In the new issue of World Affair’s Journal Scott McConnell, co-founder and editor-at-large of The American Conservative, pens an intriguing and provocative essay investigating the effects our increasingly multicultural society will have on the future of U.S. Foreign policy. In particular, he cites the growing influence of the Mexican-, Asian-, and Arab-American communities, as well as the unforseen and lasting effects of the 1965 Immigration Act in reshaping our “nation’s identity.” A new identity is emerging that is taking us away from the messianic and interventionist view our nation had adopted for the past 70 years:
… the backers of the 1965 act did not imagine huge demographic changes: there would be, they claimed, some modest increase in the number of Greek and Italian immigrants but not much else. The sheer inaccuracy of this prediction was already apparent by the early 1970s. The 1965 Act allowed entry of immigrants from any country, so long as they possessed certain job skills or family members living here or had been granted refugee status themselves.
The family reunification provision soon became the vital engine of immigrant selection. By the 1980s, it had greatly increased numbers of Asians and of Hispanics–the latter mostly from Mexico. The European population of the country was now in relative decline–from 87 percent in 1970 to 66 percent in 2008. If immigration continues at present rates (and barring a long-term economic collapse, it is likely to), by 2040, Hispanics will make up a quarter of the American population. If that does not guarantee a somewhat different foreign policy, there is also the prospect of a substantial expansion of America’s once miniscule Muslim and Arab populations. [Link]
The author summarizes that at the beginning of the 20th century America was “hyphenated nation” and that our multi-polar society had the effect of tempering our foreign policy ambitions, especially when contemplating entry into a conflict. Even at the beginning, our founding fathers, most notably Washington, believed that America had a special destiny and that we would eventually populate the entire continent and run our experiment of freedom and democracy free from the baggage of past conflicts in the old world. That isolationist view was later fortified by the fact that immigrants coming to the U.S. from different European communities, with competing viewpoints, served to some degree as a system of checks and balances in the 19th century. Pearl Harbor had the effect of sweeping away differences between the views of different European-American groups and helped forge what the author refers to as a “national identity” (“national white identity” might be more appropriate).
…America’s intra-European divisions began to melt away quickly after Pearl Harbor, as military service became the defining generational event for American men born between 1914 and 1924. The mixed army squad of WASP, Italian, German, Jew, and Irish became a standard plot device for the popular World War II novel and film. The Cold War generated a further compatibility between ethnicity and foreign policy. East European immigrants and refugees emerged to speak for the silenced populations of a newly Stalinized Eastern Europe. Suddenly, all the major European-American groups were in sync. Italian-Americans mobilized for mass letter-writing campaigns to their parents and grandparents warning of the dangers of voting Communist. Greek-Americans naturally supported the Marshall Plan. [Link]
<
p>So here is the larger point. Our present military is increasingly comprised of Evangelical Christians who come from red states or predominantly rural areas expected to lose political power as the demographics of our nation inexorably shift. Our foreign policy by contrast, dictated in large part by voting citizens, will be based on the conflicting priorities of a more heterogenous group.
Those sections of the country–the South, lower Midwest, and the regions touching the Appalachian mountains–that have received the fewest immigrants from the waves of immigration of the past 130 years not only count as the most Republican; they are the regions least likely to send white antiwar politicians to Congress. They provide a disproportionate share of the nation’s soldiers. (If one were to subtract the very poor and very white state of Maine, one would need to go through a list of twenty states ranked in order of per capita Army recruitment to reach a state that John Kerry carried in 2004.) One political conclusion is obvious: current rates of immigration will not only diminish the “white” proportion of the American population; they will also diminish the political weight of those regions with the most hawkish and pro-military political cultures. [Link]
<
p>This conflict between those who formulate policy (voters and politicians) and those who often implement it (soldiers) should naturally lead to a blunting of the aggressive responses that the U.S. exhibited in the latter half of the 20th century. Heinlein might have something to say about this.
Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, America has entered a new era of ethnicity and foreign policy, whose contours are only just now emerging. During the 1990s, when multiculturalism was in vogue, leaders of old and new minority groups steered American foreign policy toward the cause of their ancestral homelands. African-American and Hispanic leaders touted the success of American Jews in lobbying for Israel as an example to be emulated. At one major Latino conference, participants nominated themselves the vanguard of a “bridge community” between the United States and Latin America.
Ethnic lobbies, the old as much as the new, quickly filled the empty space left behind by the Cold War. Traditional realists like former defense secretary James Schlesinger and Harvard political scientist Samuel Huntington bemoaned the diminished sense of national cohesion and purpose. Ethnic lobbies, they feared, would inhibit the United States from exercising global leadership. Indeed, if one were to examine some of the major policy milestones of the Clinton era–active participation in the Northern Ireland peace process, the military occupation of Haiti, expanded trade embargoes on Cuba and Iran, the revelation of the Swiss banking scandals–it could be argued that ethnic lobbies were, as much as any coherent grand strategy, the era’s prime movers.
