Reality, Realism, And Morality In World Politics

This thread is an effort to find a home for a topic that was considered off topic on another thread. Defining the topic is a challenge, but as I understand it , it had to do with the idea that the United States has no standing to complain about things like Russian hacking and interference with our elections, or Russian interference in general, since the United States has done the same or worse in the past (and maybe the present) to other countries. Is that it?

 

There is no world court with any authority to enforce the law on everyone. For example, the US military is equal to the next six largest combined and we pay half the bills for the UN. If the US does something that the world court decides is illegal there is little that anyone can do. We've made things like mustard gas, nerve agents, and neutron bombs technically illegal for anyone to possess, yet, countries still have them and occasionally use things like mustard gas without anyone doing anything. The US itself has stockpiles of nerve agents and neutron bombs, but complaints are few and far between and complaining is all anyone can do about the situation because the US is the closest thing to a police force on the planet for international politics.

Insisting that countries like the US shouldn't complain about such things is so much wasted breath when there are no consequences for the US doing whatever the hell it wants and half the population insists the government and mass media they call evil lie to them for their own protection and takes it for granted that there is no international law beyond what the US is willing to impose. For example, marijuana has been illegal in most of the western world including places like Jamaica not because that's what they want, but because he who has the money and guns decides what is the law of the land and can arbitrarily decide to enforce it or break it themselves. The idea that such things require morality or whatever is absurd and arguing that morality should be the basis of the law will get you nowhere fast explaining why all of the spy versus spy crap goes on to this very day.

 

Let me start by defining some terms and concepts.The wiki definition of reality "the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reality .See also https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reality and http://www.thefreedictionary.com/reality The nature of reality is one of those philosophical topics that is endlessly debated, but in general there are two broad divisions: idealism and philosophical realism. Idealism views things in an ideal or perfect manner, emphasizing the importance of the tangible .Realism tends to view them strictly in terms of their tangible properties. http://www.differencebetween.net/miscellaneous/difference-between-idealism-and-realism/ http://www.spaceandmotion.com/Philosophy-Realism-Idealism.htm http://www.buzzle.com/articles/idealism-vs-realism.html
In political science, especially the field of international politics, idealism is associated with a moralistic approach characterized by certain politicians like Woodrow Wilson, who strove to "make the world safe for democracy". Realism, on the other hand, is associated with a pragmatic approach, rejecting moral considerations and focusing on national interest, defined in terms of power. The realist approach expounded by the late Hans Morgenthau. was justified by the Protestant theologian Reinhold Neibuhr in Moral Man, Immoral Society, Niebuhr argued that it would be immoral for nation-states to follow a turn-the-other cheek moralty expected of Christian individuals, because nation-states have a primary duty as trustees to protect the interests of their citizens. The United States, like Russia and other major powers are usually guided by primarily realism or Realpolitik. Realist like Morgenthau argued that when they deviate from that pattern--acting to bring the blessings of U.S. democracy to the rest of the world, punish evildoers, or protect the innocent (e.g., U.S. actions in Kosovo and Syria), they get into trouble.

 

Not exactly it. I never expected the US to not respond, of course they're going to respond
but all the anti-Russian sentiment the press and White House is stirring up amounts to mostly empty propoganda to me.

personally speaking I am going to use this as a jumping off point to criticise my country for its own evil-doing (bush era catchphrase) and hypocricy.

Mainly, and probably very vainly, in hopes that one day America could possibly be the country I want it to be.

It is hard to care about an election being influenced by outside forces when I never believe in the presidential candidates anyways, and Congress is so worthless with such a low approval rating.

Thats my own personal view of it - as far as whether or not the US government has any standing to complain? Of course they do, but their first priority should be working for and not against the average American citizen. Which is mainly why I think the whole thing is hypocritical and sounds like a lot of empty rhetoric to me

 

There actually is a world court, the International Court of Justice, but it's largely ineffective in handling the big issues, because its jurisdiction is limited to the things the member countries confer on it. Exempted are matters which are : "essentially within the jurisdiction" of the member countries, as defined by them. The U.N. Security Council also has jurisdiction to impose sanctions and send peace keeping expeditions, but of course the five permanent members have a veto, to prevent the body from doing anything so foolish as to go against the national interests of the major world powers. When the major powers agree, the UN can be quite effective, and generally speaking, public opinion, especially domestic public opinion, is not nothing--but it isn't much. The recent decision of the Obama Administration to abstain in a resolution condemning Israel is a case in point. From the standpoint of international law, the resolution condemning the settlements was on solid ground. But the reaction of U.S. politicians and Israel to it was predictable. Obama is a lame duck and Trump has promised not to honor it. Ideals, morality, and law are useful in legitimizing actions and shaping public opinion, but when push comes to shove, national interest generally wins out. The Brexit vote in the U.K. and the Trump victory are indications that we'll be getting more nationalism and less idealism in the immdeiate future.

