约翰·米尔斯海默
2018 年 9 月 25 日
https://www.amazon.ca/Great-Delusion-Liberal-International-Realities/dp/0300234198
一位著名学者认为，自由主义霸权——冷战结束后美国一直奉行的政策——注定要失败。被《金融时报》评为 2018 年最佳图书
“理想主义者和现实主义者都需要阅读这本系统性的杰作。”——《马可波罗世界的回归》作者罗伯特·卡普兰
西方普遍认为，美国应该在世界各地传播自由民主，培育开放的国际经济，建立国际机构。按照美国形象重塑世界的政策应该保护人权、促进和平，让世界安全民主。但事实并非如此。相反，美国已经成为一个高度军事化的国家，发动的战争破坏和平、损害人权，威胁国内自由价值观。
在这一重要声明中，著名国际关系学者约翰·米尔斯海默认为，自由霸权——冷战结束以来美国奉行的外交政策——注定要失败。他认为，华盛顿采取更为克制的外交政策更为合理，这种政策基于对民族主义和现实主义如何制约海外大国的深刻理解。《大妄想》是一部清晰而引人入胜的作品，对学者、政策制定者和所有对美国外交政策未来感兴趣的人都具有重要意义。
评论 / 阿尔伯特·维达尔 2019 年 9 月 4 日
https://www.unav.edu/web/global-affairs/detalle/-/blogs/the-great-delusion-a-critique
约翰·米尔斯海默，《大妄想：自由梦想与国际现实》，耶鲁大学出版社，2018 年 9 月，第 328 页。
大错觉：自由主义梦想与国际现实
“无论好坏，自由主义霸权都已成为历史。”约翰·米尔斯海默在伦敦大学亚非学院就他新出版的著作《大错觉：自由主义梦想与国际现实》发表了这样的看法。
在这本书中，米尔斯海默认为，美国在冷战结束时采取的自由主义霸权外交政策惨遭失败。他解释说，之所以发生这种情况，是因为民族主义和现实主义总是压倒自由主义。
在这本书的第一部分，他定义了自由主义、民族主义和自由主义霸权。然后，他解释了美国追求自由主义霸权的原因，以及它的过往记录。最后，他揭示了自由主义霸权失败的原因，以及我们对未来的期望。让我们更详细地了解一下。
自由主义
米尔斯海默阐明了自由主义支撑人性的两个基本假设：首先，它假设个人优先于群体；其次，自由主义假设个人无法就基本原则达成普遍共识，而这种分歧往往会导致暴力。
为了应对这种潜在的暴力，自由主义提出了一个包括三个部分的解决方案：每个人都拥有不可剥夺的个人权利；宽容受到特别强调，国家成为限制那些不尊重他人权利的人的威胁的必要条件。这些特点使自由主义成为一种普遍主义理论，正是这一点让美国成为了一个十字军国家。
民族主义
根据作者的说法，民族主义有自己的核心假设：首先，人类天生就是社会动物；其次，群体忠诚比个人主义更重要；第三，除了家庭之外，最重要的群体是国家。然后他继续说，国家（具有某些特征的个人团体，使他们有别于其他群体）想要自己的国家。
随后，米尔斯海默表示，民族主义战胜自由主义，因为人类主要是社会动物。为了说明这一点，他回忆说，整个地球都布满了民族国家，而自由民主国家甚至不占这些民族国家的 50%。
自由霸权
这只是试图按照美国的形象重塑世界，它有几个组成部分：将自由民主传播到世界各地，将更多国家纳入开放的国际经济和国际机构。从理论上讲，这将是极其有益的，因为它将消除重大的侵犯人权行为（这里作者假设自由民主国家不会犯下重大的侵犯人权行为），它将创造一个和平的世界（遵循民主和平理论），它将消除外国支持那些想要推翻国内自由民主的人的威胁。
美国为什么要追求自由霸权？
米尔斯海默说，冷战后，单极世界让美国得以无视权力平衡政治，推行自由主义外交政策。此外，美国是一个自由主义国家，它常常认为自己是个例外。这显然促使美国试图按照自己的形象重塑世界。
在这本书的这一部分，米尔斯海默展示了美国外交政策的不同失败之处。第一个是布什主义和大中东计划，该计划旨在将中东变成民主的海洋。结果却是一场彻底的灾难。第二个例子是北约扩张导致的美俄关系恶化和乌克兰危机。第三，米尔斯海默批评了美国与中国接触的方式，帮助中国更快发展，同时天真地认为中国最终会成为一个自由民主国家。
自由霸权为什么会失败？
原因是民族主义和现实主义的力量总是压倒自由主义；用米尔斯海默的话来说：“认为美国可以走遍世界试图建立民主国家并进行社会工程的想法是自找麻烦的。”各国将抵制外国干涉。此外，在世界大部分地区，人们更愿意选择安全而不是自由民主，即使这种安全必须由软性威权主义来提供。
自由霸权已经结束，因为世界不再是一个单极世界。现在美国需要担心其他大国。
对其理论的批评
尽管米尔斯海默的论点似乎很可靠，但已经提出了一些批评；其中大部分针对的是与米尔斯海默的一些论点和假设相矛盾且未得到解决的问题。
1) 米尔斯海默在引言中认为，个人无法就基本原则达成一致。我认为这是言过其实，因为大多数社会往往都赞赏某些价值观。一些例子包括生命的价值、家庭对社会延续和下一代教育的重要性、真理和诚实的重要性，等等。
2）当米尔斯海默将 1990 年代以来的美国外交政策描述为自由霸权时，他选择忽略一些明显的例外，例如与沙特阿拉伯和其他不尊重最基本人权的独裁政权的联盟。
3）自 1990 年代以来，美国外交政策的许多失败似乎实际上并非源于自由主义政策本身，而是源于未能正确实施这些政策。也就是说，这些失败是因为美国偏离了其自由主义外交政策。一个明显的例子就是伊拉克发生的事情：尽管干预得到了自由主义言论的公开支持，但许多人怀疑华盛顿是否真正致力于为伊拉克带来稳定和发展。一个常见的例子是，唯一得到有效保护的部门是石油部。其余的都被掠夺者抛弃了。真正的自由主义政策应该寻求恢复教育和卫生系统、国家机构和基础设施，但这从未真正发生过。因此，将失败归咎于自由主义政策可能并不充分。
4) 尽管米尔斯海默证明了自由霸权所带来的干预冲动，但他并没有表明一个遵循现实主义原则的霸权国家如何克制自己，减少干预次数，并保持适度。保护人权的必要性将简单地变成保护切身利益的意愿，这成为任何类型干预的借口（与人权不同，即使人权有时是灾难性干预的根源）。
最后，这本书提出了一种明确的替代方案，以取代当今大多数外交政策的主流观点，尤其是在西欧和美国。即使我们不同意其中的一些（或大多数）原则，它仍然有助于理解当前的许多动态，特别是与民族主义和普遍主义之间永恒的紧张关系有关。我们甚至可能需要重新思考我们的外交政策，而不是盲目地赞扬自由主义，我们应该接受这样一个事实：有时，自由主义并不能解决我们面临的所有问题。
米尔斯海默教授揭露：美国摧毁了其全球霸权。俄罗斯、中国推进多极化
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8AvSdjYOqw&ab_channel=
在此视频中，著名国际关系学者约翰·米尔斯海默教授讨论了他的著作《大妄想》、美国自由主义霸权及其失败、民族主义的影响、阿富汗、伊拉克和叙利亚的冲突、美国在乌克兰和中东的外交政策、北约扩张、俄罗斯和中国的崛起以及从单极世界向多极世界的转变。
约翰·米尔斯海默教授在视频中讨论了他的著作《伟大的妄想》，阐述了国家自由主义、民族主义的影响、阿富汗、伊拉克和叙利亚的冲突、乌克兰和中东方的海外政治'OTAN'的扩展，俄罗斯和中国的精华，以及'un的通道单极世界和多极世界。
今天我想谈谈我的新书《大妄想》自由主义理想与国际现实，这本书于 9 月 25 日正式出版，当然是两天前，大约花了 10 年时间制作，实际上花了 7 年时间。我花了很多时间思考书中的想法，我很高兴能把它们提出来供大家分析，当我们进入问答环节时，你们
