The Harvard Salient

November 4, 1996

A Yen for American Politics

The Wall Street Journal editorial page, in a last-ditch effort to rescue the Dole campaign, has started digging dirt on contributions that Mr. Clinton has received from "foreigners" - the Indonesian Lippo Group. The editorial page at one time wondered aloud whether Mr. Clinton's decisions to open up foreign banking and to grant China Most Favored Nation status had anything to do with his Indonesian friendship. This is silly. The Lippo Group is a featherweight in financial services. Mochtar Riady, an executive of Lippo Group, also has enough connections in China to make Warren Christopher jealous.

What is not touched on, of course, is why taking contributions from foreigners should be wrong at all. On the face of it, it seems rather simple. America for the Americans, of course. Furthermore, one really should not have foreign interests trying to subvert America's welfare. But does this argument bear a more sober scrutiny?

The fact is that America is important in the world; its actions affect many people, some of whom happen to live within its territories, and many more of whom do not. The lives of Mexicans and Canadians are affected daily by what happens in Washington, yet because of a geographical accident - or rather, because of unintentional respites in America's bellicose zeal in the nineteenth century - they are not part of the decision-making process in this country. This might not be so bad were Americans sympathetic and in tune with what is happening in the rest of the world, but, alas, Americans are not. Most Americans, including the enlightened section, have never stepped out of the country, and the majority of them do not carry a passport. Since the end of the Cold War, foreign policy has ranked as the lowest priority on the voters' checklist. And America's friends are not impressed; expatriates need constantly to brace themselves for embarrassments they suffer abroad for the ignorance at home.

Giving foreigners the vote would be a ready remedy for this situation, but money is a good though imperfect substitute. Legalizing foreign contributions will at least give these interests a voice, a force, in American politics and ensure that there is some consideration given to the impact of American action on the rest of the world. Let us not pretend that America does not do the same thing. Some years ago, America all but said that Israel should throw out Yitzhak Shamir, and patted itself on the back when Labor was elected. (Benjamin Netanyahu's campaign was run by Arthur Finkelstein, an American citizen. Imagine the uproar in America if either presidential campaign were run by an Israeli.)

Legalizing contributions from foreigners would also make more sense because, frankly, nowadays it is difficult to tell them apart. Are contributions from Mazda legal or illegal? It is a Japanese company and probably speaks for Japanese interests, but it is owned by Ford. And what about institutions as American as Saks Fifth Avenue and Brooks Brothers, or should we regard them as too Arabic and British? Is Rupert Murdoch Australian, British or American? When his money rolls in, is he playing the liberal fan of Tony Blair or the conservative pal of Newt Gingrich? Nationality, corporate or private, has become a muddle.

Allowing foreign contributions is not, in fact, so radical a theory. Legalizing foreign contributions is consistent with the fashionable theory of stakeholders. The idea is that corporations should not be run for the benefit of shareholders only; employees, customers and communities - people, groups and institutions with a "stake" in a corporation - should also have a voice on the board of directors. America's shareholders, one might say, are the people who are its citizens, but many more people around the world have a stake in what is being done here. In fact, giving foreigners a voice in the running of America is all the more important because, unlike corporations, the behavior of America is not regulated by enforceable laws. As such, the only way of preventing America from being anti-social in the world community is to allow political participation for all those who have a stake in the future of this country.

Whether America legalizes foreign campaign contributions or not, it does need to review its notions of democracy and citizenship. America was born out of a battle cry: No taxation without representation." What it really means, I gather, is that the government should derive its consent from those whose lives it affects in a substantial way. Whereas in the insular environment two hundred years ago a government could be safely assumed to affect only those who lived in well-defined boundaries, today such an assumption is unwise. Democracy is not simply "one man, one vote"; its underlying idea is self-government, extending political participation to everyone whose welfare is affected by the actions of the state.

Citizenship, likewise, involves more than being in America or being sired by Americans. Locke thought citizenship worthy only of those who owned property, for only they have a demonstrated interest in the welfare of the community. Today, property is no longer a qualification for citizenship, but the same rough idea is there. Citizenship should be more elevated than the mere accident of birth or geography. A citizen should be someone whose interest is intimately tied to a community and who feels both the duty and the need to participate in its political processes. Many "foreigners" meet these criteria. Most Americans, on the other hand, do not bother to exercise their duties as citizens; many of them do not vote, many of them do not know the political candidates, and many of them do not care. Yet they are citizens, and they have the right to decide the future of their community and that of communities around them. And why do they deserve the advantage of citizenship and of being able to wield the power of America over others? In the words of Beaumarchais's Figaro, because they took the trouble to be born, nothing more. Two hundred and twenty years ago, those words started a revolution.

-Davis Wang

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