 

Exactly, rather than the rule of law there is a world court of convenience and the UN is much the same. When courts declare things like nerve gas and neutron bombs illegal and then refuse to enforce the law they have become little more than a political weapon used to help enforce order upon chaos.

 

It would be nice if the US had standing, but it just doesn't. That's what happens when you're a hypocrite.

The only standing the US has is whatever it accredits itself, meaning whatever it can get people to gag on. As far as being respected for its integrity and virtue, I'm sad to say that no longer exists. The sickening facade of it exists, but everyone knows how disingenuous it is, whether they'll acknowledge it or not.

The only way to have a leg to stand on is to actually be honest, plain and simple, and the US is just too cowardly to do that.

 

Really, I think you fit right in: a model of the idealistic/moralistic perspective, which is certainly not a bad thing. I also hope the United States will be the country you and I want it to be, but I don't expect it to be in my lifetime. The recent elections made that even more unlikely, as Republicans are about to stack the courts with Neanderthals and undue one-by-one the major pieces of hard-won environmental, civil rights, and social justice programs of the sixties and seventies. Muslims and Mexican immigrants will find life more precarious during the next few years.

Flawed as it is, I think the United States really has stood for something valuable in the world: a relatively democratic republic with constitutional protections for individual rights and liberties. Compared with Putin's Russia or with China, there is still no contest. My wife and I visited Kunming a few years ago and were impressed at the devotion people had to their dogs being walked in the park. After we got home, we read that soldiers were clubbing the dogs to death in front of their owners--ostensibly an animal population control measure but probably also to demonstrate that the government could do it. If we allow our system of individual liberties to be undermined in what I think is a misguided desire to see the country pay for its sins, I think that would be a grave loss not only for us but for the world. I don't want to make the perfect the enemy of the not-as-bad-as-it-could-be, especially when the perfect will never come about in this world. Keep our ideals in the forefront in demanding better from our politicians, but approach .the goals step by step-- two hops forward one flop backward, like the proverbial frog in the well.

 

From the standpoint of morality, I'd say two wrongs don't make a right. But I do think the U.S. needs to rein in its interference in the domestic affairs of other countries. We need to strike a balance between isolationism and trying to be the policeman of the world. Easier said than done, I know. With the Cold War, the U.S. became used to a policy of active global engagement to contain Communism. It was them or us, we said, with some validity: two opposing systems on a collision course, with the Soviets taking over Eastern Europe and the Baltic states and working to extend its influence around the globe. I think containment (as opposed to roll back advocated by conservative Republicans) was basically a good idea and it worked, ultimately causing the Soviet Union to implode. Needless to say, this made us enemies. Putin has said it was a disaster and holds us responsible. And along the way we often got lost our moral compass.

Our basic strategy in the Middle East and Latin America consisted in propping up authoritarian "strong men". And our attachment to capitalism often led us to confuse our national interests with corporate interests. During the Eisenhower Administration, we tried to make Central America safe for United Fruit and the Middle East safe for the "Seven Sisters" of Oil. Developing strategies based on mutually assured destruction became the preoccupation of a new generation of game theorists, such as the brilliant paranoid schizophrenic John Nash, played by Russell Crowe in the movie A Beautiful Mind. (Contrary to the movie it wasn't the Russians Nash thought were after him, it was the extraterrestrials). With LBJ came escalation in Viet Nam, justified on the basis of the specious "domino theory". With G.W., we got the Neo-cons, who wanted to export our democratic institutions to the Middle East the hard way, and make the region safe for Israel. The result was two wars simultaneously, waterboarding and rendition. Obama pulled out of Iraq, but introduced accelerated drone strikes instead. We now have the world's greatest nuclear arsenals, but we seem to have fallen behind in cyberwarfare, and we haven't hardened our electrical grid to keep up with the opposition. It would be nice to turn over a new leaf, but under our new President to be, I don't think that's likely to happen. But I agree; the U.S. needs to respond vigorously to any efforts by hostile powers against our institutions or our power grid. We have a great country with a relatively democratic constitutional republic and a set of constitutional liberties to be proud of. It would be a shame for us and the world to lose it in a misguided belief that it would serve us right.Putin would not be an improvement.