The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities by John J. Mearsheimer

 

Mearsheimer's most recent (2018) book

John Mearsheimer: controversial IR theorist, especially viz. Ukraine-Russia

John Mearsheimer, a professor of international relations at the University of Chicago, has been in the news of late. Such notoriety seems unlikely for what would otherwise be an obscure professor (outside the world of academia and government). But Mearsheimer is a proponent of what he terms “offensive” and “structural” realism as the best understanding of how nations behave toward one another. In short, a conceptual framework that attempts to gauge whether we will enjoy peace or suffer war. Among Mearsheimer’s opinions, based on his conception of realism, has been a long-standing series of warnings about NATO expansion toward Russia and about the West becoming too involved in the status of Ukraine. This concern about NATO expansion and Ukraine, in particular, is not recent. He wrote about the topic extensively in 2014, when Putin grabbed Crimea from Ukraine and began his effort to eventually grab the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. But Mearsheimer’s concern with Ukraine goes back even further. In 1993, Mearsheimer published an article in Foreign Affairs arguing that Ukraine should retain the nuclear weapons that fell into its hands with the collapse of the Soviet Union. (“The Case for a Ukrainian Nuclear Deterrent.”) In this piece, Mearsheimer presciently argues:

A nuclear Ukraine makes sense for two reasons. First, it is imperative to maintain peace between Russia and Ukraine. That means ensuring that the Russians, who have a history of bad relations with Ukraine, do not move to reconquer it. Ukraine cannot defend itself against a nuclear-armed Russia with conventional weapons, and no state, including the United States, is going to extend to it a meaningful security guarantee. Ukrainian nuclear weapons are the only reliable deterrent to Russian aggression. If the U.S. aim is to enhance stability in Europe, the case against a nuclear-armed Ukraine in unpersuasive. (p.50-51.) 

Mearsheimer continues: 

A war between Russia and Ukraine would be a disaster. Great power wars are very costly and dangerous, causing massive loss of life and worldwide turmoil, and possibly spreading to involve other countries. The likely result of that war? Russia's reconquest of Ukraine would injure prospects for peace throughout Europe. It would increase the danger of a Russian-German collision, and sharply intensify the security competition across the continent. 

A conventional war between Russia and Ukraine would entail vast military casualties and the possible murder of many thousands of civilians. Russians and Ukrainians have a history of mutual enmity; this hostility, combined with the intermixing of their populations, raises the possibility that war between them could entail Bosnian style ethnic cleansing and mass murder. This war could produce mil lions of refugees clamoring at the borders of Western Europe. 

In addition, there are 14 operational nuclear reactors in Ukraine that might produce new Chernobyls if left unattended or attacked during a conventional war. The consequences of such a war would dwarf the death and suffering in the Balkans, where more than 50,000 people have died since the summer of 1991. Needless to say, if nuclear weapons were used the costs would be immeasurable. 

There is also the threat of escalation beyond the borders of Russia and Ukraine. For example, the Russians might decide to reconquer other parts of the former Soviet Union in the midst of a war, or might try to take back some of Eastern Europe. Poland and Belarus might join forces with Russia against Ukraine or gang up with Ukraine to prevent a Russian resurgence. The Germans, Americans or Chinese could get pulled in by their fear of a Russian victory. (Doubters should remember that the United States had no intention of fighting in Europe when war broke out in 1914 and again in 1939.) Finally, nuclear weapons might be used accidentally or purposefully against a third state. 

The security environment in Europe would certainly become heated and competitive in the wake of a Russian war with Ukraine. Other great powers would move quickly and sharply to contain further Russian expansion. The Russians would then think seriously for security reasons about controlling their many smaller neighbors. Other great powers would move to check them. Ukrainian nuclear weapons are the only reliable deterrent to Russian aggression. 

One might expect the burden of deterring a resurgent Russia to fall to an American-dominated NATO, in effect, bringing back the Cold War order that kept Europe at peace for 45 years. (p.52-54.) 

I could continue the quote for some length, but I assume by now you have Mearsheimer’s point, and you appreciate the accuracy of his analysis. (I highly commend the entirety of the article to you. And if you want more articles by him, go to his website: https://www.mearsheimer.com/. And be sure and appreciate the faux portrait. ) 

Why all of this background for a review of Mearsheimer’s most recent book, The Great Delusion (2018)? First, I want you to understand why I chose to read this book. Given all that Mearsheimer has stated about Ukraine and Russia, I wanted a deeper background. This book does have some discussion of the situation in Ukraine that meshes with his previous writing on the topic. Also, I’d read his The Tragedy of Great Power Politics near the time of its original publication in 2001, and I found it an accessible and comprehensive guide to Mearsheimer’s thinking about realism. And like The Tragedy, The Great Delusion is a comprehensive, learned, and accessible guide to Mearsheimer’s thought about liberalism in foreign policy. And--spoiler alert--he thinks very poorly of it. 

Before going further with Mearsheimer’s critique of liberalism in foreign policy (especially in contemporary U.S. foreign policy), I should make it clear that Mearsheimer clearly states his preference for a liberal democratic nation-state. But his enthusiasm for liberalism ends at the water’s edge. For in addition to liberalism, two other factors contend with liberalism (and other forms of domestic political arrangements) in guiding a nation’s behavior towards other nation-states: nationalism and realism. And to jump again to a Mearsheimer conclusion: both considerations of nationalism and realism trump liberalism’s aspirations when it comes to issues of foreign policy. This is so even in U.S. foreign policy, despite ongoing U.S. aspirations to establish a liberal hegemony throughout as much of the world as possible. 

