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Title Libyan Volte-Face Politics: An Analysis of Qaddafi Libya's Oscillating Foreign Policy Toward the United States
Full text http://scripties.let.eldoc.ub.rug.nl/root/Master/DoorstroomMasters/InternationaleBetrek/2012/OosterhoutJ.B.Jortva/
Date 2012
Author(s) Oosterhout, J.B. (Jort)
Abstract When addressing to the core question of how Libyan oscillating foreign policy toward the US, and its eventual conversion to moderation, can be explained through analyzing agential, societal, international, and systemic forces affecting its policymaking process, Walter Carlsnaes' Foreign Policy Analysis (FPA) approach, added by Andrew Moravcsik's liberal insights, provides a crucial insight into the matter. The chosen theoretical model clearly unravels the reasons behind Libya's alternating policy actions throughout Muammar al-Qaddafi's tenure. Both Libya's revisionist policies as well as its eventual diplomatic transformation were mainly caused by factors and processes operating at the dispositional level. Qaddafi's initial goals to curb US influence within the Arab world, expand his domestic and regional power, and enhance legitimacy for his leadership, increasingly interfered with Washington's interests in the region; namely, a steady supply of energy resources, security of its Israeli ally, and countering potential communist encroachment. Ideological revisionist notions stemming from Nasserist Arab nationalism ' most notably anti-imperialism and pan-Arabism ' mainly fueled Libya's belligerent conduct toward the US. Qaddafi perceived American 'imperialist' policies within Libya and other Arab states to be critically compromising national self-determination and true independence for its people. Moreover, Washington's conduct was perceived to be halting efforts toward a flourishing and powerful Arab nation. Through subverting pro-US regimes in the region, sponsoring violent extremist entities, and seeking Arab unity, the Qaddafi regime sought to countervail US power and subsequently satisfy its idealistic objectives. On a structural level, the bipolar distribution of power enabled Libya to collaborate with the USSR in order to augment its military capabilities and counterbalance US influence in the region. Moreover, the espoused WMD capability, coupled with Soviet alliance formation, was required to deter possible US or Israeli hostility. Thus, while John Mearsheimer's approach satisfactorily explains Tripoli's collaboration with the Kremlin and its pursuance of WMD, Moravcsik's theory ' operating within the dispositional dimension of Carlsnaes' framework ' clarifies Qaddafi's confrontation with the US more comprehensively. Through elaborating upon the fundamental ideological preferences of the Libyan leadership, coupled with its accumulation of domestic power, the basic causal factors and processes ' operating at the agential and societal level ' behind Libya's revisionist policy actions are discerned. Although both regime survival and revisionist idealism informed Qaddafi's policies during the first two decades of his rule, the former increasingly determined his foreign policy agenda after the end of the Cold War. In Moravcsik's terms, Libya's leadership was confronted with three internal threats: diverging fundamental beliefs, disaffection due to political exclusion, and material scarcity. The last factor proved the most acute and subsequently forced Qaddafi to conduct economic accommodation toward his population in order to quell domestic instability. Annulment of the international sanctions package combined with prospective Western investment in Libya's obsolete but profitable oil industry was deemed obligatory to satisfy this goal. From this perspective, the international constraint on Libyan foreign policy manifested itself indirectly by thwarting economic development and thereby undermining the regime's internal legitimacy. As regards the threat of potential US military aggression, views differ as to what extent this factor impacted upon Libya's overture. Some scholars assert that the 1986 US air bombardment and the coercive regime overthrow in Baghdad in 2003 critically informed Qaddafi's about-face politics; others conforming to the indirect perspective, however, claim his transformation to have predominantly been incited by the international embargo and the subsequent diplomatic negotiations involving substantial positive inducements (resumption of diplomatic and commercial relations coupled with the abolition of the sanctions regime). Indeed, Kelly O'Reilly's operational code analysis emphasizes the importance of positive external stimuli in explaining Qaddafi's transformation. Moreover, the Iraq-argument as put forward by Luis Martinez in section 3.3.1 ignores the concept of political and military overstretch. While Martinez argues that US unilateralism and military superiority as demonstrated during the Second Gulf War critically fueled Qaddafi's political volte-face, one could very well argue that the Iraq invasion in 2003 relieved Qaddafi from the threat of external intervention instead. Conducting a third war within the Islamic world simultaneously would have severely compromised US military capabilities and its international moral credibility. Crucially, the international preoccupation with global terrorism that followed the 9/11 attacks created an atmosphere conducive for mere counterterrorist cooperation, rendering human rights and democratic governance of secondary importance. In terms of Moravcsik, Libyan zero-sum preferences eventually altered into mixed preferences with respect to those of the White House. Through conducting crucial policy concessions ' resolving the Lockerbie crisis; terminating its support for non-state terrorism; and foregoing WMD ' the Colonel created the political space for bilateral business and counterterrorist cooperation, thereby relieving himself from the international constraint on his preference to preserve his domestic position of power. On a structural level, Mearsheimer's approach puts emphasis on US global invincibility and Libya's failure to offset the regional power imbalance through pursuing WMD or seeking alliance formation, prompting it to pragmatically bandwagon with the adversary instead in order to secure regime survival. Thus, the Guide's ideological preferences increasingly jeopardized regime continuity and its raison d'être; the constellation of power (US hegemony coupled with Tripoli's isolation) severely constrained his idealistic revisionism, eventually provoking a foreign policy conversion. Nevertheless, Mearsheimer's theory neglects the detrimental effect international isolation, and the regime's fraught socio-economic policies, had on domestic stability. Through analyzing the consulted sources by utilizing Moravcsik's liberal approach, the societal constraint on Libyan foreign policy can be conceived of as decisive in effectuating foreign policy change. Pragmatic opportunism informed by a desire to secure regime survival prompted the Qaddafi leadership to seek reconciliation with the US, reverse its position of international isolation, and subsequently accommodate the economic needs of its people.
Language en
Repository Groningen - University of Groningen
Added to C-A: 2018-11-14;10:56:35