From National Interest to Global Reform: Patterns of Reasoning in British Foreign Policy Discourse

Abstract

This article

• Formulates an ideal-typical model for filling out the implicit content of claims about the national interest;
• Applies a theoretical perspective on the national interest to New Labour's foreign policy discourse, focusing especially on its approach to global order;
• Shows how Gordon Brown, especially, extended the content of the national interest well beyond its traditional association with national security, narrowly construed;
• Provides tools for interrogating claims about the national interest and for holding politicians to account in respect of such claims.

Discussion of the national interest often focuses on how Britain's influence can be maximized, rather than on the goals that influence serves. Yet what gives content to claims about the national interest is the means-ends reasoning which links interests to deeper goals. In ideal-typical terms, this can take two forms. The first, and more common, approach is conservative: it infers national interests and the goals they advance from existing policies and commitments. The second is reformist: it starts by specifying national goals and then asks how they are best advanced under particular conditions. New Labour's foreign policy discourse is notable for its explicit use of a reformist approach. Indeed, Gordon Brown's vision of a ‘new global society’ not only identifies global reform as a key means of fulfilling national goals, but also thereby extends the concept of the national interest well beyond a narrow concern with national security.