Reports of America's Political Collapse Are Probably Premature

There's a lot of gloom about America's political system lately. The concern, increasingly, is not so much that individual politicians or even political parties are leading the country down the wrong path (though those concerns certainly abound as well), but rather: there are increasing doubts as to whether the structure of America's political system can even continue to serve it well.

In a recent article in the International Herald Tribune, David Brooks commented: "Usually when I travel from Washington to Britain I move from less gloom to more gloom. But this time the mood is reversed. The British political system is basically functional while the American system is not." He talks about how, though the two main parties "are happy to rubbish each other," they actually agree on more than they disagree.

This is a type of consensus about how to move forward that we in America can only dream of, it seems. Indeed, I can barely hide my admiration and envy of the British and the "adult" decision its electorate has made to put two parties into office that have touted a message of radical reform, coupled with searing spending cuts and some tax increases to boot. The Conservatives came to power while actively expressing the viewpoint that this had to be done. The voters, seemingly, agreed.

All true. But there are two problems with this narrative. For one, voters were not entirely certain what they wanted and were obviously torn, as they failed to give any single party a majority in an electoral system, like America's, that is designed to do just that. The Conservatives don't have a full mandate, they must share power with the liberal democrats. Fine, you say, but the LibDems and the Tories (the nickname for the Conservatives) still came together to agree on the current reform package. This is true, but it may have just been time. Bond markets were already getting edgy about Britain's debt. A looming crisis can compel. The other side of this, too, is that the election may have been more a renunciation of the Labor party, which had ruled Britain for more than a decade, rather than a vote FOR the Tories or the LibDems. The electorate, therefore, seems much less coherently for the changes that are occurring in Westminster than the election results might have us believe.

The second problem is that none of this represents systematic problems, in the sense of a problem with the system's structure itself (as opposed to problems spread throughout a system, another definition of the word "systematic"). As Brooks mentions in his Op-Ed piece, "a generation of misrule between 1945 and 1979 left the U.K. with three large problems: a stifled industrial economy; an overcentralized welfare state; and an enervated people, some of whom are locked in cycles of poverty." Indeed, the 1970s were an extraordinarily tumultuous time in British politics, with Scottish and Irish voters plumping for local parties in 1974, causing a hung parliament (a parliament with no party in the majority). The first coalition that was formed broke down within months. Another election in the same year produced a majority, but defections later destroyed this. In-fighting caused further problems. At the same time, inflation was high, peaking at over 20%. The government tried to stop this by forcing wages to stop rising. This worked fairly well, it seems, but you can imagine the uproar from labor unions. Strikes led to important services being shut down repeatedly and to a huge loss in productivity. Perhaps the most embarrassing event occurred in 1976, when Britain required an IMF bailout! The gloom and sense of political decay must have been palpable!

This all ended with the thumping election victory of Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Party in 1979. Her party introduced numerous reforms, broke the defiance of the unions (with electoral support), and got the country moving again. My point here is not to discuss the controversial aspects of her reign. Rather, the point is: I am sure Britons must have begun to doubt the ability of their political system to provide for a stable, well-managed country during the difficult 1970s. And yet, that very same system produced a political consensus that went on to last for 18 years and to fundamentally change the United Kingdom. The subsequent Labor Government, though it presided over financial deregulation and a boom that turned to bust, also made sweeping and positive changes based on solid electoral victories. The system produced good and bad governments, but the system itself was not fundamentally changed. This is important to remember as we look longingly across the Atlantic at those grown-up British, prudently taking self-administered medicine.

My point is: America has had rough and divided times before, too, and has survived (though the biggest division in history led to the Civil War, which is a rather dramatic version of "surviving"). The problem is not really the system, but that the electorate is honestly uncertain of the best path forward. In this environment, two competing ideologies are espoused by leaders, and Americans seem intent on trying them both simultaneously. In the end, there may be some sort of real crisis (like bond market jitters) that forces real change, but the electorate needs to get its act together first.

That said, there are a few systemic issues that serve to intensify problems, primarily by intensifying polarity. The main culprit here, to my mind, is Gerrymandering. This is drawing voting districts in such a way that seats become safe for one party or another. This is not a partisan issue; since both parties "benefit" from it, at least locally and in the short term, both do it frequently. California has been one of the worst examples, though I believe it has now enacted legislation to put this to an end.

