American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission (Cambridge Studies in International Relations)

CAMBRIDGE STU DIES IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 1

2

3 4 5 6 7

MYLES L. C. ROBERTSON

Soviet policy towards Japan An analysis of trends in the 1970s and 1980s FRIEDRICH V. KRATOCHWIL

Rules, norms, and decisions On the conditions of practical and legal reasoning In international relations and domestic affairs MICHAEL NICHOLSON

Formal theories in international relations MICHAEL C. PUGH

The ANZUS crisis, nuclear visiting and deterrence STEPHEN GILL

American hegemony and the Trilateral Commission HIDEMI SUGANAMI

The domestic analogy and world order proposals IAN CLARK

The hierachy of states Reform and resistance in the international order

8

ZEEV MAOZ

9

WILLIAM BLOOM

10

National choices and international processes Personal identity, national identity and international relations JAMES MAYALL

Nationalism and in�ernatio'nal society

1

11

JAMES BARBER and 0HN BARRATT South Africa's foreign policy The search for status �nd security 1945-1988

12

ROBERT H. JACKSO

13

SAKI DOCKRILL

14

KALEVI J. HOLSTI

15 16

�

Quasi�states: sover�ignty, international relations and the Third ; World ,

Britain's policy for West German rearmament 1950-1955 ;

Peace and war: armed conflicts and international order 1648-1989 Dl!'ON GELDENHUYS

Isolated states: a comparative analysis CHARl;ES

Systems in crisis New imperatives of high politics at century's end

17

TERRY NARDIN and DAVID R. MAPEL Traditions of international ethics

18

and SUSAN STRANGE Rival states, rival firms Politics and competition for world markets in developing countries

19

JOHN STOPFORD

MICHAEL NICHOLSON

Rationality and the analysis of international conflict

AMERICAN HEGEMONY AND THE TRILATERAL COMMISSION

STEPHEN GILL Associate Professor of Political Science, York University, Toronto

The TIght of lltt Universa)' olOlmbridge lQ print and self all ntIJItMr of books was gralfled by HelU'y VIII in }534, The UniPerstlY has priJIted andpublished continllOU$ly iSutCe /584.

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge New York

Port Chester

Melbourne

Sydney

Published by the Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 lRP 40 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011-4211, USA 10 Stamford Road, Oaklelgh, Melbourne 3166, Australia © Cambridge University Press 1990 First published 1 990 First paperback edition 1991 Printed in the United States of America

British Library cataloguing In publication data Gill, Stephen American hegemony and the Trilateral Commission. (Cambridge studies in international relations) 1. International relations 1. Title 303.4'82

Library of Congress catalogumg m publication data Gill, Stephen, 1950American hegemony and the Trilateral Commission I Stephen Gill. cm. - (Cambridge studies in international relations: 5). p. Bibliography. Includes mdex. ISBN 0 521 36286 5 1 . International economic relations. 2. International cooperation. 3. Trilateral Commission. 4. United States - Foreign economic relations. L Title. II. Series. HF1359. G54 1989. 337.73-dc20 89-9808 CIP ISBN 0 521 36286 5 hardback ISBN 0 521 42433 X paperback

For my father, Rowland Gill

CONTENTS

page x

List of figures List of tables

xi

xii

Acknowledgements 1

INTRODUCTION

1

Focus of the study

1

Analysing the Trilateral Commission

4

Ideology, identity, interests and political culture

6

On perspectives

8

Criteria for evaluation 2

10

REALIST AND LIBERAL PERSPECTIVES

11

Realism and mercantilism

11

Realism and the international economic order

16

Transnational liberalism

20

Realism and Trilateral co-operation

19

Public choice theory

25

Trilateral co-operation and public choice 3

28

MARXIST PERSPECTIVES: THE QUESTION OF HEGEMONY REDEFINED

33

Classical Marxism

33

Gramscian historical materialism

41

World systems theory

38

Transnational historical materialism

46

Organic intellectuals and Trilateral co-operation

51

The problem of hegemony redefined 4

54

THE DECLINE OF AMERICAN HEGEMONY: MYTH AND REALITY

57

Th� thesis of hegemonic decline

58 vii

CONTENTS

American hegemonic decline: a critique The security structure and Amencan military dominance Conclusion: decline or continuity? 5

63 78. 86

TOWARDS AN AMERICAN-CENTRED TRANSNATIONAL

891 89! Class fractions and historic blocs 90 l Trilateralism and transnational capitalism 961 The crisis of postwar hegemony , 10 0i The recessions of the 1970s and 1980s and their effects Reaganomics: its impact, its limits 105! , Theorising the rising power of internationally mobile capital 1121 HEGEMONY?

