Op-Ed Contributor
Is the Vision Thing Important?
May 23, 2013
Gorka Sampedro
As we debate our role in
the world today, it is worth asking how American global primacy came
about in the last century. After all, George Washington celebrated our
“detached and distant situation.” Some see our global role as the result
of divine providence; others credit impersonal changes in a continental
scale economy. But what about our leaders? Did it matter who was
president?
Leadership experts stress
the importance of transformational presidents with grand visions and an
inspirational style rather than incremental leaders with a transactional
style.
In a careful study of the
20th century leaders who presided over the growth of American primacy, I
found that many mattered — but not always in the ways that experts
predict.
While two presidents with
transformational objectives (Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman)
made particularly important contributions to the creation of the era of
American primacy, two who had incremental objectives and a transactional
style (Dwight D. Eisenhower and George H.W. Bush) may have been equally
important because of their prudent management that allowed favorable
structural change to occur without disastrous disruptions.
For example, if Ike had not
rejected the recommendation of the Joint Chiefs of Staff that he use
nuclear weapons against China, or if Bush had failed in managing the
peaceful withdrawal of Soviet forces from Germany and the collapse of
the Soviet empire, the world we inhabit today would be very different.
A careful assessment of the
role of leaders has to look at what Sherlock Holmes referred to as dogs
that did not bark, as well as those that did. Non-events can be as
important in foreign policy as events.
Leadership theorists often
assign a strong value to transformational leaders, but I found no
evidence to justify such a preference. The best ethical record belonged
to the incremental and transactional George H.W. Bush, and one of the
poorest records to the transformational and inspirational Woodrow
Wilson.
Yes, leadership mattered in
the creation of American primacy. If the causes were purely structural,
the process should have been much smoother.
After all, America
represented roughly a quarter of the world economy both at the beginning
and the end of the 20th century. American power was strengthened by
World War I, but then we mistakenly turned inward to isolationism. A
change in the structure of power resources cannot explain that interwar
phase of retraction. A good explanation must take (unwise) leadership
decisions into account.
In the middle of the
century, America came to represent nearly half of world product and held
a monopoly on nuclear weapons. Over the next two decades, this share
gradually reverted to the century-long norm of a quarter of the world
economy. That decline was structural, but it was accompanied by unwise
leadership decisions that John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard
Nixon made about Vietnam that created a second period of retraction.
By the 1970s, America had
returned to its earlier share of the world economy, but that did not
lead to Nixon’s expected multi-polarity and the end of American primacy.
On the contrary, American primacy increased in the 1980s and 90s. The
major cause of this shift was long-term economic structural change that
weakened the Soviet Union.
But again leadership
mattered — most importantly in Mikhail Gorbachev’s unintended
acceleration of the demise of the Soviet Union, but also in the
successful choices made by Ronald Reagan and Bush that allowed the
United States to capitalize successfully upon the structural changes.
So presidents matter, but
not exactly in the ways that leadership experts predict. Their
expectation that transformational leaders make all the difference and
incremental or transactional leaders are simply routine managers greatly
oversimplifies the role of leadership.
Appeals for
transformational leadership are not necessarily the best way to
understand the leadership needs of American foreign policy in the 21st
century. Ironically, the first president of this century, George W.
Bush, began with a domestic focus and an incremental foreign policy, but
became transformational after Sept. 11, 2001. The result of his
ambitious vision was the opposite of the successful policy of his
father, who famously proclaimed that he did not do “the vision thing.”
The moral of the story: Beware of experts and leaders bearing transformational gifts.
Joseph S. Nye Jr. is a professor at Harvard and the author most recently of “Presidential Leadership and the Creation of the American Era.”
觀點
變革型和漸進型領導人哪個更好？
小約瑟夫·S·奈 2013年05月23日
Gorka Sampedro
當我們討論美國在當今世界的角色時，有個問題值得問一問，
上世紀，美國是如何獲得世界領先地位的？畢竟，喬治·華盛頓(George
Washington)曾對美國「態度疏離且保持旁觀」這一點表示讚美。有人認為，我們在全球的地位，是上天眷顧的結果；有人將其歸功於大洲規模的經濟體
的客觀變化。但是，是否也與我們的領導人有關？是否與總統是誰有關？
領導學專家強調說，起重要作用的是那些高瞻遠矚、行事作風激勵人心的變革型總統，而非那些漸進式的交易型總統。
我仔細研究了20世紀美國影響力日益增長時的總統，發現許多總統的確很重要，但其方式並非全如專家所言。
在締造美國領先時代的過程中，兩位致力於變革的總統——富
蘭克林·D·羅斯福(Franklin D. Roosevelt )及哈里·S·杜魯門(Harry S.
