“Wherever I go, I find myself confronted with the accusations of double standards,” said EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell at Oxford University in May. At last year’s Munich Security Conference (MSC), French President Emmanuel Macron said: “I am struck by how much we are losing the trust of the Global South.”
Eisentraut makes this clear in her brief: The criticism of Western double standards is often justified. For example, countries from the Global South point out that the US and other Western states insist on the principle of the territorial integrity in Ukraine, but did not respect this principle during the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Western states have often disregarded human rights by carrying out illegal detentions as part of their war on terror. And the Europeans have made common cause with North African autocrats in order to prevent migration to Europe.
However, Eisentraut also points out that critics from countries such as China and Russia often use their accusations to relativize their own violations. Or they use them to justify an approach to foreign policy that is no longer based on moral principles at all, but only on their own interests. The result is that the value of universal rules is being questioned around the world.
I doubt as much as it is commonly feared, considering the level of hysteria (or euphoria, from some corners) about the imminent fall of Western hegemony that has been present for at least as long as I’ve been alive…
… but yes, our double standards are deeply damaging to the international order we claim to back.
The comparison between the iraq war and Russian invasion of Ukraine is disingenuous though. The western led coalition did not go in with a message that Irak had no right to exist and its people where just (Saudis or something) confused part of one of their neighboring countries. The Russians very much are intent on permanently erasing Ukranians from history.
Regardless of the ‘level’ of the offense, attacking a sovereign state under false premises remains deeply damaging to the claim of backing an international rules-based order. We should be able to hold ourselves to a higher standard than “Not genocidal like Russia”.
The false pretenses and blatant lies are the big issue imho. If the reason they gave would have been true, I would have been OK with removing a maniac like Hussein… but it was lies… making the whole ordeal indeed a horrible example of a terrible war that should have never happened. And something that should have landed the people that lied, in jail.
Or with a necktie courtesy of the Hague.
fyi, you wrote
where I presume you meant the comparison between Iraq and Ukraine wars. It took me a while to figure out what you were saying there.
Yes! Thanks, I corrected my ramblings.