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A Communitarian Letter #8
In this Issue:
Patriot Act: Reasonable compromises Betty Friedan and Coretta Scott King The need for a civilian review board Question On the Muslim cartoon controversy The “End” of Soft Power Lobbying scandal I Read: Timothy Gibson, "NIMBY and the Civic Good" Peter P. Nieckarz, Jr., “Community in Cyber Space?” James Risen, State of War Match Point: Moral progress? New Endorsements Communitarian Calendar Job Opening at The Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies
Patriot Act: Reasonable compromises
Democrats and Republicans agreed to fix the Patriot Act, introducing three new measures that help to protect civil liberties. Most notable among these is the greater protection of most libraries from FBI searches, one of the most contested elements of the original Patriot Act. The other changes give subpoena recipients the right to challenge gag orders and also forbid the F.B.I. from asking for names of attorneys consulted by people who receive secret information requests from the government. This is what America needs—legislators crossing the aisle to tackle specific issues. Note, most what truly upset civil libertarians are not in this act, such as memos authorizing torture, spying on Americans, holding people for long periods of time as “material witnesses” and so on. For more about our position visit http://www.gwu.edu/~ccps/patriot.html
Betty Friedan and Coretta Scott King
Presidents George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter eulogized Coretta Scott King, the widow of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. None of them eulogized Betty Friedan. Both died the same week, yet it was left to me and other lesser souls to rise to the occasion. It was fine for the four presidents to recognize the great African-American leader, however by any measure I know Betty Friedan contributed as much to make American society a more just society. Moreover, in an important statement she put together at the foundation of NOW, she strongly urged the women’s movement to fight for all those who are discriminated against, not just women. As I see it, at least some of these presidents should at least pay her respect at one of the forthcoming memorial services.
Trust and the government: The need for a civilian review board Trust in the Bush administration has fallen to such a low point that in order to restore at least some of it, we need a national civilian review board. The board will be composed of eminent Americans of both parties, similar if not the same people who served so well on the 9/11 Commission. Why restore trust in the Bush administration? Simply, homeland protection cannot function effectively when so many Americans distrust the government. Above all, given that existing checks and balances are failing, new ones are urgently needed. The board must set straight the grossly miscast national security debate. The No. 1 issue is not whether the government requires many new security measures - but rather to ensure that these powers are not abused. Take the uproar over the National Security Agency (NSA) spying on Americans. The main concern is not the fact that such surveillance is taking place; indeed, some Americans may be cooperating with terrorists. Moreover, colleagues at the NSA pointed out to me that often it is impossible to tell the nationality of those online. Each year about 300 million foreigners visit the United States and surely some of their messages to home bases deserve to be monitored. Hence the issue becomes under what conditions such surveillance is authorized, by whom, and above all what mechanisms are in place to ensure proper and not excessive use. One may say that there are already accountability mechanisms built into the government in the form of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (which authorizes surveillance of "agents of foreign powers" in the US), the office of inspector general, and Congressional committees. However, President Bush has circumvented all of these checks and balances. Also, the secrecy of the FISA court is hardly a public confidence builder. The inspector general's reports are useful but sporadic, and Congressional committees are highly political and partisan. Ergo, a new countervailing factor, independent of the government, is called for. A civilian board should be composed of distinguished Americans whom the public trusts. Its reports on the ways new security measures are employed are likely to have similar effects as those of the Church Committee, set up in the 1970s to review US intelligence activities. A civilian review board, however, would continue to serve and could be renewed on five-year intervals. Aside from reviewing the use of special powers, the civilian review board will examine the government's checks and balances. Some hold that the FISA court is too lax, that it never turns down a request for surveillance. Others hold that FBI agents fear damaging their career if their requests are rejected and hence apply only if they have a very strong case. Still others assert that authorization is too slow. The public deserves to find out from an independent board whether FISA is too lax or too tight, and what might be done to set it right. The same holds for all the other new powers and the institutions that are supposed to keep them in check. For instance, what might be done to beef up the office of inspector general? The Bush administration has squandered the trust of too many Americans to be able to repair the breach on its own. Congress can do some of the work, now that some Republicans no longer automatically toe the line. However, the extraordinary exercise of power calls for an extraordinary countermeasure: an independent body, not beholden to the government, that the people can trust. A version of this article was published in the Christian Science Monitor on January 31, 2006 entitled “Give Washington a Civilian Review Board.” You can find the article online by clicking here.
