Thoughts on the Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy

Chris Coyne

Yesterday evening I participated in a panel at GMU on "Political and Economic Change in the Middle East."  Each panelist had a few minutes for comments followed by open Q&A.  My initial comments are below the fold.

 

I would like to highlight two points that I hope we can discuss further during the Q&A.

 

First, what is happening in the Middle East is an indictment of U.S. 'nation building' and more specifically the idea that social change toward freedom must be initiated by outsiders.  Consider that the U.S has now been in Afghanistan for nearly 10 years and have been unable to ‘win the hearts and minds’ of Afghan citizens.  In Egypt it was a matter of weeks between the initial indigenous uprising and Mubarek’s resignation.

 

The spontaneous and unexpected events in Egypt, and the Middle East more broadly, highlight the flaws in the planning mentality that underpins most, if not all, U.S. foreign interventions.  This view holds that (1) certain societies are unable to move towards freedom without outside assistance and (2) that the complex array of institutions that underpin societies are the result of some ‘grand plan’ which can be engineered by experts. 

 

Of course there is no way of knowing whether the uprisings in the Middle East will ultimately result in increased freedom.  What we do know is that this outcome is at least a possibility, as is liberation and change from within.

 

At a minimum, the events in the Middle East should cause increased humility in the ongoing interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as other potential future foreign interventions.  We should recognize that the U.S. is not very good at predicting or facilitating social change abroad.  In addition to the ongoing issues in Afghanistan and Iraq, consider that U.S. intelligence agencies, arguably the best in the world, were unable to foresee the events in the Middle East.  What better evidence that social change can not only occur from within, but that it is an enormously complex process that cannot possibly be understood by the best and brightest experts whose sole job it is to understand these things?

 

I am skeptical that these lessons will be learned by policymakers any time soon.  Even in the wake of these indigenous spontaneous revolutions, the planning mentality continues as illustrated by the Obama administration’s call for an "orderly transition to democracy” in Egypt, implying that such change is a neat and linear process.

 

The second point that I would like to raise is that the events in Egypt, and the Middle East more broadly, provide an excellent opportunity to reconsider the longtime U.S. practice of giving foreign aid to the world’s worst dictators. 

 

Egypt has received over $25 billion in U.S. development assistance, and over $40 billion in U.S. military assistance, since Mubarek assumed power in 1981.  President Obama’s fiscal year 2011 budget requested $1.5bn in aid for Egypt, with $1.3bn of that total allocated toward the military.  Moving beyond Egypt, a recent article in Fortune noted that from 2007 to 2010 the U.S. Defense Department requested that Congress approve arms packages to Middle Eastern countries totaling $180 billion.  Over $100 billion of this has been under the Obama administration.  We should recognize and critically discuss the tension between the U.S. being a supposed champion of peace and freedom while simultaneously being the world’s lord of war.

 

These are not the only cases of the U.S. providing assistance to the world’s worst governments.  Every year Parade magazine compiles a list of the “World’s Worst Dictators.”   The U.S. has given some form of aid to each of the countries on the list at some point in time.  Keep in mind that the leaders of these countries are the worst of the worst.  These are people who are willing to maim, rape, and murder innocent adults and children in order to maintain their hold on power.  

 

One justification for giving aid to these countries is that it allows the U.S. to achieve broader strategic goals associated with its national interest.  If this is true, then the U.S. government should drop the rhetoric of “democracy,” “self-determination” and “human rights.”  Instead, in the name of transparency, a hallmark of liberal democracy which the U.S. claims to represent and uphold, the U.S. government should simply admit that it is paying off the most repugnant leaders in the world to further its national interests, despite the significant costs that this imposes on ordinary citizens who must live under these governments.  Life is about trade-offs and we might as well be honest about them instead of pretending we can have our freedom-promoting cake and eat it too.

 

Another common justification is that the provision of aid is necessary in order to reform the poorly-performing governments in these countries.  In theory, if effective government reforms are undertaken with the assistance of aid, this will result in development and other benefits for citizens.  However, this justification for aid has problems.  The aid community works through the governments in the recipient countries to design and implement reforms.  This means that the source of the problem—the predatory state—is tasked with playing a central role in solving the problem of which its very existence is the cause.  The result is the well-known pitfalls of aid such as increased corruption and issues of aid effectiveness.  The bigger question we need to ask ourselves is why we would expect the world’s most brutal dictators to suddenly act in the public interest by adopting reforms which ultimately reduce their power? 

 

Although there has been focus on ‘good governance’ by those in the international aid community, we still lack a good grasp of how to go about getting effective constraints on the grabbing hand of the state where they do not exist.  One thing we do know is that absent these constraints, funneling millions, if not billions, of dollars of aid into these countries will not only fail to achieve increased freedom, but will cause significant harms to innocent people in the process.

