Speaker 1: Hi everyone, I'm Katie Curic, and welcome to Next Question. Today.
Speaker 1: I wanted to look outside the US for a moment
Speaker 1: and consider the bigger global picture. The US has taken
Speaker 1: a clear step back from its leadership position on the
Speaker 1: global stage, and countries around the world have been left
Speaker 1: to fend for themselves, which leads to my next question,
Speaker 1: what will the new world order look like in the
Speaker 1: wake of the coronavirus pandemic? And there's really no one
Speaker 1: better to ask than my guests for this special bonus episode,
Speaker 1: Richard Hass. He's the president of the Council and Form Relations,
Speaker 1: the author of the new book The World A Brief Introduction,
Speaker 1: and definitely one of the smartest people I know. I
Speaker 1: spoke with him about why he believes this crisis promises
Speaker 1: to be less of a turning point than away station
Speaker 1: along this same road the world's been traveling for the
Speaker 1: past few decades. Richard Hass. Great to have you on
Speaker 1: the podcast. Great to be had so Richard. Of course
Speaker 1: we should mention we've known each other for a very
Speaker 1: long time. Met Gosh, at this point, maybe thirty years
Speaker 1: ago when you were in Washington. I'm much too young
Speaker 1: for that to be possible, but but it was something
Speaker 1: it might be about that you were still you were
Speaker 1: a young reporter for the NBC affiliate in Washington, that's right.
Speaker 1: And we met when we were in line at the
Speaker 1: Social Safe Way in Washington, d C. And I just
Speaker 1: started talking to you because I thought you seemed cute.
Speaker 1: I was engaged at the time, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I was like, well, we just have to kind of
Speaker 1: because I think we're gonna sound like we know each
Speaker 1: other and we're kind of familiar. So I want people
Speaker 1: to understand how and why. And I'll give the short version, Richard,
Speaker 1: I'll give the abridge version. So basically, I saw this
Speaker 1: guy he out on a nice tweet jacket with elbow patches,
Speaker 1: some Hebrew national salami in his part, and I just
Speaker 1: sort of started talking to him because I was always
Speaker 1: trying to set my friend up with a with a
Speaker 1: cute guy. And I found out, Richard, what was living
Speaker 1: in d C. That he had gone to Harvard. By
Speaker 1: the way, I just learned from your book and my research,
Speaker 1: I didn't realize you were a Rhodes scholar. To Jesus, Richard,
Speaker 1: you're quite the overachiever. Anyway, this conversation is only trouble anyway.
Speaker 1: Long story short, he met my friend, they enjoyed each
Speaker 1: other's company, and uh, but it wasn't a love connection.
Speaker 1: He ended up marrying someone else. I know, Susan Mark
Speaker 1: and Daddy. He's a wonderful person and we're all still
Speaker 1: friends to this day. And now you're frequent golf partner
Speaker 1: of my husband's, John Muhlner. A high percentage of what
Speaker 1: you just said is true. Okay, all right, We'll move
Speaker 1: on to loftier topics Richard, and namely your new book
Speaker 1: called The World a Brief Introduction, and I love what
Speaker 1: motivated you to write this book? Can you tell that story? Richard?
Speaker 1: I was doing something I don't frequently do, which was fishing,
Speaker 1: and I was with one of my best buddies and
Speaker 1: his nephew was with him. This was a very bright
Speaker 1: young man, about twenty or twenty one, I think he
Speaker 1: was between his junior and senior years at Stanford. And
Speaker 1: I asked him what he was studying there, and he
Speaker 1: said computer sciences and he told me about it, and
Speaker 1: then I said, I'm just curious because we can't have
Speaker 1: a conversation about computer sciences because I don't know enough
Speaker 1: to have a conversation. But what else are you studying?
Speaker 1: For example, Uh, what kind of history courses are you taking?
