Arguments Used by the Activist Portion of the US
Public to Assess the US Intervention in Libya
David J. Lorenzo
College of Diplomacy
NCCU
September 21, 2011
lorenzo@nccu.edu
lorenzodav@gmail.com
Outline
1) Introduction
2) Types of Arguments
3) Tests of Classification Schemes
4) Reclassification
5) Conclusion
Purpose of the Study
 Understand the views of the activist portion of the
public on the proposed intervention in Iraq by
examining the arguments the public employed
(derived from letters to the editor, contributions to
online discussions on the websites of major
newspapers)
 Understand the structure of those views
 Test current understandings of the public’s stance on
foreign policy issues.
Background: Libya
 Americans generally have a poor view of Libya and
Gaddafi, going back to the 1970s. Polls in March
showed that around 75% of those polled had an
unfavorable view of Gaddafi.
 Americans in general, however, were also ambivalent
regarding the “Arab Spring”


Some were happy about democratization and the prospect that
some of the conditions that create terrorists were going away
Others thought that the removal of traditional regimes,
particularly in Egypt, would just serve to remove our allies and
leave openings for radical Muslims.
Libya
 On March 16, the president announced the US would
intervene along with NATO and with the support of
UN resolutions supporting an international effort to
protect Libyan rebels from Gaddafi’s forces.
 On the whole, as measured by polling services, the
American public supported this move:


Support was in the 55-60% range and definite opposition
around 35%
However, large margins (around 65%) opposed long-range
democracy building efforts and slightly more (around 70%)
opposed sending ground troops.
Background: Public Opinion and Foreign Policy
 Before the 1970s, scholars were only marginally
interested in public opinion with regard to foreign
policy:


Prominent scholars and public intellectuals such as Walter
Lippmann, Gabriel Almond and George Kennan believed such
opinion was amorphous, constantly changing, ill-informed and
molded by elites.
Many scholars also did not believe that policymakers took
public opinion into account when making foreign policy
decisions.
Public Opinion
This changed in the 1970s, in response to scholarship
on the public’s views regarding Vietnam:
 Evidence that the public’s views could be resolved
into different positions that were coherent, relatively
stable and rationally structured across views.
 Evidence that policymakers did take public opinion
into account. The most obvious example was
Johnson’s decision not to run for reelection, due in
large part to opposition to the war in Vietnam.
Methodology of Current Scholarship
 Use responses to large scale opinion polls by Roper,
Chicago Council Survey, etc.
 Large N, statistical studies
 Attempt to detect structures based on binaries or
continua, in the form of views on multilateralism/unilatiralism; military/non-military, etc.
The result is often a typology, with a 2 x 2 set of
boxes, that depicts general orientations, or sets of
continua which, when put together, form a multidimensional map.
My Study
 Gather arguments that the activist portion of the
public has made (rather than examine responses to
questions that have been furnished to the general
public)
 Classify those arguments with regard to their
important elements (including the binaries they use)
 See if those arguments fit into the schemes scholars
now provide
Hypotheses
 Hypotheses
 that arguments do not fit current typologies because they
incorporate elements important to decisionmaking that are not
included in the typologies.
 That not all arguments are connected to one another; therefore
public opinion is much “lumpier” than now depicted.
The theoretical basis for these hypotheses is the general
understanding that American political culture is constituted
by multiple traditions (liberalism, civic republicanism,
Christianity, various racist narratives) that produce very
different analyses of the world and embrace different
values.
Results
 170 contributions, totaling 208 arguments, from The
Washington Post, The New York Times, Fox News, The
Daily Show, The Orange County Register, CNN, Huffington
Post.com, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune,
Yahoonews, com, USA Today, The Houston Chronicle,
(Iowa) Press-Citizen, The Des Moines Register, The
Tennessean, The Nation and PennLive.com
 171 arguments against, 37 arguments for
 11 argument sets: 8 argument sets against, 3
argument sets for intervention.