Question A right-wing organization is paying UCLA students to record their professors’ “outrageous and outright political” statements. It then publishes those statements, trying to intimidate professors into ceasing using their classrooms (and the captive audience in them) for advancing their political agendas. This form of intimidation is unacceptable (and is sure to get many right-wing professors into trouble). At the same time, the book The Uncivil University: Politics and Propaganda in American Education by Gary A. Tobin, Aryeh K. Weinberg and Jenna Ferer (Institute for Jewish & Community Research, 2005) contains the following quotes from classrooms: “The state of Israel has no claim to the heritage of the Holocaust,” (Columbia), “Judaism and the Jewish identity are offensive to most human beings and will always cause trouble between the Jews and the rest of the human race,” (University of Massachusetts) and “The real terrorists are those who some 100 years ago hijacked a beautiful religion and transformed it into a real estate venture” (Kent State University). What could be legitimately done, if anything? We would love to hear your ideas.
On the Muslim cartoon controversy In discussing the controversy of the Danish cartoons, the debate has focused whether or not these should have been published. Debate should be on what is the proper reaction to the publication of something one disapproves of. One may indeed protest, complain, or try to explain why one hold such publications should not take place. However, violent responses are completely unacceptable. Killing people (and at least eight have died so far in the ensuing riots and attacks on Western embassies) is a far worse reaction than any cartoon could possibly warrant. The demand that protest stay civil is a minimal demand, one that those who believe in unlimited free speech and those who hold that free speakers should restrain themselves should agree on. Fred Hiatt, the Op-Ed editor of the Washington Post came up with a thoughtful communitarian position regarding the offensive Danish cartoons. He pointed that the media has a right to publish such material but it also has a responsibility not offend gratuitously (2/5/2006, p. B07). As we have often stressed, a legal right is not the same as a moral judgment that one should exercise under all circumstances.
“The End” of Soft Power Iran’s unilateral breaking of the seals on its uranium enrichment facilities casts grave doubts on the European attempt to show the world that major conflicts can be ended through multilateral negotiations and subtle diplomacy, without threatening, let alone exercising, the use of force. Ever since the invasion of Iraq, numerous European public intellectuals and elected officials have severely criticized the Bush Administration for its unilateral and bullying approach to the world. The use of “soft power” has been all the rage. It was to be a foreign policy based on legitimate moves and the “power of attraction” as Joe Nye, Jr., the celebrated advocate of the term, has defined it. Nations were to be convinced or given incentives to act in line with established international norms, rather than coerced. For a while Iran played along; it suggested more negotiations, floated new proposals, and for a time won its nuclear development (possibly including a clandestine program)—while giving the Europeans the run around. Finally in January 2006 even Iran seemed to have tired of the game, and it moved ahead in open defiance of its previous international commitments. One may say that breaking the seals is merely an attempt to up the ante before a final settlement is reached. However, there is no indication that Iran is even willing to limit its nuclear program by relying on fuel to be provided by an international consortium. (The idea calls for Iran to receive enriched uranium from abroad instead of manufacturing it, so it will be able to produce all the energy it wishes—which Iran claims is its only goal—and still be unable to siphon off the material required for bomb making. The international suppliers of enriched uranium would ensure that it is used only for peaceful purposes and expatriate the spent fuel, another bomb making material). The limits of soft power have further been highlighted by the fact that the Europeans, who took the lead in dealing with Iran, are at loss as to what next to do. Economic sanctions—unlike economic incentives such as credits and favorable trade terms—are punitive and do not qualify as soft power. Moreover, they are difficult to impose, make stick, and render effective. To initiate economic sanctions the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) must refer the matter to the UN; however, its 35-member board is reluctant to proceed. If it does, China may still veto the needed Security Council resolutions or water them down. Were sanctions to be imposed, experience in the Middle East shows that they often enrich the smugglers rather then cramp the styles of the governments involved, and that the population suffers rather than the elites. Iran, which is flooded with petro-dollars, is in a strong position to resist sanctions as well as impose some of its own by withholding oil. Ergo, down the road, either military force will have to be employed or—if this is impractical—Iran will become a full-fledged nuclear power. In either case, soft power will be shown up for what it is: by itself a very insufficient instrument of international relations. It turns out that just as hard power does best when preceded and accompanied by soft power, so the other way around: soft power works much better when it is known that if all else fails, hard power might well follow. There is room to rely much more on legitimate international institutions, allies, and diplomacy than the Bush Administration has done. However, there is a much greater need for hard power back up than the Europeans have been willing to acknowledge. Iran is hardly the first case in point. The UN has passed hundreds of resolutions censuring nations but many have been wantonly ignored with almost no consequences because the UN has so little hard power of its own. Indeed the massive slaughter in East Timor did not stop until Australian troops intervened, and similar to when British troops marched into Sierra Leone and Americans into Liberia and so on. In short, the humbling of the Europeans by Iran shows that soft power by itself will not do; it must be combined with a hard backing. The time has come for the Europeans to swallow their sense of superiority and recognize that they must work with the US if a nuclear Iran is to be stopped and the numerous other international challenges that do not yield to soft power alone are to be met. The little-known PSI (Proliferation Security Initiative) might serve as a model initiated and headed by the U.S. It involves the Navies and Intelligence Services of sixty nations, working to stop traffic in nuclear arms and materials on the High Seas. But it also has the full blessing of the UN (under Resolution 1540). Thus hard and soft powers are combined. Let the era of mixed power begin.
