John Mearsheimer on the Battle Between Liberalism vs Nationalism
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- Опубліковано 22 вер 2024
- In this episode, Rob chats with John Mearsheimer, the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. Mearsheimer presents a nuanced perspective on liberalism, emphasising a crucial distinction between its positive impact domestically and its potential pitfalls when applied as a foreign policy approach. He delves into his views on modern-day liberalism, exploring the concept's "crusader impulse" and its role in intervening in other states' perceived rights.
Mearsheimer critically examines instances where the U.S., driven by a belief in the universality of liberalism, has sought to impose its values on other nations, resulting in interventions like Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria. He highlights the unintended consequences of such interventions, often leading to the rise of nationalism in the affected regions. Mearsheimer explores the intricate bond between liberalism and nationalism, expressing his disagreement with prevailing foreign policy stances that tend to fuel nationalist sentiments. Mearsheimer provides insightful perspectives on the complexities of liberalism and its intersection with nationalism in the realm of foreign policy.
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Kisin is a moron. No thanks. If you are promoting him, im unsubbing.
Nice click bait.
What is the date when this interview took place? I’m sure I’ve seen it before.
no
Mearsheimer is a brilliant man, and one has to thank God that he is doing all these shows.
He is deeply immoral man, I am not sure about his brilliance. His support and excuses for Putin barbarity makes him immoral person.
Except that nobody is actually listening to him to do what he suggests because it'd actually be a disaster for the USA. For example, he frequently says to only focus on China; however that means the US gives up on their public commitments to Ukraine and Israel. If the US goes back on those commitments, then who would trust the US going forward?
This man has balls of steel
@@thesleightofdan His head is made with the same material too. And his heart. And his soul. In short - he is equal to his idol Putin.
But he is wrong. His assumptions are totally made up. Why didn't the US didn't interven for human rights in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar etc ?
Iraq, Syria, Lybia etc were all friends of the Soviets, so the US intervened and wrecked them.
Afghanistan was a simple case of revenge against world trade centre attack.
The host keeps interrupting, it ruins the flow of Mr. Mearshiemer’s discussion
Exactly! This host was annoying. He kept interrupting Prof. Mearsheimer every time he was about to say something interesting.
Exactly !!! It is so irritating !!!
That's the nature of a conversation. A solo discussion is a lecture
@@kapitan19969838 To me it feels more like interruption than discussion, there are numerous instances where the host interrupted his points to insert his jokes, or changing the topic entirely while he was in the middle of making one.
Such as during 25:27 when Mearsheimer was trying to make the case illustrating the logical fallacies in the interventionist approach, the host just interrupted him with a random "what if". Completely changing from Mearsheimer's insightful annalysis and forcing him to engage with this meaningless fictitious moral dilemma. Asking what should people do if they could predict the holocaust while knowing full well that the inability to predict the future is exactly the reason why the liberal approach to diplomacy has created so much unnecessary bloodshed today.
You can see how dumbfounded Mearsheimer was following that question, he could not anticipate that question base on their previous exchange because it was so random and out of nowhere. It is difficult to argue if the host actually listened or if he was simply waiting for his turn to speak.
This is simply frustrating.
stop interrupting the speaker its so annoying
Indeed!
@@rodrigomohr1277Yes, I noticed that as well. Rob was a bit too quick to jump in before John had finished his thought or comment.
especially when having a speech impediment
@@mc-lb9dk Please don't shame people with speech impediments. It's rude to interrupt, full stop.
God i cannot continue is there an ai for this so i can silince him and then watch
It is actually: Global imperialism versus nationalism
Both Nationalism and Liberalism can be Imperialist.
It's about international Zionism vs nationalism.
Global imperialism is the liberal foreign policy that he is talking about ffs.
@MartinMartinm no it is not. It is Imperialism which has been around long before liberalism.
US started the Vietnam war to protect the French colonial rule and has been busy in the middle east to prevent any regional power from emerging.
There is not a single example of liberal intervention. All have been about global dominance.
@hamidhamidi3134 the USA, literally went to Vietnam to try and spread their "liberal democracy" during the Cold War.
It worked in Korea for them, but obviously not Vietnam.
The USA spreading their hegemony is global imperialism. The Koreans, Japanese, Taiwanese, Vietnamese, Chileans, eastern Europeans, etc, certainly weren't "liberal" before.
It is self-contradictory to force any other nation to adopt Liberalism because the defining feature of Liberalism is INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES 2:10
🎯
Correct, but it would be a different thing to tempt others to follow suit.
That's where American exceptionalism comes 😅 US can make rules, break rules and rules don't apply to US.
@@hasinurrahman6317 sovereign is he who makes the exception
It’s more like individual freedom….
Too bad the interviewer can’t listen to more than ¾ of an idea before launching into the next shallow interruption. John was incredibly patient with him.
ua-cam.com/video/dDyZ8n4MayQ/v-deo.html
If do not think that US ever wanted to “rescue” Afghan women. (Maybe it is just used as pretext, and some people believe it.)
