathail, G., & Roberts, S. M. (Eds) (1998). Unruly world? Globalization, governance, and geography. London: Routledge.

256

TIMOTHY W. LUKE

Huntington, S. P. (1998). The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order. New York: Simon & Schuster. Johnson, C. (2000). Blowback: The causes and consequences of American empire. New York: Henry Holt. Kaldor, M. (1999). New and old wars: Organized violence in a global era. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Kaplan, J., & Lo¨o¨w, H. (2002). The cultic milieu: Oppositional subcultures in an age of globalization. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press. Kaplan, R. D. (1996). The ends of the earth: A journey at the dawn of the 21st century. New York: Random House. Kennedy, P. (1992). Preparing for the twenty-first century. New York: Random House. Klare, M. (2005). Oil, geopolitics, and the coming war with Iran, April 11, http://www. romdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=2312_ Kupchan, C. A. (2002). The end of the American era: U.S. foreign policy and the geopolitics of the twenty-first century. New York: Knopf. Luke, T. W. (1993). Discourses of disintegration, texts of transformation: Re-reading realism in the New World Order. Alternatives, 18, 229–258. Luke, T. W. (1994). Yeltsin’s progress: On Russia’s pilgrimage to the west. Soviet and PostSoviet Review, 21(1), 2–11. Luke, T. W. (1996). Governmentality and contra-governmentality: Rethinking sovereignty and territoriality after the Cold War. Political Geography, 15(6/7), 491–507. Luke, T. W. (1999). Capitalism, democracy, and ecology: Departing from Marx. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Luke, T. W., & Boggs, C. (1982). Soviet subimperialism and the crisis of bureaucratic centralism. Studies in Comparative Communism, XV(1, 2), 95–124. Luke, T. W., & O´ Tuathail, G. (1997). On videocameralistics: The geopolitics of failed states, the CNN International, and (UN) governmentality. Review of International Political Economy, 4, 709–733. Martin, H.-P., & Schumann, H. (1998). The global trap: Globalization and the assault on democracy and prosperity. London: Zed Press. Masalha, N. (2000). Imperial Israel and the Palestinians: The politics of expansion. Herndon, VA: Pluto Press. Mayer, J. (2001). The house of Bin Laden. The New Yorker, 12(November), 54–65. Newberry, S. (2005). American Thermidor, Part II. Perspective, April 17. Nye, J. (1990). Bound to lead: The changing nature of American power. New York: Basic Books. Nye, J. (2002). The paradox of American power: Why the world’s only superpower can’t go it alone. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ohmae, K. (1990). The borderless world: Power and strategy in an interlocked economy. New York: Harper & Row. O´ Tuathail, G. (1999). Critical geopolitics: The politics of writing global space. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Poster, M. (1995). The second media age. Cambridge: Polity. Power, S. (2001). Bystanders to genocide. The Atlantic Monthly, 288(2), 84–108. Rashid, A. (2000). Taliban: Militant Islam, oil and fundamentalism in Central Asia. New Haven: Yale University Press. Reich, R. (1991). The work of nations: Preparing ourselves for 21st century capitalism. New York: Knopf.

9.11.01 and its Global Aftermath: Empire Strikes Back?

257

Rodrik, D. (1997). Has globalization gone too far? Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics. Rosenau, J. (1990). Turbulence in world politics: A theory of change and continuity. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Rutledge, I. (2005). US appears to have fought war for oil and lost it. Financial Times, April 11. Schmitt, C. (1996). The concept of the political. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Tashiro, H., & Dawson, C. (2005). Lessons from a miser. Business Week, April 11, 51. Thrift, N. (1998). The rise of soft capitalism. In: A. Herod, G. O´. Tuathail & S. M. Roberts (Eds), Unruly world? Globalization, governance and geography. London: Routledge. Walker, R. B. J. (1993). Inside/outside: International relations as political theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wright, R. (2001). Sacred rage: The wrath of militant Islam (Rev. ed.). New York: Simon and Schuster.

GLOBALIZATION AND SOCIAL JUSTICE: WORKING THE TENSIONS OF THE DIALECTICS OF NATIONAL CHARACTER Karen Monkman Response/Reaction to: Robert J. Antonio & Alessandro Bonanno, Periodizing Globalization: From Cold War Modernization to the Bush Doctrine Lauren Langman & Meghan A. Burke, From Exceptionalism to Imperialism: Culture, Character and American Foreign Policy Larry W. Isaac & Daniel M. Harrison, Corporate Warriors: The State and Changing Forms of Private Armed Force in America

In reading the three chapters I am responding to, I am struck by the parallels between the arguments presented by Antonio & Bonanno and Langman & Burke particularly. Both papers have presented analyses of how American Exceptionalism has been instrumental in bringing us to where we are in today’s world, but they have each argued their points from different disciplinary perspectives. Antonio & Bonanno have argued that the discourses related to Cold War modernization, neoliberal globalization, and neoconservative politics have colluded to shift us toward that of empire. Langman & Burke, on the other hand, have used cultural and psychosocial arguments Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 261–272 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24006-4