应该毫不犹豫地跟在我后面正如约翰所暗示的，我可以告诉你，我其实很喜欢战斗，我喜欢和人争论，我喜欢那些认为我错了的人，还有什么比和那些认为你是天才的人打交道更无聊的呢，对吧当我在这里提出你不理解的论点，或者你认为你只是固执己见的时候，你应该毫不犹豫地站起来，让我知道你的真实想法，好吧，冷战结束后美国的基本故事奉行一种我称之为自由主义的政策霸权，这一战略的主要目的是按照美国的形象重塑世界，这一政策已经彻底失败，如果你看看冷战结束至今的美国外交政策，特别是自 2001 年以来，它以一系列彻底的失败，我会详细讨论这个问题，价值 64,000 美元的问题是，为什么在 20 世纪 90 年代初人们会有如此乐观的态度，为什么人们会认为我们有后盾，我们能够按照我们自己的形象重塑世界，而今天的情况看起来一点也不好，到底出了什么问题，我的观点是，要理解到底出了什么问题，你必须理解民族主义、现实主义和自由主义之间的关系，我再次相信，我们已经遵循本质上自由主义的外交政策，这就是所谓的自由主义，它几乎在每一个转折点都被民族主义和现实主义击败了，好吧，现在我想继续讨论的是，首先我想谈谈自由主义是什么我不想谈论民族主义是什么，当我谈论自由主义和民族主义时，我不会谈论任何有关国际政治的事情，至少不会以任何有意义的方式谈论，我只是想让你了解一下自由主义是什么，美国是一个彻底自由的国家，是一个自由民主国家，我们有时称之为保守派的共和党人都是自由派，民主党人也是自由派，我使用“自由”这个词是约翰·洛恩的意思，美国诞生于一个自由民主国家。 《独立宣言》、《宪法》、《权利法案》这些都是彻底的自由主义文件，我们是自由主义的民族，好吧，但这到底意味着什么？理解这一点非常重要，因为你必须理解自由主义是什么，才能理解自由主义霸权以及哪里出了问题那么，了解民族主义是什么就非常重要了，约翰的论点很简单，民族主义是地球上最强大的意识形态，在自由主义和民族主义的较量中，民族主义每次都获胜，我想做的就是向你解释自由主义是什么民族主义是什么以及为什么民族主义击败自由主义，那么我想做的是谈谈自由主义霸权是什么，说美国有兴趣按照自己的形象重塑世界意味着什么，所以我会描述一下，然后我想谈谈为什么我们追求自由主义霸权，当然我已经告诉过你们，美国是一个彻底的自由主义国家，但故事还远不止于此，我想告诉你们我们的记录，我想
描述一下我们在中东的失败关于北约在俄罗斯的扩张以及与中国的接触，我只是谈论了我们犯错的证据，然后我想谈谈为什么自由主义血统会失败，这又是一个关于民族主义和现实主义战胜自由主义的故事，然后我想为克制辩护，我认为这是明智的外交政策，好吧，让我先从自由主义是什么开始，自由主义有两个基本假设，一个是它的核心是
个人主义，另一个是，我们能做的事情确实有限制与我们的关键做就基本原则或关于美好生活的问题达成一致的能力现在我到底在说什么你必须决定当你考虑政治时你是否认为人类首先是形成社会契约的个体或者你认为人类是从根本上讲，社会动物会为自己的个人主义开辟空间，这是非常重要的思考，自由主义就是个人主义，自由主义理论家被称为社会契约理论家
因为他们相信个人走到一起，形成社会契约，所以重点是自由主义的基本假设并不是人类从一开始就是社会动物这是第一点，第二点是，自由主义认为我们不能使用我们的批判能力，我们不能用理性来得出关于第一原则的真理，想想像堕胎平权行动这样的问题，你无法就这些问题达成普遍共识，我会在讨论过程中更多地谈论这个问题，但在我看来，自由主义的根源可以追溯到英国天主教徒和新教徒之间的宗教战争，事实上你不能用你的批判能力来确定天主教是否比新教更优越，反之亦然，或者无神论是否比它们都优越，或者犹太教或伊斯兰教比天主教和新教更优越，谁知道呢，对吧，你就是无法达成一致，我们能用批判能力做的事情确实有限，好吧，这是两个基本假设，一是你关注个人，二是你接受你无法达成普遍共识的事实，现在的核心问题是政治应该如何安排来应对这种潜在的暴力，你对自己说，什么确实有暴力的可能，事实上，天主教徒和新教徒之间互相残杀，不仅在英国，而且在整个欧洲，今天的什叶派和逊尼派互相残杀，因为他们无法就什叶派或逊尼派是否是伊斯兰教的正确解释达成一致，我们是共产主义者与自由主义者，人们无法就基本原则达成一致，当他们无法就基本原则达成一致时，如果他们对这些原则有强烈的感觉，就有暴力的可能，所以当所有这些人四处奔走，他们可能在某些情况下同意，但不是普遍同意，就有巨大的暴力潜力，所以自由主义基本上是一种基于冲突的意识形态，问题是如何解决这个冲突，有一个由三部分组成的解决方案，这应该是你们所有人的心头好，第一，你要关注个人权利，记住个人的重要性，你知道《独立宣言》生命自由和追求幸福，这些都是自然权利，这些都是应得的权利，这意味着地球上的每个人都有一套特定的权利，有时定义为自由，也就是说，如果你想成为新教徒，你就有权信奉该宗教，如果我想成为天主教徒，我有自由，我有权成为天主教徒，游戏的名称是承认每个人都有这些选择的自由，当你想到天主教徒杀死新教徒，或者犹太人杀死穆斯林，或者任何你想要无神论者杀死信徒的群体时，这完全说得通，共产主义者杀死任何权利，关键是你要关注个人，让个人自己选择他们想要过什么样的生活，你想让他们尽可能地过上他们版本的美好生活，这非常重要，地球上的每个人都有这个权利，让我先说到这里，把这个种子种在你的大脑里，如果你关注个人主义和不可剥夺的权利，你几乎会自动从个人主义意识形态转变为普世主义意识形态，因为你再次关注个人，你说每个人都有一套权利，地球上的每个人个人主义意识形态变成了普遍主义意识形态，但我们谈论的是个人，第二点是你传播宽容的规范，我们一直在谈论宽容，大学非常重视宽容，我们应该容忍我们不喜欢的观点，你请演讲者进来，或者你允许演讲者进来，说出你认为应受谴责的话，宽容真的很重要，但事实是，宽容只能让你走这么远，因为你正在与那些有时对自己的信仰如此执着的人打交道，你知道有人相信堕胎是谋杀，愿意谋杀实施堕胎的医生，对吧，所以你需要一个国家，这是等式的第三个元素，你需要一个有效的守夜人国家，确保那些想以新教徒身份生活的人不会攻击那些想以天主教徒身份生活的人，反之亦然，这是自由主义的解决方案，这就是美国的全部，个人主义，我们一直在谈论它我们谈论权利，每个人都有权利，多年来，当我告诉孩子们他们必须做某事时，他们总是提醒我，他们有权利，我不能干涉他们的权利，这就是我们从一开始就接受的教育，当然，随着社会的发展，我们是非常宽容的人，虽然不是完全的，但当然，这就是为什么我们有国家权利，你必须有警察部队，你必须有一个法院系统，所以这就是自由主义的全部意义所在，自由主义关注个人权利，奉行宽容的规范，接受你需要守夜人的事实现在让我们来谈谈民族主义，不同的动物民族主义是基于人类是社会动物的假设，我们生来就是社会动物，我们
被深深地社会化为部落，我们不是生来就生活在自然状态中，我们不是生来就被遗弃在森林中的个人，我们生来就是群体，我们非常具有部落性，所以你看，从开始假设或基石假设的角度来看，民族主义的基础是什么，什么是未决的自由主义，非常非常不同，个人主义让位于群体忠诚，对吧，世界各地的某个人杀死了一个美国人，伊斯兰国杀死了一个美国人，这与杀死一个沙特人或杀死一个英国人有着根本的不同，因为你杀死的是我们的其中一个人，这是部落，对吧，你是美国人，美国人会照顾其他美国人，我们从一开始就是社会动物，除了家庭之外，最重要的群体，记住我说过，你生来就是社会化的特定群体，抛开家庭，当今世界上最重要的群体是国家，我稍后会详细谈谈什么是民族主义，这是我的简单定义，它是一个一套政治信仰，认为一个民族，一个国家，一群具有与其他群体不同特征的个人，应该拥有自己的国家。想想民族国家这个词。民族国家民族国家体现了民族主义的意义。它说世界被划分为这些被称为国家的部落，每个部落都想要自己的国家。如果你想想今天的世界，只要看看今天的世界地图，它完全被民族国家所覆盖。只有民族国家。如果你回到 1450 年，你看欧洲地图，那张地图上甚至没有一个国家。随着时间的推移，国家的发展，然后民族国家的发展，你就会进入一个只有民族国家的世界。看看巴勒斯坦人和以色列人，相信犹太复国主义的犹太人。犹太复国主义到底是什么？它就是要拥有自己的犹太国家。西奥多·赫泽尔是犹太复国主义之父，他最著名的书叫《犹太国家》，犹太民族国家。巴勒斯坦人想要什么？两国解决方案。巴勒斯坦人想要自己的国家。巴勒斯坦人想要一个国家。他们想要一个国家。