If a government makes it illegal for an organization which is aiming to influence public policy to receive funds from foreign governments is that a liberal or an illiberal move? Perspectives?
Illiberal. Very illiberal.
For example, if the U.S. government tries to ban NGOs funded by (name a country), that is censorship, plain and simple. I think that foreign political movements deserve a fair shake in the market of ideas; otherwise, it becomes so much easier for American politicians to villainize them to the American public and perhaps start a war against them.
After all, “our side” funds Voice of America, color revolutions, and so forth, in foreign countries. Almost every country on earth has access to American media and communications: CNN, MTV, Google, and so forth. Come to think of it, the U.S. government even funded pro-coalition news articles in Iraqi newspapers!
Every NGO, every media organization, every cause celebre has its own “slant”. That is a travesty, but what is worse is when some of them are censored, and we can only see some “slants” but not others.
Great question, by the way.
But these scenarios can also happen in reverse. Lets imagine a case where a besieged foreign government is finding itself under assault by NGOs which are funded from abroad, by the power which is encircling this country, for the purpose of destabilizing it and bringing it into their fold? What if the NGOs are lobbying for an illiberal government policy, namely the acceptance of suzerainty status in relation to the Empire?
If the Iraqi government by law forbade the US to buy articles in Iraqi papers would the papers have cause to complain? Does political opposition in a country have the right to be funded by a foreign power?