Essay on Shargh Newspaper - January 31, 2019 -
The original text is in Persian and the following translation was done by Ai.
As long as the history of foreign policy and international relations, one of the marginal questions in the minds of politicians has been the relationship between domestic and foreign policy. Regardless of what politicians and especially diplomats say in official guise, which is typically a break from domestic politics and separation from domestic competitions, it goes without saying that this is nothing more than a diplomatic compliment and the reality is that politicians all have a specific political orientation and consider themselves to belong to a specific trend.
Mainly in international relations courses, regardless of the prevailing theory, the "state", whatever it may be, is recognized as an active unit in international relations. The one that not only friends, but also its enemies recognize in most cases and everything that is negotiation, demand, debt and condemnation is done towards it. Even during war, they host its representatives and maintain diplomatic relations at agreed levels.
This approach, namely state-centeredness in international relations, is in maximum proportion to what is known as the theory of realism in international relations. Realists mainly hold the view that, regardless of what is happening within countries, due to the functions imposed on them, largely the same behavior can be expected from them. In addition to the alleged indifference to relations within the sphere of states, this point of view is that states can be destroyed as soon as their analysis is aligned.
In addition to this theory, which is the most common theory of international relations, there are other theories. Among the main current views, if we go beyond Kant's idea of a world state, the most important of them is the one that, derived from Grotius, although it recognizes the anarchic atmosphere of the international system, at the same time it believes that an order based on mutual interests can be built in it. The idea that is closest to what is called "liberal peace": a peace that, by studying the history of the last two centuries, can be acknowledged that between liberal democratic states that consider each other to be liberal democratic states, although conflicts have reached high levels, they have never turned into full-scale war. This is due to the obligation of these states to be directly accountable to public opinion, which often pays the cost of governments and wars, and therefore, the liberal democratic system does not easily consider the other as a dangerous threat and does not allow elected rulers to make such a fatal choice. Since no current in politics deliberately commits suicide and removes itself from the scene, the issue is ruled out and war sees many options before it to resolve the conflict.
If we take a step back to what seems to be the case, we should think about it again: can we still say with certainty that the unit of action in international relations is the state? Can we still believe in a complete separation between a state's domestic and foreign policy?
The fact is that every government and in electoral systems, every party that is in power, makes statements and poems as if what it says is unconditionally approved by all political forces in its country and, in comparison with its international rival, does not consider any domestic rival behind or in front of it.
However, at least due to the real and operational effects of the defeats and victories that occur for the currents in power during their tenure and, as a result, cause defeats and victories in the next domestic elections, it seems that this statement should be reconsidered. As a theoretical idea, it may be said that although the number of base-based electoral systems in the world is increasing, political reality is moving further away from what is said in the theory called realism and is getting closer to Grosius's view, and that is why it can be considered that the actors in the international arena are not states but the main domestic currents of the countries: Now, if in a country (such as authoritarian systems) there is no more main political current, in the spirit of what was said in realism, all the words and positions of presence on the international stage are the same as those expressed and there is really no other voice. But who can close their eyes to the reality of today's base-based electoral systems, in which while the representative is negotiating, the political rivals of his/her current are calculating their next moves based on this negotiation. This is not far-fetched, even though it is far from official positions: the main currents of countries, as in the international arena, are constantly competing for power - if not in conflict - at least in a competition that they can abandon at any moment.
This statement inevitably means that the main currents of different countries, while having common interests with their domestic rivals - such as territorial integrity, territorial interests, etc. - can only reach an agreement with the currents and not with other countries and see their interests aligned with them: sometimes, freedom-loving tendencies may have more affinity with each other due to their common origin, which is not far-fetched. But what is interesting to note is that in the various corners of the international relations scene, right-wing and conservative tendencies, despite appearing to be at opposite ends of the political spectrum in expressing their positions, have common interests in disrupting what is considered the pinnacle of international cooperative relations, and that is why they pull the rope towards themselves, which, incidentally, will produce the same result if both insist on their own path.
To put it more clearly, by having tendencies with a common origin in power on the other side, the possibility of a specific political tendency achieving practical successes and, as a result, determining the political destiny in favor of that trend increases. Conversely, when a group, motivated by the desire to compete with their own internal rival, who may be in power, disrupts their policies and methods, they have not only directly contributed to their own victory, but have also indirectly helped their equivalent trend on the other side to achieve power and win the internal competition of the other side.
If we accept this idea, both as a nation and as politicians, we will not consider the impact and influence of our actions to be limited to within our political borders, and without any interference from any side, we will pursue the impact of the success of one movement on its equivalent through the systematic mechanism of electoral and competitive systems.
In line with the above analysis of what is our issue today, namely the JCPOA, it should also be noted that we are not facing a coherent, unified and continuous reality as "America", but rather a major tendency of that political society in every period. This is why the JCPOA, whatever it was and in whatever quality it was written, would definitely have its current fate due to the level of extremism and hostility of Trump towards the Obama movement. This is why some believe in negotiating with an extremist and more adversarial side in America and argue that no one will be more extremist than this movement in the future of politics and that a possible agreement with this movement will last under any circumstances.
But on the other hand, it should be noted that even today, Trump’s failure to win the game could end up benefiting our national interests in the medium term, and based on this argument, we should not help his 2020 election campaign by negotiating with him or even taking a photo: we should wait with open eyes and be patient until the current chapter in American politics ends, and in this way, we have not only imposed ourselves as a desirable element in international politics on our competitors, but also removed a competitor from the scene of American domestic politics who will be against our national interests from top to bottom.
Domestic concerns about the victory and defeat of the JCPOA have also been and are of the same nature: the person in the White House had the worst impact on the political fate of the current residents of Pastor Street: the person who, if it were not for him, would have achieved an exceptional victory and a long-term extension not only for those attributed to the government of prudence and hope, but also for the line of moderation with the world.
In this way, whenever we want to think about America, we should pay attention to which America are we talking about? An American who is legitimate in Europe and the world, acts moderately, predictably, and consistently, and as a result can build coalitions and trends with his partners, or an American who even his closest allies turn away from him, and almost never builds coalitions, and is incapable of even holding a meeting? Obama's America or Trump's America?
If we look back, we will find that moderation has typically produced its own results, and so has extremism. Unless we take the initiative and directly shape the situation within our borders and, consequently, on the other side of the planet, in favor of our national interests, which certainly depend on peace and stability.
Shargh Daily link
File
