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Foreign Policy
Editor’s Note
By Mark Strauss
The millennium is still a few weeks away, but the apocalypse is already in full swing. The World Wildlife Fund has issued a report on global warming filled with Old Testament prophecies: Latin America will be scorched with drought, Tokyo may be flooded, and Australia’s Great Barrier Reef could lie in ruins. New York City recently faced a deadly outbreak of encephalitis that news reports suggested might, in fact, be a bioterrorism attack. Those theories proved false, but that was of small comfort: Security experts rushed to remind us that it is no longer a question of “if” terrorists will launch a biological attack on a major city, but only a matter of “when.” And then there is the mother of all apocalypses: The Y2K bug. The Central Intelligence Agency has told Congress that China, Russia, and Indonesia are so far behind in their efforts to repair their software that they will be plagued by humanitarian crises in the days following January 1, 2000.
In The Last Apocalypse, James Reston, Jr. vividly describes the mood during the years leading up to the millennium: “The old order was crumbling, and terrifying and confusing new ideas were gaining hold in the populace. Random and horrific violence seemed to sprout everywhere without warning, and without apparent remedy.” That passage seems to encapsulate today’s widespread angst, except that Reston was writing not about the post-cold-war world on the eve of the new millennium, but about medieval Europe in the year 999. And you can be sure that everybody will be wringing their hands in the year 2999 as well. During periods of transition, humanity inevitably seems more prone to anxiety. Unfortunately, that anxiety tends to amplify our perceptions of the problems around us by a vast order of magnitude.
In truth, many of the problems that confront us today are not substantively different from those that challenged the generation before us. Just look at issues of FOREIGN POLICY published nearly 30 years ago. In the very first issue (Winter 1970-71), Harald B. Malmgren’s article “Coming Trade Wars?” speculated that neomercantilism might be on the rise. Globalization was not yet a buzzword, but Malmgren warned that increasing integration was making it more difficult for governments to insulate their nations from foreign competition.
In “Perils of the New Technology” (Spring 1971), Victor Basiuk argued that while military technology is caught in a perpetual stalemate, “civilian technology is becoming the vital factor in world power.” If countries failed to invest in technological infrastructure, he cautioned, then seemingly advanced economies might very rapidly become underdeveloped nations. C. Fred Bergsten, in “The Threat From the Third World” (Summer 1973), warned that disenfranchised countries of the developing world were poised to challenge the West through such disparate strategies as imposing oil embargoes, seizing foreign assets, and flooding urban streets with narcotics.
Three decades later, in the final issue of foreign policy in the 20th century, the anxieties are the same, but the details have changed. Back in the 1970s, Third World countries were often described as irrational zealots who had no qualms about bringing down the global economy if it meant hurting the West. Today, as three authors in this issue—George Lewis, Lisbeth Gronlud, and David Wright—point out, the leaders of some developing nations are portrayed as undeterrable fanatics who would not hesitate to launch a nuclear missile at the United States, even if it meant devastating retaliation. Not only is this view of so-called rogue states questionable, they argue, but the U.S. effort to build a national missile defense to confront this threat will only increase the likelihood of a nuclear conflict.
Martin Libicki suggests that the globalization of technology has indeed shifted the balance of power between large and small states, but not in the way most people think. Like his predecessor Basiuk, Libicki believes that in a world where almost any country, large or small, can launch a high-tech “revolution in military affairs,” the stage has been set for military stalemate. The real source of power, he suggests, comes from the ability to shape public opinion through the global media. And Bruce Stokes offers the ironic argument that free trade is threatened by its own success. The integration of markets has provoked widespread concerns over issues such as international labor standards and the environment. If these issues are not addressed, Stokes warns, protectionism could return with a vengeance.
Perhaps 30 years from now, another editor at foreign policy will look back at what we published at the turn of the millennium. If the past is a reliable prologue, then the anxieties of today’s era are likely to continue in one form or another into the not-so-distant future. But given the human tendency toward nostalgia, we can rest assured that years from now many will look back upon this era of apocalyptic angst as a simpler, less chaotic time.
Mark Strauss
Senior Editor
December 1999