261

262

KAREN MONKMAN

which highlight the centrality of the formation and perpetuation of national character in moving our national politics toward imperialism. Antonio & Bonanno (herein) argue that all three traditions – Cold War modernization, neoliberal globalization, and neoconservative perspectives – ‘‘ignore or diminish the importance of substantive equality and social justice.’’ While Langman & Burke stop short of making the same final point as Antonio & Bonanno, they could arrive at the same point through additional analysis of the weaker sides of the tri-part dialectic that they do present. Put another way, Dewey’s Just Democracy (Antonio & Bonanno’s argument) is embedded in the compassionate, collective, and pragmatic sides of the dialectics of national character (Langman & Burke’s focus). As a dialectic, we should not ignore the potential of the weaker side. This is the first point I will discuss below. The second part of my reaction to these articles will focus on the contributions of the chapter by Isaac & Harrison. The privatization trends in the military are also represented in other sectors; as a sociologist of education and a comparative educator, I will discuss the field of education. Education is considered an important dynamic in social reproduction and change processes, and it is therefore worth considering its involvement in the politics of privatization and marketization. To recognize the involvement of multiple sectors in the same processes of privatization, Isaac & Harrison’s points are made even stronger. Antonio & Bonanno end their paper by asking ‘‘yhow can ‘social justice’ be brought into the big discourse of U.S. politics to address the overall condition of American Democracy?’’ In the third part of my response I will discuss the potential role of education in this process as one possible strategy, one that links the issues discussed in these papers to the reproductive and change-oriented possibilities of education. Education is but one dimension of the social processes that impact national and global political culture; readers are invited to consider other integral dynamics.

NEOLIBERAL POLICY AND NATIONAL CHARACTER Antonio & Bonanno paint a fairly bleak picture of the trajectory of our current history in the emergent post-Cold War world. They show how three political discourses – Cold War modernization, neoliberal globalization, and neoconservative politics – all draw on particular elements of American Exceptionalism that have shifted us toward imperialist tendencies that ‘‘ignore or diminish the importance of substantive equality and social justice.’’

Globalization and Social Justice

263

Although Langman & Burke stop short of making the same final point, their analysis of the weaker sides of the tri-part dialectic – individual/community, toughness/compassion, moralism/pragmatism – is useful in developing Antonio & Bonanno’s point a bit further. Langman & Burke argue that our national character has been developed and perpetuated with more emphasis on particular aspects of the dialectics of individualism–community, toughness–compassion, and morality– pragmatism. They show quite clearly how our ideologies and cultural images that drive the definitions of who we are as a society privilege individuality, toughness, and moral conservatism over the other qualities, and how these elements lead us toward an imperialist stance that alienates others. If we consider Dewey’s notion of a Just Democracy in relation to these dialectics, we could argue that it depends on the community, compassion, and pragmatic dimensions of the dialectics being further elaborated. They, too, exist in our character historically and could be drawn upon and further institutionalized. Institutionalization of social norms, values, and practices is more deeply embraced if done willingly and in concert with other contextual dynamics. To be ‘‘institutionalized differently across different regions and cultures’’ (Antonio & Bonnano), it would have to depend on communities living freely and choosing willingly how to ‘‘grow’’ democracy, justice and equality in their own social, cultural, political, and economic contexts. Presently, values and practices are being imposed from outside and/or by a powerful minority. Will this imposition result in a deep embrace of these qualities, or a superficial and temporary response? How could notions of community, compassion, and pragmatism be institutionalized more adequately to strive toward Just Democracy and to counteract the bankrupt version of democracy now being promoted (imposed). Because Just Democracy, by definition, requires integral involvement and participation, it is a bottom-up process as opposed to one that can be imposed from the top. With current social dynamics becoming more top-down (less democratic), we need to be able to actively counter those tendencies. This is a paradox, however, since the very forces of imperialistic tendencies devalue community-based activism, a fuller notion of social justice, compassionate values, and a just form of democracy. The dialectic reveals another story, however, even if it is submerged at the present time. We can see these tensions work themselves out in educational arenas. Are these processes representative of the reproduction of our increasingly unequal and unjust social system, or are they the possibilities for change that can challenge the current individualist, tough, moralistic values and develop Just Democracy with community, compassion, and pragmatism as core values?

