hankyoreh

North Carolina

Regardless of the outcome, the results of the November 4 U.S. presidential election are expected to bring about a seismic shift on the Korean Peninsula in the areas of diplomacy and security. In the face of the global financial crisis that began on Wall Street, it seems that policy initiatives such as the unilateralism practiced during the eight-year term of U.S. President George W. Bush, along with the neoconservative foreign policy of the past 30 years since the administration of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan, can no longer continue.

Since the Reagan administration, the basic framework of U.S. foreign policy has been characterized by confrontation and bilateral alliance based on the use of its military forces, with the defining characteristic of its bilateral alliances being unbalanced relations between master and servant. The unilateralism of the Bush administration came to a head when the United States invaded Iraq after its declaration of a war on terrorism. For South Korea, American unilateralism was largely expressed within the context of a security triangle involving the United States and Japan. South Korea joined the U.S.-Japan alliance as a sub-partner, which resulted in a backlash from North Korea in the form of the development of nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, the standoff over North Korea’s nuclear ambition has waxed and waned based on the strength of the neocons in the U.S. government and their effect on foreign policy. When the unilateralist stance taken by the Bush administration was at its height, tensions over the North’s nuclear program reached a climax as well. But when the U.S. Republican Party suffered defeat in the 2006 mid-term elections, and as the U.S. invasion of Iraq began to fail, U.S. hegemony began to fade as well. The United States has since become party to bilateral discussions with North Korea and the two sides have begun to unravel the North Korean nuclear issue.

In the wake of the global financial meltdown sparked on Wall Street, Europe has tried to take a leading role by mapping out new financial systems, and China has begun to challenge the dominance of the dollar and the existence of a global financial system led by the United States, setting the stage for a tug-of-war over the new order of global finance at the upcoming G-20 summit on November 15 in Washington, D.C.

On November 3, in a letter to the next U.S. president, the European Union calls on the next U.S. leader to support an era of multilateral cooperation with its allies. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said unilateral decisions had affected the world in the past, but said that those days are gone. “We no longer want to play a secondary role,” Kouchner said in the letter. The time has come for a multipolar world, not a unipolar one, and multilateralism, not unilateral relations.

The idea is gaining support in the United States amid expectations of a soft-landing for U.S. hegemony. Democratic Party presidential candidate Barack Obama, who is widely expected to be elected as the next U.S. president, has strongly accused the Bush administration, and its unilateralist tendencies, of causing the United States to lose its place in the world. Obama has already proposed talks with the leaders of the nations in Bush’s Axis of Evil. Given that international talks on North Korea’s nuclear program have made progress under the Bush administration, a summit with the North Korean leader would likely serve as a good place for a President Obama to demonstrate his diplomatic abilities. History shows the U.S. Democratic Party has traditionally focused on alliance with China, rather than Japan, within the Northeast Asian region. This would result in a sea change for South Korea, which has grown accustomed to the South Korea-U.S.-Japan security triangle. If Obama wins the election, it is likely to help Japan’s opposition Democratic Party of Japan defeat the ruling Liberal Democratic Party in the upcoming election in that country. DPJ leader Ichiro Ozawa, though he is considered a rightist, favors multilateralism in both diplomacy and security.

Since its inauguration, the administration of President Lee Myung-bak has put its focus on the South Korea-U.S.-Japan security triangle. However, the Lee administration has shown its diplomatic incompetence in failing to deal with the conservative governments of both the United States and Japan. Though the Bush administration changed course to hold talks with North Korea, the Lee administration is still sticking to its hard-line policy on the North by ignoring the inter-Korean summit agreements. When, and if, the terms of the conservative leaders in the United States and Japan come to an end, the resulting situation could be unprecedented in its impact on Korea, so the Lee administration should begin preparing to deal with new U.S. and Japanese leaders whose ideology will differ from his. Foreign experts have already voiced concerns about a situation in which South Korea is isolated by the United States in world affairs, including on the North Korea issue.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]