Belling the Dragon

Irish foreign policy has become so dominated by our EU membership and our aid programme it is rare that other significant global issues impinge on our thinking. The recent visit of Xi Jinping, put the issue of China centre stage. It was difficult to tell from the media salivating and all out love bombing however that there are critical foreign policy issues at stake here.

Ever since 1989 and the fall of the Berlin Wall the tectonic plates of the global order have been shifting, initially around the idea of the one super power with the first Iraqi war, now towards a new far east to west balance. The rise of the BRIC countries is a big story in terms of the world economy but politically it is the increasingly authoritarian Russia and the ever growing China that are the real issues. Just look at the “frozen conflicts” that Ireland has to deal with in the chair of the OSCE in every case Russia looms large.

The ongoing China question is how its massive economic power and reach will translate in to political muscle. The omens are not good. China is everywhere and increasingly with Russia frustrating natural concerns about global and regional security (think failed U.N. Resolutions on Syria). Similarly throughout the developing world Chinas role is not stopping at economic matters, several of the poorest countries are being inveigled in to the political influence of the power house of the east. This is of course to say nothing about the well publicised domestic human rights issues. Of course nobody knows if Chinas economy will continue to dominate and well researched fears of its property market are growing.

The U.S. has been having this debate for a while and it is clearly intertwined with its own self image and internal politics. President Obama and most recently Madeleine Albright have clearly asserted the U.S. is still the dominant world power and willing to play a role (a role people like Polly Tonybee have pointed out is extremely necessary for progressives globally). That is probably the case today but we might wonder how it will look in 20 years time.

So whither Ireland in the global debate about China. If we allow the IDA set foreign policy we don’t need to debate the issue any further and allied with the “we’re only a small country” narrative it would seem there is not a lot to say. Nobody suggests it easy for any country (including the U.S.) to grapple with this global dragon. However rather like belling the cat somebody needs to figure out a strategy. Governments of course have to work on trade issues and deliver jobs and growth for their people but at what price?

There is a formulaic approach that has been developed revolving around the line “we of course raised the issue of human rights in our meeting”. This of course does nothing in relation to the global questions. Europe and the U.S. in their transatlantic alliance have done a huge amount in the last century, it would be a shame if this alliance could not develop a better strategy on this key issue. The EU itself is a key actor and Ireland within the EU could take a lead. Nobody is talking about antagonistic positioning but rather developing a new language and approach. There is already a well developed EU/China partnership and this could form the arena for such debate.

Seeing China as merely a trade issue may bring short term economic gains but we cannot lose site of how our world political order looks in 20 years. We can only presume that our people will still want to see the values that Europe and the U.S. prioritised in the past present in our future.

Priorities, Priorities

Paddy Ashdown is a fairly popular guy; long before Nick Clegg was carving out a niche for the Lib Dems Paddy Ashdown was establishing them as a political force in the UK. One can’t help but think that his rather macho image as a former SAS type helped strengthen and broaden the idea of being a “liberal”. As with many pre Clegg Leaders Ashdown probably never saw the political success he deserved but he went on to play a significant role on the world stage particularly as High Representative in Bosnia during a critical stage of its reconstruction.

Ashdown was in Dublin recently to talk about this and made some forceful points at a meeting of a Joint Oireachtas Committee on European and Foreign Affairs. A full transcript is well worth reading here. In summary Ashdown feels the EU is letting Bosnia unravel and not standing up to Serbia and its client entity in Republica Srpska and the Jim Allister of Balkan politics Milorad Dodic. He also believes that the interference by Serbia in Bosnia should not be accepted in terms of the accession process. The December European Council blocked the beginning of Serbian accession to the EU on the basis of it’s dispute with Kosovo, the implication being that the interference with Bosnia is just fine.

 

Ireland has an interesting view on this. It has clearly supported Serbia, indeed it has gone well beyond the view of the EU Commission (which itself was quite critical of Serbia but held out accession as a route to dealing with it) and has used phrases such as “major advances“ and “monumental“ . This is relatively strong stuff. We have to remember that in many instances Irelands foreign policy positions can be word for word the same as Commission statements. Paddy Ashdown has a different view. Following a fairly comprehensive presentation on the situation in Bosnia he requested that Ireland make Bosnia a foreign policy priority in the same way that the UK has. There it is, a fairly straightforward request. We could even write the language “two countries overcoming division and making their way together in a modern Europe” quite the stuff of Ferrero Rocher.

I get the feeling that such a request will be easily shrugged off and presumably the Government can cite some reasons why not. Principally we will be told that Africa and our Aid partners are our real priority. Perhaps, although even though the Government has published a worthy Africa Strategy it has not officially stated this is a foreign policy priority and we do not have a comprehensive policy document setting out what Irelands priorities are.

It is a fair question as to what Irelands priorities are in Europe’s neighbourhood, the EU has a neighbourhood policy and the External Action Service gives it a lot of attention. In terms of enlargement we are for everyone, including Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia and Turkey to mention but a few. Larger countries have issues with many of these countries but it seems to be a hallmark of our foreign policy that we have a “come one come all” approach. On the surface that would be fine but following Paddy Ashdowns logic might be another way of looking at it. We could then speak out and say Serbian gross interference in the internal affairs of Bosnia, undermining the Dayton Agreement, is not acceptable and will be opposed by Ireland.

Europe is where we live and we should have something to say about what happens on our continent. In Africa we prioritise human rights and democracy, maybe this would be an approach that we could try out closer to home.