That is because if they where seriously concerned for Afghan women, they would welcome USSR’s intervention in Afghanistan. So, it is not that the US is concerned about “rights”, they are just concerned about who is determining those “rights”, i.e. it has to be the US.
women's rights within the context of liberalism. USSR was not a liberal state. western but particularly US liberals understand themselves as the pinacle of humanity, every other nation, culture, state, group does it worse than them in their view & has to be reeducated, if necessary with military force. they are blind on the eye which could see the harm they are doing. one could indeed argue, intentionally.
He's a great analyst - & called the Ukraine debacle a decade in advance. However the idea that the US is motivated by the desire to spread liberal democracy seems very wrong to me. If you look at every such intervention, it is has been in a place where money could be made by the US corporations that bankroll the politicians who start the wars. Democracy is a handy figleaf, but little more if you look at the record.
To confirm this thesis, you need only look at what the US actually did on intervening. E.g. in Iraq, it immediately occupied the Oil Ministry & took over the oil infrastructure - & cancelled the planned elections.
I don't see why these need to be mutually exclusive. If there is a "crusader impulse" to the liberalist-nationalist approach, there is no reason why this cannot be steered by corporate interests. Given the power of lobbies in the US, it is no surprise to me that this tendency played out in areas where there was not only a perceived need for regime change, but also money to be made through the control of infrastructure.
More speculatively, the additional resources and power gained through a profitable intervention can strengthen the cause for subsequent interventions elsewhere. Quite the spiral...
The host should interrupt less.
Talk too freaking fast and is all over the place at some point or another.
I think he did very well. You can watch lots of videos of Mearsheimer talking uninterrupted for a long time.
Love listening to John Mearsheimer! Thank you!
Agreed! Except for what he says here at 10:25. I wish it was true. But it isn't.
Perhaps, but seeing how Liberalism by itself is not working out so well (particularly from a US perspective), should we not at least consider the point that he is making?@@fastinbulvis2223
Mr Mearsheimer mentioned that liberalism in the first place appeared as an answer to challenges faced by European societies. Religious wars, economic transformations etc. But other societies have different histories and cultures and even climate: the belief that individual is more important than the society is not universal. Asian cultures usually tend to give much more importance to family and community, and if you are liberal you should accept that they are entitled to their views. This 'liberal crusade' is based on exceptionalism and belief that your views are more valuable - exactly like colonialism and, actually, nazism, were based on this European/Western sense of superiority. It is just better hidden and more subtle now
American conservatives are like Asians then . The key difference between American WASP society and pretty much the rest of the world is- nuclear family vs extended family. It’s not that some Asian cultures devalue the individual , rather, they prioritize the extended family over the nuclear family. .
There are fundamental human rights in Liberalism. Although I agree that other countries should be left to their own devices, this does not mean those countries can violate fundamental human rights and it also does not mean we are forced to ally or trade with them. What you risk running up against is the paradox of intolerance. We cannot tolerate intolerance for then we are run over by the intolerant.
@@DOFT.mp4 The question is - who defines what is a fundamental human right? Early liberals were not concerned with the rights of ''uncivilized'' indigenous people in America, Australia or Africa or children's rights. Now some western activists think that changing a teenager's gender is a fundamental right. The problem starts when you think that you can decide for people from any country, historical and religious background what is right and what is wrong for them. And then in ends in chaos after military interventions supposedly aimed at protecting human rights. Right for life is the most basic of all, and millions of people died as a result of those crusades
@@q___m2158 These are troubling questions, but you can't simply acknowledge its difficulty only to give up and say it's all free reign. We can start with the Universal Declaration of Human rights by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris in 1984. There are obvious human rights that we can take action on today. For example, "[e]veryone has the right to life, liberty and security of person."
@@DOFT.mp4 True. UN is a collective body, those rights were agreed upon and ratified by most countries. But international system is still anarchic, no supreme court or world policeman or the means to impose the decision on a powerful state. The problem starts when powerful states become judges and jury and also control the world media. States based on liberal values have some systems of checks and balances inside. Theoretically even a disadvantaged person with bad reputation can count on fair treatment. But international system is different. Fair trial and even presumption of innocence don't work with some counties that are accused and considered guilty basing on some accusations (like WMD or human rights violations) and, on the other hand are not even applied to some other countries. Palestine today is one example - UN agencies cry about massive violations of rights to life and security, but has no means to impose any decision upon the sides
As a Canadian resident and historian I can state that Canada did not want to separate from Britian. Britain pushed us to get our own constitution in 1982.
That really does speak the English liberal temperament itself. No you will be like my favourite liberal son who freed himself, pack your bags! (Also the policy of the modern state, free yourself by getting the fuck out or fighting to take it over and finally end its own doom prophecy)
Can You tell us more about that?
Go see a doctor.
👏 Thank you
Obviously, he is using a 70 or 80-year-old definition of liberalism. That’s more like classic liberalism not what we see today in America as what’s called liberalism. He should make that distinction in the very beginning. Because most of what he describes as a liberal in the beginning sounds like most conservatives today. It’s almost like they have flipped.
