American leadership is what holds the world together. The President wasn’t just improvising. He has not done a lot of speeches from the Oval Office. A speech-writing team crafted that extraordinary line. It reflects deeply held views on the part of Washington. Back in February 2021, the newly appointed Secretary of State Antony Blinken gave several
As an American who studies and writes about America and its 20th Century wars, I think Graham Greene came up with the best description of America and Americans, in terms of their influence on the world, in his novel of the First Indochina War, "The Quiet American." The novel’s protagonist, cynical British journalist Thomas Fowler - a stand-in for Greene - describes the title character, Alden Pyle: “I never knew a man who had better motives for all the trouble he caused... impregnably armored by his good intentions and his ignorance.”
American leadership, at this point, consists of a series of spoiling actions to prevent links among a massive would-be group of nations who would prefer non alignment. And to slow the rise of China for as long as possible. Seen from that lens, everything makes perfect sense. Climate change being case in point.
US of course will be among the last to walk away from a hydrocarbon driven energy system. Because who makes most of the world's renewables, by overwhelming margin? The rest of the world will eventually adopt the Chinese green tech, probably having to break sanctions to do it.
I think you misrepresent the nature of American power, which is and has been to stimulate cooperation in which all participating parties benefit, and to bear much of the organizing costs of establishing structures that facilitate that cooperation. When that power has not been exercised, as it largely was not between 1920 and 1939, parties who would have benefitted by it suffer by its absence. When other parties do not wish to cooperate, no shared benefit occurs. Aspects are myriad, but consider the internet, invented in America, shared broadly, whose governance has been given away for free, but which has some countries unwilling to open themselves to sharing. America's power is here, as elsewhere, fundamentally limited to stimulating cooperation among willing partners.
Most of the world is experiencing "American leadership" through the maelstrom of that nation's own disorder and dysfunction. A feral distrust of "others", allies and non-allies alike, defines at least one (and not the least one) of America's core identities/values. This distrust has hollowed out its "public" polity and, in terms of foreign policy, animates a de facto unilateralism- "exceptionalism"-- that conditions the wider endorsement of its current claim of being the world's last best bulwark against "chaos".
If this clown show looks the way it looks from within the US, just imagine what it looks like from outside. A monkey with a handgrenade is not a strong enough simile, since nuclear weapons and the largest "defense" budget in the world amount to a lot more than a handgrenade.
I think this is one of the best and most inciscive articles of Mister Tooze. Hanging out with Carla Mattei and the like seems to open new horizons... Kudos.
Not the national but the dollar holds the world together to various degrees depending on the nations involved. Distant second is to whatever extent Pentagon-supported arms sales hold the world together.
As for that shining beacon of democracy thing, I’d like to think that shipped sealed long ago what with our democracy-stopping efforts since WWII in Greece, Germany, Italy, Iran, Iraq, Chile, Argentina, Nicaragua and the Congo as well as a few others I’m sure I’m forgetting. Of course, the BS that was our boasting about spreading democracy was much easier to push without exposure before the web and the shining of light on the subject.
Too, maybe it’s time for the US to hold the world less tightly...
I don't want China or Russia or any combo thereof being the planetary hegemon. Ditto Chevron. Ditto the Koch family. I speak as a member of the ruling class elite deep state democrat babyeating jewish laser conspiracy.
Seriously? Every empire says that. The British said that, the Greeks, the Danish, the Roman's, etc. The fact is American leadership has given us a lot of heartburn....financial crises after financial crises, wars after wars. Has anyone fought as many wars as the Americans have in trying to gather wealth?
I think America's character, at home and in the world, is shaped by two things. One, the US is a democracy built by a rebellion against a colonial power, where the rebels had the good sense to ground their actions in an Enlightenment framework of first principles. Though the country doesn't always live by those principles, and doesn't always try, they can't be erased from our history and still magnetize our politics.
Second, the US is not the richest or biggest country in the world, but it's the richest of the big countries, and the biggest of the rich countries. In this sense, Biden is totally right: a world system where the US ignores that fact and leaves a vacuum, will devolve into instability and chaos that is (a) bad for most people on earth and (b) quite bad for Americans. Maybe a future multipolar world will emerge where more countries prosper from better governance, and American centrality will become less of a necessary stabilizer. Maybe America should do more to hasten that process.
