Conflict After the Cold War
Arguments on Causes of War and Peace
Third Edition
Richard K. Betts
Columbia University The Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies
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Conflict after the Cold War : arguments on causes of war and peace / edited by Richard K. Berts. — 3rd ed. p. cm.
1SBN-13: 978-0-205-58352-2 ISBN-10: 0-205-58352-0 1. World politics—1989- 2. War. 3. Peace. I. Betts, Richard K., 1947-D2009.C66 2004 303.6'6—dc22
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Preface ix
Parti     Introduction: Three Visions of War and Peace 1
Francis Fukuyama   The End of History? 6
John J. Mearsheimer   Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War    18
Samuel P. Huntington   The Clash of Civilizations? 34
Part n    International Realism: Anarchy and Power 53
Thucydides   The Melian Dialogue 56
Niccolo Machiavelli   Doing Evil in Order to Do Good 61
Thomas Hobbes  The State of Nature and the State of War 66
Edward Hallett Carr   Realism and Idealism 70
Kenneth N. Waltz  The Origins of War in Neorealist Theory 87
Robert Gilpin   Hegemonic War and International Change 94
Geoffrey Blainey  Power, Culprits, and Arms 106
Part HI   International Liberalism: Institutions and Cooperation 119
Immanuel Kant   Perpetual Peace 122 Richard Cobden   Peace Through Arbitration    129 Woodrow Wilson   Community of Power vs. Balance of Power    132 Michael W. Doyle   Liberalism and World Politics 135 Hedley Bull   Society and Anarchy in International Relations    150 Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye  Power and Interdependence 161
Part IV   Psychology: Unconscious Sources of Conflict 169
Sigmund Freud   Why War? 171
Franco Fornari   The Psychoanalysis of War 179
Stanley Milgram   How Good People Do Bad Things 184
Daniel Kahneman and Jonathan Renshon   Why Hawks Win    191
3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10—DOH—12 II  10 09 08
V
Preface
Like many of their elders who should know better, students often assume that the latest cataclysmic events create a new order of things, reflect nontraditional driving forces of political events, and make lessons from the past, well, passe. Today's students know a world in which political violence occurs in acts of terrorism or small wars within weak or failed states. Hardly any have any personal memory of the Cold War era. Hardly any of their teachers have any memory of 1945, when change as epochal as the end of the Cold War occurred, and prevalent predictions based on what then seemed to be common sense were soon upended. Not many of either have a sense of history that inclines them to believe that traditional patterns of large-scale catastrophic conflict could reemerge. This volume puts the contemporary basis for students' assumptions into theoretical perspectives broader than recent conventional wisdom.
In the last decade of the twentieth century the opening of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union led many to herald a new era of peace and cooperation, in which war would be relegated to the margins of international politics. In the first decade of the twenty-first century terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and other targets in the United States led many to proclaim a new titanic struggle for the future of the world, and the return of war to the front burner of foreign policy. Theorists known as realists, who had dominated thinking about international affairs during much of the Cold War, went on the defensive in the 1990s as happy events made the ideas of liberal theorists ascendant. After September 11, 2001, however, theorists who emphasized the importance of cultural conflict became equal contenders in the theoretical debate.
Do these theoretical disputes have much significance beyond the ivory tower, and is it really necessary to inflict them on students, few of whom will wind up in the obsessive contemplation of their intellectual navels that their professors find so compelling? Yes. Do any of the three main approaches to estimating the probability of war or peace in the future have a lock on good sense about the problem, and can any of them be safely ignored? No.
On the first point, policymakers and practical observers of international affairs may care little about theoretical matters, but they all operate on the basis of theories about what causes tend to produce which effects. The difference is that academics do so explicitly while practitioners who consider themselves free from the unrealistic confines of theory do so unconsciously—and therefore without full recognition of what they take for granted how much of what they believe to be self-evident is really unexamined common sense, assumed and unproved, and how much of what they think they know comes from instinct and hope or from hard-eyed analysis grounded in history. Presidents and prime ministers, diplomats and generals, senators and journalists have strong opinions on what
ix
vi Contents
Contents vii
Part V    Culture: Customs, Norms, and Learning 195
Alexander Wendt  Anarchy Is What States Make of It. 198 Margaret Mew   Warfare Is Only an Invention—Not a Biological
Necessity   219 . John Mueller   The Obsolescence of Major War 224 Martha Finnemore   Constructing Norms of Humanitarian
Intervention 236 J.AnnTickner   Men, Women, and War 252
Part VI   Economics: Interests and Interdependence 265
NiccolO Machiavelli   Money Is Not the Sinews of War, Although It Is
Generally So Considered 268 Norman Angell   The Great Illusion 271 Geoffrey Blainey  Paradise Is a Bazaar 273 VI. Lenin   Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism 281 Joseph Schumpeter   Imperialism and Capitalism 288 Alan S. Milward   War as Policy 297
Kenneth N. Waltz   Structural Causes and Economic Effects 309 Richard Rosecrance  Trade and Power 319
Part VII Politics: Ideology and Identity 333
Ernest Gellner   Nations and Nationalism 336
Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder   Democratization and War 347
Cham Kaufmann   Possible and Impossible Solutions
to Ethnic Civil Wars 360 Radha Kumar   The Troubled History of Partition 378
Part VIH Strategy I: Military Technology, Strategy, and Stability 387
Samuel P.Huntington  Arms Races:Prerequisites and Results 391 RobertJervls  Cooperation Under the Security Dilemma 412 Jack S. Levy  The Offensive/Defensive Balance
of Military Technology 428 Charles H. Fairbanks, Jr. and Abram N. Shulsky  Arms Control:
The Historical Experience 440 Kenneth N. Waltz   The Spread of Nuclear Weapons:
More May Be Better 451
Part EX   Strategy II: Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare 463
T. E. Lawrence   Science of Guerrilla Warfare 466 Mao Tse-tung   On Guerrilla Warfare 475
Samuel P. Huntington   Patterns of Violence in World Politics 486
Martha Crenshaw   The Strategic Logic of Terrorism 511
Mark Jvv.rgensmf.yer   Religious Radicalism and Political Violence 525
Osama bin Ladin   Speech to the American People 541
Marc Sageman  Jihadi Networks of Terror 546
Richard K. Betts   The Soft Underbelly of Primacy 559
Part X    Transnational Tensions: Migration, Resources, Environment 577
Myron Weiner   Security, Stability, and Migration 580 JohnK.Cooley  The War Overwater 596 Thomas F. Homer-Dixon   Environmental Changes as Causes of Acute Conflict 607
Part XI   Conclusion: Strategies for Peace 623
G. John Ikenberry and Anne-Marie Slaughter   A World of Liberty
Under Law 625 Richard K. Betts and Thomas J. Christensen   China: Can the Next
Superpower Rise Without War? 631 Samuel P. Huntington   Peace Among Civilizations? 643
x Preface
Preface xi
causes wars, and how to avoid them, but most draw those opinions, often subconsciously, from suppositions outlined and debated in the entries in this book.
On the second point, it would be a mistake to adopt the spineless position that all contending theories have enough good and bad points to make them equally respectable. To figure out which makes the best sense, however, it is necessary to dig deep, stack the arguments against each other, and compare the fine print. Because real life is always more complicated than theorists like, none of these contending arguments can be dispatched as easily as shooting fish in a barrel. Any who think seriously about war and peace need to confront the logic and evidence behind contending views if they are to come to reasoned conclusions, whatever school of thought may ultimately convince them most.
This volume helps students to sort out the main debates about whether war is likely to remain a major problem in international life, or in what forms violent conflict will be most significant. Because assumptions about what causes war or peace are often unconscious, the book was originally designed to put current issues in intellectual historical context. Organized in many of its parts as, in effect, a dialogue, the collection juxtaposes competing views that have been influential at different times over the years. The basic aim is to make students aware that there are powerful arguments for both optimism and pessimism, to make them grapple with the reasoning behind those arguments, and to keep them from letting their own unexamined assumptions lead them to premature certainty that war is either obsolete or just around the corner.
In the years after the first edition of this volume was published, some of the selected readings became dated or less useful and are no longer included. Most of the original selections, however, remained thoroughly relevant and are retained, while many new ones have been added. The present edition adds some classic readings by exemplars of the liberal tradition in international relations theory, Richard Cobden and Woodrow Wilson. It doubles the entries on psychological causes of conflict, including explanations from the notorious Milgram experiments and more recent research for how good, normal people can bring themselves to initiate political violence. This edition also adds an entirely new section on how cultures shape norms and behavioral change regarding war; in keeping with recent developments in political science, this gives more attention to constructivist interpretations than were contained in earlier editions. The section on unconventional warfare and terrorism is expanded, including Osama bin Ladin's remarkably forthright statement of Al Qaeda's political objectives and strategic rationales, and Mark Sageman's fascinating study of the sociology of radical Islamist jihadists. The concluding section is entirely new, offering three commentaries on the future barriers to peace that reflect the general theoretical currents running through the rest of the volume.
For the push to provide this reader, I am grateful to my own students, to colleagues in Columbia's Arnold A. Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies, and to other friends in the field of security studies—some of whose writings are included in the pages that follow. 1 also thank the reviewers of this and previous editions for their contributions— Timothy J. Lomperis, St. Louis University; Bruce D. Porter, Brigham Young University; Eric S. Einhorn, University of Massachusetts; Dale R. Smith, Florida State University; Bruce R Dairy, Lamar University; Herbert K.Tillema, University of Missouri-Columbia;
Nancy Lapp, CSU-Sacramento; Craig T. Cobane, Culver-Stock on College, Stephen SaidemanMcG.il University; Karen Ruth Adams, University of Montana; Charles Call, American University; and Ira Afacan, Florida International University. Most of all 1 am Iteful for the patience of my wife Adela M. Bolet and our children Elena Christine, Michael Francis, and Diego Fitzpatrick Betts, who let Dad do another project without complaint Since my own views are pessim.stic on the question of whether war has a future, the four of them make me hope that history will prove me wrong.
Richard K. Betts Teaneck, New Jersey
Conflict After the Cold War
PART I
Introduction: Three Visions of War and Peace
International conflict in the twentieth century was unusually intense. The first half of the century was an unparalleled catastrophe: two world wars killed well over 60 million people, and ruined the lives of countless others—hundreds of millions maimed, traumatized, displaced, or impoverished. The second half of the century witnessed the Cold War, a global struggle between two superpowers and two transnational ideologies. The Cold War kept conflict within bounds, not least because the nuclear revolution meant that a World War III would dwarf the earlier world wars in destructiveness. Nevertheless, the Cold War was punctuated by "proxy" wars in Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan, and numerous revolts and other outbreaks of political violence. In terms of total destruction and constant levels of military mobilization, the past century ranks as one of the bloodiest in history.
To some, this dismal record closed decisively in the last decade of the century. Optimism bloomed as the Cold War ended. Western liberalism found new security as the only remaining world-spanning ideology, and growing trade and modern communications brought nations closer together than ever before. To others, however, the good news of the 1990s suggested only a temporary respite from an eternal cycle of conflict and calm. After all, the nineteenth century had witnessed relatively little large-scale international violence. And while global competition between great powers ended with the Cold War, innumerable local disputes burst out and horrific small wars spread in the wake of communism's collapse and Third World states' disintegration. Then on September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that appeared to declare war on the whole global tide of westernization raised the specter of a future frighteningly violent but different in political and military dynamics from the main wars of the past.
Will the refreshing new wave of international civility that rose when the Berlin Wall opened be limited to the developed "core" of Western Europe. Japan, and North America,
2
Part I: Introduction 3
while the poor countries of the "periphery" continue to wallow in force and fury?1 Or is the prospect even worse? Some worry that the durability of the new peace is doubtful in Europe too. despite the demise of the Soviet threat. The Cold War standoff between the superpowers had imposed a cautionary discipline on the traditional self-assertion of nations and forced them to cooperate in the interests of alliance security. Removal of the threat reduces the incentives for caution and cooperation, making it easier for states of the continent to rediscover old frictions and ambitions. Will the end of the standoff bring the "end of history" and a world of unprecedented peace? or the return of history and old patterns of violence?2 or a new chapter in history in which social identity, conflicts between cultures, and unconventional threats from transnational or religious groups replace interstate combat as the main danger? To figure out whether international relations in the next millennium will be fundamentally different from the past, we need to understand what forces made for war or peace in the past,3 which of those forces are more important in the new world and which less, and what novel forces may push events in uncharted directions.
Excessive optimism overlooks the fact that some current explanations of why international relations have become naturally and permanently peaceful are actually similar to old explanations, ones that have been jolted if not discredited by the catastrophes of the first half of the past century (the two world wars) or by the reinvigoration of the Cold War after the detente of the early 1970s. More than once, analysts have discovered decisive shifts in the world, only to find that less had changed than meets the eye.
Pessimists, on the other hand, overlook how much has changed. The demise of Marxism-Leninism everywhere but in a few puny enclaves is even more significant an elimination of ideological conflict than the destruction of fascism in 1945. Even traditional dictatorships have been declining as an alternative to the global primacy of Western liberal norms. Can political and economic change on this scale be irrelevant to the prospects for peace or war?
The readings in this volume explore competing ideas about present trends in the light of historic debates about the causes of war and peace. The Introduction presents three stark arguments, one generally optimistic, the others more pessimistic. The subsequent two sections sample the main arguments that have animated debate about whether the threat of war is inevitable or can be made obsolete. The two overarching theoretical traditions that subsume most of the arguments are realism (see Part II) and liberalism (see Part 111), both of which cover a wide variety of ideas.
Not long ago, Marxism would have been considered a competing paradigm on a level with the other two, but except to the degree that it shares some assumptions with re-
'See James M. Goldgeier and Michael McFaul, "A Tale of Two Worlds: Core and Periphery in the Post-Cold War Era," International Organization 46, No. 2 (spring 1992).
:See Robert Jervis, "The Future of World Politics: Will It Resemble the Past?" International Secwitv 16, No. 3 (winter 1991/92).
'For a comprehensive survey see Jack S. Levy. "The Causes of War: A Review of Theories and Evidence." m Philip E. Tetlock et al., eds.. Behavior, Society, and Nuclear War (New York" Oxford University Press. 1989), vol. 1.
alism,4 it has fallen by the wayside intellectually as well as politically. Part V, on cultural sources of conflict and cooperation, touches on a third school of thought about international relations that has been prominent recently—"constructivism."5 Some of the causes and concerns that figure in constructivist challenges to realism and liberalism can also be seen in the Huntington entries in Parts I and XI, and underlie some interpretations of global terrorism.
Whereas Parts II and III focus on dynamics in the relations among governments, Parts IV and V illustrate arguments about how human nature or cultural differences affect tendencies toward war or peace. Parts VI to IX present contending views of how economic, political, and military factors may encourage, suppress, or channel decisions to resort to force. Most of these entries reflect variations of the realist and liberal perspectives. (As editor I have tried to keep some balance between the two strands of argument, and I personally do not have complete faith in either one. Honesty, however, requires that I admit a tilt in favor of realism.) Part X, which briefly considers potential sources of conflict that transcend borders, shows the extent to which newly salient issues may also cut across traditional lines of theoretical explanation. The Conclusion returns to applications of the three visions featured at the beginning of the volume to bets about the future.
This collection does not represent all relevant perspectives. One problem is that like all too much of international relations theory, ideas in this volume are drawn primarily from the experience and interests of Europe and the developed industrial world. A selection of theories must draw from the best of those that have been made available. While there is ample literature on the history of war and peace on other continents, most attempts at rigorous theory (at least those that can be read in English) have drawn their inspiration from European history. Also, most people in the West who are interested in war are not worried about war in general, but about big, potentially cataclysmic wars, or about small ones that could escalate into a big one like World War 1 or 11. Thus attention still tends to focus on the great powers and areas where the concentrations of high-tech military capability, gross national product, and per capita wealth are highest, even though these areas have been far more peaceful in recent decades than the so-called Third World. Even the most optimistic arguments about a new era of peace restrict themselves to the northern hemisphere.
Another omission is the perspective of game theory or "rational choice" analysis. This volume is not meant to be a sampler, representative of all important strands of
4lf we substitute classes for states as the essential units in competition for power. Marxism has much of the materialist and determinist logic of realism. Both assert, in contrast to liberalism, that conflict rather than harmony is the natural condition of human relations. In opposition to realism, classical Marxism sees the state as only the superstructure of class interests, so transnational social alliances should have proved to be more significant than conflict between states. This idea was thoroughly knocked out by World War I. When Leninism came to dominate Marxism, and married it to Russian and Chinese nationalism. Communist statesmanship became eminently realist.
5For more in this vein see Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International I'olitics (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1999); and Peter Katzenstein. ed.. The Culture of Xaiioual Securih- (New York: Columbia University Press. 1996).
4        Part 1: Introduction
scholarship. In deciding what to fit within the limited number of selections that can be included, 1 chose to expose a few important intellectual traditions and debates in depth, and to strive for some cohesion among the selections, rather than include something of everything. Moreover, while the emphasis in the selections is on theory, it is important to maintain as close a link as possible to evidence from history and-current topics, so 1 have minimized selections that are purely deductive and abstract.
Some of the selections in the volume are reprinted in their entirety. The others have been edited to avoid repetition or discussion of matters not germane to the theme of the collection. Standard ellipses indicate where passages have been deleted. Some footnotes have also been deleted from passages that remain.
Part I: Introduction 5
All three of these arguments are arresting, but most observers, even if they gravitate one   will have more conditional diagnoses and predictions. Fukuyama. Mea sheimer and others who argue in the same verns reflect philosophical assumptions Zd in earlier and well-developed schools of thought. Huntington reflects a respect for T causal importance of identity and culture that anthropologists, or ^ruct.vBts .n li tea science have long recogmzed-although many of them would be shocked to End hemselves placed in the same boat with Huntington! Roots of all these approaches fo argument about war and peace are traced in more detail in the subsequent selections.
—RKB
The selections in the Introduction present the pithiest views about whether traditional international conflict is obsolete. Two of those views bracket more moderate and conditional versions of liberal and realist predictions. Francis Fukuyama argues that the developed world has evolved toward a liberal consensus that is effectively close to ending the bases for violent contention of the past.6 Fukuyama's argument is particularly remarkable because it was first written before the opening of the Berlin Wall, and was prescient in anticipating the irrelevance of Marxism. At the other extreme, John Mearsheimer7 challenges optimistic conventional wisdom with a pure distillation of the realist tradition represented in the readings that follow in Part II. To him, the intellectual developments that Fukuyama sees as decisive forces actually matter very little. When push comes to shove, ideas give way to interests. Mearsheimer asserts not only that the new era of peace is a mirage, but that the future will be worse than the recent past. The Cold War, not the new world, represents the most stable and peaceful order we are likely to see. Samuel Huntington's essay, extremely controversial when it appeared in the early post-Cold War period, strikes many as more compelling after September 11. Like liberals, he accords more importance to motives and values as sources of conflict than do realists. Unlike liberals, he does not see westernization as an irresistible tide that overwhelms world politics. Like realists, he sees conflict as natural rather than aberrant, and though not inevitable in the future, quite probable. Unlike realists, he places less emphasis on states as the sources of war in the future, and more on cleavages between major culture areas. Those who focus on the pessimistic aspect of Huntington's argument should be sure not to miss his essay (drawn from his more thoroughly developed book) at the end of this collection, since it charts a course for preventing a clash of civilizations from becoming a war of civilizations.
''For the full-length version of these arguments see Francis Fukuyama. The End of History and the Last Man (New York: Free Press. 1992). Responses to early attacks on the argument can be found in Fukuyama's "A Reply to My Critics," The National Interest No. 18 (winter 1989/90). See also Fukuyama. "Second Thoughts: The Last Man in a Bottle." The National Interest No. 56 (summer 1999). A more academic and detailed version of the argument can be found in John J. Mearsheimer. "Back to the Future: Instability in Furope After the Cold War." International Security 15, No. 4 (spring 1990).
The End of History? 7
The End of History?
is as yet incomplete in the real or material world. But there are powerful reasons for believing that it is the ideal that will govern the material world in the long run. To under-FrandS Fukuyama stand how this is so, we must first consider some theoretical issues concerning the nature
of historical change.
In watching the flow of events over the past decade or so, it is hard to avoid the feeling that something very fundamental has happened in world history. The past year has seen a flood of articles commemorating the end of the Cold War, and the fact that "peace" seems to be breaking out in many regions of the world. Most of these analyses lack any larger conceptual framework for distinguishing between what is essential and what is contingent or accidental in world history, and are predictably superficial. If Mr. Gorbachev were ousted from the Kremlin or a new Ayatollah proclaimed the millennium from a desolate Middle Eastern capital, these same commentators would scramble to announce the rebirth of a new era of conflict.
And yet, all of these people sense dimly that there is some larger process at work, a process that gives coherence and order to the daily headlines. The twentieth century saw the developed world descend into a paroxysm of ideological violence, as liberalism contended first with the remnants of absolutism, then bolshevism and fascism, and finally an updated Marxism that threatened to lead to the ultimate apocalypse of nuclear war. But the century that began full of self-confidence in the ultimate triumph of Western liberal democracy seems at its close to be returning full circle to where it started: not to an "end of ideology" or a convergence between capitalism and socialism, as earlier predicted, but to an unabashed victory of economic and political liberalism.
The triumph of the West, of the Western idea, is evident first of all in the total exhaustion of viable systematic alternatives to Western liberalism. In the past decade, there have been unmistakable changes in the intellectual climate of the world's two largest communist countries, and the beginnings of significant reform movements in both. But this phenomenon extends beyond high politics and it can be seen also in the ineluctable spread of consumerist Western culture in such diverse contexts as the peasants' markets and color television sets now omnipresent throughout China, the cooperative restaurants and clothing stores opened in the past year in Moscow, the Beethoven piped into Japanese department stores, and the rock music enjoyed alike in Prague, Rangoon, and Tehran.
What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of postwar history, but the end of history as such: that is, the end point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universal ization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government. This is not to say that there will no longer be events to fill the pages of Foreign Affairs's yearly summaries of international relations, for the victory of 1 iberalism has occurred primarily in the realm of ideas or consciousness and
i
The notion of the end of history is not an original one. Its best known propagator was Karl Marx, who believed that the direction of historical development was a purposeful one determined by the interplay of material forces, and would come to an end only with the achievement of a communist Utopia that would finally resolve all prior contradictions. But the concept of history as a dialectical process with a beginning, a middle, and an end was borrowed by Mare from his great German predecessor, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
For better or worse, much of Hegel's historicism has become part of our contemporary intellectual baggage. The notion that mankind has progressed through a series of primitive stages of consciousness on his path to the present, and that these stages corresponded to concrete forms of social organization, such as tribal, slave-owning, theocratic, and finally democratic-egalitarian societies, has become inseparable from the modern understanding of man. Hegel was the first philosopher to speak the language of modern social science, insofar as man for him was the product of his concrete historical and social environment and not, as earlier natural right theorists would have it, a collection of more or less fixed "natural" attributes. The mastery and transformation of man's natural environment through the application of science and technology was originally not a Marxist concept, but a Hegelian one. Unlike later historicists whose historical relativism degenerated into relativism tout court, however, Hegel believed that history culminated in an absolute moment—a moment in which a final, rational form of society and state became victorious.
It is Hegel's misfortune to be known now primarily as Marx's precursor, and it is our misfortune that few of us are familiar with Hegel's work from direct study, but only as it has been filtered through the distorting lens of Marxism. In France, however, there has been an effort to save Hegel from his Marxist interpreters and to resurrect him as the philosopher who most correctly speaks to our time. Among those modern French interpreters of Hegel, the greatest was certainly Alexandre Kojeve, a brilliant Russian emigre who taught a highly influential series of seminars in Paris in the 1930s at the Ecole Practique des Hautes Etudes.1 While largely unknown in the United States, Kojeve had a major impact on the intellectual life of the continent. Among his students ranged such
Francis Fukuyama, "The End of History'" The National Interest No. 16 (summer 1989). Copyright a 1989 by Francis Fukuyama.
'Kojeve's best-known work is his Introduction a la lecture de Hegel (Paris: Editions Gallimard. 1947). which is a transcript of the Ecole Practique lectures from the 1930s. Thts book is available m English entitled Introduction to the Reading of Hegel arranged by Raymond Queneau. edited by Allan Bloom, and translated by James Nichols (New York: Basic Books, 1969).
6
8
Part I: Introduction
The End of History!'
9
future luminaries as Jean-Paul Sartre on the Left and Raymond Aron on the Right; postwar existentialism borrowed many of its basic categories from Hegel via Kojeve.
Kojeve sought to resurrect the Hegel of the Phenomenology of Mind, the Hegel who proclaimed history to be at an end in 1806. For as early as this Hegel saw in Napoleon's defeat of the Prussian monarchy at the Battle of Jena the victory of the ideals of the French Revolution, and the imminent universalization of the state incorporating the principles of liberty and equality. Kojeve, far from rejecting Hegel in light of the turbulent events of the next century and a half, insisted that the latter had been essentially correct. The Battle of Jena marked the end of history because it was at that point that the vanguard of humanity (a term quite familiar to Marxists) actualized the principles of the French Revolution. While there was considerable work to be done after 1806—abolishing slavery and the slave trade, extending the franchise to workers, women, blacks, and other racial minorities, etc.—the basic principles of the liberal democratic state could not be improved upon. The two world wars in this century and their attendant revolutions and upheavals simply had the effect of extending those principles spatially, such that the various provinces of human civilization were brought up to the level of its most advanced outposts, and of forcing those societies in Europe and North America at the vanguard of civilization to implement their liberalism more fully.. . .
II
For Hegel, the contradictions that drive history exist first of all in the realm of human consciousness, i.e. on the level of ideas—not the trivial election year proposals of American politicians, but ideas in the sense of large unifying world views that might best be understood under the rubric of ideology. Ideology in this sense is not restricted to the secular and explicit political doctrines we usually associate with the term, but can include religion, culture, and the complex of moral values underlying any society as well.
Hegel's view of the relationship between the ideal and the real or material worlds was an extremely complicated one, beginning with the fact that for him the distinction between the two was only apparent. He did not believe that the real world conformed or could be made to conform to ideological preconceptions of philosophy professors in any simple-minded way, or that the "material" world could not impinge on the ideal. Indeed, Hegel the professor was temporarily thrown out of work as a result of a very material event, the Battle of Jena. But while Hegel's writing and thinking could be stopped by a bullet from the material world, the hand on the trigger of the gun was motivated in turn by the ideas of liberty and equality that had driven the French Revolution.
For Hegel, all human behavior in the material world, and hence all human history, is rooted in a prior state of consciousness—an idea similar to the one expressed by John Maynard Keynes when he said that the views of men of affairs were usually derived from defunct economists and academic scribblers of earlier generations. This consciousness may not be explicit and self-aware, as are modern political doctrines, but may rather take the form of religion or simple cultural or moral habits. And yet this realm of consciousness ;/; the long run necessarily becomes manifest in the material world, indeed creates
the material world in its own image. Consciousness is cause and not effect, and can develop autonomously from the material world; hence the real subtext underlying the apparent jumble of current events is the history of ideology.
Hegel's idealism has fared poorly at the hands of later thinkers. Mare reversed the priority of the real and the ideal completely, relegating the entire realm of consciousness— religion, art, culture, philosophy itself—to a "superstructure" that was determined entirely by the prevailing material mode of production. Yet another unfortunate legacy of Marxism is our tendency to retreat into materialist or utilitarian explanations of political or historical phenomena, and our disinclination to believe in the autonomous power of ideas. A recent example of this is Paul Kennedy's hugely successful The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, which ascribes the decline of great powers to simple economic overextension. Obviously, this is true on some level: an empire whose economy is barely above the level of subsistence cannot bankrupt its treasury indefinitely. But whether a highly productive modern industrial society chooses to spend 3 or 7 percent of its GNP on defense rather than consumption is entirely a matter of that society's political priorities, which are in turn determined in the realm of consciousness.
The materialist bias of modern thought is characteristic not only of people on the Left who may be sympathetic to Marxism, but of many passionate anti-Marxists as well. Indeed, there is on the Right what one might label the Wall Street Journal school of deterministic materialism that discounts the importance of ideology and culture and sees man as essentially a rational, profit-maximizing individual. It is precisely this kind of individual and his pursuit of material incentives that is posited as the basis for economic life as such in economic textbooks. One small example will illustrate the problematic character of such materialist views.
Max Weber begins his famous book, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, by noting the different economic performance of Protestant and Catholic communities throughout Europe and America, summed up in the proverb that Protestants eat well while Catholics sleep well. Weber notes that according to any economic theory that posited man as a rational profit-maximizer, raising the piece-work rate should increase labor productivity. But in fact, in many traditional peasant communities, raising the piecework rate actually had the opposite effect of lowering labor productivity: at the higher rate, a peasant accustomed to earning two and one-half marks per day found he could earn the same amount by working less, and did so because he valued leisure more than income. The choices of leisure over income, or of the militaristic life of the Spartan hoplite over the wealth of the Athenian trader, or even the ascetic life of the early capitalist entrepreneur over that of a traditional leisured aristocrat, cannot possibly be explained by the impersonal working of material forces, but come preeminently out of the sphere of consciousness—what we have labeled here broadly as ideology. And indeed, a central theme of Weber's work was to prove that contrary to Marx, the material mode of production, far from being the "base," was itself a "superstructure" with roots in religion and culture, and that to understand the emergence of modern capitalism and the profit motive one had to study their antecedents in the realm of the spirit.
As we look around the contemporary world, the poverty of materialist theories of economic development is all too apparent. The Wall Street Journal school of deterministic
10
Part I: Introduction
The End of History'!' 11
materialism habitually points to the stunning economic success of Asia in the past few decades as evidence of the viability of free market economics, with the implication that ail societies would see similar development were they simply to allow their populations to pursue their material self-interest freely. Surely free markets and stable political systems are a necessary precondition to capitalist economic growth. But just as surely the cultural heritage of those Far Eastern societies, the ethic of work and saving and family, a religious heritage that does not, like Islam, place restrictions on certain forms of economic behavior, and other deeply ingrained moral qualities, are equally important in explaining their economic performance.2 And yet the intellectual weight of materialism is such that not a single respectable contemporary theory of economic development addresses consciousness and culture seriously as the matrix within which economic behavior is formed.
Failure to understand that the roots of economic behavior lie in the realm of consciousness and culture leads to the common mistake of attributing material causes to phenomena that are essentially ideal in nature. For example, it is commonplace in the West to interpret the reform movements first in China and most recently in the Soviet Union as the victory of the material over the ideal—that is, a recognition that ideological incentives could not replace material ones in stimulating a highly productive modern economy, and that if one wanted to prosper one had to appeal to baser forms of self-interest. But the deep defects of socialist economies were evident thirty or forty years ago to anyone who chose to look. Why was it that these countries moved away from central planning only in the 1980s? The answer must be found in the consciousness of the elites and leaders ruling them, who decided to opt for the "Protestant" life of wealth and risk over the "Catholic" path of poverty and security. That change was in no way made inevitable by the material conditions in which either country found itself on the eve of the reform, but instead came about as the result of the victory of one idea over another....
Ill
... In the past century, there have been two major challenges to liberalism, those of fascism and of communism. The former3 saw the political weakness, materialism, anomie, and lack of community of the West as fundamental contradictions in liberal societies
2One need look no further than the recent performance of Vietnamese immigrants in the U.S. school system when compared to their black or Hispanic classmates to realize that culture and consciousness are absolutely crucial to explain not only economic behavior but virtually every other important aspect of life as well.
51 am not using the term "fascism" here in its most precise sense, fully aware of the frequent misuse of this term to denounce anyone to the right of the user. "Fascism" here denotes any organized ultra-nationalist movement with universalistic pretensions—not universalistic with regard to its nationalism, of course, since the latter is exclusive by definition, but with regard to the movement's belief in its right to rule other people. Hence Imperial Japan would qualify as fascist while former strongman Stoessner's Paraguay or Pinochet's Chile would not. Obviously fascist ideologies cannot be universalistic in the sense of Marxism or liberalism, but the structure of the doctrine can be transferred from country to country.
that could only be resolved by a strong state that forged a new "people" on the basis of national exclusiveness. Fascism was destroyed as a living ideology by World War 11. This was a defeat, of course, on a very material level, but it amounted to a defeat of the idea as well. What destroyed fascism as an idea was not universal moral revulsion against it, since plenty of people were willing to endorse the idea as long as it seemed the wave of the future, but its lack of success. After the war, it seemed to most people that German fascism as well as its other European and Asian variants were bound to self-destruct. There was no material reason why new fascist movements could not have sprung up again after the war in other locales, but for the fact that expansionist ultra-nationalism, with its promise of unending conflict leading to disastrous military defeat, had completely lost its appeal. The ruins of the Reich chancellory as well as the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed this ideology on the level of consciousness as well as materially, and all of the proto-fascist movements spawned by the German and Japanese examples like the Peronist movement in Argentina or Subhas Chandra Bose's Indian National Army withered after the war.
The ideological challenge mounted by the other great alternative to liberalism, communism, was far more serious. Marx, speaking Hegel's language, asserted that liberal society contained a fundamental contradiction that could not be resolved within its context, that between capital and labor, and this contradiction has constituted the chief accusation against liberalism ever since. But surely, the class issue has actually been successfully
resolved in the West----
But the power of the liberal idea would seem much less impressive if it had not infected the largest and oldest culture in Asia, China. The simple existence of communist China created an alternative pole of ideological attraction, and as such constituted a threat to liberalism. But the past fifteen years have seen an almost total discrediting of Marxism-Leninism as an economic system. Beginning with the famous third plenum of the Tenth Central Committee in 1978, the Chinese Communist party set about decollec-tivizing agriculture for the 800 million Chinese who still lived in the countryside. The role of the state in agriculture was reduced to that of a tax collector, while production of consumer goods was sharply increased in order to give peasants a taste of the universal homogenous state and thereby an incentive to work. The reform doubled Chinese grain output in only five years, and in the process created for Deng Xiao-ping a solid political base from which he was able to extend the reform to other parts of the economy. Economic statistics do not begin to describe the dynamism, initiative, and openness, evident in China since the reform began.