That's why the conversation started with Mearsheimer defining liberalism. Liberalism in the US and Australia today has nothing to do with the original doctrine. In Australia you don't find liberalism in the Liberal Party - they ought to rename that party!
One of the best Mearsheimer interviews on the internet. Thank you so much!
Noble intentions my arse, it's used as a pretext for imperialism
I really wonder why they consider judaism as a race or a nationality. It is essentially a religion or a religious faith that could apply to various ethnic and national backgrounds. Could Mr. Mearsheimer kindly elaborate because this misconception has a lot to do with the ongoing crisis in the Middle East about whether the jews have a basic right to have a state of their own with no regard to the basic rights of non-jews. Why do they insist on a jewish state and they still insist that they are a democrasy. Does it make any logical sense to you?
its an ethnic group. Its why you can have 'atheist jews' and not have a contradiction
@@MrJekkenIt's also a religion. It's why you can convert to Judaism.
Because religions are made up and they made a rule trying the religion to the ethnicity. You are Jewish if your mother is Jewish. No other religion has this rule.
@@johnc3525the idea of Judaism as ethnicity was promoted by the Zionist organization in the late 19th century to find a great excuse for establishing a Jewish state in the Middle East.
They were clashes and debates on this matter because if it is an ethnicity by blood then we can have a muslim Jew or a Buddhist Jew, so do they have the right to claim the land ?
What a brilliant and insightful definition of liberalism at the top of this interview. I'm more and more growing in appreciation of it in its classical form. What we see of it now is a degraded version of a fine ideal.
Classical liberalism is even worse than modern liberalism. The founding fathers were a perfect example of the contradictions of Liberalism.
Have you read any of Von Mises books? He really gives an amazing account of classic liberalism.
@epicphailure88 please expand, I am interested to know where you are going?
Strange that you have a St. Thomas Aquinas photo, given that Classical Liberalism was born out of an abandonment of scholasticism.
@@joepaluka9031 This seems like a good recommendation. I hadn't heard of him, I'd recently discovered a Professor Stephen Hicks writings on liberalism, but i'll look into Mises.
How can you ignore the Billions of Dollars of war profiteering and say US interventions were "well intended"?
It is an insult to the victims.
By some measures we've spent as much as $8 TRILLION on these military misadventures in the last 30 years alone!
John does very good explanations, when the host lets him finish what he is saying....
Disagree, made for a lively conversation.
18:45 crusader impulse in liberalism 21:00 intervention worked out terribly
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These people are not that different to Al-Qaeda and ISIS.
The liberal holy wars for democracy and capitalism from their point of view. State terrorism from my point of view.
Yeah, Obama liked to refer to our ancestors as "Crusaders".. And then spent his 8 years in office doing THE SAME THING himself!
Interviewer is so annoying and fast constantly interrupting John
Casual conversation on critical issues. Lucky are those that sit in classrooms with these two individuals. Bravo.
Yes, I've been extremely fortunate in having discovered Dr. John's "classroom" as the result of our initiating the Ukrainian war.
I see the comments here on the host interrupting. I’ve enjoyed watching this as a conversation, I like to see people I like or admire in equal conversations and it was stimulating to hear him answer to multiple questions. Thank you for the video!
I think it could have been achieved just as well without jumping the gun so much. Save your question for a gap, not cutting the interviewee off constantly. But interviewing is harder than it looks, so I don't want to be too harsh
@@Muzikman127 It's a discussion, not an interview.
It is a little bit distracting when the host keeps interrupting Mearsheimer's speech. He should give more room to his guest to speak his mind.
Thank you, CIS, for introducing me to John Mearsheimer. Brilliant political thinker to say the least.
Liberal Democracy begins at home. You discuss and try to agree but in the end if you cannot, the head of the family has to decide. At the same time we have an outer door and some outsiders are welcome to visit us for a while. We don't let the outsiders run our family and we don't force ourself on other families. Same with nations. 😊
Interesting point about the Nazis being the only industrialized country to pull out of the depression. But always remember the Soviet Union did not even enter depression. Its gross national income grew 500% between 1928 and 1940.
Could you even call the 1920's Soviet Union industrialised?
National socialism has been the most lied about political system, because our oligarchs would be kicked out of power.
@@jimmyjones8676 What else can you call a country that can build ships, steam locomotives, automobiles and airplanes on its own?
@jimmyjones8676 I was going to respond but see your question has already been answered.
You can't compare England or other industislised countys in 1929 to Russia.
They had nothing but poverty really
I had to check my playback speed after hearing the host. Great talk though.
He is the fastest host I came across at his age. LOL
The interruption of the speaker was so annoying let him finish off his analysis
Interviewer must think world is insufferable slow.
LOL
Great listening!
A good way to think about that distinction at the end is on the home front interactions are largely between individuals (the domain of liberalism), but internationally (hint: nationally) the interactions are not between individuals but nation states (nationalism) which are the most powerful actors.
Interviewer needs to stop trying to act as if knows everything. You have one of the top minds in the IR field , stop interrupting him
I always get an education when Prof. Mearsheimer speaks.
