Introduction: Diplomacy and Ambiguity—Constructing Interests in Cooperation

IF 1.3
Wesley Widmaier, Mathew Davies, Lorraine Elliott, Ralf Emmers, Natasha Hamilton-Hart, Wenting He, Beverley Loke, Susan Park
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Nuance, flexibility, and sometimes ambiguity are the tools of diplomacy.\" Henry Kissinger1 Scholars and practitioners of Asian diplomacy are well acquainted with notions of \"constructive ambiguity,\" a concept associated most prominently with U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger. Indeed, Kissinger's use of ambiguous language—capable of being interpreted in a range of fashions—enabled what was arguably the most important geopolitical shift of the past half-century.2 Specifically, the 1972 Shanghai Communiqué, issued by the governments of the United States and the People's Republic of [End Page 2] China (PRC), saw the United States affirm \"that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China.\"3 By expressing U.S. views in this fashion, Kissinger elided disagreements over who might govern the \"one China\" and enabled the United States and the PRC to establish a de facto partnership opposing Soviet influence in Asia. This ambiguity also served to instill a degree of caution in the PRC and Taiwanese governments, leaving U.S. policy regarding any conflict opaque. Even as Kissinger should be faulted for pursuing an amoral realism in regional contexts, his pragmatic courting of interpretive \"slack\" enabled an era of geopolitical stability. Indeed, one might argue more broadly that key elements of the wider rules-based international order that arose after World War II were themselves based in a pragmatic acceptance of ambiguity, as such ambiguity might ease the process of responding to shifts in security and economic \"fundamentals.\" For example, in place of the classical gold standard that had exacerbated deflationary pressures over the interwar decades, the fixed exchange rates of the Keynesian Bretton Woods framework had a normative component, reflecting a shared commitment to cooperation in pursuit of increased demand and growth. Even where it was recognized that a \"fundamental disequilibrium\" might compel devaluation, this criterion itself remained ambiguous, providing policymakers a zone of discretion in efforts to maintain growth.4 In this way, policymakers sought less to eliminate ambiguities than to manage them in ways that could buffer security or economic pressures. Nevertheless, such possibilities for the use of constructive ambiguity have been increasingly overlooked in recent decades. Rather than manage ambiguities, policymakers have sought to promote clarity and transparency in a way that can limit or eliminate the scope for interpretive nuance.5 Consider the change in approach to U.S.-China relations from Kissinger to President Joe Biden as the Biden administration has moved away [End Page 3] from long-standing ambiguity regarding U.S. intervention in a potential cross-strait conflict to a policy marked by increasingly clear alignment with Taiwan.6 The absence of ambiguity and uncertainty may lead to misplaced certainties and excessive risk-taking, making conflict more likely. Likewise, post–Cold War economic policymakers have seen transparency as the key to market stability. For example, former U.S. Federal Reserve chair Alan Greenspan recalled that the postwar Federal Reserve had \"sought to foster highly liquid debt markets through the use of what we called constructive ambiguity,\" on the grounds that \"markets uncertain as to the direction of interest rates would create a desired large buffer of both bids and offers.\"7 Departing from that view by the early 1990s, however, Greenspan argued that clarity would enable \"market participants…to anticipate the Federal Reserve's future moves…[thereby] stabilizing the debt markets.\"8 Such expectations would, of course, be set back by the 2007–9 global financial crisis, demonstrating the risks that misplaced market and policy certainty might fuel contagion and self-reinforcing crisis. To be sure, none of this is to suggest that there are not conditions under which clarity may have advantages. Indeed, as Jacqueline Best has noted, \"too much ambiguity can be destabilizing,\" given that there is no...","PeriodicalId":53442,"journal":{"name":"Asia Policy","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3000,"publicationDate":"2023-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Asia Policy","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1353/asp.2023.a911617","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0

