Beiträge zur geistigen Situation der Gegenwart Jg. 5 (2004), Heft 5
Beiträge zur geistigen Situation der Gegenwart Jg. 5
(2004), Heft 5
Many in Europe hope that it will be Kerry, this time. For our own sake, and for the sake of the US, our friend and ally. Tell me that I am a foreigner, that I don't know anything and that I should be quiet and do not interfere. Ok, you are right. But believe me: there are some good reasons for our foolish hope in Kerry.
As long as we will keep our minds and souls together, we Europeans shall never forget that it was the US to bring freedom, justice and democracy to a continent which in 1945 was deeply ridden by war and totalitarianism. It was the US that gave us new hope, helped decisively to fend off communism, eliminated the remains of old fascist and Nazi ideologies and established a fresh, new democracy. The US was magnanimous in giving Europe not merely a copy of US democracy, but what it most needed: freedom, its own democracies, and, most of all, confidence in its own democracies. Last but not least, we Europeans shall never forget that without the US we would probably neither have survived the cold war nor the more recent dangers in Serbia, the Balkans, Chechnya and elsewhere. It has always been the US to protect and legitimize us. Without the US, Europe could hardly have established its pluriform social and democratic systems of which it is so proud today.
And indeed: Many of us have not forgotten all this, not one single detail, even if my generation has been born in the midst of the 60s. At the time being, we were too young to understand that John F. Kennedy had been murdered. But today we are the new generation of Europeans of whom Jeremy Rifkin speaks in his books, and which awakens from a long historical sleep. And believe me: we are trying hard to understand the past and the present, just as good as we can. Many of us of the "baby boomer" generation now try to defend and establish worldwide democracy by means of science and history, cooperating closely with our US friends, knowing only too well what we owe them. So it was no wonder that most of us did initially welcome the US-led wars in Afghanistan (2002) and Iraq (2003). We had full confidence in the wider horizon of US-policy and strategies. I myself, a liberal and social democrat, was fully convinced of defending early neo-conservative policies of Paul Wolfowitz and his followers after 9/11. In the middle of heated debates, I gave public speeches in many European countries, wrote public defences of the US-administration and believed in its promises of democratization and peaceful development of the Middle East. And I still believe that some basic parts of the programs developed by Wolfowitz and his collaborators continue to be right and make sense in the greater perspective of the 21first century.
But concerning our deeper hopes, we were soon disillusioned. Following the war in Iraq, and recognizing step by step its causes and effects, that were far more complex than we thought, our hopes in the conservative administration were annulled. We slowly, but continually realized that the Bush administration followed not a greater project in the service of the free peoples in the world. Instead, it followed interests that were not even that of the US citizens - but rather the goals of some influential groups belonging merely to the military-industrial complex, of whose over-influence onto the western hemisphere President Eisenhower already had warned us all so urgently in his famous farewell-speech in 1961. Today, it has become fully clear for many of us that the Bush administration has used the US for the pursue of goals, that too often have revealed themselves to hide their grounds in the twilight between private and public interests. George W. Bush has, in many ways, used the nation as a mean for the ends of a few. And this is true not only regarding his family ties with big investors from the Saudi-Arab world, as Michael Moore pointed out. It is true also for his attempt to use 9/11 and the fear that it produced for strengthen the mix of economic and politic interests, that today has such a devastating effect on the liberal core of US democracy, and to fix the power position of the wealthy, Anglo-American, protestant and European-born conservative classes over large other parts of the US people. In doing this, he has practised, with rare arrogance, an exclusive policy against relevant parts of the nation, against the freedom of civil rights and culture, against its allies in Europe and in the rest of the democratic world and, last but not least, against the United Nations.
What does that mean? As a member of global civil society, as a political secretary that spent more than eight years in cultural and minority politics, as a political scientist, and, last but not least, as an European citizen who lived long enough in the US - at Berkeley and New Orleans - to be deeply involved with this great, powerful and admirable country, I can heartily state that if there was any time, than it is this time that many in Continental Europe may wish that there will be a positive change in the policy of the leading nation on the earth - and that John Kerry will be the next president of the US. Why?
First, to re-establish the excellent US-European-relationships we had before Bush. It makes no sense that we continue to battle each other on issues like genetic food, trade restrictions, war on terror, new world order or democratization of threshold countries. The two leading continents of the free world should work closely together in all these critical issues, knowing well that the enemies of our intentions are many. Mr. Bush has proven himself unable to reconstruct confidence in his leading style, isolating and thus weakening the US and Europe at the same time. Mr. Kerry seems to have a far more developed common sense regarding the importance of network-tissuing in the globalized world of today. And he sees at its democratic core the US-Europe-relationship.