What a great talk. Every sentence out of John's mouth is an informative gem.
Prof. John J. Mearsheimer Da Best💯✌️♥️
What actually glue people together? Is it the boundaries of a state, or is it common values and pursuit? Though I agree with mearsheimer that individuals are carved out of society, I don't his later argument convincing at the second part. To me, Common values and pursuit are far more attractive than common background or race or country of origin.
More attractive but a lot less stable over time.
Many things can glue people together. Family structure, community, religion, marriages, genetics, ideology, economics, etc, etc.
It can be all of those combined. Perhaps like the Americans, our national identity as Indonesians is "imagined" (as Mearsheimer said), or sometimes also called as civic nationalism.
You are in for a great surprise how diverse those "common values and pursuits" are in different nations and regions.
Last time I check, Israel is Jewish state and kingdom of Saudi Arabia is monarch and guess what USA is fine with it. USA uses liberal democracy as a cover to wedge war, not impose it. Professor needs to review his view!
He's very aware of that! He has stated repeatedly that the US uses liberalism when it is convenient, but when you HAVE to choose between the realist choice and the moral/ideal choice you will always choose the realist choice. If there is no COST to choosing between the two you will choose the idealist choice. There is a realist incentive there and the US chooses to engage with and be allied with Saudi Arabia because there is a REALIST impetus to do so.
Individualism is a classical liberal thing. Classical liberalism is not even liberalism. I think we need to start distinguishing between individualism and individuality.
I simply disagree based on the results we see in the countries that adopted and the clear failure of Liberalism. "A utopian dream" Having said that, I invite individuals to correct me if I'm wrong as I'm interested in the truth.
Please let this man talk!!
Yes, I totally agree with professor Mearshheimer that if each country focus on doing a better kind of governance inside , then it will lead by example
It's not that people can't agree to arrive at the truth or know it, it's that the government is not there to impose its idea of truth. Obviously we are talking about metaphysical beliefs, objective and evident facts must be able to be determined as always. Respect for beliefs is not the same as cult of lies.
A very good point.
Interestingly, Mearsheimer’s political realism is actually more idealistic than the neo-liberalism/neo-conservatism that fuels the western expansionism. Because he believes that if every society can decide it’s own rules (except from committing genocide), and western societies could lead by example, then the world would turn out for the better in the end. The idealism is that the people of other countries would willingly, and without external intervention, follow their example. But the neolibs/neocons are not so optimistic/idealistic: they believe external intervention is needed to bring about that change, because people living under effective oppressive regimes don’t stand a chance without it. So you could say they are the real «realists» of foreign policy.
great conversation.
The pain gets to be a bit much after awhile
Liberal (capitalism) vs National (Subordinated capitalism? Neo-feudal mercantilism?)
Liberalism is an ideology that believes that inalienable human rights belong to all individuals, and this transcends borders. Thus liberals think everyone is entitled to the same rights across the globe. Progressive liberalism brings this a step further and thinks that it's okay to use state force to do mass social engineering to forcefully spread itself while libertarianism eschews state force thinking that government should be minimized to protect civil liberties. Nationalism basically represents the population you belong to sharing the same set of beliefs practiced by that group (culture) to find success. Nationalism is basically the strongest force since people will act in the interest of the state/tribe/group and will tend to trust the current leaders believing those leaders will act in their interest. Nationalism may align with liberal or realist interests, which becomes a force that may facilitate either one. Since USA tends to have a largely liberal body politic, it will try to take advantage of nationalism to enact liberal goals. Example is the Second Gulf War that did not serve US interests, and was meant more to spread liberal democracy in the Middle-East. Capitalism is a tenet of liberalism, which believes nation-states with heavy economic interdependence won't attack each other since it would kill the goose that lays the golden egg.
Liberalism has nothing to do with capitalism. I am not sure what you are thinking of .
@@chosk80 well to give you an example, we pursued a policy of engagement with China. The idea would be to get it hooked on capitalism and that it would gradually become more like a liberal democracy. That plan did not work out. It was a liberal agenda to create that economic interdependence to turn China eventually into a liberal democracy. China, as a result, embraced capitalism, but didn't quite embrace the liberal democracy part.
I want to add that liberalism isnt necessarily good or bad. We experience a thriving multi-ethnic society where everyone is treated with a degree of civil liberties. However, it is insufficient and lacking when applied to foreign policy because it tends to disregard the balance of power and how power plays into strategic logic. Capitalism is also not a good or bad thing. The free market is what affords us so much privilege because the free market determines what is best for all as opposed to a select few.
To clarify, I am asking Does Mearsheimer here describe a liberal financial-capitalist faction vs a nationalist industrial-capitalist faction?
My understanding was:
Liberal faction of elite... want to keep their private ownership claims of worldwide assets valid by maintaining inviolability of private property.
More nationalist faction of (American) elite... would rather maintain real or perceived supremacy "against other nations," and would include: national or racial supremacists, financially naive or non-financialized industrialists ie farmers-miners-manufacturers-military traditional aristocracy, not bankers-insurance-cosmopolitan liberal financiers.
