De-Institutionalization Posted by David Shorr

Matt is 90% right in highlighting the importance of international institutions and legitimacy for a healthier foreign policy. But since the 10% over which we differ is one my favorite topics, I can't resist. A few days ago, Matt took the right wing to task for their "bad faith" critique of international institutions. Couldn't agree more. In fact, the point that the UN is constantly scapegoated for the failings of the national governments that comprise it is an argument over which I have some pride of authorship (two can play shameless self-promotion). But let's follow the argument to its logical conclusion, particularly as we confront the bad-faith critics on the right.

Because of the pervasive scapegoating dynamic, it's crucial that we hammer away at this. Yes, we need stronger international institutions; they are the explicit manifestation of a rules-based international order with legitimacy. But what we REALLY need is world leaders' commitment to stronger international institutions. Let's keep the burden of proof where it belongs -- no tolerance for bellyaching about the weakness of the UN, do something about it. (I'm sure there are real IR theory scholars among our readers, am I right that focusing on institutions versus the underlying social dynamic among its members is the difference between liberal internationalism and constructivism?)

Okay, so where does this leave us on the issue of intervention? There can be no doubt that Matt discourses on this brilliantly, including on the dilemma of Kosovo, in his book that none of us has read. Certainly he's right about the crucial distinction between smart wars and stupid ones, with legitimacy as the critical factor.

The other key (related) thing is practicality. Two things about humanitarian intervention: it's sensitive and controversial internationally, and it's hard to do. The sensitivity is because of its implications for sovereignty. Hard to do? Well, let's hope we understand what a pandora's box can result when you barrel in and take over a country.

Which brings me to Darfur. I'll leave it to Mark Goldberg to give the serious case against Mark Helprin's wild 'bomb Sudan' plan. All I want to say is that wild-eyed plans like this show you what happens when you let your moral clarity get the better of you. [My own rule of thumb when it comes to Sudan is to listen to Nick Kristof, who I think bats a thousand for implementable prescriptions.]

Am I making the case for prudence? I guess I am. And let me say that this is one area where I'm happy to distance myself from Bob Kagan, who has no patience for prudence, no matter how much I like some of the stuff he puts in McCain's speeches.

By the way, bonus points for anyone who knows their NYC history and can explain what de-institutionalization, and its consequences, were.

Comments

[Zathras]

I believe the deinstitutionalization to which Schorr refers was a policy change implemented in New York State beginning in the later years of the Rockefeller administration, under which many people suffering from severe mental illnesses were removed from often substandard mental hospitals and placed in community settings. The logic behind deinstitutionalization was that it would be better for the patients, since many of the hospitals (in addition to being expensive for the state) were little more than warehouses; integrating the mentally ill into the community was thought to be more healthful for them, and more respectful of their rights.

Defensible in theory, deinstitutionalization ran up against the hard fact of the (still) very limited knowledge we have about how to manage serious mental illnesses, and also against the limited resources the state and city of New York were willing or able to provide for outpatient care. While some released mental patients adapted well to life "on the outside" and other should arguably never have been institutionalized at all, many found their way onto the streets of New York City, forming a large homeless population that has ever since been the object of earnest contemplation by people aware that some patients were worse off outside institutions than inside them, whatever their legal rights and regardless of the theory behind deinstitutionalization.

The analogy to international affairs is the disintegration of the (primarily) European empires, beginning after the First World War in the Middle East and Southeast Europe and after the Second World War elsewhere. International institutions aimed at facilitating agreement on technical issues or those not involving major costs or significant political controversy are comparatively simple to found and operate; it is much more difficult for any such institutions to assume, de facto, responsibilities that properly belong to government. The debate over intervention is essentially about precisely this, and the subject of the debate is how to manage those tasks of government that the multitude of independent states resulting from the demise of the imperial system have proven unable to handle.

It is perfectly fair to point out both that many of the former empires were deficient in how they governed their subject peoples and that many of those peoples have proven quite capable, not only of managing their own governments but of prospering far better than they did under imperial governance. Neither statement, however, is universally true; it is, in fact, hard to argue objectively against the idea that a significant number of countries now independent would be better off had the British Empire, for example, been able to maintain itself.

The empires are gone; they will not be rebuilt, any more than the homeless population of New York City can look forward to a return to institutions upstate. It is no easier to find advocates for large-scale reinstitutionalization of the homeless than it is to find people willing to acknowledge what the advocates of stronger international institutions really wish to do, which is to substitute belatedly and on an ad hoc basis the engagement of such institutions for local governments in countries that could not meet the demands of independence in the modern world. The call for stronger international institutions is a call for imperialism without imperialists, a concept by no means evil or contemptible in itself but one inherently limited in how much good it can do.

[Ben Bartlett]

In answer to your question, roughly speaking, liberal internationalists see international institutions as useful tools through which states can collaborate, bargain, etc. Institutions are important, but the states are still ultimately the actors within the international system. Constructivists believe that international institutions create their own constituencies, and are important actors in their own right. You are, in effect, making a liberal internationalist argument: that international institutions are only strong to the degree to which states decide to make use of them.

[David Shorr]

To Zathras-- I actually wasn't implying any connection beyond the ongoing struggle to give titles to posts and wondering (as a NYC kid circa '70s) whether anyone out there remembered. Of course he got it right, and deftly looped around to a comment which did (as usual) didn't misconstrue me.

To Ben-- Thanks for taking the bait, but I actually thought that, in refusing to view an IGO like the UN as an independent actor, I was moving towards rather than away from constructivism. Here's how I've been taking the difference between liberal internationalism and constructivism. Constructivism is interested in the dynamic process by which norms and institutions take shape in the international system, sort of as intellectual history. A liberal internationalist believes in objective and universal norms, especially democracy for domestic governance, that are objectively true. Since domestic governance is as essential as the rules governing security and war between states, they believe true collective security institutions can only be built among democracies -- a view with which I differ strongly. Do I really have my IR theory totally screwed up here?

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