264

KAREN MONKMAN

While much of North1 American culture is decidedly individualist, much of the rest of the world is less so. This is evident in the many anthropological studies of other cultures, and in the educational discourse relating to educating students from immigrant families in U.S. schools (see for example, Portes & Rumbaut, 2001; Levitt & Waters, 2002; Spindler, 1997). One important question to consider relates to the national character of other nations and of other cultures within U.S. boundaries, and how those characteristics relate to and interact with ‘‘globalization as Americanization’’ or to imperialism. We know that many national and regional cultural norms in the world and within the U.S. value more community-oriented social dynamics (Delgado-Gaitan, 2001), and that dynamics such as pragmatism and compassion also take diverse forms. Inherent in a dialectic is the existence of its opposite. As will be mentioned in my third point, some regions of the U.S. have stronger pragmatic and compassionate histories and tendencies than we see promoted by our current national political agendas. Many immigrants fled to the U.S. to avoid authoritarian regimes, and they have maintained a preference for flatter hierarchies and service to others (even if sometimes rather paternalistic in nature). Some religious notions of morality are more compassionate and inclusive than the tendencies now influencing politics (Smagorinsky & Taxel, 2005). What would or could push the focus to the other side of the dialectics? What could help us recover the suppressed side of our national traditions and develop Dewey’s notion of Just Democracy?

PRIVATIZATION AND MARKETIZATION PROCESSES Privatization is not a likely candidate. The trend toward privatization, in relation to the military (as in Isaac & Harrison’s article), and also in relation to other sectors, is troubling. As Isaac & Harrison show, this trend intends to make public services more competitive, but it is likely to undermine democratic processes and increase terrorism as a backlash to the policies and practices that are experienced or perceived as offensive. The marketization of education takes two basic forms: privatization and choice. The privatization agenda relates to private businesses doing the business of education, similar to the private armies that Isaac & Harrison discuss, and also to the expansion and development of private schools, many of which are faith-based. ‘‘Choice’’ generally refers to charter schools, magnet schools, and voucher programs.

Globalization and Social Justice

265

The many companies currently involved in the business of education sell educational products (books, technology, curricular packages, after school educational programs, in-service training for teachers) and services (security services, janitorial and gardening services, food service, day care/after school programs) much like in the military examples provided by Isaac & Harrison. These contracts often have significant strings attached. For example, the Open Court reading program is a comprehensive reading curriculum (http://www.sraonline.com/index.php/home/curriculumsolutions/ reading/ocr/622); schools are expected to use it in its entirety. This takes away from teachers and administrators the ability to create educational approaches to reading that work for particular groups, or to fine-tune teaching strategies for particular situations; in short, it takes the art of teaching away from teachers. Open Court is a ‘‘scripted’’ program, where teachers are expected to teach word-for-word from the book and not to improvise or adjust lessons. Some teachers refer to the ‘‘Open Court police’’ who come around to schools to see if teachers are following instructions as planned (Cassidy & Cassidy, 2004/2005). Many of these contracted products and services reflect conservative moralist perspectives, with authoritarian structures and assumptions of one-size-fits-all; their functional approach sees education as an instrumental technology and assumes that the ‘‘right’’ strategies will ‘‘fix’’ the problem. The ‘‘problem’’ tends to be defined in efficiency terms, in terms of low levels of learning – usually of the urban poor and minority groups – and most recently in relation to international comparisons of tests of math and science.2 They ignore arguments that learning may not be inadequate, such as Bracey’s (1997) where he shows that learning has not decreased: with the increase in knowledge to be learned and the expansion of education to the masses, we are really doing quite well in educating more people more fully than we had historically and than other countries do. Tests measure only a fraction of what is learned; U.S. schools have historically taught many things that are not tested (creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, etc.). The current accountability and high stakes testing trends are undermining this broader focus on learning. Edison Schools are another example of privatization in schooling; they are private contractors that take over schools and ‘‘manage’’ them (Maranto, 2005). The intention is to use a more ‘‘efficient’’ business model to run schools, to reduce waste, and to get better benefits for less money. Studies of contractor-run schools have been mixed, with many studies showing that the privately run schools do no better than publicly run schools and often do worse, especially in low income, minority communities. What is missing in these programs, according to critics, is an understanding of and attention to

266

KAREN MONKMAN

the non-market dimensions of schools: children, lives outside of schools, teaching as an art and science, etc. Chicago Public Schools’ current reform effort, Renaissance 2010, calls for closing over 60 low-performing schools and opening (eventually) about 100 new (smaller) schools, some as charter schools, some as privately run schools, and some as publicly run schools (Bradley, 2004). Most of the displaced students from the school closings are minority and low-income students. The Chicago Public School system has also been opening military schools in partnership with the U.S. Army. This is one of several policies that ‘‘criminalizes and polices youth of color y [in a] new process of racialized social control’’ (Lipman, 2003, p. 346). This is another example of moral conservatism getting ‘‘tough’’ on students who are ‘‘othered.’’ Choice, in education, refers to parental ability to choose schools for their children. Magnet schools and charter schools are public schools-withinschools or stand-alone schools that offer a variety of programs, and have a variety of structures and curricular specializations. Vouchers are tax monies that are redistributed from neighborhood schools to other schoolsof-choice, sometimes including private schools and sometimes limited to other public schools. Vouchers rarely, if ever, cover the actual cost of independent private schools, and therefore they tend to subsidize schooling for affluent families in those elite schools, or to enable students to attend religious schools that are less costly (or subsidize families already sending their children there). Critics of privatization efforts and marketization strategies argue that the companies that run schools know little about educating children, and pay little to no attention to the relationship between society and schools (Levin, 2001; Bracey, 2002). They further argue that the various programs and packages that schools are encouraged to purchase further undermine the abilities of teachers to teach. When vouchers include private schools as possible recipients of voucher dollars, this is often seen as a direct strategy to benefit faith-based schools. Vouchers (both those that include private schools and those that only include public schools) are said to undermine ‘‘public’’ education, as they are likely to pull more resources out of urban and rural schools (those that serve minorities and low income populations), and build the resource bases of schools that serve middle-class populations. The notion of educating the masses for the public good (Cuban & Shipp, 2000) has been all but lost. The arguments in favor of school choice include and assertion that competition for dollars would encourage schools to improve; parents could use vouchers to send their children to any school of their choice, presumably

