From the weekndpost.co.bw: Lawrence Ookeditse wrote: Gordon Bennett visa thing is no disgrace! PDF Print E-mail It is what States must do - a rejoinder THE SUBJECT: Gordon Bennett LAWRENCE OOKEDITSE I repeat this: “life should not stop because some guy from the UK has been denied a visa”. This gives my good friend Phenyo Butale a headache. In his last week’s WeekendPost column, he argues the defence of the Gordon Bennett saga shows ‘buffoonery’. I had written in defence of it. Thus, I write to show why such action is not ‘buffoonery’, and why most likely, if there is buffoonery, then it must be in the idealism that simply forgets the conceptual guidelines that inform foreign policy. Phenyo’s assertions point out either one of the following possibilities: 1. analysis of foreign policy actions by a person who does not understand what informs international relations or 2. analysis by a person who understands foreign policy but simply disregards the principles that underpin how states relate with international actors. Since I am dealing with a person whom I presuppose understands foreign policy, I am persuaded to believe he has fallen victim to point number 2: simple disregard for principles underpinning relations between states. If not, then perhaps there may be a 3rd point: being an anarchist (anarchy here referring to ultra-liberals’ belief in absolute freedom and there being no state control over what people do. That mistaken belief that humans were created with hearts full of love for each other and can never wish harm upon others... the mistaken belief that we are generous beings who wish prosperity and success on each other and we have no destructive side thus we do not need rules to make us behave) - which is still fine for I am more on the realist side thus my opposition to this stand. My major argument is this: ‘States have no permanent friends and no permanent enemies, only permanent interests’ and in pursuit of their interests, states act in any way they can, even if it means going to war to protect those. Thus in foreign affairs, states are not moral entities and they should not be. This is the foundation of the foreign policy of all major countries in the world-it is all guided by a philosophy or theory called realism. The problem one should say, with Phenyo and the liberals, is a preoccupation with liberty and nothing else. This suffers a conceptual problem since their thinking and argument is informed not by reality but idealistic conceptions of what we ought, note ought, to live like. They paint a picture of a perfect world thus enact policy arguments that are based on that beautiful utopia thus flawed, not informed, by factors that we currently are dealing with. I will simplify this: take a family house as an example. The head of the family usually acts to protect the interests of their family. Responsibility is measured in part on the basis of the degree to which one is able o protect their family. In the routine of protecting your family, you may declare others unwelcome to your family home. See, those you decide are not welcome you basically block out. In so doing, you do not need a court order or some forensic evidence that shows indeed such people are a threat to your family. Such an act can be whimsical, so long as it does not harm the interests of your family as a collective ultimately then it is ok. It is your prerogative. See, now, states act just in that similar manner. Any suspicion that a country has over the intentions of a foreigner usually earns some sort of surveillance of that foreigner and forms of control over what they can do and their entry into a country. Options include among others, declaring the person a prohibited immigrant (persona non grata). See, this is a defence mechanism that rests not on facts necessarily. What the fact is often, is not what guides action. Action is informed by whether it ultimately helps you as a country attain your national interest. You DO NOT have to be a threat in reality: you may simply be an encumbrance-an inconvenience to the attainment of goals of the state. That is enough to earn you prohibition. This may sound arbitrary and immoral but it only would be so if it were a wholly domestic issue. In international affairs, there is nothing like morality-unless it serves the national interest. That damn phrase, ‘The National Interest’, is what matters. The argument here is not what our national interests are so for purposes of space, I will not go into them. Is this something that will make the world look at us as a disgrace? No, it is not. I will demonstrate with an example. American intelligence files leaker Edward Snowden has been declared persona non grata in the United Kingdom. The reason they advance is that they deem him detrimental to the “public good”. This is not surprising: to the UK, Snowden is a threat and an inconvenience: he may not be a terrorist himself but he is seen as a stumbling block to security efforts-same way that Bennett may be viewed as a stumbling block to a resolution of the Basarwa issue. This year alone, a total of 972 people were reported to have been deported from the United Kingdom. Statistics show that most deportees (55 percent) are from Asia (55 percent) followed by Africa (20 percent). I am sure you know why. And you will know not all of those people are convicted terrorists or criminals. Thus, the liberals and activists who keep telling us the UK and others will see us as autocratic are simply failing to appreciate how foreign policy works. Their position, the same held by my friend Butale, is a position that would hold in a perfect world. The world is not perfect though: humans are still as selfish and devious as ever and states must seek to survive in an uncertain world. This makes it important that nation states be very restrictive on who they can allow into their territory and whom not to allow. The West will not even raise a complaint because, unlike most of us, these people understand the centrality of national interests to policy and decision making in government. These countries will see Botswana as a state that is relentless in its pursuit of its own interests, just like they are and thus some worthy partner in international affairs. If then my friend Butale wants to reconstruct the world, make it a good place where there is free movement of all persons across the world, then good luck with the project. It will not happen. First, Phenyo and other liberals need to ensure they end the nefarious tendencies of human beings; they need to make all human beings reasonable, unselfish, peace loving and uniform in thinking. That they cannot do. Butale is surprised that BDP MPs argued that as a “sovereign state, Botswana is not obliged to offer Mr Bennett a place of extended employment” and feels it is “yet another PR disaster for poor old Jeff”. Governments are not PR agencies; they do not always do what will be popular for what is popular is not actually what is always in the best interest of the country and its people. The problem with Butale is also that he sees this as a PR disaster but that is a fallacy. This was never a PR stunt and therefore its efficacy cannot be measured on PR. The objective was not to gain some good publicity. It was to get rid of an individual who is considered somewhat contraband to our interests. Has that individual been successfully put under some sort of control in entry into the country? Yes, the person has. Has there been any backlash from our international partners? No. Thus, this has been a policy success. You must never lose sight of the objective of an action, else your analysis of it becomes flawed, and Butale’s has been. See, the surprise in here is simply that Phenyo is surprised by the MPs arguments. I am not. What surprises me is that a colleague who has studied affairs of the state found such reasoning to be surprising. This reasoning holds true. Nation states have that sovereignty and they can exercise it as they so wish. In this regard, the parliamentarians actually demonstrated greater understanding of the art of state craft in its international pursuits better than Butale did, and that brings about an element of surprise maybe. Unless you tell me you are surprised that cats catch and eat mice. It is what cats do and it should not be surprising! Butale says President Khama fooled the world by pretending to be the only African leader who spoke out against human rights abuses yet he merely was playing to the gallery. Did he? If he did fool the West then that was a success. States in their nature have to appease their allies, they routinely want to please each other and therefore what Phenyo cites as a bluff and a weakness is actually strength for the bluff was never called. This is why I am saying arguing this issue without appreciating how states act and what make states act the way they do simply makes one fail to see the essence of it. When analysing this, Phenyo needs to show us that what Botswana did is not what states routinely do.
Posted on: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 02:41:32 +0000