6

PRIVATE INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS COUNCILS

7

AIMS, ACTIVITIES, ORGANISATION AND MEMBERSHIP

Private international relations councils The development of Atlanticism Bilderberg Formation of the Trilateral Commission

OF THE TRILATERAL COMMISSION

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r

1221 123: 124l 1291 132:

,

143l 143: 146, 1501 155j 165: 166:

Aims and objectives of the Trilateral Commission Activities Organisation Clnd leadership Represel)'taHo* and composition of membership Financing the ffrilateral Commission Commission �embers in government Political acceptability of the Commission in the United States 1671 8

THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL ASPECTS OF THE TRILATERAL COMMISSION

Interdependence issues Security issues The international economy in the late 1970s and 1980s The Trilateral theme par excellence A higher goal: global community or the withering away of communism?

viii

173: 1741 179i 188 197 201

CONTENTS

9

HEGEMONY, KNOWLEDGE AND THE LIMITS OF INTERNATIONALISM

203

Changes in American hegemony

203

Global restructuring and the stability of world capitalism

209

Transnationalisation and international co-operation

212

International concepts and Trilateralism

217

The Trilateral Commission, international concepts and American foreign policy

222

Interests, identity, ideology and knowledge

226

Theory and hegemony

230

APPENDICES

232

Appendix 1

Regional and national membership of the

Trilateral Commission, 1973-85 Appendix 2

Breakdown

of

232 Trilateral

Commission

membership by occupational category (expressed as percentage of total members 1973-85)· Appendix 3

Trilateral

Commissioners

233 and

staff

members interviewed (plus methodological note) Appendix 4

234

List of Trilateral Commission publications

(chronological sequence)

238

Notes Select bibliography

243

Index

280

269

ix

1

INTRODUCTION

This study seeks to contribute to the development of a historical materialist theory of international relations. It does this, first, by offering an interpretation of changes in the international power and hegemony of the United States during the 1970s and 1980s, in the context of change in the world political economy. Such change involves, amongst other issues, the question of co-operation and conflict in the relations between the major capitalist states, notably those of North America, Western Europe and Japan. Second, it analyses the importance of the Trilateral Commission and similar American-sponsored private international relations councils.1 The latter are seen as indicative of the internationalisation of civil society and what I call the 'transnationalisation of the state'. These questions are considered in the context of a changing 'global political economy' which consists of a set of interacting and dynamic social forces operating at both domestic and international 'levels'. The concept of the global political economy, one which includes the social force of competing theorisations, perspectives and ideologies concerning the 'politico-economic world' held by different sets of interests, serves as the basic ontology for the study.2 For the purposes of this book 'Trilateralism' can be defined as the project of developing an organic (or relatively permanent) alliance between the major capitalist states, with the aim of promoting (or sustaining) a stable form of world order which is congenial to their dominant interests. More specifically, this involves a commitment to a more-or-Iess liberal international economic order. FOCUS OF THE STUDY,

In this study the central problem of analysing Trilateralism 1S � seen as ins�parable from ongoing theoretical and practical debates about the �hanging nature of American hegemony. This is because the \

1

A M ERICA N H EG EMONY AND TRIL AT ERA L IS M

!

Trilateral Commission can be conceived of as an expression of shifts in . dominant ideas and possibly practices in the American foreign policy establishment and, to a certain extent, its counterparts elsewhere.3 Our study addresses what, in the conventional terminology of: Anglo�Saxon international relations, would be called three 'levels of! analysis' (global, international and domestic) and one basic methodological issue. These involve: i (i) Changes in the global political economy and their implications ! for order, conflict and co-operation amongst the 'Trilateral' I countries (Canada, the United States, Japan, and the members of the European Community, except Greece). I (ii) The role of the United States in these changes. \ (iii) The role of private international· relations councils. Their significance, it will be argued, lies partly in the fact that theYt help us to understand connections between the domestic' I and 'international' levels in the political economy. The· methodological point concerns the role of ideology and consciousness in the study of political economy. The Gramscian! approach which I adopt gives weight to 'ideological apparatuses' in! explaining the nature of global hegemony, order, conflict and coJ operation. This point is specifically elaborated through analysis of the case of the Trilateral Commission, where attention is paid to theI construction of international networks o£identity, interest and ideas, I ' and their representation through institutional linkages. Let us now outline the substance of the study. Chapter 1 elaborates; our main concerns anp. aims. Chapters. 2 and 3 introduce and apply: different theoretical perspectives which help to constitute the political: economy, as well as �eek to explain its basic dynamics. Chapter 2! focuses on the realist,: neorealist and liberal theories which together; serve to constitute the hegemonic perspective ofthe American foreign policy establishment (and the bulk of the United States' membership of the Trilateral ComJ?ission). These approaches are contrasted, in! Chapter 3, with Marxist perspectives. A case is made in favour of historical materialist theory for explaining the questions at issue. In: this context the chapter extends, at the international level, the Gram-; scian concepts of the state, civil society, hegemony, historic bloc, andl organic intellectual. 4 In this chapter ideological and political forces are; related to material forces, notably those promoting the tendency; towards a deep�seated integration of the world political economy, and! those which may constrain these tendencies, such as those repre-! : sented by national security structures. Chapter 4 criticises the Widely-accepted argument that American!

