A financier-philosopher’s argument for rethinking U.S. foreign policy through the lens of open society principles
What the Work Is
Published in 1996, American National Interest and the United Nations is a policy-oriented essay by George Soros, the Hungarian-American investor and philanthropist known for his extensive philanthropic work through the Open Society Foundations. The work reflects Soros’s dual identity as both a successful financial figure and a serious student of philosophy, having studied under Karl Popper at the London School of Economics. The book sits within Soros’s broader body of writing on political and economic themes, which includes his later works on globalization and financial crises.
What the Book Is About
The book addresses the relationship between American foreign policy and the United Nations system, arguing for a conception of national interest that extends beyond narrow, short-term calculations. Soros’s central concern is how the United States should understand and pursue its interests in the post-Cold War world, particularly through multilateral institutions. The work draws on his philosophical background, especially the concept of the open society, to frame his argument about America’s role in international affairs.
Key Ideas and Themes
The concept of the open society stands at the center of Soros’s thinking in this work. Drawing from Karl Popper’s philosophy, Soros understands an open society as one characterized by democracy, individual freedom, and openness to criticism and reform. This philosophical foundation shapes his view of how American foreign policy should be conducted.
Soros argues that the United States has a genuine interest in promoting open societies abroad, not merely as an idealistic pursuit but as a practical matter of national interest. He contends that the stability and prosperity of the international system depend on the spread of democratic governance and respect for human rights. In this sense, he seeks to bridge the gap between idealistic internationalism and realistic assessments of national interest.
The book also engages with the question of international cooperation and the role of multilateral institutions. Soros examines how the United Nations and similar bodies can serve American interests while also advancing broader global goods. He is concerned with the tension between national sovereignty and international responsibility, a tension that became increasingly salient in the post-Cold War era.
A related theme involves the limits of market fundamentalism in international affairs. Soros, who would later develop these ideas more fully in works like The Crisis of Global Capitalism, questions the assumption that free markets alone can produce stable and just international order. His perspective reflects his broader critique of what he terms “market fundamentalism”—the belief that markets should be the primary mechanism for organizing social and political life.
Structure and Approach
The work is structured as a policy argument rather than a scholarly treatise. Soros writes from the perspective of someone who has been actively engaged in philanthropic efforts to promote open societies, particularly in Eastern Europe following the fall of communism. His approach combines philosophical reflection with practical policy recommendations, reflecting his belief that ideas and action are interconnected.
The book’s method is characteristic of Soros’s broader intellectual style: it moves between abstract principles and concrete policy considerations, using his own experiences in philanthropy and finance to illustrate his arguments. This approach gives the work a distinctive voice that sets it apart from more conventional policy analyses.
Significance and Influence
The book appeared at a significant moment in American foreign policy debate. The mid-1990s saw intense discussions about the proper role of the United States in the post-Cold War world, with questions about multilateralism, humanitarian intervention, and the future of international institutions very much in the air. Soros’s contribution to this debate was notable because of his unusual position as a major philanthropist with deep experience in post-communist transitions.
The work also foreshadows themes that would become increasingly prominent in Soros’s later writing. His critique of market fundamentalism, his emphasis on the importance of open societies, and his concern with the ethical dimensions of globalization all receive early expression in this book. In this sense, the work is significant not only for its immediate policy arguments but also for what it reveals about the development of Soros’s broader intellectual project.
Soros’s influence on American and international policy debates has been substantial, both through his writings and through his philanthropic activities. The Open Society Foundations, which he established, have funded initiatives around the world aimed at promoting democratic governance, human rights, and educational opportunity. While the direct influence of this particular book is difficult to measure, it represents an important statement of the philosophical and policy views that have guided his extensive philanthropic work.
Soros’s personal history is integral to understanding the perspective he brings to the work. Born in Budapest to a Jewish family, he survived the Nazi occupation of Hungary as a teenager. His father, Tivadar, was a lawyer and a well-known Esperanto author who edited the literary magazine Literatura Mondo. Tivadar had been a prisoner of war during and after World War I until he escaped from Russia. The family changed their name from “Schwartz” to “Soros” in 1936 as protective camouflage in increasingly antisemitic Hungary. Tivadar liked the new name because it is a palindrome and because of its meaning: in Hungarian, soros means “next,” and in Esperanto it means “will soar.”
