I think you should circle back from your fears about the Twitter mob to your initial assertion that foreign policy (and in truth, almost all policy) is rarely the result of a unitary actor.
Top-down following the elite has served us quite poorly (Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan). It's likely true that bottom-up mob rule would also serve us poorly. But... we'd be best off without either fully in control. We don't want a unitary actor, we want decisions that reflect the will of the people but are softened by reality.
I think there's an obvious middle ground here in which the elected "leaders" and "experts" are checked against dragging us into bad wars (and bad policies) and "the mob" pushes leaders to actually do their job and try to craft policy that satisfies these desires. The "elites" are there to enforce the rule of law and make sure popular sentiment doesn't become a mob.
In the absence of this pressure, we can see outcomes would often be worse. The support for Ukraine is the latest example, but not the only one. From a technical, top down perspective, change would rarely occur.
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At the same time, we should understand that Twitter is very much not "the mob" in any realistic sense. It's more accurate to say that Twitter reflects undercurrents in elite opinion than what the majority of people, who take little part in Twitter, actually think.
From that perspective, if Twitter is leading to irrational mob-rule it's still a top-down, elite driven phenomenon (in which the elites... or factions of them) are inciting up a mob to drive policy to their desired ends.
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These two points, I'm sure, will seem contradictory. Maybe they are, but ultimately I'm trying to suggest that we usually juggle these alternative paradigms in our heads anyway. Just like some recessions are better described by competing macro theories than others, we should step back and figure out which political theory gives us the best tools to work with here. I don't know, but while I agree that rule of law is important, I'm less sure that the mob is really the source of the threat to it, and more confident that the basic desires of people are fundamentally a good place for policy to look to.
1. Cancel culture seeks to apply the "death penalty" (maximum indiscriminate harm w/o nuance, logic, trade offs or path to redemption) to it's targets.
2. Cancel culture is now taking aim at a nuclear armed state.
What I would like to know is who/what is driving the policy change on nuclear power in Germany? Is this the elites who can read numbers, the mob looking at fuel bills, or something else?
Restraining anti-Russia sentiment seems a mistake.
1) The enemy is Putin's крыша. The populace doesn't really know what people are involved, so the shotgun approach works for the more international. The West then needs a way to lean on the domestic powers like Kadyrov.
2) Angry populaces give political cover for quick actions. The faster the West can create differentiated problems for Putin, the harder it will be for him to adapt. Putin is old. The more pain that is incurred, the more that his supporters begin to feel like it's time for his exit.
3) The best case (?) is to argue that the above benefits are not worth the blowback, eg. higher odds of a radicalized Russia joining Iran and North Korea in the Anti-West, with China earning more arbitrage profits.
Currently, the cost-benefit seems to weigh towards letting the people go on the march. Or there are other offsetting points?
This is very consistent with Martin Gurri's thesis in "The Revolt of the Public", that the "public" is now deciding things much more than the elites (e.g. Arab spring). Social media has an undeniable transformational power in new conflicts.
I don’t think the masses pushing the elites into foreign policy hawkishness is a new thing at all. It does imply a consciousness of weakness on the part of the elites. But how many times in history has a weak government decided it’s best option was war as a last ditch attempt to gain a bit of legitimacy and bring the people together. Maybe that’s not quite the same.
An extreme example of the masses pushing policy is the French Revolution, where the elites in the assembly had their actions limited and essentially dictated by the literal mob outside the doors, but that’s an extreme example.
The overshoot on informal sanctions completely eclipsing the formal sanctions will cause an enormous amount of economic destruction in the European core, which will blow back on us. This is an example of civilizational failure than one of specific political failure on the part of those who drafted the (extremely leaky by design) sanctions. It's sort of an odd dynamic for people who typically lean libertarian to face, because the state action was reasonable and restrained, whereas the action from the private market is insane, suicidal, and escalatory.
Certain parts of the government did not act prudently in setting the stage for this crisis, but even within the government there was ample dissent expressed both at the time of the 2013-2014 coup, the subsequent annexation, and in the interim. In the "salami slicer" metaphor of strategy, the West is salami slicing itself because it thinks it makes it look good to other parts of the sausage. In the escalatory ladder metaphor of nuclear war, the mob (lead by bluecheck tribunes) is charging the stage and demanding that we skip rungs on the ladder, disrupting the carefully calibrated strategic game installed by the central governments of both sides.
Foreign policy determined by the elite doesn't seem to be thought through any better than a mob. Bureaucratic elites aren't that smart, and till respond to self interest and local group pressures.
"There is widespread irrational hostility toward Israel." No, toward the policies of the Israel government, especially the policy of permitting, indeed encouraging, settlement by Israeli citizens into the Occupied Territories.
The people in power today are going to blunder us into an armed conflict with Russia if they continue down this path. I grew up in the Cold War- I haven't really feared a nuclear conflict that entire time until today. We are being led by a combination of psychopaths and idiots.
I think you are being very naïve in this article. The elites are fully in control of the Twitter mob- don't doubt it for a single second. The mob is being led by the media, and the media takes its marching orders from those in power in government.
I think you should circle back from your fears about the Twitter mob to your initial assertion that foreign policy (and in truth, almost all policy) is rarely the result of a unitary actor.
