Who do you call when you need to reach Europe? Merkel? Sarkozy? Brown? Barroso? There is no one leader of Europe. Instead of a single voice, it has 27 competing voices. It’s always been a question, and some argue that it limits Europe’s global reach. If the Lisbon treaty is ratified, there could soon be a president of the European Union.

Tony Blair is the early favorite, but a high-profile option will have several hurdles to get over. Other options include Jan Peter Balkenende, prime minister of the Netherlands, Jean-Claude Juncker, prime minister of Luxembourg, and Paavo Lipponen, a former prime minister of Finland. Power and influence do not necessarily come with the job, but a figure with global stature will clearly elevate the role.

Of course, national leaders will not go away and will remain relevant on the international stage. A president, however, could potentially strengthen Europe’s collective voice and influence in relations with other world powers – the United States, China, India, Russia, and Brazil – and in international discussions.

We will soon know who, if anyone, to call if we need Europe. That is, if the Czech Republic decides to ratify the Lisbon treaty.

Image from Foreign Policy.

The cover story of this week’s Economist argues that “it is time for the world’s biggest economy to rise from its slumber and play a global role.” Although the Lisbon treaty – and its likely ratification – does not signal an obvious emergence of a European superpower, it provokes the questions, “Will Europe wake up and take a bigger role in the world? Or are the affairs of man to be decided largely in Washington and Beijing, with the new ‘G2’ occasionally copying in the Brussels bureaucracy on its decisions?”

Over the past half century, Europe has looked inward. Sure, the soft pull of membership is often overlooked as a stabilizing force, but the European Union sometime punches below its weight in international affairs. If economic size is power, Europe isn’t taking advantage. “At present Europe is a weak actor on a stage dominated by America and China; India and Brazil are in the wings.”

Europe is capable of doing more. But, Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, warns, “It really does remain to be seen whether the changes that Lisbon brings are meaningful or whether they end up proving rather hollow because of the re-nationalization of power in Europe and the growing strength of the nation-states vis-à-vis the Union.”

Image from The Economist.

Size. Strength. Potential. Neighbors. The world’s two fastest rising powers – China and India – are often considered strategic rivals, not close friends. Sure, Beijing and Delhi often sing the same tune in international powwows, but their differences are real and could become more pronounced.

Beijing and Delhi largely agree on climate change, trade and several other issues of global concern. India’s environment minister, Jairam Ramesh, recently said that “India feels closer to China than the United States” on the issue of climate change – the two are “standing 100 percent together.”

This united front is analyzed by Neeta Lal, a journalist based in New Delhi, and she argues that their resistance to strict carbon emissions is a noteworthy but rare display of solidarity “given the two Asian giants’ generally tenuous relationship, as well as previous fractiousness regarding which one should do more to combat global warming.”

Possibilities for cooperation seem to be extending beyond climate change. “In its attempt to stomp out the pro-Uighur movement in its restive western autonomous region, Xinjiang, China might be looking for help from a surprising partner: its major rival in the region, India,” writes Bahukutumbi Raman, who formerly served in India’s intelligence agency.

While this could bring the rivals closer together, “this new partnership only goes so far…although cooperation against acts of terrorism will continue to expand, the chances of China and India working together against terrorist organizations are remote.”

Their agreements will not forever overshadow their disagreements. The relationship is still burdened by border disputes, unease over growing military capabilities, competition for resources and influence and different friends in Asia.

China and India are both too big to ignore. And neither will ignore the rise of the other.

Photo from Eric Feferberg/AFP/Getty Images.

Should America be a great power? If so, can the United States remain a great power? Christian Brose, senior editor at Foreign Policy, and Rachel Kleinfeld, president of the Truman National Security Project, debate the future of the world’s hegemon and rising heavyweights on bloggingheads.tv.

Christian Brose argues that “the greatest advantage that the United States has going forward is that as other countries become more powerful there is always going to be the feeling among their neighbors and among others in the world that they are going to view that apprehensively and I think they are going to look to the United States…to provide you with a security partner.”

“The United States could destroy ourselves if we’re not careful,” warns Rachel Kleinfeld. And she argues that the previous administration in Washington “lost more of America’s power over the last eight years than we’ve ever seen before.”

Video from blogginghead.tv.

On Tuesday, South Korea launched its first rocket but failed to put the satellite in its planned orbit. Russia helped build the rocket after the United States refused due to worries that a regional arms race could take off. “With all its neighbors – China, Japan and North Korea – pursuing space programs, South Korea has been eager to have its own.”

South Korea and its northern neighbor are not the only ones with ambitions to reach space and contend with the well-established programs. Contenders in the new global space race also include Iran and Brazil. Russia has successfully put the most payloads into orbit in the last decade with the US close behind. China now launches more rockets than Europe and Japan and India send up less than five a year on average.

Images from The Economist and Jason Lee for Foreign Policy.

What would President Monroe say?

China: Learning to enjoy the Brazilian bear hug. Presidents Lula and Hu. Source: Xinhuanet

An Economist article discusses the growing presence of Great Powers, especially China, in Latin America, flouting nearly two centuries of U.S. dominance in the region, since the articulation of the Monroe Doctrine in the early 1820s.  In the near term, this worry is overdone.  Longer-term, if the U.S. continues to damage its sovereign creditworthiness, i.e. by not putting in place a medium-term fiscal consolidation program (that is, to reduce America’s rising government debt) – a program that should include putting health care reform on hold, then America’s relative decline will accelerate and this will affect its projection of power in the Western Hemisphere. 