After a brief spasm of patriotic and military display following the attacks of 9/11, we have picked up where we left off the day before. Which is to say that the preliminary indications point toward a future that will bear some semblance to the politics of the 1990s and the World War I era, when ethnic constituencies operated as a brake on executive power and military intervention. There is no evidence that the rallying cries put forth by America’s neoconservatives and liberal hawks–democratization of tyrannies, the global war on terror, the fight against radical Islam–have gained significant traction among first- and second-generation immigrant communities. Certainly they do not resonate with anything like the intensity that anti-Communism did after World War II. On the basis of what is visible thus far, today’s and tomorrow’s Mexican-, Asian-, and Arab-Americans will more resemble the Swedes, Germans, and Irish of a century ago than the Poles, Balts, and Cubans of the Cold War era. [Link]
<
p>
On this last point I somewhat agree. It seems very reasonable that barring events like 9/11 that momentarily unite ethnic groups with differing perspectives of the world, our foreign policy will most likely change in one direction. The beliefs and geopolitical views vocalized by South Asian Americans will, I believe, have a disproportionately large effect on our foreign policy. Not only are we very steeped in identity politics, particularly the first generation, but we also have a lot of money that can be used to influence policy-makers through campaign donations. Much like the author I am somewhat ambivalent about this result. For example, do I really want to see American policy toward Pakistan disproportionately influenced by the subjectivity of Indian Americans? A “national identity” implies an objectivity that will no longer exist (even if misguided), and that is simultaneously both a wonderful and disconcerting prospect.
I see a divergence between the foreign policy interests of ethnic lobbies representing immigrants and that of US-born Desis, one that will get more pronounced with coming generations, yearly trips to the subcontinent and Bollywood films notwithstanding. Resistance is futile – all be assimilated into the hive… and the influence of hard-core ethnic lobbies might get tempered and balanced by those who might share the same ethnic background but are molded by American upbringing first and foremost. I can see a greater focus on issues like human rights, social entrepreneurship, poverty alleviation brought on by Americans who want to make a difference in the country where their parents (or grandparents grew up in). By the way, less use of military intervention, whether due to the influence of ethnic lobbies or not is not a bad thing IMHO, unless it’s military intervention to try to stop massacres like those of Bosnia and Rwanda.
“the very poor and very white state of Maine”
So where did my lovely (ahem) state of Maine fall in all this? A strange anomaly?
The first half of the essay is very poorly argued as the author having already decided to take his proposition as proven merely offers quotes snatched from here and there as evidence that ethnically informed motives drove this country’s decisions to go to war. The 75 odd years beginning from late 19th century to the conclusion of WW2 were a time of great ferment witnessing three economic upheavals and two of the nation’s four most important turning periods – Revolution and the Founding, the Civil War, New Deal, and the Civil Rights movement. Several other propositions make no sense, such as the author’s making much of the change in dominant composition of the military from episcoplian to evangelical. Our military is administered by a civilian leadership. While the author makes much of George Kennan’s desire to see a more modest foreign policy he misses the fact that it was GWB who advocated it in his acceptance speech at the nominating convention in 2000.
Just as we must never attribute to malice what is due to stupidity, we musn’t credit wisdom for what is due to selfishness. Isn’t it George Kennan who said
Of course Kennan isn’t the first political theorist to have said so. Chanakya the first ever realist founds his theories on selfishness and the three (four if you may) purusharthas as Tiruvalluvar’s Tirukkural does too in a different way (Aram, Porul and Inbam).
The article as theory although it raises important questions is almost entirely silent about the three or four very large ethnically determined groups that have had little or no say or rarely ever sought any say in their country’s foreign policy on ethnic terms. The Chinese, Japanese, African-Americans, and the people of Indian subcontinental origin.
We’ve been waiting for the link between immigration and foreign policy to become active for two generations now. Immigrants, including South Asians, will only affect US foreign policy if they vote. The disturbing trend is for groups to think that the key to influence is to set up political action committees and think tanks, heavily funded. And you will hear South Asian political types (Democrats) say that the goal should be to emulate AIPAC and consciously mirror the Jewish lobby. So there is now a US Indian Political Action Committee (www.usinpac.com). But while AIPAC’s influence on US policy is legendary, it runs counter to the political beliefs of most American Jews — who are far more liberal than the neo-con hawks at AIPAC.
Indian Americans have the financial resources to match AIPAC. But the big question is whether or not USINPAC will represent the values of most Indian Americans. Indian Americans are the wealthiest, best educated, fastest-growing ethnic group in the US, and the community’s (communities’) role in politics will become more complex and varied in the coming years.
