September 05, 2006

Let us then wish for a good backlash

Sir, Gideon Rachman in “Why the world may regret the end of the neo-con era” (September 5), warns us about a possible backlash that could “take America back into isolationism or a cynical abandonment of the promotion of democracy”. This sounds indeed like very awful possibilities, until you look a little closer at the significance of the terms. For instance, doing foreign affairs “my way”, “on my own and with “God on our side”, is in fact just another very real type of isolationism, no matter how many times you visit your McDonald’s across the Rio Grande. From this perspective a backlash could be good if it leads America to a more participatory global responsibility.

The same could be said about democracy since when we outsiders observe the ever increasing powers of the lobbying industry in Washington and on how the representation of its younger citizens is diluted by the aging baby-boomers, some of us would argue that it could be good for America to take a time out from selling its democracy worldwide, so as to give their own an overhaul first.

That said what we truly need to worry about is if a backlash would change America from having a we-care-for-the-world attitude into a we-don’t-care-a-damn about them but that does not seem to have much to do with neo-cons either, as they sometimes have shown to care just a bit too much for their own good (and ours).