Litmus test: West retains many assets within former colonies and current financial framework. To politically default on relatively small property rights obligations to Russia will terminate legal, pragmatic, & moral inviolability of the larger Western claims in non-West countries.
The wealthy vs the gung-ho war industrialists. The liberals profit by manipulating both sides to war, while the nationalists identify with one or another participant.
In good times an empire can force vassals to take necessary risks, so no existential conflict between liberals and nationalists.
However as State loses empire, liberal faction maintains their wealth and loyalty untied to nationalist ideology or loyalty, while nationalist faction cannot or does not maintain wealth & power independent of declines or advances in America's internal standards of living or external competitiveness in a dominance of hierarchy.
I don't know whether I'm wrong, he is euphemizing his language or if he is wrong.
Liberalism: "People disagree about basic principles". It's the concept of anarchy.
The classical version certainly is. The modern version loves regulation.
31:55 Mearsheimer says he doesn’t like a liberal foreign policy, but he wants to allow other nation states to figure out their own domestic policies. So it seems he actually likes a liberal foreign policy. What he doesn’t like is more accurately described as the neo-liberal foreign policy: imposing liberal values by illiberal means (violence / war).
#1 Liberalism within oneself ,
Like a classical American triality of self and our founding.
Many tribes making a union of one nation defined by borders. These individuals have liberal power not the state.
#2 1900s structuralism Physical prescriptions of Liberalism outside ones body
Liberal power granted to government and no one has a nation or a right but the state. .
John really enjoyed this one.
He’s always like that, such an affable man.
Mearsheimer for president 2024! Send him petitions to urge him to run. ❤
If you should not dictate your neighbour about how to live, which is the case in those liberal countries, you definitely should not try to dictate other nations about how to live. As a non-liberal, non-westerner, I grealty respect Professor Mearsheimer, because he is one of the few liberals who actually respect this very simple moral rule. Unfortuntaely, however, this simple foundation is really lost in the foreign policy of liberal nations, most notably the United States.
Why are so many 3rd worlders migrating to the West, if liberalism is so bad?
5:30 *_Liberalism_* and *_rights_* depend upon burn-rate. Resource-conservation limits both.
Why would you gather together for a nation which you don't need but not for individual inalienable rights which are indispensable for everyone's life?
And if the nation is not founded on those principles then what is it worth for?
What we've got are nations of subjective 'collective will' instead of individual responsibility and respect; dignity.
These are valuable questions to ask.
Thank you for this brilliantly engaging, clear, and concise analytical thesis.
Not sure about the thesis of the British Empire being dismantled had anything to do with nationalism, it was mostly due to great power dynamics and the creation of the United Nations under the auspices of the US and the growing influence of the Soviet Union in international affairs.
One of the great minds who sees the world clearly with feet firmly on the ground.
On rights & truth @ around 5:30 - I think I can save Mearsheimer's original argument here from having to be qualified in this case - rights are not truths they are tools. They are a technology.
Is there a battle between libertarianism and nationalism? It's good to let people do what they want as long as it isn't detremental to you. Living in a resilient environment minimises detrement, and part of that is a strong country. People in other countries should all have resilient ones as well. National borders are a 'firebreak' against the spread of trouble. People like to live in houses, not everyone all in one hangar.
The concept of nationalism was born as a way of differentiating a socialism that was not dependent on the socialist international or the USSR.
Any national government that is not socialist or communist wouldn't need to make that clear.
Thank you for commenting.
If a society and/or culture cannot agree on first principles, then there are NO first principles.
We saw in the 1848 German Revolutions that the revolutionaries were not able to reconcile nationalism with liberalism. They wanted a united Germany but also a more democratic one. But the German Kings were able to divide the liberals along national lines, especially Austrians against Hungarian rebels. I do think in a few cases, they are reconcilable eg the NATO campaign in Kosovo in 1998.
Humans are obviously “social,” but that framing performs an important censorship by omission, which is that humans are more specifically tribal in nature - a biological phenomenon grounded in ethnocentrism - and fully expressed in America as white supremacy, and white Christian nationalism. In addition, traditional “nationalism” is another name for such legacy “human tribalism,” despite the issues of secularism and citizenship reinterpreting the traditional tribal constitution of nationalism. At no point however, did this nativist/nationalist tribal identity and influence suddenly evaporate due to any dilution by immigration. Nor did ideological citizenship suddenly cancel out the biological undergirding of hegemonic white Christian nationalist American tribalism.
Traditional tribalism expressed as nationalism continues to undergird and influence every aspect of “citizenship-based society,” specifically throughout the ruling class, oligarchy, plutocracy, and authoritarian apparatus, including nativist populism. This legacy tribal influence exists and persists, despite all of the competing counter-narratives, which span Enlightenment philosophy, The American Experiment, Liberalism, Capitalism, Postmodernism, Socialism, and Marxism. Anyone whom defends these institutions will nearly detonate if you contaminate their Enlightenment sanctity with the subject of biological determinism. Nevertheless, all the most primitive regions of the brain light-up when tribal concepts are introduced, and the study of “Authoritarian Personality” (tribal instincts) identifies expressions that directly reinforce the taxonomy of tribal dynamics.