地球上充满了民族，其中许多都有自己的国家，几乎所有的民族都希望拥有自己的国家，民族国家，对吧，这就是民族主义的全部意义更进一步，民族非常重视主权或自决，这就是为什么他们想要自己的国家，巴勒斯坦人不希望以色列人决定他们的政治应该是什么样子，巴勒斯坦人想要自己的国家，犹太人想要自己的国家，德国人想要自己的国家，美国人想要自己的国家，因为他们相信主权，你在唐纳德·特朗普身上看到了这一点，记得唐纳德·特朗普在竞选中提出的纲领是美国优先，想想美国优先，美国，特别是国家，首先照顾我们，他已经明确表示，他不希望任何人干涉我们的主权，他昨天说，他认为我们不应该干涉其他国家的主权，对吧，这是对民族主义力量的承认，所以各国都想要自己的国家，然后一旦你有了民族国家，他们就非常重视主权或自决，这些是谁俄罗斯干涉我们的选举 美国是一个主权国家 俄罗斯或其他任何国家都没有权利干涉我们的选举 这是这里的基本论点 这就是民族主义的真正含义 好的，这样你就能感受到自由主义和民族主义之间的区别 自由主义关注个人 因此因为它强调每个人都有的个人权利 具有普遍性维度 民族主义在核心上是特殊主义的 对吧 从根本上说是不同的 好的，那么什么是自由霸权 我已经给了你自由主义的定义 我已经制定了民族主义的定义 让我来谈谈自由霸权 它基本上是一种试图按照美国的形象重塑世界 它有三个组成部分 第一个是将自由民主传播到世界各地 我之所以放三颗星 是因为它是三者中最重要的 这是我们想要把每个国家都变成自由民主国家 我们希望地球上的每个国家都拥有与我们在美国相同的政治制度 第二个目标是我们想要整合越来越多的国家加入开放的国际经济，这就是我们强调自由贸易的地方，大量的经济交流，自由的资本流动等等，你知道整个故事，然后第三，我们希望让越来越多的国家加入国际机构，比如世界贸易组织、国际货币基金组织、北约，想想北约扩张 IMF NATO think NATO exp
The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities
by John J. Mearsheimer Sept. 25 2018
https://www.amazon.ca/Great-Delusion-Liberal-International-Realities/dp/0300234198
A renowned scholar argues that liberal hegemony—the policy America has pursued since the Cold War ended—is doomed to fail. Named a Financial Times Best Book of 2018
“Idealists as well as realists need to read this systematic tour de force.”—Robert D. Kaplan, author of The Return of Marco Polo’s World
It is widely believed in the West that the United States should spread liberal democracy across the world, foster an open international economy, and build international institutions. The policy of remaking the world in America’s image is supposed to protect human rights, promote peace, and make the world safe for democracy. But this is not what has happened. Instead, the United States has become a highly militarized state fighting wars that undermine peace, harm human rights, and threaten liberal values at home.
In this major statement, the renowned international-relations scholar John Mearsheimer argues that liberal hegemony—the foreign policy pursued by the United States since the Cold War ended—is doomed to fail. It makes far more sense, he maintains, for Washington to adopt a more restrained foreign policy based on a sound understanding of how nationalism and realism constrain great powers abroad. The Great Delusion is a lucid and compelling work of the first importance for scholars, policymakers, and everyone interested in the future of American foreign policy.
REVIEW / Albert Vidal Sept 4, 2019
https://www.unav.edu/web/global-affairs/detalle/-/blogs/the-great-delusion-a-critique
John J. Mearsheimer, The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities, Yale University Press, September 2018, 328 p.
The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities
“For better or for worse, liberal hegemony is history”. With such a statement John J. Mearsheimer concluded his talk about his recently published book “The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities” at SOAS University of London.
In this book Mearsheimer argues that the foreign policy of liberal hegemony which was adopted by the US at the end of the Cold War failed miserably. He explains that it happened because nationalism and realism always overrun liberalism.
In the first part of the book he defines liberalism, nationalism and liberal hegemony. He then explains why the US pursued liberal hegemony, and what is its track record. Finally, he reveals why liberal hegemony failed, and what can we expect in the future. Let’s take a more detailed look into it.
Liberalism
Mearsheimer casts light on liberalism’s two fundamental assumptions underpinning human nature: first, it assumes that the individual takes precedence over the group; second, liberalism assumes that individuals cannot reach universal agreement over first principles, and such differences often lead to violence.
