Holden Caulfield
26th November 2009, 17:06
Theories of International Relations (IR) are often based on assumptions and so called ‘apparent truths’,[1] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn1) these are known as ‘IR Myths’. As Cynthia Weber states in ‘International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction’: “The Myths function in International Relations is the transformation of what is particular, cultural and ideological into what appears to be universal, natural and purely empirical”.[2] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn2) That is to say that IR myths allow for “lying in the guise of truth”[3] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn3) by making subjective assumptions and perspectives appear to be objective fact.
In this essay we shall expose a central, yet underlying, assumption of a policy document and highlight the way in which it affects the implicit message of that document. We shall also address what the document neglects to consider and what this neglect tells us about the use of myth in IR.
The document chosen is the “Beginners Guide to Nation-Building” published in 2007 by the RAND Corporation (RAND Corp), it is intended to advise the stabilization and redevelopment of post-conflict societies, specifically those that the USA, or “allied governments and foundations”,[4] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn4) have intervened in militarily. The document was created for several US governmental agencies such as “the Secretary of Defence, the Joint Staffs, the US Intelligence Community” ,[5] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn5) and others. The RAND Corporation attests to produce “high-quality and objective research and analysis” [6] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn6) for state, non-state and private sector actors.
The central assumption to be discussed in this essay is that: “[T]he primary objective of any nation building operation is to make violent societies peaceful”, this claim is supported by the following “[it is] not to make poor ones prosperous, or authoritarian ones democratic”.[7] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn7) We will firstly question the nature of ‘conflicts’, then discuss the assumption of what violent societies are, and lastly try to discern the actual motives of ‘nation building’, through these acts we shall expose this statement as resting upon IR myths.
Those who are resisting the ‘nation-building’ intervention are labelled by RAND Corp as simply being ‘spoilers’,[8] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn8) this view of the insurgency shows a lack of understanding, or a will to not understand the nature of resistance. To name them ‘spoilers’ adopts the myth that they are dangerous ‘others’[9] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn9) who, like a James Bond villain, simply want to ruin things for the ‘forces of good’, this biased view is typified in an article for the Boston Globe where ‘spoilers’ are said to be “cloaked insurgents who practice hit and run murders”.[10] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn10)Not only does this play on fears of a ‘hidden enemy’ but by using the term ‘murders’ it gives connotations very different from when the ‘casualties’ caused by the intervening forces are reported upon. RAND Corp goes on to claim that “the population will be vulnerable [...] to extremists who seek to undermine emerging orders”,[11] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn11)they do not however try to evaluate the conditions that give rise to such elements, or qualify their terms. For example Hamas would be considered as the ‘spoilers’ in the Palestinian Conflict (one can assume this will be the view of American Policy makers due to their election being largely condemned), however Palestinian authorities might just as easily claim Israeli settlers or even the IDF to be ‘spoilers’ (one must also keep in mind that it was Israeli settlers who first took up arms in the former British Mandate of Palestine). This myth of ‘spoilers’ can be used to obscure and justify actions taken by intervening forces, similar examples to the Hamas case can be seen in interventions the world over be that with the IRA and the Black and Tans (or RUC) in Northern Ireland, or with the American Army and the Viet Cong during the Vietnam war.
The document neglects to define what is classed as a ‘violent society’, and therefore places an assumption at its very foundation. Zizek comments on the existence of a Subjective and an Objective violence drawing distinctions that RAND Corp does not (it exclusively focuses on Subjective Violence). “Objective violence is precisely the violence inherent to this normal state of things”,[12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn12) that is to say that, hypothetically RAND would deem it prudent to alter a society that had suffered a civil war with 1000 fatalities but would not do so for a society where an economic system caused many more deaths (for example 5.6 million under-5’s alone die from malnutrition each year).[13] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn13) This subjective view of violence betrays the true aims of ‘nation-building’, they do not suggest that violent societies be pacified, rather they simply aim to make turbulent societies ‘stable’ (the reasons for this will be discussed later in this essay).