Second, to maintain long-term economic power of the US. The American economy is crucial for the US, but also for the rest of the free world. We all depend on one way or another on US economy. Bushes record shows a decrease in social welfare and job opportunities, the free fall of the Dollar on world currency markets and a dramatic domestic deficit that is a potential threat to all free markets on the world. The economic policy of Mr. Bush tends to impoverish the middle class, to decrease funds for education and public welfare, to fix class structures and unequal opportunities, to discriminate those ethnic and cultural groups which are traditionally poorer, to enlarge the gap between rich and poor, and, generally, to weaken US economy by concentrating wealth - and thus consuming power - in the hands of always fewer people. Mr. Kerry has presented a program that vows to see the bigger, deeper, long term picture: bring new social justice, give more funds to education and welfare, and see the US economy not for its own, but in its complex relations to the European and to the world economy.
Third, to maintain military balance of the leading democratic nation of the world. With an overcommitted US military force, the world today has become a more insecure place. Mr. Bush, contrary to his announcements, has continuously weakened the US military by placing it in harms way without substantial network of other allies (Britain excluded). Mr. Bush managed to alienate the best and oldest friends of the US in Continental Europe, and to bring forth a new anti-American movement with new irrational ideologies, founded merely on the arrogant, narcissistic and sometimes even autistic power strategies of his administration. Mr. Kerry wants to cooperate and form new, larger rational fellowships and alliances. He seems to be a far more credible communicator, and at the same time he wants to engage Europe not to follow blindly the US, but to do more for the common security of the democratic world by its own initiative. And that seems wise to me.
Fourth, to give the world the new ecological impulse that we do need so urgently. Europe and other willing nations alone cannot save the planet from the incumbent climate catastrophe. The planet belongs to us all, and so we all should contribute. The US is the biggest consumer of energy in the world, and it is, from any point of view, a crucial ally in signing the Kyoto Treaty for the protection of our environment. Even Russia has recently signed the treaty, but Mr. Bush continues his shortsighted policy and his refusal to participate. Mr. Kerry plans to sign the treaty and to make the US the biggest country in the world in saving our natural environment. And you can really believe me, that will count more than many other achievements, and more than we all may imagine today, in the eyes of those future generations who will look back at the nations in our time, at their men and at their behaviour.
Fifth but not last, to give science and technology the opportunities they need. Restriction of research as practised by the regressive Bush administration is no way to halt developments of knowledge and skills. It can only delay them, and thus harm the US and Europe, whose scientific industries are tied together very closely. Instead of hindering or even prohibiting research, the US and Europe should work together for establishing a new World Charta of Science and Technology Ethics for the future of democratic humanism, including the best minds of both continents, and thus bring forth common values and moral standards. Together, the US and Europe should then try to peacefully export these standards, with the close help of the United Nations and of our friends in every part of the planet, into the rest of the world.
Summing up - what can I say? From the viewpoint of an US-citizen, I am a foreigner, a European, even a "Continental" (as the British Victorian grandma of a friend always calls me with her typical mix of humour, wit and superiority). I have not to add new, sensational findings to the many things that have been said during the election campaign about the pros and cons of the two candidates. And I do definitely not want to interfere in the choice of America. As it is just, the US people alone will decide who will lead the most powerful and influential country on the earth in the next four years. Nobody has the right to counsel them in their decision. But the whole world, and Europe among it, will be affected by their choice. From my point of view, as a European and as a citizen of the new, globalized world, John Kerry is the better opportunity for America - and for the planet.
Roland Benedikter, born in 1965, teaches political and cultural science at the Universities of Vienna (Austria), Innsbruck (Austria), Bolzano (Italy) and Milan (Italy). He published more than 90 essays and 14 books, collaborated with Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker at the Report to the Club of Rome 2003 and was twice a lecturer at Mersin University (Turkey), at Clemens-Ohridski-University Sofia (Bulgaria) and at Catholic University of Lima (Peru). He contributed, among others, to Frankfurter Rundschau, Der Freitag Berlin, Radikal Istanbul, Der Standard Vienna, Die Presse Vienna, German Newspaper Moscow. In 1994 and 2000, he lived in Berkeley and New Orleans. Contact: rolandbenedikter@yahoo.de.