Speaker 1: And he said, well, I'm actually not taking any and
Speaker 1: I said, oh, that's interesting. Well what about economics. No,
Speaker 1: I'm not taking any of those either. We went through
Speaker 1: a lot of the liberal arts curriculum, and the bottom
Speaker 1: line is this bright young man was going to graduate
Speaker 1: from one of the greatest universities in the world with
Speaker 1: what I what was a really incomplete undergraduate education. And
Speaker 1: when I got back to my office, we looked at
Speaker 1: hundreds of colleges and universities around the United States, and
Speaker 1: it turned out that his experience was anything but an exception.
Speaker 1: But even though virtually every core campus offered courses on
Speaker 1: foreign policy or international affairs or what have you, virtually none,
Speaker 1: really only a handful required them for graduation. So if
Speaker 1: you wanted to, you could not. You could navigate your
Speaker 1: your requirements for graduation and essentially graduate without even a
Speaker 1: rudimentary knowledge of this world that was going to change
Speaker 1: your life. And what I thought I would try to
Speaker 1: do in a in a single book is give people
Speaker 1: the foundation, not to give them everything they need to
Speaker 1: know much less how to think, but to give them
Speaker 1: enough background so they would be better prepared to handle
Speaker 1: the flood of news coming at them, to ask the
Speaker 1: right questions, to think of out say, investments or business decisions.
Speaker 1: And that was the goal here, to establish a kind
Speaker 1: of foundational of floor level of global literacy for the
Speaker 1: average citizen. I think it's a wonderful idea, Richard, because
Speaker 1: I think not just your friend's nephew is in this boat,
Speaker 1: but I think you know, even well educated people, the
Speaker 1: world is so complicated. There's so much to keep up with.
Speaker 1: It's virtually impossible, I think, unless you're the president of
Speaker 1: the Council on Foreign Relations or this is your area
Speaker 1: of expertise to really have a handle on it. Were
Speaker 1: you able to boil it down and make it accessible
Speaker 1: and understandable for for people honestly like me who is
Speaker 1: excited about reading about some of these things, some for
Speaker 1: the first time and some as a refresher. Of course,
Speaker 1: that was the goal, and ultimately people will tell me
Speaker 1: whether I succeeded. I worked hard at it was actually
Speaker 1: a really difficult book to write for two reasons, and
Speaker 1: you're you suggested both. One was to figure out what
Speaker 1: to put in and what not to and when you
Speaker 1: have it's almost like a buffet and you can put
Speaker 1: on your plate anything from a hundred different goals. How
Speaker 1: do you decide what to take? So I took a
Speaker 1: lot of laps around Central Park thinking about what it
Speaker 1: was to include and what really wasn't uh necessary? And
Speaker 1: then I had to really unpack the issues, not use jargon,
Speaker 1: not assume that people knew some historical reference, had to
Speaker 1: explain everything. I learned a lot in writing it, because
Speaker 1: you know, I do this for a living and I've
Speaker 1: been doing it for forty years. But in many cases
Speaker 1: I didn't know everything I needed to know in order
Speaker 1: to teach it or explain it. Look, it's interesting to
Speaker 1: learn the basics of some of the history, or why
Speaker 1: is the Middle East such a messed up region? Or
Speaker 1: why should we care about I wrote about global health
Speaker 1: and pandemics before anyone knew what COVID nineteen was, or
Speaker 1: just why is climate change such a problem. My goal
Speaker 1: every step of the way was to connect it. The
Speaker 1: subliminal question was why does the world matter? And therefore
Speaker 1: why why? Why do you need to become somewhat more
Speaker 1: knowledgeable about it? Someone somewhat more prepared to deal with it.
Speaker 1: Why do you think people suddenly became so uneducated about civics,
Speaker 1: about world affairs? Um, it seems like a real indictment
Speaker 1: of our education system. Was it the shift in terms
Speaker 1: of what we needed to to really learn about in
Speaker 1: order to secure a good job when people graduated. Was it?
Speaker 1: Was there a turning point? Does it coincide with the
Speaker 1: US is I think increasing tendency to look inward? I mean,
Speaker 1: how do you explain it, because it's actually very depressing
Speaker 1: to me. Well, it's all of the above. I think
Speaker 1: this country has a history of isolationism or continental country.
