America’s Role in the World

On Tuesday, April 23rd, twelve students gathered at the University of Alabama to participate in a National Issues Forum on Americaʼs Role in the World. The issue book used for this forum offers different approaches to answering the question, “What does national security mean in the twenty-first century?” By participating in this forum, Alabama students were able to contribute to the New Dartmouth Conference, a biannual conference hosted by the Kettering Foundation. Each year the New Dartmouth Conference brings together policy makers, experts, former public officials and researchers from Russia and the United States. New Dartmouth is designed to promote a sustained dialogue about the changing nature of United States-Russian relations among prominent national leaders.

While the Kettering Foundation and their associates have been conducting forums all over the US, a group of Russian scholars and sociologists are preparing a parallel report analyzing the results of forums being held across that country on “Russia’s Role in the World.” The results of the two reports will be presented at the fall 2010 meeting of the New Dartmouth Conference.

Here is a reflection on the forum by Angel King, a Jean OʼConner Snyder intern:

I thought that the Forum was very interesting and quite a success. It seemed to me that the issue of national security was an issue that was very important the people who attended, and it also seemed to be an issue that the people present had quite a bit of knowledge on. The conversation was highly intellectual, with members often times calling upon their knowledge of economics, international relations, and politics. The amount of lofty academic discussion that occurred in this forum was surprising, but refreshing to me, since many of the forums I have attended tend be only lightly sprinkled with participants who can offer real in-depth knowledge on the topic at hand. Perhaps, it was the fact that this particular forum was held on a college campus that led to the high concentration of knowledge in the room or the topic itself, but I can honestly say that for someone who is not particularly well versed in the areas of trade, global economics, social forecasting, I left the forum having learned a lot more about several of the issues that affect national security and how we as a nation should come to define the term.

Throughout the discussion, the common thread between the participants’ views in the 3 approaches was the word balance. The group really seemed to be in accordance throughout the entire discussion, very rarely bumping heads on any of the approaches. The lack of tension when examining the approaches could very well also be due to the fact that the participants were all college students who all seemed to share a global view–a view that we as the United States can longer afford to act as if our decisions and the consequences of those decisions do not affect the world and vice versa. Because there was not much contention over the idea that America has some duty to the global society, there was not much contention over the fact that the best approach to defining national security would be to find a balance between doing what is best for the protection of our country, while not sacrificing our duty to the global society and the bigger issues such as environmental issues, or trade issues that could pose a threat to both the United States and the global society as a whole. As the group waded through each of the approaches it was clear that if any part of that approach conflicted with finding the desired balance between responsibility to home and responsibility to the world, that part was immediately raised as a point of contention.

Although the forum ended due to time constraints before the group could formulate their own 4th approach, I am sure that it would have no doubt reflected the group’s desire to have the United States act as a global leader in addressing issues such as global warming and free trade that could pose a threat to our nation’s economic and environmental security as well as having the United States continue to address more physical threats by securing borders, and responding militarily when necessary.

Overall, I felt as though the group left the forum feeling that the conversation was important and meaningful, and everyone expressed how necessary it was for conversations like the forum to continue.

-Lindsey Mullen and Angel King