Of course the US doesn’t really care about democracy breaking out in the Middle East
Well, they do. But not really. If they did really want widespread democratic reform, they’d be harder on countries like Saudi Arabia for human rights abuses and for their refusal to implement the most basic principles of democracy, such as free and fair elections. They’d also crack the whip on countries like Egypt, whose pseudo-democratic posturing is laughable to onlookers outside of Egypt, but tragic to those who have to live with it.
The story on Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s Middle East trip in TIME today illustrates the problem.
Saudi Arabia, the Arab world’s largest economy and OPEC’s de facto leader, recycles significant petrodollars into U.S. Treasury bonds. And government-run investment funds in the United Arab Emirates — Geithner’s second Arab stop — have poured billions of dollars into U.S. banks and other companies.
As a group,the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council — which includes Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman — is now the U.S.’s second biggest creditor after China.
Tarik Yousef, dean of the Harvard-affiliated Dubai School of Government, said the United States views the region as an important source of funding and as a balancing force in the world’s financial system.
“A reinforcing message about their role in the global economy … is an important message to convey,” he said.
Geithner, who is expected to hold talks with King Abdullah and his top financial advisers later Tuesday, said the meetings in Saudi aim to highlight the importance of the two countries working together to resolve the economic global crisis.
But before you become non compos mentis with anti-Americanism, consider the complexities. That it is hypocritical and shameful America would try to force democracy in Iraq and not care about it everywhere else is incontrovertible. Obama is not exempt: that we’d encourage the Sea of Green in Iran, but never try to fan similar flames in the Kingdom or in Om El Donya is embarrassing.
Nonetheless, it is what it is. Nations have interests. Self-interests. And you can’t blame them for it. At least not entirely. A nation’s affairs are always conducted for its own internal needs and desires before any other nation’s. This doesn’t always allow for neat and tidy ethics, nor the idealism up to which some of us wish our nations would live. But because politicians in democracies are elected by their people, they must first serve the interests of those people who put them there. Every now and then, a transformational politician comes along who has the ability to introduce new ways of governance and to envision very different policies—and the popularity to get them implemented—and these will lead to change at a greater pace than his predecessors would have been able had they tried the same. We are living in such a time in the United States.
However, to assume these changes mean that president will not at times carry out the same practices as his predecessors is absurd. I have read so much nonsense in American and Middle Eastern press about how Obama is the same as Bush. Of course he is. Big shocker. He is the President of the United States, following in a long line of bad Middle Eastern (and other) policies. He can’t just up and quit them all at once, nor does he seem willing to even if he could. At the same time: of course he is not. Already this president has shown an approach to Israel and to the entire Middle East that is refreshingly different to the one we witnessed previously.
But if you were in hopes that Barack Hussein Obama would fly immediately to Riyadh after he took the oath of office, storm into King Abdullah’s presence and announce, ‘A new day has arrived! I’m here to bring change, not only to America, but to the entire world!’, it was you who were incredibly naive.
Nations have self-interests. And not all of them are ethical, just, noble.