Mearsheimer is excellent in providing a taxonomy of contemporary liberalism. He identifies “modus vivendi liberalism, which is essentially classical liberalism defined by primary concerns for negative liberty or “freedom from” and that tends toward libertarianism, and “progressive liberalism,” which is concerned with providing its citizenry with opportunities and promotes conceptions of positive freedom, or “freedom to,” the ability to live in an environment that maximizes opportunities and that uses government to provide such an environment. Mearsheimer also identifies two close relatives of liberalism, utilitarianism and “liberal idealism” (which was very prominent in nineteenth-century Britain via T.H. Green and others). Mearsheimer concludes that “progressive liberalism” is now the dominant variety, with, for instance, the application of Keynesian and monetary economics to smooth economic turbulence. (We saw this in spades with the economic stimulus during the height of the COVID pandemic.) 

But while Mearsheimer expresses no significant reluctance about the practice of progressive liberalism domestically, he finds liberal attitudes inadequate when trying to apply its principles abroad. The reality of nationalism and the structure of the international political arena (anarchical) don't work with liberalism. Here, too, Mearsheimer, thoroughly, fairly, and accurately presents the realities of nationalism and realism. Nationalism, now reflected in the dominance of the nation-state system, is a potent force that all states must reckon with, both domestically and in foreign relations. As Mearsheimer notes, nationalism has overwhelmed ideas of class and ideology in defining relations among nations in ways that both liberal democracies and Marxist regimes couldn’t appreciate. Vietnam fought a war with the French and then the U.S. based much more on nationalism than on commitment to Marxist doctrine. Then after defeating the U.S., Vietnam battled its Marxist neighbors China and Cambodia. I should note (as Mearsheimer does) that Vietnam currently enjoys good relations with the U.S. because the Vietnamese (as good realists) share a common commitment with the U.S. and other nations to check Chinese power in Southeast Asia. This current relationship with the U.S. enhances, not threatens, Vietnamese nationalism. 

In addition to serving as a leading exponent of the realist tradition in international relations (a lineage that can be traced back to the ancient Greek, Thucydides), Mearsheimer is an outspoken critic of U.S. foreign policy as practiced by recent Republican and Democrat administrations. Why? Because, as he argues at length in this book, liberalism doesn’t work as an export. Only in a unipolar world (a world with only one dominant great power) could such a project be undertaken, as it was in the immediate post-Cold War era.  But now, with the rise of China and the residual military might of Russia, we no longer live in a unipolar world. And, as Mearsheimer points out, in any event, U.S. efforts to export democracy to unwilling nations have failed miserably at great cost to the U.S. Iraq and Afghanistan provide only the two most recent and dramatic instances of failure to forcibly export democracy and the rule of law. And for its effort, the U.S. has suffered a decline in its own democratic norms and commitment to the rule of law. 

Mearsheimer prosecutes a strong case. He makes a persuasive argument. He emphasizes the structural imperatives reflected in realism. In brief, there are the strong and the weak among nations, and there is no 9-1-1 to call in the event of an emergency. Therefore, there’s an imperative to be among the strong, including the use of alliances. All true, I agree. But in weighing threats and the power dynamics behind any threats, Mearsheimer doesn’t address the nature of regimes, at least not directly. He doubts democratic peace theory, economic interdependence theory, and international institutions theory as guarantors—or even as promotors—of peace. But he neglects to consider how regimes contribute to the mix. For example, as he notes, liberal democracies have to jump through more hoops—including pleasing (or cajoling) their voting public—to pursue any foreign adventures. Of course, it's been done; the U.S. provides too many examples. But popular descent can throw sand in the works, unlike authoritarian regimes like Putin’s Russia, where dissent, even internal (intra-government) dissent is quashed.

But more importantly to an argument about the limits of realism, some borders, once hotly contested, have become pacific. In the early nineteenth century the U.S. took the territory it coveted from Mexico, and many in the U.S. had their eyes on Canada during that same period. But now no armies patrol those borders. (In the U.S., border patrols and vigilantes monitor, but that’s because so many in Latin America want to come to the U.S., not because the U.S. covets those territories or the U.S. fears an invasion by the Mexican army.) And could any president to date have gotten the U.S. behind a war to conquer Canada? The imperialist ideology of the nineteenth and early twentieth century might have garnered some support for such ventures (witness the result of the Spanish-American War), but now? I think not. The nature of our regime, including the electorate, has changed. In realist theory, Canadians should perpetually be nervously scanning their southern border: their neighbor to the south is bigger: bigger population, bigger economy, bigger armed forces (including nukes), and it’s more militaristic.  Yet, the Canadians, I don't believe, live in fear of a U.S. invasion. How does realist theory explain this? As far as power dynamics go, is this so different from Russia and Ukraine? 

Let’s consider a hypothetical. Canada remains Canada, but the U.S. falls to an authoritarian regime. A strongman [sic] has taken over. Predictably, except for a privileged few (let’s call them oligarchs or plutocrats if you’re old-fashioned), things are going poorly in the U.S. The economy is a wreck, people are constrained from exercising their traditional rights, and popular discontent is on the rise. Americans have begun looking north to how well Canadians are doing with a government committed to liberal democracy and the rule of law. In fact, the migration of U.S. citizens to Canada has increased dramatically. The U.S. rulers begin talking about how the U.S. and Canada are really much the same, with so many shared traditions. Really, the strongman [sic] argues, the Manifest Destiny of the U.S. (taken out and dusted off) is to encompass the whole of North America. Might a U.S.-Canadian war break out? 

Mearsheimer would suggest the more likely scenario would be if Canada decided to become an ally of China. Then the U.S. would consider war against Canada to stem a Chinese encroachment so close to the U.S. (citing the Monroe Doctrine, no doubt). But while I wouldn’t disagree with Mearsheimer's counter-scenario, I don’t believe that it negates mine, nor would I consider his scenario the more likely. My point is that regimes make a difference. The culture, the political system, the traditions, the discourse, and all the beliefs of those active in a nation-state count toward whether and to what extent a realist paradigm becomes the dominant mode of relations between (or among) various nation-states. The constitutions and cultures of Japan and Germany are different now than they were at the beginning of WWII. Their geography didn’t change, but their regimes did, including the friends they kept (the alliances that they joined). Also, the popular culture in each nation was greatly pacified by the defeat both suffered in the war. These and other factors greatly affected the policies and actions of their decision-makers. Of course, realistic considerations have always played a role in their thinking, and of late, significant trends toward re-armament have gained traction in both Germany and Japan; but even so, they move only slowly and cautiously. 

