My only problem with Dan Drezner's piece on how different schools of thought on international relations might respond to a massive zombie uprising is that it assumes a certain amount of sentient intelligence on the part of zombies -- he imagines them appealing to a world anti-zombie body created by liberal institutionalists in order to prevent any definitive effort to wipe them out entirely. Likewise, in proposing a neoconservative solution, he assumes that zombies would be capable of establishing systems of government that could be overthrown using aggressive democracy promotion. I don't think that's the case. Whatever limited intelligence zombies possess, it's not enough to maintain a government bureaucracy -- and if it was, eradicating them completely might be immoral--it might in fact, be more appropriate to develop an artificial non-human means of zombie sustenance a la True Blood.
But let's say zombies aren't sentient. I would argue that zombies would most resemble non-state violent actors like al Qaeda, for which a liberal institutionalist approach would be more appropriate. Acting unilaterally to stop the zombie threat -- and possibly even trying to use the crisis to further cement American hegemony -- might alienate other nations dealing with the same global epidemic and ultimately lead to all of our brains being eaten because of strained alliances between countries with the shared interest of not being, you know, eaten alive. After all, isn't that what happens in zombie movies when people try to go it alone?
On the other hand, global institutions are often very slow to respond to crises, and apparently in the experimental model time is of the essence. Also, the liberal institutionalist approach carries the risk of being accused of wanting to offer "therapy and understanding" to our zombie attackers, or of being "objectively pro-zombie," so it's possible we're just all doomed to be zombie food because of the exigencies of domestic American politics, which would prevent any kind of immediate effective response.
Maybe not though, a while ago Paul Waldman suggested a zombie apocalypse might provide a strong cultural foothold for a liberal policy agenda.
-- A. Serwer
