So What is An Ethical Foreign Policy?

TimSwift Wed Sep 06, 2006 at 06:50:06 PM GMT Print-friendly version Facebook

I am lifting out and posting a comment I attached to another thread (to be fair, slightly off topic) which I hoped would promote a debate.

The essence of my question is, what would an 'ethical foreign policy' look like in the case of Darfur? How would an 'ethical foreign policy' have dealt with Iraq, not just at the time of the war, but at the continuing situation regarding sanctions, Saddam and containment?




In the thread, "We Should Not Sleepwalk into a Brown Government", the original author, Tygerland, said

A new Labour government must also undo the grave mistakes of Blair.  It must distance itself from Bush's White House.  It must rediscover Robin Cook's vision of an ethical foreign policy.  

In my comment, I said:

I am sorry to pick up on only one point from a very lengthy post, but I am increasingly frustrated by the assumption without argument that an 'ethical foreign policy' was represented by Robin Cook's line over Iraq and that the interventionist line taken by Tony Blair is in some ways 'unethical'.

Could someone therefore please advise me what would the 'ethical foreign policy' response to Saddam Hussein have been? Stepping aside from the use of specific arguments over WMD to justify military action, what was the ethical alternative? Would it have been to continue indefinitely with sanctions which were claimed to have caused great loss of life in Iraq? To continue enforcing the no-fly zones, or to allow Hussein to reimpose direct rule over the Kurdish areas with unpredicatable consequences?

Similarly, what is the answer to the criticism that an 'ethical foreign policy', wtih dependence on the United Nations, is precisely what is allowing the continued conflict within Sudan / Darfur and the knock on humanitarian impact on Chad?

I am assuming that those who argue for an ethical foreign policy which is different to the current policy also assume that this is something different from the 'neo realism' of the Major government, which for example resisted intervention in Bosnia. So what does it look like?

This was not just a rhetorical question; I genuinely want to know how people view the alternatives. The only response posted was the following, again from the original author:-

All Cook wanted was a legitimate UN Mandate.

I'm sorry, but I don't think that is enough. It does not answer the questions I raised about Chad, for example - or about the past failures of international institutions to deal with the situation in Bosnia, or to the genocide in Rwanda.

So I am raising this as a separate post in the hope of a more detailed response.


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So What is An Ethical Foreign Policy? | 3 comments (3 topical)

Re: So What is An Ethical Foreign Policy? (#1)

by Glass House on Wed Sep 06, 2006 at 06:57:49 PM GMT

Tim, you've just got to accept that some people care more about hating America than they do about and end to genecide and ethnic cleansing.


Re: So What is An Ethical Foreign Policy? (#2)

by doctordunc on Thu Sep 07, 2006 at 12:04:40 AM GMT

I think that is a dreadful accusation.  Of course there is a great deal of anger about US (and UK) foreign policy, but I really would not categorise it as anti-americanism, and the suggestion that people feel it more deeply than their revulsion at genocide and ethnic cleansing is hugely offensive.

The original poster inquired:

"Could someone therefore please advise me what would the 'ethical foreign policy' response to Saddam Hussein have been? Stepping aside from the use of specific arguments over WMD to justify military action, what was the ethical alternative? Would it have been to continue indefinitely with sanctions which were claimed to have caused great loss of life in Iraq?"

The two options that clearly were not 'ethical' were the continuation of the sanctions regime (which, as you rightly point out, was massively damaging and - furthermore - was grounded on a lie about WMD as well); or the military offensive against Iraq which has been more devastating than even I predicted at the time.  The former was both unethical and ineffective: it contributed to a public health catastrophe in Iraq, and it did not do a great deal of harm to the regime, while keeping the population impoverished.  The latter was unethical and counter-productive: it was unethical because it led, both directly and indirectly, to countless deaths and to an ever deepening crisis; it was counter-productive because the prospects of a stable and progressive Iraq seem at least as far away as ever.

The problem is more fundamental and complex than a basic question of 'what would you have done about Saddam' can really answer.  If you wish to put in place an international system that could do something about Saddam and his ilk, I - and I'm sure many on the left - would do their best to help with it.  But that system cannot be the unilateral whim of governments who arm and fund despots when it is in their political interests to do so, and remember their crimes only when the realpolitik changes.  That is not an acceptable polity for anybody.  For our governments to be strengthening the arm of the Uzbekistan dictator while preaching about Saddam is a degree of double-standards that gives us no credibility in the world.

I have to accept the charge that if I had my way Saddam might still be in power today (though only if we take a year zero approach to these things, who knows what alternative political approaches in the dim past might have achieved?) and he would still be abusing his power, as many others do around the world.  We all have to accept unpalatable truths about our political positions.

I've more to say but I've got to go out!!  I would like to continue this later though.


[ Parent ]

Re: So What is An Ethical Foreign Policy? (#3)

by Glass House on Thu Sep 07, 2006 at 01:25:44 AM GMT

I don't believe that I said or implied that everyone who was against US & UK foreign policy did so out of anti-Americanism. I said that some people do and I have absolutely no doubt that this is true. I also think that some people place more emphasis on their anti-Americanism than on being against genocide and oppression.

Your thoughtful analysis above demonstrates beyond doubt that you are not individual of whom this is true. However, some people (George Galloway, for instance) do seem to be of that persuasion.

I would say that when faced with two unethical courses of action (as you mentioned above), the ethical thing to do is to go with the least unethical one. Some believed that this was going to war, some believed that this was leaving Saddam alone.

You also mention creating an international order that could do something about Saddam. I would love to see such an order but, when all is said and done, that order would still be faced with the same ethical choice.

I also believe that such an order is much more likely to arise when the Middle East has been sorted out - something that the invasion of Iraq was a genuine attempt to do. Some may say that the result has been the opposite outcome but, as we all know, hindsight is a wonderful thing.

If I could go back in time to 2002 with video tapes of all the news coverage on the Iraq war to date and show it to Bush and Blair, I still wouldn't try to convince them to not go ahead with the invasion. It wasn't the invasion that was wrong - it was the completely inept way in which the post-conflict period was handled.


[ Parent ]

So What is An Ethical Foreign Policy? | 3 comments (3 topical)