Short read: The war on Iran and the war on Anthropic

If there is anyone who knows a thing or two about the importance of societal institutions for a country’s prosperity, it is Daron Acemoglu who in 2024 won the Nobel Prize for his work on exactly this subject. In this article, he tears into how Trump through two of his decisions in the past week – first to attack Iran and then to ban Anthropic (the AI giant), has shown scant respect for institutions. To drive home the point, he begins with the example of the Zimbabwean dictator, Robert Mugabe:

“…Mugabe won the big prize in the country’s national lottery in 2000. He won for a simple reason: because he could. Once you destroy institutions constraining your power, as Mugabe did during his 37-year reign, you can rule for personal enrichment, personal aggrandizement or simply personal entertainment. What better way to demonstrate unconstrained power than showing that the existing system of rules is a farce? The damage such behavior can do to norms and institutions is part of the design.”

First, he condemns the attack on Iran and the assassination of the Supreme Leader:

“To be sure, the Iranian regime was repressive, murderous and bad for Iranians’ economic and social well-being. Khamenei, leading elites and the feared Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had blood on their hands, including the killing and arrest of tens of thousands of protesters just since the beginning of the year.

However, none of this justifies initiating a new war in the Middle East that lacks support from international allies or any kind of domestic buy-in. The US is still considered a democracy where people’s views should in principle matter, but with Trump risking regionwide carnage, the democratic veneer appears thinner by the day.”

Ironically, experts reckon Iran may still survive this exactly because it was an institutional theocracy: “There will be no puppet regime in Iran, where state institutions and nationalist feeling are strong. When the Shah’s regime collapsed in the face of the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the state apparatus remained largely intact and transferred its allegiance to the new Islamic republic.”

Last week, Trump also banned any of its Federal contractors from working with Anthropic: “The reason? Anthropic wanted safeguards against its models being used for mass surveillance of Americans and autonomous weapon systems. Neither provision would have placed meaningful restrictions on the defense department in practice. Indeed, mass surveillance of US citizens is illegal under US law and autonomous weapon systems are not a near-term possibility, but for Trump and Hegseth, it is the showdown and intimidation of Anthropic that matter. They must demonstrate that they can do as they please, just like Mugabe.

However, unlike Zimbabwe’s rigged lottery, the Anthropic decision would have major consequences, perhaps more far-reaching than the attack on Iran. Regardless of what one thinks of current AI capabilities, there is little doubt that who controls AI in the future would have momentous implications for democracy, business, communication and privacy. Many in the industry might interpret the Anthropic ban to mean that the US government, not the private sector, would control AI.

….Trump has arguably achieved Mugabe-level absurdity with his military attack on Iran and legal attack on Anthropic. A president who came to power promising no new foreign entanglements, especially in the Middle East, has launched a potentially riskier one than the Iraq War a generation ago — and with even flimsier justification. A president who rails against “socialism” and “far-left Democrats” uses the state to crush a private company.

However, in both cases, the absurdity is the point — as it was for Mugabe. The shock value and trampling of norms embody Trump’s personal and political credo: Rules are for suckers.”

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