In order to deal with this potential for violence, liberalism offers a solution that includes three parts: everybody has individual rights that are inalienable; tolerance receives a special emphasis, and a state becomes necessary to limit the threat of those who do not respect other people’s rights. Such features make liberalism a universalistic theory, which is what turned the US into a crusader state.
Nationalism
According to the author, nationalism has its own core assumptions: first, humans are naturally social animals; second, group loyalty is more important than individualism, and third, aside from the family, the most important group is the nation. He then goes on to say that nations (bodies of individuals that have certain features that make them distinct from other groups) want their own states.
After that, Mearsheimer says that nationalism beats liberalism because human beings are primarily social animals. To show this, he recalls that the entire planet is covered with nation states, and liberal democracies do not even comprise a 50% of those nation-states.
Liberal hegemony
This is just an attempt to remake the world in America’s image and has several components: to spread liberal democracy across the planet, to integrate more countries into the open international economy and into international institutions. In theory, this would be extremely beneficial, since it would eliminate significant human rights violations (here the author assumes that liberal democracies do not engage in great human rights violations), it would make for a peaceful world (following the democratic peace theory) and it would eliminate the threat of foreign support to those who want to overthrow liberal democracy at home.
Why did the US pursue liberal hegemony?
After the Cold War, a moment of unipolarity made it possible, says Mearsheimer, for the US to ignore balance of power politics and pursue a liberal foreign policy. To this we need to add that the US is a liberal country, which oftentimes thinks itself as exceptional. This clearly prompted the US to try to remake the world into its image.
In this part of the book, Mearsheimer shows different failures of the US foreign policy. The first one is the Bush Doctrine and the Greater Middle East, which was a plan to turn the Middle East into a sea of democracies. The result was a total disaster. The second example is the awful relations between the US and Russia and the Ukraine crisis, which were the result of NATO’s expansion. Thirdly, Mearsheimer criticizes the way the US has engaged with China, helping it grow quicker while naively thinking that it would eventually become a liberal democracy.
Why did liberal hegemony fail?
The reason is that the power of nationalism and realism always overrun liberalism; in words of Mearsheimer: “the idea that the US can go around the world trying to establish democracies and doing social engineering is a prescription for trouble”. Countries will resist to foreign interference. Also, in large parts of the world, people prefer security before liberal democracy, even if that security has to be provided by a soft authoritarianism.
Liberal hegemony is finished, because the world is no longer a unipolar place. Now the US needs to worry about other powers.
A critique of his theory
Although Mearsheimer’s thesis seems solid, several critiques have been formulated; most of these are directed toward issues that contradict some of Mearsheimer’s arguments and assumptions and that have been left unaddressed.
1) In his introduction, Mearsheimer argues that individuals cannot reach an agreement over first principles. I believe that is an over-statement, since some values tend to be appreciated in most societies. Some examples would be the value of life, the importance of the family for the continuation of society and the education of the upcoming generations, the importance of truth and honesty, and many others.
2) When he describes the US foreign policy since the 1990s as liberal hegemony, Mearsheimer chooses to ignore some evident exceptions, such as the alliance with Saudi Arabia and other authoritarian regimes which do not respect the most basic human rights.
3) Many of the failures of the US foreign policy since the 1990s do not actually seem to derive from the liberal policies themselves, but from the failure of properly implementing them. That is, those failures happened because the US deviated from its liberal foreign policy. A clear example is what happened in Iraq: although the intervention was publicly backed by a liberal rhetoric, many doubt that Washington was truly committed to bring stability and development to Iraq. A commonly pointed example is that the only Ministry effectively protected was the Oil Ministry. The rest were abandoned to the looters. A true liberal policy would have sought to restore the education and health systems, state institutions and infrastructure, which never really happened. So blaming the failure to the liberal policy might not be adequate.
4) Although Mearsheimer proves the urge to intervene that comes with liberal hegemony, he doesn’t show how a hegemon following realist principles would restrain itself and intervene in fewer occasions and with moderation. The necessity to protect human rights would simply become a willingness to protect vital interests, which serves as an excuse for any type of intervention (unlike human rights, even if they have sometimes been the origin of a disastrous intervention).
As a final thought, this book suggests a clear alternative to the mainstream views of most of today’s foreign policy, especially in Western Europe and in the United States. Even if we disagree with some (or most) of its tenets, it is nevertheless helpful in understanding many of the current dynamics, particularly in relation to the everlasting tension between nationalism and universalism. We might even need to rethink our foreign policies and instead of blindly praising liberalism, we should accept that sometimes, liberalism isn’t able to solve every problem that we face.
Prof. Mearsheimer REVEALS: the US DESTROYED Its Global Hegemony. Russia, China Advance Multipolarity
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8AvSdjYOqw&ab_channel=TheStrategist
YouTube The Strategis
In this video, Professor John Mearsheimer, the prominent international relations scholar, discusses his book, "The Great Delusion", U.S. liberal hegemony and its failures, the effects of nationalism, the conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, U.S. foreign policy in Ukraine and the Middle East, NATO expansion, the rise of Russia and China, and the shift from a unipolar to a multipolar world.
Dans cette vidéo, le professeur John Mearsheimer discute de son livre, "The Great Delusion", de l'hégémonie libérale des États-Unis et de ses échecs, des effets du nationalisme, des conflits en Afghanistan, en Irak et en Syrie, de la politique étrangère américaine en Ukraine et au Moyen-Orient, de l'expansion de l'OTAN, de l'essor de la Russie et de la Chine, et du passage d'un monde unipolaire à un monde multipolaire.