Note: A version of this article was published in French in Le Monde (1/24/06) and in Dutch in NRC Handelsblad (1/19/06).
Lobbying Scandal: Be fair to Abramoff
Note: A version of this article was published in The National Law Journal on February 6, 2006.
I Read From "NIMBY and the Civic Good," by Timothy Gibson of George Mason University in City and Community (December 2005): “Policy scholars dedicated to efficient urban and industrial planning have long tried to understand the ‘NIMBY syndrome’ in order to overcome local resistance to controversial land uses. However, environmental policy scholars have begun to rethink the NIMBY syndrome, arguing that the concept is authority-centered and reduces land-use disputes to a moral struggle between rational/civic-minded planners and irrational/self-interested opponents. After describing a struggle over locating homeless services in Seattle, this paper extends this larger critique to disputes over human service facilities and argues that the NIMBY syndrome framework fails to capture the political and ethical complexities of locating human services. A conclusion examines how critical sociologists can still critique imbalances of political-economic power in the planning process without deploying the NIMBY syndrome nomenclature.” From “Community in Cyber Space?: The Role of the Internet in Facilitating and Maintaining a Community of Live Music Collecting and Trading” by Peter P. Nieckarz, Jr. of Western Carolina University in City and Community (December 2005): “The interactions based around the taping, trading and collecting of live music performances have evolved into a phenomenon that may aptly be referred to as a community. What is most remarkable about this is that the vast majority of these activities now take place over the Internet. The emergence of virtual community is addressed by sociological theories that address the increasingly disembedded nature of social structure. This article is a participant observation that specifically examines if trading is indeed a community, and demonstrates how this facilitated through the proliferation of the Internet and other technologies. The findings reveal a phenomenon that does exhibit many characteristics of a traditional community; though acceptance or rejection of the notion of virtual community is contingent upon which definition of community one uses.” In State of War (Free Press 2006), New York Times national security reporter James Risen reveals hidden security scandals within the Bush presidency. As the extent of domestic wiretapping and spying by the National Security Agency is being brought to light, Risen also exposes dramatic secrets within the administration and disturbing trends within the intelligence community. From his descriptions of “White House plausible deniability” regarding torture to the training of death squads; from his tracing of penalties for truth-seekers in the CIA to their willful ignorance of links between al Qaeda and Saudi Arabia, Risen clearly outlines an administration and community run amok with too much power and not nearly enough transparency.
Benjamin Franklin—The correct version
Newsweek magazine recently had a picture of students protesting the NSA eavesdropping program by carrying a banner reading “Those who would sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither,” a quote they attributed to Benjamin Franklin. The source is correct, but the quote actually reads: “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” -- Benjamin Franklin; Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, November 11, 1755 This quotation, slightly altered, is inscribed on a plaque in the stairwell of the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty: “They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
Match Point: Moral progress? John Podhoretz's review of Match Point (The Weekly Standard 1/21/06) suggests that Woody Allen is finding his way back to virtue. After ten movies showing that immoral acts --such as adultery-- have no ill consequences, ‘the heart wants what it wants’; in the new movie the hero has his upcoming because he ‘shrivels inside’. Well, he killed his mistress who was carrying his child and an elderly neighbor merely to cover his tracks. Whatever happens to his insides (about which we know very little, there are no visible signs of remorse), morality would call for his outsides also to shrivel, say by six feet. And as for John's suggestion that nobody would like to be in his place, well he is still a poor boy who is collecting a top salary, adored by his wife and her family, living in a mansion, being served hand and foot. It beats Sing-Sing.
New Endorsements For the Diversity Within Unity Platform: Professor Charles Westin, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden and Professor Rosa Aparicio, Universidad Pontificia Comillas Over 375 heads of state, academics and policymakers have endorsed the Diversity Within Unity Platform: please consider joining us by clicking here For the Responsive Communitarian Platform: Ambassador Gad Ranon (ret.), Former Career Officer, Israeli Foreign Service. Over 600 heads of state, academics and policymakers have endorsed the Responsive Communitarian Platform: please consider joining us by clicking here.
