Globalization and Diplomacy: A Practitioner's Perspective

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Global Diplomacy a long moment, Mamedov asked: "Are you watching what I'm watching?" I was indeed. We both had our television sets tuned to CNN, which had begun a live broadcast of Russian commandos and armored personnel carriers moving into position to storm the White House. For the next half-hour, Mamedov and I watched transfixed, exchanging occasional impressions as the battle came to its dramatic and bloody denouement. Following a phased assault that gave those inside the White House several opportunities to surrender, government forces retook the building and arrested the leaders of the opposition. The United States and Russia had come a long way from the era of Cold War brinkmanship over Berlin and Cuba. Now, the point of crisis was an internal power struggle in Russia, a showdown between a democratically elected leader and a reactionary legislature. Moreover, rather than being waged in secret behind the Kremlin walls, the struggle was being broadcast live to a worldwide audience of tens of millions. Here was the famous "CNN effect" at its most emblematic. Just as the network had made it possible for Mamedov and me to watch an event unfold in real time as we discussed its implications over an open phone line, so the communications revolution had contributed to the transformation of his country and of our world. FROM BRETTON WOODS TO DENVER By the 1980s, self-isolating dictatorships from Chile to the Soviet Union had yielded to democratic and free market ideals spread by radio, television, the fax machine, and e-mail. Since then, in addition to undermining the Berlin Wall and shredding the Iron Curtain, the powerful technological forces of the Information Age have helped to stitch together the economic, political, and cultural lives of nations, making borders more permeable to the movement of people, products, and ideas. When President Bill Clinton visited Bucharest in July, his host, Emil Constantinescu, a democratic activist and reformer who had been elected president of Romania seven months before, took him into his study and proudly showed him the desktop computer that gave him access to cyberspace. For many millions of people, globalization has meant greater freedom and prosperity. But for millions of others, the same process has brought economic disadvantage and social disruption. Striking workers in South Korea and Argentina have opposed changes that their national leaders 70 FOREIGN POLICY
Talbott insisted were necessary to meet the demands of the global economy. The unexpected victory of the Socialist Party in last spring's French legislative elections stemmed in part from voters' apprehensions about globalization. In the United States, political figures such as Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan have tapped into similar anxieties. Not all those who are within reach of television consider themselves better off as a result-in fact, often quite the contrary. There are satellite dishes in the slums of the world's megacities, and the signals they suck in from Hollywood and Madison Avenue can trigger resentment and anger: The communications revolution has the potential to foment revolutions of a different sort. Globalization itself is neither inherently good nor bad. Governments can- meant not block its effects on their citizens greater without also cutting them off from its andprosperity. opportunities and benefits. But they can shape it to their national and international advantage. While this task is an increasingly important and explicit theme in U.S. diplomacy in the post-Cold War era, it is not new. In the economic realm, it goes back at least to the immediate aftermath of World War II and the creation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund at Bretton Woods. Three decades later, in 1975, the leaders of France, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States, and West Germany took another step forward together. They met in the picturesque French farming town of Rambouillet to discuss how they could increase trade, coordinate monetary policies, and reduce their vulnerability to rising oil prices. This was the first of what became, with the addition of Canada the following year in London, the annual summit of the Group of Seven major industrialized democracies. When the successors of those leaders met for the 22nd time in Denver last June, they were joined by Boris Yeltsin-the first time that the president of the Russian Federation participated in the summit from beginning to end. Just as the cast of characters at Denver had grown since Rambouillet, so had the agenda. Transnational threats such as climate change, the spread of infectious disease, and international orga- For many millions of people, globalization has freedom But for millions of others, the same process has brought economic disadvantage and social disruption. FALL 1997 71
Page 1 and 2: Carnegie Endowment for Internationa
Page 3: V)RBY "lilt n I L. GOYERNMENT '5"F
Page 7 and 8: 450 450 400 350 U.S. Diplomatic Rep
Page 9 and 10: Talbott integrating the Arms Contro
Page 11 and 12: Talbott trade in information techno
Page 13 and 14: Talbott Working "Multi-Multilateral
Page 15 and 16: Talbott The organizational chart fo
Page 17: Talbott curtain between East and We

Globalization and Diplomacy: A Practitioner's Perspective

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?