Top-down following the elite has served us quite poorly (Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan). It's likely true that bottom-up mob rule would also serve us poorly. But... we'd be best off without either fully in control. We don't want a unitary actor, we want decisions that reflect the will of the people but are softened by reality.
I think there's an obvious middle ground here in which the elected "leaders" and "experts" are checked against dragging us into bad wars (and bad policies) and "the mob" pushes leaders to actually do their job and try to craft policy that satisfies these desires. The "elites" are there to enforce the rule of law and make sure popular sentiment doesn't become a mob.
In the absence of this pressure, we can see outcomes would often be worse. The support for Ukraine is the latest example, but not the only one. From a technical, top down perspective, change would rarely occur.
----------------
At the same time, we should understand that Twitter is very much not "the mob" in any realistic sense. It's more accurate to say that Twitter reflects undercurrents in elite opinion than what the majority of people, who take little part in Twitter, actually think.
From that perspective, if Twitter is leading to irrational mob-rule it's still a top-down, elite driven phenomenon (in which the elites... or factions of them) are inciting up a mob to drive policy to their desired ends.
----------------
These two points, I'm sure, will seem contradictory. Maybe they are, but ultimately I'm trying to suggest that we usually juggle these alternative paradigms in our heads anyway. Just like some recessions are better described by competing macro theories than others, we should step back and figure out which political theory gives us the best tools to work with here. I don't know, but while I agree that rule of law is important, I'm less sure that the mob is really the source of the threat to it, and more confident that the basic desires of people are fundamentally a good place for policy to look to.
Just to be clear:
1. Cancel culture seeks to apply the "death penalty" (maximum indiscriminate harm w/o nuance, logic, trade offs or path to redemption) to it's targets.
2. Cancel culture is now taking aim at a nuclear armed state.
Have a nice day.
What I would like to know is who/what is driving the policy change on nuclear power in Germany? Is this the elites who can read numbers, the mob looking at fuel bills, or something else?
Arnold, do you think the 5 years of non-stop anti-Russia propaganda that preceded this incident may have had an effect on the mob's thinking?
Restraining anti-Russia sentiment seems a mistake.
1) The enemy is Putin's крыша. The populace doesn't really know what people are involved, so the shotgun approach works for the more international. The West then needs a way to lean on the domestic powers like Kadyrov.
2) Angry populaces give political cover for quick actions. The faster the West can create differentiated problems for Putin, the harder it will be for him to adapt. Putin is old. The more pain that is incurred, the more that his supporters begin to feel like it's time for his exit.
3) The best case (?) is to argue that the above benefits are not worth the blowback, eg. higher odds of a radicalized Russia joining Iran and North Korea in the Anti-West, with China earning more arbitrage profits.
Currently, the cost-benefit seems to weigh towards letting the people go on the march. Or there are other offsetting points?
There is no way this is bottom up.
This is very consistent with Martin Gurri's thesis in "The Revolt of the Public", that the "public" is now deciding things much more than the elites (e.g. Arab spring). Social media has an undeniable transformational power in new conflicts.
I don’t think the masses pushing the elites into foreign policy hawkishness is a new thing at all. It does imply a consciousness of weakness on the part of the elites. But how many times in history has a weak government decided it’s best option was war as a last ditch attempt to gain a bit of legitimacy and bring the people together. Maybe that’s not quite the same.
An extreme example of the masses pushing policy is the French Revolution, where the elites in the assembly had their actions limited and essentially dictated by the literal mob outside the doors, but that’s an extreme example.
The overshoot on informal sanctions completely eclipsing the formal sanctions will cause an enormous amount of economic destruction in the European core, which will blow back on us. This is an example of civilizational failure than one of specific political failure on the part of those who drafted the (extremely leaky by design) sanctions. It's sort of an odd dynamic for people who typically lean libertarian to face, because the state action was reasonable and restrained, whereas the action from the private market is insane, suicidal, and escalatory.
Certain parts of the government did not act prudently in setting the stage for this crisis, but even within the government there was ample dissent expressed both at the time of the 2013-2014 coup, the subsequent annexation, and in the interim. In the "salami slicer" metaphor of strategy, the West is salami slicing itself because it thinks it makes it look good to other parts of the sausage. In the escalatory ladder metaphor of nuclear war, the mob (lead by bluecheck tribunes) is charging the stage and demanding that we skip rungs on the ladder, disrupting the carefully calibrated strategic game installed by the central governments of both sides.
The mob in action:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/03/russia-cat-ban-ukraine-war/?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter
Foreign policy determined by the elite doesn't seem to be thought through any better than a mob. Bureaucratic elites aren't that smart, and till respond to self interest and local group pressures.
"There is widespread irrational hostility toward Israel." No, toward the policies of the Israel government, especially the policy of permitting, indeed encouraging, settlement by Israeli citizens into the Occupied Territories.
The people in power today are going to blunder us into an armed conflict with Russia if they continue down this path. I grew up in the Cold War- I haven't really feared a nuclear conflict that entire time until today. We are being led by a combination of psychopaths and idiots.
I think you are being very naïve in this article. The elites are fully in control of the Twitter mob- don't doubt it for a single second. The mob is being led by the media, and the media takes its marching orders from those in power in government.