China could not now be described in any way as a liberal democracy. At present, no more than 20 percent of its economy has been marketized, and most importantly it continues to be ruled by a self-appointed Communist party which has given no hint of wanting to devolve power. Deng has made none of Gorbachev's promises regarding democratization of the political system and there is no Chinese equivalent ofglasnost. The Chinese leadership has in fact been much more circumspect in criticizing Mao and Maoism than Gorbachev with respect to Brezhnev and Stalin, and the regime continues to pay lip service to Marxism-Leninism as its ideological underpinning. But anyone familiar with the outlook and behavior of the new technocratic elite now governing China
12      Part I: Introduction
The End of History?      13
knows that Marxism and ideological principle have become virtually irrelevant as guides to policy, and that bourgeois consumerism has a real meaning in that country for the first time since the revolution. The various slowdowns in the pace of reform, the campaigns against "spiritual pollution" and crackdowns on political dissent are more properly seen as tactical adjustments made in the process of managing-what is an extraordinarily difficult political transition. By ducking the question of political reform while putting the economy on a new footing, Deng has managed to avoid the breakdown of authority that has accompanied Gorbachev's perestroika. Yet the pull of the liberal idea continues to be very strong as economic power devolves and the economy becomes more open to the outside world. There are currently over 20,000 Chinese students studying in the U.S. and other Western countries, almost all of them the children of the Chinese elite. It is hard to believe that when they return home to run the country they will be content for China to be the only country in Asia unaffected by the larger democratizing trend. The student demonstrations in Beijing that broke out first in December 1986 and recurred recently on the occasion of Hu Yao-bang's death were only the beginning of what will inevitably be mounting pressure for change in the political system as well.
What is important about China from the standpoint of world history is not the present state of the reform or even its future prospects. The central issue is the fact that the People's Republic of China can no longer act as a beacon for illiberal forces around the world, whether they be guerrillas in some Asian jungle or middle class students in Paris. Maoism, rather than being the pattern for Asia's future, became an anachronism____
If we admit for the moment that the fascist and communist challenges to liberalism are dead, are there any other ideological competitors left? Or put another way, are there contradictions in liberal society beyond that of class that are not resolvable? Two possibilities suggest themselves, those of religion and nationalism.
The rise of religious fundamentalism in recent years within the Christian, Jewish, and Muslim traditions has been widely noted. One is inclined to say that the revival of religion in some way attests to a broad unhappiness with the impersonality and spiritual vacuity of liberal consumerist societies. Yet while the emptiness at the core of liberalism is most certainly a defect in the ideology—indeed, a flaw that one does not need the perspective of religion to recognize—it is not at all clear that it is remediable through politics. Modern liberalism itself was historically a consequence of the weakness of religiously-based societies which, failing to agree on the nature of the good life, could not provide even the minimal preconditions of peace and stability. In the contemporary world only Islam has offered a theocratic state as a political alternative to both liberalism and communism. But the doctrine has little appeal for non-Muslims, and it is hard to believe that the movement will take on any universal significance. Other less organized religious impulses have been successfully satisfied within the sphere of personal life that is permitted in liberal societies.
The other major "contradiction" potentially unresolvable by liberalism is the one posed by nationalism and other forms of racial and ethnic consciousness. It is certainly true that a very large degree of conflict since the Battle of Jena has had its roots in nationalism. Two cataclysmic world wars in this century have been spawned by the nationalism of the developed world in various guises, and if those passions have been
muted to a certain extent in postwar Europe, they are still extremely powerful in the Third World. Nationalism has been a threat to liberalism historically in Germany, and continues to be one in isolated parts of "post-historical" Europe like Northern Ireland.
But it is not clear that nationalism represents an irreconcilable contradiction in the heart of liberalism. In the first place, nationalism is not one single phenomenon but several, ranging from mild cultural nostalgia to the highly organized and elaborately articulated doctrine of National Socialism. Only systematic nationalisms of the latter sort can qualify as a formal ideology on the level of liberalism or communism. The vast majority of the world's nationalist movements do not have a political program beyond the negative desire of independence from some other group or people, and do not offer anything like a comprehensive agenda for socio-economic organization. As such, they are compatible with doctrines and ideologies that do offer such agendas. While they may constitute a source of conflict for liberal societies, this conflict does not arise from liberalism itself so much as from the fact that the liberalism in question is incomplete. Certainly a great deal of the world's ethnic and nationalist tension can be explained in terms of peoples who are forced to live in unrepresentative political systems that they have not chosen.
While it is impossible to rule out the sudden appearance of new ideologies or previously unrecognized contradictions in liberal societies, then, the present world seems to confirm that the fundamental principles of socio-political organization have not advanced terribly far since 1806. Many of the wars and revolutions fought since that time have been undertaken in the name of ideologies which claimed to be more advanced than liberalism, but whose pretensions were ultimately unmasked by history. In the meantime, they have helped to spread the universal homogenous state to the point where it could have a significant effect on the overall character of international relations.
iv
What are the implications of the end of history for international relations? Clearly, the vast bulk of the Third World remains very much mired in history, and will be a terrain of conflict for many years to come. But let us focus for the time being on the larger and more developed states of the world who after all account for the greater part of world politics. Russia and China are not likely to join the developed nations of the West as liberal societies any time in the foreseeable future, but suppose for a moment that Marxism-Leninism ceases to be a factor driving the foreign policies of these states—a prospect which, if not yet here, the last few years have made a real possibility. How will the overall characteristics of a de-ideologized world differ from those of the one with which we are familiar at such a hypothetical juncture?
The most common answer is—not very much. For there is a very widespread belief among many observers of international relations that underneath the skin of ideology is a hard core of great power national interest that guarantees a fairly high level of competition and conflict between nations. Indeed, according to one academically popular school of international relations theory, conflict inheres in the international system as such, and to understand the prospects for conflict one must look at the shape of the system—for example,
14     Part I: Introduction
The End of History?      15
whether it is bipolar or multipolar—rather than at the specific character of the nations and regimes that constitute it. This school in effect applies a Hobbesian view of politics to international relations, and assumes that aggression and insecurityare universal characteristics of human societies rather than the product of specific historical circumstances.
Believers in this line of thought take the relations that existed between the participants in the classical nineteenth century European balance of power as a model for what a de-ideologized contemporary world would look like. Charles Krauthammer, for example, recently explained that if as a result of Gorbachev's reforms the USSR is shorn of Marxist-Leninist ideology, its behavior will revert to that of nineteenth century imperial Russia.4 While he finds this more reassuring than the threat posed by a communist Russia, he implies that there will still be a substantial degree of competition and conflict in the international system, just as there was say between Russia and Britain or Wilhelmine Germany in the last century. This is, of course, a convenient point of view for people who want to admit that something major is changing in the Soviet Union, but do not want to accept responsibility for recommending the radical policy redirection implicit in such a view. But is it true?
In fact, the notion that ideology is a superstructure imposed on a substratum of permanent great power interest is a highly questionable proposition. For the way in which any state defines its national interest is not universal but rests on some kind of prior ideological basis, just as we saw that economic behavior is determined by a prior state of consciousness. In this century, states have adopted highly articulated doctrines with explicit foreign policy agendas legitimizing expansionism, like Marxism-Leninism or National Socialism.
The expansionist and competitive behavior of nineteenth-century European states rested on no less ideal a basis; it just so happened that the ideology driving it was less explicit than the doctrines of the twentieth century. For one thing, most "liberal" European societies were illiberal insofar as they believed in the legitimacy of imperialism, that is, the right of one nation to rule over other nations without regard for the wishes of the ruled. The justifications for imperialism varied from nation to nation, from a crude belief in the legitimacy of force, particularly when applied to non-Europeans, to the White Man's Burden and Europe's Christianizing mission, to the desire to give people of color access to the culture of Rabelais and Moliere. But whatever the particular ideological basis, every "developed" country believed in the acceptability of higher civilizations ruling lower ones—including, incidentally, the United States with regard to the Philippines. This led to a drive for pure territorial aggrandizement in the latter half of the century and played no small role in causing the Great War.
The radical and deformed outgrowth of nineteenth-century imperialism was German fascism, an ideology which justified Germany's right not only to rule over non-European peoples, but over all non-German ones. But in retrospect it seems that Hitler represented a diseased bypath in the general course of European development, and since his fiery defeat, the legitimacy of any kind of territorial aggrandizement has been thoroughly
discredited.5 Since the Second World War, European nationalism has been defanged and shorn of any real relevance to foreign policy, with the consequence that the nineteenth-century model of great power behavior has become a serious anachronism. The most extreme form of nationalism that any Western European state has mustered since 1945 has been Gaullism, whose self-assertion has been confined largely to the realm of nuisance politics and culture. International life for the part of the world that has reached the end of history is far more preoccupied with economics than with politics or strategy.
The developed states of the West do maintain defense establishments and in the postwar period have competed vigorously for influence to meet a worldwide communist threat. This behavior has been driven, however, by an external threat from states that possess overtly expansionist ideologies, and would not exist in their absence. To take the "neo-realist" theory seriously, one would have to believe that "natural" competitive behavior would reassert itself among the OECD states were Russia and China to disappear from the face of the earth. That is, West Germany and France would arm themselves against each other as they did in the 1930s, Australia and New Zealand would send military advisers to block each others' advances in Africa, and the U.S.-Canadian border would become fortified. Such a prospect is, of course, ludicrous: minus Marxist-Leninist ideology, we are far more likely to see the "Common Marketization" of world politics than the disintegration of the EEC into nineteenth-century competitiveness. Indeed, as our experience in dealing with Europe on matters such as terrorism or Libya prove, they are much further gone than we down the road that denies the legitimacy of the use of force in international politics, even in self-defense.
The automatic assumption that Russia shorn of its expansionist communist ideology should pick up where the czars left off just prior to the Bolshevik Revolution is therefore a curious one. It assumes that the evolution of human consciousness has stood still in the meantime, and that the Soviets, while picking up currently fashionable ideas in the realm of economics, will return to foreign policy views a century out of date in the rest of Europe. This is certainly not what happened to China after it began its reform process. Chinese competitiveness and expansionism on the world scene have virtually disappeared: Beijing no longer sponsors Maoist insurgencies or tries to cultivate influence in distant African countries as it did in the 1960s. This is not to say that there are not troublesome aspects to contemporary Chinese foreign policy, such as the reckless sale of ballistic missile technology in the Middle East; and the PRC continues to manifest traditional great power behavior in its sponsorship of the Khmer Rouge against Vietnam. But the former is explained by commercial motives and the latter is a vestige of earlier ideologically-based rivalries. The new China far more resembles Gaullist France than pre-World War 1 Germany.
The real question for the future, however, is the degree to which Soviet elites have assimilated the consciousness of the universal homogenous state that is post-Hitler Europe. From their writings and from my own personal contacts with them, there is no
4See his article, "Beyond the Cold War," New Republic, December 19, IS
5lt took European colonial powers like France several years after the war to admit the illegitimacy of their empires, but decolonization was an inevitable consequence of the Allied victory which had been based on the promise of a restoration of democratic freedoms.
16     Part I: Introduction
The End of History? 17
question in my mind that the liberal Soviet intelligentsia rallying around Gorbachev has arrived at the end-of-history view in a remarkably short time, due in no small measure to the contacts they have had since the Brezhnev era with the larger European civilization around them. "New political thinking," the general rubric for their views, describes a world dominated by economic concerns, in which there are no ideological grounds for major conflict beween nations, and in which, consequently, the use of military force becomes less legitimate. As Foreign Minister Shevardnadze put it in mid-1988:
The struggle between two opposing systems is no longer a determining tendency of the present-day era. At the modern stage, the ability to build up material wealth at an accelerated rate on the basis of front-ranking science and high-level techniques and technology, and to distribute it fairly, and through joint efforts to restore and protect the resources necessary for mankind's survival acquires decisive importance.
The post-historical consciousness represented by "new thinking" is only one possible future for the Soviet Union, however. There has always been a very strong current of great Russian chauvinism in the Soviet Union, which has found freer expression since the advent ofglasnost. It may be possible to return to traditional Marxism-Leninism for a while as a simple rallying point for those who want to restore the authority that Gorbachev has dissipated. But as in Poland, Marxism-Leninism is dead as a mobilizing ideology: under its banner people cannot be made to work harder, and its adherents have lost confidence in themselves. Unlike the propagators of traditional Marxism-Leninism, however, ultranationalists in the USSR believe in their Slavophile cause passionately, and one gets the sense that the fascist alternative is not one that has played itself out entirely there.
The Soviet Union, then, is at a fork in the road: it can start down the path that was staked out by Western Europe forty-five years ago, a path that most of Asia has followed, or it can realize its own uniqueness and remain stuck in history. The choice it makes will be highly important for us, given the Soviet Union's size and military strength, for that power will continue to preoccupy us and slow our realization that we have already emerged on the other side of history.
those at the end of history, would still be possible. There would still be a high and perhaps rising level of ethnic and nationalist violence, since those are impulses incompletely played out, even in parts of the post-historical world. Palestinians and Kurds, Sikhs and Tamils, Irish Catholics and Walloons, Armenians and Azeris, will continue to have their unresolved grievances. This implies that terrorism and wars of national liberation will continue to be an important item on the international agenda. But large-scale conflict must involve large states still caught in the grip of history, and they are what appear to be passing from the scene.
The end of history will be a very sad time. The struggle for recognition, the willingness to risk one's life for a purely abstract goal, the worldwide ideological struggle that called forth daring, courage, imagination, and idealism, will be replaced by economic calculation, the endless solving of technical problems, environmental concerns, and the satisfaction of sophisticated consumer demands. In the post-historical period there will be neither art nor philosophy, just the perpetual caretaking of the museum of human history. I can feel in myself, and see in others around me, a powerful nostalgia for the time when history existed. Such nostalgia, in fact, will continue to fuel competition and conflict even in the post-historical world for some time to come. Even though I recognize its inevitability, I have the most ambivalent feelings for the civilization that has been created in Europe since 1945, with its North Atlantic and Asian offshoots. Perhaps this very prospect of centuries of boredom at the end of history will serve to get history started once again.
v
The passing of Marxism-Leninism first from China and then from the Soviet Union will mean its death as a living ideology of world historical significance. For while there may be some isolated true believers left in places like Managua, Pyongyang, or Cambridge, Massachusetts, the fact that there is not a single large state in which it is a going concern undermines completely its pretensions to being in the vanguard of human history. And the death of this ideology means the growing "Common Marketization" of international relations, and the diminution of the likelihood of large-scale conflict between states.
This does not by any means imply the end of international conflict per se. For the world at that point would be divided between a part that was historical and a part that was post-historical. Conflict between states still in history, and between those states and
Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War
John J. Mearsheimer
Peace: It's wonderful. I like it as much as the next man, and have no wish to be willfully gloomy at a moment when optimism about the future shape of the world abounds. Nevertheless, my thesis in this essay is that we are likely soon to regret the passing of the Cold War.
To be sure, no one will miss such by-products of the Cold War as the Korean and Vietnam conflicts. No one will want to replay the U-2 affair, the Cuban missile crisis, or the building of the Berlin Wall. And no one will want to revisit the domestic Cold War, with its purges and loyalty oaths, its xenophobia and stifling of dissent. We will not wake up one day to discover fresh wisdom in the collected fulminations of John Foster Dulles.
We may, however, wake up one day lamenting the loss of the order that the Cold War gave to the anarchy of international relations. For untamed anarchy is what Europe knew in the forty-five years of this century before the Cold War, and untamed anarchy— Hobbes's war of all against all—is a prime cause of armed conflict. Those who think that armed conflicts among the European states are now out of the question, that the two world wars burned all the war out of Europe, are projecting unwarranted optimism onto the future. The theories of peace that implicitly undergird this optimism are notably shallow constructs. They stand up to neither logical nor historical analysis. You would not want to bet the farm on their prophetic accuracy.
The world is about to conduct a vast test of the theories of war and peace put forward by social scientists, who never dreamed that their ideas would be tested by the world-historic events announced almost daily in newspaper headlines. This social scientist is willing to put his theoretical cards on the table as he ventures predictions about the future of Europe. In the process, I hope to put alternative theories of war and peace under as much intellectual pressure as I can muster. My argument is that the prospect of major crises, even wars, in Europe is likely to increase dramatically now that the Cold War is receding into history. The next forty-five years in Europe are not likely to be so violent as the forty-five years before the Cold War, but they are likely to be substantially more violent than the past forty-five years, the era that we may someday look back upon not as the Cold War but as the Long Peace, in John Lewis Caddis's phrase.
This pessimistic conclusion rests on the general argument that the distribution and character of military power among states are the root causes of war and peace. Specifically,
John J. Mearsheimer. "Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War." €■ 1990 by John Mearsheimer. as originally published in The Atlantic. November 1990. Reprinted by permission.
Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War 19
the peace in Europe since 1945—precarious at first, but increasingly robust over time— has flowed from three factors; the bipolar distribution of military power on the Continent; the rough military equality between the polar powers, the United States and the Soviet Union; and the ritualistically deplored fact that each of these superpowers is armed with a large nuclear arsenal.
We don't yet know the entire shape of the new Europe. But we do know some things. We know, for example, that the new Europe will involve a return to the multipolar distribution of power that characterized the European state system from its founding, with the Peace of Westphalia, in 1648, until 1945. We know that this multipolar European state system was plagued by war from first to last. We know that from 1900 to 1945 some 50 million Europeans were killed in wars that were caused in great part by the instability of this state system. We also know that since 1945 only some 15,000 Europeans have been killed in wars; roughly 10,000 Hungarians and Russians, in what we might call the Russo-Hungarian War of October and November, 1956, and somewhere between 1,500 and 5,000 Greeks and Turks, in the July and August, 1974, war on Cyprus.
The point is clear: Europe is reverting to a state system that created powerful incentives for aggression in the past. If you believe (as the Realist school of international-relations theory, to which I belong, believes) that the prospects of international peace are not markedly influenced by the domestic political character of states—that it is the character of the state system, not the character of the individual units composing it, that drives states toward war—then it is difficult to share in the widespread elation of the moment about the future of Europe. Last year was repeatedly compared to 1789, the year the French Revolution began, as the Year of Freedom, and so it was. Forgotten in the general exaltation was that the hope-filled events of 1789 signaled the start of an era of war and conquest.
A "HARD" THEORY OF PEACE
What caused the era of violence in Europe before 1945, and why has the postwar era, the period of the Cold War, been so much more peaceful? The two world wars before 1945 had myriad particular and unrepeatable causes, but to the student of international relations seeking to establish generalizations about the behavior of states in the past which might illuminate their behavior in the future, two fundamental causes stand out. These are the multipolar distribution of power in Europe, and the imbalances of strength that often developed among the great powers as they jostled for supremacy or advantage.
There is something elementary about the geometry of power in international relations, and so its importance is easy to overlook. "Bipolarity" and "multipolarity" are ungainly but necessary coinages. The Cold War, with two superpowers serving to anchor rival alliances of clearly inferior powers, is our model of bipolarity. Europe in 1914, with France, Germany, Great Britain, Austria-Hungary, and Russia positioned as great powers, is our model of multipolarity.
If the example of 1914 is convincing enough evidence that multipolar systems are the more dangerous geometry of power, then perhaps 1 should rest my case. Alas for
18
20      Part I: Introduction
theoretical elegance, there are no empirical studies providing conclusive support for this proposition. From its beginnings until 1945 the European state system was multipolar, so this history is barren of comparisons that would reveal the differing effects of the two systems. Earlier history, to be sure, does furnish scattered examples of bipolar systems, including some—Athens and Sparta, Rome and Carthage—that were warlike. But this history is inconclusive, because it is incomplete. Lacking a comprehensive survey of history, we can't do much more than offer examples—now on this, now on that side of the debate. As a result, the case made here rests chiefly on deduction.
Deductively, a bipolar system is more peaceful for the simple reason that under it only two major powers are in contention. Moreover, those great powers generally demand allegiance from minor powers in the system, which is likely to produce rigid alliance structures. The smaller states are then secure from each other as well as from attack by the rival great power. Consequently (to make a Dick-and-Jane point with a well-worn social-science term), a bipolar system has only one dyad across which war might break out. A multipolar system is much more fluid and has many such dyads. Therefore, other things being equal, war is statistically more likely in a multipolar system than it is in a bipolar one. Admittedly, wars in a multipolar world that involve only minor powers or only one major power are not likely to be as devastating as a conflict between two major powers. But small wars always have the potential to widen into big wars.
Also, deterrence is difficult to maintain in a multipolar state system, because power imbalances are common-place, and when power asymmetries develop, the strong become hard to deter. Two great powers can join together to attack a third state, as Germany and the Soviet Union did in 1939, when they ganged up on Poland. Furthermore, a major power might simply bully a weaker power in a one-on-one encounter, using its superior strength to coerce or defeat the minor state. Germany's actions against Czechoslovakia in the late 1930s provide a good example of this sort of behavior. Ganging up and bullying are largely unknown in a bipolar system, since with only two great powers dominating center stage, it is impossible to produce the power asymmetries that result in ganging up and bullying.
There is a second reason that deterrence is more problematic under multipolarity. The resolve of opposing states and also the size and strength of opposing coalitions are hard to calculate in this geometry of power, because the shape of the international order tends to remain in flux, owing to the tendency of coalitions to gain and lose partners. This can lead aggressors to conclude falsely that they can coerce others by bluffing war, or even achieve outright victory on the battlefield. For example, Germany was not certain before 1914 that Britain would oppose it if it reached for Continental hegemony, and Germany completely failed to foresee that the United States would eventually move to contain it. In 1939 Germany hoped that France and Britain would stand aside as it conquered Poland, and again failed to foresee the eventual American entry into the war. As a result, Germany exaggerated its prospects for success, which undermined deterrence by encouraging German adventurism.
The prospects for peace, however are not simply a function of the number of great powers in the system. They are also affected by the relative military strength of those major states. Bipolar and multipolar systems both are likely to be more peaceful when
power
Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War 21
is distributed equally in them. Power inequalities invite war, because they increase
an aggressor's prospects for victory on the battlefield. Most of the general wars that have tormented Europe over the past five centuries have involved one particularly powerful state against the other major powers in the system. This pattern characterized the wars that grew from the attempts at hegemony by Charles V, Philip II, Louis XIV, Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, Wilhelniine Germany, and Nazi Germany. Hence the size of the gap in military power between the two leading states in the system is a key determinant of stability. Small gaps foster peace; larger gaps promote war.
Nuclear weapons seem to be in almost everybody's bad book, but the fact is that they are a powerful force for peace. Deterrence is most likely to hold when the costs and risks of going to war are unambiguously stark. The more horrible the prospect of war, the less likely war is. Deterrence is also more robust when conquest is more difficult. Potential aggressor states are given pause by the patent futility of attempts at expansion.
Nuclear weapons favor peace on both counts. They are weapons of mass destruction, and would produce horrendous devastation if used in any numbers. Moreover, they are more useful for self-defense than for aggression. If both sides' nuclear arsenals are secure from attack, creating an arrangement of mutual assured destruction, neither side can employ these weapons to gain a meaningful military advantage. International conflicts then become tests of pure will. Who would dare to use these weapons of unimaginable destructive power? Defenders have the advantage here, because defenders usually value their freedom more than aggressors value new conquests.
Nuclear weapons further bolster peace by moving power relations among states toward equality. States that possess nuclear deterrents can stand up to one another, even if their nuclear arsenals vary greatly in size, as long as both sides have an assured destruction capability. In addition, mutual assured destruction helps alleviate the vexed problem of miscalculation by leaving little doubt about the relative power of states.
No discussion of the causes of peace in the twentieth century would be complete without a word on nationalism. With "nationalism" as a synonym for "love of country" I have no quarrel. But hypernationalism, the belief that other nations or nation-states are both inferior and threatening, is perhaps the single greatest domestic threat to peace, although it is still not a leading force in world politics. Hypernationalism arose in the past among European states because most of them were nation-states—states composed mainly of people from a single ethnic group—that existed in an anarchic world, under constant threat from other states. In such a system people who love their own nation can easily come to be contemptuous of the nationalities inhabiting opposing states. The problem is worsened when domestic elites demonize a rival nation to drum up support for national-security policy.
Hypernationalism finds its most fertile soil under military systems relying on mass armies. These require sacrifices to sustain, and the state is tempted to appeal to nationalist sentiments to mobilize its citizens to make them. The quickening of hypernationalism is least likely when states can rely on small professional armies, or on complex high-technology military organizations that operate without vast manpower. For this reason, nuclear weapons work to dampen nationalism, because they shift the basis of military power away from mass armies and toward smaller, high-technology organizations.
22      Part I: Introduction
Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War
23
Hypernationalism declined sharply in Europe after 1945, not only because of the nuclear revolution but also because the postwar occupation forces kept it down. Moreover, the European states, no longer providing their own security, lacked an incentive to whip up nationalism to bolster public support for national defense. But the decisive change came in the shift of the prime locus of European politics to the United States and the Soviet Union— two states made up of peoples of many different ethnic origins which had not exhibited nationalism of the virulent type found in Europe. This welcome absence of hypernationalism has been further helped by the greater stability of the postwar order. With less expectation of war, neither superpower felt compelled to mobilize its citizens for war.
Bipolarity, an equal balance of military power, and nuclear weapons—these, then, are the key elements of my explanation for the Long Peace.
Many thoughtful people have found the bipolar system in Europe odious and have sought to end it by dismantling the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe and diminishing Soviet military power. Many have also lamented the military equality obtaining between the superpowers; some have decried the indecisive stalemate it produced, recommending instead a search for military superiority; others have lamented the investment of hundreds of billions of dollars to deter a war that never happened, proving not that the investment, though expensive, paid off, but rather that it was wasted. As for nuclear weapons, well, they are a certifiable Bad Thing. The odium attached to these props of the postwar order has kept many in the West from recognizing a hard truth: they have kept the peace.
But so much for the past. What will keep the peace in the future? Specifically, what new order is likely to emerge if NATO and the Warsaw Pact dissolve, which they will do if the Cold War is really over, and the Soviets withdraw from Eastern Europe and the Americans quit Western Europe, taking their nuclear weapons with them—and should we welcome or fear it?
One dimension of the new European order is certain: it will be multipolar. Germany, France, Britain, and perhaps Italy will assume major-power status. The Soviet Union will decline from superpower status, not only because its military is sure to shrink in size but also because moving forces out of Eastern Europe will make it more difficult for the Soviets to project power onto the Continent. They will, of course, remain a major European power. The resulting four- or five-power system will suffer the problems endemic to multipolar systems—and will therefore be prone to instability. The other two dimensions—the distribution of power among the major states and the distribution of nuclear weapons—are less certain. Indeed, who gets nuclear weapons is likely to be the most problematic question facing the new Europe. Three scenarios of the nuclear future in Europe are possible.
THE "EUROPE WITHOUT NUCLEAR WEAPONS" SCENARIO
Many Europeans (and some Americans) seek to eliminate nuclear weapons from Europe altogether. Fashioning this nuclear-free Europe would require that Britain, France, and the Soviet Union rid themselves of these talismans of their sovereignty—an improbable
eventuality, to say the least. Those who wish for it nevertheless believe that it would be the most peaceful arrangement possible. In fact a nuclear-free Europe has the distinction of being the most dangerous among the envisionable post-Cold War orders. The pacifying effects of nuclear weapons—the caution they generate, the security they provide, the rough equality they impose, and the clarity of the relative power they create—would be lost Peace would then depend on the other dimensions of the new order—the number of poles and the distribution of power among them. The geometry of power in Europe would look much as it did between the world wars—a design for tension, crisis, and possibly even war.
The Soviet Union and a unified Germany would likely be the most powerful states in a nuclear-free Europe. A band of small independent states in Eastern Europe would lie between them. These minor Eastern European powers would be likely to fear the Soviets as much as the Germans, and thus would probably not be disposed to cooperate with the Soviets to deter possible German aggression. In fact, this very problem arose in the 1930s, and the past forty-five years of Soviet occupation have surely done little to mitigate Eastern European fears of a Soviet military presence. Thus scenarios in which Germany uses force against Poland, Czechoslovakia, or even Austria enter the realm of the possible in a nuclear-free Europe.
Then, too, the Soviet withdrawal from Eastern Europe hardly guarantees a permanent exit. Indeed, the Russian presence in Eastern Europe has surged and ebbed repeatedly over the past few centuries. In a grave warning, a member of President Mikhail Gorbachev's negotiating team at the recent Washington summit said, "You have the same explosive mixture you had in Germany in the 1930s. The humiliation of a great power. Economic troubles. The rise of nationalism. You should not underestimate the danger."
Conflicts between Eastern European states might also threaten the stability of the new European order. Serious tensions already exist between Hungary and Romania over Romania's treatment of the Hungarian minority in Transylvania, a formerly Hungarian region that still contains roughly two million ethnic Hungarians. Absent the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe, Romania and Hungary might have gone to war over this issue by now, and it might bring them to war in the future. This is not the only potential danger spot in Eastern Europe as the Soviet empire crumbles. The Polish-German border could be a source of trouble. Poland and Czechoslovakia have a border dispute. If the Soviets allow some of their republics to achieve independence, the Poles and the Romanians may lay claim to territory now in Soviet hands which once belonged to them. Looking farther south, civil war in Yugoslavia is a distinct possibility. Yugoslavia and Albania might come to blows over Kosovo, a region of Yugoslavia harboring a nationalistic Albanian majority. Bulgaria has its own quarrel with Yugoslavia over Macedonia, while Turkey resents Bulgaria's treatment of its Turkish minority. The danger that these bitter ethnic and border disputes will erupt into war in a supposedly Edenic nuclear-free Europe is enough to make one nostalgic for the Cold War.
Warfare in Eastern Europe would cause great suffering to Eastern Europeans. It also might widen to include the major powers, especially if disorder created fluid politics that offered opportunities for expanded influence, or threatened defeat for states friendly to one or another of the major powers. During the Cold War both superpowers were drawn
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Part P. Introduction
into Third World conflicts across the globe, often in distant areas of little strategic importance. Eastern Europe is directly adjacent to both the Soviet Union and Germany, and it has considerable economic and strategic importance. Thus trouble in Eastern Europe would offer even greater temptations to these powers than past conflicts in the Third World offered to the superpowers. Furthermore, Eastern European states would have a strong incentive to drag the major powers into their local conflicts, because the results of such conflicts would be largely determined by the relative success of each party in finding external allies.
It is difficult to predict the precise balance of conventional military power that will emerge in post-Cold War Europe. The Soviet Union might recover its strength soon after withdrawing from Eastern Europe. In that case Soviet power would outmatch German power. But centrifugal national forces might pull the Soviet Union apart, leaving no remnant state that is the equal of a unified Germany. Finally, and probably most likely, Germany and the Soviet Union might emerge as powers of roughly equal strength. The first two geometries of power, with their marked military inequality between the two leading countries, would be especially worrisome, although there would be cause for concern even if Soviet and German power were balanced.
A non-nuclear Europe, to round out this catalogue of dangers, would likely be especially disturbed by hypernationalism, since security in such an order would rest on mass armies, which, as we have seen, often cannot be maintained without a mobilized public. The problem would probably be most acute in Eastern Europe, with its uncertain borders and irredentist minority groups. But there is also potential for trouble in Germany. The Germans have generally done an admirable job of combating hypernationalism over the past forty-five years, and of confronting the dark side of their past. Nevertheless, a portent like the recent call of some prominent Germans for a return to greater nationalism in historical education is disquieting.
For all these reasons, it is perhaps just as well that a nuclear-free Europe, much as it may be longed for by so many Europeans, does not appear to be in the cards.
THE "CURRENT OWNERSHIP" SCENARIO
Under this scenario Britain, France, and the Soviet Union retain their nuclear weapons, but no new nuclear powers emerge in Europe. This vision of a nuclear-free zone in Central Europe, with nuclear weapons remaining on the flanks of the Continent, is also popular in Europe, but it, too, has doubtful prospects.
Germany will prevent it over the long run. The Germans are not likely to be willing to rely on the Poles or the Czechs to provide their forward defense against a possible direct Soviet conventional attack on their homeland. Nor are the Germans likely to trust the Soviet Union to refrain for all time from nuclear blackmail against a non-nuclear Germany. Hence they will eventually look to nuclear weapons as the surest means of security, just as NATO has done.
The small states of Eastern Europe will also have strong incentives to acquire nuclear weapons. Without them they would be open to nuclear blackmail by the Soviet
Wlyy We Will Soon Miss the Cold War 25
Union, or by Germany if proliferation stopped there. Even if those major powers did not have nuclear arsenals, no Eastern European state could match German or Soviet conventional strength.
Clearly, then, a scenario in which current ownership continues, without proliferation, seems very unlikely.
THE "NUCLEAR PROLIFERATION" SCENARIO
The most probable scenario in the wake of the Cold War is further nuclear proliferation in Europe. This outcome is laden with dangers, but it also might just provide the best hope for maintaining stability on the Continent. Everything depends on how proliferation is managed. Mismanaged proliferation could produce disaster; well-managed proliferation could produce an order nearly as stable as that of the Long Peace.
The dangers that could arise from mismanaged proliferation are both profound and numerous. There is the danger that the proliferation process itself could give one of the existing nuclear powers a strong incentive to stop a non-nuclear neighbor from joining the club, much as Israel used force to stop Iraq from acquiring a nuclear capability. There is the danger that an unstable nuclear competition would emerge among the new nuclear states. They might lack the resources to make their nuclear forces invulnerable, which could create first-strike fears and incentives—a recipe for disaster in a crisis. Finally, there is the danger that by increasing the number of fingers on the nuclear trigger, proliferation would increase the risk that nuclear weapons would be fired by accident or captured by terrorists or used by madmen.