Globalization and Social Justice

267

those that are high(er) performing schools; and other schools (who would be losing students) would be challenged through the market to improve their programs and strengthen the education that they can provide. The tension in such logic is that the low performing schools are losing money and straitjacketed with administrative requirements at the very times they are being expected to strengthen themselves. Under No Child Left Behind (NCLB) and Florida’s A+ Plan,3 schools that are high performing receive bonuses; these are generally in more affluent suburban communities. These policies are both examples of high stakes accountability trends; they are based on market logic of school improvement, but critics maintain that they undermine the ability of low-performing schools – which are predominantly in minority and low income communities – to improve (Lipman, 2004). Parallels to the patterns in the military are evident. Privatization serves to whither away the state; take authority and decision-making out of the hands of educators; create conflicts of interest between educational contractors, schools systems, teachers, and the public interest; reduce transparency in educational realms making it harder to influence policy; and create differentiated rules for the various school systems (e.g., private, traditional public, charter, magnet, contractor-run public schools). Again, the notion of Just Democracy is inherently absent in such initiatives. The communities and the schools that reside in them have little ability to shape their own futures.

THE FUTURE OF U.S. DEMOCRACY Antonio & Bonanno end their paper by asking ‘‘yhow can ‘social justice’ be brought into the big discourse of U.S. politics to address the overall condition of American Democracy?’’ While there is no easy answer, a look at education may be helpful, as education is considered an important actor in socialization processes, and in socially constructing notions such as national character. Several of the authors mentioned aspects of education as being intertwined with, related to, or pertinent to their arguments. When considering how social justice can be brought back into political discourse, including public discourse about politics, we should look at the role of education in shaping those possibilities. Education is well-known for its role in social reproduction (Karabel & Halsey, 1977; Bowles & Gintis, 1976; among many others), but it also has potential in creating change (Levinson & Holland, 1996; Freire, 1970). The paradox is, of course, that some types of education – those that reflect values

268

KAREN MONKMAN

of individualism, toughness, and moral conservatism – are more likely to be reproductive in our current point in history, and those that reflect the other side of the dialectics of American character – community or collective focus, compassion, and pragmatism – are aimed at a more dynamic (and less bankrupt) version of democratic social process that is just.4 Those who are attracted to the profession of teaching tend to be young, idealistic, and committed to helping others. These qualities signal an elective affinity for a socially just democratic movement. In my opinion, however, teachers need to become more committed to seeing teaching as social change in a Freireian (1970) sense so that they are better able to challenge obstacles and the status quo. If teachers can be more politicized around these issues, they might be able to influence more students and parents, thus helping to move these issues into the public consciousness. Demonstrative of the tension in educational policy are efforts to promote ‘‘character education.’’ Character education generally refers to teaching students to be better people, to be ethical, responsible, etc., as opposed to directly teaching them a particular national character. But, as we see, the versions of ‘‘character’’ taught in schools tend to closely reflect the dialectic dimensions outlined by Langman & Burke. Smagorinsky and Taxel (2004, 2005) have recently completed a critical discourse analysis of federal education grant applications relating to character education. They find that the RFP itself emanates from an unsubstantiated model of character education that assumes that ‘‘there are invariant, culture-free dimensions to character’’ (2004, p. 119), and that, because the funding was funneled through a student achievement bill, it requires that character education be linked to achievement (a connection for which there is no empirical basis). Their study focuses primarily on two proposals from the Deep South, and two from the Upper Midwest, presented as ideal types in that they are polar opposites in many respects and representative of a range of possibilities. The proposals from the Southern states reflect the prominent notions of national character as are discussed in the papers in this volume. The Midwest examples reflect values that are more linked to Dewey’s notion of Just Democracy. Religion and moral absolutism is inherent in the Southern proposals. Civility in the form of respect for adults is a key characteristic, as is an assumption of youth depravity and the need to be taught morality didactically. One plan states that ‘‘students ought to read about exemplary moral characters, rather then complex ones or negative examples’’ (Smagorinsky & Taxel, 2004, p. 121). The role of the school in teaching what parents don’t teach (implying that parents are not moral role models or don’t teach

