The Fourteen Points were listed in a speech delivered by United States President Woodrow Wilson to a joint session of Congress on January 8, 1918. The address was intended to assure the country that the Great War was being fought for a moral cause and for postwar peace in Europe. The common people of Europe welcomed Wilson as a hero but his Allied colleagues (George Clemenceau, David Lloyd George, and Vittorio Emanuele Orlando) remained skeptical of the applicability of Wilsonian idealism. The speech was delivered over ten months before the armistice with the German Empire ended the Great War, but the Fourteen Points became the basis for the terms of the German surrender, as negotiated at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. The Treaty of Versailles, however, had little to do with the Fourteen Points and so was never ratified by the U.S. Senate.
Wilson tried to reform diplomacy. The new diplomacy is no longer a mere mean of diffusing the next conflict; it’s most important implication was, in fact, for the present pursuit of peace: “that it must be a peace without victory.” According to President Wilson, “only a peace between equals can last; only a peace the very principle of which is equality and a common participation in a common benefit”. Moreover, because states then treated each other as they treated their citizens; domestic government was the bedrock upon which a democratic international order must stand. This belief in the interdependence of domestic and international politics was reiterated in succinctly in Wilson’s war message: “The world must be made for democracy.” The Fourteen Points were formulated to ensure that justice would be done in the wake of its terrible contravention. As such all addressed the specific ills behind the European system’s degeneration and collapse into war. Yet not all points were created equal. In drafting and revising the speech with his adviser Colonel House, Woodrow Wilson determined on “placing the general terms first and territorial adjustments last.” The only exception was the call for a League of Nations, which Wilson felt “should come last [of all] because it would round out the message properly.
THE SIX OF THE FOURTEEN POINTS OF PRESIDENT WOODROW WILSON:
1. Open diplomacy
2. Freedom of the seas
3. Removal of economic barriers
4. Reduction of armaments
5. Adjustment of colonial claims
6. Association of nations
To sum up, eight of the 14 points treated specific territorial issues among the combatant nations. Five of the other six concerned general principles for a peaceful world: open covenants (i.e., treaties or agreements), openly arrived at; freedom of the seas; free trade; reduction of armaments; and adjustment of colonial claims based on the principles of self-determination. The 14th point proposed what was to become the League of Nations to guarantee the "political independence and territorial integrity [of] great and small states alike". Six of these points will be the subject of discussion in this paper.
1. Open Diplomacy
The old system of secret diplomacy is tottering to its fall. President Wilson, who before entering the war had denounced secret diplomacy as the principal cause of the war, has now placed its abolition in the foremost place in his program for securing permanent peace. He has pronounced for:
“Open covenants of peace openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind, but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.”
This point was a condemnation of secret engagements which were not unveil, and the committing of a country by its government without the country being aware of what was being done or having an opportunity of expressing an opinion. Thus, a need for an open diplomacy would build greater honesty in international politics, and new legal constraints and the threat of collective sanctions would impede any reckless resort to force.
2. Freedom of the seas
The second point that President Woodrow Wilson offered was this “Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of international covenants Today “freedom of the seas” was replaced by the so-called Law of the Sea Treaty. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) is an international treaty governing the use and exploitation of the world’s oceans
This means that all nations no matter what their locations are must straighten out their national territories with giving due deliberation to their maritime boundaries. Also this second point emphasized the need to consider always peace in every dispute with respect to their nautical range. It also includes the principle that all waters beyond national boundaries are considered international waters, meaning it is free for all but belonging to none of them (the mare liberum principle promulgated by Hugo Grotius).
PRINCIPLES OF THE LAW OF THE SEA TREATY
Navigational Freedom
Exclusive Economic Zones
Environmental Protection
Dispute Settlement Provisions
3. Free Trade
Wilson, in his third point, calls for “The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance”.
Since the end of WWII until 1970’s, the use of tariffs and quotas dropped dramatically. The world started to accept the liberal philosophy of trade (that it should have few barriers) and to the policies adopted by GATT and the WTO. Political and Economic leaders drew the lesson from economic policies that limited free trade as chiefly responsible for both the Great Depression and World War II.
4. Reduction of armaments
The fourth point of President Woodrow Wilson states that “adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.”
One good example as a product of this point as a form of recommendation in the world up to date is the non-proliferation treaty (NPT). Proliferation as defined is the spread of weapons of mass destruction – nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles and chemical or biological weapons into the hands of many actors. The Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1968 created a framework for controlling the spread of nuclear materials and expertise.
In view with this fourth point also, it can also be related to the creation of the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1992 to ban production and possession of chemical weapons, it has been signed by 167 states including all the great powers. This treaty includes strict verification provisions and the threat to sanctions against violators those who are not participants in the treaty.
From this point also rose the treaties regarding the banning, controlling and inspection of nuclear weapons, and other "war" related weapons.
5. Adjustment Of Colonial Claims Based On The Principles Of Self-Determination
“A free, open-minded and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty, the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined”.
The principle of self- determination was first applied to the modern international relations context by Woodrow Wilson in his Fourteen Points of January 1918, in which he set out a blueprint for a just and lasting peace in Europe after World War I. Currently, this principle is prominently embodied in Article I of the Charter of the United Nations which marks the universal recognition of this principle as fundamental to the maintenance of friendly relations and peace among states.
6. Association of Nations
The last point is this “A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike.”
The last point of President Woodrow Wilson has the greatest impact today. The last point led to the creation of the League of Nations and eventually became the United Nations. Like the League, the UN was founded to increase international order and the rule of law to prevent another world war. The UN is the closest thing to a world government that has ever existed, but it is not a world government. The basic purpose of the UN is to provide a global institutional structure through which states can sometimes settle conflicts with less reliance on the use of force.
Its impact on diplomacy is like this, the UN is a symbol of international order in which diplomacy wants. It also brings about the global identity. It is also a forum where states promotes their views and bring their disputes. And it is a mechanism for conflict resolution in international security affairs. The UN also promotes and coordinates development assistance and that what trade diplomacy offers. Lastly, the UN is a coordinating system of information and planning by hundreds of internal and external agencies and programs, and for the publication of international data. (Goldstein, 2002).
WHY DID THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS FAIL?
• Weak – the League’s ‘powers’ were little more than going ‘tut-tut’. Sanctions did not work. It had no army.
• America – the strongest nation in the world never joined. Britain and France were not strong enough to impose pace on their own.
• Structure – the League was muddled, so it took ages to do anything. Members couldn’t agree – but decisions had to be unanimous. This paralyzed the League.
• Depression – the world-wide Depression made countries try to get more land and power. They were worried about themselves, not about world peace.
• Unsuccessful – the more the League failed, the less people trusted it. In the end, everybody just ignored it.
• Members – the League’s main members let it down. Italy and Japan betrayed the League. France and Britain did nothing to help it.
• Big bullies – in the 1920s, the League had dealt with weak countries. In the 1930s, powerful countries like Germany, Italy and Japan attacked weaker countries. They were too strong for the League to stop them.
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