Mr. Tooze, the only people who want a global loss and damages fund for weather patterns of the past are political criminals and the delusional, the delusional are usually well heeled and can toss their Trust funds on the altar of Gaia Guilt. This sort of Grift for imaginary sins is what has completely discredited the entire environmental movement, the only Green they are interested in is other people’s money. As for these countries demanding $$, let them follow the example of Sri Lanka and show us the way.
Thank God the reign of madness dies with our Old Buddha, Joe Biden. He’s the last you know, there’s no feasible or even improbable successor.
All that's fine as far as it goes. I see you focusing on Biden's quote "either some other country tries to take our place, ....or no one does, and then you get chaos." Seems like a simple rephrasing of Kindleberger's thesis. Do you think Kindleberger was wrong?
If so, no need to be concerned about a Kindleberger moment as all will be fine (unlike the 1930s)?
I must admit, I was so flummoxed by how quickly and shortly you dismissed the American Example as self-deluded nonsense that it took me a few tries to organize my thoughts.
As another reader posted, America's character is built on enlightenment first principles. We are living in a time where the global emphasis of these principles is waning, as rightward nativist and authoritarian trends grown worldwide and leas to more conflict and a return to great powers.
It's fair to criticize America's ability to organize the world to solve big problems. But I interpreted Biden's speech as being about leading through the power of our example, of enlightenment first principles, by pushing back against the aggression of forces that are non-aligned. I don't think that's self-deluded, and I do think that things like freedom of speech and right to assembly are just as important to the nature of a country's influence as is their ability to solve collective problems like climate change. And we should all want for the promotion of our first principles, whether it's the US or someone else.
"As a metaphysical proposition it is silly and self-deluding. It is bizarre to imagine that the world needs America to “hold it together”."
Metaphysical proposition Mr. Tooze? Read up on Pax Romana, the 200-year period that saw unprecedented peace and economic prosperity throughout the Roman Empire.
This substack is swinging more and more leftward with each passing day.
As an American who studies and writes about America and its 20th Century wars, I think Graham Greene came up with the best description of America and Americans, in terms of their influence on the world, in his novel of the First Indochina War, "The Quiet American." The novel’s protagonist, cynical British journalist Thomas Fowler - a stand-in for Greene - describes the title character, Alden Pyle: “I never knew a man who had better motives for all the trouble he caused... impregnably armored by his good intentions and his ignorance.”
American leadership, at this point, consists of a series of spoiling actions to prevent links among a massive would-be group of nations who would prefer non alignment. And to slow the rise of China for as long as possible. Seen from that lens, everything makes perfect sense. Climate change being case in point.
US of course will be among the last to walk away from a hydrocarbon driven energy system. Because who makes most of the world's renewables, by overwhelming margin? The rest of the world will eventually adopt the Chinese green tech, probably having to break sanctions to do it.
China brokering peace and reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and Iran blew up the lie that only American hegemony can keep the peace.
And China did not need to fire a single shot or, as far as anyone can tell, bribe anyone.
I think you misrepresent the nature of American power, which is and has been to stimulate cooperation in which all participating parties benefit, and to bear much of the organizing costs of establishing structures that facilitate that cooperation. When that power has not been exercised, as it largely was not between 1920 and 1939, parties who would have benefitted by it suffer by its absence. When other parties do not wish to cooperate, no shared benefit occurs. Aspects are myriad, but consider the internet, invented in America, shared broadly, whose governance has been given away for free, but which has some countries unwilling to open themselves to sharing. America's power is here, as elsewhere, fundamentally limited to stimulating cooperation among willing partners.
Joe Biden is basically a used car salesman. Was a failure as a lawyer so became a politician. Very sad. And Blinken is totally incompetent
Most of the world is experiencing "American leadership" through the maelstrom of that nation's own disorder and dysfunction. A feral distrust of "others", allies and non-allies alike, defines at least one (and not the least one) of America's core identities/values. This distrust has hollowed out its "public" polity and, in terms of foreign policy, animates a de facto unilateralism- "exceptionalism"-- that conditions the wider endorsement of its current claim of being the world's last best bulwark against "chaos".