So is Mearsheimer right that the West is at “fault” for the current war in Ukraine? Let me ask you this: A person enters a neighborhood known for its muggers, and the person knows of this danger. The person has every right to be there and to be free from harm. The person chooses to walk through the neighborhood, and sure enough, gets mugged. Is the person at fault? Does the person who exercised a perfectly legitimate right in a peaceful, non-threatening manner deserve the blame? By the way, the mugger, upon being confronted, defended himself by saying that he didn’t want “their type” in our neighborhood. Besides, the mugger says, the person kept bad friends (hostile to the mugger and his group), and they might have weapons. Again, is the person mugged at fault? Should the cops, who warned the person not to enter this bad neighborhood, decline to act because the person acted foolishly in picking this route? “Rights be damned, you’re a fool, and you have to pay the price,” says the cop standing down. Is this the course the cops should take?

To be clear, Mearsheimer isn’t arguing in favor of Putin’s invasion, nor does he support Putin’s cause. Mearsheimer is only saying that the whole bad situation could have been avoided with the exercise of greater prudence (to wit, a realist analysis of the dynamics of the situation). He has a point, but we're in it now. The cops have arrived (or at least are providing assistance to the person amid the mugging), so how far should they—should we—go? How much should we--the U.S., NATO--risk in defense of Ukraine? Should the mugger walk away with the victim's purse, or even the victim's life, with impunity?

There are no easy, clearly right or wrong answers here. And, however you come down on these issues, Mearsheimer’s analysis provides a bracing tonic against wishful thinking and continuing fantasies. Liberalism, especially U.S. liberalism that seeks export abroad, is called to question in a detailed and knowledgeable exposition that challenges the status quo. We’d all be advised to take heed and govern ourselves accordingly. 

Putin and climate change: 2 maladies, 1 treatment: A Guest Op-Ed from the Pueblo Chieftain by Stephen N. Greenleaf

Below is an op-ed piece that was published in THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN on 20 March of this year. The only update I might add is that I've learned more about the persistent and compelling evidence of the harm caused by air pollution from burning fossil fuels. The switch away from fossil fuels addresses three maladies instead of just two. It would prove a trifecta win and not just a twofer. What was published:

"Putin and climate change: 2 maladies, 1 treatment"

Your Turn

Stephen Greenleaf

Guest columnist

The term 'polycrisis' describes the current state of the world. It denotes the fact that we find ourselves in the midst of more than one crisis at a time. Most recently, we faced the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic dislocation caused by the pandemic. Now, we face the return of war to Europe with the brutal invasion of Ukraine by the Putin regime. And we still have the continuing (and increasing) reality of climate change with which we must deal, which we haven’t yet done on the scale required.

In the face of these multiple challenges, we can deploy a response that would effectively address two huge concerns with one stroke: We immediately and aggressively reduce our consumption of fossil fuels.

As to the immediate threat of Putin’s aggression, a reduction of our consumption of fossil fuels aids the current sanctions regime that seeks to starve the beast. More than one commentator has described Russia as 'a gas station with nukes.' We can shut down (or at least cripple) the gas station by not buying the gas.

To be clear, at present, the U.S. is a net petroleum exporter. We purchase relatively little petroleum from Russia, and a complete cut-off will not limit U.S. supplies of oil or gas. The restrictions on imports from Russia won’t have much direct impact on U.S. energy prices, although worldwide we can expect higher prices.

This is because the market for petroleum is worldwide, with multiple global players, like Saudi Arabia. The Saudis and other petroleum exporters will affect oil and gas prices by deciding how much petroleum to produce. Also, the volatility in oil and gas prices, with sharp increases and drops, is a continuing characteristic of the global fossil fuels market. Increasing America’s oil and gas development and drilling, which some propose as a response to Putin’s aggression, would not have any significant impact on the high prices we are seeing at the pump now.

As long as we are dependent on fossil fuels, we’ll continue to be subject to manipulation of supplies and prices by the Gulf States and other large producers, like Russia. A clean energy economy would be our surest path towards stable and lower energy prices, and true energy independence from foreign producers.

Over the longer term, decreased use and dependence on fossil fuels will mean fewer dollars for Putin. Of course, reduced demand would result in fewer dollars paid to all fossil fuel providers, including oil and gas companies in the U.S. But they know (and have known for a long time) that the world must eventually drastically reduce our consumption of fossil fuels.

Indeed, those European nations who oppose Putin’s aggression now have — and will increasingly have — access to cheaper alternative systems of energy, including renewables and other forms of clean energy. Accelerating the shift to renewable energy appears to be part of their short- and long-term strategies for opposing Russian aggression.

In addition to the moral and strategic imperatives to reduce fossil fuel consumption to counter Putin’s menace, accelerating our shift to renewable energy will reduce the pollution that fuels increasing global climate change. We have procrastinated in making the necessary transition to cleaner energy for over 30 years. Now the opportunity for gaining a strategic advantage over a hostile adversary should spur us to take the necessary actions that we have so long delayed. More foot-dragging only aids Putin and costs us more.

And remember, greater domestic production of fossil fuels in response to Putin’s aggression would put us further behind in facing up to climate reality. This merely threatens to pull the pin on a slow-motion grenade that will hurt us all. In short, the more petroleum that remains in the ground, the safer we all become. For the well-being—and even survival—of our children and grandchildren, we need to walk away from the fossil fuels that finance Russian aggression and that poison our Earth.