Meanwhile, all of the modern Enlightenment manifestations require conformity with “tabula rasa” human state of nature theory, asserting sacrosanct individualism, reason, and rational choices that can conveniently choose any of the above choices, while never suffering from the primitive encoding of instinctive tribal influence. Such assertions however, are a form of species exceptionalism. Equivalent expressions are the initial reactionary rejection of Darwinism, the hubris of much philosophical intellectualism, including blaming the individual for what reduces to the sins of a tribal species. Consequently, all of these offending Enlightenment ideologies suffer from false first principles, false framing, and horrendous perpetual hypocrisy that eventually tears itself apart through ethnocentric ruling class abuses inflicted upon the multiracial multicultural working class, including through indebted micro-militarism (currently against black and brown people in the Global South, including the entire Eastern hemisphere). Historically identified as Lifecycle Empire.
Understanding the phenomenon of tribalism is tremendously important. This study identifies biological causality and human instincts (an entire taxonomy of tribal instincts with authoritarian characteristics), which existence and qualities undermines rationalism, Liberalism, and individualism, including explains national exceptionalism, demonizing out-groups, and coveting expansionist ideology, not to mention people repeating the same idiosyncratic behaviors in every state on every continent throughout history.
Human tribalism identifies a ubiquitous synthesis of characteristics, which are threefold: 1) ethnocentrism, 2) monotheism, and 3) ultra-nationalism, to constitute a unique exceptionalistic self-interested identity. These characteristics respectively represent: 1) racial supremacy, racism, xenophobia, and demonization; 2) any prevailing binding belief system, which can include religion, spirituality, animism, pantheism, or ideology; and 3) territoriality, where territory is highly integrated with natural resources, sacred spaces, and secure occupation. This tribal synthesis of characteristics - representative of white supremacy - is reproduced throughout the elite spectrum as vanguards of authentic moral legitimate tribal identity. The tribal synthesis is embedded in religion, law, politics, economics, and armed services. Culturally speaking, a significant element of nationalist populism declare their fealty to this tribal synthesis as a non-negotiable, including conviction to defend it with their lives. Significantly, approximately 25-30% of such tribal like-mindedness is sufficient to achieve cultural hegemony, and control a social narrative. Possibly more significantly, despite representing a fractional “opulent minority,” ruling class oligarchy demonstrates ability to control the narrative through the force multipliers of capitalism, social engineering, and the state monopoly on violence.
These tribal characteristics manifest through the familiar expressions of national exceptionalism, national innocence, and national mythology; populations paying irrational reactionary fealty to church-state authority; the demonization and suppression of out-groups; and supremacist expansionist ideologies. America prosecutes three expansionist ideologies: capitalism; Universalist Liberal hegemony; and white Christian supremacy - the authoritarian instincts and pathologies involved are regressive and disturbing. It is true that human tribalism can be expressed on a more peaceable spectrum during access to plentiful resources, and through different modes of production. Nonetheless, historical expressions are plagued by violence, and modern expressions developed during agrarianism and technology demonstrate evolutionary arms race escalation and anarchistic endangerment that must be dealt with as they currently exist, where the true causality reduces to biology, not money. Money however, namely capitalism, is a primary tool of ruling class instruments. In that regard, the legacy church-state system - whether through secular, theocratic, or military dictatorship expression - each demonstrates the authoritarian institutional hierarchy of militarism, religion, politics, economics, and culture, where each institution is required to perform an authoritarian function for the self-interested state, and should be considered an institutional projection of human tribalism.
It is certain that Liberalism is not the best system. Liberalism gets human state of nature theory wrong, and an entire litany of culpabilities follow. Liberalism processes individualism unnaturally throughout several exploitative yet foundational institutions, where the pathology of individualism becomes disproportionately sick. In addition, because Liberalism never correctly determines the truth of existence, it thereby perpetuates its own false raison d'être in perpetuity. In this manner, Liberalism condemns humanity to negative circular logic and the causality of a stunting doom-loop, which actually prevents achieving enlightenment, despite such enlightenment revealing the grim reality that humanity is in point of fact tribal and instinctive in nature. Liberalism, and many expressions of individual freedoms, provides sanctuary for everything regressive and reactionary, which sustains all of the potential required to resist progressive change, undermine democracy, and impose moralizing right-wing economics. The “postmodernism” of Liberalism diminishes society into cultural factionalism, where cultural issues replace preserving awareness regarding economics that benefit the general welfare. Relatedly, Liberalism enables economic freedom to constitute weaponized individual liberty, which allows individualism to function in unsustainable abstraction from systems-based accountability. Liberalism does not withstand the scrutiny of environmental sustainability protocols, which requires Universalist coordination with physics-governed environmental determinism. Liberalism occupied the mantle of responsibility while presiding over Anthropocene Homo sapiens failing miserably. Liberalism does not successfully negotiate Plato’s battle between democracy and oligarchy, where liberalism, including through liberal economics, has enabled oligarchy to prevail over democracy.
