More on the Politics of Humanitarianism

Yesterday I encouraged readers to take a look at a column by David Rieff over on The New Republic website.  Today’s Wall Street Journal reports some changes in the Obama administration’s efforts to support dissidents in Iran.

The details are interesting, and readers will undoubtedly have their own view on the overall policy of the Obama administration, which, as far as I can see, can’t make up its mind about how to deal with Iran, in large part because there aren’t any good options. But the larger significance concerns Rieff’s observation that our humanitarian causes, which we would like to see as independent of particular state interests, have come to be interwoven with geo-political power struggles.

In the case of Iranian dissidents, it’s transparently the case that our moral interest in human rights dovetails with our national interest in toppling the Iranian regime. This is why the administration’s efforts support the dissidents (or lack of efforts, as the case may be) are part of our larger foreign policy strategy. And, of course, the Iranian government recognizes precisely the same unity of interests, which is why they think of the dissident as pawns of Western powers.  or good or for ill, the high rhetoric of democracy, human rights, and humanitarianism is interwoven with gritty details of state conflict, as they have been ever since Napoleon conquered Europe on behalf of liberty, equality, and fraternity.