Sunday, September 12, 2004
The feeble giant
As a social scientist, I often simplify complex concepts into simple, one-dimensional scales (collapsing modern political ideology into a scale of "conservatism", for example). I then try to formulate and test hypotheses using these concepts.
Political leaders, non-state actors, and ordinary citizens do much the same thing when they try to understand political phenomena. And, like social scientists, they can make a dog's breakfast of the exercise.
For example, you could take a complex choice, like the range of strategies a state could use to confront a terrorist threat, and summarize it with a hopelessly over-simplified scale called "toughness". Toughness appears to mean, roughly, how hard and how violently you "fight back" against the terrorists, their allies, and silent helpers. Low "toughness" is taken to mean "weakness", and so, ipso facto, the toughness scale is also a "goodness scale" (at least to those who assume weakness is bad for security). So we compound the sin of ignoring the diverse (good and bad) ways to respond to terrorism by importing the unfalsifiable assumption that tougher policies are better.
Where does this way of thinking lead us? We try "tough" policies against terrorists (or harboring states, or states that look at us cross-eyed). If that fails to stop the terrorists, we recall that sufficiently tough policies "must work" (just as policies that are not tough enough "must fail"), so we decide our policy must not have been tough "enough". Then we try something more forceful. Often this leads to a spiral of violence. Some of my readers will think of Russia-Chechnya, others of the US-Iraq, still others perhaps Israel-Palestine. In the main, I think all are good examples of this cognitive simplification and its hazards.
Chechnya is the example that motivated my thinking. The WaPo had this to say:
The remainder of the article is an excellent review of how Putin reached his conclusion that "weakness" would fail in Chechnya: not through failed negotiation, but through failed application of overwhelming force.
I'm willing to entertain the hypothesis that "tougher policies against terrorism are more effective", but currently, I think the evidence is pretty strong that this is not in fact true. But many people seem unwilling to admit this possibility, or perhaps even blind to it. And political leaders are quite ready to exploit the blind spot. (Remember the reflexive need of politicians to appear "tough" on crime, because who wants to look "weak"? Same thing---the best policy may not be the "toughest", but once voters are cued to evaluate policies by toughness, the question of which policy is really best disappears).
With respect to terrorism, I don't intend to reherse the argument that "toughness" doesn't work (you've heard it before: striking back aids terrorist recruitment, harms and thus enrages innocents, undermines normal life and hence makes terrorism seem the only option, etc.) I'm tired of hearing such arguments referred to as apologies for terrorism. They aren't of course; they are propositions that are either true or not, and nothing more.
Instead, I worry that everyone is worse off when we use the stupidly confining concept of "toughness" to stand for the whole range of strategies a state could use to combat terrorism. To take the American example (though similar advice applies to Russia), we should be working to isolate terrorists in their own societies, by cultivating ties with moderate leaders, showing real concern for the well-being of the publics from which terrorists recruit, and offering real aid for development. We should be as worried about our image as a callous, paranoid, violent empire as we are worried about our ability to project military might.
Joseph Nye tried to get us out of the weak-tough false dichotomy by talking about soft power. It's time to recognize that soft power---stemming from diplomatic ties, the ability to call on friends, cooperation in development and problem solving around the world, and possession of moral high ground and cultural good standing---can make our hard power exercises more productive. If we had these things in Iraq, fewer American soldiers and innocent Iraqis would be dead. But instead, we squander soft power with reckless overuse of military power, and that serves no one's interests.
To return briefly to Chechnya, I would most like to see Russia and Chechnya as independent societies, at peace with each other and respectful of each others' security and autonomy. But if that's not on the table, I'd rather see Russia achieve hegemony over Checnya through a combination of political manipulation and a modicum of force, than to see Russia bomb Chechnya into the stone age only to reap terrorist reprisals. If we cannot have a liberal international system, let us at least have Machiavellian powers that keep the peace, rather than feeble military giants who strike out and kill thousands, and incite only chaos.
Political leaders, non-state actors, and ordinary citizens do much the same thing when they try to understand political phenomena. And, like social scientists, they can make a dog's breakfast of the exercise.
