Pol Sci 120B - Structural Realism After the Cold War - Reading Notes PDF

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Reading Notes: Week 2 — Structural Realism after the Cold War Page 5 Some argue that realism’s concepts of anarchy, self-help, and power balancing may have been appropriate to a bygone era but they have been displaces by changed conditions and eclipsed by better ideas If the conditions that a theory contemplated have changed, the theory no longer applies Changes of the system would cause a change in the international system, changes in the system would not cause change because the system itself would still remain Examples of within the system changes means of transportation communication war fighting Introduction of nuclear weaponry was the greatest of within the system changes Yet even with this introduction of new war fighting, arena still remained ‘self help' Nuclear weapons have not altered the anarchic structure of the international political system Changes within are changes at the unit level Changes in polarity affect how states provide for their security With more than two poles, states rely for their security both on their own international efforts and on the alliances they make with others Page 6 Competition in multiparty system is more complicated than competition in bipolar systems because uncertainties about the comparative capabilities of states multiply as numbers grow, and because estimates of the cohesiveness and strength of coalitions are hard to make Changes in weaponry and polarity do not change the system itself Changes that are occuring that are transforming the system 1. Realism is being rendered obsolete as democracy extends its sway 2. as interdependence tightens its grip 3. And as institutions smooth the way to peace Democracy and Peace End of Cold War coincided with what many take as a new democratic wave Trend toward democracy combined with Doyle’s discovery of the peaceful behavior of liberal democratic states contributes strongly to the belief that war is obsolete among

the advanced industrial states of the world DEMOCRATIC PEACE THEORY Democratic Peace Thesis: Democracies do not fight democracies Says ‘thesis’ not ‘theory’ because believes that democracies constitute a some of peace rests on a perceived high correlation between governmental form and international outcome Page 7 Explanation of democratic peace theory Kant: Democracies of the right kind, liberal ones, are peaceful in relation to one another Used the term republic Owens: Democracies that perceive one another as liberal will not fight Layne: Emphasizing the international political reasons for democracies not fighting another For Kant’s explanation, consider the Weimar Republic Wilhelmine Germany Had: wide suffrage, honest elections, legislature that controlled economics, competitive parties, free press and a highly competent bureaucracy After 1914 this democracy turned out not the be the right kind at all Owen’s explanation is refuted because liberal democracies have prepared and came close to waging war Some wars between democracies were averted because of a third party fear In 1898 how could France and Britain fought with Germany in the background? Page 8 Layne: Emphasizing the international political reasons for democracies not fighting another Conformity of countries to a prescribed political form may eliminate some of the causes of war; it cannot eliminate all of them Democratic peace thesis will hold only if all of the causes of war lie inside of states The Causes of War Kant’s explanation of War: The natural state is the state of war Under the conditions of international politics, war recurs; way to abolish war, is to abolish international politics Liberals over the centuries have had a strong desire to get politics out of politics Ideal of 19th century liberals was the police state state would confine its activities to catching criminals and enforcing contracts Ideal of the laissez-faire states funds many counter parts among international politics

students wanting to remove power out of power politics national out of international politics dependence out of interdependence relative out of relative gains politics out of international politics structure out of structural theory Proponents of democratic peace these assert it will negate effects of anarchy No reason to associate anarchy with war With enough democracies in the world, it may be possible in part to supersede the realist principles (anarchy and security dilemma) that have dominated practice since the 17th THUS REMOVING THE STRUCTURE FROM STRUCTURAL THEORY Guarantee of the states proper external behavior would derive from its admirable internal qualities Page 9 Kant’s seventh proposition of his ‘Principles of the Political Order' Establishment of the proper constitution internally requires the proper order of the external relations of states FIRST DUTY OF THE STATE IS TO DEFEND ITSELF; with none other than the state being able to define the actions required You may have an ally as a condition prior to any conflict, but you may still attack him as conflict ensues In the state of the nature, there is no such thing as an unjust war Hume’s rejection of causality can argue against democratic peace thesis, asserting that merely an association between events does not infer there being a causal relation Muller assets that it is not democracy that causes peace, but that other conditions cause both democracy and peace Democratic actions casting doubt on peace thesis US gov. deemed the democratically elected Juan Bosch of the Dominican Republic too weak to bring order to his country US toppled his government Salvador Allende, democratically elected ruler of Chile, was systematically and effectively undermined by the US because US leaders though his government was taking a wrong turn powerful states often gain their ends by peaceful means where weaker states either fail or have to resort to war Page 10 One may say DR and Chile were not liberal democracies nor perceived as such by the