Speaker 1: A lot goes on here, and when you think about it,
Speaker 1: World War two, in the last seventy years, or really
Speaker 1: the exception when the United States has been involved in
Speaker 1: the world in an open ended way before then, was anything.
Speaker 1: But in some ways, what we're seeing is a little
Speaker 1: bit of a return to our tradition. I think with
Speaker 1: the end of the Cold War this accelerated the sense was, well,
Speaker 1: we can now put our feet up. We don't really
Speaker 1: have to worry about the world all that much. We've
Speaker 1: got lots of problems here at at home to tackle,
Speaker 1: so I think a lot. And then I think, probably
Speaker 1: more recently, Iraq and Afghanistan created the sense that getting
Speaker 1: involved in the world was a bad thing. It costs lives,
Speaker 1: it costs money. So again it pushed people more to
Speaker 1: think about problems. In the United States, you didn't have
Speaker 1: political leaders who were explaining why what goes on in
Speaker 1: the world matters. That's somewhat nuanced conversation. So for any
Speaker 1: number of reasons, Americans just turned away from it, and
Speaker 1: I think mostly in part because they weren't studying it,
Speaker 1: didn't see the didn't see the connections. No one was
Speaker 1: pointing out why this is useful, to know why this
Speaker 1: is relevant, and people thought they could get along fine
Speaker 1: without it. And one of the expensive lessons of what
Speaker 1: we're all going through now in the pandemic is that
Speaker 1: we're learning that the world does matter, it does affect
Speaker 1: our lives. Indeed, fundamentally our life. Denial is not a policy.
Speaker 1: I think the same thing applies to to climate change,
Speaker 1: but it is an indictment that our education in many
Speaker 1: cases is not preparing Americans collectively or individually for the
Speaker 1: for the world that they're going to inherit. When we
Speaker 1: come back more with Richard Hass, President of the Council
Speaker 1: Inform Relations. We're back with Richard Hass, President of the
Speaker 1: Council on Foreign Relations. It's sort of surprising that, as
Speaker 1: Tom Friedman wrote about the world becoming flat, that globalization
Speaker 1: was accompanied by a certain sense of detachment from what
Speaker 1: was happening in you know, outside our borders. You're right,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's a contradiction. Also, I think against globalization
Speaker 1: there was a certain pushback again. Foreign policy we've seen
Speaker 1: as sometimes wasteful or expensive. People didn't always like what
Speaker 1: they saw. They thought they could get along with with
Speaker 1: without it, And we've been living in a certain bubble.
Speaker 1: And we learned on nine eleven that terrorists who were
Speaker 1: trained in Afghanistan could cause the death of three thousand Americans,
Speaker 1: And in a couple of hours, we're learning now about
Speaker 1: what began in Wuhan didn't day in Wuhan, It traveled
Speaker 1: around the world, and now more than eighty thousand or
Speaker 1: so Americans have lost their lives, Trillions of dollars of
Speaker 1: wealth have been eliminated, tens and millions of jobs have
Speaker 1: been eliminated. We saw the fires last summer in California.
Speaker 1: We saw them in Australia, and I think that's just
Speaker 1: a glimmer of what's to come. So I think what
Speaker 1: we're learning is that the world really does matter, that
Speaker 1: we ignore it to our peril. Isolationism is not a
Speaker 1: solution to anything. What I'm hoping people also learn from
Speaker 1: the current crisis is that unilateralism isn't much of a
Speaker 1: response either. We can't do it by ourselves. It can't
Speaker 1: just be America first. We've got to pool our resources
Speaker 1: and and work with others. So this is this is
Speaker 1: the most expensive teaching lesson I can imagine, and I
Speaker 1: want to wish that on this country or any individual,
Speaker 1: no matter what. But since it is happening, I'm hoping
Speaker 1: that we can at least come away with this somewhat
Speaker 1: somewhat the wiser. Well, let's talk about the US response
Speaker 1: to this global pandemic. I know you believe it won't
Speaker 1: so much change the basic direction of world history, but
Speaker 1: will accelerate it. So I think, what what this pandemic
Speaker 1: has done, Richard? In so many ways, it's brought into
Speaker 1: sharp relief pre existing conditions, if you will, not only
Speaker 1: domestically about income, inequality, access to healthcare, but globally about
Speaker 1: the you know, the road we were already down before
Speaker 1: this even surface. Can you talk about that this pandemic
Speaker 1: didn't come out of nowhere, that it came into a context.