For example, you could take a complex choice, like the range of strategies a state could use to confront a terrorist threat, and summarize it with a hopelessly over-simplified scale called "toughness". Toughness appears to mean, roughly, how hard and how violently you "fight back" against the terrorists, their allies, and silent helpers. Low "toughness" is taken to mean "weakness", and so, ipso facto, the toughness scale is also a "goodness scale" (at least to those who assume weakness is bad for security). So we compound the sin of ignoring the diverse (good and bad) ways to respond to terrorism by importing the unfalsifiable assumption that tougher policies are better.
Where does this way of thinking lead us? We try "tough" policies against terrorists (or harboring states, or states that look at us cross-eyed). If that fails to stop the terrorists, we recall that sufficiently tough policies "must work" (just as policies that are not tough enough "must fail"), so we decide our policy must not have been tough "enough". Then we try something more forceful. Often this leads to a spiral of violence. Some of my readers will think of Russia-Chechnya, others of the US-Iraq, still others perhaps Israel-Palestine. In the main, I think all are good examples of this cognitive simplification and its hazards.
Chechnya is the example that motivated my thinking. The WaPo had this to say:
The day after the Beslan standoff culminated in a bloody battle that left hundreds of hostages dead, Putin went on the air to address the nation. For a moment, he seemed to acknowledge that his policy had failed. But then he concluded he simply had not been tough enough.
"We need to admit that we did not fully understand the complexity and the dangers of the processes at work in our own country and in the world," he said. "In any case, we proved unable to react adequately. We showed ourselves to be weak. And the weak get beaten."
The remainder of the article is an excellent review of how Putin reached his conclusion that "weakness" would fail in Chechnya: not through failed negotiation, but through failed application of overwhelming force.
I'm willing to entertain the hypothesis that "tougher policies against terrorism are more effective", but currently, I think the evidence is pretty strong that this is not in fact true. But many people seem unwilling to admit this possibility, or perhaps even blind to it. And political leaders are quite ready to exploit the blind spot. (Remember the reflexive need of politicians to appear "tough" on crime, because who wants to look "weak"? Same thing---the best policy may not be the "toughest", but once voters are cued to evaluate policies by toughness, the question of which policy is really best disappears).
With respect to terrorism, I don't intend to reherse the argument that "toughness" doesn't work (you've heard it before: striking back aids terrorist recruitment, harms and thus enrages innocents, undermines normal life and hence makes terrorism seem the only option, etc.) I'm tired of hearing such arguments referred to as apologies for terrorism. They aren't of course; they are propositions that are either true or not, and nothing more.
Instead, I worry that everyone is worse off when we use the stupidly confining concept of "toughness" to stand for the whole range of strategies a state could use to combat terrorism. To take the American example (though similar advice applies to Russia), we should be working to isolate terrorists in their own societies, by cultivating ties with moderate leaders, showing real concern for the well-being of the publics from which terrorists recruit, and offering real aid for development. We should be as worried about our image as a callous, paranoid, violent empire as we are worried about our ability to project military might.
Joseph Nye tried to get us out of the weak-tough false dichotomy by talking about soft power. It's time to recognize that soft power---stemming from diplomatic ties, the ability to call on friends, cooperation in development and problem solving around the world, and possession of moral high ground and cultural good standing---can make our hard power exercises more productive. If we had these things in Iraq, fewer American soldiers and innocent Iraqis would be dead. But instead, we squander soft power with reckless overuse of military power, and that serves no one's interests.
To return briefly to Chechnya, I would most like to see Russia and Chechnya as independent societies, at peace with each other and respectful of each others' security and autonomy. But if that's not on the table, I'd rather see Russia achieve hegemony over Checnya through a combination of political manipulation and a modicum of force, than to see Russia bomb Chechnya into the stone age only to reap terrorist reprisals. If we cannot have a liberal international system, let us at least have Machiavellian powers that keep the peace, rather than feeble military giants who strike out and kill thousands, and incite only chaos.