These and other dangers of proliferation can be lessened if the current nuclear powers take the right steps. To forestall preventive attacks, they can extend security guarantees. To help the new nuclear powers secure their deterrents, they can provide technical assistance. And they can help to socialize nascent nuclear societies to understand the lethal character of the forces they are acquiring. This kind of well-managed proliferation could help bolster peace.
Proliferation should ideally stop with Germany. It has a large economic base, and so could afford to sustain a secure nuclear force. Moreover, Germany would no doubt feel insecure without nuclear weapons, and if it felt insecure its impressive conventional strength would give it a significant capacity to disturb the tranquillity of Europe. But if the broader spread of nuclear weapons proves impossible to prevent without taking extreme steps, the current nuclear powers should let proliferation occur in Eastern Europe while doing all they can to channel it in safe directions.
However. 1 am pessimistic that proliferation can be well managed. The members of the nuclear club are likely to resist proliferation, but they cannot easily manage this tricky process while at the same time resisting it—and they will have several motives to resist. The established nuclear powers will be exceedingly chary of helping the new nuclear powers build secure deterrents, simply because it goes against the grain of state behavior to share military secrets with other states. After all, knowledge of sensitive military technology
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Part I: Introduction
WJjy We Will Soon Miss the Cold War
27
could be turned against the donor state if that technology were passed on to adversaries. Furthermore, proliferation in Europe will undermine the legitimacy of the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and this could open the floodgates of proliferation worldwide. The current nuclear powers will not want that to happen, and so they will probably spend their energy trying to thwart proliferation, rather than seeking to manage it.
The best time for proliferation to occur would be during a period of relative international calm. Proliferation in the midst of a crisis would obviously be dangerous, since states in conflict with an emerging nuclear power would then have a powerful incentive to interrupt the process by force. However, the opposition to proliferation by citizens of the potential nuclear powers would be so vociferous, and the external resistance from the nuclear club would be so great, that it might take a crisis to make those powers willing to pay the domestic and international costs of building a nuclear force. All of which means that proliferation is likely to occur under international conditions that virtually ensure it will be mismanaged.
IS WAR OBSOLETE?
Many students of European politics will reject my pessimistic analysis of post-Cold War Europe. They will say that a multipolar Europe, with or without nuclear weapons, will be no less peaceful than the present order. Three specific scenarios for a peaceful future have been advanced, each of which rests on a well-known theory of international relations. However, each of these "soft" theories of peace is flawed.
Under the first optimistic scenario, a non-nuclear Europe would remain peaceful because Europeans recognize that even a conventional war would be horrific. Sobered by history, national leaders will take care to avoid war. This scenario rests on the "obsolescence of war" theory, which posits that modem conventional war had become so deadly by 1945 as to be unthinkable as an instrument of statecraft. War is yesterday's nightmare.
The fact that the Second World War occurred casts doubt on this theory: if any war could have persuaded Europeans to forswear conventional war, it should have been the First World War, with its vast casualties. The key flaw in this theory is the assumption that all conventional wars will be long and bloody wars of attrition. Proponents ignore the evidence of several wars since 1945, as well as several campaign-ending battles of the Second World War, that it is still possible to gain a quick and decisive victory on the conventional battlefield and avoid the devastation of a protracted conflict. Conventional wars can be won rather cheaply; nuclear war cannot be, because neither side can escape devastation by the other, regardless of what happens on the battlefield. Thus the incentives to avoid war are of another order of intensity in a nuclear world than they are in a conventional world.
There are several other flaws in this scenario. There is no systematic evidence demonstrating that Europeans believe war is obsolete. The Romanians and the Hungarians don't seem to have gotten the message. However, even if it were widely believed in Europe that war is no longer thinkable, attitudes could change. Public opinion on national-security issues is notoriously fickle and responsive to
ipulation by elites as well as to changes in the international environment. An end m the Cold War. as we have seen, will be accompanied by a sea change in the geom-'tr of power in Europe, which will surely alter European thinking about questions ofwar and peace. Is it not possible, for example, that German thinking about the benefits of controlling Eastern Europe will change markedly once American forces are withdrawn from Central Europe and the Germans are left to provide for their own security9 Is it not possible that they would countenance a conventional war against a substantially weaker Eastern European state to enhance their position vis-á-vis the Soviet Union? Finally, only one country need decide that war is thinkable to make war possible.
IS PROSPERITY THE PATH TO PEACE?
Proponents of the second optimistic scenario base their optimism about the future of Europe on the unified European market coming in 1992—the realization of the dream of the European Community. A strong EC, they argue, ensures that the European economy will remain open and prosperous, which will keep the European states cooperating with one another. Prosperity will make for peace. The threat of an aggressive Germany will be removed by enclosing the newly unified German state in the benign embrace of the EC. Even Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union can eventually be brought into the EC. Peace and prosperity will then extend their sway from the Atlantic to the Urals.
This scenario is based on the theory of economic liberalism, which assumes that states are primarily motivated by the desire to achieve prosperity and that leaders place the material welfare of their publics above all other considerations, including security. Stability flows not from military power but from the creation of a liberal economic order.
A liberal economic order works in several ways to enhance peace and dampen conflict. In the first place, it requires significant political cooperation to make the trading system work—make states richer. The more prosperous states grow, the greater their incentive for further political cooperation. A benevolent spiral relationship sets in between political cooperation and prosperity. Second, a liberal economic order fosters economic interdependence, a situation in which states are mutually vulnerable in the economic realm. When interdependence is high, the theory holds, there is less temptation to cheat or behave aggressively toward other states, because all states can retaliate economically. Finally, some theorists argue, an international institution like the EC will, with ever-increasing political cooperation, become so powerful that it will take on a life of its own, eventually evolving into a superstate. In short, Mrs. Thatcher's presentiments about the EC are absolutely right.
This theory has one grave flaw: the main assumption underpinning it is wrong. States are not primarily motivated by the desire to achieve prosperity. Although economic calculations are hardly trivial to them, states operate in both an international political and an international economic environment, and the former dominates the latter when the two systems come into conflict. Survival in an anarchic international political system is the highest goal a state can have.
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Part I: Introduction
Proponents of economic liberalism largely ignore the effects of anarchy on state behavior and concentrate instead on economic motives. When this omission is corrected, however, their arguments collapse for two reasons.
Competition for security makes it difficult for states to cooperate, which, according to the theory of economic liberalism, they must do. When security is scarce, states become more concerned about relative than about absolute gains. They ask of an exchange not "Will both of us gain?" but "Who will gain more?" They reject even cooperation that will yield an absolute economic gain if the other state will gain more, from fear that the other might convert its gain to military strength, and then use this strength to win by coercion in later rounds. Cooperation is much easier to achieve if states worry only about absolute gains. The goal, then, is simply to ensure that the overall economic pie is expanding and that each state is getting at least some part of the increase. However, anarchy guarantees that security will often be scarce; this heightens states' concerns about relative gains, which makes cooperation difficult unless the pie can be finely sliced to reflect, and thus not disturb, the current balance of power.
Interdependence, moreover, is as likely to lead to conflict as to cooperation, because states will struggle to escape the vulnerability that interdependence creates, in order to bolster their national security. In time of crisis or war, states that depend on others for critical economic supplies will fear cutoff or blackmail; they may well respond by trying to seize the source of supply by force of arms. There are numerous historical examples of states' pursuing aggressive military policies for the purpose of achieving economic autarky. One thinks of both Japan and Germany during the interwar period. And one recalls that during the Arab oil embargo of the early 1970s there was much talk in America about using military force to seize Arab oil fields.
In twentieth-century Europe two periods saw a liberal economic order with high levels of interdependence. According to the theory of economic liberalism, stability should have obtained during those periods. It did not.
The first case clearly contradicts the economic liberals. The years from 1890 to 1914 were probably the time of greatest economic interdependence in Europe's history. Yet those years of prosperity were all the time making hideously for the First World War.
The second case covers the Cold War years, during which there has been much interdependence among the EC states, and relations among them have been very peaceful. This case, not surprisingly, is the centerpiece of the economic liberals' argument.
We certainly see a correlation in this period between interdependence and stability, but that does not mean that interdependence has caused cooperation among the Western democracies. More likely the Cold War was the prime cause of cooperation among the Western democracies, and the main reason that intra-EC relations have flourished.
A powerful and potentially dangerous Soviet Union forced the Western democracies to band together to meet a common threat. This threat muted concerns about relative gains arising from economic cooperation among the EC states by giving each Western democracy a vested interest in seeing its alliance partners grow powerful. Each increment of power helped deter the Soviets. Moreover, they all had a powerful incentive to avoid conflict with one another while the Soviet Union loomed to the East, ready to harvest the grain of Western quarrels.
Win' We Will Soon Miss the Cold War
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In addition, America's hegemonic position in NATO, the military counterpart to the EC mitigated the effects of anarchy on the Western democracies and induced cooperation among them. America not only provided protection against the Soviet threat; it also guar-nteed that no EC state would aggress against another. For example, France did not have to fear Germany as it re-armed, because the American presence in Germany meant that the Germans were contained. With the United States serving as a night watchman, fears about relative gains among the Western European states were mitigated, and furthermore, those states were willing to allow their economies to become tightly interdependent.
Take away the present Soviet threat to Western Europe, send the American forces home, and relations among the EC states will be fundamentally altered. Without a common Soviet threat or an American night watchman, Western European states will do what they did for centuries before the onset of the Cold War—look upon one another with abiding suspicion. Consequently, they will worry about imbalances in gains and about the loss of autonomy that results from cooperation. Cooperation in this new order will be more difficult than it was during the Cold War. Conflict will be more likely.
In sum, there are good reasons for being skeptical about the claim that a more powerful EC can provide the basis for peace in a multipolar Europe.
DO DEMOCRACIES REALLY LOVE PEACE?
Under the third scenario war is avoided because many European states have become democratic since the early twentieth century, and liberal democracies simply do not fight one another. At a minimum, the presence of liberal democracies in Western Europe renders that half of Europe free from armed conflict. At a maximum, democracy spreads to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, bolstering peace. The idea that peace is cognate with democracy is a vision of international relations shared by both liberals and neoconservatives.
This scenario rests on the "peace-loving democracies" theory. Two arguments are made for it.
First, some claim that authoritarian leaders are more likely to go to war than leaders of democracies, because authoritarian leaders are not accountable to their publics, which carry the main burdens of war. In a democracy the citizenry, which pays the price of war, has a greater say in what the government does. The people, so the argument goes, are more hesitant to start trouble, because it is they who must pay the bloody price; hence the greater their power, the fewer wars.
The second argument rests on the claim that the citizens of liberal democracies respect popular democratic rights—those of their countrymen, and those of people in other states. They view democratic governments as more legitimate than others, and so are loath to impose a foreign regime on a democratic state by force. Thus an inhibition on war missing from other international relationships is introduced when two democracies face each other.
The first of these arguments is flawed because it is not possible to sustain the claim that the people in a democracy are especially sensitive to the costs of war and therefore
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Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War
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less willing than authoritarian leaders to fight wars. In fact the historical record shows that democracies are every bit as likely to fight wars as are authoritarian states, though admittedly, thus far, not with other democracies.
Furthermore, mass publics, whether in a democracy or not, can become deeply imbued with nationalistic or religious fervor, making them prone to support aggression and quite indifferent to costs. The widespread public support in post-Revolutionary France for Napoleon's wars is just one example of this phenomenon. At the same time, authoritarian leaders are often fearful of going to war, because war tends to unleash democratic forces that can undermine the regime. In short, war can impose high costs on authoritarian leaders as well as on their citizenry.
The second argument, which emphasizes the transnational respect for democratic rights among democracies, rests on a secondary factor that is generally overridden by other factors such as nationalism and religious fundamentalism. Moreover, there is another problem with the argument. The possibility always exists that a democracy, especially the kind of fledgling democracy emerging in Eastern Europe, will revert to an authoritarian state. This threat of backsliding means that one democratic state can never be sure that another democratic state will not turn on it sometime in the future. Liberal democracies must therefore worry about relative power among themselves, which is tantamount to saying that each has an incentive to consider aggression against another to forestall trouble. Lamentably, it is not possible for even liberal democracies to transcend anarchy.
Problems with the deductive logic aside, at first glance the historical record seems to offer strong support for the theory of peace-loving democracies. It appears that no liberal democracies have ever fought against each other. Evidentiary problems, however, leave the issue in doubt.
First, democracies have been few in number over the past two centuries, and thus there have not been many cases in which two democracies were in a position to fight with each other. Three prominent cases are usually cited: Britain and the United States (1832 to the present); Britain and France (1832-1849; 1871-1940); and the Western democracies since 1945.
Second, there are other persuasive explanations for why war did not occur in those three cases, and these competing explanations must be ruled out before the theory of peace-loving democracies can be accepted. Whereas relations between the British and the Americans during the nineteenth century were hardly blissful, in the twentieth century they have been quite harmonious, and thus fit closely with the theory's expectations. That harmony, however, can easily be explained by common threats that forced Britain and the United States to work together—a serious German threat in the first part of the century, and later a Soviet threat. The same basic argument applies to relations between France and Britain. Although they were not on the best of terms during most of the nineteenth century, their relations improved significantly around the turn of the century, with the rise of Germany. Finally, as noted above, the Soviet threat goes far in explaining the absence of war among the Western democracies since 1945.
Third, several democracies have come close to fighting each other, suggesting that the absence of war may be due simply to chance. France and Britain approached war during
Fashoda crisis of 1898. France and Weimar Germany might have come to blows over vt Rnjne]and during the 1920s. The United States has clashed with a number of elected ' vernments in the Third World during the Cold War, including the Allende regime in Chile and the Arbenz regime in Guatemala.
Last, some would classify Wilhelmine Germany as a democracy, or at least a quasi-democracy; if so, the First World War becomes a war among democracies.
While the spread of democracy across Europe has great potential benefits for human ights it will not guarantee peaceful relations among the states of post-Cold War Europe. Most Americans will find this argument counterintuitive. They see the United States as fundamentally peace-loving, and they ascribe this peacefulness to its democratic character. From this they generalize that democracies are more peaceful than authoritarian states, which leads them to conclude that the complete democratization of Europe would largely eliminate the threat of war. This view of international politics is likely to be repudiated by the events of coming years.
MISSING THE COLD WAR
The implications, of my analysis are straightforward, if paradoxical. Developments that threaten to end the Cold War are dangerous. The West has an interest in maintaining peace in Europe. It therefore has an interest in maintaining the Cold War order, and hence has an interest in continuing the Cold War confrontation. The Cold War antagonism could be continued at lower levels of East-West tension than have prevailed in the past, but a complete end to the Cold War would create more problems than it would solve.
The fate of the Cold War is mainly in the hands of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union is the only superpower that can seriously threaten to overrun Europe, and the Soviet threat provides the glue that holds NATO together. Take away that offensive threat and the United States is likely to abandon the Continent; the defensive alliance it has headed for forty years may well then disintegrate, bringing an end to the bipolar order that has kept the peace of Europe for the past forty-five years.
There is little the Americans or the West Europeans can do to perpetuate the Cold War. For one thing, domestic politics preclude it. Western leaders obviously cannot base national-security policy on the need to maintain forces in Central Europe simply to keep the Soviets there. The idea of deploying large numbers of troops in order to bait the Soviets into an order-keeping competition would be dismissed as bizarre, and contrary to the general belief that ending the Cold War and removing the Soviet yoke from Eastern Europe would make the world safer and better.
For another, the idea of propping up a declining rival runs counter to the basic behavior of states. States are principally concerned about their relative power in the system—hence they look for opportunities to take advantage of one another. If anything, they prefer to see adversaries decline, and invariably do whatever they can to speed up the process and maximize the distance of the fall. States, in other words, do not ask which distribution of power best facilitates stability and then do everything possible to build or maintain such an order. Instead, each pursues the narrower aim of maximizing
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Why We Will Soon Miss the Cold War
33
its power advantage over potential adversaries. The particular international order that results is simply a by-product of that competition.
Consider, for example, the origins of the Cold War order in Europe. No state intended to create it. In fact the United States and the Soviet Union each worked hard in the early years of the Cold War to undermine the other's position in Europe, which would have needed the bipolar order on the Continent. The remarkably stable system that emerged in Europe in the late 1940s was the unintended consequence of an intense competition between the superpowers.
Moreover, even if the Americans and the West Europeans wanted to help the Soviets maintain their status as a superpower, it is not apparent that they could do so. The Soviet Union is leaving Eastern Europe and cutting its military forces largely because its economy is floundering badly. The Soviets don't know how to fix their economy themselves, and there is little that Western governments can do to help them. The West can and should avoid doing malicious mischief to the Soviet economy, but at this juncture it is difficult to see how the West can have a significant positive influence.
The fact that the West cannot sustain the Cold War does not mean that the United States should make no attempt to preserve the current order. It should do what it can to avert a complete mutual withdrawal from Europe. For instance, the American negotiating position at the conventional-arms-control talks should aim toward large mutual force reductions but should not contemplate complete mutual withdrawal. The Soviets may opt to withdraw all their forces unilaterally anyway; if so, there is little the United States can do to stop them.
Should complete Soviet withdrawal from Eastern Europe prove unavoidable, the West would confront the question of how to maintain peace in a multipolar Europe. Three policy prescriptions are in order.
First, the United States should encourage the limited and carefully managed proliferation of nuclear weapons in Europe. The best hope for avoiding war in post-Cold War Europe is nuclear deterrence; hence some nuclear proliferation is necessary, to compensate for the withdrawal of the Soviet and American nuclear arsenals from Central Europe. Ideally, as I have argued, nuclear weapons would spread to Germany but to no other state.
Second, Britain and the United States, as well as the Continental states, will have to counter any emerging aggressor actively and efficiently, in order to offset the ganging up and bullying that are sure to arise in post-Cold War Europe. Balancing in a multipolar system, however, is usually a problem-ridden enterprise, because of either geography or the problems of coordination. Britain and the United States, physically separated from the Continent, may conclude that they have little interest in what happens there. That would be abandoning their responsibilities and, more important, their interests. Both states failed to counter Germany before the two world wars, making war more likely. It is essential for peace in Europe that they not repeat their past mistakes.
Both states must maintain military forces that can be deployed against Continental states that threaten to start a war. To do this they must persuade their citizens to support a policy of continued Continental commitment. This will be more difficult than it once was, because its principal purpose will be to preserve peace, rather than to prevent an
imminent hegemony, and the prevention of hegemony is a simpler goal to explain publicly Furthermore, this prescription asks both countries to take on an unaccustomed task, given that it is the basic nature of states to focus on maximizing relative power, not on bolstering stability. Nevertheless, the British and the Americans have a real stake in peace, especially since there is the risk that a European war might involve the large-scale use of nuclear weapons. Therefore, it should be possible for their governments to lead their publics to recognize this interest and support policies that protect it.
The Soviet Union may eventually return to its past expansionism and threaten to upset the status quo. If so, we are back to the Cold War. However, if the Soviets adhere to status-quo policies, Soviet power could play a key role in countering Germany and in maintaining order in Eastern Europe. It is important in those cases where the Soviets are acting in a balancing capacity that the United States cooperate with its former adversary and not let residual distrust from the Cold War obtrude.
Third, a concerted effort should be made to keep hypernationalism at bay, especially in Eastern Europe. Nationalism has been contained during the Cold War, but it is likely to re-emerge once Soviet and American forces leave the heart of Europe. It will be a force for trouble unless curbed. The teaching of honest national history is especially important, since the teaching of false, chauvinist history is the main vehicle for spreading hypernationalism. States that teach a dishonestly self-exculpating or self-glorifying history should be publicly criticized and sanctioned.
None of these tasks will be easy. In fact, I expect that the bulk of my prescriptions will not be followed; most run contrary to important strains of domestic American and European opinion, and to the basic nature of state behavior. And even if they are followed, peace in Europe will not be guaranteed. If the Cold War is truly behind us, therefore, the stability of the past forty-five years is not likely to be seen again in the coming decades.
The Clash of Civilizations?
Samuel P. Huntington
THE NEXT PATTERN OF CONFLICT
World politics is entering a new phase, and intellectuals have not hesitated to proliferate visions of what it will be—the end of history, the return of traditional rivalries between nation states, and the decline of the nation state from the conflicting pulls of tribalism and globalism, among others. Each of these visions catches aspects of the emerging reality. Yet they all miss a crucial, indeed a central, aspect of what global politics is likely to be in the coming years.
It is my hypothesis that the fundamental source of conflict in this new world will not be primarily ideological or primarily economic. The great divisions among humankind and the dominating source of conflict will be cultural. Nation states will remain the most powerful actors in world affairs, but the principal conflicts of global politics will occur between nations and groups of different civilizations. The clash of civilizations will dominate global politics. The fault lines between civilizations will be the battle lines of the future.
Conflict between civilizations will be the latest phase in the evolution of conflict in the modern world. For a century and a half after the emergence of the modern international system with the Peace of Westphalia, the conflicts of the Western world were largely among princes—emperors, absolute monarchs and constitutional monarchs attempting to expand their bureaucracies, their armies, their mercantilist economic strength and, most important, the territory they ruled. In the process they created nation states, and beginning with the French Revolution the principal lines of conflict were between nations rather than princes. In 1793, as R. R. Palmer put it, "The wars of kings were over; the wars of peoples had begun." This nineteenth-century pattern lasted until the end of World War I. Then, as a result of the Russian Revolution and the reaction against it, the conflict of nations yielded to the conflict of ideologies, first among communism, fascism-Nazism and liberal democracy, and then between communism and liberal democracy. During the Cold War, this latter conflict became embodied in the struggle between the two superpowers, neither of which was a nation state in the classical European sense and each of which defined its identity in terms of its ideology.
These conflicts between princes, nation states and ideologies were primarily conflicts within Western civilization, "Western civil wars," as William Lind has labeled them. This was as true of the Cold War as it was of the world wars and the earlier wars of the
Samuel R Huntington, "The Clash of Civilizations?" Reprinted by permission of Foreign Affairs. Vol. 72, No. 3 (summer. 1993). Copyright 1993 by the Council on Foreign Relations. Inc.
The Clash of Civilizations? 35
seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. With the end of the Cold War. international politics moves out of its Western phase, and its centerpiece becomes the interaction between the West and non-Western civilizations and among non-Western civilizations. In the politics of civilizations, the peoples and governments of non-Western civilizations no longer remain the objects of history as targets of Western colonialism but join the West as movers and shapers of history.
THE NATURE OF CIVILIZATIONS
During the Cold War the world was divided into the First, Second and Third Worlds. Those divisions are no longer relevant. It is far more meaningful now to group countries not in terms of their political or economic systems or in terms of their level of economic development but rather in terms of their culture and civilization.
What do we mean when we talk of a civilization? A civilization is a cultural entity. Villages, regions, ethnic groups, nationalities, religious groups, all have distinct cultures at different levels of cultural heterogeneity. The culture of a village in southern Italy may be different from that of a village in northern Italy, but both will share in a common Italian culture that distinguishes them from German villages. European communities, in turn, will share cultural features that distinguish them from Arab or Chinese communities. Arabs, Chinese and Westerners, however, are not part of any broader cultural entity. They constitute civilizations. A civilization is thus the highest cultural grouping of people and the broadest level of cultural identity people have short of that which distinguishes humans from other species. It is defined both by common objective elements, such as language, history, religion, customs, institutions, and by the subjective self-identification of people. People have levels of identity: a resident of Rome may define himself with varying degrees of intensity as a Roman, an Italian, a Catholic, a Christian, a European, a Westerner. The civilization to which he belongs is the broadest level of identification with which he intensely identifies. People can and do redefine their identities and, as a result, the composition and boundaries of civilizations change.
Civilizations may involve a large number of people, as with China ("a civilization pretending to be a state," as Lucian Pye put it), or a very small number of people, such as the Anglophone Caribbean. A civilization may include several nation states, as is the case with Western, Latin American and Arab civilizations, or only one, as is the case with Japanese civilization. Civilizations obviously blend and overlap, and may include sub-civilizations. Western civilization has two major variants, European and North American, and Islam has its Arab, Turkic and Malay subdivisions. Civilizations are nonetheless meaningful entities, and while the lines between them are seldom sharp, they are real. Civilizations are dynamic; they rise and fall; they divide and merge. And, as any student of history knows, civilizations disappear and are buried in the sands of time.
Westerners tend to think of nation states as the principal actors in global affairs. They have been that, however, for only a few centuries. The broader reaches of human history have been the history of civilizations. In A Study of History, Arnold Toynbee identified 21 major civilizations; only six of them exist in the contemporary world.
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36      Part I: Introduction
The Clash of Civilizations'' 37
WHY CIVILIZATIONS WILL CLASH
Civilization identity will be increasingly important in the future, and the world will be shaped in large measure by the interactions among seven or eight major civilizations. These include Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American and possibly African civilization. The most important conflicts of the future will occur along the cultural fault lines separating these civilizations from one another. Why will this be the case?
First, differences among civilizations are not only real; they are basic. Civilizations are differentiated from each other by history, language, culture, tradition and, most important, religion. The people of different civilizations have different views on the relations between God and man, the individual and the group, the citizen and the state, parents and children, husband and wife, as well as differing views of the relative importance of rights and responsibilities, liberty and authority, equality and hierarchy. These differences are the product of centuries. They will not soon disappear. They are far more fundamental than differences among political ideologies and political regimes. Differences do not necessarily mean conflict, and conflict does not necessarily mean violence. Over the centuries, however, differences among civilizations have generated the most prolonged and the most violent conflicts.
Second, the world is becoming a smaller place. The interactions between peoples of different civilizations are increasing; these increasing interactions intensify civilization consciousness and awareness of differences between civilizations and commonalities within civilizations. North African immigration to France generates hostility among Frenchmen and at the same time increased receptivity to immigration by "good" European Catholic Poles. Americans react far more negatively to Japanese investment than to larger investments from Canada and European countries. Similarly, as Donald Horowitz has pointed out, "An Ibo may be ... an Owerri Ibo or an Onitsha Ibo in what was the Eastern region of Nigeria. In Lagos, he is simply an Ibo. In London, he is a Nigerian. In New York, he is an African." The interactions among peoples of different civilizations enhance the civilization-consciousness of people that, in turn, invigorates differences and animosities stretching or thought to stretch back deep into history.
Third the processes of economic modernization and social change throughout the world are separating people from longstanding local identities. They also weaken the nation state as a source of identity. In much of the world religion has moved in to fill this gap, often in the form of movements that are labeled "fundamentalist." Such movements are found in Western Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and Hinduism, as well as in Islam. In most countries and most religions the people active in fundamentalist movements are young, college-educated, middle-class technicians, professionals and business persons. The "unsecularization of the world," George Weigel has remarked, "is one of the dominant social facts of life in the late twentieth cenmry." The revival of religion, "la revanche de Dieu," as Giiles Kepel labeled it, provides a basis for identity and commitment that transcends national boundaries and unites civilizations.
Fourth, the growth of civilization-consciousness is enhanced by the dual role of the West. On the one hand, the West is at a peak of power. At the same time, however, and
perhaps
as a result, a return to the roots phenomenon is occurring among non-Western
'' lizations. Increasingly one hears references to trends toward a turning inward and "Asianization" in Japan, the end of the Nehru legacy and the "Hinduization" of India, the failure of Western ideas of socialism and nationalism and hence "re-lslamization" of the Middle East, and now a debate over Westernization versus Russianization in Boris Yeltsin's country. A West at the peak of its power confronts non-Wests that increasingly have the desire, the will and the resources to shape the world in non-Western ways.
In the past, the elites of non-Western societies were usually the people who were most involved with the West, had been educated at Oxford, the Sorbonne or Sandhurst, and had absorbed Western attitudes and values. At the same time, the populace in non-Western countries often remained deeply imbued with the indigenous culture. Now, however, these relationships are being reversed. A de-Westernization and indigenization of elites is occurring in many non-Western countries at the same time that Western, usually American, cultures, styles and habits become more popular among the mass of the people.
Fifth, cultural characteristics and differences are less mutable and hence less easily compromised and resolved than political and economic ones. In the former Soviet Union, communists can become democrats, the rich can become poor and the poor rich, but Russians cannot become Estonians and Azeris cannot become Armenians. In class and ideological conflicts, the key question was "Which side are you on?" and people could and did choose sides and change sides. In conflicts between civilizations, the question is "What are you?" That is a given that cannot be changed. And as we know, from Bosnia to the Caucasus to the Sudan, the wrong answer to that question can mean a bullet in the head. Even more than ethnicity, religion discriminates sharply and exclusively among people. A person can be half-French and half-Arab and simultaneously even a citizen of two countries. It is more difficult to be half-Catholic and half-Muslim.
Finally, economic regionalism is increasing. The proportions of total trade that were intraregional rose between 1980 and 1989 from 51 percent to 59 percent in Europe, 33 percent to 37 percent in East Asia, and 32 percent to 36 percent in North America. The importance of regional economic blocs is likely to continue to increase in the future. On the one hand, successful economic regionalism will reinforce civilization-consciousness. On the other hand, economic regionalism may succeed only when it is rooted in a common civilization. The European Community rests on the shared foundation of European culture and Western Christianity. The success of the North American Free Trade Area depends on the convergence now underway of Mexican, Canadian and American cultures. Japan, in contrast, faces difficulties in creating a comparable economic entity in East Asia because Japan is a society and civilization unique to itself. However strong the trade and investment links Japan may develop with other East Asian countries, its cultural differences with those countries inhibit and perhaps preclude its promoting regional economic integration like that in Europe and North America.
Common culture, in contrast, is clearly facilitating the rapid expansion of the economic relations between the People's Republic of China and Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and the overseas Chinese communities in other Asian countries. With the Cold War over, cultural commonalities increasingly overcome ideological differences, and mainland China and Taiwan move closer together. If cultural commonality is a prerequisite for economic
t
38
Part I: Introduction
integration, the principal East Asian economic bloc of the future is likely to be centered on China. This bloc is, in fact, already coming into existence. As Murray Weidenbaum has observed,
Despite the current Japanese dominance of the region, the .Chinese-based economy of Asia is rapidly emerging as a new epicenter for industry, commerce and finance. This strategic area contains substantial amounts of technology and manufacturing capability (Taiwan), outstanding entrepreneurial, marketing and services acumen (Hong Kong), a fine communications network (Singapore), a tremendous pool of financial capital (all three), and very large endowments of land, resources and labor (mainland China)____From Guangzhou to Singapore, from
Kuala Lumpur to Manila, this influential network—often based on extensions of the traditional clans—lias been described as the backbone of the East Asian economy.1
Culture and religion also form the basis of the Economic Cooperation Organization, which brings together ten non-Arab Muslim countries: Iran, Pakistan, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Tadjikistan, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan. One impetus to the revival and expansion of this organization, founded originally in the 1960s by Turkey, Pakistan and Iran, is the realization by the leaders of several of these countries that they had no chance of admission to the European Community. Similarly, Caricom, the Central American Common Market and Mercosur rest on common cultural foundations. Efforts to build a broader Caribbean-Central American economic entity bridging the Anglo-Latin divide, however, have to date failed.
As people define their identity in ethnic and religious terms, they are likely to see an "us" versus "them" relation existing between themselves and people of different ethnicity or religion. The end of ideologically defined states in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union permits traditional ethnic identities and animosities to come to the fore. Differences in culture and religion create differences over policy issues, ranging from human rights to immigration to trade and commerce to the environment. Geographical propinquity gives rise to conflicting territorial claims from Bosnia to Mindanao. Most important, the efforts of the West to promote its values of democracy and liberalism as universal values, to maintain its military predominance and to advance its economic interests engender countering responses from other civilizations. Decreasingly able to mobilize support and form coalitions on the basis of ideology, governments and groups will increasingly attempt to mobilize support by appealing to common religion and civilization identity.
The clash of civilizations thus occurs at two levels. At the microlevel, adjacent groups along the fault lines between civilizations struggle, often violently, over the control of territory and each other. At the macro-level, states from different civilizations compete for relative military and economic power, struggle over the control of international institutions and third parties, and competitively promote their particular political and religious values.
The Clash of Civilizations?
39
1 Murray Weidenbaum, Greater China: The Next Economic Superpower}' St. Louis: Washington University Center tor the Study ol American Business. Contemporary Issues, Series 57, February 1993, pp. 2-3.
THE FAULT LINES BETWEEN CIVILIZATIONS
The fault lines between civilizations are replacing the political and ideological boundaries of the Cold War as the flash points for crisis and bloodshed. The Cold War began when the Iron Curtain divided Europe politically and ideologically. The Cold War ended with the end of the Iron Curtain. As the ideological division of Europe has disappeared, the cultural division of Europe between Western Christianity, on the one hand, and Orthodox Christianity and Islam, on the other, has reemerged. The most significant dividing line in Europe, as William Wallace has suggested, may well be the eastern boundary of Western Christianity in the year 1500. This line runs along what are now the boundaries between Finland and Russia and between the Baltic states and Russia, cuts through Belarus and Ukraine separating the more Catholic western Ukraine from Orthodox eastern Ukraine, swings westward separating Transylvania from the rest of Romania, and then goes through Yugoslavia almost exactly along the line now separating Croatia and Slovenia from the rest of Yugoslavia. In the Balkans this line, of course, coincides with the historic boundary between the Hapsburg and Ottoman empires. The peoples to the north and west of this line are Protestant or Catholic; they shared the common experiences of European history—feudalism, the Renaissance, the Reformation, the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the Industrial Revolution; they are generally economically better off than the peoples to the east; and they may now look forward to increasing involvement in a common European economy and to the consolidation of democratic political systems. The peoples to the east and south of this line are Orthodox or Muslim; they historically belonged to the Ottoman or Tsarist empires and were only lightly touched by the shaping events in the rest of Europe; they are generally less advanced economically; they seem much less likely to develop stable democratic political systems. The Velvet Curtain of culture has replaced the Iron Curtain of ideology as the most significant dividing line in Europe. As the events in Yugoslavia show, it is not only a line of difference; it is also at times a line of bloody conflict.