 Exploration of these arguments in a qualitative
fashion
(1) Take Care of America First [30 arguments]
 The first argument against intervention holds that
the US should attend to its own problems rather than
intervene. To intervene means to divert essential
time, attention and resources away from addressing
domestic troubles.
 Some adherents of this argument hold that the
Libyan gambit is a diversionary tactic, meant to
distract the public from the failure of the current
administration to fix economic and fiscal problems.
America First
 Most of those who deployed this argument held the more
straightforward view that the policy decision itself would
result in the expenditure of time and resources better utilized
to address domestic concerns.
 “Please explain to me- because I really want to know- how
children can be allowed to go to sleep hungry in this country
every night, how people cannot afford to go to, or take their
children to, a doctor or dentist in this fine country every day
and the government can't seem to remedy this. But we can
afford to spend millions in other countries to drop bombs. I
think someone needs to explain it to these children and their
parents. I am disgusted by this. So tired of seeing us
addressing another nation's issues before our own. Where is
our nation- building?” (“Mrs.,” NYT, March 28, 2011)
(2) The US is no Better than the Rest of the World
[10 arguments]
 This argument takes a counter-exceptionalism position.
It rejects the notion that the US can make the world
better because it has something good and unique to offer.
The US is no shining “city on a hill” and, therefore, has
no mission to play in making the world better, freer, or
safer for democracy. As with the world at large, the US is
a mixture of good and bad, and it acts in the same ways
as do others
 “The next time someone claims ‘civilian massacre’ or
‘genocide’ or the like, how about a photo? Gaddafi's
troops indeed killed his "own people" - rebels who took
over large cities. If American rebels took over Chicago,
our troops would also kill our ‘own people.’”
(3) Interventions Abroad Harm US Institutions
[10 arguments]
 “Harm” arguments have a long pedigree, dating back to
Early National warnings that the US must be careful not
to follow in the footsteps of Rome in moving from a
republic to an empire. Mead labels this argument a part
of the “Jeffersonian” tradition.
 The argument holds that an activist US foreign policy
necessitates particular mindsets and institutional
adjustments that endanger our republican form of
government. The military and the executive branch
become too strong, realpolitik replaces republican virtue
and citizens are seduced by the prospect of wielding
power in the world rather than attending to the needs of
their community
(4) The World is a Jungle [28 arguments]
 Arguments that emphasize the problematic nature of the world
(generally in contrast with the US) put forward several overlapping
propositions.
 The first is that problems are all around us and will always be with
us. There are lots of bad people in the world and there is no way the
US can resolve all the problems they create.
 Second, these arguments often point to problematic areas in which
the US did not or has not intervened in the past and question
whether intervening in Libya will either a) create a policy precedent
 Third, some of these arguments hold that because there are so many
bad people and the problems they create cannot be resolved, it is
neither pragmatically smart nor morally correct for us to use human
or other resources to attempt to resolve those problems. In some
versions, no problems can be solved and, therefore, we should not
intervene. In other versions, the argument is that because we cannot
intervene everywhere, we should intervene nowhere.
World is a Jungle
The following was written in response to Obama’s
address:
“My God, Does he really think there are not already
countless serious problems just about everywhere
that have already “stained the conscience of the
world” many times over?
And does he not know that following the implied
principle here would require America’s constant,
disastrous overcommitment to solving those
problems?
This is sheer craziness!”
(5) Oil and Corporate Interests [32 arguments]
“Oil”/Corporate interest arguments hold that the only reason for
the US intervention in Libya is the presence of oil reserves.
This judgment renders the endeavor illegitimate. These
arguments take two forms.
One form holds that the US government is the actor, pursuing a
realist (and therefore immoral) policy to secure energy
supplies.
The other variant holds that the government is no more than a
puppet of oil and other corporate interests (such as arms
manufacturers). The object of the exercise is to help maximize
corporate profits.
“Thought we were supposed to be ‘spreading democracy’ in the
Middle East. Oh. Wait. I forgot. It's just about OIL.”