Truman)——做出了卓越貢獻，然而，兩位致力於漸進式目標的交易型總統——德懷特·D·艾森豪威爾(Dwight D.
Eisenhower)及喬治·H·W·布殊(George H.W.
Bush)——也同樣重要，因為他們謹慎管理國家，使得美國在沒有受到災難性干擾的同時，進行了有益的結構性變化。
例如，如果艾克（Ike，艾森豪威爾的綽號——譯註）沒有
拒絕參謀長聯席會議(Joint Chiefs of
Staff)請他對中國使用核武器的建議，如果布殊(Bush)未能使蘇聯軍隊和平撤出德國，未能妥善應對蘇聯帝國的解體，我們今天居住的這個世界會是完
全不同的。
要仔細評價領導人的作用，就要看一看神探福爾摩斯(Sherlock Holmes)所說的那種不叫的狗，也要看看那種叫喚的狗。在外交上，風平浪靜與風起雲湧一樣重要。
領導學理論家常常極其看重變革型領導人，但是我未曾找到任何證據，來證明這種偏好是合理的。最佳的道德紀錄屬於有着漸進和交易風格的喬治·H·W·布殊，最差紀錄屬於變革型的、激勵型的伍德羅·威爾遜(Woodrow Wilson)。
是的，在締造美國全球領先地位的過程中，領導人很重要。假如這項事業完全是結構性的，其過程會順利許多。
畢竟，在二十世紀初及二十世紀末，美國都佔全球經濟的約四
分之一。第一次世界大戰加強了美國的力量，但是隨後我們錯誤地轉向國內，走上了孤立主義的道路。力量資源結構的變化，不能解釋兩次世界大戰之間美國的退守
行為。要解釋該問題，必須考慮一下那些（不明智的）領導層決定。
上世紀中期，美國生產全球近一半的產品，而且是唯一擁有核
武器的國家。在隨後的二十年里，該份額漸漸回到全球經濟四分之一這個長達一個世紀的平均狀態。這一下降是結構性的，但是也伴隨着約翰·F·肯尼迪
(John F. Kennedy)、林登·B·約翰遜(Lyndon B. Johnson)及理乍得·尼克松(Richard
Nixon )有關越南的不明智領導層決定。這些決定導致了第二個退守階段。
到了20世紀70年代，美國重新恢復其早期的世界經濟份額。但是這並未引發尼克松所預期的世界多極化，及美國領先地位的終結。相反，美國的領先地位在20世紀80年代及90年代得到提升，主要原因是出現了使蘇聯受到削弱的長期經濟結構變化。
但是，領導人也再次起到重要作用——最重要的不僅是米哈伊爾·戈爾巴喬夫(Mikhail Gorbachev)無意間加速了蘇聯的解體，而且還是羅納德·里根(Ronald Reagan)及布殊做出成功選擇，使得美國很好地利用了這些結構性變化。
所以說，總統很重要，但是並非是領導學專家所說的那樣。專家們認為，所有重要貢獻都是變革型領導人做的，漸進風格或交易型的總統僅僅是按部就班的經理人。他們這種對於領導人角色的看法實在太過膚淺。
要理解美國二十一世紀外交政策中需要什麼樣的領導層，最好
的方法不一定就是尋求變革型領導人。諷刺的是，本世紀首位總統喬治·W·布殊(George W.
Bush)上任時，致力於國內事務，外交政策也是漸進型的，但是2011年9月11日之後，他走上了變革型道路。他的宏大遠見的結果與其父的成功政策恰恰
相反。而其父老布殊的名言是，自己不長於做「高瞻遠矚」的事。
因此，本文提醒各位：警惕那些送上變革型禮物的專家及領導人。
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