America’s Moral Breakdown and Domestic/International Restructuring

When taking stock of America’s development in 2013, the two crucial phases to understand are “moral breakdown” and “restructuring.”

Democracy, Society and Virtue All Lose Value

As the United States finally appears to be experiencing some moderate growth, its internal political challenges have become more prominent. First, political polarization is persistent, with a fierce battle between the two parties. The Republicans quibbled over the federal budget issue to obstruct the implementation of Obama’s health care reform, thus forcing the federal government to shut down for half a month. Some believe that Washington’s political division is the most severe America has seen since the Civil War. Second, the political status of the Obama administration has long been vulnerable. Its mishandling of the healthcare reform, coupled with Republican interference, brought Obama’s public approval ratings to an all-time low since the beginning of his presidency. All this reflects the shortcomings of America’s veto system, and suggests that its problems will continue.

U.S. society’s moral breakdown also became prominent in 2013. In an end-of-year speech, Obama candidly cited growing inequality and declining social mobility in today’s America as “pos[ing] a fundamental threat to the American dream, our way of life and what we stand for around the globe.” In the context of an economic crisis as well as an increasingly unreasonable mechanism for wealth distribution, the actual income of the middle class has declined, the entire group is shrinking and America has the highest inequality of any country in the developed world. The shrinking of the middle class causes a loss of confidence in the future of America and the American system of values. Intensified inequality and poverty will further the U.S. economic crisis and cause harm to political and social stability.

At the international level, America’s moral breakdown was exposed in the Snowden incident. Just like the U.S. relies on its military superiority to repeatedly wage war against others, Washington also uses its technological superiority to monitor the entire world. This [incident] reflects that America’s abuse of surveillance power superiority has deep roots. Also propelling America’s international surveillance activity — including toward its allies — is undoubtedly Washington’s desire for psychological hegemony over the entire world. In recent years the U.S. has unceasingly portrayed itself as the victim of Chinese Internet hackers, but Snowden’s huge reveal made clear that the U.S. is the online world’s superhacker, fully demonstrating its hypocrisy.

Obama Doctrine

Considering lessons learned from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Obama pushed for a restructuring of U.S. strategy after taking office. In his first term, restructuring efforts primarily took the form of ending the two wars and the implementation of a “rebalance” in its Asia-Pacific strategy.

America’s response to the Syrian chemical weapons incident of 2013 as well as other initiatives, such as improvement of relations with Iran, sheds light on a few characteristics of “Obama doctrine” foreign policy. First is a reduction in overseas military intervention. Following that is full utilization of diplomacy to deal with international hotspots. Again, involvement is selective. From now on, substantial investments in U.S. military and diplomatic resources are restricted to limited areas. Finally, America will rely on drones and special forces to attack foreign terrorist organizations, avoiding large-scale deployment of ground forces.

According to the American public’s mood, as revealed in a Pew Center survey, for the first time since 1964 more than half of all respondents believe that “America should mind its own business internationally.” As the elite foreign policy [thinkers], represented by Richard Haass, hold, America is in a period of rest and reorganization; it needs to restrict foreign activity and regain its internal strength.

According to U.S. diplomatic cycle theory, America is currently entering the next stage of foreign affairs. The first half of this period consists of approximately 20 years of domestic oriented strategy; the domestic period’s defining trait is that policymakers and the public’s attention is more focused on internal affairs. U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014 is perhaps a landmark event, the beginning of an increasingly multipolar world power structure. America’s power sits relatively low in this new model of U.S. participation in world affairs.

China’s Diplomacy To Appease the United States

With the gradually narrowing gap between U.S. and Chinese strength, America will experience an intensifying strategic anxiety — a sense of unease from China’s overtaking America and the aftermath thereof. America will not only accelerate its response to the diplomatic, security and economic positioning of China’s rise, but at times may also react violently to some of China’s behavior. As far as China is concerned, the task of pacifying America is an important one. This includes [China] strengthening its communication to lessen America’s misgivings and jealous suspicions, while on international issues of great concern to the United States supplying appropriate cooperation according to the principles and interests of the Chinese. [These are] interests in expanding our perimeter, taking notice of opportunities while extending the feelers of strategy and focusing on operational “rationality and restraint.”

Against the backdrop of overwhelming hegemony, the United States needs more international support to achieve its foreign policy goals. In the Asia-Pacific region, the U.S. increasingly values weaving a network of “allied nations and partners,” maintaining its dominant position in the region to counterbalance China. At the global level, the U.S. will still rely on cooperation to deal with major power centers and hotspots as well as for the promotion of global government. Given China’s rising power and influence, the United States will increasingly rely upon it for global issues. As for China, it should vigorously promote an inclusive Asia-Pacific diplomacy, promote regional economy and security cooperation, and prevent the U.S. from isolating China or fragmenting the Asia-Pacific. At the global level, we should emphasize China’s status as a responsible world power and its desire to cooperate with international society, adopting a positive attitude and participating in the treatment of global issues.