September 4, 2000 Features Never Mind the Bollocks BY BILL BOISVERT Here's the new Republican Party The Battle of Philadelphia BY DAVE LINDORFF Working It BY DAVID MOBERG Will unions go all out for Gore? Black Radicals Regroup BY SALIM MUWAKKIL Detroit hosts the Black Radical Congress. Mad Sheep Scare BY TERRY J. ALLEN Farmers, scientists and the USDA square off in Vermont. News Cleaning Up BY HANS JOHNSON Missouri, Oregon consider campaign finance initiatives. Star Strike BY BEN WINTERS Actors demand a better deal. Renegade or Redeemer? BY STEVE ELLNER Hugo Chavez leads Venezuela into a new era. The New Front BY KARI LYDERSEN American anti-abortion groups crusade in Ireland. Profile BY TED KLEINE Johnny Lira is in their corner. Views Editorial BY DAVID MOBERG Big money problems. Appall-O-Meter BY DAVID FUTRELLE A Terry Laban Cartoon Dialogue: The Balkans More Conspiracy Theories? BY EDWARD S. HERMAN A Humanitarian Crusade BY DIANA JOHNSTONE Culture A Man for All Seasons BY HOWARD ZINN Francis Wheen's Marx: A Life. Interstate Rambler BY PHILIP CONNORS On the road with Larry McMurty. England's Dreaming BY JOHN GHAZVINIAN History falls off the back of a lorry. Under the Influence BY JASON SHOLL Sadie Plant writes on drugs. Vanishing Act BY JOSHUA ROTHKOPF Paul Verhoeven's Hollow Man. Presidential Dance Parties BY GREG SMITHSIMON

A Humanitarian Crusade By Diana Johnstone Few issues have provoked as much debate among progressive Americans in recent years as the war in the Balkans. In the following article, Diana Johnstone responds to Paul Hockenos' essay "Human Wrongs: How the Great Powers Failed the Balkans," which appeared in the August 7 issue of the magazine. In the obscure mix of motives behind such an action as NATO intervention in the Balkans, some motives - and not those most openly proclaimed - may turn out to be more operative than others. NATO's professed objective of creating a multi-ethnic, humanitarian democracy in Kosovo - no doubt the sincere desire of some of the many lesser supporters in NATO's "humanitarian crusade," especially intellectuals who have mistaken Balkan windmills for Hitlerian dragons - is a resounding failure. Rather than "stability" the operation has produced many of the effects Hockenos claims it wished to prevent. For Hockenos, criticism of the new doctrine of "humanitarian intervention" has strict limits. It is all right to want to make it more effective by using ground warfare rather than air strikes, and by following up military intervention with "credible, professional peacekeeping missions that will help indigenous democratic forces create self-sustaining democratic institutions and political cultures." In fact, Hockenos himself, having worked for the OSCE administration of Bosnia at Banja Luka, has been actively engaged in the enterprise of teaching democracy to the local people. This is no doubt an inspiring and rewarding project, but so was the imperial civilizing mission of the 19th century. The Christian missionaries have been replaced by progressive NGOs. Idealistic or cynical, those embarked on this crusade readily partake of a consensus that fiercely rejects any suggestion that the mission itself might be basically flawed - that freedom and democracy must be developed by the people themselves, not by occupying armies and foreign administrators who know what is best, as dictated by IMF economists. Imbued with their own righteousness, the transnational benefactors indignantly reject the suggestion that the Great Powers and their armies that make their humanitarian work possible might have ulterior motives, and might even be largely responsible for stirring up the conflicts and instability that allow them to intervene in the first place.   TOP HOME SUBSCRIBE MAIL   In These Times © 2000 Vol. 24, No. 20