If this clown show looks the way it looks from within the US, just imagine what it looks like from outside. A monkey with a handgrenade is not a strong enough simile, since nuclear weapons and the largest "defense" budget in the world amount to a lot more than a handgrenade.
I think this is one of the best and most inciscive articles of Mister Tooze. Hanging out with Carla Mattei and the like seems to open new horizons... Kudos.
Not the national but the dollar holds the world together to various degrees depending on the nations involved. Distant second is to whatever extent Pentagon-supported arms sales hold the world together.
As for that shining beacon of democracy thing, I’d like to think that shipped sealed long ago what with our democracy-stopping efforts since WWII in Greece, Germany, Italy, Iran, Iraq, Chile, Argentina, Nicaragua and the Congo as well as a few others I’m sure I’m forgetting. Of course, the BS that was our boasting about spreading democracy was much easier to push without exposure before the web and the shining of light on the subject.
Too, maybe it’s time for the US to hold the world less tightly...
I don't want China or Russia or any combo thereof being the planetary hegemon. Ditto Chevron. Ditto the Koch family. I speak as a member of the ruling class elite deep state democrat babyeating jewish laser conspiracy.
Seriously? Every empire says that. The British said that, the Greeks, the Danish, the Roman's, etc. The fact is American leadership has given us a lot of heartburn....financial crises after financial crises, wars after wars. Has anyone fought as many wars as the Americans have in trying to gather wealth?
I think America's character, at home and in the world, is shaped by two things. One, the US is a democracy built by a rebellion against a colonial power, where the rebels had the good sense to ground their actions in an Enlightenment framework of first principles. Though the country doesn't always live by those principles, and doesn't always try, they can't be erased from our history and still magnetize our politics.
Second, the US is not the richest or biggest country in the world, but it's the richest of the big countries, and the biggest of the rich countries. In this sense, Biden is totally right: a world system where the US ignores that fact and leaves a vacuum, will devolve into instability and chaos that is (a) bad for most people on earth and (b) quite bad for Americans. Maybe a future multipolar world will emerge where more countries prosper from better governance, and American centrality will become less of a necessary stabilizer. Maybe America should do more to hasten that process.
“If you want a global loss and damages fund,”...
Mr. Tooze, the only people who want a global loss and damages fund for weather patterns of the past are political criminals and the delusional, the delusional are usually well heeled and can toss their Trust funds on the altar of Gaia Guilt. This sort of Grift for imaginary sins is what has completely discredited the entire environmental movement, the only Green they are interested in is other people’s money. As for these countries demanding $$, let them follow the example of Sri Lanka and show us the way.
Thank God the reign of madness dies with our Old Buddha, Joe Biden. He’s the last you know, there’s no feasible or even improbable successor.
All that's fine as far as it goes. I see you focusing on Biden's quote "either some other country tries to take our place, ....or no one does, and then you get chaos." Seems like a simple rephrasing of Kindleberger's thesis. Do you think Kindleberger was wrong?
If so, no need to be concerned about a Kindleberger moment as all will be fine (unlike the 1930s)?
https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/kindleberger-moment
I must admit, I was so flummoxed by how quickly and shortly you dismissed the American Example as self-deluded nonsense that it took me a few tries to organize my thoughts.
As another reader posted, America's character is built on enlightenment first principles. We are living in a time where the global emphasis of these principles is waning, as rightward nativist and authoritarian trends grown worldwide and leas to more conflict and a return to great powers.
It's fair to criticize America's ability to organize the world to solve big problems. But I interpreted Biden's speech as being about leading through the power of our example, of enlightenment first principles, by pushing back against the aggression of forces that are non-aligned. I don't think that's self-deluded, and I do think that things like freedom of speech and right to assembly are just as important to the nature of a country's influence as is their ability to solve collective problems like climate change. And we should all want for the promotion of our first principles, whether it's the US or someone else.
Mr. Tooze writes:
"As a metaphysical proposition it is silly and self-deluding. It is bizarre to imagine that the world needs America to “hold it together”."
Metaphysical proposition Mr. Tooze? Read up on Pax Romana, the 200-year period that saw unprecedented peace and economic prosperity throughout the Roman Empire.
This substack is swinging more and more leftward with each passing day.