Although only published in 2007, the document can be criticised by looking at past examples as it puts forth a very similar method of nation-building as has already been seen. Since the US led intervention in Iraq around 1.3 million lives have been lost violently,[14] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn14) this hardly unifies the key principle of trying to pacify a nation with the view that “nation-building [...] involves the use of armed force”.[15] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn15) Further exposing the myth of pacification being a key aim of nation-building; is the fact that since the end of the Iraq War in the period of ‘nation-building’, the death toll actually increased from an estimated 15,000 a month to a figure near double that.[16] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn16) This can be attributed to increased resistance to the occupation itself, and to the arming of local militias by the occupying forces, something that the RAND Corporation suggest as a method of creating peace in a society.
The myth of wanting to ‘build peaceful nations’ can be further exposed using Haiti as a case study. Before we do this it is necessary to draw attention to two points made in our document, the first is that “nation building has become an inescapable responsibility [for ‘Western Governments’]”,[17] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn17) the second being that in Haiti there was an “increasing professionalism”[18] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn18) in operations. In Haiti the conflict can be seen as emerging partly from economic reform which removed tariffs, this led to a crash in local agriculture as Haitian farmers could not compete with cheap (mainly US) imports. The resulting unemployment caused discontent and riots. These economic reforms were done on the request of the IMF, in other words the IMF reforms directly contributed to the society become increasingly violent (both subjectively and objectively), however RAND Corp suggest that the same institution should “take the lead in working [...] to create a [...] healthy financial system”.[19] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn19) The USA intervened in Haiti and started a process of nation-building, however RAND itself admits that Haiti never reached a ‘tipping point’ (a point of relative self reliance) yet the troops withdrew leaving a ‘failed state’. The RAND document tells us half completed projects often have worse consequences than if no intervention had occurred at all.[20] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn20) The reason for withdrawal from Haiti brings us to our second strand of criticism, that the motivation for this intervention, and for all others, was not peace but profits.[21] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn21)
Marxists would see military interventions and ‘nation-building’ simply as expansion in the search for new markets: “[in] the need of a constantly expanding market [...] the bourgeois [spread] over the whole surface of the globe, it must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, and establish connections everywhere”.[22] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn22) Marxists look at the motives for interventions whereas RAND Corp neglects to do so, instead it focuses simply on the acts of how best to subdue and exploit the nation in question.
The very wording of the entire document betrays its central priority in nation building, when explaining why intervention is the correct course of action it does not primarily speak of the human cost but in terms financial cost: “While it may be prohibitively expensive to forcefully halt a civil war in full swing, experience has shown that interventions intended to consolidate and perpetuate a tentative peace are cost effective”.[23] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn23) As afore mentioned the aim of nation-building is to create stability in a region, this is to allow for ‘business as usual’, not to create peace, in the ‘Nation Building Guide’ is advice to help intervening forces make the most of their profits: “In most instances the society would be better off if such state-owned enterprises we sold to the private sector”.[24] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn24)This disregard for peace is pursuit of profit can be seen in numerous cases which we cannot fully discuss in this essay; however examples can be found in the failed 2002 Venezuelan Coup,[25] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn25) the actions of the US government in supporting the United Front Company,[26] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn26) the tacit support for Columbian ‘death-squads’[27] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn27) and many others.
One can view the exercise of nation-building as simply being a form of imperialism, Michael Iganatieff puts it: “Humanitarian Intervention: an imperial exercise of power if ever there was one”.[28] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn28) RAND Corp, unintentionally, justifies this claim by asserting that “Nation-Building [...] involves an effort to promote political and economic reforms”,[29] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn29)any economic reforms will be, as previously discussed, led by the IMF and the World Bank and aim to sell off state run businesses to private sector companies. Any political reforms will not be to “make authoritarian states democratic”[30] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn30) but to create stability to allow “the more important task of reducing the level of risk for all investors, private and government”.[31] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn31) Iganatieff states that military interventions in post-conflict states “make them [host nation] practice Western values, if not at gun point, then under the implicit threat that if they don’t the internationals will go and leave them to their [...] hatreds”.[32] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn32)By ‘Western values’ one can infer that he means western socio-economic patterns, what has been termed in the past as ‘McDonaldization’[33] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn33), or what is known as capitalist globalization and the expansion of US hegemony.
