I took offense yesterday at the judgement passed by Condoleezza Rice that a particular document was ‘historical’ in nature. Rice’s dismissal of history as a mode of analysis is beyond personal offense. It is symptomatic of the problems of the current presidency.

History has use and purpose. It is only partially literary and educational. Historical methodology is important for establishing origins, continuity, ruptures, and fragmentations. It is especially useful as a means of putting events into different time frames, looking at long term trends versus short term developments. It is a means of being critical of current events and analyzing whether they are novelties, in line with larger developments, or a radical break with the past that requires actors to come up with the new solutions. It is for these reasons that political science and history share common origins in the historians of Greek and Rome. Indeed, before political science was history.

Government documents that are based around historical analysis ought not to be dismissed. Since I have been concentrating more on political trends (as a reflection of social and cultural developments) I have found that historical reviews were useful for administrators and politicians in forming policies. In particular, I have looked a many records concerning the French occupation of the Rhineland in the 1920s. Paul Tirard, the commander of the French army in the Rhine and the French representative for the Inter-Allied Council, included historical analysis as part of his strategy for identifying Germans who might collaborate and those who were responsible for sabotage (what the current administration would include under the large umbrella “terrorism). Tirard was especially concerned about identifying how economic hardships led to violence and resistance and learning whether or not economic assistance could be used to establish a permanent French presence along the left bank of the Rhine.

I grant that administrative ‘historical’ documents are really boring. They tend to consist mostly of information that was already known. However, they contain references to two or three current events. I cry when I see these types of documents because I cannot just dismiss them. They are important for revealing to me how circumstances are changing and how the administration sees their situation. I breeze through them looking for what is new. My point is that, despite their historicity, these documents are histories of the present. They put events into a context and helps administrators and policy makes to assign priorities and come up with strategies. Even if events reveal no change from long-term developments, an historical document can confirm that perception while reaffirming the government’s will to deal with ongoing problems.

Rice’s comments are typical of a presidency that tries to destroy the continuities between itself and the previous presidency and that is ignorant of how it diverges from the more ‘glorious’ presidencies of the 1980s. It has no memory. It insists on analyzing each situation anew and ignoring the wisdom of the past. It is an administration which has, by Weberian analysis, regressed: it is an impoverishing of social and political organization. It is the symptom of a presidency that insists on reinventing the wheel but allows no one to walk until the new wheel is completed.