Conflict along the fault line between Western and Islamic civilizations has been going on for 1,300 years. After the founding of Islam, the Arab and Moorish surge west and north only ended at Tours in 732. From the eleventh to the thirteenth century the Crusaders attempted with temporary success to bring Christianity and Christian rule to the Holy Land. From the fourteenth to the seventeenth century, the Ottoman Turks reversed the balance, extended their sway over the Middle East and the Balkans, captured Constantinople, and twice laid siege to Vienna. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as Ottoman power declined Britain, France, and Italy established Western control over most of North Africa and the Middle East.
After World War 11, the West, in turn, began to retreat; the colonial empires disappeared; first Arab nationalism and then Islamic fundamentalism manifested themselves; the West became heavily dependent on the Persian Gulf countries for its energy; the oil-rich Muslim countries became money-rich and when they wished to. weapons-rich. Several wars occurred between Arabs and Israel (created by the West). France fought a bloody and ruthless war in Algeria for most of the 1950s; British and French forces invaded Egypt
40
Part I: Introduction
in 1956; American forces went into Lebanon in 1958; subsequently American forces returned to Lebanon, attacked Libya, and engaged in various military encounters with Iran; Arab and Islamic terrorists, supported by at least three Middle Eastern governments employed the weapon of the weak and bombed Western planes and installations and seized Western hostages. This warfare between Arabs and the West culminated in 1990 when the United States sent a massive army to the Persian Gulf to defend some Arab countries against aggression by another. In its aftermath NATO planning is increasingly directed to potential threats and instability along.its "southern tier."
This centuries-old military interaction between the West and Islam is unlikely to decline. It could become more virulent. The Gulf War left some Arabs feeling proud that Saddam Hussein had attacked Israel and stood up to the West. It also left many feeling humiliated and resentful of the West's military presence in the Persian Gulf, the West's overwhelming military dominance, and their apparent inability to shape their own destiny. Many Arab countries, in addition to the oil exporters, are reaching levels of economic and social development where autocratic forms of government become inappropriate and efforts to introduce democracy become stronger. Some openings in Arab political systems have already occurred. The principal beneficiaries of these openings have been Islamist movements. In the Arab world, in short, Western democracy strengthens anti-Western political forces. This may be a passing phenomenon, but it surely complicates relations between Islamic countries and the West.
Those relations are also complicated by demography. The spectacular population growth in Arab countries, particularly in North Africa, has led to increased migration to Western Europe. The movement within Western Europe toward minimizing internal boundaries has sharpened political sensitivities with respect to this development. In Italy, France and Germany, racism is increasingly open, and political reactions and violence against Arab and Turkish migrants have become more intense and more widespread since 1990.
On both sides the interaction between Islam and the West is seen as a clash of civilizations. The West's "next confrontation," observes M. J. Akbar, an Indian Muslim author, "is definitely going to come from the Muslim world. It is in the sweep of the Islamic nations from the Maghreb to Pakistan that the struggle for a new world order will begin." Bernard Lewis comes to a similar conclusion:
We are facing a mood and a movement far transcending the level of issues and policies and the governments that pursue them. This is no less than a clash of civilizations—the perhaps irrational but surely historic reaction of an ancient rival against our Judeo-Christian heritage, our secular present, and the worldwide expansion of both.2
Historically, the other great antagonistic interaction of Arab Islamic civilization has been with the pagan, animist, and now increasingly Christian black peoples to the south. In the past, this antagonism was epitomized in the image of Arab slave dealers and black
The Clash of Civilizations?
41
Bernard Lewis, "The Roots of Muslim Rage," The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 266, September 1990 p 60' Time, June 15, 1992, pp. 24-28.
■ It has been reflected in the on-going civil war in the Sudan between Arabs and s , ' tne fighting in Chad between Libyan-supported insurgents and the government, tensions between Orthodox Christians and Muslims in the Horn of Africa, and the po-ftical conflicts, recurring riots and communal violence between Muslims and Christians n Nigeria. The modernization of Africa and the spread of Christianity are likely to enhance the probability of violence along this fault line. Symptomatic of the intensification of this conflict was the Pope John Paul II's speech in Khartoum in February 1993 attack-• a the actions of the Sudan's Islamist government against the Christian minority there.
On the northern border of Islam, conflict has increasingly erupted between Orthodox and Muslim peoples, including the carnage of Bosnia and Sarajevo, the simmering violence between Serb and Albanian, the tenuous relations between Bulgarians and their Turkish minority, the violence between Ossetians and Ingush, the unremitting slaughter of each other by Armenians and Azeris, the tense relations between Russians and Muslims in Central Asia, and the deployment of Russian troops to protect Russian interests in the Caucasus and Central Asia. Religion reinforces the revival of ethnic identities and restimulates Russian fears about the security of their southern borders. This concern is well captured by Archie Roosevelt:
Much of Russian history concerns the struggle between the Slavs and the Turkic peoples on their borders, which dates back to the foundation of the Russian state more than a thousand years ago. In the Slavs' millennium-long confrontation with their eastern neighbors lies the key to an understanding not only of Russian history, but Russian character. To understand Russian realities today one has to have a concept of the great Turkic ethnic group that has preoccupied Russians through the centuries.3
The conflict of civilizations is deeply rooted elsewhere in Asia. The historic clash between Muslim and Hindu in the subcontinent manifests itself now not only in the rivalry between Pakistan and India but also in intensifying religious strife within India between increasingly militant Hindu groups and India's substantial Muslim minority. The destruction of the Ayodhya mosque in December 1992 brought to the fore the issue of whether India will remain a secular democratic state or become a Hindu one. In East Asia, China has outstanding territorial disputes with most of its neighbors. It has pursued a ruthless policy toward the Buddhist people of Tibet, and it is pursuing an increasingly ruthless policy toward its Turkic-Muslim minority. With the Cold War over, the underlying differences between China and the United States have reasserted themselves in areas such as human rights, trade and weapons proliferation. These differences are unlikely to moderate. A "new cold war," Deng Xaioping reportedly asserted in 1991, is under way between China and America.
The same phrase has been applied to the increasingly difficult relations between Japan and the United States. Here cultural difference exacerbates economic conflict. People on each side allege racism on the other, but at least on the American side the antipathies are not racial but cultural. The basic values, attitudes, behavioral patterns of the two societies could hardly be more different. The economic issues between the United
3 Archie Roosevelt. For Lust of Knowing. Boston: Little, Brown, 1988, pp. 332-333.
42
Part I; Introduction
States and Europe are no less serious than those between the United States and Japan but they do not have the same political salience and emotional intensity because the differences between American culture and European culture are so much less than those between American civilization and Japanese civilization.
The interactions between civilizations vary greatly in the extent to which they are likely to be characterized by violence. Economic competition clearly predominates between the American and European subcivilizations of the West and between both of them and Japan. On the Eurasian continent, however, the proliferation of ethnic conflict, epitomized at the extreme in "ethnic cleansing," has not been totally random. It has been most frequent and most violent between groups belonging to different civilizations. In Eurasia the great historic fault lines between civilizations are once more aflame. This is particularly true along the boundaries of the crescent-shaped Islamic bloc of nations from the bulge of Africa to central Asia. Violence also occurs between Muslims, on the one hand, and Orthodox Serbs in the Balkans, Jews in Israel, Hindus in India, Buddhists in Burma and Catholics in the Philippines. Islam has bloody borders.
CIVILIZATION RALLYING:THE KIN-COUNTRY SYNDROME
Groups or states belonging to one civilization that become involved in war with people from a different civilization naturally try to rally support from other members of their own civilization. As the post-Cold War world evolves, civilization commonality, what H. D. S. Greenway has termed the "kin-country" syndrome, is replacing political ideology and traditional balance of power considerations as the principal basis for cooperation and coalitions. It can be seen gradually emerging in the post-Cold War conflicts in the Persian Gulf, the Caucasus and Bosnia. None of these was a full-scale war between civilizations, but each involved some elements of civilizational rallying, which seemed to become more important as the conflict continued and which may provide a foretaste of the future.
First, in the Gulf War one Arab state invaded another and then fought a coalition of Arab, Western and other states. While only a few Muslim governments overtly supported Saddam Hussein, many Arab elites privately cheered him on, and he was highly popular among large sections of the Arab publics. Islamic fundamentalist movements universally supported Iraq rather than the Western-backed governments of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Forswearing Arab nationalism, Saddam Hussein explicitly invoked an Islamic appeal. He and his supporters attempted to define the war as a war between civilizations. "It is not the world against Iraq," as Safar Al-Hawali, dean of Islamic Studies at the Umm Al-Qura University in Mecca, put it in a widely circulated tape. "It is the West against Islam." Ignoring the rivalry between Iran and Iraq, the chief Iranian religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called for a holy war against the West: "The struggle against American aggression, greed, plans and policies will be counted as a jihad, and anybody who is killed on that path is a martyr." "This is a war," King Hussein of Jordan argued, "against all Arabs and all Muslims and not against Iraq alone."
The Clash of Civilizations:'
43
The rallying of substantial sections of Arab elites and publics behind Saddam Hussein d those Arab governments in the anti-Iraq coalition to moderate their activities and C3U r their public statements. Arab governments opposed or distanced themselves from 'sequent Western efforts to apply pressure on Iraq, including enforcement of a no-fly SU S in the summer of 1992 and the bombing of Iraq in January 1993. The Western-Soviet-Turkish-Arab anti-Iraq coalition of 1990 had by 1993 become a coalition of almost only the West and Kuwait against Iraq.
Muslims contrasted Western actions against Iraq with the West's failure to protect Bosnians against Serbs and to impose sanctions on Israel for violating U.N. resolutions. The West, they alleged, was using a double standard. A world of clashing civilizations, however is inevitably a world of double standards: people apply one standard to their kin-countries and a different standard to others.
Second, the kin-country syndrome also appeared in conflicts in the former Soviet Union. Armenian military successes in 1992 and 1993 stimulated Turkey to become increasingly supportive of its religious, ethnic and linguistic brethren in Azerbaijan. "We have a Turkish nation feeling the same sentiments as the Azerbaijanis," said one Turkish official in 1992. "We are under pressure. Our newspapers are full of the photos of atrocities and are asking us if we are still serious about pursuing our neutral policy. Maybe we should show Armenia that there's a big Turkey in the region." President Turgut Ozal agreed, remarking that Turkey should at least "scare the Armenians a little bit." Turkey, Ozal threatened again in 1993, would "show its fangs." Turkish Air Force jets flew reconnaissance flights along the Armenian border; Turkey suspended food shipments and air flights to Armenia; and Turkey and Iran announced they would not accept dismemberment of Azerbaijan. In the last years of its existence, the Soviet government supported Azerbaijan because its government was dominated by former communists. With the end of the Soviet Union, however, political considerations gave way to religious ones. Russian troops fought on the side of the Armenians, and Azerbaijan accused the "Russian government of turning 180 degrees" toward support for Christian Armenia.
Third, with respect to the fighting in the former Yugoslavia, Western publics manifested sympathy and support for the Bosnian Muslims and the horrors they suffered at the hands of the Serbs. Relatively little concern was expressed, however, over Croatian attacks on Muslims and participation in the dismemberment of Bosnia-Herzegovina. In the early stages of the Yugoslav breakup, Germany, in an unusual display of diplomatic initiative and muscle, induced the other 11 members of the European Community to follow its lead in recognizing Slovenia and Croatia. As a result of the pope's determination to provide strong backing to the two Catholic countries, the Vatican extended recognition even before the Community did. The United States followed the European lead. Thus the leading actors in Western civilization rallied behind their coreligionists. Subsequently Croatia was reported to be receiving substantial quantities of arms from Central European and other Western countries. Boris Yeltsin's government, on the other hand, attempted to pursue a middle course that would be sympathetic to the Orthodox Serbs but not alienate Russia from the West. Russian conservative and nationalist groups, however, including many legislators, attacked the government for not being more forthcoming in its support for the Serbs.
44     Part I: Introduction
By early 1993 several hundred Russians apparently were serving with the Serbian forces and reports circulated of Russian arms being supplied to Serbia..
Islamic governments and groups, on the other hand, castigated the West for not coming to the defense of the Bosnians. Iranian leaders urged Muslims from all countries to provide help to Bosnia; in violation of the U.N. arms embargo, Iran supplied weapons and men for the Bosnians; Iranian-supported Lebanese groups sent guerrillas to train and organize the Bosnian forces. In 1993 up to 4,000 Muslims from over two dozen Islamic countries were reported to be fighting in Bosnia. The governments of Saudi Arabia and other countries felt under increasing pressure from fundamentalist groups in their own societies to provide more vigorous support for the Bosnians. By the end of 1992, Saudi Arabia had reportedly supplied substantial funding for weapons and supplies for the Bosnians, which significantly increased their military capabilities vis-á-vis the Serbs.
In the 1930s the Spanish Civil War provoked intervention from countries that politically were fascist, communist and democratic. In the 1990s the Yugoslav conflict is provoking intervention from countries that are Muslim, Orthodox and Western Christian. The parallel has not gone unnoticed. "The war in Bosnia-Herzegovina has become the emotional equivalent of the fight against fascism in the Spanish Civil War," one Saudi editor observed. "Those who died there are regarded as martyrs who tried to save their fellow Muslims."
Conflicts and violence will also occur between states and groups within the same civilization. Such conflicts, however, are likely to be less intense and less likely to expand than conflicts between civilizations. Common membership in a civilization reduces the probability of violence in situations where it might otherwise occur. In 1991 and 1992 many people were alarmed by the possibility of violent conflict between Russia and Ukraine over territory, particularly Crimea, the Black Sea fleet, nuclear weapons and economic issues. If civilization is what counts, however, the likelihood of violence between Ukrainians and Russians should be low. They are two Slavic, primarily Orthodox peoples who have had close relationships with each other for centuries. As of early 1993, despite all the reasons for conflict, the leaders of the two countries were effectively negotiating and defusing the issues between the two countries. While there has been serious fighting between Muslims and Christians elsewhere in the former Soviet Union and much tension and some fighting between Western and Orthodox Christians in the Baltic states, there has been virtually no violence between Russians and Ukrainians.
Civilization rallying to date has been limited, but it has been growing, and it clearly has the potential to spread much further. As the conflicts in the Persian Gulf, the Caucasus and Bosnia continued, the positions of nations and the cleavages between them increasingly were along civilizational lines. Populist politicians, religious leaders and the media have found it a potent means of arousing mass support and of pressuring hesitant governments. In the coming years, the local conflicts most likely to escalate into major wars will be those, as in Bosnia and the Caucasus, along the fault lines between civilizations. The next world war, if there is one, will be a war between civilizations.
The Clash of Civilizations?
45
THE WEST VERSUS THE REST
The West is now at an extraordinary peak of power in relation to other civilizations. Its superpower opponent has disappeared from the map. Military conflict among Western states is unthinkable, and Western military power is unrivaled. Apart from Japan, the West faces no economic challenge. It dominates international political and security institutions and with Japan international economic institutions. Global political and security issues are effectively settled by a directorate of the United States, Britain and France, world economic issues by a directorate of the United States, Germany and Japan, all of which maintain extraordinarily close relations with each other to the exclusion of lesser and largely non-Western countries. Decisions made at the U.N. Security Council or in the International Monetary Fund that reflect the interests of the West are presented to the world as reflecting the desires of the world community. The very phrase "the world community" has become the euphemistic collective noun (replacing "the Free World") to give global legitimacy to actions reflecting the interests of the United States and other Western powers.4 Through the IMF and other international economic institutions, the West promotes its economic interests and imposes on other nations the economic policies it thinks appropriate. In any poll of non-Western peoples, the IMF undoubtedly would win the support of finance ministers and a few others, but get an overwhelmingly unfavorable rating from just about everyone else, who would agree with Georgy Arbatov's characterization of IMF officials as "neo-Bolsheviks who love expropriating other people's money, imposing undemocratic and alien rules of economic and political conduct and stifling economic freedom."
Western domination of the U.N. Security Council and its decisions, tempered only by occasional abstention by China, produced U.N. legitimation of the West's use of force to drive Iraq out of Kuwait and its elimination of Iraq's sophisticated weapons and capacity to produce such weapons. It also produced the quite unprecedented action by the United States, Britain and France in getting the Security Council to demand that Libya hand over the Pan Am 103 bombing suspects and then to impose sanctions when Libya refused. After defeating the largest Arab army, the West did not hesitate to throw its weight around in the Arab world. The West in effect is using international institutions, military power and economic resources to run the world in ways that will maintain Western predominance, protect Western interests and promote Western political and economic values.
That at least is the way in which non-Westerners see the new world, and there is a significant element of truth in their view. Differences in power and struggles for mi litary, economic and institutional power are thus one source of conflict between the West and other civilizations. Differences in culture, that is basic values and beliefs, are a second source
"Almost invariably Western leaders claim they are acting on behalf of "the world community. One minor lapse occurred during the run-up to the Gulf War. In an interview on "Good Morning America.' Dec 21. 1990 British Prime Minister John Major referred to the actions "the West" was taking against Saddam Hussein, lie quickly corrected himself and subsequently referred to "the world community. He was, however, right when he erred.
46     Part I: Introduction
of conflict. V. S. Naipaul has argued that Western civilization is the "universal civilization" that "fits all men." At a superficial level much of Western culture has indeed permeated the rest of the world. At a more basic level, however, Western concepts differ fundamentally from those prevalent in other civilizations. Western ideas of individualism, liberalism, constitutionalism, human rights, equality, liberty, the rule of law, democracy, free markets, the separation of church and state, often have little resonance in Islamic, Confucian, Japanese, Hindu, Buddhist or Orthodox cultures. Western efforts to propagate such ideas produce instead a reaction against "human rights imperialism" and a reaffirmation of indigenous values, as can be seen in the support for religious fundamentalism by the younger generation in non-Western cultures. The very notion that there could be a "universal civilization" is a Western idea, directly at odds with the particularism of most Asian societies and their emphasis on what distinguishes one people from another. Indeed, the author of a review of 100 comparative studies of values in different societies concluded that "the values that are most important in the West are least important worldwide."5 In the political realm, of course, these differences are most manifest in the efforts of the United States and other Western powers to induce other peoples to adopt Western ideas concerning democracy and human rights. Modern democratic government originated in the West. When it has developed in non-Western societies it has usually been the product of Western colonialism or imposition.
The central axis of world politics in the future is likely to be, in Kishore Mahbubani's phrase, the conflict between "the West and the Rest" and the responses of non-Western civilizations to Western power and values.6 Those responses generally take one or a combination of three forms. At one extreme, non-Western states can, like Burma and North Korea, attempt to pursue a course of isolation, to insulate their societies from penetration or "corruption" by the West, and, in effect, to opt out of participation in the Western-dominated global community. The costs of this course, however, are high, and few states have pursued it exclusively. A second alternative, the equivalent of "band-wagoning" in international relations theory, is to attempt to join the West and accept its values and institutions. The third alternative is to attempt to "balance" the West by developing economic and military power and cooperating with other non-Western societies against the West, while preserving indigenous values and institutions; in short, to modernize but not to Westernize.
THE TORN COUNTRIES
In the future, as people differentiate themselves by civilization, countries with large numbers of peoples of different civilizations, such as the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia are candidates for dismemberment. Some other countries have a fair degree of cultural homogeneity but are divided over whether their society belongs to one civilization or another
'Harry C. Triandis. The AW York Tunes, Dec. 25, 1990, p. 41. and "Cross-Cultural Studies of Individualism and Collectivism, Nebraska Symposium on Motivation vol 37 1989 pp 41-133 •Kishore Mahbubani. "The West and the Rest," The National Interest, summer IW pp 3 -13
The Clash of Civilizations? 47
These are torn countries. Their leaders typically wish to pursue a bandwagoning strategy and to make their countries members of the West, but the history, culture and traditions of their countries are non-Western. The most obvious and prototypical torn country is Turkey. The late twentieth-century leaders of Turkey have followed in the Attatiirk tradition and denned Turkey as a modern, secular, Western nation state. They allied Turkey with the West in NATO and in the Gulf War; they applied for membership in the European Community. At the same time, however, elements in Turkish society have supported an Islamic revival and have argued that Turkey is basically a Middle Eastern Muslim society. In addition, while the elite of Turkey has defined Turkey as a Western society, the elite of the West refuses to accept Turkey as such. Turkey will not become a member of the European Community, and the real reason, as President Ozal said, "is that we are Muslim and they are Christian and they don't say that." Having rejected Mecca, and then being rejected by Brussels, where does Turkey look? Tashkent may be the answer. The end of the Soviet Union gives Turkey the opportunity to become the leader of a revived Turkic civilization involving seven countries from the borders of Greece to those of China. Encouraged by the West. Turkey is making strenuous efforts to carve out this new identity for itself.
During the past decade Mexico has assumed a position somewhat similar to that of Turkey. Just as Turkey abandoned its historic opposition to Europe and attempted to join Europe, Mexico has stopped defining itself by its opposition to the United States and is instead attempting to imitate the United States and to join it in the North American Free Trade Area. Mexican leaders are engaged in the great task of redefining Mexican identity and have introduced fundamental economic reforms that eventually will lead to fundamental political change. In 1991 a top adviser to President Carlos Salinas de Gortari described at length to me all the changes the Salinas government was making. When he finished, I remarked; "That's most impressive. It seems to me that basically you want to change Mexico from a Latin American country into a North American country." He looked at me with surprise and exclaimed: "Exactly! That's precisely what we are trying to do, but of course we could never say so publicly." As his remark indicates, in Mexico as in Turkey, significant elements in society resist the redefinition of their country's identity. In Turkey, European-oriented leaders have to make gestures to Islam (Ozal's pilgrimage to Mecca); so also Mexico's North American-oriented leaders have to make gestures to those who hold Mexico to be a Latin American country (Salinas' Ibero-American Guadalajara summit).
Historically Turkey has been the most profoundly torn country. For the United States, Mexico is the most immediate torn country. Globally the most important torn country is Russia. The question of whether Russia is part of the West or the leader of a distinct Slavic-Orthodox civilization has been a recurring one in Russian history. That issue was obscured by the communist victory in Russia, which imported a Western ideology, adapted it to Russian conditions and then challenged the West in the name of that ideology. The dominance of communism shut off the historic debate over Westernization versus Russification. With communism discredited Russians once again face that question.
President Yeltsin is adopting Western principles and goals and seeking to make Russia a "normal" country and a part of the West. Yet both the Russian elite and the Russian public are divided on this issue. Among the more moderate dissenters, Sergei
48      Part 1: Introduction
The Clash of Civilizations? 49
Stankevich argues that Russia should reject the "Atlanticist" course, which would lead it "to become European, to become a part of the world economy in rapid and organized fashion, to become the eighth member of the Seven, and to put particular emphasis on Germany and the United States as the two dominant members of the Atlantic alliance." While also rejecting an exclusively Eurasian policy, Stankevich nonetheless argues that Russia should give priority to the protection of Russians in other countries, emphasize its Turkic and Muslim connections, and promote "an appreciable redistribution of our resources, our options, our ties, and our interests in favor of Asia, of the eastern direction." People of this persuasion criticize Yeltsin for subordinating Russia's interests to those of the West, for reducing Russian military strength, for failing to support traditional friends such as Serbia, and for pushing economic and political reform in ways injurious to the Russian people. Indicative of this trend is the new popularity of the ideas of Petr Savitsky, who in the 1920s argued that Russia was a unique Eurasian civilization.7 More extreme dissidents voice much more blatantly nationalist, anti-Western and anti-Semitic views, and urge Russia to redevelop its military strength and to establish closer ties with China and Muslim countries. The people of Russia are as divided as the elite. An opinion survey in European Russia in the spring of 1992 revealed that 40 percent of the public had positive attitudes toward the West and 36 percent had negative attitudes. As it has been for much of its history, Russia in the early 1990s is truly a torn country.
To redefine its civilization identity, a torn country must meet three requirements. First, its political and economic elite has to be generally supportive of and enthusiastic about this move. Second, its public has to be willing to acquiesce in the redefinition. Third, the dominant groups in the recipient civilization have to be willing to embrace the convert. All three requirements in large part exist with respect to Mexico. The first two in large part exist with respect to Turkey. It is not clear that any of them exist with respect to Russia's joining the West. The conflict between liberal democracy and Marxism-Leninism was between ideologies which, despite their major differences, ostensibly shared ultimate goals of freedom, equality and prosperity. A traditional, authoritarian, nationalist Russia could have quite different goals. A Western democrat could carry on an intellectual debate with a Soviet Marxist. It would be virtually impossible for him to do that with a Russian traditionalist. If, as the Russians stop behaving like Marxists, they reject liberal democracy and begin behaving like Russians but not like Westerners, the relations between Russia and the West could again become distant and conflictual.8
7Sergei Stankevich, "Russia in Search of Itself," The National Interest, summer 1992, pp. 47-51; Daniel Schneider, "A Russian Movement Rejects Western Tilt," Christian Science Monitor, Feb. 5. 1993, pp. 5-7. 8Owen Harries has pointed out that Australia is trying (unwisely in his view) lo become a lorn country in reverse. Although it has been a full member not only of the West but also of the ABCA military and intelligence core of the West, its current leaders are in effect proposing that it defect from the West, redefine itself as an Asian country and cultivate close ties with its neighbors. Australia's future, they argue, is with the dynamic economies of East Asia. But. as 1 have suggested, close economic cooperation normally requires a common cultural base. In addition, none of the three conditions necessary for a torn country to join another civilization is likely to exist in Australia's case.
THE CONFUCIAN-ISLAMIC CONNECTION
The obstacles to noi> Western countries joining the West vary considerably. They are least for Latin American and East European countries. They are greater for the Orthodox countries of the former Soviet Union. They are still greater for Muslim, Confucian, Hindu and Buddhist societies. Japan has established a unique position for itself as an associate member of the West: it is in the West in some respects but clearly not of the West in important dimensions. Those countries that for reason of culture and power do not wish to, or cannot, join the West compete with the West by developing their own economic, military and political power. They do this by promoting their internal development and by cooperating with other non-Western countries. The most prominent form of this cooperation is the Confucian-Islamic connection that has emerged to challenge Western interests, values and power.
Almost without exception, Western countries are reducing their military power; under Yeltsin's leadership so also is Russia. China, North Korea and several Middle Eastern states, however, are significantly expanding their military capabilities. They are doing this by the import of arms from Western and non-Western sources and by the development of indigenous arms industries. One result is the emergence of what Charles Krauthammer has called "Weapon States," and the Weapon States are not Western states. Another result is the redefinition of arms control, which is a Western concept and a Western goal. During the Cold War the primary purpose of arms control was to establish a stable military balance between the United States and its allies and the Soviet Union and its allies. In the post-Cold War world the primary objective of arms control is to prevent the development by non-Western societies of military capabilities that could threaten Western interests. The West attempts to do this through international agreements, economic pressure and controls on the transfer of arms and weapons technologies.
The conflict between the West and the Confucian-Islamic states focuses largely, although not exclusively, on nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, ballistic missiles and other sophisticated means for delivering them, and the guidance, intelligence and other electronic capabilities for achieving that goal. The West promotes nonproliferation as a universal norm and nonproliferation treaties and inspections as means of realizing that norm. It also threatens a variety of sanctions against those who promote the spread of sophisticated weapons and proposes some benefits for those who do not. The attention of the West focuses, naturally, on nations that are actually or potentially hostile to the West.
The non-Western nations, on the other hand, assert their right to acquire and to deploy whatever weapons they think necessary for their security. They also have absorbed, to the full, the truth of the response of the Indian defense minister when asked what lesson he learned from the Gulf War: "Don't fight the United States unless you have nuclear weapons." Nuclear weapons, chemical weapons and missiles are viewed probably erroneously, as the potential equalizer of superior Western conventional power. China, of course, already has nuclear weapons; Pakistan and India have the capability to deploy them. North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Algeria appear to be attempting to acquire them. A top Iranian official has declared that all Muslim states should acquire nuclear weapons, and in 1988 the president of Iran reportedly issued a directive calling for development of "offensive and defensive chemical, biological and radiological weapons"
50      Part I: Introduction
The Clash of Civilizations?
51
Centrally important to the development of counter-West military capabilities is the sustained expansion of China's military power and its means to create military power. Buoyed by spectacular economic development, China is rapidly increasing its military spending and vigorously moving forward with the modernization of its armed forces. It is purchasing weapons from the former Soviet states; it is developing long-range missiles; in 1992 it tested a one-megaton nuclear device. It is developing power-projection capabilities, acquiring aerial refueling technology, and trying to purchase an aircraft carrier. Its military buildup and assertion of sovereignty over the South China Sea are provoking a multilateral regional arms race in East Asia. China is also a major exporter of arms and weapons technology. It has exported materials to Libya and Iraq that could be used to manufacture nuclear weapons and nerve gas. It has helped Algeria build a reactor suitable for nuclear weapons research and production. China has sold to Iran nuclear technology that American officials believe could only be used to create weapons and apparently has shipped components of 300-mile-range missiles to Pakistan. North Korea has had a nuclear weapons program under way for some while and has sold advanced missiles and missile technology to Syria and Iran. The flow of weapons and weapons technology is generally from East Asia to the Middle East. There is, however, some movement in the reverse direction; China has received Stinger missiles from Pakistan.
A Confucian-Islamic military connection has thus come into being, designed to promote acquisition by its members of the weapons and weapons technologies needed to counter the military power of the West. It may or may not last. At present, however, it is, as Dave McCurdy has said, "a renegades' mutual support pact, run by the proliferators and their backers." A new form of arms competition is thus occurring between Islamic-Confucian states and the West. In an old-fashioned arms race, each side developed its own arms to balance or to achieve superiority against the other side. In this new form of arms competition, one side is developing its arms and the other side is attempting not to balance but to limit and prevent that arms build-up while at the same time reducing its own military capabilities.
IMPLICATIONS FOR THE WEST
This article does not argue that civilization identities will replace all other identities, that nation states will disappear, that each civilization will become a single coherent political j entity, that groups within a civilization will not conflict with and even fight each other. j This paper does set forth the hypotheses that differences between civilizations are real and { important; civilization-consciousness is increasing; conflict between civilizations will ' supplant ideological and other forms of conflict as the dominant global form of conflict; > international relations, historically a game played out within Western civilization, will in- ' creasingly be de-Westernized and become a game in which non-Western civilizations are actors and not simply objects; successful political, security and economic international institutions are more likely to develop within civilizations than across civilizations; conflicts between groups in different civilizations will be more frequent, more sustained and more violent than conflicts between groups in the same civilization; violent conflicts between
oroups in different civilizations are the most likely and most dangerous source of escalation that could lead to global wars; the paramount axis of world politics will be the relations between "the West and the Rest"; the elites in some torn non-Western countries will try to make their countries part of the West, but in most cases face major obstacles to accomplishing this; a central focus of conflict for the immediate future will be between the West and several Islamic-Confucian states.
This is not to advocate the desirability of conflicts between civilizations. It is to set forth descriptive hypotheses as to what the future may be like. If these are plausible hypotheses, however, it is necessary to consider their implications for Western policy. These implications should be divided between short-term advantage and long-term accommodation. In the short term it is clearly in the interest of the West to promote greater cooperation and unity within its own civilization, particularly between its European and North American components; to incorporate into the West societies in Eastern Europe and Latin America whose cultures are close to those of the West; to promote and maintain cooperative relations with Russia and Japan; to prevent escalation of local inter-civilization conflicts into major inter-civilization wars; to limit the expansion of the military strength of Confucian and Islamic states; to moderate the reduction of Western military capabilities and maintain military superiority in East and Southwest Asia; to exploit differences and conflicts among Confucian and Islamic states; to support in other civilizations groups sympathetic to Western values and interests; to strengthen international institutions that reflect and legitimate Western interests and values and to promote the involvement of non-Western states in those institutions.
In the longer term other measures would be called for. Western civilization is both Western and modern. Non-Western civilizations have attempted to become modern without becoming Western. To date only Japan has fully succeeded in this quest. Non-Western civilizations will continue to attempt to acquire the wealth, technology, skills, machines and weapons that are part of being modern. They will also attempt to reconcile this modernity with their traditional culture and values. Their economic and military strength relative to the West will increase. Hence the West will increasingly have to accommodate these non-Western modern civilizations whose power approaches that of the West but whose values and interests differ significantly from those of the West. This will require the West to maintain the economic and military power necessary to protect its interests in relation to these civilizations. It will also, however, require the West to develop a more profound understanding of the basic religious and philosophical assumptions underlying other civilizations and the ways in which people in those civilizations see their interests. It will require an effort to identify elements of commonality between Western and other civilizations. For the relevant future, there will be no universal civilization, but instead a world of different civilizations, each of which will have to learn to coexist with the others.
PART II
International Realism Anarchy and Power
The appeal of different schools of thought in international relations tends to vary with developments in the real world. Perhaps because the twentieth century was one of unprecedented catastrophe, the dominant tradition has been what is known colloquially as "power politics." In academic circles this family of ideas is known as "realism." The main themes in this school of thought are that in order to survive, states are driven to seek power, that moral or legal principles that may govern relations among citizens within states cannot control the relations among states, and that wars occur because there is no sovereign in the international system to settle disputes peacefully and enforce judgments. States have no one but themselves to rely on for protection, or to obtain what they believe they are entitled to by right.
