Back to the Future: World Politics

Edition
Russia is a throwback to the 19th century. The Islamic State wants to turn
the clock back by 1,000 years. And Japan is stuck in the post-WWII order.
How much of today's geopolitics are actually from bygone eras?

BY STEPHEN M. WALT

JULY 8, 2015

In 2014, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry criticized Russias seizure of

Crimea by saying, You just dont in the 21st century behave in 19th-century
fashion by invading another country on completely trumped-up pretext.
Never mind that Kerrys comment applied with equal force to the invasion of
Iraq by George W. Bushs administration. The comment captured the familiar
idea that the world has supposedly moved beyond the cynical calculus of
pure power politics, as Bill Clinton once put it. The problem, at least in
Kerrys view, is that leaders like Russian President Vladimir Putin havent
gotten the memo about proper 21st-century behavior either Putin hasnt
bothered to read it or doesnt agree with its message.
I was reminded of Kerrys comment during my recent trip to Europe, where I
attended conferences in Greece and France and talked with a wide array of
academics and policy experts from Europe and Asia. In particular, I was
struck by how many people embrace Kerrys view at least rhetorically
and are deeply worried that the world is making a U-turn away from postCold War progress and heading back to the more competitive environment
of past eras.
This observation got me thinking,
Which centuryare different countries living in?
Which century aredifferent countries living in? Were all part of the 21st
century, of course, but the worldviews that different states embrace often
seem to come from different eras. Some countries appear comfortably
committed to a 21st-century view of the world, while other states remain
ensconced in worldviews that date back centuries.
So, which countries best exemplify 21st-century thinking today?
First and foremost is the European Union, whose members have, for the
most part, adopted the complete liberal prescription for the conduct of
international politics full stop. With some minor differences, European
elites now recoil from the grim realities of power politics and believe that
democracy, the rule of law, and powerful transnational institutions can
dampen or eliminate rivalries between states and thereby guarantee

stability and tranquility. Despite the eurozone crisis, Euroskepticism in the

United Kingdom, and resurgent right-wing nationalism throughout Europe,
many elites on the continent still believe economic, political, and social
integration within Europe has weakened atavistic national loyalties and has
fostered the development of a post-modern, post-national, pan-European
unity.
These convictions (plus continued U.S. protection) have encouraged the EU
member states to let their own military capabilities atrophy into
insignificance. If everyone operates according to 21st-century principles,
serious military power wont be necessary and spending serious money on it
is wasteful. Powerful national armies would also make neighboring states
insecure and reopen the door to the militarist pathologies that helped
produce past European wars. The EU should emphasize diplomacy and other
forms of soft power instead, and it should eschew military force and the
defense of traditional geopolitical interests.
It follows that Europes 21st-century elites blame contemporary political
problems on illiberal troublemakers such as the late Slobodan Milosevic or
Putin. The problem, however, is that illiberal leaders like them are unlikely to
be swayed by normative arguments or by economic sanctions, which leaves
the EU with little capacity to shape the behavior of those states that are still
operating with a more traditional view of world politics.
Whom do I have in mind? The most obvious examples are Putins Russia and
contemporary China, whose foreign policies reflect traditional concerns for
national sovereignty, territorial integrity, state capacity, and the balance of
power. Russia is defending its sphere of influence in its near abroad
vigorously and is challenging the liberal individualism that underpins core
Western institutions, and it is all too willing to use proxy forces and other
violent tools to protect what it sees as its core interests. If this goal requires
seizing territory or promoting civil wars elsewhere both venerable
practices in the annals of statecraft so be it. Western leaders can talk
themselves hoarse declaring that their actions pose no threat to Russia; the
point is that Moscow doesnt believe them (and not without reason).
Similarly, a rapidly rising China may have embraced globalization as an
economic meal ticket, but its not adopting a 21st-century view of world
politics. On the contrary, after two centuries of humiliation, China wants to
be rich enough and strong enough to thwart foreign pressure both now and
well into the future. That goal requires continued economic growth,
increased military power, and patient efforts to regain control over
territories or regions it regards as legitimately part of China (such as
Taiwan). China also wants to establish itself as a regional hegemon in Asia,
largely by pushing the United States out of the region and encouraging its
neighbors to accommodate themselves to Chinese power. After all, this is
pretty much what the United States did during its own rise to world power
(see under: Monroe Doctrine).

