Misunderstanding International Relations: A Focus On Liberal Democracies

169 Pages·2020·1.754 MB·English

by  Scott Burchill

Misunderstanding
International Relations
A Focus on Liberal
Democracies
Scott Burchill
Misunderstanding International Relations
Scott Burchill
Misunderstanding
International Relations
A Focus on Liberal Democracies
Scott Burchill
School of Politics & International Studies
Deakin University
Burwood, VIC, Australia
ISBN 978-981-15-1935-2 ISBN 978-981-15-1936-9 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-1936-9
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2020
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Cover Pattern © Melisa Hasan
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For Anna with all my love
A
cknowledgements
The quality of the manuscript was significantly improved by the careful
reading and helpful comments of Clinton Fernandes, Anna Moss and Zoë
Burchill. I have also benefited enormously from suggestions made over
many years by Andrew Linklater, Noam Chomsky and Gabriel Kolko.
Conversations with Amira Hass, Antony Loewenstein, Brian Toohey and
Lance Collins significantly improved my understanding of the subjects I
have attempted to grapple with here. I am also grateful for the patience
and forbearance of Anushangi Weerakoon at Palgrave Macmillan and the
professional support of Matthew Clarke at Deakin University. All mistakes
and infelicities, however, remain mine.
Earlier versions of some of the arguments that can be found in the
chapters were trialed in the online commentary sites New Matilda, Crikey,
The Conversation, Arena and Pearls and Irritations.
Scott Burchill
vii
c
ontents
1 Introduction 1
2 Critical Thinking: Part One—The Limits of the Expressible 5
3 Critical Thinking: Part Two—Escaping the Zeitgeist and
Building an Intellectual Self-Defence 27
4 Israel-Palestine: Part One—Do States Have a “Right to
Exist”? 53
5 Israel-Palestine: Part Two—Australian Foreign Policy and
the Israel-Palestine Conflict—Avoiding the Colonialist
Narrative 63
6 Is There a Deep State? 85
7 U nited States Foreign Policy: Radical Islam and the West 107
8 T he Vietnam War: Morality and History 133
ix
x CONTENTS
9 Class Power in the United States and Australia 141
Index 161
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
Abstract As a discipline, International Relations is widely misunderstood,
both in theory and in practice, largely because of its politicised nature.
This book explains how thinking about international politics has been
affected by critical errors in reasoning, ideology and argument. It intro-
duces a number of case studies which are affected by these errors, includ-
ing the legal status of the modern nation-state, the Israel-Palestine conflict,
the unique relationships constructed by settler-colonial societies, the idea
of the Deep State, the relationship between the West and radical Islam, the
impact of moral righteousness on historical memory and understanding,
and the role played by class conflict in modern Western politics.
Keywords Chomsky • Propaganda • Zeitgeist • Nation-state • Deep
State • Class
Given the intrinsic political nature of the subject, it is not surprising that
International Relations is a widely misunderstood subject.
Some of these misunderstandings come from faulty thinking, theoreti-
cal limitations and cognitive bias. In other cases it is the product of ideo-
logical indoctrination and state propaganda.
The Western world likes to highlight the shortcomings of international
thought and practice in rival states, and amongst rival groups, outside its
© The Author(s) 2020 1
S. Burchill, Misunderstanding International Relations,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-1936-9_1
2 S. BURCHILL
own domains. However, it remains strikingly allergic to examinations of its
own thought crimes and breaches of international law. At its root, this
allergy is deeply unethical. As Noam Chomsky points out in his compari-
son of the West’s responses to conflicts in Kosovo and East Timor, “for
profession of high principles to be taken seriously, the principles must first
and foremost be applied to oneself, not only to official enemies or others
designated as unworthy in the prevailing political culture.”1
This book treats this sensitivity to introspection in two ways, first by
exposing how thinking about international politics has been affected by
critical errors in reasoning and argument. It then explores a number of
case studies which are affected by these errors, including the legal status of
the modern nation-state, the Israel-Palestine conflict, the unique relation-
ships constructed by settler-colonial societies, the idea of the Deep State,
the relationship between the West and radical Islam, the impact of moral
righteousness on historical memory and understanding, and the role
played by class conflict in modern Western politics.
Chapter 2 examines how limitations are placed on the available spec-
trum of permissible thinking about international relations. Why are some
views regarded as mainstream and acceptable, while others are considered
to be beyond the bounds of the expressible? Where are those boundaries
and who sets them? This chapter looks at the relationship between inter-
ests and ideas, the consequences of self-censorship, and the ways in which
the particular interests of elites are presented as the national interests of
the state.
The literature on totalitarian and authoritarian societies is saturated
with studies of how the state indoctrinates citizens with government pro-
paganda. Chapter 3 argues that indoctrination and propaganda, as well as
the marginalising of dissent, also exist in self-described free societies where
coercive means to achieve conformity and subordination are not so readily
available to the state. In fact those strategies need to be subtle and effec-
tive if they are to work. The chapter also examines the dangers of pre-
sentism and the importance of escaping the zeitgeist of contemporary
dramatic events if a deeper understanding of them is to be found.
The claim that states have a “right to exist” has found currency in con-
temporary discussions of international politics, specifically in relation to
the Israel-Palestine conflict. Chapter 4 argues that no such legal or moral
right exists today or has ever existed for states. Furthermore, the invoca-
tion of such a right by Israeli negotiators was first raised in the 1980s as a
way of blocking a resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict by erecting an