(6a) Irony [44 arguments]
 Irony arguments hold that US intervention will produce results directly
opposed to US intentions. There are two equally numerous variants of
this argument here.
 The first variant holds that in assisting the Libyan rebels, the US will be
arming, aiding and placing into power the kinds of Islamic militants
and terrorists the US has been fighting for the past two decades. This
type of blowback argument is often tied to narratives in which US aid to
the Afghan resistance in the 1980s resulted in the triumph of the
Taliban and the rise of Al Qaeda:
“Libya could very well turn out like our folly supporting
rebels in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation. We arm
them, support them, assist them with money, then years
later they are trained terrorists who kill thousands of us as
they did on 9-11.”
(6b) Irony
 The second variant holds that military intervention in
Libya is ironic because such an intervention, if it is meant
to save lives, will only result in the loss of more lives.
Some arguments make their point by asserting that using
the military to kill people as a way of saving lives makes
no sense; others provide a more sophisticated analysis:
“The President has succeeded in creating a civil war
in which many Libyans will die. By leveling the
sides -- degrading Gadhafi's military and
strengthening the rebels, he has ensured that it will
be prolonged and bloody.”
(7) The US is acting as a Hegemon
[10 arguments]
“Hegemon” arguments hold that the Libyan
intervention, as with those in Iraq and Afghanistan,
are merely operations in which the US pursues,
consolidates and exercises its power; therefore, this
action should be opposed.
(8) Intervene Only to Defend US Security [7 arguments]
These arguments place US security as the sole criterion justifying
intervention. If an intervention is not directly connected with
security, generally as a response to an attack on the US, then the
intervention is not warranted. In the arguments deployed in this
rather small set, commenters assert that this criterion is not
present:
“look the point is, we fight wars when we are attacked PERIOD. we
have to get into everything, lets just let the libyans solve there own
problems, we cant afford another war. dont u get it? we fought our
revolution, let libya fight thers, every government falls eventually. if
we just stay out of the middle east we would be so much better off.
give me one LEGITIMATE reason why we should waste our money
helping a nation that dosnt effect us.ok im all for freedom, but it
wont come from a big nation helping some rebels. it comes from the
smaller, struggling nation. PERIOD”
(9) Multilateralism [13 arguments]
The first argument set that supports the intervention
consists of multilateralist arguments. Multilateralist
arguments hold that it is legitimate for the US to
participate in interventions if other nations have agreed
that an intervention is needed. The multilateral
component is understood differently by various
commenters.
Some see the participation of other countries or the
invitation to intervene as providing moral justification.
Agreement by more than one nation that intervention is
justified seems most important to these people
Others see multilateralism in more practical terms, as
spreading out costs and risks
(10) Duty and Obligation [20 arguments]
 The majority of those who provided arguments in favor
of the Libyan intervention did so by invoking a duty or
other principled obligation for the US to intervene.
 The basis for that duty varies. Some cites a duty to
prevent leaders from killing their citizens while rejecting
the “oil” argument as grounds for opposition.
 Others saw the matter as more complex and mixed a duty
to protect with other factors, such as the obligation to
support democracy and the duty to help citizens
overthrow authoritarian rulers that the US had
previously aided
American Security is at Stake [4 arguments]
 This argument poses the same question as the
“intervene only to protect US security” arguments,
but provides a different answer. Whereas the
purveyors of the former argument hold that the
Libyan intervention does not address such interests,
the proponents of this argument set do:
“As candidate Obama explained time and again,
having more democratic regimes in Muslims
countries in absolutely essential to our own security
and economic well-being.”
Tests: Left-Right Spectrum
While straight ideology has not generally been a favorite of those who
attempt to classify popular foreign policy views, a few scholars have
recently argued that locations of people on the left and right of the
political spectrum are important for understanding the public’s foreign
policy positions.
We see in this instance that such an analysis does little work. Liberal and
conservatives support the intervention and liberal and conservatives
oppose it. Also liberals and conservatives use the same arguments.