As this critical document analysis has shown the very foundations of “Nation-Building for Beginners” are subjective IR myths, these myths let actors neglect large discrepancies in the justification of their actions and allows the phrasing of expansionist policy to be in benevolent terms. The assertion we focused on in particular emphasised the ‘brand state’ perception of the USA, that is to say it reinforces the image of the USA as peace loving,[34] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn34) however with deeper analysis this was exposed to be a myth of international relations theory.
[1] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref1) Cynthia Weber ‘International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction’ (New York: Routledge 2006) 6
[2] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref2) Weber ‘International Relations Theory’ 7
[3] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref3) Slavoj Zizek ‘Violence’ (London: Profile Books Ltd 2008) 85
[4] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref4) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ (http://www.rand.org/events/2007/03/14/event.html (http://www.rand.org/events/2007/03/14/event.html) 9 November 2009) preface: X
[5] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref5) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ preface: X
[6] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref6) RAND Corporation ‘History & Mission’ (http://www.rand.org/about/history/ (http://www.rand.org/about/history/) 16th September 2009)
[7] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref7) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXV
[8] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref8) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 23
[9] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref9) Robin, Lakoff ‘The Language of War’ (Berkeley: University of California Press 2000)
[10] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref10) Jeet Heer ‘Revisionists argue that counterinsurgency won the battle against guerrillas in Vietnam, but lost the larger war. Can we do better in Iraq’ Boston Globe (4 January 2004)
[11] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref11) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 47
[12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref12) Slavoj Zizek ‘Violence’ 2
[13] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref13) ‘Malnutrition: Death of 5.6 Million Under-Fives Every Year’ Asian Human Rights Commission (http://acr.hrschool.org/mainfile.php/0283/700/ (http://acr.hrschool.org/mainfile.php/0283/700/) 9 November 2009)
[14] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref14) ‘Iraq Deaths’ Just Foreign Policy(http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq (http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq) 9 November 2009)
[15] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref15) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXVII
[16] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref16) Michael Schwartz ‘Media Silence about the carnage in Iraq: Killing 10,000 Iraqis Every Month’ Counterpunch.org (http://www.counterpunch.org/schwartz07052007.html (http://www.counterpunch.org/schwartz07052007.html) 9 November 2009)
[17] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref17) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ foreword: V
[18] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref18) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ foreword: VI
[19] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref19) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXXIII
[20] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref20) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 152
[21] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref21) It is of interest to mention that the cost of nation-building in Haiti was around $9 per person per annum, whereas in Afghanistan it is around $61 p.p.p.a, with this in mind one can safely assume that it was not the cost of actions alone that motivated the withdrawal.
[22] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref22) Karl Marx ‘On the Question of Free Trade’ Marx & Engels Collected Works, Volume 6. (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/01/09ft.htm (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/01/09ft.htm) 9 November 2009)
[23] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref23) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 258
[24] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref24) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 237
[25] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref25) ‘ US ‘likely behind’ Chavez Coup’ Aljazeera (http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/09/200992116049879437.html (http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/09/200992116049879437.html) 9 November 2009)
[26] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref26) Lars Shoultz ‘Beneath the United States’ (New York: Harvard University Press 1998) 337
[27] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref27) ‘Human Rights in Republic of Columbia’ Amnesty International (http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/colombia (http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/colombia) 9 November 2009)
[28] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref28) Michael Iganatieff ‘Empire Lite: Nation-Building in Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan’ (London: Vintage 2003)69
[29] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref29) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XVII
[30] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref30) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXV
[31] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref31)RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 251
[32] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref32) Iganatieff ‘Empire Lite’ 71
[33] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref33) George Ritzer, ‘The McDonaldization of Society’ (Los Angeles: Pine Forge Press: 2008)
[34] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref34) Peter Van Ham ‘The Rise of the Brand State: The Post Modern Politics of Image and Reputation’ (http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&folder=715&paper=968 (http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&folder=715&paper=968) 11 November 2009)
In this essay we shall expose a central, yet underlying, assumption of a policy document and highlight the way in which it affects the implicit message of that document. We shall also address what the document neglects to consider and what this neglect tells us about the use of myth in IR.
