Ian Bremmer, author of Superpower: Three Choices for America's Role in the World, was just on Charlie Rose
.. with many interesting insights into Trump and foreign policy .. and more.
Ian is famous for his "three choices" for US foreign policy:
1 - Indispensable America
2 - Moneyball America
3 - Independent America
Like Kissinger and Machiavelli, I find him quite compelling. He aligns with Kissinger's book World Order, I believe.
For those Complexity folks amongst us, he also wrote The Fat Tail: The Power of Political Knowledge in an Uncertain World
-- Owen
Three choices as I see them, very different. One, indispensable America: The idea that we may not wanna be the world's policeman, but no one else is gonna do it, the world is only gonna be much more problematic and conflict oriented if we don't. And so we have to do as much as possible, both in terms of active leadership with allies and institutions, but also promoting American values around the world, democracy, the free market, and the like.
Second option: Moneyball America, from Michael Lewis' old book and the film later on. The idea that just like Billy Bean's Oakland A's, we need to be much less sentimental, focus much less on values internationally; that the Chinese don't wanna listen to you on free markets, that the Russians don't wanna listen to on democracy. Instead, focus on those investments that we think are gonna return actual value.
And then the third is independent America. And the idea there is we may like to talk about all the things we'd like to do internationally, but if we're not really going to adhere to these red lines, either selectively or globally, then it's much better to stop and instead focus much more on American values at home. In other words, don't demand respect, command respect and lead by example. All three I think actually feasible, all three real options for the world's still only superpower, but in choosing a course as opposed to continuing to have a much more incoherent path as we have over the last 25 years, I think is critically important in the 2016 elections.
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