Russia and China arent the only states living with a 19th-century vision of
foreign policy. Israels high-tech economy (and rising inequality) exemplify a
21st-century outlook, but as the now-deceased historian Tony Judt pointed
out more than a decade ago, its political DNA Zionism is at its core just
19th-century European ethnocentric nationalism. Moreover, the long
campaign to create a Greater Israel on the West Bank is just a lingering
manifestation of 19th-century settler colonialism.
One wonders whether part of the alleged chemistrybetween Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Putin is a 19th-century outlook that places
territorial expansion ahead of peace on the list of national priorities.

China, Russia, and Israel may be stuck with a certain 19th-century outlook
at least in terms of foreign policy but some other states seemed
trapped in the amber of the 20th century. North and South Korea are divided
by a frozen conflict dating back to 1950, and South Korea and Japan have
been unable to get past the toxic legacy of Japans colonialism and its World
War II atrocities. Furthermore, Japans political and economic systems seem
unable to break free from the institutional arrangements that fueled its postWorld War II economic miracle but have crippled its economy ever since the
bubble burst in 1990 (and thats 25 years, folks!).
But lets not stop here. Some states and political movements have
worldviews that date not from the 19th century but from far earlier periods.
Al Qaeda, the Islamic State, the Taliban, and Wahhabi Saudi Arabia use
modern technologies to varying degrees, but their political models are
based on precepts dating back to the seventh century. When somebody says
he wants to restore a medieval caliphate, its a pretty clear rejection of the
democracy+human rights+markets+rule of law, etc. formula that optimists
once believed was the only way to organize an advanced 21st-century
society.
And what of the United States? Americans like to think of themselves as
forward-looking, progressive, and fully committed to the same liberal values
as their Western European allies; indeed, they sometimes think they
invented those values. In short, Americans think they are also the
embodiment of the 21st-century worldview. Theres some truth in that,
insofar as the United States does spend a lot of time invoking liberal ideals
and patting itself on the back for defending them. But in reality, the United
States today is something of an amalgam of 21st-century idealism and 19thcentury power politics. Its rhetoric extols democracy, human rights, gender
equality, open markets, and other prominent features of the 21th-century
formula, and it is quick to chide rivals like Russia or China for their
shortcomings on these dimensions.
But the United States also retains a 19th-century view of power politics.
Washington wants to preserve U.S. hegemony in the Western Hemisphere

and is still willing to defend an array of undemocratic allies around the

world. Like past great powers, it has a decidedly flexible attitude toward
international law and institutions: It embraces them when they are in the
U.S. interest, and it ignores them when they get in the way of what it wants
to do. The United States is far from bashful about using its military power to
attack other countries, either in large doses (Iraq, Afghanistan) or in small
ones (Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan, Serbia, Panama, etc.). One might
even say that Washington talks like a good 21st-century idealist, but
itsactions are more old-fashioned than it wants to admit.
Does any of this matter? I think it does in at least two ways. First, states
whose respective operating softwares reflect different eras will have
trouble understanding each other, and each will tend to regard the other
sides actions as incomprehensible or illegitimate or both. This problem is
precisely what bedevils relations between East and West over Ukraine: The
West thinks the East is being reactionary, and the East thinks the West is
being domineering and insensitive.

Second, a countrys worldview will also affect the capabilities it acquires and
thus its ability to influence the behavior of others. When countries with
different worldviews interact, one or both may find themselves unable to
speak or act in a language that the other understands. Europes vaunted
civilian power is of little value in dealing with Moscow, for example, and it
doesnt give Europe much capacity to shape events in violent regions such
as Syria or Libya. But by the same token, Russias unwillingness to fully
modernize and its reliance on energy exports in a falling market prevent it
from wielding the economic clout that would allow it to shape global politics
outside its immediate region.
Back when I was in graduate school, a perennial question on Berkeleys
Ph.D. qualifying exam was the following: Has the fundamental nature of
international politics changed in the past 400 years? The faculty members
at the time didnt agree on this topic, so crafting an answer the grading
committee would accept was a bit tricky. The same problem now confronts
political leaders around the world: How much of 21st-century world politics
is new and different, and how much is the same old story? You can probably
guess how I answered the question back then; Id offer pretty much the
same answer now.