The document chosen is the “Beginners Guide to Nation-Building” published in 2007 by the RAND Corporation (RAND Corp), it is intended to advise the stabilization and redevelopment of post-conflict societies, specifically those that the USA, or “allied governments and foundations”,[4] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn4) have intervened in militarily. The document was created for several US governmental agencies such as “the Secretary of Defence, the Joint Staffs, the US Intelligence Community” ,[5] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn5) and others. The RAND Corporation attests to produce “high-quality and objective research and analysis” [6] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn6) for state, non-state and private sector actors.
The central assumption to be discussed in this essay is that: “[T]he primary objective of any nation building operation is to make violent societies peaceful”, this claim is supported by the following “[it is] not to make poor ones prosperous, or authoritarian ones democratic”.[7] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn7) We will firstly question the nature of ‘conflicts’, then discuss the assumption of what violent societies are, and lastly try to discern the actual motives of ‘nation building’, through these acts we shall expose this statement as resting upon IR myths.
Those who are resisting the ‘nation-building’ intervention are labelled by RAND Corp as simply being ‘spoilers’,[8] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn8) this view of the insurgency shows a lack of understanding, or a will to not understand the nature of resistance. To name them ‘spoilers’ adopts the myth that they are dangerous ‘others’[9] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn9) who, like a James Bond villain, simply want to ruin things for the ‘forces of good’, this biased view is typified in an article for the Boston Globe where ‘spoilers’ are said to be “cloaked insurgents who practice hit and run murders”.[10] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn10)Not only does this play on fears of a ‘hidden enemy’ but by using the term ‘murders’ it gives connotations very different from when the ‘casualties’ caused by the intervening forces are reported upon. RAND Corp goes on to claim that “the population will be vulnerable [...] to extremists who seek to undermine emerging orders”,[11] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn11)they do not however try to evaluate the conditions that give rise to such elements, or qualify their terms. For example Hamas would be considered as the ‘spoilers’ in the Palestinian Conflict (one can assume this will be the view of American Policy makers due to their election being largely condemned), however Palestinian authorities might just as easily claim Israeli settlers or even the IDF to be ‘spoilers’ (one must also keep in mind that it was Israeli settlers who first took up arms in the former British Mandate of Palestine). This myth of ‘spoilers’ can be used to obscure and justify actions taken by intervening forces, similar examples to the Hamas case can be seen in interventions the world over be that with the IRA and the Black and Tans (or RUC) in Northern Ireland, or with the American Army and the Viet Cong during the Vietnam war.
The document neglects to define what is classed as a ‘violent society’, and therefore places an assumption at its very foundation. Zizek comments on the existence of a Subjective and an Objective violence drawing distinctions that RAND Corp does not (it exclusively focuses on Subjective Violence). “Objective violence is precisely the violence inherent to this normal state of things”,[12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn12) that is to say that, hypothetically RAND would deem it prudent to alter a society that had suffered a civil war with 1000 fatalities but would not do so for a society where an economic system caused many more deaths (for example 5.6 million under-5’s alone die from malnutrition each year).[13] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn13) This subjective view of violence betrays the true aims of ‘nation-building’, they do not suggest that violent societies be pacified, rather they simply aim to make turbulent societies ‘stable’ (the reasons for this will be discussed later in this essay).
Although only published in 2007, the document can be criticised by looking at past examples as it puts forth a very similar method of nation-building as has already been seen. Since the US led intervention in Iraq around 1.3 million lives have been lost violently,[14] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn14) this hardly unifies the key principle of trying to pacify a nation with the view that “nation-building [...] involves the use of armed force”.[15] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn15) Further exposing the myth of pacification being a key aim of nation-building; is the fact that since the end of the Iraq War in the period of ‘nation-building’, the death toll actually increased from an estimated 15,000 a month to a figure near double that.[16] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn16) This can be attributed to increased resistance to the occupation itself, and to the arming of local militias by the occupying forces, something that the RAND Corporation suggest as a method of creating peace in a society.
