12:54 pm
Responsibility and Foreign Policy
The Connect U.S. Fund is a fairly new collaborative created to fund those organizations that promote “responsible U.S. engagement in an increasingly interdependent world.” (Full disclosure: I am good friends with most of its staff).
Yesterday, it released an open letter to President-elect Obama calling on him to change the direction and focus of American foreign policy, moving away from unilateralism and towards a more consultative and collaborative approach. I was pleased to be one of more than 200 foreign policy leaders, experts, and practicioners to sign.
Here are a few highlights:
Your Administration will confront challenges and opportunities in an interconnected world, in which our security and prosperity are tied to the security and prosperity of others, problems cannot be managed in isolation, and addressing critical national security concerns will require that we advance shared global interests. . . .
We recognize that in the first months of your administration, you will face urgent foreign policy challenges, which include ending the war in Iraq, promoting security and stability in Afghanistan and Pakistan, addressing the global financial crisis, and dealing effectively with nuclear weapons development in Iran and North Korea. They must not prevent you from addressing broader and systemic challenges to U.S. leadership worldwide.
In particular, the ability of the United States to achieve key national security objectives has eroded over the past eight years, as the war in Iraq has diverted attention and resources from other vital needs, the civilian instruments of U.S. power – both development and diplomacy – have been neglected, and our capacity to lead effectively has been undermined through unilateral actions in disregard of the views and interests of key friends and allies.
The letter goes on to outline a number of essential steps that an Obama Administration should take, including prohibiting torture; closing Guantanamo; establish a carbon cap system; promote clean energy technology; reengage on climate negotiations; resume talks with Russia on reducing nuclear arms; outlaw nuclear weapons testing, increase funding for foreign operations, particularly State and USAID; and support the Millennium Development Goals.
These are all important goals, and I agree with every one of them — otherwise I would not have signed the letter. But the problem with such letters is that the laundry list approach often obscures the more fundamental issues here.
It also sometimes leads to the inclusion of stuff that doesn’t belong. For example, here’s one of the letter’s fifteen bullet points:
Transmit to Congress with the FY2010 budget a separate national security and international affairs budget that includes funding for Foreign Operations, Homeland Security, and Defense. The justification for this separate budget should highlight how the four agencies that support national security (DOD, Homeland Security, USAID, and the State Department) complement one another to make America and the world more safe.
That’s a valid issue, one that I wholly support. But does it really belong in this letter? It certainly doesn’t have the same oomph as, say, closing Guantanamo or reengaging on climate change negotiations.
I don’t mean to pick on that one point, or to suggest it isn’t important. But no matter how valid it may be, it’s in the weeds, not part of the big picture. It certainly shouldn’t be listed as one of fifteen most important things the Obama Administration should do to change the direction of U.S. foreign policy — so essential that, as the letter puts it, the new administration should take action “in the first six months of {Obama’s] Administration.” In fact, I can think of a number of other issues that are more important, from fixing the international financial institutions to reengaging with the United Nations, from ending genocide in Darfur to ending the conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, from better relations with China to fixing U.S. policy towards the Americas.
And if it is that important, couldn’t the letter’s organizers have come up with a shorter, pithier way to say it? After all, framing the message is a key part of what makes it successful. I would have gone with something along the lines of “work with Congress to fix the problems with the existing national security and international affairs budgeting process.” That pretty much states the issue in plain language that those outside the Beltway can understand (and in the process would have made the case that it was worthy of being included on the list).
The reality is that the inclusion of such talking points may have pleased some of the letter’s signers, but it has obscured the essential message: that the United States needs to move away from the ad hoc, thoughtless and often reckless approach of the Bush Administration and toward more thoughtful, responsible, and cooperative engagement with the rest of the world.
That, not the laundry list, is what’s most important.
Of course it would be great if the Administration also moved quickly on the laundry list too.