It’s unfortunate that Congress has not yet adopted a carbon fee and dividend scheme that will collect a price on carbon that would be paid back to Americans as a dividend. These significant dividend payments would help ordinary Americans ride out the price instability baked into the global fossil fuels market, including a transition away from it to a clean energy system. And, with a price on carbon, the U.S. could lawfully apply a carbon border adjustment that would aid American businesses that run efficiently and on clean energy (and overall, that tend to be cleaner than many foreign competitors).

But it’s not too late to adopt and apply this win-win-win — for democracy, the Earth, and American consumers — solution. We can convert our current polycrisis into an opportunity to improve the lives of all Americans. We can act to help preserve democracy and the rule of law. And we can establish a cleaner, safer, and cheaper energy system that at the same time helps create a safer, more hospitable climate for our children and grandchildren.

Stephen Greenleaf is a retired lawyer living in Colorado Springs, who’s involved in advocating for national policies to address climate change."

Copyright © 2022 The Pueblo Chieftain, Pueblo, CO. 3/20/2022

Max Weber's "Politics as a Vocation:" The Concluding Paragraph

Max Weber: 1864-1920

 The following quote is the concluding paragraph of Max Weber's lecture (and later essay), “Politics as a Vocation,” first delivered in Munich in 1918 as fighting in the Great War had drawn to a close. This essay is one of the most important and stimulating reflections on political life that I know of. I return to it on occasion for perspective. The entire essay is less than 30 pages. I commend it to you. 

Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards. It takes both passion and perspective. Certainly all historical experience confirms the truth --that man would not have attained the possible unless time and again he had reached out for the impossible. But to do that a man must be a leader, and not only a leader but a hero as well, in a very sober sense of the word. And even those who are neither leaders nor heroesmust arm themselves with that steadfastness of heart which can brave even the crumbling of all hopes. This is necessary right now, or else men will not be able to attain even that which is possible today. Only he has the calling for politics who is sure that he shall not crumble when the world from his point of view is too stupid or too base for what he wants to offer. Only he who in the face of all this can say 'In spite of all!' has the calling for politics.

Liberalism in Dark Times: The Liberal Ethos in the Twentieth Century by Joshua L. Cherniss

 

2021 publication

Every once in a while we stumble into a book that seems tailor-made for the occasion. Over the Christmas holiday, I bought this book, having recently read a favorable review of it. (I don't recall where, alas.) And given that my reading list remains backed up for years (and I fear well beyond any reasonable hope of clearing in my lifetime), I could have chosen to start any number of worthy books. But  I chose this one. Why? I can't say for sure, but in looking back, I believe that the invasion of Ukraine by the Putin regime, along with the continuing threat of Trump and his ilk, played a role. But by whatever prompt, I'm very pleased that I selected and read this book. It is, as I referenced above, tailor-made for the times. 

I also selected this book because I recognized the names of those whose thought it explores: Max Weber, Albert Camus, Raymond Aron, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Isaiah Berlin, along with many other figures discussed or cited in this book.  I sometimes rue that education--my education-- was wasted on my callow youth, but--take heart teachers--sometimes planting a seed, even if it takes decades to fully bloom, brings about the desired blossom. Professor and instructors in the departments of History and Political Science introduced me to all of these thinkers, if not by direct assignment, then by reference. Indeed, the subtitle of this book refers to “dark times,” a term deployed by one of their peers, Hannah Arendt, which, along with the idea of a “time of troubles” were introduced to me as a student. When I think back, the 70s were not an easy time. American politics had to deal with the social and political turmoil of the 60s and the continuing competition between the liberal democratic regimes and the Marxist camps. Also, we experienced Watergate, the Vietnam War, and continuing forms of political unrest through much of the world. And the totalitarian threat remained real. Stalin had only died the year of my birth, while Mao still ruled in China. Thus, the thinker-actors considered in this book were all still quite topical in the 1970s. 

In addition to a thorough and considered examination of the legacy of these thinkers, Cherniss deploys a vocabulary that resonated deeply with me. Ethos, ethics, stance, posture, dirty hands, ruthlessness, and other such terms were prominent in the final political theory course I took as an undergraduate. (Hat tip to Professor (then Instructor) John S. Nelson for this class.) From where I am now, and in accord with Cherniss's argument, I find that these terms, these concerns, this mode of addressing the world of politics, goes to the very heart of the political enterprise. Not that laws, institutions, policies, and such don't count. They do. However, politics is a very human endeavor marked by speech and thus persuasion. Violence, the negation of politics, always lurks in the background, and one must understand that war (violence) isn't the continuation of politics by other means, but the cessation of politics, which comes about when politics fails. Thus, political leaders must contend not only with the plurality of views and words, but they must deal with violence or the threat of violence. There are, of course, political leaders, who, like Mao, believe political power emanates from the barrel of a gun. And some who wield the power of government believe that the utopian ends often justify ruthless means. This “realism” led to some of the greatest atrocities known to humankind. Terms like “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity” seem too sterile when addressing the horror perpetrated by individuals and regimes in the twentieth century, but we must start somewhere. 

In brief, all of these individuals opposed ruthless individuals and regimes and those who claimed to be only “realistic” and were excessively “Machiavellian.” (Poor Niccolò, I think, gets a bum rap with this usage, but the usage remains as if written in stone into our political vocabulary.). Cherniss provides detailed expositions of the thought of Camus, Aron, Niebuhr, and Berlin. (The consideration of Weber is less detailed, and Cherniss includes Gyorgy Lukacs as a foil to Weber's outlook.) Cherniss dubs these five thinkers, and others of their perspective, as “tempered liberals.” (With some hesitation expressed about Weber's bona fides as a liberal.) That is, these thinkers attempt to walk the tightrope between naïveté and excessive “realism” and “Machiavellianism.” They do so by attention to persons and situations, and they recognize the reality of competing values and goods. They tend to particular observations and appraisals, and they shy away from systems of thought and purely logical conclusions. They tend to write essays instead of tomes. They work to avoid suffering while recognizing that sacrifices often prove necessary. As one reads about each of these figures, one can see from our current position that they didn't always get things right (to the extent that we can identify what's right). But overall, they provided markers against which political actions could be appropriately judged. 

