 
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
              
|
Weekend Perspectives: America the exceptional We are a world unto ourselves. Yet, as patriots, we must understand others Saturday, July 03, 1999 By Schuyler Foerster
The Fourth of July. As usual, a day of flags, parades, fireworks, baseball and family barbecues - a day to celebrate what it means to be American.
There's a lot to celebrate. The American "experiment" is 223 years young.
Despite our share of mistakes, we're still a beacon to many around the world. To invoke Winston Churchill, democracy is a messy form of government, but it's better than all the alternatives.
If you only know America in the 1990s, you might believe that war is a video game in which American casualties are a rarity, that double-digit growth in the stock market is the norm, and that the United States' dominant position in the world is part of the natural order. Success is a powerful hallucinogen.
Patriotism should not invite narcissism. We must certainly look inward - both at our successes and our shortcomings. We must look outward as well. What happens in the rest of the world will determine how this experiment prospers in the future.
And it's a messy world.
The United States leads the information revolution - the third great transformation in human history, following the agricultural and industrial revolutions. We are "plugged in" to a world that straddles all three.
American culture is inescapable across the planet, stimulating fans and fanatics alike. In return, economic implosion and political chaos in faraway capitals provoke the largest drops on Wall Street. Human and environmental tragedies across the globe become personal - provided the media bring them to us. Globalization is not a choice but a reality.
As Americans, we are still confused about what role we should play. We still call this the "post-Cold War world" because we don't know what else to call it.
We have always argued about our relationship with the rest of the world.
George Washington warned against "entangling alliances," a sentiment lingering in 20th-century isolationism. Yet, in 1917, 1941 and again in 1947 - with our policy to contain the Soviet Union - the United States asserted itself. Each time, we responded to a direct and substantial threat - to "make the world safe for democracy," or to fight the extremes of fascism and communism. Each time, we debated whether we had the responsibility and the resources to assume such a role.
Now - unlike World War I, World War II or the Cold War - there is no single adversary to focus America's response. We face new threats, such as ethnic conflict, civil strife, terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and the growing availability of ballistic missiles. They cast a shadow over our security and our interests, both at home and abroad.
Unlike 1917, 1941 and 1947, these forces do not have a single name or a face. Instead, there are many local names and faces, and our response is more local than global.
In the past year, the World Affairs Council heard from policy-makers, scholars and political leaders-including the Dalai Lama. Their topics included Russia's political and economic implosion, the difficult search for peace in places like Ireland and the Middle East, the new face of terrorism, Saddam's intransigence in Iraq, the future of China, the road to recovery from the Asian economic "flu," the promise and challenge of a global economy, conflicts in Bosnia and Kosovo, and the dilemmas of American leadership in a changing world.
A question haunted these discussions, posed more by students than adults - what does it mean to be the "world's only superpower" if we can't always influence others the way we want?
There is no easy answer. Political instability and insecurity remain a normal condition of international affairs, however much we wished that the end of the Cold War proved otherwise. Perhaps they are the real "enemy."
The global changes assaulting each of us often increase prosperity - yet, for others, they make their lives more insecure, their societies more prone to conflict.
Perhaps power isn't what it used to be.
Over the past two weeks, the World Affairs Council hosted dozens of high school students and teachers looking at the United States' role in the world. I asked what motivated American foreign policy-power or values? They answered, "power." Then we turned to a hypothetical foreign policy problem; they argued about values. They concluded that values were an essential part of national power. The issue was not just whether the United States exercised leadership, but also how.
Leaders need to have others willing to follow. Correct. A-plus.
If values matter, we must recognize that others on this planet may not share the same perspectives as we. It may not be a contradiction after all for "the world's only superpower" to need others to help protect our interests around the globe. Others may have strengths we don't. And if values matter, we need some consensus on what we stand for as a nation.
America needs a conversation about our interests, values and priorities. It's a new world full of promise and peril. This is not starry-eyed idealism, but an essential part of effective leadership.
Amid the demands of our daily lives, we may be losing the kind of informed citizenry necessary for that conversation. But we have also found considerable interest among young and old alike, once the ideas are put before them. We need to show how and why the world is relevant to their lives. We need to ensure our communities and schools are prepared to discuss America's role in the world.
It's the patriotic thing to do.
|
||||||||||||||||||||