Liberal
Conservative
Support Intervention
(9), (10), (11)
Oppose Intervention
(1), (2), (3), (5),
(6b), (7), (8)
(9), (10), (11)
(1), (2), (3), (4),
(6a,b), (8)
The Drezner Realist/Liberal Internationalist
Distinction
 Drezner tests for the presence of realist positions in
non-elite foreign policy opinion, as opposed to
Liberal Internationalist positions.
 In Drezner’s understanding, realists see the world in
Hobbesian terms, emphasize national interests, and
justify the use of force by reference to self-defense.
Liberal internationalists have a more optimist view
of the world and see legitimate foreign policy goals
and the use of force as including the enforcement of
international law and the promotion of democracy.
Realist/Liberal Internationalist
Realist Arguments
Support
Oppose
(11)
(4), (6a), (8)
Liberal
Internationalist
Arguments
(9), (10)
(6b)
 While this scheme identifies the opposing arguments posed by sets (11)
and (6b), it does little to allow us to understand the impact of these
arguments. Both realist and internationalist arguments in this scheme
oppose and support the intervention.
 The majority of the oppositional arguments are also missing here.
These arguments are either not concerned with the core of realist and
liberal internationalist analysis, or specifically reject such analysis.
Militant Internationalism/
Cooperative Internationalism
This classification scheme comes from the influential studies by Wittkopf, as
well as Holsti and Rosenau’s confirmatory study.
Here, orientations towards cooperative internationalism are crossed with
orientations towards militant internationalism.
In the resulting 2 x 2 typology,
Hardliners are those who approve the use of force to defend American
security in a world that tends to threaten the US and do not wish to have
America’s hands tied by international organizations and are not favorable
towards humanitarian, non-military interventions.
Isolationists wish to safeguard American values by withdrawing from the
contaminating influence of the world.
Internationalists see the US as playing a leading role in the world and are
open to playing that role and defending US interests unilaterally and
multilaterally, by military means and by nonmilitary means.
Accomodationists see the role of the US as a multilateral player in the drive
to help the world and further US interests primarily through humanitarian
aid and other nonmilitary means.
MI/CI
Hardliner
Support
Intervention
(11)*
Oppose
Intervention
(8)*
Isolationist
Internationalist
Accomodationist
(9), (10)
(1)*, (3)
(6b)*
The differentiations among arguments embedded in this scheme are only moderately helpful
in allowing us to sort through these arguments. The contrast that is revealed between the
deeply isolationist Argument sets (1) and (3) and the moral imperative to intervene
contained in Argument set (10) is useful, as is the contrast in general between the
Isolationist arguments and the internationalism of Argument set (9).
 The Isolationist box is too narrowly constructed to encompass all the arguments that
generally oppose activist policies. Holsti and Rosenau’s argument that thinking of
Isolation and Cooperation as separate continua, such that more nuanced
understanding of the different categories can be advanced, would not be helpful
because such a fix would not necessarily expand the Isolationist box.
 More importantly, this scheme also appears unable to account clearly for important
oppositional understandings – (5), (6a) and (7) – that have nothing to do with the
military/nonmilitary and cooperative/non-cooperative binaries.
Mead’s Foreign Policy Traditions
Mead argues that the arguments of American foreign policy elites can be
categorized in terms of important indigenous political traditions that
important overlap with domestic political traditions.
Hamiltonians place importance on defending America’s economic
interests and using power to promote trade and commerce.
Wilsonians favor the spread of democracy and freedom and the use of
multilateral and, if possible, nonmilitary means.
Jeffersonians are skeptical of foreign involvement and fear that
republican institutions will be harmed by a turn towards imperial
ambitions.
Jacksonians value security and are reluctant to engage in foreign
interventions unless national security is directly involved, given their
belief that communities should take care of themselves. If national
security is involved, they remain committed to action until the threat is
eliminated.