Making seats safe for one party or other leads to polarization because the general election no longer matters. Instead, the primary matters. For example, if a district is so gerrymandered that only a democrat has a chance of winning, then the democratic primary becomes the de facto election. To win the primary, a candidate must pander to the party base. That means they can ignore republicans and independents. (This is, of course, all true for same republican seats, too.) What's more, the democratic voters themselves can ignore the others, too. Normally, voters might think "well, I don't agree with all this candidate says, but I think she has a better chance of beating the republican." If voters know the primary candidate will win the election, they can easily vote for the one closest to their beliefs (which are "extreme" by their very nature, as democrats and republicans are left and right of center, respectively, and their fired up bases on the extremes are the ones surest to vote in primaries). Less political polarization would go a long way to helping America find the consensus needed to move ahead and solve problems. The Senate cannot be gerrymandered, since senators are elected state-wide. This is why the senate has a reputation for being the "saner" of the two houses (another reason is the longer senate term, meaning senators don't have to constantly campaign and can actually get on with governing as they reason is best).

But even gerrymandering is not a problem to make or break America. It, too, can be fixed via the electoral process if voters want to fix it. What America needs most is informed and diligent voters to move the country onto the right path, or, at the very least, a coherent one. No system in the world can counter an electorate that is not doing its job except, of course, for a dictatorship. When voters have not paid attention in the past (or even the present: think Venezuela), this is also precisely what they have gotten. THAT would be a broken political system. America's, as yet, is not.

Israel and Palestine: What's the Strategy?

I have argued before (and I'm not the only one) that it is impossible for a conflict to be settled if one side thinks it would do better to continue the conflict. My previous example was Afghanistan, in which all Afghans, including the Taliban, know that the US will not remain forever (see post). The Taliban know that time is on their side. Whenever a disagreement seems intractable, something like this probably lies behind the scenes.

Take the long fight between the Israeli government and authorities representing the Palestinians. There seems to be no ending this fight. But why? It is easy to see why Palestinians believe time is on their side, if for none other than demographic reasons: the Palestinian population of the region, including inside of Israel proper, is increasing more quickly than the Israeli population. Beyond that, there seems to be a general, but gradual, shift in world politics away from unquestioning support of Israel. This has a couple reasons, among them a relative decline of the "West" along with the slow slippage of the Holocaust into something only read about in history books.

In this environment, it would seem wise for Israel to talk tough but to try to find a solution as quickly as possible, allowing it time to mend relations with antagonistic neighbors. Instead, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced that Israel will not accept a path to peace that his predecessor had already essentially agreed upon. In effect holding up hopes, then changing the terms at the last minute. There seems to be no rush for peace. What is going on here? There are a few possible explanations:

1. Israelis, too, feel that time is on their side and that the Palestinians will eventually give up hoping for a better solution. This may also fit in with creating "facts on the ground" by continuing settlements on the West Bank, making their eventual removal politically all but impossible in the future. This is like a game of chicken.
2. Another possibility, and this is one that I seem to hear coming from Israel, is the one I call the panic strategy. Israelis are well aware that time is not on their side. Furthermore, they do not believe that even a two-state solution will convince their hostile neighbors to leave them alone. Better, then, to try to push for all concessions they can, now, while they still have clout This, too, is a somewhat different game of chicken.

One of the most important concessions for Israel, and one that is entirely understandable, is that Hamas renounce the use of violence and recognize Israel's right to exist before it even begins to negotiate with it. Ironically, diminished US and European support for Israel might actually end up helping Israel in this regard: as long as the US was seen to be 100% behind Israel, the Palestinians did not feel there was any way to be sure that their concessions would be met with real concessions from Israel. With President Obama putting public pressure on Israel, while still leaving no doubt as to his support for Israel's security, Palestinians may become less uncomfortable with making concessions, while still seeing that Israel is not about to be weakened to the point of making more concessions than it has hinted at in the past.

In such an unstable place, a little more trust could go a long way.

The Road to a PhD Program: Final Act

For personal reasons, I'd stopped commenting my road to a PhD program. The last post I wrote on the subject is now almost a year ago!

