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The National Interest | http://nationalinterest.org/
Eagle in a China Shop
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One
pervasive, troublesome feature of U.S. foreign policy is the tendency
to view all countries as more or less coherent national entities.
American officials and opinion leaders are “map centric.” If they look
at a map and see an area bounded by solid lines with a large star
somewhere in the center to mark the capital city, they assume it is a
real country with a national identity. And the usual procedure is to
regard the supposed leader, whether his title is president, king or some
other honorific, residing in that capital as someone who exercises
authority throughout the country.
July 25, 2013
But in many parts of the world, the Western concept of a nation-state is extremely weak. The primary loyalty of an inhabitant is more likely to be to an ethnic group, tribe, clan or religion than to a country. U.S. officials appear to have difficulty grasping that point, and as a result, the United States too often barges into fragile societies, disrupting what modest order may exist. America is the bull (or more accurately, the eagle) in the china shop, flailing about, breaking delicate political and social connections and disrupting domestic balances of power. Washington’s ambitious agenda typically is to try to forge or strengthen a cohesive national identity in client states, even when the real power and cohesion lies at the local or subregional level. The results have ranged from disappointing to calamitous.
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