aid to left-wing movements in Latin America was both financed and encour-
aged by the Soviet Union, it remains true that the doctrine is actually being
used to allow the USA to intervene in purely regional and national political
and social disputes. The USA will not readily allow the establishment of any
government of a communist nature anywhere in its hemisphere, whether or
not this is actually the result of interference from a European power, and this is
what the Monroe Doctrine has come to mean. In 1983 US forces intervened
in Grenada after a coup threatened to place the island’s government even more
firmly in the Cuban and Soviet camp, and aid was channelled to the Contra
guerrillas fighting the left-wing Sandinista government in Nicaragua through
much of the 1980s.
Ironically the doctrine was also the first statement of Americanisolation-
ism, and indeed part of the justification of the unilateral declaration of
hegemony over the American continent was a promise not to intervene or
have any interest in matters on the European continent. As the isolationist
aspect of the doctrine has now completely disappeared with US membership
ofNATO, and its recent world leadership inUnited Nationsactivities, there
is no good reason exceptrealpolitikfor other countries to accept their
exclusion, even when invited to help a local state, from the southern half of
the American continent. Effectively the Doctrine is an attempt to expand the
rights of national sovereignty outside national boundaries, but in an age where
national sovereignty itself is coming into question, any extension must be
dubious.
Montesquieu
The French nobleman Charles-Louis de Secondat Montesquieu (1689–1755)
is often seen, along withMachiavelli, as one of the founding fathers of
modern political science. His major work,The Spirit of the Laws(1748), is an
attempt to provide what would now be seen as a cultural and environmental
explanation for the legitimacy of different forms of government in different
contexts. He held, for example, that climate, geographical location and history
had great influence over the nature of social relations, and therefore of political
bonds. He tried to identify, at the same time, a particular ideological prop to
different forms of government, such as a high value attached to the idea of
‘honour’ in a monarchial society.
Although his work was influential in helping to develop a more empirical
aspect to political studies, influencing future writers as diverse asBurkeand
Engels, it is his constitutional theory that has been most important in retro-
spect. Montesquieu, along withLocke, developed the concept of thesepara-
tion of powers, whereby the executive, legislative and judicial branches of
Montesquieu