I should note that Weber's distinction between the “ethic of ultimate ends” and the “ethics of responsibility” is an insight and a guide that has been with me for a long time. And I never seem to go very long without thinking about the hard decisions political officials must make, such as whether to take half a loaf or none in regard to some legislation. Or whether to rest with some evil for the sake of peace or decide that some good merits the sacrifice of lives. So also with the work of Reinhold Niebuhr, perhaps the thinker amongst these five of whom I've read the most and the deepest. Like Weber and the others, Niebuhr walks a tightrope between realism (which include a theological position grounded in original sin) and the need for justice. And while Weber and Niebuhr have provided the greatest influence on my thinking from amongst these five, Cherniss's work prompts me to want to explore Camus, Aron, and Berlin in more depth. I realize that as much as I appreciate and admire Cherniss's summary and exploration of their work, his exposition points to the depth of what he's exploring. He allows me to see that there's much more in each of these thinkers than what he can share in a chapter. 

Finally, I asked myself: “Is this a work of history or of political theory?” The answer, I suggest, is that it's both. And that is as it should be. All political thought of lasting interest arises from the politics of the age in which it is produced. To understand concerns with ethos, ethics, dirty hands, stances, and the like is to be of a time. As throughout the parade of human life, we live in a world that is at once unique in the fleeting now and yet that follows paths laid down by generations before us. History provides a rough guide, but only a rough guide, a map of the terrain without the details. Thus, history provides a path to self-knowledge, both collectively and individually, but it doesn't provide a running commentary. We have to explore the sites on our own. And while history doesn't repeat itself, it does rhyme. (I know this is an old chestnut, a cliché, but it harbors too much truth to ignore.) Thus, while we are not repeating the 1930s, we can certainly discern its echoes as a land hungry dictator marches his armies without justification into a neighboring nation in Eastern Europe. And in the wider world, democracy and liberalism have been under attack and have seemed to wane. Even in the U.S., where fascist-style populism and authoritarianism threatened but was turned aside during the Great Depression, has recently experienced fascist-style populism allowed demagogue and wanna-be authoritarian to gain the presidency. And even as I write this little man (intellectually, morally) leads polls for the presidency despite the continuing revelation of his overtly criminal activities. So, yes, “tempered liberalism” is needed once again. We can't simply repeat the thoughts of these exemplars, but we can gain a great deal of wisdom and insight from their work, and we can hope that Joshua Cherniss continues to guide us in our quest. 

N.B. This book receives the highest ratings from me on Goodreads and Amazon (and anywhere else I could say so.) 

"How to Defeat Putin & Save the Planet" by Thomas Friedman w/ Introductory Commentary

 This is a MUST-READ piece from Tom Friedman. In short, he agrees with me and I with him. To wit, we need to move quickly away from fossil fuels to score a double-win. First, we can stop funding both sides of so many wars. We do so by our “addiction” (his word--appropriate) to fossil fuel. We finance petrostates like Putin's Russia, Saudi Arabia, the late Saddam Hussein, the thugs in Venezuela, and the Iranian regime. Need I go on? Our addiction to fossil fuels warps our entire foreign policy.

And the other half of the win? Climate change. This past month, temperatures in Antarctica have been 70F degrees above normal. In the Arctic, 50F above normal. I hope you don't own any oceanside property.

But some good news: renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels. By going electric--soon, fast--we can reduce the cost of energy that we use. We can also use less energy (let's be frank: we Americans are energy hogs) and we can develop more efficient systems.

Finally, the Biden Administration, like administrations before them, can stop going hat-in-hand to petrostates begging for more or less oil production, depending on the circumstances. The fossil fuel giants can see the end of their cash cow in sight & begin making plans for their demise. They have the money, and they've had the time to plan for the wind-down of their polluting ways. But we, the American people, have to accept that we must undertake this transition and that the price of fossil fuels will (and should) increase.

Now's the time. We can reduce a twin pair of evils by acting decisively now.

NYTIMES.COM

Opinion | How to Defeat Putin and Save the Planet

by Thomas Friedman

The Ups and Downs of Humanity: Can We Ever Exit the Roller-Coaster?

Machu Picchu: One of many examples

 

Like many who are interested in politics and history, I’m intrigued by the patterns and courses of political and other historical events. Who drives history? Is there an “end” to history? Is there (or will there be) a final stage of development from which no further significant change will occur in the human project? Or is there an end as in goal, the realization of an ideal to which we can only continue to aspire? (This is a key issue when we think about how to assess Francis Fukuyama’s well-known—and frequently mocked—work, The End of History and the Last Man (more on this work later). 

Lots of thinkers have identified patterns and goals in the course of historical events. The identification of cyclical patterns predominated from archaic times well into the Axial Age and the development of long-running cultures and civilizations. Like seasons, civilizations rose and fell. Early on, these patterns are found in chronicles of the rise and fall of Chinese dynasties, St. Augustine, the medieval Muslim thinker Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), and others. The tradition continues into modernity with Vico and Gibbon. In the twentieth century, some of the best-known figures in this tradition were Oswald Spengler (The Decline of the West) and Arnold Toynbee, with his monumental A Study of History. Both of these two twentieth-century thinkers build their theories on biological metaphors of growth and decline in the individual. One late-twentieth-century entry into this field was Joseph Tainter, who published his work, The Collapse of Complex Societies, in 1988. Tainter, an anthropologist, argued against Toynbee and others whose work he found too “mystical” or “literary.” Instead, Tainter argues that a society increases complexity to address declining returns on investments for energy.  (Abbreviated EROI: energy return on investment; i.e., the amount of energy a society expends to capture a given amount of energy for use.) In short, societies jerry-rig solutions to capture enough energy (food and fuel) to continue functioning. In time, however, the complex schemes to maintain standards collapse under the weight of the accumulated complexity. Soils deteriorate, forests are cut, water supplies dwindle or become polluted, and so on. 