Some plans changed and I ended up applying to schools in England in the greater London area. The hardest part was writing the dissertation proposal, which I had to do really quickly while simultaneously rushing to finish my master's thesis. My topic is Terrorism and Deterrence, and I hope to find whether terrorism can/has ever been deterred. That'll be my course of study for the next three years.

So: I obviously got in somewhere! I've accepted an offer to study at King's College London in their War Studies Program, which I am very excited about! Now just to jump through numerous immigration hurdles (essentially technicalities, but still a toootal pain in the ass).

The next items I write on this subject will be the Road to a PhD (minus the program part), in which I'll talk about the trials and tribulations of actually doing the research and writing the damn thing. It will surely be a combination of enjoyment at involving myself in my own research, and horrible suffering ;-).

Stay tuned...

A Flight of Fantasy

OK folks. I like to talk about "real" issues, but today I'm going to go a bit off the usual track with a little trip into theoretically-possible-land, just for fun.

I've been reading Francis Fukuyama's latest book. It discusses how political orders formed. It took thousands of years of human development to move from small bands to tribal organizations, and another few thousand to move from that to anything resembling a state, with many setbacks along the way. This progress was essentially evolutionary in nature: it wasn't within anyone's power to make it happen, though individual leaders certainly played an important role in pushing changes at the right moments.

This made me think: will this process continue? Will this one day create a world state, a federation with a single global defense force and global, hopefully representative, government?

There are several reasons why such a thing could be a dream or a nightmare, but let's ignore those for now, that's not what I want to discuss. Rather, I'd like to discuss ways we could feasibly move closer to that in an organic, evolutionary way.

One of the first steps might be something I've proposed for a long time. Tired of visa restrictions and immigration crap, I thought to myself "why do we even need to restrict movement like this between rich countries?" I know, the "rich country" part doesn't sound too nice, but let's face it: allowing everyone to move all over is not going to happen anytime soon. But, if the US were to open its doors to Canadians and vice versa, do we really think there'd be a stream of immigrants rushing over the border and overwhelming one side or the other? That seems patently absurd. So how about it?

Step 1: The North American Union
This has been a dream for a long time. Initially, it was hoped that NAFTA might lead to this. Lately, though, it seems unlikely that Mexico could be part of such an immigration and customs union (and border controls between the US and Canada have gotten more stringent, not less). Somewhat more likely in our lifetimes: a union between the US and Canada. What would such a union entail? It wouldn't have to be anything as close and organized as the EU. No monetary union, either, both countries would keep their currencies. Both countries would remain solely sovereign; there would be no "government" for the union or anything, no North American Parliament or the like. No, just a single market: goods, services, people, and capital could flow freely back and forth. Americans could work in Canada and vice versa. Each country would still be able to make, enforce, and interpret its own laws as it saw fit. It would open up most of the continent for most of its people to live, work, and play wherever they wanted.

Such a union would only require a treaty between the two countries. The only things they'd have to agree on would be eliminating all barriers to cross border trade and investment, as well as agreeing to allow nationals of the other side to live in work in their countries. This would require some harmonization of foreign policy, specifically for a customs union. Both sides would have to agree on what was allowed in and out of the area and what tariffs, etc., if any, they ought to apply. Also, immigration policy would need to harmonized to some degree for security reasons (the US is a lot stricter). That said, they wouldn't have to agree completely on immigration policy. EU countries do not (though this is admittedly sometimes problematic). The freedom of movement would only apply to citizens of both countries, not to immigrants/non-citizen residents, etc. For example, someone from outside the North American Union (NAU) who has a work permit for Canada would not automatically be able to work and live in the US. Since there would be no border controls, however, it would be impractical to stop such a person from visiting the US freely, which is why immigration security policies would have to be harmonized. This, in principle, is the way the EU works.

Alternatively (and this would be a better solution, but one that would require more difficult political consensus) the two countries could agree to adopt the same immigration rules and have a visa system with visas valid for both countries. I mean, we're dreaming here, right?

So let's continue along this logical route, suspending our disbelief a little bit longer.

