On Apr 25, 2005, at 3:16 PM, Dan Minette wrote:
OK, I never meant to advance the criminal justice model for international relationships. I was merely pointing out a counter example to the notion that interfering with the actions of another country presupposes that the leaders of the other country are children.
Do you think that the criminal justice model as a good one?
Not really. I think a "community of nations" is more apt, and does not preclude recognition of the need for a criminal justice system within that community. It calls upon "citizen-nations" to be responsible members of the community, to respect others' rights, and to contribute to the common wealth.
Personally, I am drawn to the "family of nations" analogy, but it suffers from the problem that you point out above: it implies that there are parent nations and child nations, and that's not necessarily conducive to clear thinking about our roles in the world.
Your question reminds me that the metaphors we choose have power. The president's use of the phrase "permission slip" in the state of the union address was carefully chosen to call up visions of the United States as a child, having to go begging some adult nation for a kind of "hall pass." That vision was intended to be so repulsive that to suggest that the US must seriously consider the opinions of other nations before acting was to reduce our great nation to childishness.
Thanks for reminding me of that,
Dave
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