Very Soft Power

Although Joseph Nye coined the term 'soft power' in his 1990 book Bound to Lead, it's always striking to come across examples of Americans in previous generations who had tremendous faith in the concept, although the never coined the phrase.

For example, as the US weighed the question of whether to intervene in the Greek struggle for independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1824, Rep. Daniel Webster informed the House that

The age has undergone a change; there is a force in public opinion, which, in the long run, will outweigh all the physical force that can be brought to oppose it." (Quoted in Marion Smith, The Myth of American Isolationism, p.19)

In 1929, Secretary of State Henry Stimson explained that public opinion "is a sanction which is growing stronger every day where public is growing more enlightened." Thus the surest way to enforce the Kellogg-Briand peace pact was

"Not by seeking to add extraneous sanctions of force, but by providing the machinery for enlightening and strengthening the present sanction of public opinion." (Quoted in Robert H. Ferrell, American Diplomacy in the Great Depression, p.26)

Thankfully, this kind of naivete doesn't prevail today among any serious policy analysts, but it is a sober reminder of the excesses to which we are prone.

Great Moments of Presidential Optimism

"Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future." Often attributed to Yogi Berra, the actual source of the quotation seems to be the physicist Niels Bohr, who himself borrowed it from others. Anyhow, as a rogue political scientist who frowns on his discipline's unquenchable thirst for predictive power, it's a quotation of which I am very fond. It came to mind because I was recently struck by two examples of presidential optimism that, at least in hindsight, seem shockingly naive.

Summit at Potsdam

In his Pulitzer-winning biography of Harry Truman, David McCullough says that Truman, upon his arrival at Potsdam, retained

his fundamental faith that most problems come down to misunderstandings between people, and that even the most complicated problems really weren't as complicated as they were made out to be, once everyone got to know each other...He was sure if he could meet Stalin and deal with him, then he could get to know Stalin and understand him. (pp.409-410)

Thankfully, Truman wised up later on. On a related note, I also came across this quote from Herbert Hoover, from a letter to his Secretary of State Henry Stimson, written in September 1929.

It seems to me that there is the most profound outlook for peace today that we have had at any time in the last half century...it occurs to me that the dangers of war during the next six or ten years...are inconceivably less than they have been at any period since the Great War.

Oops.  Btw, Hoover's quote can be found in Robert Ferrell's American Diplomacy in the Great Depression, p.19.