Globalization and Social Justice

269

morality) is clear: ‘‘those most in need of character education were from poor backgrounds, did not speak standard English, were from a cultural or racial minority, and otherwise departed from the white middle class values that govern U.S. schools’’ (p. 123). Character, in these proposals, was to be directly taught by schools because certain social categories of children grew up in homes that were considered deficient. In the Midwestern examples, character was thought to be something that is learned by example rather than directly taught, student agency is recognized as a good thing, and more positive language is used to discuss community and family roles. While the school is positioned paternalistically as needing to ‘‘help’’ families and communities in the process of character development, the family is seen as the ‘‘child’s first teacher;’’ the family is seen as part of an extended community that is involved in child raising. The class basis of morality in the Midwestern proposals was more subtle; rather than naming low income and minority groups as those in need of character education, most of the focus was on those with discipline problems (smoking, behavior problems) and lack of participation in school activities as indications of deficiencies in character. Although there was some focus on minority and Limited English Proficient students, there was ambivalence in that parents from these communities were also valued as positive role models. Smagorinsky & Taxel found the Midwestern notions of character represented a different set of beliefs than in the Southern states, ones that were more communitarian and reflected the historical democratic and socialist underpinnings of the German and Scandinavian cultures that settled these areas. Still, however, these proposals reflected white communities’ notions of character. The Midwestern proposals linked their beliefs directly to Dewey’s thoughts on democracy: ‘‘y John Dewey’s main concern was our democratic way of life, y he also understood the central role that public education must play if the republic is to remain vital, dynamic, and healthy’’ (Smagorinsky & Taxel, 2004, p. 132, quoting one of the RFPs). A discourse of community was consistent in these proposals, reflecting ‘‘values as local and situated,’’ efforts that should be bottom-up if they are to be effective, and schools that should create environments that ‘‘reflect and honor the cultural traditions of all people’’ and ‘‘develop a variety of teaching strategies to meet the diverse needs of students’’ (p. 133, 134). The authoritarian approaches of the Southern proposals conflict with the Midwestern notions of local control.5 This study of character education is indicative of the variety of values and norms we see represented in educational policy today, whether it pertains to

270

KAREN MONKMAN

character education, improving achievement, parent involvement, or school reform. The current dominant trends favor more control from the top (which is new to education in the U.S.), and tend to define education narrowly, to reject progressive educational notions of important thinkers such as Dewey, and to assume that there are universal norms and values that all people agree with. These trends reflect the individual, tough, moralist notions described by Langman & Burke (herein). But, we see that the other sides of the dialectics are also alive and well in some arenas such as the Midwestern proposals studied by Smagorinsky & Taxel (2004, 2005), in some of the educational programs that talk of social justice (see http:// www.rethinkingschools.org for example), and in the strong basis of Deweyian influence in U.S. educational thought and teacher education. In most teacher-education programs, for example, students (including future teachers) cannot avoid knowing about Dewey’s ideas, and there is deliberate focus on understanding the broader purposes of education, social justice and the roles of schools, education for the common good, and respectful ways of understanding diversity and schools. While there are shortcomings,6 many of us are hopeful that we will be able to withstand the current trends globally and continue promoting socially just forms of education that could, in turn, resurrect the pragmatic, community-oriented compassion dimensions of our national character. Dialectics, by their very nature, incorporate their oppositional tendencies; it is in those oppositional tendencies that there is the possibility of a shifting of focus. Whether we can prevail in bringing these qualities to the fore in this environment of conservatism, moralism, and neoliberal economics remains to be seen.

NOTES 1. Much of Latin America finds our reference to ourselves as ‘‘Americans’’ problematic, as they, as residents of the American continents, also consider themselves ‘‘Americans.’’ They refer to us as North Americans. This then becomes problematic for Canadians, who often do not want to be lumped into a category with the U.S. To maintain consistency with the other papers in this volume, I will use the term American to refer to the U.S., but want to note that it is problematic, as another form of imperialist discourse. 2. I refer here to the TIMSS, the Trends in International Math and Science Study, http://nces.ed.gov/timss/, and the PISA, Programme for International Student Assessment, http://www.pisa.oecd.org. 3. NCLB is a federal educational reform promoted by President G. W. Bush, but supported by both parties, that provides money to schools that are ‘‘improving’’ as measured by test scores. Florida’s A+ Plan grades schools according to (primarily)

Globalization and Social Justice

271

test score gains and gives ‘‘A’’ schools bonuses. ‘‘Failing’’ schools in Florida are then closed or taken over by the district or private companies. See http://www.ed.gov/nclb and http://www.myflorida.com/myflorida/government/governorinitiatives/aplusplan/ youKnow.html. 4. See Val Rust’s (2000) argument that the present day ‘‘right’’ have become the radicals, promoting change, while the ‘‘left’’ has become the conservative force in their efforts to maintain gains made in the 1960s and 1970s. 5. There were several inconsistencies in the Midwestern proposals, however, the study’s authors interpret these to mostly be related to the requirements of the federal government in the RFP. 6. Labaree (2004) points out that the low status of schools of education makes their effect on educational change weak. With the status of education schools being intimately tied to the rhetoric of pedagogical progressives like Dewey, they promote a conception of education that is currently at odds with the conservative trends that have more impact at the administrative level than at the level of teachers and teacher educators.

