100 days of Gordon Brown

After years of working in the sidelines, Gordon Brown finally ascended to the top job of UK politics 100 days this October 5. His has been a premiership long in the making that should now deliver on many fronts, not least internationally.
Brown created quite a name for himself in his previous job as Chancellor of the Exchequer. His economic policies defined a decade and he presided over the longest ever period of growth in the country. It would come as no surprise that now, as Prime Minister, Brown would take his past recipe for success and adopt an economist’s view of foreign affairs.
His biggest challenges lie, as they have for the past five years, in the Middle East. The thorny issue of Iraq demobilisation, along with the possibility of problems with Iran, wider action in Afghanistan and stalemate over the Palestinian question, have been and will remain a major focus of his policy. So far, Brown has said he is committed to gradually withdrawing from Iraq while maintaining and even expanding British presence in Afghanistan. Brown has also made it clear that he believes in economic sanctions and incentives to deal with potential terrorist breeding grounds.
His pragmatic approach will reach across the Atlantic. Brown’s meeting with US President George Bush was friendly, but lacked the unquestioning praise of his predecessor. Neither American nor European-centred, it seems Brown’s even-handedness will be the main characteristic of his international policy. Aid and trade should remain pivotal issues in his agenda, as Brown’s strong stance on poverty and development has led him to announce stronger backing of the UN Millennium Development Goals set by the G8 (in his UN speech on 31 July 2007) and he still pushes hard his Make Poverty History campaign.
One of his most unambiguous moves so far, however, has been towards Africa. Brown has declared that he will not attend the EU/AU summit to be held in Lisbon this coming December if Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe makes an appearance. This could definitely mean a return to the idea of “moral” foreign policy once unfurled by the Blair government.
It is widely recognised that foreign policy is central to the prime minister’s role (Jonathan Freedman, “Brown’s new world order”). If Brown wants to step away from his previous boss’s shadow, he will need to stand back from US-led unilateralism and embrace globalisation, international institutions and responsible diplomacy.

For more information:
“Gordon Brown’s foreign policy challenges” by David Held and David Mepham
http://www.opendemocracy.net/node/34314/print

“Brown’s new world order” by Jonathan Freedland
http://www.newstatesman.com/200705280014

Reflective report: As an assignment, I enjoyed writing this piece because it gave me a chance to look deeper at Gordon Brown’s foreign policy. Having lived in the United Kingdom during Tony Blair’s term, it was good to see what was really different between the two and if anything would really change.
I focused on his foreign policy because, as an international student, this is the area that interests me most about UK politics.To start off, I thought about what the most pressing issues in UK foreign politics were. It was immediately obvious that Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Middle East are at the forefront and I set about looking up the latest developments in the area, both by searching in the Internet and in the newspapers of the day.I also came across various academic articles that served as background information for my article and I published links to the ones I thought most relevant to my piece. I enjoyed reading David Held and David Mepham’s article on Gordon Brown’s foreign policy challenge, which explained briefly the areas I considered important for British policy from the start. Jonathan Freedland’s article for the New Statesman was more in-depth and very informative.
Since this was not written as a news story or outright op-ed piece, I went for a balanced approach that showcased what was going on at the time and some possible scenarios for the future. It turned out more as a commentary piece than anything else.