But the most powerful political tools are always going to be the individual vote and participating in the process not just by donating money but by running for office — organizing, knocking on doors, and planting yard signs.
4 · Preston on July 23, 2009 12:06 PM · Direct link Indian Americans have the financial resources to match AIPAC. But the big question is whether or not USINPAC will represent the values of most Indian Americans. Indian Americans are the wealthiest, best educated, fastest-growing ethnic group in the US, and the community’s (communities’) role in politics will become more complex and varied in the coming years. But the most powerful political tools are always going to be the individual vote and participating in the process not just by donating money but by running for office — organizing, knocking on doors, and planting yard signs.
Great points. I noticed that here in the USA, many ethnic groups, clump up into their own linguistic groups quite ardently. One could even argue that there is even more cliques/tribalism/casteism in the USA than there is in India. In much the same way that 2nd generation Muslims are more conservative than their parents in certain countries like UK and USA, I also find that many 2nd generation Desi-Americans are more…fanatic than their parents.
There is far more Khalistanists in the USA than in India. I know this for a fact, because I talked/interacted with some misguided young SIkhs at a Gurudwara in Milford, Massachusetts. Moreover, this coming weekend, there’s actually a forum to remember ’84 and Operation Bluestar victims. The speakers at this event at Harvard are transparently Khalistani separatists. One day, I’m sure that when they have a little more clout, they would probably work antagonistically against India.
One could even argue that there is even more cliques/tribalism/casteism in the USA than there is in India. In much the same way that 2nd generation Muslims are more conservative than their parents in certain countries like UK and USA, I also find that many 2nd generation Desi-Americans are more…fanatic than their parents.
make the argument. i’m curious, because i’m really skeptical. one could make the argument that 2nd generation muslims in the UK are more conservative (though i disagree, what is really true is that 2nd generation muslims in the UK are very conservative socially in the context of the society in which they grow up, while their parents were the median, if even more conservative, in a very conservative society). 2nd generation american muslims aren’t more conservative than their immigrant parents, though they are more ‘international.’ the survey data show them to be moderately socially conservative and fiscally liberal, like blacks. but substantial numbers (around 1/2) believe muslim women should be allowed to marry non-muslims, and the like.
6 · razib on July 23, 2009 11:44 PM · Direct link make the argument. i’m curious, because i’m really skeptical. one could make the argument that 2nd generation muslims in the UK are more conservative (though i disagree, what is really true is that 2nd generation muslims in the UK are very conservative socially in the context of the society in which they grow up, while their parents were the median, if even more conservative, in a very conservative society). 2nd generation american muslims aren’t more conservative than their immigrant parents, though they are more ‘international.’ the survey data show them to be moderately socially conservative and fiscally liberal, like blacks. but substantial numbers (around 1/2) believe muslim women should be allowed to marry non-muslims, and the like.
What I meant was that many 2nd generational immigrants tend to be more “nationalistic” than their parents. For example, Muslim immigrants who never wore the head covering has daughthers, who on their own compulsion, wear burqas/chadors/etc.
There is far more Khalistanists in the USA than in India. I know this for a fact, because I talked/interacted with some misguided young SIkhs at a Gurudwara in Milford, Massachusetts. Moreover, this coming weekend, there’s actually a forum to remember ’84 and Operation Bluestar victims. The speakers at this event at Harvard are transparently Khalistani separatists. One day, I’m sure that when they have a little more clout, they would probably work antagonistically against India.
I have noticed that some of these young khalisanti idiots here in Vancouver are Canadian born and there parents more often then not moderate sikh’s
On the other hand alot of the older hardcore Khalisanti idiots there Canadian born sons have ended up being some of the top Indo-Canadian gangesters in the Vancouver area.
8 · Suki Dillon on July 25, 2009 05:47 AM · Direct link I have noticed that some of these young khalisanti idiots here in Vancouver are Canadian born and there parents more often then not moderate sikh’s On the other hand alot of the older hardcore Khalisanti idiots there Canadian born sons have ended up being some of the top Indo-Canadian gangesters in the Vancouver area.
BOSTON_MAHESH: I’m glad that we’re in agreement here. Just like you, I, too, noticed that the more nationalistic/regiospecific qualities are found MORE in the offsprings than in the parents. Also, I also have noticed just like you that these Khalistani youths are misguided, and gangster types. I don’t know if you visited that website that I had a hyperlink for, but there is this one webpage, and it equates “Sikh Studies” with Operation Blue Star. That’s like having a Jewish istudies organization called Hillel having an emblem of a Nazi concentration camp. we all know that Jewish history is a LOT more than the Holocaust. NOTE: I”m NOT marginalizing the Nazi atrocities.
I printed this article out a week ago and finally got around to reading it — it was worth the wait. I loved the analysis.