If during business as usual, the status quo, and prevailing wisdom, Homo sapiens premature extinction presents a quandary, one might consider the merits of a contrarian thesis. In addition, considering the legacy agents that have historically ruled the human condition - exceptionalistic tribal identity reproducing the tribal synthesis, rule by capital, and oligarchy with toxic pathology and ideology - none of these agents are something that deserve repeating.
So, what would be a better system? To begin with, one that admits the ugly tribal truth, and through such cognitive objectification, achieves the ability to transcend this Paleo-regressive determinism. Subsequently, the phenomenon’s of white supremacy, the tribal synthesis expressed throughout the ruling class, oligarchy, plutocracy, national security state, and nationalist populism, including the self-interested state competing in the interstate system, could all be collectively superannuated to the annals of history. An alternative civilization could be erected upon cognitive-based progressive cultural evolution organizing itself in relationship to attaining environmental sustainability. And Plato’s antagonism between oligarchy and democracy could find resolution that favors democracy through choosing systems-based egalitarian economics and Ecosocialism.
Liberalism seems to have critically failed with looking after the commons; ecology and sustainability. Also failed on social justice and equity, and world peace. What can rectify this ?
Liberalism is pure evil.
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Good discussion. However, is Mearsheimer conflating "national identity" with nationalism here? Can there be a national identity without the exceptionalism of nationalism? Is patriotism not pride in national identity without the excesses of nationalism which can lead to belligerence?
Very good. I’ll have a look for Konstantin.
If the liberal society dont agree on what is the truth, how can rights be universally applicable or inalinable? Who decides if rights are inalienable, the state? What happens to rights if state collapses? Just curious
Greetings from Bolivia 🇧🇴
Feet resting upon WHO'S FOOTSTOOL? Who's Who? Students shared "i" AM and shared Feet resting upon WHO'S FOOTSTOOL? Resting upon HUMILITY.
So, what do we do if I own a house in Dearborn, MI, and the government there becomes Islamic?
jOHNS LIVING IN DREAMLAND HERE. the reason there was group cohesion between the first migrants was definitely due to core values but was a huge part due to race. Europeans are a race no matter the branches between them and find some commonality that goes beyond idealism. Hes just too American and simplistic to understand this.
Very naive interviewer. It seems that he's not into the actual debate, so he keeps asking stupid questions and John has invest his energy with impertinences as: "is the state good or bad?". Come on.
I'm surprised Prof Mearsheimer agreed to sit down again with CIS, which really should change its name to Centre of Imperial Promotion, after the Professors visit and disgraceful event that was an embarrassment to Australia because of the ignorance and subservience on display which John at least found amusing.
23:30 The self defeating moment. Not worth watching tbh. Loaded with strawman arguments.
Philosophy is beautiful
Mearsheimer has a few points, but I don't share his pessimistic view of humans, nor his "theory of everything" approach to International Relations.
Mearsheimer is a dreamer.
Really wish to see Mr Jaishankar sitting together with John and reminiscing the foreign policy AtoZ with anecdotes
That will be the epitome of wisdom, knowledge for the whole world
DrJ will blow the house-of-cards over without even trying.
These facile discussions show how shallow the structural/systemic concepts of the west are. Of course, these contradictory concepts used by miershimer (he's best of a bad bunch) are just thin cover to mask Imperialism from those who are both hard of thinking and uninterested.
This construction is less informed than Individualism vs. Collectivism. That's where the real struggle is.
How the collective responds, "liberal/ expansive or "nationalist/protective" is of interest to the collective ruling clique and its victims.
How the collective contests with/diminishes the individual is what we individuals suffer.
I am a huge fan of Prof. John Mearsheimer but this is the first time I disagree with some of his points.
1. Most of the U.S. invasions he cited (Iraq, Libya, Syria) did NOT happen out of American kindness. Please do research and you'll find-out who they served. Cui bono.
2. Women's rights in the USA? Are you serious? After all the recent laws against abortion?
"Noble intention" my ar$.
This is really great! John's argument very much seems to me like some version of the cultural relativism debate. I agree with him that the US should not intervene even though such a view invites the criticism that non-intervention means complicity in oppression of whosever individual rights are violated. I don't know how he would get out of this. But I am glad he made the distinction with genocide even though in the real world genocide may be taking place without the outside world really finding out about it till it's too late. Or getting bogged down in a protracted debate about whether genocide is really taking place or not. Take Israel and Gaza. Is what the Israelis are doing over there genocide? Could the fact of genocide actually be a matter of opinion? I'd say yes. Same with the Armenian genocide. And it goes back to John's great point that we humans can't agree on first principles. Each likes to stick to their own truth. People used to resolve such radical differences with wars. Or we'll just have to learn to live with each other - but especially with RADICAL DIFFERENCE! This is where I think most of us just fail.
Was the German people pre WW2 encourgaged to vote in a dictator who took Germany to war?
Why would the German people do that, one wonders.