Arguments According to Mead
Hamiltonian
Support
Intervention
Oppose
Intervention
Jeffersonian
(3), (7)
Wilsonian
Jacksonian
(9), (10)
(11)
(1), (4), (6a),
(8)
 Mead is better able to account for the oppositional arguments than most of the other
typologies. They are, in this understanding, mostly Jeffersonian and Jacksonian,
depending as they do on either a skeptical view of America or a skeptical view of the
world. The opposition represented by the Wilsonian arguments is also useful.
 The broad aggregation of many of the oppositional arguments into the Jacksonian
category is deeply problematic. There is a logic connecting the America First, The
World is a Jungle, The Irony of Supporting Potential Terrorists and Intervene only
for Security arguments (be wary of foreign involvement and take care of yourself
because the world is a Hobbesian place), but each set of arguments has its own
internal logic that can cause friction with the others.
 This scheme is also not able to account for Argument sets (2), (5), and (6b), which
tells us it generally tracks arguments from the center to the right.
Davis and Lynn-Jones Similarity/Difference Model
Davis and Lynn-Jones hypothesized that American foreign policy may
oscillate between activist and non-activist stances depending upon
understandings of the US as either exceptional or not exceptional
with regard to the rest of the world.
In their understanding, seeing the world as the same as the home
country tends to direct understandings in a non-activist direction,
while seeing it as different (exceptional) tends to direct
understandings in an activist direction. They also identify an antiactivist set of arguments that portrays the US as malignant.
Elsewhere, I have shown in the course of critiquing this argument that
activist, even imperialist policies can be justified by understanding
the world as similar to the home country. In turn, non-activist (or
anti-imperialist) arguments could be derived from understanding
the world as different from home.
Similarities/Differences
The US is
Exceptional
The US is
Malignant
(9), (10)
Support Intervention
Oppose Intervention
The World
and the US
are Similar
(1), (3), (4), (6a)*
(2), (6b)
(5), (7)
We see that this typology can account for many of the arguments in this data set, thereby
establishing that understandings of the US in relation to the world form an important
part of many argument sets. In particular, this scheme makes sense of those arguments
that see the rest of the world as incorrigible and its inhabitants as savages, as well as the
radical arguments that question American motives.
 But this account does not otherwise appreciably increase our knowledge of the relations
among these arguments. Reluctance to engage in this intervention is spread across all
three positions that compare the US to the world. In terms of the original Davis/Lynn
Jones model, the important divergence does not occur among adherents of difference,
but among different followers of the doctrine of sameness.

Conclusions
These arguments do not fit well into the typologies scholars have created:
 Inability to account for arguments
 Mix arguments that generate different positions in the same box
 Wrongly predict the positions arguments will generate
Sources of many problems:
 Attempts to uncover a universal structure where there probably is none
 Use of opinion polls that create an artifactual structure
 Focus on only conventionally defined mainstream arguments
General assessment:
 Public positions are more complex, nuanced and numerous than thought
 Foundations of those positions are not always connected, in that their
interpretive material is found in various traditions that do not always think
of the world in the same general ways.
 Therefore, these positions are lumpier and cannot be analyzed and sorted by
recourse to a few common binaries or continua.
Types of Arguments
 Isolationist Lump: (1), (3): US should focus on itself and
minimize engagement with the world
 Radical Lump: (5), (7): US as presently constituted is
problematic
 Skeptical Lump: (4), (6a) the world is deeply problematic and
resistant to solutions
 Libertarian Lump: (2) The US should not impose itself on the world
 Realist Lump: (8), (11) Foreign policy should be guided by the
goals of protecting interests and security
 Liberal Internationalist Lump: (6b), (9), (10): Foreign
policy should adhere to liberal internationalist values
Current Literature
The current understandings are able to account for the
Internationalist, Realist and some of the Isolationist
arguments and relations among them. It has a much
less sure grasp of the other arguments, the
relationships among them, and the relationships
among all the lumps taken together (including the
disconnect among them).