Speaker 1: And the context internationally was one of a deteriorating US
Speaker 1: Chinese relationship. You had the Brexit and the problems facing Europe.
Speaker 1: The Middle East was turbulent, to say the least. North
Speaker 1: Korea was increasing its nuclear missile arsenals. Russia was in
Speaker 1: uh Ukraine, China was repressing freedom in Hong Kong, was
Speaker 1: building out in the South China Sea, and as well,
Speaker 1: it was a failed state, hemorrhaging people, and these and
Speaker 1: any number of other challenges or realities in the world.
Speaker 1: And what this has done is intensified it, accelerated and
Speaker 1: exacerbated it. Uh So, the US Chinese relationship is even
Speaker 1: is even worse. The Middle East now faces even more problems,
Speaker 1: and we're looking away. So North Korea has been free
Speaker 1: to continue down its path of missile and nuclear development.
Speaker 1: The world has done nothing to catch up to the
Speaker 1: challenge of climate change. And what's even worse, Katie, is
Speaker 1: because we've had to devote so much of our attention,
Speaker 1: so much of our bandwidth, so much of our resources.
Speaker 1: I worry about this combination of a world that's in
Speaker 1: worse shape than it was because of the pandemic, and
Speaker 1: now we have less attention less capacity to to deal
Speaker 1: with it. That seems to me the worst of all situations.
Speaker 1: But I'm afraid that's the one we have less capacity
Speaker 1: to deal with. What Richard, Oh, it's everything from the
Speaker 1: fact of you've got millions of people around the world
Speaker 1: who are are either ill or will be. You've got
Speaker 1: economies that can't produce enough wealth in order to deal
Speaker 1: with the public health needs as well as to keep
Speaker 1: people employed. You've got the proliferation challenges, the terrorism challenges.
Speaker 1: Russia hasn't left Ukraine, China is not pulling in it's horns.
Speaker 1: You've had all the problems you had before. The last
Speaker 1: book was the World in Disarray, So you had all
Speaker 1: the disarray in the world, which has gradually gotten worse.
Speaker 1: And again, what's now I think that more problematic is
Speaker 1: the problems are more advanced, like climate change. The relationship
Speaker 1: between the two most powerful countries in the world, the
Speaker 1: US and China, is rubbed raw, and the United States
Speaker 1: is spending trillions of dollars in order to provide relief
Speaker 1: to American citizens and businesses, which means that we're not
Speaker 1: going to have the capacity to devote resources and time
Speaker 1: and attention to these international problems. And as we are learning, uh,
Speaker 1: bad things happen around the world, sooner or later, they
Speaker 1: will find their way here. You know, I was thinking
Speaker 1: about terrorism, and I was thinking, as we're all focused
Speaker 1: on the pandemic, we're really not keeping our eye on
Speaker 1: on what kind of mischief quote unquote could be being
Speaker 1: made in some of these terror hot spots or these
Speaker 1: these terrorists hot spots. So I was just I was
Speaker 1: thinking this morning, I mean, when's the last time we
Speaker 1: really focused on terrorism? And the one thing we looked
Speaker 1: at we didn't see Kim Jong n We thought he
Speaker 1: might have died because he wasn't in public. But these
Speaker 1: things have taken are even I mean, they're on the
Speaker 1: back burner in a big way, aren't they. And what
Speaker 1: do you see the ramifications of us not keeping eye
Speaker 1: our eye on terrorism, which certainly is not going away. No,
Speaker 1: history doesn't have a pause button. So just because we're distracted,
Speaker 1: just because we're focusing in where it doesn't mean anything
Speaker 1: else much like everything else stops. It worries me a
Speaker 1: little bit that a terrorist might look at what's going
Speaker 1: on and say, wow, we've been focusing on the wrong
Speaker 1: kinds of threats or weapons. Our goal shouldn't be to
Speaker 1: bring down airplanes or use car bombs, but maybe there
Speaker 1: is something that we could use to infect a population.