i

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I

I

I

I

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2

INTRODUCTION

international power and hegemony declined substantially dunng the

1970s and 1980s, opening up the possibility of a disintegration of the postwar international economic order into economic spheres-of­ influence and protected regional blocs, akin to the situation in the 1930s. Rather, American centrality in the global political economy has

changed and in some respects has been re-emphasised. Thus argu­ ments concerning 'hegemonic decline' are misplaced. Chapter 5 offers

an alternative, historical materialist interpretation, and advances the argument that the changes of the 1970s and 1980s are best seen as a 'crisis of hegemony', a crisis which involves a structural trans­ formation in the nature of the postwar politico-economic order, and the political consensus between the states and civil societies of the major capitalist nations. This is not a crisis in American power per se, rather it is a change in the relationship between key social forces within the constitution of the global capitalist order. It is argued that this change cannot be adequately understood using a concept of the state as a domestically autonomous rational actor, unproblematically aggregating national interests.5 In particular, my analysis emphasises the complex interrelationship between state and civil society in the

>

metropolitan capitalist countries, links which connect state and civil society at both 'domestic'. and 'international' levels, and the way these

links can be understood. In order to do this I mtroduce an analysis of the cumulative power of internationally mobile capital within the

global system, and develop a novel, synthetic concept of the 'power of capital'. Chapters 6 to 8 focus on the Trilateral Commission and associated institutions. Chapter 6 examines the origins and formation of the Commission, and Chapter 7 examines its organisational form and networks of interest. Chapter 8 assesses its evolution and develop­ ment in terms of debates about changes in Trilateral and global relations. Special attention is given to the construction and mainte­

nance of networks which link together the internationalist elements of . the civil society of each of the Trilateral countries, helping to cement

their military, political and economic linkages. In particular I consider to what extent the Trilateral Commission 1S dominated by American material interests and frameworks of thought. It is argued that the . political influence of the Trilateral Commission on United States , administrations has been most pronounced on economic rather than military questions. Chapt�r 9 reconsiders the main arguments and evidence, and recapitulates, the theme of a crisis of hegemony. It also applies the criteria for �valuation of different theoretical approaches noted below.

i

3

AMERICAN HEGEMONY AND TRILATERALISM ANALYSING THE TRILATERAL COMMISSION

v !

n

Despite the existence of private international forums like the! Trilateral Commission since the turn of the century, very little sys-I a tematic attention has been paid to them in the major accounts of inter�! T national relations in the twentieth century. 6 I A This might be seen as ironic given that the United States, where! n both the Commission and a large number of other such councils origi-! e' nated, is generally considered to be the birthplace of the modern! a, study of international relations, as well as having the largest and best-I tl resourced research community in this field.7 Moreover, many com-! '" mentators have noted the high degree of interchange between private! a individuals, academics,and policy makers in the sphere of United I 0 States foreign policy,8:Many such individuals are, or have been,! P members of the private councils under discussion. Despite such a\ a: silence in the literature, this book argues that a careful study of the a Commission helps to shed light on important ideological and social I a processes in the global political economy. The membership and net-j 0 works associated with the Commission stretch to the other Trilateral! '1 countries and beyond. In this study, our exposition and analysis of the Commission isl 0 based on a categorisation developed from the three types of (trans-! T national) social forces, identified by Robert Cox. These are: material I 0 capabilities, institutions and ideas.9 These generally originate in the j( economic structure but :interact in a dynamic and dialectical way at! aJ three levels: production !relations (broadly defined), state-civil society i