In the early twenty-first century, the work of biologist and Cliodynamics founder, Peter Turchin, has gained attention. (Cliodynamics is the use of large data sets and statistical analysis to history to discern large-scale patterns and trends.) Turchin, along with historical sociologist Jack Goldstone, developed a theory of demographic-structural change that considers elite overproduction, population pressures, increasing immiseration of the laboring classes, and other factors to account for social unrest and revolution. These are the circumstances that bring down social, political, and economic regimes. Turchin also helped revive interest in the work of Ibn Khaldun, a medieval North African, who identified a pattern of initiative and decline within dynasties and regimes.

(For Turchin’s use of Ibn Khaldun and his identification of overall patterns, see his War and Peace and War: The Rise and Fall of Empires (2006); from an eerily accurate forecast of current American troubles and set into a complete theory, see Turchin’s Ages of Discord: A Structural-Demographic Theory of American History (2017); and for an update co-written with Jack Goldstone during the turbulent 2020 election season (and thus before the January 6 attack) see “Welcome to the “Turbulent Twenties’” (20 Sept. 2020).) 

With the advent of modernity—the European discovery and exploitation of the Americas and other parts of the world and the Scientific and Industrial Revolutions—another train of thought arose, that of Progress. The idea of progress largely displaced cyclical theories of history that provided accounts of rise and decline. 

Modernity and the attendant belief in a sense of progress began in Northern Europe and spread around the globe to the point where many of its beliefs and characteristics are nearly universal. At the same time, historical consciousness arose; that is, our ability to understand ourselves and our species as creatures in time that make decisions that create—at least in significant part—our future. Progress is cumulative; knowledge and materials of wealth begin to accumulate, such that each succeeding generation enjoyed a higher standard of living and (unevenly) shared welfare than the generation before it. This unprecedented increase in human welfare wasn’t shared equally (or equitably) within nations (i.e., between classes) nor between nations (i.e., rich and poor; “North” and “South;” “East” and “West”). Yet, from where we stand now in the twenty-first century, aggregate human welfare is immensely greater on an individual and aggregate basis than ever before in the human story. Ordinary people in widely dispersed locales throughout the globe know levels of material abundance and physical well-being that no royalty or aristocracy could have dreamed of achieving even a hundred years ago. 

But is there a worm in the apple? Have we as a species broken the chains of cycles? Are we on the path of endless Progress? As I write this, it most certainly seems not. 

But before exploring the above questions, there are other lines of thought that we should consider: dialectic thought and logic (Hegel and Marx provide the most prominent of examples); evolution (Darwin & Wallace); and process philosophy and thought (Whitehead & Hartshorne). Each of these trains of thought, beginning with Hegel in the late nineteenth century, adopts, at least in principle, some concept of progress. In Hegel, this is first conceived as “dialectic.” A short while later, the theory of evolution and natural selection set forth by Wallace and Darwin makes its appearance. The Hegelian-Marxist dialectic doesn’t arise from the study of biology but it begins by claiming to have identified the pattern of society and thought that moves toward a more or less ideal resolution. And while Hegelian and later Marxist conceptions of the movement of the dialectic became increasingly important in the nineteenth century, the idea of the dialectic was joined (and in many ways complemented by) the theory of evolution and natural selection. (Both theories were influenced by Malthus's theory of population and scarcity; Darwin accepted it, Marx contested it.) The theory of evolution by natural selection came into the public limelight with Darwin’s publication of The Origin of the Species (1859). With Darwin’s expositions of evolution and those of his supporters, evolution moved onto the main stage, influencing not only biology, but also philosophy, social sciences, political thought, and history. At least in the English-speaking world, Herbert Spencer, along with “Darwin’s bulldog,” T.H. Huxley, became the foremost proponents of Darwin’s insight. Unfortunately for the application of evolutionary perspectives and insights outside of biology, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, evolution became associated with Social Darwinism. This ideology misapplied Darwin’s insights in an attempt to justify social privilege, economic hierarchies, and racism. So while evolution became the unquestioned principle of biology, its application to society and culture became suspect. 

However, while the association with Social Darwinism stymied the application of evolutionary thinking to society and culture, evolutionary thinking continued on the fringes of social and political thought and philosophy. Figures like Henri Bergson, C.S. Pierce, William James, and Alfred North Whitehead all incorporated evolutionary thought into their own thinking. Whitehead’s “process philosophy” is an especially clear example of the marriage of evolutionary thought and contemporary physics to appreciate the continuing process of change at work in the universe. These thinkers didn’t write much about society, economics, or politics. But their insights and inspirations were applied by their successors to human affairs. Appreciations of change, creativity, and evolution were gaining traction, albeit slowly. 

Also in the twentieth century, thinkers outside the mainstream made similar contentions: the Indian independence leader and teacher Sri Aurobindo set forth the first iteration of “integral philosophy.”  The French Jesuit paleontologist, Teilhard De Chardin, identified the “noosphere” (a collective human mind of sorts) as an evolutionary phenomenon. The English solicitor and member of the Inklings, Owen Barfield, developed the concept of the “evolution of consciousness.” The Swiss thinker Jean Gebser developed a taxonomy of cultural changes that he dubbed “structures of consciousness.” These thinkers and others applied evolutionary thinking to humanity and, on the whole, helped create a hopeful, aspirational attitude about humankind even through the bloody, war-torn, and ofttimes horrific twentieth century. 