Speaker 1: And so I worry a little bit about uh so
Speaker 1: called grand terrorism along uh those you know those lines.
Speaker 1: But even without that uh, the violence hasn't stopped in Afghanistan.
Speaker 1: It hasn't stopped in Seria or Olibya, or or Yemen.
Speaker 1: So again, just because we're not watching, just because we're
Speaker 1: not heavily involved, doesn't mean it's not happening. Take one example, Iran.
Speaker 1: Over the last six months or year, it's estimated that
Speaker 1: Iran has reduced by a significant out how many months
Speaker 1: they would need before they would be on the brank
Speaker 1: of developing a nuclear weapon. And we're not paying close
Speaker 1: attention to it. I expect the Israelis are. But again
Speaker 1: it's just a reminder that here we are while we
Speaker 1: tackle this new set of problems, including pandemics, the old
Speaker 1: set of problems hasn't been resolved, much less going away.
Speaker 1: So two very scary notions, the use of biological weapons,
Speaker 1: which we've of course been somewhat concerned about for many years,
Speaker 1: and a nuclear Iran. Although I thought Iran had been
Speaker 1: so impacted by COVID nineteen as well, Richard, Iran has
Speaker 1: been badly hurt by the plummeting oil price. By their
Speaker 1: in net mismanagement of the pandemic, they allowed the pilgrimage
Speaker 1: to to continue. The government was discredited by their shootdown
Speaker 1: of the Ukrainian civil airliner a few months ago and
Speaker 1: their subsequent cover up. Just the other day there was
Speaker 1: a friendly fire accident where Ronnie and Saw shot at
Speaker 1: an Iranian vessel and I think killed something like twenty
Speaker 1: soldiers or sailors. But at the same time, Uranians are
Speaker 1: still causing real mischief around the region and in Iraq
Speaker 1: and other places, and they are continuing to press up
Speaker 1: against the edges of the two thousand fifteen nuclear agreement.
Speaker 1: So they are there. They are able, if you will,
Speaker 1: to take the punch of the pandemic and still continue
Speaker 1: to cause other problems. Indeed, there's a school of thought
Speaker 1: that because the regime there is facing public criticism for
Speaker 1: its handling of COVID nineteen, that they're doing things in
Speaker 1: order to promote a confrontation with the United States so
Speaker 1: they can wrap themselves in the flag. Change the subject
Speaker 1: if you will, Yes, wag the dog varsity style. Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's you have said that foreign leaders have told you
Speaker 1: that they quote don't recognize America right now and that
Speaker 1: this is not the America they thought they knew. Uh.
Speaker 1: Can you can you elaborate on that a little bit cured?
Speaker 1: And can you talk about what ideally the American response
Speaker 1: would have been to this pandemic versus in reality what
Speaker 1: it has been. Uh, there's two sides to the coin.
