Princeton historian on ‘Davids,’ ‘Goliaths’ and the case of Greece
Small states seem more resilient and healthy in an increasingly unstable world, points out Harold James, the Claude and Lore Kelly Professor in European Studies, a professor of history and international affairs and director of the Program in Contemporary European Politics and Society at Princeton University.
While the “Goliaths” of this world, either the US or Russia, are challenged by internal divisions while facing external threats, the “Davids,” Denmark or Finland, remain remarkably stable and successful. S8 is a recently established Swiss-based league of successful small nations, as opposed to the G8. Perhaps Greece could be counted in the list of “Davids” if it weren’t for Turkey issuing threatening warnings every second day. Also, the war in Ukraine with its many repercussions threatens global stability not least because the nuclear threat now seems more serious than it was 60 years ago during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
In your article “Geopolitical Davids and Goliaths,” published by Project Syndicate, you point out that the flexibility of small nations is something that helps them achieve remarkable goals. But how can small nations continue to be stable and grow if the broader geopolitical security framework continues to tremble because of the clashes both within and between Goliaths? Do Davids need Goliaths to remain healthy and stable more than ever?
That’s quite right – the clashes of the Goliaths make the world more dangerous for everyone, and that includes the Davids. It is obviously worrying to be in the position of Estonia, or Moldova, or for that matter the Greek islands just off the Turkish coast. Small countries unambiguously had an easier time at the high-water mark of globalization, in the early 2000s, when there appeared to be a much clearer rulebook. The partial rollback that started with the global financial crisis and which now threatens to tear the world into rival blocs was bad for small states. The short term thus looks full of bleak choices. But are they really so bleak in a broader or longer perspective? The point of my piece was to suggest that Goliaths may have an inclination, a proclivity to act not only destructively, but also self-destructively. So, in the biblical story, Goliath is over-equipped (“he was armed with a coat of mail; and the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of brass”) and David is also convinced that his cause is just. Thus there is some prospect that self-destructive giants will encounter setbacks, commotions, reversal. Translated into the modern language of states, that means that even big countries will at some stage see the advantage of a general framework that protects openness, even if they very much don’t see that right now. The question is just when that stage will come: of how much destruction will precede a realization that there is a better way.
‘In 2015, Greek policy-makers believed they could also play Russia, and China, and the US, against each other and against the EU: But that was a losing proposition’
Greece can aspire to be a David given its flexibility to weather the storms of the financial and Covid crises. Could Greece qualify to become a member of an expanded S8? Can we expect S8 to expand to S20?
Yes, indeed – the future of Greece looks much better than it did seven years ago. That also has to do with not engaging in a destructive exercise in which conflicts between Goliaths might suggest: playing the contending giants against each other and hoping to sow discontent in order to benefit. The prolonged eurozone debt crisis set up the possibility of states playing strategic games: Thus Greece and the north European countries – principally of course Germany – were engaged in what game theorists think of as a game of chicken, when each side presses on because they believe that an eventual breakdown would be so disastrous that the other side has to give way, and the country with the weakest nerve gives up first. In 2015, Greek policy-makers believed they could also play Russia, and China, and the US, against each other and against the EU: But that was a losing proposition. In the current crisis, Russia is playing a similar game of chicken with the EU, and at the same time using the energy issue to divide EU countries and set them up against each other – squabbling over scarce resources. That is a strategic challenge, and it needs to be confronted by the only effective means of defense, the kind of solidarity that for instance birds like geese often display when confronted with a marauding predator. So the answer to your excellent question is: Yes, S8 would need to expand (and will expand if is successful) to include more and more members.
Certainly the fact that the Republican Party seems keen not to accept election results is alarming as the US approaches midterm elections. But can we explain the phenomenon as a collective decision of a considerable number of voters who question the electoral laws that make it too easy for immigrants to vote?
The US has always been a country of immigration, and opinion polls actually show a broad support for both continued immigration and a path to citizenship. The conspiracy theory is not, I think, shared by many, but it is a powerful instrument in the hands of a few. There are, in fact, reasons why each side can point to some odd feature. Democrats are upset by the way the Senate is constituted, with small states having a magnified voice, with populous states poorly represented, or with the odd and inconsistent arithmetic of the Electoral College. There will be voices there too that claim a new constitutional settlement is needed: But drawing new constitutions in an age of polarization is a recipe for more division.
You have pointed out in your article and other writings that external threats fortify the internal cohesion of nations. Do you expect that deteriorating US relations with Russia and China will finally help lower the heat in the United States’ internal divisions?
There may be such a logic; but there is always a countervailing pressure, an anxiety about external influence, about Russian or Chinese interference in the electoral process, about disinformation, the mobilization of antagonistic groups (white nationalists, militant Black rights activists). At the moment, both sides of the aisle in Washington compete with each other using quite radical rhetoric about the extent of the Chinese challenge. This political competition, designed to score points with American voters, is unhelpful in what I feel to be a more important cause, bringing China to the table to resolve issues that affect everyone on the planet – including the aftermath of the Ukraine-Russia war.
The specter of nuclear disaster has come back to haunt us. Can we use any example of past crises to handle this one? The Cuban Missile Crisis averting rulebook seems increasingly incompatible with the current Ukraine war situation. Could the world slide slowly into a nuclear war by tit-for-tats of detonating one tactical nuclear weapon after another? Are we in danger that such a development, if it happens, would come to be seen as the biggest historical shift in human affairs since the Renaissance?
That indeed would of course be an utterly catastrophic outcome and would threaten what is euphemistically termed a mass extinction event. But we are not living in quite the same framework as at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis. At that time, there was a stable Soviet command structure, and a good mechanism through which Kennedy and Khrushchev could quickly communicate with each other. But today, the process that is making a slide to nuclear war more possible or likely – it still appears at least to me relatively unlikely – is that in the face of the colossal Russian military setbacks, the Russian government and the chain of command is steadily disintegrating. The crucial crisis avoidance or reduction mechanism do not at the moment have a capability of speaking quickly and easily with Vladimir Putin, but rather the possibility of communicating with a wide range of actors in that disintegrating system. In some ways, modern media and communications make that easier: There is thus no doubt in the minds of all Russians, including those at the top, of the way the war is going and the risks that do exist of escalation. Ultimately there is a need to communicate with a much broader group of people in Russia, and to make absolutely clear how dangerous the current situation is and how unpredictable nuclear escalation might be. I think in consequence that President Biden’s obviously worrying public warning that Putin is not bluffing is an important step in that direction – and that that is the right direction.