The heirs to these developmental and evolutionary thinkers from Hegel through Barfield (the most recently deceased (1997) on the list above) are the Integral thinkers, beginning with the work of Ken Wilber first published in the late 1970s. For those of you not acquainted with Integral thinking, in a nutshell, it's a school of thought that focuses upon evolutionary and developmental changes in individuals and groups (societies, cultures). I should be quick to add that individuals and societies proceed along a course of development at different rates and settle at varying levels of attainment. Individual lives display differing physical, mental, and spiritual levels of attainment. Also, individuals vary greatly in levels of attainment: some may be great athletes or scientists while remaining emotionally and spiritually stunted. And humankind as a whole has developed (evolved?) from its earliest manifestations through to today, with some societies realizing a totally new and often extraordinary level of knowledge and consciousness. In short, we know more about our world and ourselves than our ancestors and have a greater range of action and control than ever before. And not just concerning our physical environment, but also the level of our knowledge of our minds, our relationships, our emotions, and our relationship to reality as a whole. 

If you believe that this is an optimistic outlook, you've reached a fair conclusion. Looking back over the scan of human history (our time on this Earth as thinking beings—beings who can express themselves—we see huge gains in human knowledge, abilities, and consequently, human welfare. Integral thought, represented foremost by the work of Ken Wilber and Steve McIntosh, make strong cases for its perspective, detailed and comprehensive. Also, outside the circle of proponents of Integral Philosophy, other thinkers share this fundamental optimism. For instance, those identified by Carter Phipps as “Evolutionaries” in his 2010 book of that title. Across a wide variety of thinkers under the Integral umbrella and more broadly within Phipps’s catalog of Evolutionaries, we see a tale of human progress. (I suspect that most of these individuals eschew or would at least avoid the term “progress” because of its somewhat antiquated and checkered past, but still, in the end, the differences from some past uses of the term are not so great.) 

“The short twentieth-century” (1914-1991) witnessed a titanic three-way struggle between liberal democracy, fascism, and totalitarian communism. (More garden-variety forms of authoritarianism—strongmen, military juntas, and various forms of monarchy and aristocracy—all continued to exist but failed to compete in the great political-economic struggles of the twentieth century.) With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, liberal democracy was widely declared the winner. The liberal democracies, with the rule of law, democratic forms of decision-making, markets, conceptions of human rights and national self-determination, and individual freedoms (thought, expression, movement, etc.) became the dominant model on the world stage. Francis Fukuyama, writing first in a 1989 article, and then in a book, The End of History and the Last Man (1992), identified this triumph as a resolution of Hegel’s dialectic of master and slave (also sometimes translated from German as “lordship and bondage”). Fukuyama’s conception of the struggle for recognition is based on an interpretation of Hegel tendered by the twentieth-century French thinker Alexandre Kojève. This variety of Hegelian dialectic identified an ongoing struggle for “recognition” among peoples and individuals as the motor of history. (Marx later converted Hegel’s ideas on this matter into his concept of class struggle as the dynamic of history.) Fukuyama argued in his 1992 book that with the decline of communism as an attractive system and the seeming triumph of liberal democracy, the Hegelian dialectic of lordship and bondage had been resolved. The liberal democracies then ascendant had achieved a sufficient degree of universal recognition to have realized “the end (as the purpose) of history.” 

As Fukuyama noted in his book, this didn’t mean that events would no longer occur, and in that sense, history would continue. And he also noted the potential for a worm in the apple. He reminds of this in the title of the book, which is all too often truncated: “the end of history and the last man.” “The last man” nods toward Nietzsche’s concern about contentment in bourgeois society. And, as we all now realize, history did not stop. In fact, in many of the most significant events since 1992, we’ve witnessed history going backward: the genocide in the Balkans in the 1990s; radical Islamic terrorism in the early twenty-first century; a nearly worldwide financial collapse in 2008; a pandemic in 2020; and as I write this, a revanchist, strong-man regime in Russia has invaded a neighboring nation with only the flimsiest fig leaf attempting to cover its naked aggression. Contrary to whatever hope we might have held about the “end of history” as an end to violence and domination, we seem to be going backward. Why? 

Evolution is directional toward greater complexity. Increased complexity (at least up to a point) creates greater powers within a species by way of creating a greater array of adaptive behaviors and tools. And within humanity, biological and then cultural evolution has provided us with powers for self-guided creation. But species have flaws and vulnerabilities. A species must address vulnerabilities by genetic or behavioral adaptation to the changing environment, or the species crashes and burns; to wit, it becomes extinct. Biological evolution doesn’t provide an encouraging guide for us humans. Change in the environment is constant, but the magnitudes of diverse changes vary greatly. Contemporary humanity lives in the Anthropocene Age, in which humanity’s actions have themselves become a significant factor in molding our physical environment. The astonishing increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that fuel global temperature increases—and thus global climate change—provides the most obvious and alarming aspect of the reality of the Anthropocene. Can we adapt to or alter these changes that we have fueled? Can we alter our behaviors and actions that have triggered these changes? Can we stop ourselves from further imperiling our well-being as an entire species? 

If not, why not? 

To some extent, we must learn to guide our own evolution. But can we do this? Are there “bugs” in the human operating system or in our programs of society, politics, and economy, that remain so deeply impeded within our collective psyches that they prevent us from taking effective actions to preserve and enhance our well-being?  I proffer that we have bugs both at the deep level of our operating systems, bugs that are a part of human nature and the human condition; i.e., the situation that we are born into in the way of history, society, economic relations, and political relations. Can we debug humanity?

 

One fundamental reality facing each person is that of impending death. Individuals of all species experience death and thus a limited lifetime. We humans know of our mortality, even as we often work to shunt it aside, out of our awareness. Entropy creates the inevitability of death. It reflects the fact that any physical system runs down. Thus, no matter how fortunate we are and how careful we are, the reality of entropy will inevitably express itself as death, regardless of our physical, mental, or spiritual attainments. As embodied creatures, our reality is marked by the absolute finitude of time and energy available to us. 