Speaker 1: One is domestically, when they look at our politics, they
Speaker 1: look at other features of American society there they shake
Speaker 1: their heads. A lot of them studied here, a lot
Speaker 1: of them spend time here. And so they see United
Speaker 1: States that has not just inequality, but has had several
Speaker 1: decades of lagging or drifting incomes in the part of
Speaker 1: many families. They see the gun violence, which they can't
Speaker 1: understand or comprehend, the opioid deaths. Now, they see the
Speaker 1: inept handling of the pandemic, the lack of testing, the
Speaker 1: lack of discipline, social distancing, inadequate hospital capacity. So this
Speaker 1: is not the United States. They respect much less want
Speaker 1: to emulate. And then they see what we're doing or
Speaker 1: not doing around the world. The fact that we not
Speaker 1: participate in the European led effort to bring countries together
Speaker 1: governments together, say to develop a vaccine, so we're essentially
Speaker 1: missing an action. We talk about being tough on China,
Speaker 1: but then we don't join the Trans Pacific Partnership, the
Speaker 1: Regional Economic grouping, and most of our interaction with our
Speaker 1: allies in the region is to break them over the
Speaker 1: level of defense spending, rather than to come up with
Speaker 1: a common approach, say to dealing with the challenge from
Speaker 1: from China. So I think this the pandemic reinforces a
Speaker 1: lot of these these perceptions of the United of the
Speaker 1: United States that can no longer be counted on abroad,
Speaker 1: were no longer as reliable and at home the United States,
Speaker 1: that is not setting a standard or behavior that they
Speaker 1: had come to to expect from us. And this is
Speaker 1: what this leads to as a world where we have
Speaker 1: less influence, where other countries kind of go their own way.
Speaker 1: But it's not a good situation because these other countries
Speaker 1: don't have the capacity to substitute for US. In some cases,
Speaker 1: they may decide to develop more military capability so they're
Speaker 1: more independent, which is not to me a reassuring future.
Speaker 1: In some cases they may need to assuage a more
Speaker 1: powerful neighbor. But a post American world will probably be
Speaker 1: less prosperous, less free, UH, and less peaceful. And that's
Speaker 1: the direction things are moving. We'll be back with more
Speaker 1: of our conversation right after this once again, Richard Hass,
Speaker 1: President of the Council and Form Relations. You've worked with
Speaker 1: both Republicans and Democratic administrations, Richard uh Is, this is
Speaker 1: this because of Donald Trump's leadership. It has something to
Speaker 1: do with that. Donald Trump is UH an outlier. If
Speaker 1: you look at it, re American president from Harry Truman
Speaker 1: to through Barack Obama, what they had in common was
Speaker 1: far greater than where they disagreed. Donald Trump is the
Speaker 1: first president who probably disagrees more than he has in
Speaker 1: common with all of his modern predecessors. He is clearly
Speaker 1: in that sense of disruptor. But one of the big
Speaker 1: questions in the field is whether it's in six months
Speaker 1: or in four years and six months. And Donald Trump
Speaker 1: is succeeded by someone else. To what extent the things
Speaker 1: go back to what extent now has the rest of
Speaker 1: the world somewhat moved on, to what extent as if
Speaker 1: the American people decided they don't want to support certain
Speaker 1: kinds of policy. But to put it in another way,
Speaker 1: to what extent is Donald Trump or reflection of a
Speaker 1: changed America in a changed world as much as he
Speaker 1: is a driver of it, and that there's a there's
Speaker 1: a big debate about that about what things look like afterwards.
Speaker 1: I don't think there's any going back to where where
Speaker 1: where things were exactly, but I do think they're a
Speaker 1: potential for more of a return to a familiar traditional
Speaker 1: American role in the world. I do think that's possible,
Speaker 1: although you have posited that even a Biden presidency would
Speaker 1: likely not guarantee a full scale return of an expansive
Speaker 1: US role in the world. That's correct. I've written that,
Speaker 1: and I still think that, and it's because the American
Speaker 1: people aren't there. I think the pandemic we'll also reinforce
Speaker 1: that because our domestic needs are going to be enormous,
Speaker 1: the rest of the world might not be as prepared
Speaker 1: to accept America's leadership in the future, and with the
Speaker 1: thought that GF had happened once, it could happen again.
Speaker 1: We can't be quite as reliant on the United States.
Speaker 1: China has become more powerful, Russia is more entrenched in
Speaker 1: the Middle East and in Ukraine. North Korea has much
Speaker 1: farther advanced in terms of its nuclear and missile development.