In the 1820s, as revolution in Spain led to unrest in its colonies in the Western Hemisphere, the Holy Alliance of autocratic east European courts – Russia, Austria and Prussia, threatened to intervene in these colonies.  President Monroe in 1823, backed by the British Navy, warned Europe that any extension of European power to the Western Hemisphere would be “dangerous to our [U.S.] peace and safety.”

Nowadays, as the world moves increasingly toward a multipolar system, power projection in Latin America is largely in the form of commerce.  China, India and others seek, above all, the region’s raw materials to fuel their rising economies.  True, with economic influence comes political influence.  True as well, such powers as Russia and Iran seek direct political influence through arms sales and energy deals with the likes of Chavez’s Venezuela, Cuba, and Evo Morales’s Bolivia.  But these countries are on the fringe.  More of interest to U.S. policymakers are China’s economic relations with the major economies of the region, notably Brazil.  China’s economic relations with Brazil have been hand in glove — raw materials fueling a manufacturing juggernaut, while with Mexico, they have been competitive.  Brazil is also a manufacturing nation and will one day find China an unwelcome competitor. 

So, the thrust of the foreign “intervention” is commercial and good for Latin America.  This is good for the United States as well, insofar as China supports growth in the region and the U.S. no longer has to be relied on so heavily as the source of demand and investment for the hemisphere.  In previous U.S. downturns, Latin countries hovered on the brink of default (or in fact defaulted), whereas this crisis they have weathered, due in part to demand from China and elsewhere. 

China, for its part, is “intervening” in Latin America as a rule-abiding member of the global capitalist system, wrought by the U.S. and its allies.  This should not worry American policymakers.  Sure, they should keep an eye on the mischief-making of countries like Iran and Russia that seek to upset the U.S. in its own backyard, much as Krushchev did with Cuba in the middle of the last century (however less dramatic and threatening the current mischief-making is).  Again, the smartest thing U.S. policymakers can do is get America’s fiscal house in order – by first of all, postponing health care reform — and revive the formidable U.S. economy — upon which the country’s power projection is based — not least through continued banking overhaul, workout of real estate loans, policies to increase household savings, and a reform of monetary policy (by discarding Greenspan’s discredited approach).

While India is rapidly developing and modernizing, the police force is abusive and failing. Last week, Human Rights Watch released a report that “documents the failings of state police forces that operate outside the law, lack sufficient ethical and professional standards, are overstretched and outmatched by criminal elements and unable to cope with increasing demands and public expectations.”

Even though police officers in India know the boundaries of the law, they often commit human rights violations because they believe “that unlawful methods, including illegal detention and torture, [are] necessary tactics of crime investigation and law enforcement.” Marginalized groups are particularly vulnerable to abuse. In turn, the public’s lack of trust in the police force, limits officers’ ability to investigate major crimes, including terrorism.

India’s newly elected government has promised to enact reforms, but governments have repeatedly failed to hold abusers accountable.

Photo from Getty Images and video from Human Rights Watch.

“After decades of frustration, miscalculation, unrealized potential, India is now emerging as a factor in the global balance of power,” writes Shakti Prasad Srichandan in a Foreign Policy Association Feature published yesterday. He is a scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.

“In the coming years, it will have an opportunity to shape outcomes on the most critical issues of the twenty-first century like the construction of Asian stability, the management of globalization, war on terror, non-proliferation, climate change, energy security, WTO negotiations and the future of UN.”

Also, check out FPA’s new blog on India.

Image from the Stanley Foundation.

Are India’s foreign policy institutions undermining the country’s rise? Daniel Markey, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, writes in this month’s issue of Asia Policy that “India’s own foreign policy establishment hinders the country from achieving great-power status.” He argues that India needs to reform and expand the foreign service and develop stronger foreign policy research by increasing access to information, investing in think tanks and improving university education.

“Institutions charged with researching, formulating, debating, and implementing foreign policy are too often underdeveloped, in decay, or chronically short of resources. In particular, India’s diplomatic service, think-tanks, and universities are not yet up to the task of managing an agenda befitting a great power. As a result, even a wealthier and more powerful India may remain politically inconsequential, unable to set forth and implement a realistic global agenda or to exercise international leadership.”

Figure from Asia Policy.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke today at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, DC. She emphasized the centrality of the United States and the importance of cooperation. Even though no country can solve global challenges alone, “no challenge can be met without America.” Working with the world’s rising powers – including China, India, Russia, Brazil, Turkey, Indonesia, and South Africa – is essential as “these states are vital to achieving solutions to the shared problems and advancing our priorities.”

“Now, some see the rise of other nations and our economic troubles here at home as signs that American power has waned. Others simply don’t trust us to lead; they view America as an unaccountable power, too quick to impose its will at the expense of their interests and our principles. But they are wrong…

“America will always be a world leader as long as we remain true to our ideals and embrace strategies that match the times…

“Our approach to foreign policy must reflect the world as it is, not as it used to be. It does not make sense to adapt a 19th century concert of powers, or a 20th century balance of power strategy. We cannot go back to Cold War containment or to unilateralism…

“In short, we will lead by inducing greater cooperation among a greater number of actors and reducing competition, tilting the balance away from a multi-polar world and toward a multi-partner world…

“We will also put special emphasis on encouraging major and emerging global powers – China, India, Russia and Brazil, as well as Turkey, Indonesia, and South Africa – to be full partners in tackling the global agenda. I want to underscore the importance of this task, and my personal commitment to it. These states are vital to achieving solutions to the shared problems and advancing our priorities – nonproliferation, counterterrorism, economic growth, climate change, among others. With these states, we will stand firm on our principles even as we seek common ground.”

For more, check out coverage in the FPA’s Africa Blog.

Photo from AFP/Karen Bleier and clip from MSNBC.