REFERENCES Bowles, S., & Gintis, H. (1976). Schooling in capitalist America: Educational reform and the contradictions of economic life. New York: Basic Books. Bracey, G. (1997). What happened to America’s public schools? Not what you may think. American Heritage, 48(7), 38–52. Bracey, G. W. (2002). The war against America’s public schools: Privatizing schools, commercializing education. Boston: Allyn & Bacon. Bradley, A. (2004). Chicago Board approves rules for opening 100 new schools. Education Week, 24(5), 4. Cassidy, J., & Cassidy, D. (2004/2005). What’s hot, what’s not for 2005. Reading Today, 22(3), p. 1. Available at: http://www.reading.org/publications/reading_today/samples/ RTY-0412-hotnot.html (Accessed 6/29/05). Cuban, L., & Shipp, D. (Eds) (2000). Reconstructing the common good in education: Coping with intractable American dilemmas. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Delgado-Gaitan, C. (2001). The power of community: Mobilizing for family and school. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Continuum. Karabel, J., & Halsey, A. H. (Eds) (1977). Power and ideology in education. New York: Oxford University Press. Labaree, D. F. (2004). The trouble with ed schools. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Levin, H. M. (Ed.) (2001). Privatizing education: Can the marketplace deliver choice, efficiency, equity & social cohesion? Boulder: Westview. Levinson, B. A., & Holland, D. (1996). The cultural production of the educated person, an introduction. In: B. A. Levinson, D. E. Foley & D. C. Holland (Eds), The cultural production of the educated person (pp. 1–54). Albany: State University of New York Press. Levitt, P., & Waters, M. C. (Eds) (2002). The changing face of home: The transnational lives of the second generation. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

272

KAREN MONKMAN

Lipman, P. (2003). Chicago school policy: Regulating Black and Latino youth in the global city. Race, Ethnicity & Education, 6(4), 331–353. Lipman, P. (2004). High stakes education: Inequality, globalization & urban school reform. New York: Routledge Falmer. Maranto, R. (2005). A tale of two cities: School privatization in Philadelphia & Chester. American Journal of Education, 111(2), 151–190. Portes, A., & Ruben, G. R. (2001). Legacies: The story of the immigrant second generation. Berkeley: University of California Press, and New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Rust, V. (2000). Educational reform: Who are the radicals? In: N. P. Stromquist & K. Monkman (Eds), Globalization & education: Integration and contestation across cultures. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. Smagorinsky, P., & Taxel, J. (2004). The discourse of character education: Ideology and politics in the proposal and award of federal grants. The Journal of Research in Character Education, 2(2), 113–140. Smagorinsky, P., & Taxel, J. (2005). Discourse of character education: Culture wars in the classroom. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Spindler, G. D. (Ed.) (1997). Education and cultural process: Anthropological approaches, (3rd ed.). Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press.

NEOLIBERALISM AND ITS DISCONTENTS: COMMENTS ON THREE VIEWS OF THE AMERICAN EMPIRE Barney Warf The hegemony of the Republican right and the global triumph of neoliberalism comprise the two central political questions of the contemporary age. Progressive intellectuals seem to be at a loss as to how to explain these intertwined themes. Why has the war waged by the American ruling class, at home and abroad, been received so enthusiastically among many in the U.S. and faced so little opposition internationally? What can history tell us about the triumph of the Right? These papers shed light on three aspects of the American empire, pointing to the ways in which the domestic and the foreign are entangled in powerful and complex ways. Langman and Burke raise important issues about the cultural origins of American imperialism, tracing the contemporary forms of arrogance and xenophobia to the Puritan roots in New England. In this reading, the deeply conservative nature of the United States emanates from its religious roots, the exaggerated individualism that pervades the nation, which bleeds commitments to the public sphere, the market fundamentalism that has long viewed state intervention with distrust, and the simplistic notion of masculinity that equates it exclusively with power and violence. Hofstedder

Globalization Between the Cold War and Neo-Imperialism Current Perspectives in Social Theory, Volume 24, 273–278 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0278-1204/doi:10.1016/S0278-1204(06)24007-6