US Liberal democracies as they prepare for war begin to look less liberal and will look less liberal still of they begin to fight in one Thesis casted in the manner its proponents do is irrefutable Liberal democracy at war with another country is unlikely to call the opponent a liberal democracy Even if all states became democratic, structure of international politics would remain anarchic Structure of international politics is not transformed by changes internal to states In the absence of an external authority, a state cannot be sure that today’s friend is not tomorrow’s enemy James Monroe: The government of a Republic was as capable of intriguing with he leaders of a free people as neighboring monarchs France and Britain were principle adversaries of the great power politics of the 19th century their becoming democracies did not change their behavior toward each other 1914 Democratic France and Britain fought democratic Germany and doubts about the latter’s democratic standing merely illustrate the problem of the definition Democratic pluralism of Germany cause of the war In response to domestic interests, Germany followed policies that were bound to frighten Britain and Russia Page 11 What can we conclude? Democracies rarely fight democracies; internal excellence of states is a brittle basis of peace Democratic Wars Democratic states coexist with undemocratic states Democracies promote war because they at time decide that the war to preserve peace is to defeat nondemocratic states and make them democratic During the Vietnam war, Secretary of State Dean Rusk claimed that the US cannot be secure until the total international environment is ideologically safe Very existence of undemocratic states us a danger to others This is liberal interventionism Bill Clinton Admin. held this view Former Army Chief of Staff General Gordon Sullivan: Replacing the negative aim of containment with a positive one: to promote democracy,regional stability and economic prosperity Page 12 If the world can be made safe for democracy only by making it democratic, then all

means are permitted and to use them becomes a duty Global Dominance GS view Governments are sometimes constrained by electoral calculation to defer preventive measures AND democratic leader may respond to the fervor for war that their citizens display Not good enough to sustain democratic thesis Grant that peace among democratic states prevails CONSIDER THE OBVERSE: democracy may promote war against undemocratic states If latter is true, not sure that spread of democracy will bring a net decrease in the amount of war in the world Page 13 With a Republic established in a strong state, Kant hoped the republican form would gradually take hold in the world In 1795 US provided this hope Liberalism has been divided since it’s beginning Liberal interventionist: Liberal states should work to uplift benighted people and bring the benefits of liberty, justice and property to them JS Mill, Woodrow Wilson, Clinton Agreeing with the benefits that democracy can bring, emphasize the difficulties and the dangers of actively seeking to promote it’s propagation Kant and Richard Cobden When democracy is ascendant, the interventionist spirit flourishes Peace is the noblest cause of war If the conditions of peace are lacking, then the country with a capability of creating them may be temped to do so, whether or not by force The end may be Noble but: As a matter of right: Kant insist that no state can intervene in the internal arrangements of another As a matter of fact: intervention often brings more harm than good THE VICE TO WHICH GREAT POWERS EASILY SUCCUMB IN A: Multipolar world- inattention Bipolar world - overreaction Unipolar world - ever extension Peace is maintained by a delicate balance of internal and external restrains Kant: The laws of the voluntary federations (international institutions) are disregarded at the whim of the stronger As the US demonstrated by mining Nicaraguan waters and by invading Panama US violated international law denied jurisdiction of International Court of Justice Flaunted the law embodied in the Charter of the Organization of American States

If democratic peace thesis is right, structuralist realist theory is wrong Peace depends on a balance of forces Causes of war are found in the states and in the states system Democratic peace thesis proponents neglect this fact Internal policies of a state being non-democratic may cause democratic state with internal democratic policies to wage war Think of Britain and France example declaring War against Germany in WW! due to it’s internal policies that threatened them System of international politics being democratic may cause war by promoting war against un-democratic think of Bush Doctrine Page 14 The Weak Effects of Interdependence To the supposedly peaceful inclination of democracies, interdependence adds the propulsive power of the profit motive Democratic states may increasingly devote themselves to the pursuit of peace and profits The trading state is replacing the political-military state and the power of the market now rivals or surpasses the power of the state Interdependence is some ways promotes peace by multiplying contacts among states and contributing mutual understanding Also promotes the occasions for conflicts that may promote resentment and even war Close interdependence — condition in which one party can scarcely move without jostling others Closer the social bonds, the more extreme the effect becomes One cannot sensibly pursue an interest without taking other’s interest into account One country is then inclined to treat another country’s acts as events within its own polity and to attempt to control them Interdependence is a weak force that shapes international politics Interdependence within modern states is much stronger than it is across states Despite the tight integration of the USSR, the state fell Page 15 Internal interdependence is better dubbed as integration expectation that peace will prevail and order will be preserved is high more of a dependent than an independent variable state shy away from becoming excessive dependent on goods and resources that may be denied in crises and wars Japan’s managed trade avoids excessive dependence on others

Impulse to protect ones identity -cultural, political, economical- is strong With zero interdependence, neither conflict nor war is possible with integration, international becomes national politics Good effects of interdependence 1. divided labor 2. mutual understanding 3. cultural enrichment Bad effects of interdependence 1. Protectionism 2. mutual resentment 3. Conflict 4. War Uneven effects of interdependence is one state gaining more or less than another This is obscured by the term ‘Asymmetric interdependence’ for relations of dependence and independence among states Relatively independent states are in a better state than dependent ones If I depend on you more than you depend on me, you have more ways of influencing me and affecting my fate than I have of affecting yours Page 16 Much of international politics is about inequalities Power not very fungible for weak states is fungible for strong states History of US FP is full of examples of the US using its superior economic capability to promote its political and security interests Waltz described interdependence as an ideology used by US to camouflage the great leverage the US enjoys in international politics by making it seems that strong and weak, rich and poor nations are similarly entangled in a thick web of interdependence Firms of the stronger say’s control the largest market shares of the economy Page 17 History of the past 2 centuries has been on of central governments acquiring more and more power Weak states have lost some of their influence and control over external matters, but strong states have not lost theirs In 19th and 19th century, the strongest state intervened all over the globe and built history’s most extensive empire In the 20th century the strongest state repeated Britain’s interventionist behavior without building an empire Absence of an empire does not means US influence and control over the actions of others is of lesser extent Withering away of the power of the state, internally or externally, is an illusion in reality Character of international politics changes as national interdependence tightens or