The myth of wanting to ‘build peaceful nations’ can be further exposed using Haiti as a case study. Before we do this it is necessary to draw attention to two points made in our document, the first is that “nation building has become an inescapable responsibility [for ‘Western Governments’]”,[17] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn17) the second being that in Haiti there was an “increasing professionalism”[18] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn18) in operations. In Haiti the conflict can be seen as emerging partly from economic reform which removed tariffs, this led to a crash in local agriculture as Haitian farmers could not compete with cheap (mainly US) imports. The resulting unemployment caused discontent and riots. These economic reforms were done on the request of the IMF, in other words the IMF reforms directly contributed to the society become increasingly violent (both subjectively and objectively), however RAND Corp suggest that the same institution should “take the lead in working [...] to create a [...] healthy financial system”.[19] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn19) The USA intervened in Haiti and started a process of nation-building, however RAND itself admits that Haiti never reached a ‘tipping point’ (a point of relative self reliance) yet the troops withdrew leaving a ‘failed state’. The RAND document tells us half completed projects often have worse consequences than if no intervention had occurred at all.[20] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn20) The reason for withdrawal from Haiti brings us to our second strand of criticism, that the motivation for this intervention, and for all others, was not peace but profits.[21] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn21)
Marxists would see military interventions and ‘nation-building’ simply as expansion in the search for new markets: “[in] the need of a constantly expanding market [...] the bourgeois [spread] over the whole surface of the globe, it must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, and establish connections everywhere”.[22] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn22) Marxists look at the motives for interventions whereas RAND Corp neglects to do so, instead it focuses simply on the acts of how best to subdue and exploit the nation in question.
The very wording of the entire document betrays its central priority in nation building, when explaining why intervention is the correct course of action it does not primarily speak of the human cost but in terms financial cost: “While it may be prohibitively expensive to forcefully halt a civil war in full swing, experience has shown that interventions intended to consolidate and perpetuate a tentative peace are cost effective”.[23] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn23) As afore mentioned the aim of nation-building is to create stability in a region, this is to allow for ‘business as usual’, not to create peace, in the ‘Nation Building Guide’ is advice to help intervening forces make the most of their profits: “In most instances the society would be better off if such state-owned enterprises we sold to the private sector”.[24] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn24)This disregard for peace is pursuit of profit can be seen in numerous cases which we cannot fully discuss in this essay; however examples can be found in the failed 2002 Venezuelan Coup,[25] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn25) the actions of the US government in supporting the United Front Company,[26] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn26) the tacit support for Columbian ‘death-squads’[27] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn27) and many others.
One can view the exercise of nation-building as simply being a form of imperialism, Michael Iganatieff puts it: “Humanitarian Intervention: an imperial exercise of power if ever there was one”.[28] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn28) RAND Corp, unintentionally, justifies this claim by asserting that “Nation-Building [...] involves an effort to promote political and economic reforms”,[29] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn29)any economic reforms will be, as previously discussed, led by the IMF and the World Bank and aim to sell off state run businesses to private sector companies. Any political reforms will not be to “make authoritarian states democratic”[30] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn30) but to create stability to allow “the more important task of reducing the level of risk for all investors, private and government”.[31] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn31) Iganatieff states that military interventions in post-conflict states “make them [host nation] practice Western values, if not at gun point, then under the implicit threat that if they don’t the internationals will go and leave them to their [...] hatreds”.[32] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn32)By ‘Western values’ one can infer that he means western socio-economic patterns, what has been termed in the past as ‘McDonaldization’[33] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn33), or what is known as capitalist globalization and the expansion of US hegemony.