Comments

[Richard Ebeling]

It seems to me that the only reasonable approach to current government foreign policy practices is the privatization of foreign policy.

Each individual in a free society should be at liberty to make his own choice as to whether or not to support some foreign cause, such as a civil war against some faraway tyrant or to give support to a peaceful people who have been invaded by some aggressive power.

That support may include financial contributions of a "humanitarian" sort, or helping to supply arms to the cause being supported, or volunteering to go oneself to fight for that cause (for free or for monetary compensation).

We have seen this before, such as those who went and fought on the "Republican" side of the Spanish Civil War against Franco's fascist side. They were members of the George Washington and Abraham Lincoln Brigades. Most of them were "lefties" or communists. But that's the point. That was their business if they wished to fight for the side and cause they believed in. (Just as the character that actress, Maggie Smith, played in the movie, "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie," supports Franco, as a "great man.")

This solves the dilemma, for instance, of Americans who may be Jewish having to see their tax dollars going to support some Arab dictator who speaks out or supports terror against Israel; and any Arab-Americans who object to their tax dollars going to support Israel and what they may view as Israel's unjust occupation policies in the West Bank.

At the same time, from a Hayekian perspective, each individual knows his own circumstances as to how best he may consider it possible, appropriate, or desirable to support some foreign cause, or not to support some such cause, based on his judgment concerning the "pros" and "cons" of the two sides in that foreign conflict; and his own subjective opportunity cost judgment as to how important it is for him to support one side or another in such a foreign conflict, relative to what would have to be foregone for him to do so.

What, then, becomes the far more limited "foreign policy" of the government? To protect the American citizenry from any foreign invasion and attack, with American military forces confined within the traditional three-mile limit off the U.S. shore.

Richard Ebeling

[Richard Ebeling]

If I may add, for anyone interested in such a case for the privatization of foreign policy, I made the argument for this in a wider context in an article entitled, 'World Peace, International Order, and Classical Liberalism,' in the "International Journal of World Peace", Vol. XII, No. 4 (December 1995) pp. 47-68.

Richard Ebeling

[McKinney]

Excellent points! Of course, you know you're asking for the moon by asking that politicians be humble?

[K Sralla]

"the U.S. is not very good at predicting or facilitating social change abroad"

That is too generous. Predictive skill in these types of events approaches zero, yet a few U.S. foreign policy makers (from both mainstream political parties) still exhibit a type of fatal conceit in thinking that they are able to design the desired outcomes (mostly at the end of a gun barrel).

“The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.”

They must be reminded over and over and over again the "oughts" and the "cans".

[Cyril Morong]

Did anyone see this article in The New Yorker "The Tyrant Tax?"

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2011/03/07/110307ta_talk_surowiecki

He says that a big part of the problem is that they stifle entrepreneurship in the Middle East

[Mario Rizzo]

Each time opportunities for intervention arise there are people out there trying to make a "humanitarian" case for US/NATO/UN intervention. Given the various dangers and problems of intervention and the abysmal ignorance of the American public about foreign nations (and, I should add, of the US's government experts), we ought to promote a DOGMA of non-intervention. This is the root wisdom of so-called isolationism.

[Jerry O'Driscoll]

Not just US intelligence agencies, but Israel's were caught flat-footed by events in Egypt. Steve Hanke has a column in Global Asia using an upated Barro misery index to asses the MENA countries. The indices in the affected countries were generally quite high. Intelligence agenices underestimate economic factors.

[Jerry O'Driscoll]

Soryy - I meant to commend Chris for his comments.

[emma]

I listen to the FFT guys over at they called the stockmarket crash back in 08 and this middle east
crisis. Well worth having a look at.

They also have a controversial ebook coming out next week called U.S. SECRET HIDDEN TREASURE MAP!
http://www.forecastfortomorrow.com/news/products looks intresting

[Ed Weick]

What if the 'nation building' idea is a decoy. What if the actual primary US objective in Afghanistan is to control the 'tera firma' for the purpose of controling the vast mineral resourses and also for controling the physical space between Iran and Pakistan?

Being there already 10 years has a different spin to it when examined through these policy
lenses.

Ed

[True Religion Outlet]

A life, a fulfilling life, a rich life includes ups and downs, includes pain and getting up again, includes failure and getting up again.

[Supra Shoes]

I dont Agree with this Sensus As its by Lockheed martin who make Deadly weapons that have killed millions of small innocent children. It would be against my own law to do this sensus.so it is being returned back to sender ,No Contract!!!And also a big waste of money.