Sovereignty or Submission: Will Americans Rule Themselves or be Ruled by Others?

John Fonte

sept 2011 · Encounter Books

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The Twenty-First Century is witnessing an epic struggle between the forces of global governance and American constitutional democracy. Transnational progressives and pragmatists in the UN, EU, post-modern states of Europe, NGOs, corporations, prominent foundations, and most importantly, in America’s leading elites, seek to establish “global governance.” Further, they understand that in order to achieve global governance, American sovereignty must be subordinated to the “global rule of law.” The U.S. Constitution must incorporate “evolving norms of international law.” Sovereignty or Submission? examines this process with crystalline clarity and alerts the American public to the danger ahead.

Global governance seeks legitimacy not in democracy, but in a partisan interpretation of human rights. It would shift power from democracies (U.S., Israel, India) to post-democratic authorities, such as the judges of the International Criminal Court. Global governance is a new political form (a rival to liberal democracy), that is already a significant actor on the world stage. America faces serious challenges from radical Islam and a rising China. Simultaneously, it faces a third challenge (global governance) that is internal to the democratic world; is non-violent; but nonetheless threatens constitutional self-government. Although it seems unlikely that the utopian goals of the globalists could be fully achieved, if they continue to obtain a wide spread influence over mainstream elite opinion, they could disable and disarm democratic self-government at home and abroad. The result would be the slow suicide of American liberal democracy. Whichever side prevails, the existential conflict of global governance versus American sovereignty (and democratic self-government in general) will be at the heart of world politics as far as the eye can see.

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John Fonte is Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for American Common Culture at Hudson Institute. His writing has been published in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia, Israel, and Latin America, and he has appeared on CNN, BBC, France 24 and other news outlets. He has advised California, Texas, and Virginia on civic education and has testified before Congress on citizenship issues. His ideas on “lawfare” were cited in the annual New York Times Magazine’s “Year in Ideas” as among the most noteworthy of 2004. Fonte received a Ph.D. in world history from the University of Chicago.