Thucydides' Peloponnesian War, the history of the conflict between Athens and Sparta two and a half millennia ago, is the classic statement of these ideas. The selection included here—the Melian Dialogue—is perhaps the most extreme and frank discussion of power politics, unclouded by diplomatic niceties, ever recorded. Taken alone, the dialogue can appear a caricature, so readers are encouraged to read more of the original work, which is rich in commentary on various aspects of balance of power politics, strategy, and the role of ideology and domestic conflict in international relations.'
The tradition of realism can be traced in various forms through Machiavelli, Hobbes, the German schools of Realpolitik and Machtpolitik, to E. H. Carr, Reinhold Niebuhr, Hans Morgenthau, and others in the mid-twentieth century. The selections from Machiavelli's The Prince and Hobbes's Leviathan that follow capsulize their views of the roots of political ruthlessness, the similarity of diplomacy and political competition to the state of nature, and the need for leaders who seek to secure their regimes lo do things in public life that are condemned in traditional codes of morality.
'Thucydides also presents examples thai differ markedly from the Melian Dialogue, such as Ihe Mytilene debute. See Michael Walzers comparison m.lust ami Unjust Wars (NewYork: Basic Books. 1977). pp. 5- II.
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Part II: International Realism
Part II: International Realism 55
Students not steeped in political philosophy should avoid the popular misinterpretation of these thinkers as amoral. Rather they should be understood as moral relativists, concerned with the need to secure the prerequisite (power) for achievement of anything moral, a need that may require behavior inconsistent with absolute norms or religious ethics. As Machiavelli argues in the following excerpt, a prince must "not deviate from what is good, if possible, but be able to do evil if constrained."
In the past century, Morgenthau's Politics Among Nations2 was the most prominent textbook of realism in the United States. Carr's Twenty Years Crisis, on the other hand, is distinguished by its pungency, which helps to convey the essence of realism in brief selections. Before pigeonholing Carr as a strident realist, however, note his eloquent discussion of the serious deficiencies of the theory in the middle of the excerpts that follow.
The most prominent recent writings in the realist school have been dubbed "neo-" or "structural" realism to distinguish their more rigorously scientific formulation of the theory. Ncorealists focus less on the questions of human motivation or the nature of political regimes than on the security incentives posed by the structure of the international system. The selection by Kenneth Waltz, the dean of neorealism, is close to a summary of his masterwork, Theory of International Politics.^ Mearsheimer's hyper-realist argument in favor of the Cold War, featured in Part I, derives directly from Waltz's reasoning about the stability of a bipolar world (discussed in this selection), and the pacifying effect of nuclear weapons (discussed in the selection by Waltz in Part VIII).
The favorable view of bipolarity among neorealists, however, contradicts traditional balance of power theory. In considering whether a world of only two major powers, as opposed to a world of many, should be less likely to lead to war, compare Waltz and Mearsheimer with Thucydides, Blainey, and Gilpin. The competition between Athens and Sparta, for example, unlike that between the United States and the Soviet Union, ended in disaster. Where Waltz sees bipolarity as imposing clarity and stability on the competition, others see it as inherently unstable, a delicate balance between contenders ever striving for primacy. Robert Gilpin sees history as a succession of struggles for hegemony between declining and rising powers, with the struggles normally resolved by a major war. Geoffrey Blainey considers a hierarchical system, in which differences in power are clear, as most stable. When there is no doubt about who would prevail if disagreements were to lead to combat, there is little chance that the strong will need to resort to combat or that the weak will dare. Blainey sees a world of rough parity, in contrast, as unstable, because it is easier for states to miscalculate the balance of power and their chances of being able to impose their will by either initiating or resisting the use of force. This view is consistent with Gilpin's, since the challenger in a hegemonic transition is usually one whose power is approaching that of the leading state.
'Hans Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, 5th edition (New York: Knopf. 1973). 'Kenneth N. Waltz. Theory of International Politics (Reading. Mass.: Addison-Wesley. 1979). See also Walt/. Man. the Slate, ami War (New York: Columbia University Press. 1959). For a large collection of recent views on realism see the two special issues in volume 5, numbers 2 and 3. of Security Studies edited by Benjamin Frankel: Roots of Realism (winter 1995) and Realism: Restatements anil Renewal (spring I 996)
How much do the structure of the international balance of power and competition for primacv determine the actions of states? We might ask how one could have predicted the end of the Cold War from realist theories. Was the Soviet Union's voluntary surrender of control over Eastern Europe in 1989. indeed its entire withdrawal from the power stru«ele with the West, consistent with such explanations of state behavior? Realists understand th-lt statesmen do not always act in accord with realist norms. But the enormity of the Gorbachev revolution is an uncomfortable exception for the theory to have to bear. Nevertheless, realist scholars offer arguments for why the end of the Cold War should confirm their theories rather than revise them.4
If readers are not fully convinced that realist theories adequately explain the end of the Cold War they might consider another possibility. The greatest irony might be that the end came from the adoption of liberal ideas about international cooperation by the leadership of the Soviet Union, the superpower that had so tenaciously opposed Western liberalism as a model for the world.5 The readings in Part HI will present some tenets of the liberal tradition that offer a very different view of the possibilities of peace from the one presented in this section.
—RKB
"•Kenneth N. Waltz, "Structural Realism After the Cold War," International Security 25, No. 1 (summer 2000); William C. Wohlforth. "Realism and the End of the Cold War," International Security 19. No. 3 (winter 1994/95). See also Richard K. Betts. "Not with My Thucydides. You Don't," The American Interest 2. No. 4 (March/April 2007), p. 142.
SA further irony would be that if the liberal explanation for Soviet foreign policy at the end of the Cold War is convincing, the results in terms of international politics are still consistent with realism. The Gorbachev revolution contributed to the destruction of the Soviet Union, even if it did not fully cause it. It was not necessarily inevitable that a more ruthless Soviet leadership would have failed to preserve the empire, ai least into the twenty-first century. In Waltz's terms, the Soviet Union certainly did "lall by the wayside."
The Melian Dialogue
Thucydides
The Melians are a colony of Lacedaemon [Sparta] that would not submit to the Athenians like the other islanders, and at first remained neutral and took no part in the struggle, but afterwards upon the Athenians using violence and plundering their territory, assumed an attitude of open hostility. Cleomedes, son of Lycomedes, andTisias, son of : Tisimachus, the generals, encamping in their territory with the above armament, before doing any harm to their land, sent envoys to negotiate. These the Melians did not bring before the people, but bade them state the object of their mission to the magistrates and the few; upon which the Athenian envoys spoke as follows:—
Athenians: 'Since the negotiations are not to go on before the people, in order that we may not be able to speak straight on without interruption, and deceive the ears of the multitude by seductive arguments which would pass without refutation (for we know that this is the meaning of our being brought before the few), what if you who sit there were to pursue a method more cautious still! Make no set speech yourselves, but take us up at whatever you do not like, and settle that before going any farther. And first tell us if this proposition of ours suits you.'
The Melian commissioners answered:—
Melians: 'To the fairness of quietly instructing each other as you propose there is nothing to object; but your military preparations are too far advanced to agree with what you say, as we see you are come to be judges in your own cause, and that all we can reasonably expect from this negotiation is war, if we prove to have right on our side and refuse to submit, and in the contrary case, slavery.'
Athenians: 'If you have met to reason about presentiments of the future, or for anything else than to consult for the safety of your state upon the facts that you see before you, we will give over; otherwise we will go on.'
Melians: 'It is natural and excusable for men in our position to turn more ways than one both in thought and utterance. However, the question in this conference is, as you say, the safety of our country; and the discussion, if you please, can proceed in the way which you propose.'
Athenians: 'For ourselves, we shall not trouble you with specious pretences— either of how we have a right to our empire because we overthrew the Mede, or are now attacking you because of wrong that you have done us—and make a long speech which would not be believed; and in return we hope that you, instead of thinking to
Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War, Richard Crawley, trans. (New York: The Modern Library 1934) Book V.
The Melian Dialogue 57
1fluence us by saying that you did not join the Lacedaemonians, although their ' olonists or that you have done us no wrong, will aim at what is feasible, holding in view the real sentiments of us both; since you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.'
Melians: 'As we think, at any rate, it is expedient—we speak as we are obliged, since ou enjoin us to let right alone and talk only of interest—that you should not destroy what is our common protection, the privilege of being allowed in danger to invoke what is fair and right, and even to profit by arguments not strictly valid if they can be got to pass current. And you are as much interested in this as any, as your fall would be a signal for the heaviest vengeance and an example for the world to meditate upon.'
Athenians: 'The end of our empire, if end it should, does not frighten us: a rival empire like Lacedaemon, even if Lacedaemon was our real antagonist, is not so terrible to the vanquished as subjects who by themselves attack and overpower their rulers. This, however, is a risk that we are content to take. We will now proceed to show you that we are come here in the interest of our empire, and that we shall say what we are now going to say, for the preservation of your country; as we would fain exercise that empire over you without trouble, and see you preserved for the good of us both.'
Melians: 'And how, pray, could it turn out as good for us to serve as for you to rule?'
Athenians: 'Because you would have the advantage of submitting before suffering the worst, and we should gain by not destroying you.'
Melians: 'So that you would not consent to our being neutral, friends instead of enemies, but allies of neither side.'
Athenians: 'No; for your hostility cannot so much hurt us as your friendship will be an argument to our subjects of our weakness, and your enmity of our power.'
Melians: 'Is that your subjects' idea of equity, to put those who have nothing to do with you in the same category with peoples that are most of them your own colonists, and some conquered rebels?'
Athenians: 'As far as right goes they think one has as much of it as the other, and that if any maintain their independence it is because they are strong, and that if we do not molest them it is because we are afraid; so that besides extending our empire we should gain in security by your subjection; the fact that you are islanders and weaker than others rendering it all the more important that you should not succeed in baffling the masters of the sea.'
Melians: 'But do you consider that there is no security in the policy which we indicate? For here again if you debar us from talking about justice and invite us to obey your interest, we also must explain ours, and try to persuade you, if the two happen to coincide. How can you avoid making enemies of all existing neutrals who shall look at our case and conclude from it that one day or another you will attack them? And what is this but to make greater the enemies that you have already, and to force others to become so who would otherwise have never thought of it?'
Athenians: 'Why, the fact is that continentals generally give us but little alarm; the liberty which they enjoy will long prevent their taking precautions against us; it is rather islanders like yourselves, outside our empire, and subjects smarting under the yoke, who would be the most likely to take a rash step and lead themselves and us into obvious danger.'
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Melians: 'Well then, if you risk so much to retain your empire, and your subjects to get rid of it, it were surely great baseness and cowardice in us who are still free not to try everything that can be tried, before submitting to your yoke.'
Athenians: 'Not if you are well advised, the contest not being an equal one, with honour as the prize and shame as the penalty, but a question of self-preservation and of not resisting those who are far stronger than you are.'
Melians: 'But we know that the fortune of war is sometimes more impartial than the disproportion of numbers might lead one to suppose; to submit is to give ourselves over to despair, while action still preserves for us a hope that we may stand erect.'
Athenians: 'Hope, danger's comforter, may be indulged in by those who have abundant resources, if not without loss at all events without ruin; but its nature is to be extravagant, and those who go so far as to put their all upon the venture see it in its true colours only when they are ruined; but so long as the discovery would enable them to guard against it, it is never found wanting. Let not this be the case with you, who are weak and hang on a single turn of the scale; nor be like the vulgar, who, abandoning such security as human means may still afford, when visible hopes fail them in extremity, turn to invisible, to prophecies and oracles, and other such inventions that delude men with hopes to their destruction.'
Melians: 'You may be sure that we are as well aware as you of the difficulty of contending against your power and fortune, unless the terms be equal. But we trust that the gods may grant us fortune as good as yours, since we are just men fighting against unjust, and that what we want in power will be made up by the alliance of the Lacedaemonians, who are bound if only for very shame, to come to the aid of their kindred. Our confidence, therefore, after all is not so utterly irrational.'
Athenians: 'When you speak of the favour of the gods, we may as fairly hope for that as yourselves; neither our pretensions nor our conduct being in any way contrary to what men believe of the gods, or practise among themselves. Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary law of their nature they rule wherever they can. And it is not as if we were the first to make this law, or to act upon it when made: we found it existing before us, and shall leave it to exist for ever after us; all we do is to make use of it, knowing that you and everybody else, having the same power as we have, would do the same as we do. Thus, as far as the gods are concerned, we have no fear and no reason to fear that we shall be at a disadvantage. But when we come to your notion about the Lacedaemonians, which leads you to believe that shame will make them help you, here we bless your simplicity but do not envy your folly. The Lacedaemonians, when their own interests of their country's laws are in question, are the worthiest men alive; of their conduct towards others much might be said, but no clearer idea of it could be given than by shortly saying that of all the men we know they are most conspicuous in considering what is agreeable honourable, and what is expedient just. Such a way of thinking does not promise much for the safety which you now unreasonably count upon.'
Melians: 'But it is for this very reason that we now trust to their respect for expediency to prevent them from betraying the Melians, their colonists, and thereby losing the confidence of their friends in Hellas and helping their enemies.'
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Athenians: 'Then you do not adopt the view that expediency goes with security, while justice and honour cannot be followed without danger; and danger the Lacedaemonians generally court as little as possible."
Melians: 'But we believe that they would be more likely to face even danger for our sake, and with more confidence than for others, as our nearness to Peloponnese makes it easier for them to act, and our common blood insures our fidelity.'
Athenians: 'Yes, but what an intending ally trusts to, is not the goodwill of those who ask his aid, but a decided superiority of power for action; and the Lacedaemonians look to this even more than others. At least, such is their distrust of their home resources that it is only with numerous allies that they attack a neighbour; now is it likely that while we are masters of the sea they will cross over to an island?'
Melians: 'But they would have others to send. The Cretan sea is a wide one, and it is more difficult for those who command it to intercept others, than for those who wish to elude them to do so safely. And should the Lacedaemonians miscarry in this, they would fall upon your land, and upon those left of your allies whom Brasidas did not reach; and instead of places which are not yours, you will have to fight for your own country and your own confederacy.'
Athenians: 'Some diversion of the kind you speak of you may one day experience, only to learn, as others have done, that the Athenians never once yet withdrew from a siege for fear of any. But we are struck by the fact, that after saying you would consult for the safety of your country, in all this discussion you have mentioned nothing which men might trust in and think to be saved by. Your strongest arguments depend upon hope and the future, and your actual resources are too scanty, as compared with those arrayed against you, for you to come out victorious. You will therefore show great blindness of judgment, unless, after allowing us to retire, you can find some counsel more prudent than this. You will surely not be caught by that idea of disgrace, which in dangers that are disgraceful, and at the same time too plain to be mistaken, proves so fatal to mankind; since in too many cases the very men that have their eyes perfectly open to what they are rushing into, let the thing called disgrace, by the mere influence of a seductive name, lead them on to a point at which they become so enslaved by the phrase as in fact to fall wilfully into hopeless disaster, and incur disgrace more disgraceful as the companion of error, than when it comes as the result of misfortune. This, if you are well advised, you will guard against; and you will not think it dishonourable to submit to the greatest city in Hellas, when it makes you the moderate offer of becoming its tributary ally, without ceasing to enjoy the country that belongs to you; nor when you have the choice given you between war and security, will you be so blinded as to choose the worse. And it is certain that those who do not yield to their equals, who keep terms with their superiors, and are moderate towards their inferiors, on the whole succeed best. Think over the matter, therefore, after our withdrawal, and reflect once and again that it is for your country that you are consulting, that you have not more than one, and that upon this one deliberation depends its prosperity or ruin.'
The Athenians now withdrew from the conference; and (he Melians, left to themselves, came to a decision corresponding with what they had maintained in the discussion.
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and answered, 'Our resolution, Athenians, is the same as it was at first. We will not in a moment deprive of freedom a city that has been inhabited these seven hundred years; but we put our trust in the fortune by which the gods have preserved it until now, and in the help of men, that is, of the Lacedaemonians; and so we will try and save ourselves. Meanwhile we invite you to allow us to be friends to you and foes to neither party, and to retire from our country after making such a treaty as shall seem fit to us both.'
Such was the answer of the Melians. The Athenians now departing from the conference said, 'Well, you alone, as it seems to us, judging from these resolutions, regard what is future as more certain than what is before your eyes, and what is out of sight, in your eagerness, as already coming to pass; and as you have staked most on, and trusted most in, the Lacedaemonians, your fortune, and your hopes, so will you be most completely deceived.'
The Athenian envoys now returned to the army; and the Melians showing no signs of yielding, the generals at once betook themselves to hostilities, and drew a line of cir-cumvallation round the Melians, dividing the work among the different states. Subsequently the Athenians renamed with most of their army, leaving behind them a certain number of their own citizens and of the allies to keep guard by land and sea. The force thus left stayed on and besieged the place....
Summer was now over. The next winter the Lacedaemonians intended to invade the Argive territory, but arriving at the frontier found the sacrifices for crossing unfavourable, and went back again. This intention of theirs gave the Argives suspicions of certain of their fellow-citizens, some of whom they arrested; others, however, escaped them. About the same time the Melians again took another part of the Athenian lines which were but feebly garrisoned. Reinforcements afterwards arriving from Athens in consequence, under the command of Philocrates, son of Demeas, the siege was now pressed vigorously; and some treachery taking place inside, the Melians surrendered at discretion to the Athenians, who put to death all the grown men whom they took, and sold the women and children for slaves, and subsequently sent out five hundred colonists and inhabited the place themselves.
Doing Evil in Order to Do Good
Niccold Machiavelli
OFTHETHINGS FOR WHICH MEN, AND ESPECIALLY PRINCES, ARE PRAISED OR BLAMED
It now remains to be seen what are the methods and rules for a prince as regards his subjects and friends. And as I know that many have written of this, I fear that my writing about it may be deemed presumptuous, differing as 1 do, especially in this matter, from the opinions of others. But my intention being to write something of use to those who understand, it appears to me more proper to go to the real truth of the matter than to its imagination; and many have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather learn to bring about his own ruin than his preservation. A man who wishes to make a profession of goodness in everything must necessarily come to grief among so many who are not good. Therefore it is necessary for a prince, who wishes to maintain himself, to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge and not use it, according to the necessity of the case.
Leaving on one side, then, those things which concern only an imaginary prince, and speaking of those that are real, I state that all men, and especially princes, who are placed at a greater height, are reputed for certain qualities which bring them either praise or blame. Thus one is considered liberal, another misero or miserly (using a Tuscan term, seeing that avaro with us still means one who is rapaciously acquisitive and misero one who makes grudging use of his own); one a free giver, another rapacious; one cruel, another merciful; one a breaker of his word, another trustworthy; one effeminate and pusillanimous, another fierce and high-spirited; one humane, another haughty; one lascivious, another chaste; one frank, another astute; one hard, another easy; one serious, another frivolous; one religious, another an unbeliever, and so on. I know that every one will admit that it would be highly praiseworthy in a prince to possess all the above-named qualities that are reputed good, but as they cannot all be possessed or observed, human conditions not permitting of it, it is necessary that he should be prudent enough to avoid the scandal of those vices which would lose him the state, and guard himself if possible against those which will not lose it him, but if not able to, he can indulge them with less
Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince'huigi Ricci and E. R. P. Vincent, trans. (Modern Library. 1950). Chapters 15, 17. 18.
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scruple. And yet he must not mind incurring the scandal of those vices, without which it would be difficult to save the state, for if one considers well, it will be found that some things which seem virtues would, if followed, lead to one's ruin, and some others which appear vices result in one's greater security and well-being. ....
OF CRUELTY AND CLEMENCY, AND WHETHER IT IS BETTER TO BE LOVED OR FEARED
Proceeding to the other qualities before named, I say that every prince must desire to be considered merciful and not cruel. He must, however, take care not to misuse this mercifulness. Cesare Borgia was considered cruel, but his cruelty had brought order to the Romagna, united it, and reduced it to peace and fealty. If this is considered well, it will be seen that he was really much more merciful than the Florentine people, who, to avoid the name of cruelty, allowed Pistoia to be destroyed. A prince, therefore, must not mind incurring the charge of cruelty for the purpose of keeping his subjects united and faithful; for, with a very few examples, he will be more merciful than those who, from excess of tenderness, allow disorders to arise, from whence spring bloodshed and rapine; for these as a rule injure the whole community, while the executions carried out by the prince injure only individuals. And of all princes, it is impossible for a new prince to escape the reputation of cruelty, new states being always full of dangers. Wherefore Virgil through the mouth of Dido says:
Res dura, et regni novitas me talia cogunt Moliri, et late fines custode tueri.
Nevertheless, he must be cautious in believing and acting, and must not be afraid of his own shadow, and must proceed in a temperate manner with prudence and humanity, so that too much confidence does not render him incautious, and too much diffidence does not render him intolerant.
From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved more than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved, if one of the two has to be wanting. For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger, and covetous of gain; as long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours; they offer you their blood, their goods, their life, and their children, as I have before said, when the necessity is remote; but when it approaches, they revolt. And the prince who has relied solely on their words, without making other preparations, is ruined; for the friendship which is gained by purchase and not through grandeur and nobility of spirit is bought but not secured, and at a pinch is not to be expended in your service. And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared; for love is held by a chain of obligation which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose; but fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.
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Still, a prince should make himself feared in such a way that if he does not gain love, he at any tate avoids hatred; for fear and the absence of hatred may well go together, and will be always attained by one who abstains from interfering with the property of his citizens and subjects or with their women. And when he is obliged to take the life of any one, let him do so when there is a proper justification and manifest reason for it; but above all he must abstain from taking the property of others, for men forget more easily the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony. Then also pretexts for seizing property are never wanting, and one who begins to live by rapine will always find some reason for taking the goods of others, whereas causes for taking life are rarer and more fleeting.
But when the prince is with his army and has a large number of soldiers under his control then it is extremely necessary that he should not mind being thought cruel; for without this reputation he could not keep an army united or disposed to any duty. Among the noteworthy actions of Hannibal is numbered this, that although he had an enormous army, composed of men of all nations and fighting in foreign countries, there never arose any dissension either among them or against the prince, either in good fortune or in bad. This could not be due to anything but his inhuman cruelty, which together with his infinite other virtues, made him always venerated and terrible in the sight of his soldiers, and without it his other virtues would not have sufficed to produce that effect. Thoughtless writers admire on the one hand his actions, and on the other blame the principal cause of them.
And that it is true that his other virtues would not have sufficed may be seen from the case of Scipio (famous not only in regard to his own times, but all times of which memory remains), whose armies rebelled against him in Spain, which arose from nothing but his excessive kindness, which allowed more licence to the soldiers than was consonant with military discipline. He was reproached with this in the senate by Fabius Maximus, who called him a corrupter of the Roman militia. Locri having been destroyed by one of Scipio's officers was not revenged by him, nor was the insolence of that officer punished, simply by reason of his easy nature; so much so, that someone wishing to excuse him in the senate, said that there were many men who knew rather how not to err, than how to correct the errors of others. This disposition would in time have tarnished the fame and glory of Scipio had he persevered in it under the empire, but living under the rule of the senate this harmful quality was not only concealed but became a glory to him.
I conclude, therefore, with regard to being feared and loved, that men love at their own free will, but fear at the will of the prince, and that a wise prince must rely on what is in his power and not on what is in the power of others, and he must only contrive to avoid incurring hatred, as has been explained.
IN WHAT WAY PRINCES MUST KEEP FAITH
How laudable it is for a prince to keep good faith and live with integrity, and not with astuteness, everyone knows. Still the experience of our times shows those princes to have done great things who have had little regard for good faith, and have been able by astuteness to confuse men's brains, and who have ultimately overcome those who have made loyalty their foundation.
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You must know, then, that there are two methods of fighting, the one by law, the other by force: the first method is that of men, the second of beasts; but as the first method is often insufficient, one must have recourse to the second. It is therefore necessary for a prince to know well how to use both the beast and the man. This was covertly taught to rulers by ancient writers, who relate how Achilles and many others of those ancient princes were given to Chiron the centaur to be brought up and educated under his discipline. The parable of this semi-animal, semi-human teacher is meant to indicate that a prince must know how to use both natures, and that the one without the other is not durable.
A prince being thus obliged to know well how to act as a beast must imitate the fox and the lion, for the lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognise traps, and a lion to frighten wolves. Those that wish to be only lions do not understand this. Therefore, a prudent ruler ought not to keep faith when by so doing it would be against his interest, and when the reasons which made him bind himself no longer exist. If men were all good, this precept would not be a good one; but as they are bad, and would not observe their faith with you, so you are not bound to keep faith with them. Nor have legitimate grounds ever failed a prince who wished to show colourable excuse for the non-fulfilment of his promise. Of this one could furnish an infinite number of modern examples, and show how many times peace has been broken, and how many promises rendered worthless, by the faithlessness of princes, and those that have been best able to imitate the fox have succeeded best. But it is necessary to be able to disguise this character well, and to be a great feigner and dissembler; and men are so simple and so ready to obey present necessities, that one who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived.
I will only mention one modern instance. Alexander VI did nothing else but deceive men, he thought of nothing else, and found the occasion for it; no man was ever more able to give assurances, or affirmed things with stronger oaths, and no man observed them less; however, he always succeeded in his deceptions, as he well knew this aspect of things.
It is not, therefore, necessary for a prince to have all the above-named qualities, but it is very necessary to seem to have them. I would even be bold to say that to possess them and always to observe them is dangerous, but to appear to possess them is useful. Thus it is well to seem merciful, faithful, humane, sincere, religious, and also to be so; but you must have the mind so disposed that when it is needful to be otherwise you may be able to change to the opposite qualities. And it must be understood that a prince, and especially a new prince, cannot observe all those things which are considered good in men, being often obliged, in order to maintain the state, to act against faith, against charity, against humanity, and against religion. And, therefore, he must have a mind disposed to adapt itself according to the wind, and as the variations of fortune dictate, and, as I said before, not deviate from what is good, if possible, but be able to do evil if constrained.
A prince must take great care that nothing goes out of his mouth which is not full of the above-named five qualities, and, to see and hear him, he should seem to be all mercy, faith, integrity, humanity, and religion. And nothing is more necessary than to seem to have this last quality, for men in general judge more by the eyes than by the hands, for everyone can see, but very few have to feel. Everybody sees what you appear
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i be.
few feel what you are, and those few will not dare to oppose themselves to the many, who have the majesty of the state to defend them; and in the actions of men, and especially of princes, from which there is no appeal, the end justifies the means. Let a prince therefore aim at conquering and maintaining the state, and the means will always be judged honourable and praised by everyone, for the vulgar is always taken by appearances and the issue of the event; and the world consists only of the vulgar, and the few who are not vulgar are isolated when the many have a rallying point in the prince. A certain prince of the present time, whom it is well not to name, never does anything but preach peace and good faith, but he is really a great enemy to both, and either of them, had he observed them, would have lost him state or reputation on many occasions
The State of Nature and the State of War
Thomas Hobbes
OF THE NATURAL CONDITION OF MANKIND AS CONCERNING THEIR FELICITY AND MISERY
Men by nature equal. Nature hath made men so equal, in the faculties of the body, and mind; as that though there be found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body, or of quicker mind than another; yet when all is reckoned together, the difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himself any benefit, to which another may not pretend, as well as he. For as to the strength of body, the weakest has strength enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination, or by confederacy with others, that are in the same danger with himself.
And as to the faculties of the mind, setting aside the arts grounded upon words, and especially that skill of proceeding upon general, and infallible rules, called science; which very few have, and but in few things; as being not a native faculty, born with us; nor attained, as prudence, while we look after somewhat else, I find yet a greater equality amongst men, than that of strength. For prudence, is but experience; which equal time, equally bestows on all men, in those things they equally apply themselves unto. That which may perhaps make such equality incredible, is but a vain conceit of one's own wisdom, which almost all men think they have in a greater degree, than the vulgar; that is, than all men but themselves, and a few others, whom by fame, or for concurring with themselves, they approve. For such is the nature of men, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves; for they see their own wit at hand, and other men's at a distance. But this proveth rather that men are in that point equal, than unequal. For there is not ordinarily a greater sign of the equal distribution of any thing, than that every man is contented with his share.
From equality proceeds diffidence. From this equality of ability, ariseth equality of hope in the attaining of our ends. And therefore if any two men desire the same thing, which nevertheless they cannot both enjoy, they become enemies; and in the way to their end, which is principally their own conservation, and sometimes their delectation only, endeavour to destroy, or subdue one another. And from hence it comes to pass, that where an invader hath no more to fear, than another man's single power; if one plant, sow, build,
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The State of Nature and the State of War 67
0r possess a convenient seat, others may probably be expected to come prepared with forces united, to dispossess, and deprive htm, not only of the fruit of his labour, but also of his life, or liberty. And the invader again is in the like danger of another.
from diffidence war. And from this diffidence of one another, there is no way for any man to secure himself, so reasonable, as anticipation; that is, by force, or wiles, to master the persons of all men he can, so long, till he see no other power great enough to endanger him: and this is no more than his own conservation requireth, and is generally allowed. Also because there be some, that taking pleasure in contemplating their own power in the acts of conquest, which they pursue farther than their security requires; if others, that otherwise would be glad to be at ease within modest bounds, should not by invasion increase their power, they would not be able, long time, by standing only on their defence, to subsist. And by consequence, such augmentation of dominion over men being necessary to a man's conservation, it ought to be allowed him.
Again, men have no pleasure, but on the contrary a great deal of grief, in keeping company, where there is no power able to over-awe them all. For every man looketh that his companion should value him, at the same rate he sets upon himself: and upon all signs of contempt, or undervaluing, naturally endeavours, as far as he dares, (which amongst them that have no common power to keep them in quiet, is far enough to make them destroy each other), to extort a greater value from his contemners, by damage; and from others, by the example.
So that in the nature of man, we find three principal causes of quarrel. First, competition; secondly, diffidence; thirdly, glory.
The first, maketh men invade for gain; the second, for safety; and the third, for reputation. The first use violence, to make themselves masters of other men's persons, wives, children, and cattle; the second, to defend them; the third, for trifles, as a word, a smile, a different opinion, and any other sign of undervalue, either direct in their persons, or by reflection in their kindred their friends, their nation, their profession, or their name.
Out of civil states, there is always war of every one against every one. Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war, as is of every man, against every man. For WAR, consisteth not in battle only, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of time, is to be considered in the nature of war; as it is in the nature of weather. For as the nature of foul weather, lieth not in a shower or two of rain; but in an inclination thereto of many days together: so the nature of war, consisteth not in actual fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is PEACE.
The incommodities of such a war. Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withal. In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious
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building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force-no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; vso arts; no letters; no society-and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.
It may seem strange to some man, that has not well weighed these things; that nature should thus dissociate, and render men apt to invade, and destroy one another: and he may therefore, not trusting to this inference, made from the passions, desire perhaps to have the same confirmed by experience. Let him therefore consider with himself, when taking a journey, he arms himself, and seeks to go well accompanied; when going to sleep, he locks his doors; when even in his house he locks his chests; and this when he knows there be laws, and public officers, armed, to revenge all injuries shall be done him; what opinion he has of his fellow-subjects, when he rides armed; of his fellow citizens, when he locks his doors; and of his children, and servants, when he locks his chests. Does he not there as much accuse mankind by his actions, as I do by my words? But neither of us accuse man's nature in it. The desires, and other passions of man, are in themselves no sin. No more are the actions, that proceed from those passions, till they know a law that forbids them: which till laws be made they cannot know: nor can any law be made, till they have agreed upon the person that shall make it.
It may peradventure be thought, there was never such a time, nor condition of war as this; and I believe it was never generally so, over all the world: but there are many places, where they live so now. For the savage people in many places of America, except the government of small families, the concord whereof dependeth on natural lust, have no government at all; and live at this day in that brutish manner, as I said before. Howsoever, it may be perceived what manner of life there would be, where there were no common power to fear, by the manner of life, which men that have formerly lived under a peaceful government, use to degenerate into, in a civil war.
But though there had never been any time, wherein particular men were in a condition of war one against another; yet in all times, kings, and persons of sovereign authority, because of their independency, are in continual jealousies, and in the state and posture of gladiators; having their weapons pointing, and their eyes fixed on one another; that is, their forts, garrisons, and guns upon the frontiers of their kingdoms; and continual spies upon their neighbours; which is a posture of war. But because they uphold thereby, the industry of their subjects; there does not follow from it, that misery, which accompanies the liberty of particular men.
In such a war nothing is unjust. To this war of every man, against every man, this also is consequent; that nothing can be unjust. The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice have there no place. Where there is no common power, there is no law: where no law, no injustice. Force, and fraud, are in war the two cardinal virtues. Justice, and injustice are none of the faculties neither of the body, nor mind. If they were, they might be in a man that were alone in the world, as well as his senses, and passions. They are qualities, that relate to men in society, not in solitude. It is consequent also to the same condition, that there be no propriety, no dominion, no mine and thine distinct; but only that to be every man's, that he can get: and for so long, as he can keep it. And thus
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v. for the ill condition, which man by mere nature is actually placed in; though with m sibility to come out of it, consisting partly in the passions, partly in his reason. 3 The passions that incline men to peace. The passions that incline men to peace, are fear of death; desire of such things as are necessary to commodious living; and a hope their industry to obtain them. And reason suggesteth convenient articles of peace, on which men may be drawn to agreement. These articles, are they, which otherwise are called the Laws of Nature: whereof I shall speak more particularly, in the two following chapters. . . .
OF OTHER LAWS OF NATURE
The third law of nature, justice. From that law of nature, by which we are obliged to transfer to another, such rights, as being retained, hinder the peace of mankind, there fol-loweth a third; which is this, that men perform their covenants made: without which, covenants are in vain, and but empty words; and the right of all men to all things remaining, we are still in the condition of war.
