Review: The Return of History and the end of Dreams

Abstract

THE RETURN OF HISTORY ANDTHE END OF DREAMS Robert Kagan New York: Knopf, 2008. 116pp, $22.95 cloth (ISBN 978-0307269232)The controversial author of this short book - really an extended essay -rejects label but has long advocated a muscular, typically neoconservative US foreign policy founded on, and justified by, America's unique combination of and righteousness. Kagan worked in State Department during Reagan administration, co-founded (with William Kristol) Project for New American Century in 1997, pushed Clinton administration to adopt a policy of regime change in Iraq, and was one of most prominent defenders of President George W. Bush's invasion of that country in 2003. He has therefore been held co-responsible for a shift in American foreign policy that many regard as a disastrous error fuelled by arrogance and ignorance.The long and difficult trajectory of Iraq war and failure of its stated justifications (Saddam's non-existent WMDs) caused many neocons to reassess their previous positions. Perhaps most telling recantation was that of Francis Fukuyama, whose book America at Crossroads: Democracy Power, and Neoconservative Legacy, singled out Kagan in particular as a champion ofthe idea of benevolent American hegemony. Fukuyama argued that neocons, having misattributed fall of Soviet Union to a virile show of American strength, wrongly assumed that virtuous progress of history toward democracy could be accelerated by aggressive American agency. The misadventures of Iraq, he wrote, gave lie to this, and future administrations would have to persuade world, first, that America was good and, second, that it could be wise in its application of power, emphasizing military less and soft power more.The very title of Kagan' s book suggests a riposte to Fukuyama, whose most famous work is The End of History. Kagan rejects pusillanimous revisionism and adopts attack as best defence. An extract from this book in New Republic caused a furor accompanied by accusations that he is merely repackaging old positions. He argues that the great fallacy of our era - an old Enlightenment one revitalized by collapse of communism is a deterministic belief in progress of liberal ideas and institutions, an unwarranted confidence in humanity's inevitable forward march toward peaceful and prosperous coexistence (102). Recent developments - in particular rise of China and turning away of Putin's Russia from western-style democracy - have revealed this pleasant vision to be a mirage. History has returned with a vengeance, propelled by ambition, pride, and fear of competitive, mutually suspicious, and potentially hostile nation-states. In an anarchic world, such states are not reliably restrained by international laws and institutions, or even by growing economic interdependence, and naturally seek enhanced security in military preparedness. Moreover, an excess of inevitably breeds discontent with status quo and a desire for greater influence in world, as well as for respect and honour that great always commands. Witness Iran with its nuclear ambitions, or even democratic India whose economic transformation has caused the of to be displaced by the argument of power (42).This sounds perfectly realist, yet Kagan argues that it is not just differentials of that matter. Values do, too. Ideological competition may be a thing ofthe past, but world continues to resist convergence in value terms because some ofthe major players are autocracies. The leaders of China and Russia and nations that take heart from their example are not merely cynical autocrats; they believe in autocracy. Democratic factionalism, they claim, is dangerous to stability, and so-called universal liberal values are merely impositions of western power. The international liberal order does not imply progress for them but oppression, for it questions the fundamental legitimacy of governments, which for autocracies can be a matter of life and death (67). …