today what I want to talk about is my new book The Great delusion liberal
ideals and international realities uh this book uh came out
officially on September 25th which of course was two days ago uh it was about 10 years in the making really seven
years of pretty much straight hard work uh and I've spent a lot of time thinking
about the ideas in the book and I'm excited about throwing them out for you to analyze and when we go to the Q&A you
shouldn't hesitate to come after me as John alluded to and as I can tell you I actually love combat I love arguing with
people and I love people who think I'm wrong uh what could be more boring than
to deal with people who think you're a genius right so if as I go along here I
make arguments that you don't understand or you think you're just wrongheaded you should not hesitate uh to uh stand up
and let me know what you really think okay
basic story after the Cold War ended the United States pursued a policy that I
called liberal hegemony and the main aim of that strategy was to remake the world in
America's image uh the policy has failed miserably
uh if you look at us foreign policy from the end of the Cold War till now and especially since 2001 it's marked by a
whole series of abject failures uh and I'll talk about that at Great length and
The $64,000 Question is why why was there all this optimism in the early
1990s why did people think we had the wind at the back our back and we were going to be able to remake the world in
our own image and today things uh don't look good at all what went wrong and my
argument is that to understand what went wrong you have to understand the relationship between nationalism and
realism and liberalism and I believe again that we have followed what is
essentially a liberal foreign policy this is called liberal Hemy and that it
has been defeated at almost every turn by nationalism and
realism okay now the way I want to proceed is first of all I want to talk
about what liberalism is then don't want to talk about what nationalism is and
when I talk about liberalism and nationalism I'm not going to say anything about International politics at least in any meaningful way I just want
to give you a sense for what liberalism is the United States is a thoroughly liberal country it is a liberal
democracy both Republicans who we sometimes refer to as conservatives are
liberals and Democrats are liberals I'm using the term liberal in the John loan
sense of the term the United States was born as a liberal democracy the Declaration of Independence the
Constitution the Bill of Rights these these are thoroughly liberal documents we are a liberal
people okay but what exactly does that mean it's very important that you
understand it because you have to understand what liberalism is to understand liberal hegemony and what
went wrong then it's very important to understand what nationalism is John's
argument is very simple here nationalism is the most powerful ideology on the planet and in a contest between
liberalism and nationalism nationalism wins every time and what I want to do is
explain to you what liberalism is what nationalism is and why nationalism
defeats liberalism then what I want to do is talk about what liberal hegemony is what does it mean to say that the
United States is interested in remaking the world in its own image so I'll describe that then I want to talk about
why we pursued liberal hegemony and of course I've tipped you off by telling you that the United States is a
thoroughly liberal country but there's more of the story then I want to tell you what our track record is I want to
describe our failures in the Middle East with regard to Nato expansion in Russia
and with regard to engagement in China just talk about the evidence that we
goofed then I want to talk about why liberal hemony fails and this again is basically a story about nationalism and
realism trumping liberalism and then I want to make the case for restraint what I think is a
wise foreign policy okay so let me start with what is
liberalism there are two Bedrock assumptions that underpin liberalism one is that it's
individualistic at its core and number two is that there real limits to what we can do with our
critical faculties to reach agreement on first principles or questions about the
good life now what exactly am I saying you you have to decide when you
think about politics whether you think human beings are first and foremost
individuals who form social contracts or you think that human beings
are fundamentally social animals who carve
out room for their individualism right this is very very
important to think about right liberalism is all about
individualism liberal theorists are known as social contract theorists
because they believe that individuals come together and form
social contracts so the focus is on the individual the Assumption underpinning
liberalism is not that human beings are social animals from the get-go that's the first point the second
point is that liberalism assumes that we cannot use our critical faculties we
cannot use reason to come up with truth about first principles think about
issues like abortion affirmative action you cannot get Universal agreement on
those issues right and I'll talk about this more as we go along but the roots of liberalism
are traced back in my opinion to the religious wars in Britain between
Catholics and Protestants and the fact is you cannot use your critical faculties to determine whether
Catholicism is a superior religion to protestantism or vice versa or whether atheism is superior to both of them or
Judaism or Islam spia to Catholicism and protestantism who knows
right you just can't reach agreement there are real limits to what we can do with our
critical faculties okay so these are the two Bedrock assumptions one you focus on
the individual and number two you accept the fact that you can't reach Universal
agreement now central question how should politics
be arranged to deal with this potential for violence and you say to yourself
what do seeming potential for violence the fact is that Catholics and Protestants were killing each other in
huge numbers not only in Britain but all over Europe people today Shia and sunnis
kill each other because they can't agree on whether shiism or sunnism is the correct interpretation of
Islam we're Communists versus liberals people can't agree on first principles
and when they can't agree on first principles if they feel really strongly about them there is potential for
violence so when you have all these individuals running around who don't agree they may agree in
some cases but don't universally agree there's tremendous potential for violence so liberalism is basically an
ideology that's based on conflict and the question is how do you solve that
conflict there's a three-part solution and this should be dear to all of your hearts the first is
you focus on individual rights remember the importance of the individual you know the Declaration of
Independence life liberty and the pursuit of happiness those are natural rights those are in alible rights this
means that every person on the planet has a particular set of
Rights sometimes defined as freedoms this is to say you if you want to be a
Protestant have the right to to practice that religion and if I want to be a
Catholic I have the freedom I have the right to be a Catholic the name of the game is to
recognize that everybody has these freedoms to choose this makes perfect sense when you
think about Catholics killing Protestants right or Jews killing Muslims or whatever group you want atheists killing Believers communist
killing whatever right the the point is you want to focus on the individual and
let the individual choose for him or herself what kind of Life they want to
lead you want to let them lead as much as possible their version of the good life and very important every person on
the planet has that right and let me get ahead of myself here just put this seed
in your brain If you focus on individualism and inalienable rights you
go almost automatically from an individualistic ideology to a
universalistic ideology right because again you're focusing on the individual you're saying
every individual has a set of Rights every individual on the planet that
individualistic ideology becomes a universalistic ideology but we're talking
about the individual here the second is you purvey the norm of Tolerance we talk
about tolerance all the time universities are really big on tolerance we're supposed to tolerate opinions that
we don't like you bring in speakers or you allow speakers to come in who say
things that you find reprehensible tolerance really
matters but the fact is the tolerance only takes you so far because you're
dealing with people who sometimes are so committed to their beliefs you know somebody who believes
that abortion is murder is willing to murder a doctor who practices abortion
right so you need a state that's the third element of the equation you need a
state that's effectively in night Watchman that make sure that those people over there who want to live as
Protestants don't attack those people who want to live as Catholics or vice versa this is the liberal solution this
is what America is all about individ ual ISM we talk about it all the time we
talk about rights everybody has rights my kids over the years have always reminded me when I tell them that they
have to do X Y and Z that they have rights and I cannot interfere with their
rights right that's the way we're educated from the get-go and of course we're remarkably tolerant people as
societies go not completely but that's of course why we have a state right you
got to have have a police force you got to have a system of Courts right so
that's that's what liberalism is all about right liberalism focuses on the
individual right purveys the norm of Tolerance and accepts the fact that you need a night Watchman State now let's
talk about nationalism different animal nationalism is based on the
assumption that human beings are social animals we are born born and we are
heavily socialized into tribes we are not born in the state of nature we are
not individuals born and left alone in the woods we are born into groups we are
very tribal so you see in terms of starting assumptions or Bedrock assumptions what underpins nationalism
what unpend liberalism very very different and individualism takes a backseat to group
loyalty right somebody around the world kills an American Isis kills an American it's
fundamentally different than killing a Saudi or killing a Brit because you're
killing one of us this is the tribe right you're an American Americans look
out for other Americans we're social animals from the get-go and aside from the family the
