But with America’s 2012 presidential election rapidly approaching, and a changing of the guard a very real possibility, the question stands: would the Security Council remain a key foreign policy tool under a Republican president?
Based on campaign rhetoric from this year’s GOP hopefuls, the answer would seem to be an emphatic “NO!” Indeed, the party’s two frontrunners - Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney - have in recent months proposed defunding all or part of the world body if elected to the White House.
Although it’s still too early to predict what kind of foreign agenda either would adopt in a year’s time - let alone how that agenda might evolve over the three subsequent years - two considerations point to a continued strong U.S. presence in Council chambers, irrespective of party lines.
First, the geopolitical landscape of 2012 is virtually unrecognizable from that when George W. Bush took office in 2000. Then, Washington was the undisputed economic, military, and cultural hegemon in a unipolar world. Granted, America remains the dominant state in each of these categories, but two long wars and a global economic crisis have sapped a good deal of both its hard and soft power. Even before the world economy tanked, new poles of influence (notably the BRICs) were flourishing economically and have continued to grow at unprecedented rates. Against this backdrop, multilateral strategies of power projection are less an option than a necessity.
Second, recent history has shown that UN-wary Republicans can work effectively with the Security Council. Condoleezza Rice’s appointment in 2005 to head the State Department marked the beginning of the pivot toward multilateral engagement at Turtle Bay. That year, Washington went to the Council for the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri, to demand the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, and to pass a resolution on Darfur, despite its referral to the much-maligned International Criminal Court (ICC).
According to Jeffrey Laurenti, Senior Fellow at the Century Foundation, a floundering war in Iraq helped accelerate the trend toward greater U.S. engagement in the Council. In 2006, Washington accepted (albeit reluctantly) reinforcements of the UN’s peacekeeping forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in the wake of an Israeli-Hezbollah war. The following year, the White House grudgingly agreed to reappoint Mohamad El-Baradei head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Mr. El-Baradei went on to work with Washington in passing a third round of Security Council sanctions against Iran’s alleged covert nuclear weapons program.
To be sure, the Security Council is not a panacea for threats to international peace and security. On the contrary, its great power politics often preclude tough action in certain parts of the world (see Syria). But regardless of its flaws, the political and economic burden-sharing afforded by the multi-state Council, in an age of global austerity and power diffusion, cannot be ignored - not even if you’re Republican.
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Why Republicans Can't Ignore the UN
January 31, 2012
But with America’s 2012 presidential election rapidly approaching, and a changing of the guard a very real possibility, the question stands: would the Security Council remain a key foreign policy tool under a Republican president?
Based on campaign rhetoric from this year’s GOP hopefuls, the answer would seem to be an emphatic “NO!” Indeed, the party’s two frontrunners - Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney - have in recent months proposed defunding all or part of the world body if elected to the White House.
Although it’s still too early to predict what kind of foreign agenda either would adopt in a year’s time - let alone how that agenda might evolve over the three subsequent years - two considerations point to a continued strong U.S. presence in Council chambers, irrespective of party lines.
First, the geopolitical landscape of 2012 is virtually unrecognizable from that when George W. Bush took office in 2000. Then, Washington was the undisputed economic, military, and cultural hegemon in a unipolar world. Granted, America remains the dominant state in each of these categories, but two long wars and a global economic crisis have sapped a good deal of both its hard and soft power. Even before the world economy tanked, new poles of influence (notably the BRICs) were flourishing economically and have continued to grow at unprecedented rates. Against this backdrop, multilateral strategies of power projection are less an option than a necessity.
Second, recent history has shown that UN-wary Republicans can work effectively with the Security Council. Condoleezza Rice’s appointment in 2005 to head the State Department marked the beginning of the pivot toward multilateral engagement at Turtle Bay. That year, Washington went to the Council for the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri, to demand the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, and to pass a resolution on Darfur, despite its referral to the much-maligned International Criminal Court (ICC).
According to Jeffrey Laurenti, Senior Fellow at the Century Foundation, a floundering war in Iraq helped accelerate the trend toward greater U.S. engagement in the Council. In 2006, Washington accepted (albeit reluctantly) reinforcements of the UN’s peacekeeping forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in the wake of an Israeli-Hezbollah war. The following year, the White House grudgingly agreed to reappoint Mohamad El-Baradei head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Mr. El-Baradei went on to work with Washington in passing a third round of Security Council sanctions against Iran’s alleged covert nuclear weapons program.
To be sure, the Security Council is not a panacea for threats to international peace and security. On the contrary, its great power politics often preclude tough action in certain parts of the world (see Syria). But regardless of its flaws, the political and economic burden-sharing afforded by the multi-state Council, in an age of global austerity and power diffusion, cannot be ignored - not even if you’re Republican.