Justice and injustice what. And in this law of nature, consisteth the fountain and original of JUSTICE. For where no covenant hath preceded, there hath no right been transferred, and every man has right to everything; and consequently, no action can be unjust. But when a covenant is made, then to break it is unjust: and the definition of INJUSTICE, is no other than the not performance of covenant. And whatsoever is not unjust, is just.
Justice and propriety begin with the constitution of commonwealth. But because covenants of mutual trust, where there is a fear of not performance on either part, as hath been said in the former chapter, are invalid; though the original of justice be the making of covenants; yet injustice actually there can be none, till the cause of such fear be taken away; which while men are in the natural condition of war, cannot be done. Therefore before the names of just, and unjust can have place, there must be some coercive power, to compel men equally to the performance of their covenants, by the terror of some punishment, greater than the benefit they expect by the breach of their covenant; and to make good that propriety, which by mutual contract men acquire, in recompense of the universal right they abandon: and such power there is none before the erection of a commonwealth. And this is also to be gathered out of the ordinary definition of justice in the Schools: for they say, that justice is the constant will of giving to every man his own. And therefore where there is no own, that is no propriety, there is no injustice; and where there is no coercive power erected, that is, where there is no commonwealth, there is no propriety; all men having right to all things: therefore where there is no commonwealth, there nothing is unjust. So that the nature of justice, consisteth in keeping of valid covenants: but the validity of covenants begins not but with the constitution of a civil power, sufficient to compel men to keep them: and then it is also that propriety begins.
Realism and Idealism
Edward Hällett Can
... In Europe after 1919, planned economy, which rests on the assumption that no natural harmony of interests exists and that interests must be artificially harmonised by state action, became the practice, if not the theory, of almost every state. In the United States, the persistence of an expanding domestic market staved off this development till after 1929. The natural harmony of interests remained an integral part of the American view of life; and in this as in other respects, current theories of international politics were deeply imbued with the American tradition. Moreover, there was a special reason for the ready acceptance of the doctrine in the international sphere. In domestic affairs it is clearly the business of the state to create harmony if no natural harmony exists. In international politics, there is no organized power charged with the task of creating harmony; and the temptation to assume a natural harmony is therefore particularly strong. But this is no excuse for burking the issue. To make the harmonisation of interests the goal of political action is not the same thing as to postulate that a natural harmony of interests exist; and it is this latter postulate which has caused so much confusion in international thinking.
Politically, the doctrine of the identity of interests has commonly taken the form of an assumption that every nation has an identical interest in peace, and that any nation which desires to disturb the peace is therefore both irrational and immoral. This view bears clear marks of its Anglo-Saxon origin. It was easy after 1918 to convince that part of mankind which lives in English-speaking countries that war profits nobody. The argument did not seem particularly convincing to Germans, who had profited largely from the wars of 1866 and 1870, and attributed their more recent sufferings, not to the war of 1914, but to the fact that they had lost it; or to Italians, who blamed not the war, but the treachery of allies who defrauded them in the peace settlement; or to Poles or Czecho-Slovaks who, far from deploring the war, owed their national existence to it; or to Frenchmen, who could not unreservedly regret a war which had restored Alsace-Lorraine to France; or to people of other nationalities who remembered profitable wars waged by Great Britain and the United States in the past. But these people had fortunately little influence over the formation of current theories of international relations, which emanated almost exclusively from the English-speaking countries. British and American writers continued to assume that the uselessness of war had been irrefutably demonstrated by the experience of 1914-18, and that an intellectual grasp of this fact was all that was necessary to induce the nations to keep the peace in the future; and they were sincerely puzzled as well as disappointed at the failure of other countries to share this view.
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The confusion was increased by the ostentatious readiness of other countries to flatter the Anglo-Saxon world by repeating its slogans. In the fifteen years after the first World war, every Great Power (except, perhaps, Italy) repeatedly did lip-service to the doctrine by declaring peace to be one of the main objects of its policy.1 But as Lenin observed long ago, peace in itself is a meaningless aim. "Absolutely everybody is in favour of peace in general", he wrote in 1915, "including Kitchener, Joffre, Hindenburg and Nicholas the Bloody, for everyone of them wishes to end the war."2 The common interest in peace masks the fact that some nations desire to maintain the status quo without having to fight for it, and others to change the status quo without having to fight in order to do so----
INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC HARMONY
... We find in the modern period an extraordinary divergence between the theories of economic experts and the practice of those responsible for the economic policies of their respective countries. Analysis will show that this divergence springs from a simple fact. The economic expert, dominated in the main by laissez-faire doctrine, considers the hypothetical economic interest of the world as a whole, and is content to assume that this is identical with the interest of each individual country. The politician pursues the concrete interest of his country, and assumes (if he makes any assumption at all) that the interest of the world as a whole is identical with it. Nearly every pronouncement of every international economic conference held between the two world wars was vitiated by this assumption that there was some "solution" or "plan" which, by a judicious balancing of interests, would be equally favourable to all and prejudicial to none.
In the nineteenth century, Germany and the United States, by pursuing a "strictly nationalistic policy", had placed themselves in a position to challenge Great Britain's virtual monopoly of world trade. No conference of economic experts, meeting in 1880, could have evolved a "general plan" for "parallel or concerted action" which would have allayed the economic rivalries of the time in a manner equally advantageous to Great Britain,
From Edward Hallett Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis. 1919-1939, 2nd ed. Macmillan Ltd., 19S6 Reproduced with permission of Palgrave Macmillan.
'"Peace must prevail, must come before all" (Briand, League of Nations: Ninth Assembly, p. 83). "The maintenance of peace is the first objective of British foreign policy" (Eden, league ofNations: Sixteenth Assembly, p. 106). "Peace is our dearest treasure" (Hitler, in a speech in the German Reichstag on January 30, 1937, reported in The Times. February 1, 1937). "The principal aim of the international policy of the Soviet Union is the preservation of peace" (Chicherin in 777e Soviet Union and Peace [1929], p. 249). "The object of Japan, despite propaganda to the contrary, is peace" (Matsuoka, League of Nations: Special Assembly 1932-33, iii. p. 73). The paucity of Italian pronouncements in favour of peace was probably explained by the poor reputation of Italian troops as fighters: Mussolini feared that any emphatic expression of preference for peace would be construed as an admission that Italy had no stomach for war.
2Lenin. Collected Works (Engl, transl), xviii. p. 264. Compare Spenser Wilkinson's dictum: "It is not peace but preponderance that is in each case the real object The truth cannot be too often repeated that peace is never the object of policy: you cannot define peace excepl by reference to war, which is a means and never an end" (Government anil the War. p. 121).
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Germany and the United States. It was not less presumptuous to suppose that a conference meeting in 1927 could allay the economic rivalries of the later period by a "plan" beneficial to the interests of everyone. Even the economic crisis of 1930-33 failed to bring home to the economists the true nature of the problem which they had to face. The experts who prepared the "Draft Annotated Agenda" for the World Economic Conference of 1933 condemned the "world-wide adoption of ideals of national self-sufficiency which cut unmistakably athwart the lines of economic development".3 They did not apparently pause to reflect that those so-called "lines of economic development", which might be beneficial to some countries and even to the world as a whole, would inevitably be detrimental to other countries, which were using weapons of economic nationalism in self-defence____Laissez-faire, in international relations as in those between capital and labour, is the paradise of the economically strong. State control, whether in the form of protective legislation or of protective tariffs, is the weapon of self-defence invoked by the economically weak. The clash of interests is real and inevitable; and the whole nature of the problem is distorted by an attempt to disguise it.
THE FOUNDATIONS OF REALISM
... The three essentia] tenets implicit in Machiavelli's doctrine are the foundation-stones of the realist philosophy. In the first place, history is a sequence of cause and effect, whose course can be analysed and understood by intellectual effort, but not (as the Utopians believe) directed by "imagination". Secondly, theory does not (as the Utopians assume) create practice, but practice theory. In Machiavelli's words, "good counsels, whencesoever they come, are born of the wisdom of the prince, and not the wisdom of the prince from good counsels". Thirdly, politics are not (as the Utopians pretend) a function of ethics, but ethics of politics. Men "are kept honest by constraint". Machiavelli recognised the importance of morality, but thought that there could be no effective morality where there was no effective authority. Morality is the product of power.4
The extraordinary vigour and vitality of Machiavelli's challenge to orthodoxy may be attested by the fact that, more than four centuries after he wrote, the most conclusive way of discrediting a political opponent is still to describe him as a disciple of Machiavelli. . . .
. . . Theories of social morality are always the product of a dominant group which identifies itself with the community as a whole, and which possesses facilities denied to subordinate groups or individuals for imposing its view of life on the community. Theories of international morality are, for the same reason and in virtue of the same process, j the product of dominant nations or groups of nations. For the past hundred years, and j more especially since 1918, the English-speaking peoples have formed the dominant | group in the world; and current theories of international morality have been designed to '
* League ofNations: C.48, M.I 8, 1933, ii. p. 6.
"Machiavelli, The Prince, chs. 15 and 23 (Engl, transl., Everyman's Library, pp. 121, 193).
erpetuate their supremacy and expressed in the idiom peculiar to them. France, retaining something of her eighteenth-century tradition and restored to a position of dominance for a short period after 1918, has played a minor part in the creation of current international morality, mainly through her insistence on the role of law in the moral order Germany, never a dominant Power and reduced to helplessness after 1918, has remained for these reasons outside the charmed circle of creators of international morality Both the view that the English-speaking peoples are monopolists of international morality and the view that they are consummate international hypocrites may be reduced to the plain fact that the current canons of international virtue have, by a natural and inevitable process, been mainly created by them.
THE REALIST CRITIQUE OF THE HARMONY OF INTERESTS
The doctrine of the harmony of interests yields readily to analysis in terms of this principle. It is the natural assumption of a prosperous and privileged class, whose members have a dominant voice in the community and are therefore naturally prone to identify its interest with their own. In virtue of this identification, any assailant of the interests of the dominant group is made to incur the odium of assailing the alleged common interest of the whole community, and is told that in making this assault he is attacking his own higher interests. The doctrine of the harmony of interests thus serves as an ingenious moral device invoked, in perfect sincerity, by privileged groups in order to justify and maintain their dominant position. But a further point requires notice. The supremacy within the community of the privileged group may be, and often is, so overwhelming that there is, in fact, a sense in which its interests are those of the community, since its well-being necessarily carries with it some measure of well-being for other members of the community, and its collapse would entail the collapse of the community as a whole. In so far, therefore, as the alleged natural harmony of interests has any reality, it is created by the overwhelming power of the privileged group, and is an excellent illustration of the Machiavellian maxim that morality is the product of power.
. . . British nineteenth-century statesmen, having discovered that free trade promoted British prosperity, were sincerely convinced that, in doing so, it also promoted the prosperity of the world as a whole. British predominance in world trade was at that time so overwhelming that there was a certain undeniable harmony between British interests and the interests of the world. British prosperity flowed over into other countries, and a British economic collapse would have meant world-wide ruin. British free traders could and did argue that protectionist countries were not only egotistically damaging the prosperity of the world as a whole, but were stupidly damaging their own, so that their behaviour was both immoral and muddle headed. In British eyes, it was irrefutably proved that international trade was a single whole, and flourished or slumped together. Nevertheless, this alleged international harmony of interests seemed a mockery to those under-privileged nations whose inferior status and insignificant stake in international trade were consecrated by it. The revolt against it destroyed that overwhelming British
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preponderance which had provided a plausible basis for the theory. Economically, Great Britain in the nineteenth century was dominant enough to make a bold bid to impose on the world her own conception of international economic morality. When competition of all against all replaced the domination of the world market by a single Power, concep. tions of international economic morality necessarily became chaotic.
Politically, the alleged community of interest in the maintenance of peace, whose ambiguous character has already been discussed, is capitalised in the same way by a dominant nation or group of nations. Just as the ruling class in a community prays for domestic peace, which guarantees its own security and predominance, and denounces class-war, which might threaten them, so international peace becomes a special vested interest of predominant Powers. In the past, Roman and British imperialism were commended to the world in the guise of the pax Romana and the pax Briiannica. To-day, when no single Power is strong enough to dominate the world, and supremacy is vested in a group of nations, slogans like "collective security" and "resistance to aggression" serve the same purpose of proclaiming an identity of interest between the dominant group and the world as a whole in the maintenance of peace.
... It is a familiar tactic of the privileged to throw moral discredit on the underprivileged by depicting them as disturbers of the peace; and this tactic is as readily applied internationally as within the national community. "International law and order", writes Professor Toynbee of a recent crisis, "were in the true interests of the whole of mankind . . . whereas the desire to perpetuate the region of violence in international affairs was an anti-social desire which was not even in the ultimate interests of the citizens of the handful of states that officially professed this benighted and anachronistic creed."5 This is precisely the argument, compounded of platitude and falsehood in about equal parts, which did duty in every strike in the early days of the British and American Labour movements. It was common form for employers, supported by the whole capitalist press, to denounce the "anti-social" attitude of trade union leaders, to accuse them of attacking law and order and of introducing "the reign of violence", and to declare that "true" and "ultimate" interests of the workers lay in peaceful cooperation with the employers.6 In the field of social relations, the disingenuous character of this argument has long been recognised. But just as the threat of class-war by the proletarian is "a natural cynical reaction to the sentimental and dishonest efforts of the privileged classes to obscure the conflict of interest between classes by a constant emphasis on the minimum interests which they have in common",7 so the war-mongering of the dissatisfied Powers was the "natural, cynical reaction" to the sentimental and dishonest platitudinising of the satisfied Powers on the common interest in peace. When Hitler refused to believe "that
5Toynbee, Survey of International Affairs, 1935, ii. p. 46.
6"Pray earnestly that right may triumph", said the representative of the Philadelphia coal-owners in an early strike organised hy the United Mine Workers, "remembering that the Lord God Omnipotent still reigns, and that His reign is one oflaw and order, and not of violence and crime" (H F Pringle Theodore Roosevelt, p. 267) ' 7R. Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society, p. 153.
,     permitted some nations first to acquire a world by force and then to defend this obbery w'tn moralising theories"8 he was merely echoing in another context the Marxist denial of a community of interest between "haves" and "have-nots", the Marxist ex-ire of the interested character of "bourgeois morality", and the Marxist demand for fl!°e expropriation of the expropriators. . . .
THE LIMITATIONS OF REALISM
The exposure by realist criticism of the hollowness of the Utopian edifice is the first task of the political thinker. It is only when the sham has been demolished that there can be any hope of raising a more solid structure in its place. But we cannot ultimately find a resting place in pure realism; for realism, though logically overwhelming, does not provide us with the springs of action which are necessary even to the pursuit of thought. Indeed, realism itself, if we attack it with its own weapons, often turns out in practice to be just as much conditioned as any other mode of thought. In politics, the belief that certain facts are unalterable or certain trends irresistible commonly reflects a lack of desire or lack of interest to change or resist them. The impossibility of being a consistent and thorough-going realist is one of the most certain and most curious lessons of political science. Consistent realism excludes four things which appear to be essential ingredients of all effective political thinking: a finite goal, an emotional appeal, a right of moral judgment and a ground for action....
Consistent realism, as has already been noted, involves acceptance of the whole historical process and precludes moral judgments on it. As we have seen, men are generally prepared to accept the judgment of history on the past, praising success and condemning failure. This test is also widely applied to contemporary politics. Such institutions as the League of Nations, or the Soviet or Fascist regimes, are to a considerable extent judged by their capacity to achieve what they profess to achieve; and the legitimacy of this test is implicitly admitted by their own propaganda, which constantly seeks to exaggerate their successes and minimise their failures. Yet it is clear that mankind as a whole is not prepared to accept this rational test as a universally valid basis of political judgment. The belief that whatever succeeds is right, and has only to be understood to be approved, must, if consistently held, empty thought of purpose, and thereby sterilise and ultimately destroy it. Nor do those whose philosophy appears to exclude the possibility of moral judgments in fact refrain from pronouncing them. Frederick the Great, having explained that treaties should be observed for the reason that "one can trick only once", goes on to call the breaking of treaties "a bad and knavish policy", though there is nothing in his thesis to justify the moral epithet. Marx, whose philosophy appeared to demonstrate that capitalists could only act in a certain way, spends many pages—some of the most effective in Capital—in denouncing the wickedness of capitalists for behaving in precisely that way. The necessity, recognised by all politicians, both in domestic and in international affairs, for cloaking
"Speech m the Reichstag, January 30,
1939.
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interests in a guise of moral principles is in itself a symptom of the inadequacy of realism Every age claims the right to create its own values, and to pass judgments in the light of them; and even if it uses realist weapons to dissolve other values, it still believes in the absolute character of its own. It refuses to accept the implication of realism that the word "ought" is meaningless.
Most of all, consistent realism breaks down because it fails to provide any ground for purposive or meaningful action. If the sequence of cause and effect is sufficiently rigid to permit of the "scientific prediction" of events, if our thought is irrevocably conditioned by our status and our interests, then both action and thought become devoid of purpose. If, as Schopenhauer maintains, "the true philosophy of history consists of the insight that, throughout the jumble of all these ceaseless changes, we have ever before our eyes the same unchanging being, pursuing the same course to-day, yesterday and for ever", then passive contemplation is all that remains to the individual. Such a conclusion is plainly repugnant to the most deep-seated belief of man about himself. That human affairs can be directed and modified by human action and human thought is a postulate so fundamental that its rejection seems scarcely compatible with existence as a human being. Nor is it in fact rejected by those realists who have left their mark on history. Machiavelli, when he exhorted his compatriots to be good Italians, clearly assumed that they were free to follow or ignore his advice. Marx, by birth and training a bourgeois, believed himself free to think and act like a proletarian, and regarded it as his mission to persuade others, whom he assumed to be equally free, to think and act likewise. Lenin, who wrote of the imminence of world revolution as a "scientific prediction", admitted elsewhere that "no situations exist from which there is absolutely no way out". In moments of crisis, Lenin appealed to his followers in terms which might equally well have been used by so thorough-going a believer in the power of the human will as Mussolini or by any other leader of any period: "At the decisive moment and in the decisive place, you must prove the stronger, you must be victorious." Every realist, whatever his professions, is ultimately compelled to believe not only that there is something which man ought to think and do, but that there is something which he can think and do, and that his thought and action are neither mechanical nor meaningless.
We return therefore to the conclusion that any sound political thought must be based on elements of both Utopia and reality. Where utopianism has become a hollow and intolerable sham, which serves merely as a disguise for the interests of the privileged, the realist performs an indispensable service in unmasking it. But pure realism can offer nothing but a naked struggle for power which makes any kind of international society impossible. Having demolished the current Utopia with the weapons of realism, we still need to build a new Utopia of our own, which will one day fall to the same weapons. The human will continue to seek and escape from the logical consequences of realism in the vision of an international order which, as soon as it crystallizes itself into concrete political form, becomes tainted with self-interest and hypocrisy, and must once more be attacked with the instruments of realism.
Here, then, is the complexity, the fascination and the tragedy of all political life. Politics are made up of two elements—Utopia and reality—belonging to two different planes which can never meet. There is no greater barrier to clear political thinking than
Realism and Idealism 77
failure to distinguish between ideals, which are Utopia, and institutions, wmui an, iv». jty The communist who set communism against democracy was usually thinking of communism as a pure ideal of equality and brotherhood, and of democracy as an institution which existed in Great Britain, France or the United States and which exhibited the vested interests, the inequalities and the oppression inherent in all political institutions. The democrat who made the same comparison was in fact comparing an ideal pattern of democracy laid up in heaven with communism as an institution existing in Soviet Russia with its class-divisions, its heresy-hunts and its concentration camps. The comparison, made in each case between an ideal and an institution, is irrelevant and makes no sense. The ideal, once it is embodied in an institution, ceases to be an ideal and becomes the expression of a selfish interest, which must be destroyed in the name of a new ideal. This constant interaction of irreconcilable forces is the stuff of politics. Every political situation contains mutually incompatible elements of Utopia and reality, of morality and power. . . .
Military Power
The supreme importance of the military instrument lies in the fact that the ultima ratio of power in international relations is war. Every act of the state, in its power aspect, is directed to war, not as a desirable weapon, but as a weapon which it may require in the last resort to use. Clausewitz's famous aphorism that "war is nothing but the continuation of political relations by other means" has been repeated with approval both by Lenin and by the Communist International9 and Hitler meant much the same thing when he said that "an alliance whose object does not include the intention to fight is meaningless and useless".10 In the same sense, Mr. Hawtrey defines diplomacy as "potential war"." These are half-truths. But the important thing is to recognise that they are true. War lurks in the background of international politics just as revolution lurks in the background of domestic politics. There are few European countries where, at some time during the past thirty years, potential revolution has not been an important factor in politics;12 and the international community has in this respect the closest analogy to those states where the possibility of revolution is most frequently and most conspicuously present to the mind.
Potential war being thus a dominant factor in international politics, military strength becomes a recognised standard of political values. Every great civilisation of the past has enjoyed in its day a superiority of military power. . . .
Military power, being an essential element in the life of the state, becomes not only an instrument, but an end in itself. Few of the important wars of the last hundred years
'Lenin. Collected Works (Engl, trans!.), xviii, p. 97,Theses of (he Sixth Congress of Comintern quoted in Taracouzio, The Soviet Union and International law, p. 436. '"Hitler, Mem Kampf, p. 749.
"R. G. Hawtrey, Economic Aspects of Sovereignty, p. 107.
I2lt is perhaps necessary to recall the part played in British politics in 1914 by the threat of the Conservative Party to support revolutionary action in Ulster.
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seem to have been waged for the deliberate and conscious purpose of increasing either trade or territory. The most serious wars are fought in order to make one's own country militarily stronger or, more often, to prevent another country from becoming militarily stronger, so that there is much justification for the epigram that "the principal cause of war is war itself".13 Every stage in the Napoleonic Wars was devised to prepare the way for the next stage: the invasion of Russia was undertaken in order to make Napoleon strong enough to defeat Great Britain. The Crimean War was waged by Great Britain and France in order to prevent Russia from becoming strong enough to attack their Near Eastern possessions and interests at some future time. The origin of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5 is described as follows in a note addressed to the League of Nations by the Soviet Government in 1924: "When the Japanese torpedo-boats attacked the Russian fleet at Port Arthur in 1904, it was clearly an act of aggression from a technical point of view, but, politically speaking, it was an act caused by the aggressive policy of the Tsarist Government towards Japan, who, in order to forestall the danger, struck the first blow at her adversary".'4 In 1914, Austria sent an ultimatum to Servia because she bel ieved that Servians were planning the downfall of the Dual Monarchy; Russia feared that Austria-Hungary, if she defeated Servia, would be strong enough to menace her; Germany feared that Russia, if she defeated Austria-Hungary, would be strong enough to menace her; France had long believed that Germany, if she defeated Russia, would be strong enough to menace her, and had therefore concluded the Franco-Russian alliance; and Great Britain feared that Germany, if she defeated France and occupied Belgium, would be strong enough to menace her. Finally, the United States came to fear that Germany, if she won the war would be strong enough to menace them. Thus the war, in the minds of all j the principal combatants, had a defensive or preventive character. They fought in order that they might not find themselves in a more unfavourable position in some future war. Even colonial acquisitions have often been prompted by the same motive. The consoli- , dation and formal annexation of the original British settlements in Australia were inspired J by fear of Napoleon's alleged design to establish French colonies there. Military, rather than economic, reasons dictated the capture of German colonies during the war of 1914 and afterwards precluded their return to Germany.
It is perhaps for this reason that the exercise of power always appears to beget the appetite for more power. There is, as Dr. Niebuhr says, "no possibility of drawing a sharp line between the will-to-live and the will-to-power".'5 Nationalism, having attained its first objective in the form of national unity and independence, develops almost automatically into imperialism. International politics amply confirm the aphorisms of Machiavelli that "men never appear to themselves to possess securely what they have unless they acquire something further from another",'6 and of Hobbes that man "cannot assure the power and means to live well which he hath present, without the acquisition of
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R. G. Hawtrey, Economic Aspects of Sovereignty, p. 105.
League of Nations: Official Journal, May 1924, p. 578. ■ R. Niebuhr, Moral Alan and Immoral Society, p. 42. "'Machiavelli, Discorsi, 1. i. eh. v.
oTe" 17 Wars, begun for motives of security, quickly become wars of aggression and self-seeking. President McKinley invited the United States to intervene in Cuba a ainst Spain in order "to secure a full and final termination of hostilities between the Government of Spain and the people of Cuba and to secure on the island the establishment of a stable government."18 But by the time the war was over the temptation to self-aggrandisement by the annexation of the Philippines had become irresistible. Nearly every country participating in the first world war regarded it initially as a war of self-defence; and this belief was particularly strong on the Allied side. Yet during the course of the war, every Allied Government in Europe announced war aims which included the acquisition of territory from the enemy Powers. In modern conditions, wars of limited objective have become almost as impossible as wars of limited liability. It is one of the fallacies of the theory of collective security that war can be waged for the specific and disinterested purpose of "resisting aggression". Had the League of Nations in the autumn of 1935, under the leadership of Great Britain, embarked on "military sanctions" against Italy, it would have been impossible to restrict the campaign to the expulsion of Italian troops from Abyssinia. Operations would in all probability have led to the occupation of Italy's East African colonies by Great Britain and France, of Trieste, Fiume and Albania by Yugoslavia, and of the islands of the Dodecanese by Greece or Turkey or both; and war aims would have been announced, precluding on various specious grounds the restoration of these territories to Italy. Territorial ambitions are just as likely to be the product as the cause of war.
Economic Power
Economic strength has always been an instrument of political power, if only through its association with the military instrument. Only the most primitive kinds of warfare are altogether independent of the economic factor. The wealthiest prince or the wealthiest city-state could hire the largest and most efficient army of mercenaries; and every government was therefore compelled to pursue a policy designed to further the acquisition of wealth. The whole progress of civilisation has been so closely bound up with economic development that we are not surprised to trace, throughout modern history, an increasingly intimate association between military and economic power. In the prolonged conflicts which marked the close of the Middle Ages in Western Europe, the merchants of the towns, relying on organised economic power, defeated the feudal barons, who put their trust in individual military prowess. The rise of modern nations has everywhere been marked by the emergence of a new middle class economically based on industry and trade. Trade and finance were the foundation of the short-lived political supremacy of the Italian cities of the Renaissance and later of the Dutch. The principal international wars of the period from the Renaissance to the middle of the eighteenth century were trade wars (some of them were actually so named). Throughout this period, it was universally held
l7Hobbes, Leviathan, eh. xi.
^British and Foreign Slate Papers, ed. Hertslet. xc. p. SI 1.
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that, since wealth is a source of political power, the state should seek actively to promote the acquisition of wealth; and it was believed that the right way to make a country powerful was to stimulate production at home, to buy as little as possible from abroad, and to accumulate wealth in the convenient form of precious metals. Those who argued in this way afterwards came to be known as mercantilists. Mercantilism was a system of economic policy based on the hitherto unquestioned assumption that to promote the acquisition of wealth was part of the normal function of the state.
THE SEPARATION OF ECONOMICS FROM POLITICS
The laissez-faire doctrine of the classical economists made a frontal attack on this assumption. The principal implications of laissez-faire have already been discussed. Its significance in the present context is that it brought about a complete theoretical divorce between economics and politics. The classical economists conceived a natural economic order with laws of its own, independent of politics and functioning to the greatest profit of all concerned when political authority interfered least in is automatic operation. This doctrine dominated the economic thought, and to some extent the economic practice (though far more in Great Britain than elsewhere), of the nineteenth century. . . .
Marx was overwhelmingly right when he insisted on the increasing importance of the role played by economic forces in politics; and since Marx, history can never be written again exactly as it was written before him. But Marx believed, just as firmly as did the laissez-faire liberal, in an economic system with laws of its own working independently of the state, which was its adjunct and its instrument. In writing as if economics and politics were separate domains, one subordinate to the other, Marx was dominated by nineteenth-century presuppositions in much the same way as his more recent opponents who are equally sure that "the primary laws of history are political laws, economic laws are secondary".19 Economic forces are in fact political forces. Economics can be treated neither as a minor accessory of history, nor as an independent science in the light of which history can be interpreted. Much confusion would be saved by a general return to the term "political economy", which was given the new science by Adam Smith himself and not abandoned in favour of the abstract "economics", even in Great Britain itself, till the closing years of the nineteenth century.20 The science of economics presupposes a given political order, and cannot be profitably studied in isolation from politics.
l9Moeller van den Bruck. Germany's Third Empire, p. 50. The idea is a commonplace of National Socialist and Fascist writers.
20ln Germany, "political economy" was at first translated Nalionalokononue, which was tentatively replaced in the present century by Sozialdkonomie.
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SOME FALLACIES OF THE SEPARATION OF ECONOMICS FROM POLITICS
. The most conspicuous practical failure caused by the persistence of this nineteenth-century illusion was the breakdown of League sanctions in 1936. Careful reading of the text of Article 16 of the Covenant acquits its framers of responsibility for the mistake. Paragraph 1 prescribes the economic weapons, paragraph 2 the military weapons, to be employed against the violator of the Covenant. Paragraph 2 is clearly complementary to paragraph 1, and assumes as a matter of course that, in the event of an application of sanctions, "armed forces" would be required "to protect the Covenants of the League". The only difference between the two paragraphs is that, whereas all members of the League would have to apply the economic weapons, it would be natural to draw the necessary armed forces from those members which possessed them in sufficient strength and in reasonable geographical proximity to the offender.21 Subsequent commentators, obsessed with the assumption that economics and politics were separate and separable things, evolved the doctrine that paragraphs 1 and 2 of Article 16 were not complementary, but alternative, the difference being that "economic sanctions" were obligatory and "military sanctions" optional. This doctrine was eagerly seized on by the many who felt that the League might conceivably be worth a few million pounds worth of trade, but not a few million human lives; and in the famous 1934 Peace Ballot in Great Britain, some two million deluded voters expressed simultaneously their approval of economic, and their disapproval of military, sanctions. "One of the many conclusions to which 1 have been drawn", said Lord Baldwin at this time, "is that there is no such thing as a sanction which will work, which does not mean war."22 But the bitter lesson of 1935-36 was needed to drive home the truth that in sanctions, as in war, the only motto is "all or nothing", and that economic power is impotent if the military weapon is not held in readiness to support it.23 Power is indivisible; and the military and economic weapons are merely different instruments of power.24
2'This interpretation is confirmed by the report of the Phillimore Committee, on whose proposals the text of Article 16 was based. The Committee "considered financial and economic sanctions as being simply the contribution to the work of preventing aggression which might properly be made by countries which were not in a position to furnish actual military aid" (International Sanctions: Report by a Group oj Members of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, p. 115 where the relevant texts are examined). "House of Commons, May 18, 1934; Official Report, col. 2139.
23It is not, of course, suggested that the military weapon must always be used. The British Grand Fleet was little used in the first world war. But it would be rash to assume that the result would have been much the same if the British Government had not been prepared to use it. What paralyzed sanctions in 1935-36 was the common knowledge that the League Powers were not prepared to use the military weapon. J4lt is worth noting that Stresemann was fully alive to this point when Germany entered the League of Nations. When the Secretary-General argued that Germany, if she contracted out of military sanctions, could still participate in economic sanctions, Stresemann replied: "We cannot do that either; if we take part in an economic boycott of a powerful neighbour, a declaration of war against Germany might be the consequence, since the exclusion of another country from intercourse with a nation of sixty million citizens would be a hostile act" (Stresemann s Diaries and Papers [Engl. Transl.], ii. p. 69).
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A different, and equally serious, form in which this illusory separation of politics and economics can be traced is the popular phraseology which distinguishes between "power" and "welfare", between "guns" and "butter". "Welfare arguments are 'economic' ", remarks an American writer, "power arguments are 'political'."25 This fallacy is particularly difficult to expose because it appears to be deducible from a familiar fact. Every modern government and every parliament is continually faced with the dilemma of spending money on armaments or social services; and this encourages the illusion that the choice really lies between "power" and "welfare", between political guns and economic butter. Reflexion shows, however, that this is not the case. The question asked never takes the form, Do you prefer guns or butter? For everyone (except a handful of pacifists in those Anglo-Saxon countries which have inherited a long tradition of uncontested security) agrees that, in case of need, guns must come before butter. The question asked is always either, Have we already sufficient guns to enable us to afford some butter? or, Granted that we need x guns, can we increase revenue sufficiently to afford more butter as well? But the neatest exposure of this fallacy comes from the pen of Professor Zimmern; and the exposure is none the less effective for being unconscious. Having divided existing states on popular lines into those which pursue "welfare" and those which pursue "power", Professor Zimmern revealingly adds that "the welfare states, taken together, enjoy a preponderance of power and resources over the power states" 26 thereby leading us infallibly to the correct conclusion that "welfare states" are states which, already enjoying a preponderance of power, are not primarily concerned to increase it, and can therefore afford butter, and "power states" those which, being inferior in power, are primarily concerned to increase it, and devote the major part of their resources to this end. In this popular terminology, "welfare states" are those which possess preponderant power, and "power states" those which do not. Nor is this classification as illogical as it may seem. Every Great Power takes the view that the minimum number of guns necessary to assert the degree of power which it considers requisite takes precedence over butter, and that it can only pursue "welfare" when this minimum has been achieved. For many years prior to 1933, Great Britain, being satisfied with her power, was a "welfare state." After 1935, feeling her power contested and inadequate, she became a "power state"; and even the Opposition ceased to press with any insistence the prior claim of the social services. The contrast is not one between "power" and "welfare", and still less between "politics" and "economics", but between different degrees of power. In the pursuit of power, military and economic instruments will both be used.. . .
