{"id":62144,"date":"2021-02-01T06:00:14","date_gmt":"2021-01-31T19:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=62144"},"modified":"2021-01-31T21:31:15","modified_gmt":"2021-01-31T10:31:15","slug":"the-liberal-partys-struggles-with-multilateralism-and-the-un","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/the-liberal-partys-struggles-with-multilateralism-and-the-un\/","title":{"rendered":"The Liberal Party\u2019s struggles with multilateralism and the UN"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

\u2018We should avoid any reflex towards a negative globalism that coercively seeks to impose a mandate from an often ill-defined borderless global community. And worse still, an unaccountable internationalist bureaucracy. Globalism must facilitate, align and engage, rather than direct and centralise.\u2019<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u2014 Prime Minister Scott Morrison<\/a>, October 2019<\/p>\n

\u2018Covid-19 is a shared crisis\u2014a reminder that many problems are best solved or, indeed, can only be solved through cooperation. At the heart of successful international cooperation is the concept that each country shares, rather than yields, a portion of its sovereign decision-making. And in return, each gets something from it that is greater than their contribution.\u2019<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u2014 Foreign Minister\u00a0Marise Payne<\/a>, June 2020<\/p>\n

The prime minister and foreign minister offer opposed, puzzling facets of Australia\u2019s Liberal Party.<\/p>\n

The puzzle\u2014reaching towards paradox\u2014is the way the Libs can mock multilateralism and scorn the United Nations. Twice in the past 20 years, Liberal governments have ordered broad cost\u2013benefit reviews of what the UN system means for Australia.<\/p>\n

The party has a proud ability to walk and talk liberal internationalism. The Liberals know deeply why Australia wants and needs a rules-based international system. Yet when it comes to the instruments of that system, the case for the negative is strong.<\/p>\n

The Liberal posture for 30 years has been as a party that thinks, feels and acts on a vision of national-interest bilateralism: Australia will only bother with the UN when clear national interests are served.<\/p>\n

The two strands of Australian political opinion on the UN throughout the Cold War were Evatt Enthusiasm and Menzies Scepticism. This wasn\u2019t a party-line division: many Libs were UN enthusiasts; plenty of Laborites were realist, balance-of-power sceptics.<\/p>\n

Under Prime Minister John Howard, a third strand emerged: rejectionism<\/a> that doesn\u2019t see the UN as a core Australian interest. In office, Howard\u2019s pragmatism meant he easily adopted multilateral solutions, but his policy instincts and language reflected his mental tic about the UN. The tic became a Liberal habit of mind, and Howard\u2019s version of himself in retirement.<\/p>\n

In Howard\u2019s autobiography<\/a>, there\u2019s no sign of the leader willing to sign the landmine ban treaty<\/a> over the objections of Australia\u2019s Defence Department; his chapter \u2018The liberation of East Timor\u2019 gives only a grudging nod to the UN\u2019s central role in one of his proudest achievements.<\/p>\n

Instead, Howard\u2019s memoir warns against \u2018the dictates of multilateral bodies\u2019, ridiculing those \u2018with an almost childlike faith in the processes of the United Nations\u2019. \u2018When it comes to the crunch on really big issues\u2019, he argues, \u2018multilateralism usually falls short\u2019.<\/p>\n

The call is for \u2018a selective approach to the multilateral agenda\u2019 while focusing on bilateral relationships as \u2018the basic building block\u2019, which was the framework of the Howard government\u2019s 1997 foreign policy white paper<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Australia must be realistic about what multilateral institutions such as the United Nations system can deliver. International organisations can only accomplish what their member states enable them to accomplish. If the reach of the UN system is not to exceed its grasp, it must focus on practical outcomes which match its aspirations with its capability.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Where Menzies Scepticism makes the Libs scratchy and itchy, Howard Rejectionism causes the party to gnaw and gnash.<\/p>\n

The\u00a02000 cabinet records<\/a>\u00a0released on 1 January by the National Archives\u00a0of Australia show the gnaw-gnash habit being formed.<\/p>\n

Howard\u2019s cabinet pondered whether a seat on the UN Security Council was worth the effort. Maddened at UN committees\u2019 treatment of Oz, cabinet in March 2000 ordered a report<\/a> on how to push back and change the UN system.<\/p>\n

The 120-page review of the UN committee system as it affects Australia<\/a> went to cabinet in August 2000. While committed to the UN\u2019s human rights and refugee frameworks, \u2018Australia has had long-standing concerns about their focus and manner of operation\u2019, the submission said. UN committees were guilty of relying on the views of non-government organisations rather than government reports.<\/p>\n

The review trigger was an \u2018unsatisfactory\u2019 report on Australia by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. And Canberra was facing other UN committees on \u2018domestically contentious indigenous, asylum seeker and other issues\u2019.<\/p>\n

Cabinet decided the UN human rights treaty committee system needed a \u2018complete overhaul\u2019. The government would adopt \u2018a more robust and strategic approach\u2019. Robustness generated plenty of headlines in 2000: UN committees would only be allowed to visit Oz if there was a \u2018compelling\u2019 need; Australia wouldn\u2019t sign the protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women because of its new complaints procedure (acceptance of the protocol<\/a> happened in 2009).<\/p>\n

The Labor opposition ran the line that the Liberals were doing a UN \u2018dummy spit\u2019<\/a>. Rather than spitting, though, cabinet was gnashing. See that in a submission in September 2000 on a possible bid for a seat on the UN Security Council in 2007\u201308<\/a>, considered when Howard returned from a UN visit.<\/p>\n

Cabinet agreed Australia would express interest but decide on whether to \u2018proceed with a firm candidacy\u2019 in 2002. Taking office in 1986, Howard inherited the previous, ultimately unsuccessful bid for a seat in 1997\u201398, and that defeat rankled. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade argued for another quest:<\/p>\n

Membership of the elite club at the apex of international multilateral affairs brings particular benefits. Most especially, Security Council membership maximises national leverage both before and beyond the actual term served. This enhanced projection of Australia\u2019s international role may be brought to bear on the full range of national interests.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet opposed the bid, emphasising the political costs of another unsuccessful candidacy. Factors weighing against an Oz bid were \u2018our poor level of representation and support in Africa\u2019, the potential for Australia\u2019s natural policy positions to \u2018put us at odds with influential countries or groupings\u2019, the \u2018chronic unreliability of voting commitments\u2019, and the benefits of the seat not being worth the costs and resources of the campaign.<\/p>\n

PM&C knew the mind of its master. Rejectionism prevailed. Australia ultimately scrapped that Security Council bid.<\/p>\n

When Morrison gave his \u2018negative globalism\u2019<\/a> speech in 2019\u2014\u2018international engagement will be squarely driven by Australia\u2019s national interests\u2019\u2014he again ordered DFAT to do \u2018a comprehensive audit of global institutions and rule-making processes where we have the greatest stake\u2019.<\/p>\n

Payne\u2019s speech in praise of international cooperation and multilateralism reflected the audit\u2019s conclusions: \u2018Australia\u2019s interests are not served by stepping away and leaving others to shape global order for us.\u2019 Her calm meditation<\/a> was aimed at persuading her own party.<\/p>\n

The scratching and gnashing will go on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018We should avoid any reflex towards a negative globalism that coercively seeks to impose a mandate from an often ill-defined borderless global community. And worse still, an unaccountable internationalist bureaucracy. 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