Interview with Hubert Védrin

...in L'Orient-Le Jour, translated by Nur al-Cubicle:

The overall theme of my book is that after the fall of the Soviet Union, the West went overboard with euphoria in the notion that it had won the battle of history. It believed that its notions would then be automatically applicable everywhere : its ideas of democracy, its conception of the market economy, its values –which it believes are universal. In its mindset, there will be no more policy problems because there will be no more fundamental disputes on anything. All that would remain is how the world would be organized. It has even been adopted World Bank jargon, talking about things like "governance" which suggests business management rather than policies.

This Western illusion is split into two branches: one is American and the other European. The American branch attributes primordial importance to military superiority. It is here where the Neocons suceeded in hijacking US foreign policy with their very peculiar understanding of the Middle East –an interpretation which they tried to foist on the rest of the world. In their minds, the Palestinian question is of no importance –it is merely a pretext invented by the enemies of Israel– and therefore it is necessary to transform Arab states willy nilly and make them democratic, which would naturally make them pro-Western. But this type of reasoning is borrowed from Dr. Strangelove. How in heaven’s name did the United States, a great country, –certainly very nationalistic but overall very smart– get hijacked in this way ? This is worth investigating.

The other branch, the European branch, is very different but I would lable it ingenuous. Modern Europeans believe that the world is made up of Boy Scouts who want to protect the overall well-being of humanity. They believe that we are part of an international community that works to prevent conflicts through the United Nations, etc.

These two irrealistic branches of thought, which are very different, really don’t work. Actually, a kind of multi-polar world is in the process of forming.