"The Erosion of American National Interests" by Samuel P. Huntington, in Foreign Affairs (Sept.–Oct. 1997), 58 E. 68th St., New York, N.Y. 10021.

Defining America’s national interest has become almost impossible in the 1990s, argues Huntington, a political scientist at Harvard University and author of The Clash of Civilizations (1996). Foreign affairs pundits and other specialists have searched frantically "for new purposes that would justify a continuing U.S. role in world affairs comparable to that in the Cold War," but their quest has come to naught. The real problem, he argues, is that, deprived of an enemy by the demise of the Soviet Union, and increasingly subjected to multiculturalism’s centrifugal forces, Americans are no longer sure of who they are.

"Given the domestic forces pushing toward heterogeneity, diversity, multiculturalism, and ethnic and racial division...the United States, perhaps more than most countries, may need an opposing other to maintain its unity," Huntington writes. But no significant enemy is now in sight. "New threats will undoubtedly arise, but given the scarcity of current ones, campaigns to arouse interest in foreign affairs and support for major foreign policy initiatives now fall on deaf ears," he points out. "The administration’s call for the ‘enlargement’ of democracy does not resonate with the public and is belied by the administration’s own actions," letting the commercial interests of particular firms and the sentimental ties of particular ethnic groups determine U.S. foreign policy.

Polls show that most Americans "are unwilling to support the commitment of significant resources to the defense of American allies, the protection of small nations against aggression, the promotion of human rights and democracy, or economic and social development in the Third World," Huntington notes. Consequently, he says, the alternative to a foreign policy in pursuit of commercial and ethnic interests cannot be one based on some "grand design," but rather must be "a policy of restraint and reconstitution aimed at limiting the diversion of American resources to the service of particularistic... interests."

At some time in the future, a serious external threat may compel Americans to clearly define their national interests and commit major resources to their defense. Until then, Huntington concludes, the United States should conserve its resources by scaling back its involvement in the world. Today, he writes, America’s "national interest is national restraint."