Communitarian Calendar Diversity Within Unity Project Conference
Date: April 26, 2006 Location: Brussels, Belgium The Diversity Within Unity Project at George Washington University is organizing a conference on the rights and responsibilities of immigrants and their new homelands. We are happy to report that Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, British Minister of State for Immigration and Citizenship Tony McNulty, and British MP David Willetts will participate. Other public leaders are to be announced. Participation is by invitation only. Interested parties should be email kbell05@gwu.edu for more information. The approach that will be discussed at the meeting is called “Diversity Within Unity: Rights and responsibilities of immigrants and their new homeland.” Diversity Within Unity aims to change the contours of the debate by positing an alternative to strict assimilation and unbounded multiculturalism. The position, detailed in a platform available at http://www.gwu.edu/~ccps/dwu_positionpaper.html, focuses on fostering both respect for the whole and respect for all. The purpose of the meeting in April will be to explore the merits and challenges of this approach and elaborate on its policy implications in Europe. To see a full list of endorsers or to offer an endorsement, please visit http://www.gwu.edu/~ccps/dwu_endorse.html. SASE 2006: Constituting Globalization: Actors, Arenas and Outcomes Communitarian Workshop at SASE June 30, 9:00 AM– 12:00 PM. University of Trier, Germany
Additional details will soon be posted at our Conferences and Events webpage To submit papers, click here The Communitarian Network will conduct a workshop on communitarian economics on June 30, just before the SASE meetings start. For more information, please visit www.communitariannetwork.org. Spanish Communitarian Seminar: I Encuentro Iberoamericano de Comunitarismo Inaugural Lecture by Amitai Etzioni With presentations by José Peréz Adán (Universidad de Valencia), Carlos Díaz (founder of Instituto Emmanuel Mounier), Alicia Ocampo Jiménez (Universidad de Valencia) and Jorge Del Pico (Universidad de Chile) Bogotá, Colombia July 26-28 2006 l For more information email encuentrocomunitarismo@dansocial.gov.co or visit www.dansocial.gov.co.
In our last Letter In A Communitarian Letter # 7 we misidentified Robert H. Nelson while citing his article “In Defense of Religious Neighborhood Associations” in the Fall 2005 issue of Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly. We regret the error.
Job Openings at The Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies [[AE PLEASE INDICATE IF YOU WANT 1 OR 2]]
1) Position Available: Outreach and Research Assistant
Description: The Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies is seeking an individual to assist with our research and outreach efforts. The position entails helping to develop our position papers and effectively communicating our message to elected officials, media, voluntary associations, and the public at large through a variety of channels. The chosen candidate will work directly with director Amitai Etzioni. Qualifications: The candidate should possess the ability to work independently and should have strong writing and editing skills. Previous experience in communications, public relations, and/or student publications is desirable. Salary is commensurate with qualifications.
To Apply: Please send by mail, fax, or email a cover letter, resume, a list of at least 2 references, and a writing sample to Kristin Hubing, The Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies; 2130 H St. NW, Suite 703, Washington, D.C., 20052. Fax: 202-994-1606. Email:comnet@gwu.edu. NO PHONE CALLS PLEASE. Tuition remission may be available. 2) The Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies at The George Washington University is looking for recent college graduates for positions in research and outreach. Applicants should have experience in editing and research, as well as excellent writing skills in both academic and popular styles. To offer applicants a sense of what the position involves, one of our research and outreach associates has written about her experience at the Institute: When I was graduating from college I was still undecided as to whether or not I wanted to jump right into grad school. Something told me that if I took a year or two off from school, I’d be more prepared to make a decision about what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I saw an ad for a position at the Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies and it looked like it would offer me a chance to get a taste of academia while also exposing me to the policy world of Washington, DC. I had only encountered communitarianism once before in a college class, but I decided to apply—I thought I had the research, editing, and outreach skills they were looking for. Plus, it would be more intellectually stimulating than making lattes at Starbucks or placing commas for a publishing company. I’ve been with the Institute for six months now and I’ve found what I came for. My days consist of doing editing and research for Dr. Etzioni’s articles and organizing a conference in Europe (I might even get to go to Brussels!). I’ve stayed mentally sharp and observed first-hand the inner workings of academia from a professor who has been at it for a long time (half a century). The position has also afforded me plenty of time to read on my own, apply to graduate schools, and enjoy a break from the crazy schedule I had in college. Most of all, it’s been wonderful to work with the other young people at the office; there are six of us here who all recently graduated from college and we have a great time doing happy hours together, debating Dr. Etzioni’s papers, and supporting each other in our interests—plus, more than one of the staff members makes really good cupcakes. If you’re not sure yet what you’re doing next year and you want a chance to use those research and writing skills you’ve spent four years perfecting, it’s worth your while to apply for a position with us. We can promise an interview that consists of more than “what are your strengths and weaknesses Mr. Smith” and “walk us through your resume Miss Jones.”
We welcome your thoughts and feedback.
Sincerely, Amitai Etzioni |
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The Communitarian Network |