As this critical document analysis has shown the very foundations of “Nation-Building for Beginners” are subjective IR myths, these myths let actors neglect large discrepancies in the justification of their actions and allows the phrasing of expansionist policy to be in benevolent terms. The assertion we focused on in particular emphasised the ‘brand state’ perception of the USA, that is to say it reinforces the image of the USA as peace loving,[34] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftn34) however with deeper analysis this was exposed to be a myth of international relations theory.
[1] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref1) Cynthia Weber ‘International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction’ (New York: Routledge 2006) 6
[2] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref2) Weber ‘International Relations Theory’ 7
[3] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref3) Slavoj Zizek ‘Violence’ (London: Profile Books Ltd 2008) 85
[4] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref4) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ (http://www.rand.org/events/2007/03/14/event.html (http://www.rand.org/events/2007/03/14/event.html) 9 November 2009) preface: X
[5] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref5) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ preface: X
[6] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref6) RAND Corporation ‘History & Mission’ (http://www.rand.org/about/history/ (http://www.rand.org/about/history/) 16th September 2009)
[7] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref7) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXV
[8] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref8) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 23
[9] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref9) Robin, Lakoff ‘The Language of War’ (Berkeley: University of California Press 2000)
[10] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref10) Jeet Heer ‘Revisionists argue that counterinsurgency won the battle against guerrillas in Vietnam, but lost the larger war. Can we do better in Iraq’ Boston Globe (4 January 2004)
[11] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref11) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 47
[12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref12) Slavoj Zizek ‘Violence’ 2
[13] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref13) ‘Malnutrition: Death of 5.6 Million Under-Fives Every Year’ Asian Human Rights Commission (http://acr.hrschool.org/mainfile.php/0283/700/ (http://acr.hrschool.org/mainfile.php/0283/700/) 9 November 2009)
[14] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref14) ‘Iraq Deaths’ Just Foreign Policy(http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq (http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq) 9 November 2009)
[15] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref15) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXVII
[16] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref16) Michael Schwartz ‘Media Silence about the carnage in Iraq: Killing 10,000 Iraqis Every Month’ Counterpunch.org (http://www.counterpunch.org/schwartz07052007.html (http://www.counterpunch.org/schwartz07052007.html) 9 November 2009)
[17] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref17) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ foreword: V
[18] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref18) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ foreword: VI
[19] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref19) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXXIII
[20] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref20) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 152
[21] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref21) It is of interest to mention that the cost of nation-building in Haiti was around $9 per person per annum, whereas in Afghanistan it is around $61 p.p.p.a, with this in mind one can safely assume that it was not the cost of actions alone that motivated the withdrawal.
[22] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref22) Karl Marx ‘On the Question of Free Trade’ Marx & Engels Collected Works, Volume 6. (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/01/09ft.htm (http://marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/01/09ft.htm) 9 November 2009)
[23] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref23) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 258
[24] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref24) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 237
[25] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref25) ‘ US ‘likely behind’ Chavez Coup’ Aljazeera (http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/09/200992116049879437.html (http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/09/200992116049879437.html) 9 November 2009)
[26] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref26) Lars Shoultz ‘Beneath the United States’ (New York: Harvard University Press 1998) 337
[27] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref27) ‘Human Rights in Republic of Columbia’ Amnesty International (http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/colombia (http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/colombia) 9 November 2009)
[28] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref28) Michael Iganatieff ‘Empire Lite: Nation-Building in Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan’ (London: Vintage 2003)69
[29] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref29) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XVII
[30] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref30) RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ summary: XXV
[31] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref31)RAND Corporation ‘Beginners Guide to Nation-Building’ 251
[32] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref32) Iganatieff ‘Empire Lite’ 71
[33] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref33) George Ritzer, ‘The McDonaldization of Society’ (Los Angeles: Pine Forge Press: 2008)
[34] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=16#_ftnref34) Peter Van Ham ‘The Rise of the Brand State: The Post Modern Politics of Image and Reputation’ (http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&folder=715&paper=968 (http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&folder=715&paper=968) 11 November 2009)