After World War II, the American government made a critical political error most people have never heard of: It sided with Ethiopia in its bid to control Eritrea, a former Italian colony that sought independence.
While the United States was preaching the right to self-determination, it also decided it needed to make some practical choices. Ethiopia was a strategic ally in the burgeoning Cold War, and Ethiopia wanted Eritrea’s Red Sea coastline.
What followed was a brutal, decades-long oppression campaign against the Eritreans by the ruling Ethiopian government.
For all of you realpolitik heads out there, this didn’t even work out great for the U.S.’ strategic interests: Ethiopia ended up siding with the USSR anyway.
It’s easy for someone to look at this period of history and conclude that American liberal hypocrisy was a big failure. America could be a force for good, but only when it was convenient.
My podcast cohost Matt Yglesias makes a version of this argument. He thinks the push to frame foreign policy in idealistic terms tends to obscure more than it clarifies. It stops people from doing proper cost-benefit analysis and can justify bloody interventions.
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He points to the NATO bombing campaign in Libya as an example. “It’s not super clear how helpful that was. It cost billions of dollars. And, like, the whole time, nobody was saying, ‘maybe we should try to develop a malaria vaccine.’”
That’s all well and good, but the purpose of having high standards, even if you often fail to meet them, is that hopefully you try to hold yourself to them sometimes.
During the Cold War, Soviet propaganda highlighted the contradiction between America’s stated liberal ideals of freedom and equality on the international stage and the reality of Jim Crow at home. This painful truth became impossible to ignore domestically, and it helped create the conditions for the Civil Rights Movement.
What would the world look like without liberal hypocrisy, anyway? Well, we’re kind of living it.
While Trump’s typical off-the-cuff and offensive rhetoric has been charitably read as “telling it like it is” by his supporters, it also emboldens his most nefarious instincts. What we’re left with is the president’s gross justifications for military action — like capturing the president of Venezuela for the oil and attacking Iran before it could supposedly attack us. Any stated desire for peace and prosperity in these regions is offered like an afterthought.
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Show notes:
“Missing liberal hypocrisy,” Jerusalem’s article on foreign policy ideals that Matt reacted to: The Argument article
Coverage of the United Arab Emirates funding militia groups in Sudan: The Guardian article, Council on Foreign Relations post
Coverage of U.S. supporting Ethiopia as a Cold War ally instead of supporting Eritreans’ right of self-determination: Britannica page, UCLA article
Coverage of British intervention of Sierra Leone: The Guardian article, DTIC case study
Coverage of Kenya training Haitian police officers: NPR report, Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime analysis
Coverage of Brazilian efforts to train Haitian police officers: The Rio Times article
Oregon bill preempting Portland and other municipalities from enforcing affordable housing requirements on developers in many cases: Oregon State Legislature overview
Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy, book by Mary Dudziak about how U.S. self-interest aligned with its ideals during the Civil Rights Movement: Goodreads page
Coverage of money being spent on global public health programs after USAID was shuttered: The New York Times article
Coverage of Libyan intervention costing over $1 billion: Council on Foreign Relations article, CNN article
Why Nations Fail, book by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson arguing that there are critical junctures in time where a country develops extractive or inclusive institutions: Goodreads page
Peer review: “Easy A’s, Less Pay: The Long-Term Effects of Grade Inflation,” study by Jeffrey T. Denning, Rachel L. Nesbit, Nolan G. Pope, and Merrill Warnick: NBER working paper
Coverage of Harvard limiting the number of A grades teachers can distribute: The Harvard Gazette article, Harvard Magazine article, Inside Higher Ed article
(Illustration by The Argument, image by XNY/Star Max via Getty)
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