Abstract

Introduction:Diplomacy and Ambiguity—Constructing Interests in Cooperation Wesley Widmaier (bio), Mathew Davies (bio), Lorraine Elliott (bio), Ralf Emmers (bio), Natasha Hamilton-Hart (bio), Wenting He (bio), Beverley Loke (bio), and Susan Park (bio) [End Page 1] "Diplomacy requires constant adjustment to changing circumstance; it must leave a margin for the unexpected; the unpredictable is what always happens in foreign affairs. Nuance, flexibility, and sometimes ambiguity are the tools of diplomacy." Henry Kissinger1 Scholars and practitioners of Asian diplomacy are well acquainted with notions of "constructive ambiguity," a concept associated most prominently with U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger. Indeed, Kissinger's use of ambiguous language—capable of being interpreted in a range of fashions—enabled what was arguably the most important geopolitical shift of the past half-century.2 Specifically, the 1972 Shanghai Communiqué, issued by the governments of the United States and the People's Republic of [End Page 2] China (PRC), saw the United States affirm "that all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait maintain there is but one China and that Taiwan is a part of China."3 By expressing U.S. views in this fashion, Kissinger elided disagreements over who might govern the "one China" and enabled the United States and the PRC to establish a de facto partnership opposing Soviet influence in Asia. This ambiguity also served to instill a degree of caution in the PRC and Taiwanese governments, leaving U.S. policy regarding any conflict opaque. Even as Kissinger should be faulted for pursuing an amoral realism in regional contexts, his pragmatic courting of interpretive "slack" enabled an era of geopolitical stability. Indeed, one might argue more broadly that key elements of the wider rules-based international order that arose after World War II were themselves based in a pragmatic acceptance of ambiguity, as such ambiguity might ease the process of responding to shifts in security and economic "fundamentals." For example, in place of the classical gold standard that had exacerbated deflationary pressures over the interwar decades, the fixed exchange rates of the Keynesian Bretton Woods framework had a normative component, reflecting a shared commitment to cooperation in pursuit of increased demand and growth. Even where it was recognized that a "fundamental disequilibrium" might compel devaluation, this criterion itself remained ambiguous, providing policymakers a zone of discretion in efforts to maintain growth.4 In this way, policymakers sought less to eliminate ambiguities than to manage them in ways that could buffer security or economic pressures. Nevertheless, such possibilities for the use of constructive ambiguity have been increasingly overlooked in recent decades. Rather than manage ambiguities, policymakers have sought to promote clarity and transparency in a way that can limit or eliminate the scope for interpretive nuance.5 Consider the change in approach to U.S.-China relations from Kissinger to President Joe Biden as the Biden administration has moved away [End Page 3] from long-standing ambiguity regarding U.S. intervention in a potential cross-strait conflict to a policy marked by increasingly clear alignment with Taiwan.6 The absence of ambiguity and uncertainty may lead to misplaced certainties and excessive risk-taking, making conflict more likely. Likewise, post–Cold War economic policymakers have seen transparency as the key to market stability. For example, former U.S. Federal Reserve chair Alan Greenspan recalled that the postwar Federal Reserve had "sought to foster highly liquid debt markets through the use of what we called constructive ambiguity," on the grounds that "markets uncertain as to the direction of interest rates would create a desired large buffer of both bids and offers."7 Departing from that view by the early 1990s, however, Greenspan argued that clarity would enable "market participants…to anticipate the Federal Reserve's future moves…[thereby] stabilizing the debt markets."8 Such expectations would, of course, be set back by the 2007–9 global financial crisis, demonstrating the risks that misplaced market and policy certainty might fuel contagion and self-reinforcing crisis. To be sure, none of this is to suggest that there are not conditions under which clarity may have advantages. Indeed, as Jacqueline Best has noted, "too much ambiguity can be destabilizing," given that there is no...
