Attempting to shift any given person's viewpoint is a challenging task, and endeavouring to persuade an extensive, advanced and influential society that its foreign policy towards the rest of world is a total failure is downright naïve. Western nations do not lack the tools to learn better about the facts on the ground and citizen preferences in the rest of the world, which could eventually enable them to design more constructive foreign policies. However, Westerners clearly prefer handling a crisis after it occurs to dealing with a latent problem pre-emptively. For many years, reputable non-Western scholars have been raising the alarm about the irrelevance or impracticality of Western foreign policies vis-à-vis their nations, only to be rewarded with Western claims that the absence of democracy in their countries invalidates their arguments. Western nations seek to learn about developments in other nations with the intention of applying their own predetermined political propositions, which are often not best suited for non-Western nations. Western nations, proud of their freedom of expression, are, however, constrained by their political frame of mind and by the restrictive policies of individual media outlets. For example, the Western media has never been open to Iranians to express their opinions on the war that might be imposed on their country. Syrians have not been able to discuss the impact of withdrawing US troops from their territory, and Iraqis have not been able to question the validity of the democracy that has been foisted upon them. Regardless of their merits, these ventures, and many others, have clearly been imposed by Western nations. Furthermore, Western foreign policy tends to evolve quickly, giving the impression that it will solve universal problems simply because it was conceived in the dominant Western sphere and is backed by well-functioning political mechanisms. However, when such ideas migrate to other nations that do not have the same political structures, they become like an alien organ transplanted into a different body, leaving stunned Westerners to claim that, “the rest declines the best.” Westerners tend to be proud of their ruling systems that empower minorities to express their opinions freely and even to gain political eminence. They praise systems that allow immigrants to become integrated into new communities, enabling some of them to succeed in their respective fields. However, these triumphs can only occur on the condition that the immigrants relinquish the values of their original environments and merge into Western society. US President Donald Trump's policy of not interfering in other nations' domestic affairs, which in practice translates into turning a blind eye to many unpleasant events, is just as bad as the previous US policy of meddling in other nations' internal affairs without taking notice of their citizens' desires to shape their own futures. Due to their limited knowledge, Western pundits who confidently debate their nations' foreign policies may be unaware of the drastic effects their ignorance can have on other nations. Western politicians operate according to a frame of mind that is designed to fit in seamlessly with their overall political dynamics. The Western nations' rapid technological progress makes them scientifically superior, further strengthening their arguments. However, the world does not revolve around science alone: the arts, culture and people's minds play a hugely significant role in shaping the world and distinguishing one society from another. The expansion of Western military power has substantially inflated Westerners' confidence in their political propositions. As a result, they may not notice ideas that emerge from the rest of the world that may not be compatible with their political thinking. Westerners' “wrong-doings” committed in distant places don't affect their nations' domestic political or economic affairs. As a result, they are never aware of their true magnitude. For better or for worse, the Western nations are the world's magnetic compass, and the slightest adjustment to it can have a major impact on the rest of the world. However, despite this we should continue to empower ourselves to challenge the Western nations' foreign policies, whether they are deliberately articulated or unintentionally developed. The world revolves around far more than just the Western pattern of thought and the political framework of the United States. 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The writer is a politicial analyst.