Soros was 13 years old in March 1944 when Nazi Germany occupied Hungary. The Nazis barred Jewish children from attending school, and Soros was made to report to the Judenrat (“Jewish Council”). He later described to writer Michael Lewis how the Council asked the children to hand out deportation notices. He took the slips of paper to his father, who instantly recognized them as a list of Hungarian Jewish lawyers and instructed him to tell the people that if they reported, they would be deported. Soros did not return to that job, and his family survived the war by purchasing documents to say they were Christians. Later that year, at age 14, he posed as the Christian godson of an official of the collaborationist Hungarian government’s Ministry of Agriculture. Tivadar saved not only his immediate family but also many other Hungarian Jews. Soros later wrote that 1944 had been “the happiest [year] of his life,” for it had given him the opportunity to witness his father’s heroism. In 1945, he survived the Siege of Budapest, where Soviet and German forces fought house-to-house.
Intellectual Formation and Early Career
Soros relocated to Paris before eventually moving to England, where he became a student at the London School of Economics. While studying under the philosopher Karl Popper, he worked as a railway porter and as a waiter, and once received £40 from a Quaker charity. He would sometimes stand at Speakers’ Corner lecturing about the virtues of internationalism in Esperanto. He obtained his Bachelor of Science in philosophy in 1951 and a Master of Science in philosophy in 1954. After graduating, he wanted to stay at the university and work as a professor, but his grades were not high enough, prompting him to work for an investment firm in London.
In a 2006 discussion, Soros recounted that he wrote to every managing director in every merchant bank in London, got just one or two replies, and eventually got a job at a merchant bank. In 1954, he began his financial career at Singer & Friedlander of London, working as a clerk and later moving to the arbitrage department. In 1956, he moved to New York City, where he worked as an arbitrage trader for F. M. Mayer, specializing in European stocks. In 1959, he moved to Wertheim & Co., planning to stay for five years to save $500,000, after which he intended to return to England to study philosophy. He worked as an analyst of European securities until 1963.
During this period, Soros developed the theory of reflexivity to extend the ideas of his tutor, Karl Popper. Reflexivity posits that market values are often driven by the fallible ideas of participants, not only by the economic fundamentals of the situation. Ideas and events influence each other in reflexive feedback loops. Soros argued that this process leads to markets having procyclical “virtuous” or “vicious” cycles of boom and bust, in contrast to the equilibrium predictions of more standard neoclassical economics.
Philanthropic Foundations and Political Engagement
Soros’s philanthropic work began in earnest in 1984, when he founded his first Open Society Institute in Hungary with a budget of $3 million. From 1979, as an advocate of ‘open societies’, he financially supported dissidents including Poland’s Solidarity movement, Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia, and Andrei Sakharov in the Soviet Union. According to Waldemar A. Nielsen, an authority on American philanthropy, Soros undertook “nothing less than to open up the once-closed communist societies of Eastern Europe to a free flow of ideas and scientific knowledge from the outside world.”
Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Soros’s funding has played an important role in the newly independent countries. A 2017 study found that a grant program by Soros which awarded funding to over 28,000 scientists in the former Soviet republics shortly after the end of the Soviet Union “more than doubled publications on the margin, significantly induced scientists to remain in the science sector, and had long-lasting [beneficial] impacts.” His funding of pro-democratic programs in Georgia was considered by Georgian nationalists to be crucial to the success of the Rose Revolution, although Soros has said that his role has been “greatly exaggerated.” Former Georgian foreign minister Salome Zourabichvili wrote that institutions like the Soros Foundation were the cradle of democratization and that all the NGOs that gravitated around the Soros Foundation undeniably carried the revolution.
In 1997, Soros closed his foundation in Belarus after it was fined $3 million by the government for “tax and currency violations.” Soros called the fines part of a campaign to “destroy independent society.” In June 2009, he donated $100 million to Central Europe and Eastern Europe to counter the impact of the Great Recession on the poor, voluntary groups, and non-government organizations.
Later Intellectual and Policy Work
Soros’s critique of market fundamentalism, which is a theme in the book, was further developed in his later work. In an interview concerning the late-2000s recession, Soros referred to it as the most serious crisis since the 1930s. According to Soros, market fundamentalism with its assumption that markets will correct themselves with no need for government intervention in financial affairs has been “some kind of an ideological excess.” In his view, the markets’ moods—a prevailing bias or optimism/pessimism with which the markets look at reality—”actually can reinforce themselves so that there are these initially self-reinforcing but eventually unsustainable and self-defeating boom/bust sequences or bubbles.” In reaction to the Great Recession, he founded the Institute for New Economic Thinking in October 2009, a think tank composed of international economic, business, and financial experts mandated to investigate radical new approaches to organizing the international economic and financial system.
In 1998’s The Crisis of Global Capitalism: Open Society Endangered, Soros explained his role in the Asian financial crisis, writing that by the beginning of 1997, it was clear to Soros Fund Management that the discrepancy between the trade account and the capital account in Thailand was becoming untenable. He noted that they sold short the Thai baht and the Malaysian ringgit early in 1997, but that they were not sellers of the currency during or several months before the crisis; on the contrary, they were buyers when the currencies began to decline.