Speaker 1: What I do know is whoever is the next president
Speaker 1: in early twenty one, whether it's Donald Trump for second
Speaker 1: term or Joe Biden for his first, it's going to
Speaker 1: be an extraordinarily difficult, even daunting uh inbox challenges. And
Speaker 1: that's where again COVID nineteen, the pandemic has made it worse.
Speaker 1: The challenges are somewhat greater about traditional ones as as
Speaker 1: well as global ones, including the pandemic. Would also say
Speaker 1: climate change, and our capacity and focus is going to
Speaker 1: be less so. Even even if a president came in
Speaker 1: like a Joe Biden who was inclined to do certain things,
Speaker 1: he's just going to be dealt a very difficult, very
Speaker 1: difficult hand. Do you think he's up up to the job,
Speaker 1: Richard Well, Joe Biden is someone who has a lot
Speaker 1: of experience, So I have no doubt about his ability.
Speaker 1: He spent eight years as vice president, he spent decades
Speaker 1: in the in the Senate, on the on the Foreign
Speaker 1: Relations Committee. He's experienced with the with the issues. I
Speaker 1: run a nonpartisan institution, so I have to be have
Speaker 1: to be careful. I don't endorse candidates and the like,
Speaker 1: but simply you know, he's got his background and whether
Speaker 1: I don't think even his critics can can deny that
Speaker 1: they can agree or disagree with various stances he's taken
Speaker 1: and he and I have disagreed at times on issues.
Speaker 1: But does he have the experience? Does he have the
Speaker 1: familiarity both with the issues and how the US government
Speaker 1: makes policy? I think the answer there is a clear guess. Clearly,
Speaker 1: we are probably on the verge of a new era
Speaker 1: in foreign policy. You know, from the post Cold War war.
Speaker 1: This might be the post pandemic right era in foreign relations.
Speaker 1: But are there some positive things that we can look
Speaker 1: forward to? I think one thing that has been made
Speaker 1: abundantly clear, at least from where I sit, Richard is
Speaker 1: in an era where expertise was less and less valued.
Speaker 1: We are starting to recognize, I think more than we did,
Speaker 1: the importance of science, the important of data, the importance
Speaker 1: of facts. Some people more than others, I think, would
Speaker 1: are appreciating those things. But do you see that as
Speaker 1: a positive as we emerge from this crisis, Well, I
Speaker 1: hope you're right, and the kind of respect you feet
Speaker 1: see for Dr Fauci, for example, the climate debate became
Speaker 1: a more serious debate and people we spent less time
Speaker 1: having to argue that a climate change is real and
Speaker 1: more change, more kind of time talking about actually how
Speaker 1: to actually deal with it, how to prevent future climate change,
Speaker 1: adapt to existing climate change, than I would be uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I would be gratified and reassured. I'm hoping
Speaker 1: also that what comes out of this is a growing
Speaker 1: recognition that the world does matter, that isolationism and unilateralism
Speaker 1: are not viable alternatives, that we have a tremendous stake
Speaker 1: and what happens outside our borders, and that we have
Speaker 1: to we have to be involved, We can't be passive,
Speaker 1: we can't simply bury our head in the center. Well,
Speaker 1: I certainly hope we learn. And the other thing that
Speaker 1: I hope is but I'm not I'm not certain it
Speaker 1: will happen, is that Americans become more interested in what's
Speaker 1: happening around the world in addition to reading your book,
Speaker 1: that they actually that that our education system brings back
Speaker 1: and and recognizes the importance of a well informed citizenry, uh,
Speaker 1: not only for our democracy, but to be good global
Speaker 1: citizens in general. Amen to that, I would I would
Speaker 1: love that the day come sooner at the later every
Speaker 1: high school graduate and every college graduate had certain things
Speaker 1: under his or her belt, and it would be on domestically,
Speaker 1: they would have read the Constitution and the federalist paper
Speaker 1: is in the TOPEFIL and so forth, and understand what
Speaker 1: is our political DNA, what is it that makes our