Perhaps it was extreme nationalism along with desperation as to the state of Germany following WW1.
Same with Japan, why go to war against the USA. What drove Japan to go to war against the USA after it invaded Nanchuria etc.....Oil and survival perhaps?
The same question must be asked today, as to why Russia invaded Ukraine....Why would Russia invade a country of 50 million people with a ground force of only 100000.?
According to Putin it was an exercise to prevent Ukraine arming and becoming a member of NATO.....
That is, in Putin's mind, it was for survival.
So Nations under threat of survival are liable to go to war.?
Imagine if Hitler had the nuclear bomb.......
Putin has a massive arsenal of nuclear weapons.
So if it is about survival of the Russian state, does anybody doubt that Putin will use nuclear weapons?
The reaction of the West, which is obviously doing it's best to destroy Russia, using economic sanctions and supplying Ukraine with more and more weapons is obvious....No sign of peace only attacking and prodding the "bear"
This is a very dangerous time and this military exercise by the Nato only heightens the threat.
One mistake is all that is required to set off a chain reaction....
Tommy: and one more time to survive our country, you choose what? Realism vs Constructivism Nationalism.
Liberalism mean peace and evolution. Nationalism means autoritarism and war. For me that live in autocracy for 39 years cannot anybody convince me is better than liberalism.
He is not saying it is better.
Multiculturalism has major challenges....Integration and social cohesion works....Interculturalism might lead to understanding...
18:19 What happened there?
Benedict Anderson's phrase isn't always right - in Europe there are Basques, Welsh, Irish, Serbs and others who all expressed identity prior to the early modern period. Some of these were even more isolated and including them would invite too many both sensible and silly questions.
People like the Albanians and English were nurtured in their pre-modern development as a nation or people by the still extant people. Identity can be a reaction.
England existed prior to the modern era and that is still not accepted. England has ended now - but it did exist and it existed prior to the invention of the modern nation-state.
Intellectuals' support for the wackier and wilder shores of identity politics is a coping mechanism for their refusal to accept obvious truths about countries, cultures, nations and peoples?
nationalism for state, liberalism for divine central authority unity
4:17 The fundamental problem is that pluralism is for individuals and not for groups. Liberalism defends the individual life project, not the group one. Because the group life project is a state within another state, that is why multiculturalism does not work and it is because of accepting collectivism without seeing the consequences. Absolutely wrong: Liberalism is individualist, not collectivist: just Individuals, not individuals and communities.
So, if a group considers itself a nation, and there can be more than one within a state, that is incompatible with a liberal state. That is why it is necessary to discern whether nationalism is used to express non-dependence on other states or whether nationalism is used to express the supremacy of a group of people.
Thank you for the thoughtful comment
BTW I AGREE with like 75% of Mearsheimer ideas. just not down with the Ukraine argument.
There is need to distinguish between nationalism and patriotism. Nationalism is loyalty to an ethnic group, its language, its culture, its history. Patriotism is loyalty to a country and its political institutions, symbols, etc.
Not sure many people will subscribe to the benign-USA-trying-to-help-the-world-through-liberalism view. Some might think this is an ideological facade.
it's not a facade as much as not the whole truth, some Americans wanted to spread Christianity, some just wanted to have fun committing war crimes and not be prosecuted. a group of people may agree on a set of actions but differ entirely in their motivations.
Well, He is talking about US foreign policy makers being motivated by (benign) ideological impulse. And that's what I'm skeptical about - that these politicians and the interests they represent are trying to spread liberalism from ultimately benign motives.
@@elroz1675 Many are simply trying to spread liberalism because they believe that's their moral imperative. America is like the Catholic Church, they try to spread Christianity throughout the world by any means available to them, and many Catholics do this because they sincerely believe this will improve peoples lives so much that any means can be justified. Other Catholics are doing it so they act out their sadistic pleasures in a safe space.
interviewer interruots too much. Extremely discourteous to invited guest.
Very rare insights indeed.
Nationalism flourishes for great petiod of time when demographic strength is unparalleled and resources are aplenty, this is not so in all and every situation. (Human societies are greatly vulnerable to natural disasters and epidemics, all the regular rules are turned upside down in correlation to the magnitude of a crisis). Liberals need to be open and flexible in order to address deficiencies. Liberal thinking can be shark like, it will offer little but take big from another, this hard negotiation erodes long term trust, you got to arrive at mutually beneficial equation. However, Nationalism is pragmatic when the other partners do not have big virtues, you take a tough call, you may not want a deal at all if it can imbalance your entire organization and future stability.
A grand country could suggest liberal order to others but may be in truth focused on building a grand empire or a grand alliance, it is a nationalst or group promoter with unusual ability to influence lesser countries. For a healthy liberalism to arrive, there needs to be numerous parallel platforms, unhealthy liberalism, which involves the establishing of clients by a significant leader is not ideal but is a realistic order.
Relativistic Realism? First Principles are the easist to come to, ontologically, and epistemologically. Organic Intelligence leads the way, or Nature's Imperative, qua determinism. Kant's ethics.
Tell it like it is.