But as a species, or as a group, the time and energy horizons available to us, while not infinite, are nevertheless nearly limitless. In principle, at least, we humans should have access to sufficient time and energy to allow us—if we act wisely—to continue to adapt to our environment. We have, in increasing measure, gained the ability to shape ourselves. After all, what is education but the molding of a person with the knowledge of the culture that has been accumulated over the eons? (Or it should be.)  What is any endeavor of self-development other than an effort to increase our knowledge and skills to shape our destinies through greater knowledge and wisdom? Any skills we gain allow us opportunities to shape ourselves and our environment in the most favorable ways. What is the value of the development of historical consciousness if not to gain of self-knowledge as a species and as a party of any sub-group (culture, civilization, nation-state, etc.)? And the same applies to individuals. We have gained—and continue to gain—greater knowledge about ourselves, collectively and individually. And because this project of self-knowledge is not complete, we can appreciate that one aim of the human project has been, and will remain for a long time to come, the achievement of self-knowledge. 

But what is the value of self-knowledge? Is it a matter of mere contemplation? A thing of beauty valuable only as a completed achievement? I think not. Not because self-knowledge isn’t in itself a thing of beauty—I have no doubt that it is (although, to be honest, I’m a long way from it.) No, we realize the value of self-knowledge in action more than through contemplation. Self-knowledge, from its most primitive manifestations to its most enlightened manifestations, is at the root of any reality of goodness, truth, and beauty. Only to the extent we act—consciously, intentionally, purposefully—can we realize self-knowledge and appreciate its value. The philosopher R.G. Collingwood (1889-1943) asserts that “all history is the history of human thought”. And what we think (at many levels) is manifest not only by our words but also by our deeds, our res gestae (deeds done). But note that communicating by words or images also constitutes a type of deed. In one manner of viewing the issues, all thoughts are a form of deeds; some manifest, most not. Thus, history consists of deeds, human actions marked by some level of thought and intention. History is not some grand design or a natural process but an account of human thoughts manifest as deeds. The natural processes that surround us and that we inhabit provide the scenery of human actions in which we humans create the stuff of history. 

So, the question is whether at this juncture of the human story, have we the ability—the power of thought and action—to shape our future and overcome the confining residue of our collective and individual greed, foolishness, and ignorance. Have we, as individuals, acting collectively, sufficient self-knowledge to act to save ourselves from the quandary into which we have placed ourselves? Can we—will we— act to deliver ourselves from the grave dangers that we have created? Yes, it’s possible that we can rectify our situation, that we can extricate ourselves from the plight into which we’ve placed ourselves. But how? 

Let me circle back here. If decline, decay, collapse, and such are a matter of entropy, the dissipation of energy within a system, then what we need is negentropy—-a flow of energy into a system. In what form? Foremost, we require energy in its most ethereal of forms: enthusiasm, drive, purpose, goal, thought, goodwill, determination. Here I harken the spirit of William James. We must realize that we are facing “the moral equivalent of war.” And, I hasten to add, I don’t believe that I’d have had the temerity to make this assertion but for the example in Ukraine that we’re now witnessing. In the face of brutal, overwhelming force, the leaders and people of Ukraine have refused to capitulate to the evil that has been brought to bear upon them. And in the rest of the world, especially in the liberal democracies, we’ve seen a coming together with a unity of purpose arising from a shared revulsion at the level of transgression and brutality displayed in the invasion. This shared response has triggered a willingness (so far) to sacrifice in the face of this manifest evil. Few (if any) thought this response possible before it became manifest. This Great Refusal will no doubt dissipate in some measure. It, too, will prove subject to the pressures of entropy, of decay, as time and hardships and frustration take their toll. But maybe it will prove enough to turn a tide. Maybe. It provides a necessary dose of hope that we can succeed when the chips are down. 

I posted an initial query based on these musings on the Developmental Politics group Facebook page, and I received several thoughtful responses to my musings. Among the responses was one from Steve McIntosh, the leader of the Developmental Politics group, the head of The Institute for Cultural Evolution, and a leading Integral thinker. McIntosh commented in response to my post: 

Decay, the force of entropy, is continuously breaking things down. Human history accordingly evinces regular events of destruction. Some of this is “creative destruction” (making way for something better). But often, we see merely “destructive destruction” (which counts as regression).

Cultural evolution is not predetermined, it is highly contingent and primarily “up to us.” So naturally, its course is marked by both growth and degrowth. Nevertheless, something more keeps coming from something less over the long term. The abiding possibility of cultural failure and regression (and its frequent occurrence), however, is necessary for freedom’s exercise to have moral meaning.

 I was particularly struck by McIntosh’s statement that “cultural evolution is not predetermined; it is highly contingent and primarily ‘up to us.’” This strikes me as undoubtedly true, and a really good news/bad news statement. Yes, human action can make a difference, but human indifference and ignorance (which precludes meaningful action) can muck it all up. Humanity, looking backward, especially over the last 250 years, has been riding a rocket of material development and knowledge acquisition that has gained momentum as it seeks to escape the pull of gravity. But have we enough thrust to escape the gravity of finitude? Of our own inherent weaknesses?  Economist Eric Beinhocker talks about the “great transition” ahead; and indeed, we do face one. If we pass it, we will look upon our past as a comedy, a happy ending. But if we fail, we will look upon the human project as a tragedy: so much promise, so much effort, wasted because of flaws that were within our power to alleviate. I want a comedy; I fear a tragedy. I keep plugging away in my small way—as I'm sure anyone reading this does—to realize the comedy and avoid the tragedy. But the crucial point is not to speculate about the outcome, but to act to create it. Now, more than ever in human history, we have the power, the capacity, to write our own ending. Which ending do we intend to pursue? 

Where do we start? There will be no single convincing, comprehensive answer to this query. But that being said, we need to start everywhere. We need to change our conditions through individual and collective (political) action. We need to realize that for all the perfection and accomplishment we imagine, we have some very stark, persistent, and deadly traits that we will need to continue to deal with far into the future. And we need to get started down these multiple tracks to reach our multiple goals. The clock is ticking.