Americans are from Mars, Europeans are from... nursery school?

Posted By Blake Hounshell Wednesday, May 7, 2008 - 11:42 AM Share

Peter Wehner, formerly the head of the White House office of strategery, blogs for Commentary on his recent trip to a conference in Europe:

I came away from the gathering (portions of which I missed) with several broad impressions. One was that multilateralism has become virtually an end in itself. What matters to many Europeans and liberal-leaning Americans is the process rather than the results. What almost never gets discussed is what happens when one's desire for multilateralism collides with achieving a worthy end (for example, trying to stop genocide in Darfur or prevent Iran from developing a nuclear bomb). The child-like faith in multilateralism as the solution to all that ails the world would be touchingly innocent if it weren't so terribly dangerous.

Do Europeans really have a "child-like faith in multilateralism"? Discuss.

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LUCY

12:51 PM ET

May 7, 2008

What are his proposed solutions?

I would like to know what Mr. Wehner's proposed solutions for those problems are? Should we just let the United States handle Darfur and Iran and everything else? I'm trying to be realistic here, we don't have unlimited resources to deal with every global issue. If a lot of countries want to work together, I think that is a very practical solution.

JTHERIAULT

2:52 PM ET

May 7, 2008

Perhaps, but no more than our "child-like" faith in democracy.

It is a perfectly valid to be mindful of whether the use of multilateralism is actually obstructing the goal for which it is being employed. However, it is equally valid, especially in the case of the present administration, to be concerned that systemic skepticism of it derails its use when it would be effective.

More to the point, it is quite possible that Europe has developed a "habit" for multilateralism, as the entire point of E.U. was to encourage that between member nations to increase their interdependence. And since it has worked to prevent conflict for them, why wouldn't they be inclined to believe it should be reused and exported in the same way we talk about exporting democracy because of our success?

In short, he may be as right as someone can be of something so subjective, but he certainly phrased it in a belittling manner that won't endear Europeans to considering us for any future multilateral initiatives.

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