导论:外交与歧义——合作中的利益建构
简介:外交与歧义——构建合作中的利益韦斯利·威德迈尔(传记)、马修·戴维斯(传记)、洛林·艾略特(传记)、拉尔夫·埃默斯(传记)、娜塔莎·汉密尔顿-哈特(传记)、何文霆(传记)、贝弗利·洛克(传记)和苏珊·帕克(传记)“外交需要不断调整以适应不断变化的环境;它必须为意外事件留有余地;外交事务中总是发生不可预测的事情。细微差别、灵活性,有时模棱两可是外交的工具。”亚洲外交的学者和实践者对“建设性模糊”的概念非常熟悉,这个概念与美国国务卿亨利·基辛格联系在一起。事实上,基辛格使用的模棱两可的语言——能够以各种方式进行解释——促成了可以说是过去半个世纪最重要的地缘政治转变具体来说,1972年由美国和中华人民共和国政府发表的《上海公报》申明,“台湾海峡两岸的所有中国人都认为只有一个中国,台湾是中国的一部分。”通过以这种方式表达美国的观点,基辛格回避了关于谁可以管理“一个中国”的分歧,并使美国和中国能够建立一种事实上的伙伴关系,反对苏联在亚洲的影响。这种模棱两可也给中国和台湾政府灌输了一定程度的谨慎,使美国对任何冲突的政策都不透明。尽管基辛格在地区背景下追求一种非道德的现实主义应该受到指责,但他对解释性“松弛”的务实追求,使一个地缘政治稳定的时代成为可能。事实上,人们可能会更广泛地认为,二战后出现的更广泛的基于规则的国际秩序的关键要素本身就是基于对模糊性的务实接受,因为这种模糊性可能会缓解应对安全和经济“基本面”变化的过程。例如,凯恩斯布雷顿森林框架的固定汇率取代了在两次世界大战之间的几十年里加剧通缩压力的经典金本位制,它有一个规范的组成部分,反映了共同致力于合作以追求增加的需求和增长。即使在认识到“根本失衡”可能迫使货币贬值的地方,这一标准本身仍然模棱两可,为政策制定者在努力维持增长方面提供了一个自由裁量的空间通过这种方式,政策制定者寻求的不是消除歧义,而是以能够缓冲安全或经济压力的方式管理它们。然而,近几十年来,这种使用建设性歧义的可能性越来越被忽视。政策制定者不是管理含糊不清,而是设法以一种可以限制或消除解释细微差别的范围的方式促进清晰度和透明度考虑一下从基辛格到乔·拜登(Joe Biden)总统对美中关系的态度变化,拜登政府已经从长期以来对美国干预潜在的两岸冲突的模棱两可转向了与台湾日益明确结盟的政策。缺乏模棱两可和不确定性可能导致错误的确定性和过度的冒险,使冲突更有可能发生。同样,冷战后的经济政策制定者将透明度视为市场稳定的关键。例如,前美联储主席艾伦·格林斯潘回忆说,战后的美联储“试图通过使用我们所谓的建设性模糊来培育高流动性的债务市场”,理由是“市场对利率方向的不确定性将创造一个理想的买卖双方的巨大缓冲。”然而,到20世纪90年代初,格林斯潘改变了这一观点,他认为,明确将使“市场参与者……能够预测美联储未来的行动……[从而]稳定债务市场。”当然,这种预期会因2007 - 2009年的全球金融危机而受挫,这表明,错误的市场和政策确定性可能会加剧危机的蔓延和自我强化。可以肯定的是,这并不是说,在某些情况下,透明度可能会有好处。的确,正如杰奎琳·贝斯特(Jacqueline Best)所指出的那样,“太多的模糊性可能会破坏稳定”,因为没有……
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来源期刊
Asia Policy
Asia Policy Arts and Humanities-History
CiteScore
0.80
自引率
0.00%
发文量
55
期刊介绍: Asia Policy is a peer-reviewed scholarly journal presenting policy-relevant academic research on the Asia-Pacific that draws clear and concise conclusions useful to today’s policymakers.
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