People’s voice in foreign policy debates lacking in East and West 

February 26, 2014, 12:00 pm

UKRAINE, Kiev : (FILES) Photo taken on December 11,2013 shows Berkut riot police storming the barricades set up by pro-EU protestors on Independence Square in Kiev. Acting interior minister Arsen Avakov announced on his Facebook account that he was dissolving the feared unit effective immediately on February 26, 2014. "The Berkut is no more," the 50-year-old wrote. AFP

With Ukraine flaring into civil strife of a murderous kind, an issue to be raised is the extent to which ‘the voice of the people’ is proving a decisive influence in the shaping of US and Russian policy on this latest crisis which is seeing these major powers in a standoff with each other. This poser may come as a surprise to some because foreign policy anywhere is seen as best left in the hands of Foreign Ministries, connected high profile ‘dignitaries’ and numerous ‘specialists’, who are usually ‘Far From the Madding Crowd’.

A recent AFP commentary on the conflict, could be considered a suitable ‘kick –off’ point for a discussion of this question of the lack of public participation in foreign policy debates and discussions. Ending the commentary the reporters said: ‘So while Washington is outraged at the carnage when troops fire on protestors in Kiev – and may impose sanctions, few in Washington argue the showdown is a dominant US national interest.’

Leave alone governments, it is seldom or never that international news agencies conduct extensive public opinion surveys on foreign policy issues of relevance to Western states in particular. These sections of the media are generally quite content with gathering the opinions of ‘specialists’ on the issues in focus, such as academics and think tanks, but it is rarely that public opinion surveys are held to sound out the people on critical questions. Thus, it is only the opinions of ‘experts’ which are projected as of crucial interest. In the above instance, it is only opinion in ‘Washington’ which is seen as mattering.

The conclusion of the commentary just quoted refers to the ‘national interest’, but it is an open question whether the opinion of the ‘nation’ was sought by the ‘experts’ whose pronouncements on the Ukraine crisis are given in the news analysis. It is plain to see that ‘the few in Washington’, that is ‘expert opinion’, are merely voicing the views that are circulating among themselves, who amount to a microscopic minority among the US public.

It is very likely that the majority of the US public would consider the relevant conflict as being of little interest to them too, and therefore, as having little bearing on the national interest, but this position is not obtained through a public opinion survey. It is presumed that the opinions of ‘experts’ are representative of the views of the wider public. This is, of course, not necessarily so, as the mass public protests in the West against the Western military incursion of Iraq in 2003 graphically illustrated. The people anywhere tend to be wiser than their ‘masters’ on many matters of national importance.

Therefore, it is the states and ‘experts’ who are usually seen as deciding what the national interest is. Such skewed thinking on foreign policy issues is common to most countries and it could be said with some certainty that democratic consultations or debates in which public participation figures, in matters of foreign policy, are absent in the majority of countries, including those that claim to be ‘liberal democracies’.

This brings the observer and analyst to the larger question of who usually decides what the national interest is. Is the Lankan public, for instance, asked by the state as to what its prime interests are in the field of foreign policy? Isn’t it usually told by the state and other public actors what its position should be on issues in foreign policy?

If these questions are answered frankly, it would be plain that the people have little or no decisive voice in determining what the national interest is. Nor are their views sought on questions of foreign policy. These issues are decided for them primarily by governments, political parties and forces and social institutions, such as, the media. Thus, is democracy seriously impaired.

A question now being posed by sections of the Western media, in relation to the differences which are emerging between the US and Russia on the Ukrainian conflict, is, whether they are not evincing Cold War-type conduct towards each other. Some of the ‘specialists’ quoted by the media see Russia as trying to protect its Cold War era ‘spheres of influence’ in Eastern Europe through its current policy postures on the Ukraine.

‘We consider this idea of spheres of influence to be a wildly outmoded notion…We’ve been clear about that with the people of Ukraine, we’ve been clear about that with Russia’, a senior US State Department official was quoted saying.

The West is also showing signs of being perturbed over the possibility of Russia using military pressure on Ukraine, in the style of the old Soviet Union, to make it succumb to its wishes. US Secretary of State John Kerry is reported to have told his Russian counterpart that it was ‘the United States’ expectation that Ukraine’s….democratic freedom of choice will be respected by all states.’

While Russia is yet to make any concrete, practical moves in relation to the conflict, it is clear that the US is at present making some presumptions that justify the observer in seeing it as predisposing itself to Cold War-type thinking and posturings. While it is all too obvious that Ukraine is divided and in the throes of disunity, the worst that could happen to it is for a seeming solution to be imposed on it, through Western governments’ intervention and pressure. This could prove as divisive and disruptive as a Soviet-style military intervention.

While interested external state actors are having their say on the conflict and are also probably preparing themselves for some form of intervention in it, no thought is given, by states, to the democratic obligation to listen to all domestic sides in the Ukrainian strife and to bring them into the decision-making process. The Ukrainian public must be heard across all divisions but this does not seem to be happening. It is clear that domestic political and military formations do not fully represent the Ukrainian people. The people need to be heard out on what they see as good for them. Likewise, Western publics must be asked for their views on Ukraine.

No doubt, the issues in the Ukraine are of some complexity. It would be naïve of the analyst to expect simple answers to them. But superficial, conventional thinking on the part of external state actors in particular, could only take Ukraine in the direction of Egypt and Libya. In all such ‘hot spots’ the people have been left out of the decision making process and armed groups made to decide what’s good for them, under the guise of adhering to the norms of democracy. If the people are brought to centre stage, and made to decide on the national interest, the conflicts could prove more manageable.