Step 2: Joining other unions
The same logic that says Americans need not fear a rush of Canadian immigrants providing cheap labor and vice versa also goes for a similar union agreement with the EU. No, I don't mean joining the EU. That would mean surrendering sovereignty at a level the US would not agree to any time in the foreseeable future, assuming Europeans would even want this. After all, much of the impetus behind the EU was to be able to act as a counterweight to American power, not have the system dominated by it yet again. The same type of bilateral treaty could apply again. Canada, the US, and the EU could agree to create a customs and immigration union (again, not necessarily allowing free movement for third-country immigrants) between the EU and the more loosely organized NAU. Again, no transatlantic parliament or superbureaucracy needed, just a bilateral treaty. Now Germans could live in work in the US, Americans in France, what have you. And again, why not?

This time, we could even take a step back from immigration cooperation, since eliminating border controls would be impractical across the Atlantic. If every member region or state still had border controls, there would be no need to harmonize immigration security. No need, therefore, for the EU to adopt the US's rather draconian measures, etc. No difficult political agreement necessary.

Step 3: Continued expansion
Now that we've come this far, why not make similar agreements with countries like Australia, New Zealand, and Japan? Maybe South Korea and Singapore? The Japanese really don't like opening up to immigrants of any kind, so this could prove even harder than the other steps. But even without Japan, it seems hard to find a good reason to oppose a customs and residency union with Australia and New Zealand.

How does this relate to world government? Well, these unions were limited to developed countries due to the "economic refugee" problematic, if you will. But many other countries are developing and may catch up with us over the coming century. What's to stop Brazil or even China from joining? The answer, of course, is realpolitik, I fear. This would cause a two-steps-forward, one-step-back sort of dynamic. Nonetheless, it's still juuuust conceivable that something like this could lead, maybe in hundreds of years, to such freedom of movement, where people can vote for governments and things with their feet. Governments could be forced by people leaving either to close the doors again and lose all the benefits of openness, or change their policies to please their people. In such a world, people might eventually break loose from nationalistic ideas -- and it might for the first time actually be sensible to do so completely -- and really begin to be citizens of the world. Could a world government, built organically from the ground up following societal evolution, be that far behind?

Well, not in our lifetime, and maybe still never, but I see this as one possible path for how it could conceivably evolve. Human history is a long process of political organizational development. We tend to view the world now as "developed." But maybe it still has a ways (like, 1,000 years) to go...

Four Lions: Sensitive Tragi-Comic Perfection only the Brits Could Pull Off

I don't often do film reviews, but I thought this one deserved an exception. The film is Four Lions, by British director Christopher Morris. SPOILER ALERT! The film caused quite a stir when it came out because it seemed to be tempting fate: it makes fun of terrorists. The film would indeed be provocative and perhaps distasteful if that were the only point. The film intertwines tragedy and comedy to make fun of much more than terrorists. The end result is funny-in-a-sad-way.

The terrorists portrayed in the film are complete idiots. Alas, so is just about everyone else in the film, especially the police, who proclaim quite inexplicably at one point that they had "shot the right guy," but that the "wrong guy then exploded." The part I enjoyed best though was, I would say, the central message of the film: each side's actions essentially amounted to an own-goal. The terrorists end up killing very few non-Muslims, killing many more Muslims in the process, including, by accident, Osama bin Laden himself! They also, comically, kill a sheep and a crow. At the same time, the police end up killing only innocent civilians. When they finally catch some guys for questioning, they take in the very man who tried to convince the men who were planning a terror attack not to do it. This may be because the man the police arrest and take to a location "in Britain but technically in Egypt," is a very devout Muslim and wears traditional dress, making himself a target. He had always preached peace and frowned upon the violence planned by his compatriot, trying to get him to come to prayer meetings and forget his violent mission.

The film goes a long way towards underscoring the senselessness of violence (not least by having a cast of terrorist characters who mostly had no idea what it meant to blow themselves up), but also highlights the difficulties inherent in stopping it along the way, either by reason (the peace-loving Muslim who tries to stop the terror group with words) or by force (the bumbling police). At base it is a sad story with extremely comedic juxtapositions (listening to silly pop songs while driving to a suicide mission or wearing ridiculous-looking costumes to smuggle bombs into a marathon). Watch it, but don't expect to laugh all too hard, the seriousness of the subject has not been forgotten by anyone, especially not by Christopher Morris.