273

274

BARNEY WARF

(1962) notes the long history of anti-intellectualism in the U.S., a pragmatic culture in which ‘‘doing’’ has long been valued more than ‘‘thinking,’’ and one in which the highly educated are often regarded with suspicion. Indeed, part of the appeal of George W. Bush reflects the extent to which large segments of the public identify with his lack of articulateness, his contempt for intellectuals, and his seemingly straightforward way of slicing through complex problems. This view is sustained by an educational system carefully designed to minimize any sense of criticality. Not surprisingly, Americans exhibit a high degree of ignorance about the rest of the world, and about their own political reality. Thomas Frank (2004), in his insightful What’s the Matter with Kansas?, reveals how Republicans have played anti-intellectualism into a hatred of Democrats and liberals, engineering a French Revolution in reverse that is rapidly taking the U.S. into a Darwinian, laissez faire, neofeudal social order by dismantling the welfare state. To pull off this stunt, neoliberalism hides its economic agenda behind the rhetoric of family values, the church, individualism, and the mythologized free market, allowing the Right to speak out on behalf of the middle class without offending its core, big business. Neoconservatives represent the world in terms of a culture war, as a moral contest between good and evil, in which liberals, feminists, gays, immigrants, environmentalists are equated with economic decline, moral decadence, and relativism. Religiosity, perhaps more than any other force, has served to sustain and legitimate American expansionism, ranging from the annihilation of Native Americans to overseas colonialism that exploded after the Spanish-American War. Despite the ostensible separation of church and state (which is being rapidly eroded today), American culture and patriotism have long been infused with a moral certitude couched in religious terms, including ‘‘In God We Trust’’ to ‘‘God Bless America.’’ The Cold War and the struggle against the ‘‘Evil Empire’’ were long couched in simplistic terms of god and country, right and wrong, discourses that serve above all to smother any contradictions within the U.S. The rise of the religious Right over the last three decades reflects the periodic swells of religion in the U.S., a culture that remains in many ways essentially feudal despite its postindustrial and postmodern trappings, as is evident in the profound distrust or rejection of Darwinian evolution (and even acceptance of absurdities such as astrology) among large swaths of the public. Today, the ‘‘Axis of Evil’’ and the socalled ‘‘War on Terror’’ have replaced the Evil Empire, but their purpose – to legitimate the global aggression of the American ruling class – remain the same. Such observations serve to dispel Weberian visions of religion as

Neoliberalism and Its Discontents

275

gradually disappearing in the face of secularized commodity fetishism. Seen in this way, Puritanism remains alive and well, primarily in the form of the Southern Baptists and their role in the G.O.P. The predominance of religion more than any other dimension differentiates the U.S. from Europe, which has become an essentially secular continent. Finally, religious fundamentalism is hardly confined to the U.S. (Stump, 2000); the rise of fundamentalist Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism similarly reflect the opposition to globalization by diverse marginalized groups around the world. There can be little doubt that these features deeply shape the construction of the self in American society, the way in which Americans view themselves and one another, and color U.S. foreign policy. A focus on these trends helps to inject a concern for culture and ideology into political economy, which has long been overly obsessed with the material and the social at the expense of the symbolic and the individual. From the perspective of poststructuralism, with its emphasis on plurality and diversity, it is worth pondering whether or not there exists one ‘‘national character’’ or if this term does not point to a mythological hegemonic ideology, a bourgeois representation of the United States that naturalizes itself by assuming everyone falls within its embrace. To be sure, the sketch offered by Langman and Burke accurately captures the worldview of dominant WASPS. But there are, and always have been, multiple ‘‘characters’’ jostling with one another, competing for power and influence, and the trajectory of the United States has reflected their interactions and collisions. For example, other ‘‘characters,’’ albeit not hegemonic ones, include African American culture, which has long placed more emphasis on family and community than did most whites, and that of liberal, secular whites who value an intellectual life and compassion. Despite the growing power of conservative Protestants, there remains a healthy movement in opposition to them, one grounded in tolerance regardless of ethnicity, gender, or sexuality. The future domestic and foreign policy of the United States will be shaped by the struggles between these two broad visions of the country. Conversely, it is important to recognize that American culture has been shaped by the changing position of the U.S. in the world system, as well as shaping it. The rise of the Pax Americana, or what Henry Luce termed the ‘‘American Century,’’ brought with it a Fordist social contract and Keynesian state, as evidenced in the 1960s War on Poverty and similar reforms, all of which are anathema to neoliberals today. Conversely, the tenuous position of the United States internationally, its military might notwithstanding, has catapulted the most reactionary segments of society to the fore under the aegis of neoliberalism, a trend that has clearly acquired a whiff of