most important group remember I said that you're born into and heavily so socialized into particular groups
putting aside the family the most important group in today's world is the
nation I'll say more about that in a second what's nationalism here's my
simple definition it's a set of political beliefs which
holds that a nation a nation a body of individuals with
characteristics that purportedly distinguish them from other groups
should have their own State think of the word nation state nation state nation
state embodies what nationalism is all about says the world is divided up into these tribes called Nations and each one
of them wants its own state if you think about the world today just look at a map
of the world today it is completely covered with nation states
nothing but nation states if you went back to 1450 and you looked at a map of Europe there isn't even a single state
on that map over time the growth of the state and then the growth of the nation
state you move to a world that is filled with nothing but nation states look at
the Palestinians and the Israelis the Jews who believed in
Zionism what is Zionism all about it's all about having your own Jew Jewish
State Theodore Herzel who's the father of Zionism his most famous book is called the Jewish State Jewish nation
state what do the Palestinians want two-state solution Palestinians want their own State Palestinians a nation
they want their own State the planet is filled with Nations many of which have
their own State almost all of which want their own
State nation state right that's what nationalism is all about take it a step
further Nations Place enormous importance on sovereignty or
self-determination which is why they want their own State the Palestinians don't want the Israelis
deciding what their politics should look like Palestinians want their own State Jews want their own State Germans want
their own State Americans want their own State because they believe in
sovereignty you saw this with Donald Trump remember Donald Trump ran in the campaign on a platform that he referred
to as America First just think about that America First America particular
Nation take care of us first and he has made it very clear that he does not want anybody interfering in our sovereignty
and he was saying yesterday he doesn't think we should be interfering in the sovereignty of other countries right
that's recognition of the power of nationalism right so
nations want their own State and then once you get nation states they Place enormous importance on sovereignty or
self-determination who are these Russians to be interfering in our elections United States is a sovereign
country no country like Russia or any other country for that matter has the right to interfere in our elections it's
the basic argument here that's what nationalism is really all about Okay so
you get a feel for the difference between liberalism and nationalism liberalism focuses on the individual and
therefore because it emphasizes individual rights which everybody has has a universalistic dimension
nationalism is particularistic at the core right
fundamentally different okay so what's liberal
hegemony I've given you the definition of liberalism and the definition of
nationalism that I've worked out let me talk a little bit about liberal hegemony it's basically an attempt to remake the
world in America's image and it has three components the first is spreading
liberal democracy all over the globe and the reason that I put three stars up
there is it is the most important of the three this is the idea that we want to
turn every country into a liberal democracy we want every country on the planet to have the same
political system that we do here in the United States second goal is we want to
integrate more and more countries into the open International economy this is
where we have an emphasis on free trade lots of economic intercourse right free Capital flows and
so forth and so on you know the whole story and then third is we want to integrate more and more countries into
intern ational institutions uh like the World Trade Organization the IMF NATO
think NATO expansion uh the TPP trans-pacific partnership which the
Obama Administration was building and which president Trump uh cashiered okay
the liberal story places a great emphasis on institutions it places a great emphasis
on an open International economy and most importantly on spreading democracy
just to give you a feel for this Donald Trump ran against liberal
hegemony right and liberal hemony to be clear was supported by both Republicans and Democrats as I like to say the
Republicans especially but the Democrats also like to make the argument that there's a big difference between the two parties on foreign policy this is not a
serious argument this is tweetle D and tweetle dumb hardly any difference between the Republicans and the
Democrats there's a real difference between Donald Trump and in both of them remember Donald Trump ran the table in
the Republican primaries by criticizing the Republicans performance on the foreign policy front for decades and
criticizing the Democrats in the general election Donald Trump said I'm not interested in spreading liberal
democracy across the globe and in fact he was quite comfortable making nice
with dictators second he was not interested in supporting an open
International economy in fact he is showing today that he is willing to put
tariffs on China Canada and our European allies and as far as International
institutions are concerned he said NATO is obsolete he was contemptuous of the
World Trade Organization contemptuous of the European Union does not like the IMF
does not like the World Bank does not like NAFTA cashiered the TPP that's that's Donald Trump he ran
against this but Obama George W bush Bill Clinton George HW Bush they
embraced this after the Cold War ended and by the way it was the failure of
this policy it's the failure of American policy that helped put Donald Trump in the white house for those of you who say
to yourself how could this man have ever been elected president of the United States I'm telling you an important part
of the story right it's the failure of the foreign policy Elites in this country to produce over the past 30
years okay what are the benefits of liberal hegemony this is very important
other why did we go down this road in part is due to the fact that the foreign policy Elites in the
United States had a story to tell about how this was going to lead to all sorts of wonderful consequences first of all
if you turn every country on the planet into a liberal democracy you basically
eliminate significant human rights violations we don't need r2p or any more these policies that are designed to run
around the world protecting human rights because human rights are no longer threatened because the world is
comprised of nothing but liberal democracies second and maybe even more importantly liberals tend to believe and
again I'm using liberals to include Democrats and Republicans they believe in what's called Democratic peace theory that is that liberal democracies don't
fight each other so if you can create a world of nothing but liberal democracies they don't fight each other
peace breaks out and problems like proliferation terrorism are taken off the table and it's just a world of peac
Lov and dope can't get much better than that right and then finally it makes the world safe for Liberal democracy as you
all know inside every liberal democracy there are going to be elements who don't like liberal democracy when I was a kid
this was the Communist Party in the United States well if there's no Soviet Union out there that's a communist state
that can interact with those Communists in the United States then you don't have to worry about those Communists in the
United States getting support from abroad so what we do is we make the whole planet nothing but liberal
democracies and that really amarat the problems that any of these liberal democracies have on the home front
because there's no foreign power that can assist them this is a wood R Wilson like argument made by the likes of George Bush right so these are the three
great benefits of liberal hity and this is what propelled people to pursue this
policy of remaking the world in America's image which mainly means spreading liberal
democracy Now why did the US pursue liberal hegemony first of all as I said to you
folks before the United States is a profoundly liberal country uh it it's what makes the United States a wonderful
place you should understand here that I am not arguing that liberalism is a Bad
Thing period end the story I actually think that liberal democracy is the best political system you can possibly have
and I thank my lucky stars that I was born in the United States of America a liberal democracy and raised in a
liberal democracy I would want it no other way my argument is that liberal democracy is the best of all possible
political systems that you can have but as a foreign policy liberalism is bankrupt right so
you understand the argument I'm making here but this is a fundamentally liberal country and realists like me John
schusler Jason Castillo they can tell you this realists like me and they them
have a tough time in America because liberals don't like realists right that's why so many people don't like me
right because I'm a realist on on foreign policy grounds right right so this is a profoundly liberal country and
just to go back to that slide when you start trying to sell these kinds of arguments in the early
1990s it's very easy to do America just gravitate to these arguments because it
is a liberal country second American nationalism
supplied an unhealthy dose of uis to the equation
this is a very important part of the story John told you that nationalism is the most powerful political ideology on
the planet what I'm telling you also I didn't say this before but I tell you now the United States is a very
nationalistic country if you go to the library here University of Chicago Harvard you name it right they're whole
wig of the library that are filled with books about American liberalism there is
probably one shelf worth of books on American nationalism because we never talk about ourselves as a nationalistic
country we are very nationalistic let me just say a few words about this matal Albright canonical liberal right loves
liberal hegemony is famous for saying this America is the indispensable Nation
We Stand polar and we see further this is pure unadulterated
nationalism America is America as opposed to the other right that America
is the indispensable there's the word Nation Nation as a nationalism we we are
the indispensable Nation we stand taller and we see