THE NATURE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW
International law differs from the municipal law of modern states in being the law of an undeveloped and not fully integrated community. It lacks three institutions which are
ntial parts of any developed system of municipal law: a judicature, an executive and a legislature.
m International law recognises no court competent to give on any issue of law or decisions recognised as binding by the community as a whole. It has long been the tch't of some states to make special agreements to submit particular disputes to an in-3 tional court for judicial settlement. The Permanent Court of International Justice, 'etup u"der the Covenant of the LeaSue> represents an attempt to extend and generalise this habit. But the institution of the court has not changed international law: it has merely created certain special obligations for states willing to accept them.
(2) International law has no agents competent to enforce observance of the law. In certain cases, it does indeed recognise the right of an aggrieved party, where a breach of the law has occurred, to take reprisals against the offender. But this is the recognition of a right of self-help, not the enforcement of a penalty by an agent of the law. The measures contemplated in Article 16 of the Covenant of the League, in so far as they can be regarded as punitive and not merely preventive, fall within this category.
(3) Of the two main sources of law—custom and legislation—international law knows only the former, resembling in this respect the law of all primitive communities. To trace the stages by which a certain kind of action or behaviour, from being customary, comes to be recognised as obligatory on all members of the community is the task of the social psychologist rather than of the jurist. But it is by some such process that international law has come into being. In advanced communities, the other source of law— direct legislation—is more prolific, and could not possibly be dispensed with in any modern state. So serious does this lack of international legislation appear that, in the view of some authorities, states do on certain occasions constitute themselves a legislative body, and many multilateral agreements between states are in fact "law-making treaties" (traités-lois)21 This view is open to grave objections. A treaty, whatever its scope and content, lacks the essential quality of law: it is not automatically and unconditionally applicable to all members of the community whether they assent to it or not. Attempts have been made from time to time to embody customary international law in multilateral treaties between states. But the value of such attempts has been largely nullified by the fact that no treaty can bind a state which has not accepted it. The Hague Conventions of 1907 on the rules of war are sometimes treated as an example of international legislation. But these conventions were not only not binding on states which were not parties to them, but were not binding on the parties vis-á-vis states which were not parties. The Briand-Kellogg Pact is not, as is sometimes loosely said, a legislative act prohibiting war. It is an agreement between a large number of states "to renounce war as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another". International agreements are contracts concluded by states with one another in their capacity as subjects of international law, and not laws created by states in the capacity of international legislators. International legislation does not yet exist. . . .
25F. L. Schiiman, International Politics, p. 356. 26Zimmern, Quo Vadimus? p. 41.
27The Carnegie Endowment has, tor example, given the title International Legislation to a collection published under its auspices of "multipartite instruments of general interest".
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In June 1933, the British Government ceased to pay the regular installments due under its war debt agreement, substituting minor "token payments"; and a year later these token payments came to an end. Yet in 1935 Great Britain and France once more joined in a solemn condemnation of Germany for unilaterally repudiating her obligations under the disarmament clauses of the Versailles Treaty. Such inconsistencies are so common that the realist finds little difficulty in reducing them to a simple rule. The element of power is inherent in every political treaty. The contents of such a treaty reflect in some degree the relative strength of the contracting parties. Stronger states will insist on the sanctity of the treaties concluded by them with weaker states. Weaker states will renounce treaties concluded by them with stronger states so soon as the power position alters and the weaker state feels itself strong enough to reject or modify the obligation. Since 1918, the United States have concluded no treaty with a stronger state, and have therefore unreservedly upheld the sanctity of treaties. Great Britain concluded the war debt agreement with a country financially stronger than herself, and defaulted. She concluded no other important treaty with a stronger Power and, with this single exception, upheld the sanctity of treaties. The countries which had concluded the largest number of j treaties with states stronger than themselves, and subsequently strengthened their position, were Germany, Italy and Japan; and these are the countries which renounced or violated the largest number of treaties. But it would be rash to assume any moral distinction between these different attitudes. There is no reason to assume that these countries would insist any less strongly than Great Britain or the United States on the sanctity of treaties favourable to themselves concluded by them with weaker states.
The case is convincing as far as it goes. The rule pacta sunt servanda is not a moral principle, and its application cannot always be justified on ethical grounds. It is a rule of international law; and as such it not only is, but is universally recognised to be, necessary to the existence of an international society. But law does not purport to solve every political problem; and where it fails, the fault often lies with those who seek to put it to uses for which it was never intended. It is no reproach to law to describe it as a bulwark ] of the existing order. The essence of law is to promote stability and maintain the existing framework of society; and it is perfectly natural everywhere for conservatives to describe themselves as the party of law and order, and to denounce radicals as disturbers of the peace and enemies of the law. The history of every society reveals a strong tendency on the part of those who want important changes in the existing order to commit acts which are illegal and which can plausibly be denounced as such by conservatives. It is true that in highly organised societies, where legally constituted machinery exists for bringing about changes in the law, this tendency to illegal action is mitigated. But it is never removed altogether. Radicals are always more likely than conservatives to come into conflict with the law.
Before 1914, international law did not condemn as illegal resort to war for the purpose of changing the existing international order; and no legally constituted machinery existed for bringing about changes in any other way. After 1918 opinion condemning "aggressive" war became almost universal, and nearly all the nations of the world signed a pact renouncing resort to war as an instrument of policy. While therefore resort to war for the purpose of altering the status quo now usually involves the breach of a treaty
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obligation and 's according'y illegal m international law, no effective international machinery has been constituted for bringing about changes by pacific means. The rude nineteenth-century system, or lack of system, was logical in recognising as legal the one effective method of changing the status quo. The rejection of the traditional method as illegal and the failure to provide any effective alternative have made contemporary international law a bulwark of the existing order to an extent unknown in previous international law or in the municipal law of any civilised country. This is the most fundamental cause of the recent decline of respect for international law; and those who, in deploring the phenomenon, fail to recognise its origin, not unnaturally expose themselves to the charge of hypocrisy or of obtuseness.
Of all the considerations which render unlikely the general observance of the legal rule of the sanctity of treaties, and which provide a plausible moral justification for the repudiation of treaties, this last is by far the most important. Respect for international law and for the sanctity of treaties will not be increased by the sermons of those who, having most to gain from the maintenance of the existing order, insist most firmly on the morally binding character of the law. Respect for law and treaties will be maintained only in so far as the law recognises effective political machinery through which it can itself be modified and superseded. There must be a clear recognition of that play of political forces which is antecedent to all law. Only when these forces are in stable equilibrium can the law perform its social function without becoming a tool in the hands of the defenders of the status quo. The achievement of this equilibrium is not a legal, but a political task....
Peaceful Change
.. . The attempt to make a moral distinction between wars of "aggression" and wars of "defence" is misguided. If a change is necessary and desirable, the use or threatened use of force to maintain the status quo may be morally more culpable than the use or threatened use of force to alter it. Few people now believe that the action of the American colonists who attacked the status quo by force in 1776, or of the Irish who attacked the status quo by force between 1916 and 1920, was necessarily less moral than that of the British who defended it by force. The moral criterion must be not the "aggressive" or "defensive" character of the war, but the nature of the change which is being sought and resisted. . . .
.. . When the change is effected by legislation, the compulsion is that of the state. But where the change is effected by the bargaining procedure, the force majeure can only be that of the stronger party. The employer who concedes the strikers' demands pleads inability to resist. The trade union leader who calls off an unsuccessful strike pleads that the union was too weak to continue. "Yielding to threats of force", which is sometimes used as a term of reproach, is therefore a normal part of the process. . . .
The defence of the status quo is not a policy which can be lastingly successful. It will end in war as surely as rigid conservatism will end in revolution. "Resistance to aggression", however necessary as a momentary device of national policy, is no solution; for readiness to fight to prevent change is just as unmoral as readiness to fight to enforce it. To establish methods of peaceful change is therefore the fundamental problem of
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international morality and of international politics. We can discard as purely Utopian and muddle-headed plans for a procedure of peaceful change dictated by a world legislature or a world court. We can describe as Utopian in the right sense (i.e. performing the proper function of a Utopia in proclaiming an ideal to be aimed at, though not wholly attainable) the desire to eliminate the element of power and to base the bargaining process of peaceful change on a common feeling of what is just and reasonable. But we shall also keep in mind the realist view of peaceful change as an adjustment to the changed relations of power; and since the party which is able to bring most power to bear normally emerges successful from operations of peaceful change, we shall do our best to make ourselves as powerful as we can. In practice, we know that peaceful change can only be achieved through a compromise between the Utopian conception of a common feeling of right and the realist conception of a mechanical adjustment to a changed equilibrium of forces. That is why a successful foreign policy must oscillate between the apparently opposite poles of force and appeasement. . . .
The Origins of War in Neorealist Theory
Kenneth N. Waltz
Like most historians, many students of international politics have been skeptical about the possibility of creating a theory that might help one to understand and explain the international events that interest us. Thus Morgenthau, foremost among traditional realists was fond of repeating Blaise Pascal's remark that "the history of the world would have been different had Cleopatra's nose been a bit shorter" and then asking "How do you systemize that?"1 His appreciation of the role of the accidental and the occurrence of the unexpected in politics dampened his theoretical ambition.
The response of neorealists is that, although difficulties abound, some of the obstacles that seem most daunting lie in misapprehensions about theory. Theory obviously cannot explain the accidental or account for unexpected events; it deals in regularities and repetitions and is possible only if these can be identified. A further difficulty is found in the failure of realists to conceive of international politics as a distinct domain about which theories can be fashioned. Morgenthau, for example, insisted on "the autonomy of politics," but he failed to apply the concept to international politics. A theory is a depiction of the organization of a domain and of the connections among its parts. A theory indicates that some factors are more important than others and specifies relations among them. In reality, everything is related to everything else, and one domain cannot be separated from others. But theory isolates one realm from all others in order to deal with it intellectually. By defining the structure of international political systems, neorealism establishes the autonomy of international politics and thus makes a theory about it possible.2
In developing a theory of international politics, neorealism retains the main tenets of realpolitik, but means and ends are viewed differently, as are causes and effects. Morgenthau, for example, thought of the "rational" statesman as ever striving to accumulate more and more power. He viewed power as an end in itself. Although he acknowledged
Kenneth N. Waltz, "The Origins of War in Neorealist Theory." Reprinted from The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, XVIII (1988), 615-628, with the permission of the editors of The Journal of Interdisciplinary Histoiy and the MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts. © 1988 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Inc.
'Hans J. Morgenthau, "International Relations: Quantitative and Qualitative Approaches," in Norman D. Palmer (ed.), A Design for International Relations Research: Scope, Theorv, Methods, and Relevance (Philadelphia, 1970), 78.
2Morgenthau. Politics among Nations (New York, 1973; 5th ed.), 11. Ludwig Boltzman (trans. Rudolf Weingartner), "Theories as Representations," excerpted in Arthur Danto and Sidney Morgenbesser (eds). Philosophy of Science (Cleveland, 1960), 245-252. Neorealism is sometimes dubbed structural realism. I use the terms interchangeably and, throughout this article, refer to my own formulation of neorealist theory. See Waltz, Theory oj International Politics (Reading. Mass.. 1979); Robert Keohane (ed.). Neorealism and Its Critics (New York, 1986).
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that nations at times act out of considerations other than power, Morgenthau insisted that when they do so, their actions are not "of a political nature."3 In contrast, neorealism sees power as a possibly useful means, with states running risks if they have either too little or too much of it. Excessive weakness may invite an attack that greater strength would have dissuaded an adversary from launching. Excessive strength may prompt other states to increase their arms and pool their efforts against the dominant state. Because power is a pos. sibly useful means, sensible statesmen try to have an appropriate amount of it. In crucial situations, however, the ultimate concern of states is not for power but for security. This revision is an important one.
An even more important revision is found in a shift of causal relations. The infinite materials of any realm can be organized in endlessly different ways. Realism thinks of causes as moving in only one direction, from the interactions of individuals and states to the outcomes that their acts and interactions produce. Morgenthau recognized that, when there is competition for scarce goods and no one to serve as arbiter, a struggle for power will ensue among the competitors and that consequently the struggle for power can be explained without reference to the evil born in men. The struggle for power arises simply because men want things, not because of the evil in their desires. He labeled man's desire for scarce goods as one of the two roots of conflict, but, even while discussing it, he seemed to pull toward the "other root of conflict and concomitant evil"—"the animus dominandi, the desire for power." He often considered that man's drive for power is more basic than the chance conditions under which struggles for power occur. This attitude is seen in his statement that "in a world where power counts, no nation pursuing a rational policy has a choice between renouncing and wanting power; and, if it could, the lust for power for the individual's sake would still confront us with its less spectacular yet no less pressing moral defects."4
Students of international politics have typically inferred outcomes from salient attributes of the actors producing them. Thus Marxists, like liberals, have linked the outbreak of war or the prevalence of peace to the internal qualities of states. Governmental forms, economic systems, social institutions, political ideologies—these are but a few examples of where the causes of war have been found. Yet, although causes are specifically assigned, we know that states with widely divergent economic institutions, social customs, and political ideologies have all fought wars. More striking still, many different sorts of organizations fight wars, whether those organizations be tribes, petty principalities, empires, nations, or street gangs. If an identified condition seems to have caused a given war, one must wonder why wars occur repeatedly even though their causes vary. Variations in the characteristics of the states are not linked directly to the outcomes that their behaviors produce, nor are variations in their patterns of interaction. Many historians, for example, have claimed that World War I was caused by the interaction of two opposed and closely balanced coalitions. But then many have claimed that World War II was caused by the failure of some states to combine forces in an effort to right an imbalance of power created by an existing alliance.
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^Morgenthau, Politics among Nations. 27.
Aldem, Scientific Man vs Power Politics (Chicago, 1946), 192, 200. Italics added.
jsleorealism contends that international politics can be understood only if the effects of structure are added to the unit-level explanations of traditional realism. By emphasizing how structures affect actions and outcomes, neorealism rejects the assumption that man's innate lust for power constitutes a sufficient cause of war in the absence of any other. It reconceives the causal link between interacting units and international outcomes. According to the logic of international politics, one must believe that some causes of international outcomes are the result of interactions at the unit level, and, since variations in presumed causes do not correspond very closely to variations in observed outcomes, one must also assume that others are located at the structural level. Causes at the level of units interact with those at the level of structure, and, because they do so, explanation at the unit level alone is bound to be misleading. If an approach allows the consideration of both unit-level and structural-level causes, then it can cope with both the changes and the continuities that occur in a system.
Structural realism presents a systemic portrait of international politics depicting component units according to the manner of their arrangement. For the purpose of developing a theory, states are cast as unitary actors wanting at least to survive, and are taken to be the system's constituent units. The essential structural quality of the system is anarchy—the absence of a central monopoly of legitimate force. Changes of structure and hence of system occur with variations in the number of great powers. The range of expected outcomes is inferred from the assumed motivation of the units and the structure of the system in which they act.
A systems theory of international politics deals with forces at the international, and not at the national, level. With both systems-level and unit-level forces in play, how can one construct a theory of international politics without simultaneously constructing a theory of foreign policy? An international-political theory does not imply or require a theory of foreign policy any more than a market theory implies or requires a theory of the firm. Systems theories, whether political or economic, are theories that explain how the organization of a realm acts as a constraining and disposing force on the interacting units within it. Such theories tell us about the forces to which the units are subjected. From them, we can draw some inferences about the expected behavior and fate of the units: namely, how they will have to compete with and adjust to one another if they are to survive and flourish. To the extent that the dynamics of a system limit the freedom of its units, their behavior and the outcomes of their behavior become predictable. How do we expect firms to respond to differently structured markets, and states to differently structured international-political systems? These theoretical questions require us to take firms as firms, and states as states, without paying attention to differences among them. The questions are then answered by reference to the placement of the units in their system and not by reference to the internal qualities of the units. Systems theories explain why different units behave similarly and, despite their variations, produce outcomes that fall within expected ranges. Conversely, theories at the unit level tell us why different units behave differently despite their similar placement in a system. A theory about foreign policy is a theory at the national level. It leads to expectations about the responses that dissimilar polities will make to external pressures. A theory of international politics bears on the foreign policies of nations although it claims to explain only certain aspects of them. It can tell us what international conditions national policies have to cope with.
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From the vantage point of neorealist theory, competition and conflict among states stem directly from the twin facts of life under conditions of anarchy: States in an anarchic order must provide for their own security, and threats or seeming threats to their security abound. Preoccupation with identifying dangers and counteracting them become a way of life. Relations remain tense; the actors are usually suspicious and often hostile even though by nature they may not be given to suspicion and hostility. Individually, states may only be doing what they can to bolster their security. Their individual intentions aside, collectively their actions yield arms races and alliances. The uneasy state of affairs is exacerbated by the familiar "security dilemma," wherein measures that enhance one state's security typically diminish that of others.5 In an anarchic domain, the source of one's own comfort is the source of another's worry. Hence a state that is amassing instruments of war, even for its own defensive, is cast by others as a threat requiring response. The response itself then serves to confirm the first state's belief that it had reason to worry. Similarly, an alliance that in the interest of defense moves to increase cohesion among its members and add to its ranks inadvertently imperils an opposing alliance and provokes countermeasures.
Some states may hunger for power for power's sake. Neorealist theory, however, shows that it is not necessary to assume an innate lust for power in order to account for the sometimes fierce competition that marks the international arena. In an anarchic domain, a state of war exists if all parties lust for power. But so too will a state of war exist if all states seek only to ensure their own safety.
Although neorealist theory does not explain why particular wars are fought, it does explain war's dismal recurrence through the millennia. Neorealists point not to the ambitions or the intrigues that punctuate the outbreak of individual conflicts but instead to the existing structure within which events, whether by design or accident, can precipitate open clashes of arms. The origins of hot wars lie in cold wars, and the origins of cold wars are found in the anarchic ordering of the international arena.
The recurrence of war is explained by the structure of the international system. Theorists explain what historians know: War is normal. Any given war is explained not by looking at the structure of the international-political system but by looking at the particularities within it: the situations, the characters, and the interactions of states. Although particular explanations are found at the unit level, general explanations are also needed. Wars vary in frequency, and in other ways as well. A central question for a structural theory is this: How do changes of the system affect the expected frequency of war?
KEEPING WARS COLD: THE STRUCTURAL LEVEL
In an anarchic realm, peace is fragile. The prolongation of peace requires that potentially destabilizing developments elicit the interest and the calculated response of some or all of the system's principal actors, in the anarchy of states, the price of inattention
See John II. Herz, "Idealist Internationalism and the Security Dilemma," World Politics II (19501 157 -180. '
The Origins of War in Neorealist Theory 91
miscalculation is often paid in blood. An important issue for a structural theory to ad-°j c= is whether destabilizing conditions and events are managed better in multipolar or b)poIar systems.
In a system of, say, five great powers, the politics of power turns on the diplomacy by which alliances are made, maintained, and disrupted. Flexibility of alignment means both that the country one is wooing may prefer another suitor and that one's present alliance partner may defect. Flexibility of alignment limits a state's options because, ideally its strategy must please potential allies and satisfy present partners. Alliances are made by states that have some but not all of their interests in common. The common interest is ordinarily a negative one: fear of other states. Divergence comes when positive interests are at issue. In alliances among near equals, strategies are always the product of compromise since the interests of allies and their notions of how to secure them are never identical.
If competing blocs are seen to be closely balanced, and if competition turns on important matters, then to let one's side down risks one's own destruction. In a moment of crisis the weaker or the more adventurous party is likely to determine its side's policy. Its partners can afford neither to let the weaker member be defeated nor to advertise their disunity by failing to back a venture even while deploring its risks.
The prelude to World War I provides striking examples of such a situation. The approximate equality of partners in both the Triple Alliance and Triple Entente made them closely interdependent. This interdependence, combined with the keen competition between the two camps, meant that, although any country could commit its associates, no one country on either side could exercise control. If Austria-Hungary marched, Germany had to follow; the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire would have left Germany alone in the middle of Europe. If France marched, Russia had to follow; a German victory over France would be a defeat for Russia. And so the vicious circle continued. Because the defeat or the defection of a major ally would have shaken the balance, each state was constrained to adjust its strategy and the use of its forces to the aims and fears of its partners.
In alliances among equals, the defection of one member threatens the security of the others. In alliances among unequals, the contributions of the lesser members are at once wanted and of relatively small importance. In alliances among unequals, alliance leaders need worry little about the faithfulness of their followers, who usually have little choice anyway. Contrast the situation in 1914 with that of the United States and Britain and France in 1956. The United States could dissociate itself from the Suez adventure of its two principal allies and subject one of them to heavy financial pressure. Like Austria-Hungary in 1914, Britain and France tried to commit or at least immobilize their ally by presenting a fait accompli. Enjoying a position of predominance, the United States could continue to focus its attention on the major adversary while disciplining its two allies. Opposing Britain and France endangered neither the United States nor the alliance because the security of Britain and France depended much more heavily on us than our security depended on them. The ability of the United States, and the inability of Germany, to pay a price measured in intra-alliance terms is striking.
In bnlance-of-power politics old style, flexibility of alignment led to rigidity of strategy or the limitation of freedom of decision. In balance-of-power politics new style, the
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obverse is true: Rigidity of alignment in a two-power world results in more flexibility 0| strategy and greater freedom of decision. In a multipolar world, roughly equal parties erJ gaged in cooperative endeavors must look for the common denominator of their policies! They risk finding the lowest one and easily end up in the worst of all possible worlds, a bipolar world, alliance leaders can design strategies primarily to advance their own i terests and to cope with their main adversary and less to satisfy their own allies.
Neither the United States nor the Soviet Union has to seek the approval of othe states, but each has to cope with the other. In the great-power politics of a multipolaj world, who is a danger to whom and who can be expected to deal with threats ami problems are matters of uncertainty. In the great-power politics of a bipolar world, who' is a danger to whom is never in doubt. Any event in the world that involves the fortunes! of either of the great powers automatically elicits the interest of the other. President! Harry S. Truman, at the time of the Korean invasion, could not very well echo Neville! Chamberlain's words in the Czechoslovakian crisis by claiming that the Americans knew! nothing about the Koreans, a people living far away in the east of Asia. We had to know! about them or quickly find out.
In a two-power competition, a loss for one is easily taken to be a gain for the other. | As a result, the powers in a bipolar world promptly respond to unsettling events. In a multipolar world, dangers are diffused, responsibilities unclear, and definitions of vital interests easily obscured. Where a number of states are in balance, the skillful foreign \ policy of a forward power is designed to gain an advantage without antagonizing other i states and frightening them into united action. At times in modern Europe, the benefits j of possible gains have seemed to outweigh the risks of likely losses. Statesmen have • hoped to push an issue to the limit without causing all of the potential opponents to unite. When there are several possible enemies, unity of action among them is difficult to achieve. National leaders could therefore think—or desperately hope, as did Theobald Von Bethmann Hollweg and Adolf Hitler before two world wars—that a united opposition would not form.
If interests and ambitions conflict, the absence of crises is more worrisome than their presence. Crises are produced by the determination of a state to resist a change that another state tries to make. As the leaders in a bipolar system, the United States and the Soviet Union are disposed to do the resisting, for in important matters they cannot hope that their allies will do it for them. Political action in the postwar world has reflected this condition. Communist guerrillas operating in Greece prompted the Truman Doctrine. The tightening of Soviet control over the states of Eastern Europe led to the Marshall Plan and the Atlantic Defense Treaty, and these in turn gave rise to the Cominform and the Warsaw Pact. The plan to create a West German government produced the Berlin blockade. During the past four decades, our responses have been geared to the Soviet Union's actions, and theirs to ours.
Miscalculation by some or all of the great powers is a source of danger in a multipolar world; overreaction by either or both of the great powers is a source of danger in a bipolar world. Which is worse: miscalculation or overreaction? Miscalculation is the greater evil because it is more likely to permit an unfolding of events that finally threatens the status quo and brings the powers to war. Overreaction is the lesser evil
' flčause at worst it costs only money for unnecessary arms and possibly the fighting of "gjjpjted wars. The dynamics of a bipolar system, moreover, provide a measure of correction- In a world in which two states united in their mutual antagonism overshadow any others, the benefits of a calculated response stand out most clearly, and the sanctions against irresponsible behavior achieve their greatest force. Thus two states, isolationist by tradition, untutored in the ways of international politics, and famed for impulsive behavior, have shown themselves—not always and everywhere, but always -^in crucial cases—to be wary, alert, cautious, flexible, and forbearing.
WARS, HOT AND COLD
Wars, hot and cold, originate in the structure of the international political system. Most Americans blame the Soviet Union for creating the Cold War, by the actions that follow necessarily from the nature of its society and government. Revisionist historians, attacking the dominant view, assign blame to the United States. Some American error, or sinister interest, or faulty assumption about Soviet aims, they argue, is what started the Cold War. Either way, the main point is lost. In a bipolar world, each of the two great powers is bound to focus its fears on the other, to distrust its motives, and to impute offensive intentions to defensive measures. The proper question is what, not who, started the Cold War. Although its content and virulence vary as unit-level forces change and interact, the Cold War continues. It is firmly rooted in the structure of postwar international politics, and will last as long as that structure endures.
Hegemonic War and International Change
Robert Gilpjn
Because of the redistribution of power, the costs to the traditional dominant state of maintaining the international system increase relative to its capacity to pay; this, in turn, produces the severe fiscal crisis. ... By the same token, the costs to the rising state of changing the system decrease; it begins to appreciate that it can increase its own gains by forcing changes in the nature of the system. Its enhanced power position means that the relative costs of changing the system and securing its interests have decreased. Thus, in accordance with the law of demand, the rising state, as its power increases, will seek to change the status quo as the perceived potential benefits begin to exceed the perceived costs of undertaking a change in the system.
As its relative power increases, a rising state attempts to change the rules governing the international system, the division of the spheres of influence, and, most important of all, the international distribution of territory. In response, the dominant power counters this challenge through changes in its policies that attempt to restore equilibrium in the system. The historical record reveals that if it fails in this attempt, the disequilibrium will be resolved by war. Shepard Clough, in his book The Rise and Fall of Civilization, drew on a distinguished career in historical scholarship to make the point: "At least in all the cases which we have passed ... in review in these pages, cultures with inferior civilization but with growing economic power have always attacked the most civilized cultures during the latters' economic decline" (1970, p. 263). The fundamental task of the challenged dominant state is to solve what Walter Lippmann once characterized as the fundamental problem of foreign policy—the balancing of commitments and resources (Lippmann, 1943, p. 7). An imperial, hegemonic, or great power has essentially two courses of action open to it as it attempts to restore equilibrium in the system. The first and preferred solution is that the challenged power can seek to increase the resources devoted to maintaining its commitments and position in the international system. The second is that it can attempt to reduce its existing commitments (and associated costs) in a way that does not ultimately jeopardize its international position. Although neither response will be followed to the exclusion of the other, they may be considered analytically as separate policies. The logic and the pitfalls of each policy will be considered in turn.
Historically, the most frequently employed devices to generate new resources to meet the increasing costs of dominance and to forestall decline have been to increase domestic taxation and to exact tribute from other states. Both of these courses of action have
^Klm^ ?^e." from War a„d 0,a„ge ,n World
Press. University Press 1981. Reprinted with the permission of Cambridge University
Hegemonic War and International Change 95
ent dangers in that they can provoke resistance and rebellion. The French Revolution ' triggered in part by the effort of the monarchy to levy the higher taxes required to Weet the British challenge (von Ranke, 1950, p. 211). Athens's "allies" revolted against Athenian demands for increased tribute. Because higher taxes (or tribute) mean decreased productive investment and a lowered standard of living, in most instances such expedient can be employed for only relatively short periods of time, such as during a war.
The powerful resistance within a society to higher taxes or tribute encourages the overnment to employ more indirect methods of generating additional resources to meet a fiscal crisis. Most frequently, a government will resort to inflationary policies or seek to manipulate the terms of trade with other countries. As Carlo Cipolla observed (1970, p 13), the invariable symptoms of a society's decline are excessive taxation, inflation, and balance-of-payments difficulties as government and society spend beyond their means. But these indirect devices also bring hardship and encounter strong resistance over the long run.
The most satisfactory solution to the problem of increasing costs is increased efficiency in the use of existing resources. Through organizational, technological, and other types of innovations, a state can either economize with respect to the resources at its disposal or increase the total amount of disposable resources. Thus, as Mark Elvin explained, the fundamental reason that imperial China survived intact for so long was its unusually high rate of economic and technological innovation; over long periods China was able to generate sufficient resources to finance the costs of protection against successive invaders (Elvin, 1973). Conversely, the Roman economy stagnated and failed to innovate. Among the reasons for the decline and destruction of Rome was its inability to generate resources sufficient to stave off barbarian invaders. More recently, the calls for greater industrial productivity in contemporary America derive from the realization that technological innovation and more efficient use of existing resources are needed to meet the increasing demands of consumption, investment, and protection.
This innovative solution involves rejuvenation of the society's military, economic, and political institutions. In the case of declining Rome, for example, a recasting of its increasingly inefficient system of agricultural production and a revised system of taxation were required. Unfortunately, social reform and institutional rejuvenation become increasingly difficult as a society ages, because this implies more general changes in customs, attitudes, motivation, and sets of values that constitute a cultural heritage (Cipolla, 1970, p. 11). Vested interests resist the loss of their privileges. Institutional rigidities frustrate abandonment of "tried and true" methods (Downs, 1967, pp. 158-66). One could hardly expect it to be otherwise: "Innovations are important not for their immediate, actual results but for their potential for future development, and potential is very difficult to assess" (Cipolla, 1970, pp. 9-10).
A declining society experiences a vicious cycle of decay and immobility, much as a rising society enjoys a virtuous cycle of growth and expansion. On the one hand, decline is accompanied by lack of social cooperation, by emphasis on rights rather than emphasis on duty, and by decreasing productivity. On the other hand, the frustration and pessimism generated by this gloomy atmosphere inhibit renewal and innovation. The failure to innovate accentuates the decline and its psychologically debilitating
94
96      Part IP International Realism
consequences. Once caught up in this cycle, it is difficult for the society to break out (Cipolla, 1970, p. 11). For this reason, a more rational and more efficient use of existing resources to meet increasing military and productive needs is seldom achieved.
There have been societies that have managed their resources with great skill for hundreds of years and have rejuvenated themselves in response to external challenges, and this resilience has enabled them to survive for centuries in a hostile environment. In fact, those states that have been notable for their longevity have been the ones most successful in allocating their scarce resources in an optimal fashion in order to balance, over a period of centuries, the conflicting demands of consumption, protection, and investment. An outstanding example was the Venetian city-state. Within this aristocratic republic the governing elite moderated consumption and shifted resources back and forth between protection and investment as need required over the centuries (Lane, 1973). The Chinese Empire was even more significant. Its longevity and unity were due to the fact that the Chinese were able to increase their production more rapidly than the rise in the costs of protection (Elvin, 1973, pp. 92-3, 317). The progressive nature of the imperial Chinese economy meant that sufficient resources were in most cases available to meet external threats and preserve the integrity of the empire for centuries. In contrast to the Romans, who were eventually inundated and destroyed by the barbarians, the Chinese "on the whole . . . managed to keep one step ahead of their neighbours in the relevant technical skills, military, economic and organizational" (Elvin, 1973, p. 20).
An example of social rejuvenation intended to meet an external challenge was that of revolutionary France. The point has already been made that European aristocracies were reluctant to place firearms in the hands of the lower social orders, preferring to rely on small professional armies. The French Revolution and the innovation of nationalism made it possible for the French state to tap the energies of the masses of French citizens. The so-called levee en masse greatly increased the human resources available to the republic and, later, to Napoleon. Although this imperial venture was ultimately unsuccessful, it does illustrate the potentiality for domestic rejuvenation of a society in response to decline.
The second type of response to declining fortunes is to bring costs and resources into balance by reducing costs. This can be attempted in three general ways. The first is to eliminate the reason for the increasing costs (i.e., to weaken or destroy the rising challenger). The second is to expand to a more secure and less costly defensive perimeter. The third is to reduce international commitments. Each of these alternative strategies has its attractions and its dangers.
The first and most attractive response to a society's decline is to eliminate the source of the problem. By launching a preventive war the declining power destroys or weakens the rising challenger while the military advantage is still with the declining power. Thus, as Thucydides explained, the Spartans initiated the Peloponnesian War in an attempt to crush the rising Athenian challenger while Sparta still had the power to do so. When the choice ahead has appeared to be to decline or to fight, statesmen have most generally fought. However, besides causing unnecessary loss of life, the greatest danger inherent in preventive war is that it sets in motion a course of events over which statesmen soon lose control (see the subsequent discussion of hegemonic war).
HegemonicWar and International Change 97
Second, a state may seek to reduce the costs of maintaining its position by means of further expansion.1 In effect, the state hopes to reduce its long-term costs by acquiring less costly defensive positions.iAs Edward Luttwak (1976) demonstrated in his brilliant study of Roman grand strategy, Roman expansion in its later phases was an attempt to find more secure and less cosjtly defensive positions and to eliminate potential challengers. Although this response to declining fortunes can be effective, it can also lead to further overextension of commitments, to increasing costs, and thereby to acceleration of the decline. It is difficult fojr a successful and expanding state to break the habit of expansion, and it is all too eajsy to believe that "expand or die" is the imperative of
international survival. Perhap power, as it proved eventually!
gradually begin to sap its strength (Grant, 1968, p. 246)
The third means of bringirj foreign-policy commitments
the greatest danger for every imperial or hegemonic to be for Rome, is overextension of commitments that
rjig costs and resources into balance is, of course, to reduce
ioreign-F""^j .........------Jjhrough political, territorial, or economic retrenchment, a
society can reduce the costs of jnaintainingits international position. However, this strategy is politically difficult, and! carrying it out is a delicate matter. Its success is highly uncertain and strongly dependent on timing and circumstances. The problem of retrenchment will be considered first in general terms; then a case of relatively successful retrenchment by a great power will be discussed.