276

BARNEY WARF

fascism today in its intolerance for critique and disagreement. The dominance of the traditional ‘‘national character,’’ it would seem, reflects the degree of hegemony the country enjoys at any given historical moment. Moreover, there is nothing exceptional about American exceptionalism, except that it happens to be dominant at this moment in history. Earlier hegemons in the world system likewise asserted their unique superiority. Victorian England portrayed its own triumph in highly religious terms, as did Spain and Portugal before them. Antonio and Bonanno offer a thorough and meticulous history of the rise of neoliberalism, including the long series of aftershocks that accompanied the end of the postwar boom. As the social fabric frayed in the 1960s, marginalized groups such as women, gays, and ethnic minorities demanded more rights, and deindustrialization and globalization eroded the earnings of the middle class, the powerful backlash among conservatives managed to translate the fears and frustrations of suburban and small town whites into an organized and well financed political movement aimed at the ‘‘liberal elite.’’ Thus, the Right gave birth to and made use of Reaganism, including its war against the poor, privatization and deregulation, tax cuts and supply side economics, and grotesque militarism that ensured U.S. dominance internationally. (The U.S. today spends one half of the world’s total military expenditures). It is noteworthy that while these programs have a solid core of enthusiastic supporters in the U.S., their receipt in Europe and Canada has been decidedly more lukewarm. Antonio and Bonanno’s paper points to the intimate linkages between domestic neoliberalism and globalization. For example, under the ‘‘Baker Plan’’ of the 1980s, neoliberalism was exported from the U.S. to the rest of the world via the IMF and World Bank. In large part, the neoliberal agenda – from dismantling the Keynesian state to making the world safe for free trade – reflects the changing scale of capital accumulation, from the national to the global, giving rise to a new ‘‘spatial fix,’’ to use Harvey’s (1989) celebrated aphorism. They invoke Thomas Friedman as the pundit most associated with the latter. Yet Friedman’s view of globalization (which contains much that is accurate) suffers from teleological implications, viewing the process as an unstoppable force. To be against globalization, he argues, is like being against the sun coming up. This view tends to equate globalization with rationality, so that any resistance to it is automatically deemed irrational. Yet such a representation portrays globalization as something other than a human creation. In fact, there exists a worldwide opposition to globalization, some of it peaceful and some of it not, ranging from the ‘‘Battle in Seattle’’ to the attacks of September 11, 2001. While

Neoliberalism and Its Discontents

277

such resistance may not succeed in the long term, it is certainly capable of rounding out globalization’s harsher edges. The regime of Bush II undoubtedly marks a new chapter in the historical geography of neoliberalism. Contemptuous of international agreements, unilateral in its diplomacy, hypocritical and arrogant (such as the tolerance of war profiteering in Iraq), and far more likely to use military might, the Bush administration reveals neoliberalism at its most naked and aggressive. Erstwhile allies such as the E.U. have steadily dissociated themselves while pursuing an alternative vision of the global system, and opinion polls reveal the popularity of the U.S. abroad to be at an all-time low. Yet even the patina of invincibility carefully cultivated by the G.O.P.’s formidable propaganda machine (such as Fox ‘‘news’’) covers serious problems that point to neoliberalism’s multiple weaknesses: tax cuts and budget deficits have made the U.S. highly reliant upon foreign capital, particularly Asian, and the attempt to privatize social security has, at long last, presented neoliberalism’s domestic agenda with an obstacle it may not overcome. How long can U.S. elites afford to be obstinate about pursuing a neoliberal agenda in the face of mounting resistance abroad and dismay at home? If militarism lies at the heart of U.S. hegemony, and market fundamentalism comprises the essence of neoliberal ideology, the two themes have intersected uneasily. Isaac and Harrison’s exploration of the corporatization of American armed forces speaks directly to this issue. By pointing to the use of private militias in various class conflicts in the nation’s labor history, they tie together the domestic and foreign fronts of the war waged by the ruling class. Under neoliberalism, and its extreme fetish for privatization, the corporatization of the military was only a matter of time, following decades of reduced government and heightened public subcontracting. If schools, garbage pickup, prisons, and health care can all be run by private firms, why not the military, particularly when it offers politicians the opportunity to funnel state funds to large campaign contributors? Eisenhower’s military–industrial complex always straddled the public and the private domains through a complex series of interactions through which the military, lobbyists, and defense contractors came to be shot through with one another. Contemporary corporatization only extends this process to a deeper level. The use of private firms to supply the military, including mercenaries, reached an unprecedented level in the occupation of Iraq. No doubt think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation will offer elegant synopses as to why the quintessential ‘‘public interest’’ – defense – can and should be most effectively protected by private actors. What is troubling about this process is the degree to which American society has become so

278

BARNEY WARF

thoroughly drenched in military culture, devoting more than $400 billion to the Pentagon annually and accepting its necessity without question. Chalmers Johnson’s (2004) Sorrows of Empire attests to the hidden costs of running an empire, including the financial burdens of a global necklace of military bases. As Paul Kennedy (1987) warned in The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, military overspending sooner or later erodes the economic foundations that make an empire possible.

REFERENCES Frank, T. (2004). What’s the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America. New York: Metropolitan Books. Harvey, D. (1989). The Condition of Postmodernity. Cambridge: Blackwell. Hofstedder, R. (1962). Anti-Intellectualism in American Life. New York: Vintage Books. Johnson, C. (2004). The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy and the End of the Republic. New York: Metropolitan Books. Kennedy, P. (1987). Rise and Fall of the Great Powers. New York: Random House. Stump, R. (2000). Boundaries of Faith. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.