loosens But states have to take care of themselves as best they can in an anarchic environment Page 18 The limited Role of international Institutions Skipped Page 27 Balancing Power: Not Today but Tomorrow Expectations of realist theory came to pass during and after the Cold War Key proposition of realist theory is that international politics reflects the distribution of national capabilities Another key proposition is that the balancing of power by some states against others recurs Realist theory asserts that balance disrupted will one day be restored Just cannot say when Theory cannot say when ‘tomorrow’ will occur because international political theory deals with the pressures of structure on states and not how states will respond to the pressures International political system became unipolar with the demise of the USSR Page 28 In light of structural theory, unipolarity appears as the least durable of international configurations because 1. Dominant powers take on too many tasks beyond their own borders, thus weakening themselves in the long run Imperial decay is primarily a result of the misuse of power which follows inevitably from its concentration 2. Even if a dominant state behaves with moderation, restraint and forbearance, weaker states will worry about tis future behavior Faced with unbalanced power, some states try to increase their own strength or they ally with other to bring the international distribution of power into balance Behavior of dominant powers Unbalanced power, whoever wields it, is a potential danger to others The powerful state may, as the US does, thinks of itself as acting for the sake of peace, justice and well-being in the world these terms are defined by how the powerful perceives them, and may conflict with the preferences and interests of others In international politics, overwhelming power repels and leads others to try to balance

against it US will act boastfully until its power is checked During the Cold War, constancy of the Soviet threat produced a constancy of American policy Other countries could rely on the US for protection because protecting them seemed to serve US security interests Page 29 With the disappearance of the USSR, the US no longer faces a major threat to its security Constancy of threat produces constancy of policy, absence of threat permits policy to become capricious When few if any vital interests are endangered, a country’s policy becomes sporadic and self-willed Absence of serious threats to US security gives the US wide latitude in making foreign policy choices A dominant power acts internationally only when the spirit moves it When Yugoslavia’s collapse was followed by genocidal war in successor states, US failed to respond and only acted not doe the sake of its own security but to maintain its leadership position in Europe American policy was generated not by external security interests, but by interna political pressure and national ambition Unbalances power leaves weaker states feeling uneasy and gives them reason to strengthen their positions US behavior in Central America provides little evidence of self-restraint in the absence of countervailing power Concentrated power invites distrust because it is so easily misused Page 30 Balancing Power in a Unipolar World Expectation that following victory in a great war a new balance of power will form is firmly grounded in both history and theory CLEARLY SOMETHING HAS CHANGED Victories in major wars leave the balance of power badly skewed Winning side emerges as a dominant coalition Some believe that the leaders of states have learned that playing the game of power is costly and unnecessary National and international conditions determine how long it will take for a new balance of power to form Explanation for sluggish balancing of power is easy: the materials for constructing a new balance we readily at hand Previous wars left a sufficient number of great power standing to permit a new balance to be rather easily constructed

Charles Kegley says: if the world becomes multipolar once again, realists will be vindicated Candidates for become the next great powers, and this restoring a balance are 1. EU 2. Germany leading a coalition 3. China 4. Japan 5. And in a more distant future, Russia Page 31 EU has been remarkably successful in integrating their national economies Achievement of a large measure of economic integration without a corresponding political unity is an accomplishment without historical precedent EU can act militarily only with consent of its members, making bold or risky action impossible EU lacks the organizational ability and the collective will to use their tools population, resources, technology and military capabilities Policies that must be arrived at by consensus can be carried out only when they are fairly inconsequential Western Europe was unable to make its own foreign and military policies when it was an organization of 6 or 9 states living in fear of the USSR With less pressure and more members, count that occuring impossible Only when the US decides on a policy has the EU been able to follow it EU leaders made at the unipolarity call for strengthening multilateral institutions like the IMF and UN but this does not explain how US influence would be diminished For Europe to have a voice, they have to establish a unity in military and foreign affairs as they have achieved in economic matters US and world will treat Europe as a major force if Britain and France join nuclear forces to create a European Military Organization Page 32 International Structure and National Responses Throughout modern history, international politics centered on Europe Two world wars ended Europe’s dominance The movement from unipolarity to multipolarity is taking place in Asia International development and external reactions of China and Japan are steadily raining both countries to the great power level China will emerge as a great power so long as it stays politically united and competent China can strategically raise ...