further right we are superior you all know we're the city on the hill right we
have the right we have the responsibility and we have the capability to transform countries all
around the world into liberal democracies right this is nationalism so
what I'm saying to you here oh let me just give you another example American exceptionalism you
surely all believe in American exceptionalism and if any of you plan to run for political office in the United
States you better say you believe in American exceptionalism and CUO just got
himself in trouble for denying that and Barack Obama flirted with that argument
and he quickly backed off well if you believe in American exceptionalism you believe in American nationalism because
exceptionalism is what nationalism is all about right so what you have here is a
country that is fueled by both nationalism and
liberalism right so it is hard surprising that this country is going to
go on a rampage and try to remake the world and then finally and this is a
very important part of my argument I believe you can only pursue liberal hegemony in
unipolarity the reason is if you're in bipolarity or multipolarity you have other you have
other great powers to deal with and you have to act according to the dictates of
realism right bipolarity means two great Powers multipolarity three or more unipolarity
there's only one great power well if there's only one great power you don't have to worry about great power politics
this is where the United States was at the end of the Cold War we were Godzilla we were incredibly powerful relative to
everybody else in the system tremendous amounts of power Charles Crow hammer called this the
unipolar moment so here we are we're incredibly powerful and we think that
liberal democracy is the wave of the future we think we have the wind at our back and we think the idea of spreading
liberal democracy given how powerful we are it's going to be easy and we don't have to worry about balance and power
politics 1991 the Soviet Union disappears it was a week Lan even before
it disappeared China hasn't risen yet there's nobody else out there we don't have to worry about the Balance power so
we are free to pursue liberal hity if you're in a bipolar system or a multipolar system I'm getting way ahead
of myself now think rise of China trying to think resurrection of Russian power not much room for Liberal emany
you're talking about balance of power politics pivot to Asia dot dot dot you know the story but here if you have
unipolarity and the so poll that's Uncle sugar the soul Paul is profoundly
liberal right and profoundly nationalistic you're Off to the Races
and that's what happened in starting in the early 1990s
uh hang on just one second I'll move it with this yeah liberal hgi's track record
just want to talk a little bit about this these are the failures of American foreign policy talk about the Bush Doctrine in
the greater Middle East Afghanistan you think we're going to turn Afghanistan into a liberal democracy just a question
when we turn it back over to the Taliban uh longest war in American history
Iraq total disaster led to the creation of Isis hundreds of thousands of people
died uh Iran now has significant influence in Iraq Syria we played a key
role in unsettling the regime in Syria that's worked out really well uh Libya
we played a key role in toppling Colonel Gaddafi power that's really worked out
very well we're deeply involved in the war in Yemen now which is a human rights
catastrophe the Americans ought to be embarrassed uh for their disgraceful Behavior supporting this war supporting
the Saudis uh you look at our track record in the greater Middle East failure after failure and Donald Trump
to his credit pointed this out in the campaign and the American people fully understand this the Elites in this
country don't because they're deeply invested in these wars but uh dismal
track record uh the Ukraine crisis and US Russia relations of course inside the
elite we blame the Russians the Americans never blame themselves for anything but actually what happened here
is that the United States decided when the Cold War ended that we would take
NATO and we would take the EU and we would March them Eastward right up to
the border of Russia and what we would do is we would help Sol
ify the democracies that had emerged in Eastern Europe after the Cold War we
would get the countries in Eastern Europe embedded in international institutions like NATO and the EU we
would get them hooked on capitalism and we would make sure they were liberal
democracies by the way those countries that weren't liberal democracies we would F revolutions remember the orange
revolution in UK Ukraine the rose revolution in Georgia right it's a whole
part of a piece it's all part of this story right realists like me George Kennan we all said are you crazy you
think you could take a military Alliance that was a mortal enemy of the Soviet Union during the Cold War and March it
right up to the Russians border and they're just going to sit there and take it and of course the Russians scream bloody murder about NATO expansion from
1995 forward we didn't listen right but it eventually blew up
in our face Georgia 2008 Ukraine 2014 we
are principally responsible for creating the crisis that led to Russia
recapturing Crimea or capturing Crimea depending on your view and for the war in Ukraine today the Russians have
basically said you're not going to make Ukraine a Western bwar on our border not
going to happen we'll wreck it before we let that happen and they said the same thing about Georgia from an American
point of view this makes eminently good sense you've all heard of the Monroe Doctrine right you know what the Monroe Doctrine says no distant great power
from Europe or East Asia is allowed to come into the Western Hemisphere with military force and form an alliance with
any country in this region that's that's the Monroe Doctrine I'm old enough to remember the
Cuban Missile Crisis we went ballistic when we found out the Soviets had put missiles in Cuba and then later they
were talking about building a naval base at San fuos who do these people think they are don't they understand that this
is the Western Hemisphere they are not allowed to move military forces into
this region we still have sanctions on Cuba God knows how many years since 1959
this has been going on because the Cubans had the audacity to form a military alliance with a distant great
power well as my mother taught me when I was a little boy what's good for the goose is good for the gander and if we can have him on Doctrine are you shocked
that they had a Monroe Doctrine or they have a Monroe Doctrine you're shocked that the Russians don't like the idea of
us marching NATO right up to their border you shouldn't be you shouldn't be great Powers I can
tell you from studying a lot of military history are remarkably sensitive about their borders and the idea that an enemy
is going to creep right up to their borders and they're just going to stand there and say oh that's okay we live in
a world of peace love and dope that's not the way International politics works that realism
101 slamming liberal hemony it's also
all about nationalism right because the United States is interested in interfering in the politics of both
Russia and China and this brings us to engagement with China our goal from the beginning has been to turn China into a
liberal democracy that involves interfering with their politics do you think they were happy about that no they
weren't let's go back to the goose and the gander you've been watching all of these Americans screaming bloody murder
about the fact the Russians are interfering in a election well don't you think the Chinese and the Russians are going to screen bloody murder when we
try and interfere in their politics they are surprise of
surprises but of course liberals and here I get I'm talking about Republicans and Democrats view us as a benign
hegemon we're a benign hegemon we only have good intentions and we just want to make the world look like us and of
course once that happens we all live happily ever after didn't work out that way just look at
that giant disaster Zone called the Middle East look at the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people who've
died we have a lot of blood on our hands us Russian relations we bear
principal respons the principal responsibility for the deterioration of those relations and with regard to
engagement it's been a failure principal Architects like Kurt Campbell now admit that's true we
failed policy has been an abject failure so the question is why did it
fail I'm not going to go into this any detail but power of nationalism right I was one
of the leading opponents there weren't many uh in the sort of foreign policy
establishment uh one of I was one of the leading opponents of the Iraq War I think it was because I was in the
American Military from 1965 to 1975 which was co-terminus with the Vietnam
War and when I heard that these people were thinking about invading Iraq I said
if they lost their mind right there's no question the United States military is an incredibly formidable fighting force
and we can topple regimes almost anywhere in the world maybe China and Russia left out we can go into Iran go
into Iraq go into Syria you can topple regimes the problem is what do you do once you own the place right what do you
do uh you're greeted as a liberator the first day week maybe even the first
month right all sorts of people were glad we got rid of Saddam Hussein but then we got to stay to do social
engineering and this is a prescription for big trouble remember what I told you about sovereignty remember what I told you about self-determination you think
the Iraqis wanted us telling them what color toilet paper they could use I don't think they liked it at all and we
had resistance serious resistance you want to wreck Russia tell
them to invade Ukraine that'll be pretty let them go with lfia Lithuania in Estonia let them reestablish the Soviet
Empire in Eastern Europe you think that'll make them more powerful they'll be up to their eyeballs and
alligators I remember in 1979 the Soviets invaded Afghanistan virtually
everybody in the National Community security Community was a gas oh my God the Soviets are on the March this is the
end of the world I said you got it all wrong they just jumped into a giant tarpit when you're involved in an arms
rra with a country like the Soviet Union what you want them to do is go in Afghanistan just like you want us to go
into Vietnam you want to do that one again almost tore this country apart almost wrecked their
military I told the Chinese when I first started going there in the early 2000s what you ought to tell the Americans is