Speaker 1: democracy vibrant? Uh? And and for an international they'd understand
Speaker 1: why the world matters? What about this or that international
Speaker 1: institution or alliances for this global challenge? What are certain
Speaker 1: lessons of history? So yeah, they had that we would
Speaker 1: be able to face the future with a foundation of
Speaker 1: understanding about our country and the world that I really
Speaker 1: think every citizen needs, uh, not just for their own career,
Speaker 1: their investments and delight, but also to to hold their
Speaker 1: elected representatives to account. Democracy needs to be based on
Speaker 1: informed citizen right, and I think our schools aren't doing
Speaker 1: the job in many cases, and not everybody obviously goes
Speaker 1: to college or goes to high school. Beyond the age
Speaker 1: of sixteen or once they reach our age, you forget
Speaker 1: just about everything you might have learned. So I think
Speaker 1: we need to rethink the idea of education and get
Speaker 1: beyond the idea that it's just what you learned in
Speaker 1: classrooms when you're a teenager in your early twenties. It's
Speaker 1: got to be home a lifelong experience. And you know,
Speaker 1: that's again why I wrote a book like this, because
Speaker 1: it's aim not just as students, but it's aimed to
Speaker 1: that for their parents and grandparents. We need an informed
Speaker 1: citizen rey, regardless of the person's age. What did you
Speaker 1: learn the most when you were writing this book, Richard?
Speaker 1: What you know? Has you had to synthesize these very
Speaker 1: complex things. You're, as I mentioned, one of the smartest
Speaker 1: people I know. But what did you learn in the
Speaker 1: process of writing this that surprised you or perhaps made
Speaker 1: you reconsider previously held positions? For my own thinking changed
Speaker 1: the most, Katie, in writing the book was in how
Speaker 1: do I put this step? Most of my study, most
Speaker 1: of my life has been involved with traditional foreign policy,
Speaker 1: problems in the U. S. Soviet relationship, now the US
Speaker 1: Chinese relationship, great power relations you know, that's what I
Speaker 1: studied when I was a student at Oxford. What where
Speaker 1: I changed the most in writing this book was coming
Speaker 1: up with a new appreciation of global issues that every
Speaker 1: era of history has its defining features, and say, in
Speaker 1: the first half of the twentieth century, it was probably
Speaker 1: the relationship between France, Britain and Germany among those three countries.
Speaker 1: Second half of the twentieth century was obviously the U. S.
Speaker 1: Sovia Cold War. I think in this century, what's qualitatively
Speaker 1: different and this is where my own thinking evolved the most,
Speaker 1: That we not only have to take into account the
Speaker 1: traditional great power politics, but there's this whole new set
Speaker 1: of global issues and we simply don't have the thinking,
Speaker 1: much less the institutions or arrangements for dealing with them.
Speaker 1: And and if we don't, that is going to be
Speaker 1: the that's gonna write most of the history of the
Speaker 1: twentieth century. It's gonna be our ability or inability to
Speaker 1: come together to deal with these global challenges, from pandemics
Speaker 1: to to to climate change to terrorism. That makes the
Speaker 1: twenty one century qualitatively different than the rest of modern history.
Speaker 1: And that's thanks for me that I just didn't appreciate
Speaker 1: nearly so much until I really delved into the issues. Well,
Speaker 1: Richard is always great to talk to you. The new
Speaker 1: book you're the thirteenth I believe that you've written or edited.
Speaker 1: Is that right? Might even be one or two more
Speaker 1: than that, Katie, but who's counting. It's called The World
Speaker 1: a Brief Introduction. Thanks so much for doing this today.
Speaker 1: Thanks Katie, great fun. Richard Hass's new book is called
Speaker 1: The World a Brief Introduction and it's out now. I
Speaker 1: highly recommend it. And that does it for this special
Speaker 1: bonus episode of Next Question. You can check out all
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Speaker 1: Until Next time and my Next Question, I'm Katie Couric.
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