Human Rights Dominate Our Times : But U.S. Has No Mandate to Impose Democracy Everywhere

Zbigniew Brzezinski, assistant to the President for national-security affairs during the Jimmy Carter Administration, was asked by The Times to comment on the role of the United States in the transfer of power in the Philippines.

Question--In the Philippines, are we seeing a Carter Administration human-rights policy triumphant, without Carter? Should disruptive, government-toppling “diplomatic intervention for human rights” be the core of American policy in the developing world?

Answer--I think we are seeing the success of the quest for human rights in the Philippines. It would be presumptuous to claim credit for this development on behalf of the Carter Administration. But I think it is fair to say that the Carter Administration sensed, quite accurately, that the desire for human rights has become the most dominant political imperative of our time. As far as making human rights the basic focus of American policy, particularly in regard to the Third World, I would say that that would be too one-sided. Obviously, as a democracy, we have to be concerned with human rights. But we have other concerns as well--geopolitical, strategic and economic. And in some cases, under special circumstances, the latter might be overriding.

Q--Should it now be our policy to push hard the cause of democracy in such nations as Chile, South Korea or even Taiwan? After events in the Philippines, will there not be strong domestic and international pressure on an American Administration to do this, even if there are pitfalls?

A--It is a mistake to generalize or to even universalize any particular moral focus. In every case there are specific circumstances that have to be taken into account. For example, when a country is reasonably secure, it is easier and even desirable to promote human rights. There may be circumstances in which a country is insecure and the promotion of human rights would be to create social and political disruption to such an extent that the very independence of the country is ultimately jeopardized. I would therefore not wish to generalize about South Korea, Taiwan or Chile. I think the balance between these factors is different in each case.

Q--Would that be the same answer you would have in a case of a country like South Africa? Should we be bringing pressure on that minority government, or is this such a special case that it requires other measures?

A--I think that in the case of South Africa, apartheid is not only so morally revolting but so antediluvian in its premises that clear-cut American disapprobation is appropriate. However, the resolution of that problem will ultimately depend on what the South Africans, both black and white, work out themselves. It is unlikely to be determined by the United States as such.

Q--What are the rules of the intervention game now: Once democracy has been established, do we have an obligation to use all of our powers to make sure it is maintained, and by what standard? When does one step in to thwart a democratically elected leader from becoming a dictator?

A--I don’t believe that the United States has a mandate, either to impose democracy or to protect it from internal disruption. I think the United States has a clear-cut obligation to make certain that a foreign power motivated by totalitarian ideology does not succeed in imposing its system by force on others. Beyond that, however, I think that democracy, to be strong and to be generally blossoming, has to be nourished by internal forces. It has to spring from the development and moral aspirations of the people concerned. I think we would be very wrong if we moved from an attitude of relative indifference into a posture of universal crusading on behalf of human rights.

Q--At times in recent years we’ve thought we might see the gradual convergence of East and West. But while democracy may be on the ascendancy in the West with developments in South America and elsewhere, there is no evidence of any relaxation in the Soviet Bloc. Is there a danger that the two sides are becoming even more opposite, thereby causing an even greater threat to global security?

A--I don’t think that’s the danger, because I think the two sides have been very different all along, and I don’t think they are becoming more different. The fact that democracy is spreading is a welcome development, and I think it demonstrates more than anything else that the communist system is antiquated, that it is anti-historical, and that eventually it is doomed to failure from within. That I consider to be a promising development. And the increasing worldwide appreciation of the stagnant, inefficient and essentially hypocritical nature of the Soviet system, particularly, is in itself a giant step forward from an earlier era in which there were widespread and unfounded illusions entertained about the Soviet system.

Q--While the Reagan Administration has applied diplomatic intervention to end a dictatorship in the Philippines, it is also committed to aiding the violent overthrow of leftist governments in Nicaragua and Angola. Isn’t this an inconsistency? As a last course, should human rights be protected at the point of a gun?

A--I don’t think it is necessarily an inconsistency. In the Philippines, the United States was on the side of political self-determination, and we made the electoral process the ultimate test for that self-expression. Our negative reaction was against a violation or abuse of that process. In Angola or Nicaragua, whether one agrees with the specifics of the Reagan Administration efforts or not, the fact is that the armed opposition is against political regimes which in terms of their ideology and exercise of power are committed to the subordination of society to the state, of the individual to the government, which are determined to restrict or even eliminate societal and individual freedom. In that sense there is no inconsistency between what the United States has been doing in the Philippines and what it may or may not aspire to do in Angola or Nicaragua.