that you're counting on them to win the war on terror tell them they got to stay in Afghanistan and Iraq until they win
the war they'll be there forever grinding up their military wrecking their economy
you know what the lesson here is stay out of those places unless you absolutely have to go in but we had
exactly the opposite worldview because we had a foreign policy that's based on
liberalism right we thought we had a right responsibility and the capability to do all the social engineering power
of nationalism you never want to underestimate it and you want to understand that as Americans you are
very nationalistic and you ain't special everybody else on the planet is very
nationalistic and nationalism is all about self-determination and sovereignty and if you don't like people interfering
in your politics don't be surprised if they don't like you interfering in their
politics talk about the power of realism again when you're dealing with
China and you're dealing with Russia you're dealing with very powerful countries and you start moving military
alliances you start moving military forces uh up to their borders you get in their face you're asking for serious
trouble right just talk to the Chinese sometime about how they think about those American Naval and Air Forces
right off their Coast it really bothers them they don't like it at all I don't
blame them right as an American I'm glad we're there I want to contain the Chinese you're very clear about that I'm
a realist realist I I don't you know want to cut the Chinese any slack but I
understand why they get upset but again liberal Emy doesn't buy that line of
argument now I want to about overselling individual rights and liberal liberalism just very quickly on overselling
individual rights the fact is that we make a really big deal about the importance of Rights
here in the United States but if you look around the world uh most people
don't really think that individual rights matter that much in a thoroughly
liberal country like the United States you can sell that kind of argument up to a point but it's very hard to do abroad
especially in countries where people prize security if you go to Russia today
uh and you talk to people about liberal democracy and rights they will tell you almost all of them we tried that in the
1990s and Russia was turned into the wild west we're much happier with Putin
and the political system that we have soft authoritarianism it's much more suited
for us and we don't care that much about rights we have some rights we understand their limits but we don't want your
political system we've been there we tried that it didn't work so what I'm
saying to you is in a lot of countries when you invade them and you think you can do social engineering all
for the purpose of turning them into liberal democracies what you discover in almost all those cases is that being
turned into a liberal democracy where individual rights are prized is not that
important it's not to say it's un important but people are just not craving for individual rights and in
many cases they're just craving for stability if you're an Iraqi and it's
2003 and Uncle sugar pays you a visit he topples the regime right and then chaos
breaks out over the next couple years you're not going to be worried too much about creating a liberal democracy
you're not going to be worried too much about individual rights you're just going to be worried about what you can do to stabilize the country so that you
and your family don't get k killed right so you just want to understand that we
tend to oversell individual rights and when you marry that with the power of nationalism and the power of realism you
get into real trouble my final Point has to do with illiberal li illiberal
liberalism remember what I told you about liberalism to begin with I told you that liberalism was
predicated on the assumption that you could not reach Universal agreement M on
first principles remember I told you that and therefore you develop sort of a
Live and Let Live political order that's what liberalism is it's a modus vendi
form of politics you let people decide for themselves if he wants to be a Protestant I want to be a Catholic he
wants to be a Jew I want to be a Muslim you let people do what they want
okay because you can't reach Universal agreement if you think about it liberal
hegemony is based on intolerance it says everybody has to be a liberal democracy
my view is if you have soft authoritarianism in Russia so what
that's their choice why can't they have a soft authoritarian system why do we have to
say everybody has to look like us isn't this antithetical to the basic liberal
Enterprise I think the answer is yes case for restraint very
quickly uh if I'm running foreign policy and you can rest assure that will
never happen but if I was running American foreign policy from the early
90s forward I would have pursued a policy of restrain uh I would have abandoned
liberal hity uh which mainly means
abandoning the policy of spreading democracy around the world okay I I
think that that was the key mistake that we made right we we thought that liberal
democracy was going to take root everywhere for those of you you young people haven't read Frank fukiyama or
Francis fukuyama's famous article the end of History you really should read it the two most important articles that
were written when the Cold War ended were Francis fukiyama is the end of history and Charles crammer is the
unipole moment and basically what Frank fukiyama said is that we spent the first
half of the 20th century defeating fascism we spent the second half defeating communism and now that we had
won those two battles all that was really left standing was liberal democracy and the world was slowly but
steadily going to evolve into a system of liberal democracies and Frank says at the very end of the piece that the
biggest problem that we're going to face in the future is probably boredom boredom why boredom because once you
have a world that's populated by all liberal democracies you get peace uh and Crow Hammer wrote this
piece called the unipolar moment that he said this is a unique moment in world history in the United States is by far
the most powerful State on the planet we have this tremendous military and we ought to use it to reshape the world in
our own interest you marry Crow Hammer's argument with Fuki ama's argument
fukiyama says we've got the wind at the back our back crowd Hammer says we have this big stick that we can use to
facilitate the process and you're Off to the Races right and this of course is exactly uh what happens but I would have
abandoned that and I would have concentrated instead on maintaining a favorable Global balance of power which
mainly means containing the rise of China right as you would expect from a
realist like me what I really care about is not what kind of political system a state has I just care how much power it
has and my principal goal as an American is to make sure we are the most powerful
State on the planet uh and as many of you know in my lexicon that means to make sure we are a hedgemon in the reg
in the Western Hemisphere we want to be a regional hedgemon in the Western Hemisphere and make sure that there is
no hedgemon in Europe or in East Asia or in the Gulf right so I I believe in
Primacy that's my definition of Primacy to be the most powerful state in the system but I'm not interested to go back
to my first point in spreading liberal democracy again I think liberal democracy is a wonderful thing if every
state in the world was a liberal democracy I think that would be good for the people who live in those countries
but my view is because I believe in sovereignty it's up to them to decide what they
want uh final point I want to make to you here on this slide is liberalism abroad
leads to Il liberalism at home uh this is what the founding father fathers understood if you're in a
permanent state of War right it's going to have consequences for liberalism at
home because you're going to create a National Security State and you're going to have a state that spies on people and
does all sorts of other things uh so I think from a point of view of civil liberties uh this foreign policy is
bankrupt final point the end of liberal hegemony you remember what John said to
you very early in the talk I said that you could only have liberal hegemony in
unipolarity because in unipolarity the sole poll which is the United States
does not have to worry about great power politics because by definition you can't have great power politics when there's
only one great power well we are now transitioning out of unipolarity into multipolarity this
is very clearly reflected in a document on the country's National Security
strategy that the White House issued in December of 2017 and then the Pentagon in January of
2018 issued a similar document uh on our national security strategy and both these documents make it clear that multipolarity is here that unipolarity is over with in great power politics is
what we're going to be mainly concerned with in the future and that has to do with one the rise of China which I think
for all of you young people in the audience will be the most important issue of your lifetime and then the second issue is the resurrection of Russian power after Putin came to office in 2000 Russia is a declining great power uh you don't want to overestimate Russian power right China is the real threat to the United States here uh but nevertheless the Russians are back and the Russians have thousands of nuclear weapons and they can cause us a lot of trouble and we are at loggerheads with them over the
Ukraine crisis uh so we want to pay them serious attention but what I'm saying to you here is that I think with the coming
of multipolarity liberal hegemony will go away now if I'm wrong and we remain in the unipolar world because the Chinese rise doesn't continue and Russia begins to fall apart again and we are once again the unipole then we're back to arguing against liberal hegemony and making the case for restraint but I don't think that people like me are going to have to make the case for restraint in the future in large part because of the rise of China I would say and this is my concluding point that I have very mixed emotions about that on one hand I welcome the rise of China and the resurrection of Russian power because it means that liberal hegemony is going away but on the other hand what it means means is that the United States is now facing a potential peer competitor and I think all things considered I'd rather have liberal hegemony as a problem to deal with rather than have China and Russia as twin problems to deal with thank you