The most direct method of retrenchment is unilateral abandonment of certain of a state's economic, political, or military commitments. For example, a state may withdraw from exposed and costly strategic positions. Venice, as was pointed out, pursued for centuries a conscious policy of alternating advance and retreat. The longevity of the later Roman Empire or Byzantine Empire may be partially explained by its withdrawal from its exposed and difficult-to-defend western provinces and consolidation of its position on a less costly basis in its eastern provinces; its survival for a thousand years was due to the fact that it brought the scale of empire and resources into balance (Cipolla, 1970, p. 82; Rader, 1971, p. 54). In our own time, the so-called Nixon doctrine may be interpreted as an effort on the part of the United States to disengage from vulnerable commitments and to shift part of the burden of defending the international status quo to other powers (Hoffmann, 1978, pp. 46-7).
A second standard technique of retrenchment is to enter into alliances with or seek rapprochement with less threatening powers. In effect, the dominant but declining power makes concessions to another state and agrees to share the benefits of the status quo with that other state in exchange for sharing the costs of preserving the status quo. Thus the Romans brought the Goths into the empire (much to their later regret) in exchange for
'This cause of expansion is frequently explained by the "turbulent-frontier" thesis. A classic example-was Britain's steady and incremental conquest of India in order to eliminate threatening political disturbances on the frontier of the empire. Two recent examples are the American invasion of Cambodia during the Vietnam War and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
2As Raymond Aron argued (1974), defeat in Vietnam may. in the long run, save the United States from the corrupting and ultimately weakening vice of overexpansion of commitments.
98     Part 11: International Realism
Hegemonic War and International Change 99
their assistance in defending the frontiers of the empire. As will be pointed out in a moment, the policy of entente or rapprochement was pursued by the British prior to World War 1 as they sought to meet the rising German challenge. The American rapprochement with Communist China is a late-twentieth-century example. In exchange for weakening the American commitment to Taiwan, the Americans seek Chinese assistance in containing the expanding power of the Soviet Union.
Unfortunately, there are several dangers associated with this response to decline. First, in an alliance between a great power and a lesser power there is a tendency for the former to overpay in the long run, as has occurred with the United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO); the great power increases its commitments without a commensurate increase in the resources devoted by its allies to finance those commitments. Further, the ally is benefited materially by the alliance, and as its capabilities increase, it may turn against the declining power. Thus the Romans educated the Goths in their military techniques only to have the latter turn these techniques against them. Second, the utility of alliances is limited by Riker's theory of coalitions: An increase in the number of allies decreases the benefits to each. Therefore, as an alliance increases in number, the probability of defection increases (Riker, 1962). Third, the minor ally may involve the major ally in disputes of its own from which the latter cannot disengage itself without heavy costs to its prestige. For these reasons, the utility of an alliance as a response to decline and a means to decrease costs is severely restricted.
The third and most difficult method of retrenchment is to make concessions to the rising power and thereby seek to appease its ambitions. Since the Munich conference in 1938, "appeasement" as a policy has been in disrepute and has been regarded as inappropriate under every conceivable set of circumstances. This is unfortunate, because there are historical examples in which appeasement has succeeded. Contending states have not only avoided conflict but also achieved a relationship satisfactory to both. A notable example was British appeasement of the rising United States in the decades prior to World War I (Perkins, 1968). The two countries ended a century-long hostility and laid the basis for what has come to be known as the "special relationship" of the two Anglo-Saxon powers.
The fundamental problem with a policy of appeasement and accommodation is to find a way to pursue it that does not lead to continuing deterioration in a state's prestige and international position. Retrenchment by its very nature is an indication of relative weakness and declining power, and thus retrenchment can have a deteriorating effect on relations with allies and rivals. Sensing the decline of their protector, allies try to obtain the best deal they can from the rising master of the system. Rivals are stimulated to "close in," and frequently they precipitate a conflict in the process. Thus World War I began as a conflict between Russia and Austria over the disposition of the remnants of the retreating Ottoman Empire (Hawtrey, 1952, pp. 75-81).
Because retrenchment signals waning power, a state seldom retrenches or makes concessions on its own initiative. Yet, not to retrench voluntarily and then to retrench in response to threats or military defeat means an even more severe loss of prestige and weakening of one's diplomatic standing. As a consequence of such defeats, allies defect to the victorious party, opponents press their advantage, and the retrenching society itself
becomes demoralized. Moreover, if the forced retrenchment involves the loss of a "vital . terest," then the security and integrity of the state are placed in jeopardy. For these rea-'ons retrenchment isa hazardous course for a state; it is a course seldom pursued by a declining power. However, there have been cases of a retrenchment policy being carried out rather successfully.
An excellent example of a declining hegemon that successfully brought its resources and commitments into balance is provided by Great Britain in the decades just rior to World War I. Following its victory over France in the Napoleonic wars, Great Britain had become the world's most powerful and most prestigious state. It gave its name to a century of relative peace, the Pax Britannica. British naval power was supreme on the high seas, and British industry and commerce were unchallengeable in world markets. An equilibrium had been established on the European continent by the Congress of Vienna (1814), and no military or industrial rivals then existed outside of Europe. By the last decades of the century, however, a profound transformation had taken place. Naval and industrial rivals had risen to challenge British supremacy both on the Continent and overseas. France, Germany, the United States, Japan, and Russia, to various degrees, had become expanding imperial powers. The unification of Germany by Prussia had destroyed the protective Continental equilibrium, and Germany's growing naval might threatened Britain's command of the seas.
As a consequence of these commercial, naval, and imperial challenges, Great Britain began to encounter the problems that face every mature or declining power. On the one hand, external demands were placing steadily increasing strains on the economy; on the other hand, the capacity of the economy to meet these demands had deteriorated. Thus, at the same time that the costs of protection were escalating, both private consumption and public consumption were also increasing because of greater affluence. Superficially the economy appeared strong, but the rates of industrial expansion, technological innovation, and domestic investment had slowed. Thus the rise of foreign challenges and the climacteric of the economy had brought on disequilibrium between British global commitments and British resources.
As the disequilibrium between its global hegemony and its limited resources intensified, Britain faced the dilemma of increasing its resources or reducing its commitments or both. In the national debate on this critical issue the proponents of increasing the available resources proposed two general courses of action. First, they proposed a drawing together of the empire and drawing on these combined resources, as well as the creation of what John Seeley (1905) called Greater Britain, especially the white dominions. This idea, however, did not have sufficient appeal at home or abroad. Second, reformers advocated measures to rejuvenate the declining British economy and to achieve greater efficiency. Unfortunately, as W. Arthur Lewis argued, all the roads that would have led to industrial innovation and a higher rate of economic growth were closed to the British for social, political, or ideological reasons (Lewis, 1978. p. 133). The primary solution to the problem of decline and disequilibrium, therefore, necessarily lay in the reduction oi overseas diplomatic and strategic commitments.
The specific diplomatic and strategic issue that faced British leadership was whether to maintain the global position identified with the Pax Britannica or to bring
100    Partií: International Realism
Hegemonic War and International Change 101
about a retrenchment of its global commitments. By the last decade of the century, Great Britain was confronted by rival land and sea powers on every continent and every sea European rivals were everywhere: Russia in the Far East, south Asia, and the Middle East; France in Asia, the Middle East, and north Africa; Germany in the Far East, the Middle East, and Africa. Furthermore, in the Far East, Japan had suddenly emerged as a great power; the United States also was becoming a naval power of consequence and was challenging Great Britain in the Western Hemisphere and the Pacific Ocean.
At the turn of the century, however, the predominant problem was perceived to be the challenge of German naval expansionism. Whereas all the other challenges posed limited and long-term threats, the danger embodied in Germany's decision to build a battle fleet! was immediate and portentous. Despite intense negotiations, no compromise of this naval armaments race could be reached. The only course open to the British was retrenchment of their power and commitments around the globe in order to concentrate their total efforts on the German challenge.
Great Britain settled its differences with its other foreign rivals one after another. In the 1890s came the settlement of the Venezuela-British Guiana border dispute in accordance with American desires; in effect, Britain acquiesced in America's primacy in the Caribbean Sea. A century of American-British uneasiness came to an end, and the foundation was laid for the Anglo-American alliance that would prevail in two world wars. ] Next, in the Anglo-Japanese alliance of 1902, Great Britain gave up its policy of going it | alone and took Japan as its partner in the Far East. Accepting Japanese supremacy in the \ northwestern Pacific as a counterweight to Russia, Great Britain withdrew to the south This was immediately followed in 1904 by the entente cordiale, which settled the Mediter- ! ranean and colonial confrontation between France and Great Britain and ended centuries of conflict. In 1907 the Anglo-Russian agreement resolved the British-Russian confrontation in the Far East, turned Russia's interest toward the Balkans, and eventually aligned Russia, Great Britain, and France against Germany and Austria. Thus, by the eve of World { War I, British commitments had been retrenched to a point that Britain could employ whatever power it possessed to arrest further decline in the face of expanding German power.
Thus far we have described two alternative sets of strategies that a great power may pursue in order to arrest its decline: to increase resources or to decrease costs. Each of these policies has succeeded to some degree at one time or another. Most frequently, however, the dominant state is unable to generate sufficient additional resources to defend its vital commitments; alternatively, it may be unable to reduce its cost and commitments to some manageable size. In these situations, the disequilibrium in the system becomes increasingly acute as the declining power tries to maintain its position and the rising power attempts to transform the system in ways that will advance its interests. As a consequence of this persisting disequilibrium, the international system is beset by tensions, uncertainties, and crises. However, such a stalemate in the system seldom persists for a long period of time.
Throughout history the primary means of resolving the disequilibrium between the structure of the international system and the redistribution of power has been war, more particularly, what we shall call a hegemonic war. In the words of Raymond Aron, describing World War I, a hegemonic war "is characterized less by its immediate causes
■ s explic'1 purposes than by its extent and the stakes involved. It affected all the °F litical units inside one system of relations between sovereign states. Let us call it, for P°     <-a better term* a war of hegemony, hegemony being, if not conscious motive, at ^ rate the inevitable consequence of the victory of at least one of the states or groups" n 1964, p. 359). Thus, a hegemonic war is the ultimate test of change in the rela-• e standings of the powers in the existing system.
' Every international system that the world has known has been a consequence of the erritorial, economic, and diplomatic realignments that have followed such hegemonic struggles- The most important consequence of a hegemonic war is that it changes the system in accordance with the new international distribution of power; it brings about a reordering of the basic components of the system. Victory and defeat reestablish an unambiguous hierarchy of prestige congruent with the new distribution of power in the vstem. The war determines who will govern the international system and whose interests will be primarily served by the new international order. The war leads to a redistribution of territory among the states in the system, a new set of rules of the system, a revised international division of labor, etc. As a consequence of these changes, a relatively more stable international order and effective governance of the international system are created based on the new realities of the international distribution of power. In short, hegemonic wars have (unfortunately) been functional and integral parts of the evolution and dynamics of international systems.
It is not inevitable, of course, that a hegemonic struggle will give rise immediately to a new hegemonic power and a renovated international order. As has frequently occurred, the combatants may exhaust themselves, and the "victorious" power may be unable to reorder the international system. The destruction of Rome by barbarian hordes led to the chaos of the Dark Ages. The Pax Britannica was not immediately replaced by the Pax Americana; there was a twenty year interregnum, what E. H. Carr called the "twenty years' crisis." Eventually, however, a new power or set of powers emerges to give governance to the international system.
What, then, are the defining characteristics of a hegemonic war? How does it differ from more limited conflicts among states? In the first place, such a war involves a direct contest between the dominant power or powers in an international system and the rising challenger or challengers. The conflict becomes total and in time is characterized by participation of all the major states and most of the minor states in the system. The tendency, in fact, is for every state in the system to be drawn into one or another of the opposing camps. Inflexible bipolar configurations of power (the Delian League versus the Peloponnesian League, the Triple Alliance versus the Triple Entente) frequently presage the outbreak of hegemonic conflict.
Second, the fundamental issue at stake is the nature and governance of the system. The legitimacy of the system may be said to be challenged. For this reason, hegemonic wars are unlimited conflicts; they are at once political, economic, and ideological in terms of significance and consequences. They become directed at the destruction of the offending social, political, or economic system and are usually followed by religious, political, or social transformation of the defeated society. The leveling of Carthage by Rome, the conversion of the Middle East to Islam by the Arabs, and the democratization of contemporary Japan and West Germany by the United States are salient examples----
102    Part II: International Realism
Third, a hegemonic war is characterized by the unlimited means employed and by the general scope of the warfare. Because all parties are drawn into the war and the stakes involved are high, few limitations, if any, are observed with respect to the means employed; the limitations on violence and treachery tend to be only those necessarily imposed by the state of technology, the available resources, and the fear of retaliation Similarly, the geographic scope of the war tends to expand to encompass the entire in-ternational system; these are "world" wars. Thus, hegemonic wars are characterized by their intensity, scope, and duration.
From the premodern world, the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta and 1 the Second Punic War between Carthage and Rome meet these criteria of hegemonic war. In the modern era, several wars have been hegemonic struggles: the Thirty Years' War (1618-48); the wars of Louis XIV (1667-1713); the wars of the French Revolution and Napoleon (1792-1814); World Wars I and II (1914-18, 1939-45) (Mowat, 1928, pp. 1-2). At issue in each of these great conflicts was the governance of the international system.
In addition to the preceding criteria that define hegemonic war, three preconditions generally appear to be associated with the outbreak of hegemonic war. In the first place, the intensification of conflicts among states is a consequence of the "closing in" of space and opportunities. With the aging of an international system and the expansion of states, the distance between states decreases, thereby causing them increasingly to come' into conflict with one another. The once-empty space around the centers of power in the system is appropriated. The exploitable resources begin to be used up, and opportunities for economic growth decline. The system begins to encounter limits to the growth and expansion of member states; states increasingly come into conflict with one another. Interstate relations become more and more a zero-sum game in which one state's gain is another's loss.
Marxists and realists share a sense of the importance of contracting frontiers and their significance for the stability and peace of the system. As long as expansion is possible, the law of uneven growth (or development) can operate with little disturbing effect on the overall stability of the system. In time, however, limits are reached, and the international system enters a period of crisis. The clashes among states for territory, resources, and markets increase in frequency and magnitude and eventually culminate in hegemonic war. Thus, as E. H. Carr told us, the relative peace of nineteenth-century Europe and the belief that a harmony of interest was providing a basis for increasing economic interdependence were due to the existence of "continuously expanding territories and markets" (1951, p. 224). The closing in of political and economic space led to the intensification of conflict and the final collapse of the system in the two world wars.
The second condition preceding hegemonic war is temporal and psychological rather than spatial; it is the perception that a fundamental historical change is taking place and the gnawing fear of one or more of the great powers that time is somehow beginning to work against it and that one should settle matters through preemptive war while the advantage is still on one's side. It was anxiety of this nature that Thucydides had in mind when he wrote that the growth of Athenian power inspired fear on the part of the Lacedaemonians and was the unseen cause of the war. The alternatives open to
Hegemonic War and International Change 103
state whose relative power is being eclipsed are seldom those of waging war versus * nioting peace, but rather waging war while the balance is still in that state's favor or waging war later when, the tide may have turned against it. Thus the motive for hegemonic war at least from the perspective of the dominant power, is to minimize one's losses rather than to maximize one's gains. In effect, a precondition for hegemonic war is the realization that the law of uneven growth has begun to operate to one's disadvantage.
The third precondition of hegemonic war is that the course of events begins to escape human control. Thus far, the argument of this study has proceeded as if mankind controlled its own destiny. The propositions presented and explored in an attempt to understand international political change have been phrased in terms of rational cost/benefit calculations. Up to a point, rationality does appear to apply; statesmen do explicitly or impliedly make rational calculations and then attempt to set the course of the ship of state accordingly. But it is equally true that events, especially those associated with the passions of war, can easily escape from human control.
"What is the force that moves nations?" Tolstoy inquires in the concluding part of War and Peace, and he answers that ultimately it is the masses in motion (1961, Vol. II, p. 1404). Leadership, calculation, control over events—these are merely the illusions of statesmen and scholars. The passions of men and the momentum of events take over and propel societies in novel and unanticipated directions. This is especially true during times of war. As the Athenians counseled the Peloponnesians in seeking to forestall war, "consider the vast influence of accident in war, before you engage in it. As it continues, it generally becomes an affair of chances, chances from which neither of us is exempt, and whose event we must risk in the dark. It is a common mistake in going to war to begin at the wrong end, to act first, and wait for disaster to discuss the matter" (Thucydides, 1951, p. 45).
Indeed, men seldom determine or even anticipate the consequences of hegemonic war. Although in going to war they desire to increase their gains or minimize their losses, they do not get the war they want or expect; they fail to recognize the pent-up forces they are unleashing or the larger historical significance of the decisions they are taking. They underestimate the eventual scope and intensity of the conflict on which they are embarking and its implications for their civilization. Hegemonic war arises from the structural conditions and disequilibrium of an international system, but its consequences are seldom predicted by statesmen. As Toynbee suggested, the law governing such conflicts would appear to favor rising states on the periphery of an international system rather than the contending states in the system itself. States directly engaged in hegemonic conflict, by weakening themselves, frequently actually eliminate obstacles to conquest by a peripheral power.
The great turning points in world history have been provided by these hegemonic struggles among political rivals; these periodic conflicts have reordered the international system and propelled history in new and uncharted directions. They resolve the question of which state will govern the system, as well as what ideas and values will predominate, thereby determining the ethos of succeeding ages. The outcomes of these wars affect the economic, social, and ideological structures of individual societies as well as the structure of the larger international system.
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In contrast to the emphasis placed here on the role of hegemonic war in changing the international system, it might be argued that domestic revolution can change the in ternational system. This is partially correct. It would be foolish to suggest, for example that the great revolutions of the twentieth century (the Russian, Chinese, and perhaps Iranian) have not had a profound impact on world politics. However, the primary consequence of these social and political upheavals (at least of the first two) has been to facii. itate the mobilization of the society's resources for purposes of national power. In other words, the significance of these revolutions for world politics is that they have served to strengthen (or weaken) their respective states and thereby cause a redistribution of power in the system.
As the distinguished French historian Elie Haley put it, "all great convulsions in the history of the world, and more particularly in modern Europe, have been at the same time wars and revolutions" (1965, p. 212). Thus the Thirty Years' War was both an international war among Sweden, France, and the Hapsburg Empire and a series of domestic conflicts among Protestant and Catholic parties. The wars of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic period that pitted France against the rest of Europe triggered political upheavals of class and national revolutions throughout Europe. World Wars I and II represented not only the decay of the European international political order but also an onslaught against political liberalism and economic laissez-faire. The triumph of American power in these wars meant not only American governance of the system but also reestablishment of a liberal world order.
1
Theory of International Relations. Garden City, N.Y.:
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Aron, Raymond. Peace and War-Doubleday, 1966.
-. "War and Industrial Society." In War—Studies from Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology,
edited by Leon Bramson and George W. Goethals, pp. 351 -394. New York: Basic Books, 1964.
-. The Imperial Republic. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1974.
Beer, Francis A. Peace Against War—The Ecology of International Violence. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman, 1981.
Carr, Edward Hallett, The Twenty Years'Crisis, 1919-1939. An Introduction to the Study of International Relations. London: Macmillan, 1951.
Cipolla, Carlo M. Guns, Sails and Empires—Technological Innovation and the Early Phases of European Expansion 1400-1700. New York: Minerva Press, 1965.
-. ed. The Economic Decline of Empires. London: Methuen, 1970.
Clark, George. War and Society in the Seventeenth Century. Cambridge University Press, 1958.
Clough, Shepard B. The Rise and Fall of Civilization. New York: Columbia University Press, 1970.
Downs, Anthony. An Economic Theoty of Democracy. New York: Harper & Row, 1957.
-. Inside Bureaucracy. Boston: Little, Brown, 1967.
Elvin, Mark. The Pattern of the Chinese Past. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1973. Grant, Michael. 77ie Climax of Rome, the Final Achievements of the Ancient World. London:
Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1968. Halevy, F.lic. The Era of Tyrannies. New York: Doubleday, 1965.
Hawtrey, Ralph G. Economic Aspects of Sovereignty. London: Longmans, Green, 1952.
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ffrnann Stanley, ed. Conteinporan- Theoty in International Relations. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
H° prentice-Hall, 1960.
"International Systems and International Law." In The State of War—Essays on the
Theory and Practice of International Politics, edited by Stanley Hoffmann, pp. 88-122.
New York: Praeger, 1965. _______ -'Choices." Foreign Policy 12 (1973): 3-42.
____"An American Social Science: International Relations." Daedalus 1 (1977): 41-60.
_ Primacy or World Order—American Foreign Policy since the Cold War. New York:
McGraw-Hill, 1978.
Lane Frederic C. "The Economic Meaning of War and Protection." Journal of Social Philosophy
and Jurisprudence 7 (1942): 254-70. ______ "Economic Consequences of Organized Violence." The Journal of Economic History 18
(1958): 401-17.
Venice and Histoiy: The Collected Papers of Frederic C Lane. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1966.
Venice—A Maritime Republic. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973.
Lewis, W. Arthur. The Theoty of Economic Growth. New York: Harper & Row, 1970. -. Growth and Fluctuations 1870-1913. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1978.
Lippmann, Walter. U.S. Foreign Policy: Shield of the Republic. Boston: Little, Brown, 1943.
"The Long Cycle of Global Politics and the Nation-State." Comparative Studies in Society and History 20 (1978): 214-35.
Luttwak, Edward. The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire—From the First Centuty A.D. to the Third. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976.
Mensch, Gerhard. Stalemate in Technology—Innovations Overcome the Depression. Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger Publishing, 1979.
Modelski, George. "Agraria and Industria: Two Models of the International System." World Politics 14(1961): 118-43.
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Mowat, R. B. A History of European Diplomacy 1451-1789. New York: Longmans, Green, 1928. Perkins, Bradford. The Great Rapprochement—England and the United States, 1895-1914.
New York: Atheneum, 1968. Rader, Trout. The Economics of Feudalism. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1971. Riker, William H. The Theory of Political Coalitions. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1962. Rostow, W. W. Politics and the Stages of Growth. Cambridge University Press, 1971. -. Gettingfrom Here to There. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978.
-. Why the Poor Get Richer and the Rich Slow Down: Essays in the Marshallian Long
Period. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1980. Seeley, John. The Expansion of England—Two Courses of Lectures. Boston: Little, Brown, 1905. Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War. New York: Modern Library, 1951. Tolstoy, L. N. War and Peace. 2 vols. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1961.
Toynbee, Arnold J. Survey of International Affairs 1930. London: Oxford University Press, 193 1.
-.A Study of History.Vote. 3 and 12. London: Oxford University Press, 1961.
von Ranke, Leopold. "The Great Powers" In Leopold Ranke—The Formative Years, edited by
Theodore H. von Laue, pp. 181-218. Princeton University Press, 1950. Walbank, F. W. The Awful Revolution: The Decline of the Roman Empire in the West. Liverpool:
Liverpool University Press, 1969. Wright, Quincy. A Study of War. 2 vols. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942.
Power, Culprits, and Arms
Geoffrey Blainey
THE ABACUS OF POWER
I
The Prussian soldier, Carl von Clausewitz, died of cholera in 1831, while leading an army against Polish rebels. He left behind sealed packets containing manuscripts which his widow published in the following year. The massive dishevelled books, entitled On War, could have been called On War and Peace, for Clausewitz implied that war and peace had much in common. In his opinion the leisurely siege of the eighteenth century was not much more than a forceful diplomatic note; that kind of war was 'only diplomacy somewhat intensified'.1 In essence diplomatic despatches breathed deference, but their courtesy was less effective than the silent threats which underwrote them. The threat might not be mentioned, but it was understood. The blunt words of Frederick the Great had similarly summed up the way in which military power influenced diplomacy: 'Diplomacy without armaments is like music without instruments'.2
Clausewitz had fought for Prussia in many campaigns against the French but he had more influence on wars in which he did not fight. He is said to have been the talisman of the German general who planned the invasions of France in 1870 and 1914. His books were translated into French just before the Crimean War and into English just after the Franco-Prussian War, and in military academies in many lands the name of this man who had won no great battles became more famous than most of those names inseparably linked with victorious battles. His writings however had less influence outside military circles. He was seen as a ruthless analyst who believed that war should sometimes be 'waged with the whole might of national power'.3 His views therefore seemed tainted to most civilians; he appeared to be the sinister propagandist of militarism. Those who studied a war's causes, as distinct from its course, ignored him. And yet one of the most dangerous fallacies in the study of war is the belief that the causes of a war and the events of a war belong to separate compartments and reflect completely different principles. This fallacy, translated into medicine, would require the causes and course of an illness to be diagnosed on quite different principles.
Reprinted with permission ofThe Free Press, a Division of Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group, and Palgrave Macmillan, from The Causes of War, 3rd Edition by Geoffrey Blainey. Copyright >D 1973, 1977. 1988 by Geoffrey Blainey. All rights reserved. Chapters 8.10. A siege likened to diplomacy: Clausewitz, 111 97.
-'Diplomacy without armaments': Gooch, Studies in Diplomacy, p. 226. "Waged with the whole might': Leonard, p. 25.
Power, Culprits, and Arms 107
Clausewitz s tumble of words was overwhelmingly on warfare, and the index of the three English volumes of his work points to only one sentence on peace. Nevertheless some of his views on peace can be inferred from lonely sentences. He believed that a clear ladder of international power tended to promote peace. 'A conqueror is always a lover of peace', he wrote.4 His statement at first sight seems preposterous, but at second sight it commands respect.5
Power is the crux of many explanations of war and peace, but its effects are not agreed upon. Most observers argue that a nation which is too powerful endangers the peace. A few hint, like Clausewitz, that a dominant nation can preserve the peace simply by its ability to keep inferior nations in order. There must be an answer to the disagreement. The last three centuries are studded with examples of how nations behaved in the face of every extremity of military and economic power.
That a lopsided balance of power will promote war is probably the most popular theory of international relations. It has the merit that it can be turned upside down to serve as an explanation of peace. It is also attractive because it can be applied to wars of many centuries, from the Carthaginian wars to the Second World War. The very phrase, 'balance of power', has the soothing sound of the panacea: it resembles the balance of nature and the balance of trade and other respectable concepts. It therefore suggests that an even balance of power is somehow desirable. The word 'balance', unfortunately, is confusing Whereas at one time it usually signified a set of weighing scales—in short it formerly signified either equality or inequality—it now usually signifies equality and equilibrium. In modern language the assertion that 'Germany had a favourable balance of power' is not completely clear. It is rather like a teacher who, finding no equality of opportunity in a school, proceeded to denounce the 'unfavourable equality of opportunity'. The verbal confusion may be partly responsible for the million vague and unpersuasive words which have been written around the concept of the balance of power.
The advantages of an even balance of power in Europe have been stressed by scores of historians and specialists in strategy. The grand old theory of international relations, it is still respected though no longer so venerated. According to Hedley Bull, who was a director of a research unit on arms control in the British foreign office before becoming professor of international relations at the Australian National University, 'The alternative to a stable balance of military power is a preponderance of power, which is very much more dangerous'.6 Likewise, Alastair Buchan, director of London's Institute for
''A conqueror': Clausewitz, 11155. r.„ii,;„„ ih-,1
'Clausewitz on peace: On first reading Clausewitz 1 noticed no comment on peace. Latei. ical,zmc thai he must have commented by implication, 1 skimmed through his work again. As h.s veterences to peace seem sparse, 1 cannot be sure that I have interpreted his views correctly. ''Bull: cited in Buchan, p. 34.
w
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Strategic Studies, suggested in his excellent book War in Modern Society: 'certainly^ know from our experience of the 1930s that the lack of such a balance creates a clear temp, tation to aggression'.7 Many writers of history have culled a similar lesson from past wars
Most believers in the balance of power think that a world of many powerful states tends to be more peaceful. There an aggressive state can be counterbalanced by a combination of other strong states. Quincy Wright, in his massive book, A Study of War, sug. gested with some reservations that 'the probability of war will decrease in proportion as the number of states in the system increases'.8 Arnold Toynbee,9 observing that the world contained eight major powers on the eve of the First World War and only two—the United States and the Soviet Union—at the close of the Second World War, thought the decline was ominous. A chair with only two legs, he argued, had less balance. As the years passed, and the two great powers avoided major war, some specialists on international affairs argued that a balance of terror had replaced the balance of power. In the nuclear age, they argued, two great powers were preferable to eight. The danger of a crisis that slipped from control was diminished if two powers dominated the world.10 Nevertheless even those who preferred to see two powers dominant in the nuclear age still believed, for the most part, that in the pre-nuclear era a world of many strong powers was safer.11
To my knowledge no historian or political scientist produced evidence to confirm that a power system of seven strong states was more conducive to peace than a system of two strong states. The idea relies much on analogies. Sometimes it resembles the kind of argument which old men invoked in European cities when the two-wheeled bicycle began to supersede the tricycle. At other times it resembles a belief in the virtues of free competition within an economic system. It parallels the idea that in business many ^ strong competitors will so function that none can win a preponderance of power; if one § seems likely to become predominant, others will temporarily combine to subdue him. It is possibly significant that this doctrine of flexible competition in economic affairs was brilliantly systematised at the time when a similar doctrine was refined in international affairs. While Adam Smith praised the virtues of the free market in economic affairs, the Swiss jurist Emerich de Vattel praised it in international affairs. In one sense both theories were reactions against a Europe in which powerful monarchs hampered economic life with meddlesome regulations and disturbed political life with frequent wars.
It is axiomatic that a world possessing seven nations of comparable strength, each of which values its independence, will be a substantial safeguard against the rise of one world-dominating power. Even two nations of comparable strength will be a useful safeguard. When all this has been said we possess not an axiom for peace but an axiom for national independence. And that in fact was the main virtue of a balance of power in the
Power, Culprits, and Arms 109
7Buchan, p. 177.
"Wright, abridged edn., p. 122.
''Toynbee, A Study of History, IX 244.
"The preference for a bi-polar system often seems to hinge on the idea that wars are often the result of situations which go further than either nation intended.
"Scholars'preference for a multi-polar system before 1945 and bi-polar system thereafter- G H Snyder in Pruitt and Snyder, p. 124. '
of those who originally practiced it. It was not primarily a formula for peace: it was e^forrnula for national independence. Edward Gulick,12 Massachusetts historian, was ^amant that its clearest theorists and practitioners—the Metternichs and Castlereaghs— ^all thought of war as an instrument to preserve or restore a balance of power'. In essence balance of power was simply a formula designed to prevent the rise of a nation to world domina'lce- " merely masqueraded as a formula for peace.
Ill
The idea that an even distribution of power promotes peace has gained strength partly because it has never been accompanied by tangible evidence. Like a ghost it has not been captured and examined for pallor and pulse-beat. And yet there is a point of time when the ghost can be captured. The actual distribution of power can be measured at the end of the war.
The military power of rival European alliances was most imbalanced, was distributed most unevenly, at the end of a decisive war. And decisive wars tended to lead to longer periods of international peace. Indecisive wars, in contrast, tended to produce shorter periods of peace. Thus the eighteenth century was characterised by inconclusive wars and by short periods of peace. During the long wars one alliance had great difficulty in defeating the other. Many of the wars ended in virtual deadlock: military power obviously was evenly balanced. Such wars tended to lead to short periods of peace. The War of the Polish Succession—basically an ineffectual war between France and Austria—was followed within five years by the War of the Austrian Succession. That war after eight years was so inconclusive on most fronts that the peace treaty signed in 1748 mainly affirmed the status quo. That ineffectual war was followed only eight years later by another general war, the Seven Years War, which ended with Britain the clear victor in the war at sea and beyond the seas, though on European soil the war was a stalemate. But even the Anglo-French peace which followed the Treaty of Paris in 1763 was not long; it ended after fifteen years. It ended when the revolt of the American colonies against Britain removed Britain's preponderance of power over France.
The French Revolutionary Wars which, beginning in 1792, raged across Europe and over the sea for a decade were more decisive than any major war for more than a century. They ended with France dominant on the continent and with England dominant at sea and in America and the East. They thus failed to solve the crucial question: was England or France the stronger power? The Peace of Amiens, which England and France signed in 1802, lasted little more than a year. So began the Napoleonic Wars which at last produced undisputed victors.
This is not to suggest that a general war which ended in decisive victory was the sole cause of a long period of peace. A decisive general war did not always lead to a long period of peace. This survey of the major wars of the period 1700 to 1815 does suggest however that the traditional theory which equates an even balance of power with peace should be reversed. Instead a clear preponderance of power tended to promote peace.
^Gulick. p. 36.
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Of the general wars fought in Europe in the last three centuries those with the m0s( decisive outcome were the Napoleonic (1815), Franco-Prussian (1871), First World War (1918). and Second World War (1945). The last days of those wars and the early years of the following periods of peace marked the height of the imbalance of power in Europe. At the end of those wars the scales of power were so tilted against the losers that Napoleon Bonaparte was sent as a captive to an island in the South Atlantic, Napoleon III was captured and permitted to live in exile in England, Kaiser Wilhelm II went into exile in Holland and Adolf Hitler committed suicide. Years after the end of those wars, the scales of power were still strongly tilted against the losers. And yet those years of extreme imbalance marked the first stages of perhaps the most pronounced periods of peace known to Europe in the last three or more centuries.
Exponents of the virtues of an even distribution of military power have concentrated entirely on the outbreak of war. They have ignored however the conditions surrounding the outbreak of peace. By ignoring the outbreak of peace they seem to have ignored the very period when the distribution of military power between warring nations can be accurately measured. For warfare is the one convincing way of measuring the distribution of power. The end of a war produces a neat ledger of power which has been duly audited and signed. According to that ledger an agreed preponderance of power tends to foster peace. In contrast the exponents of the orthodox theory examine closely the prelude to a war, but that is a period when power is muffled and much more difficult to measure. It is a period characterised by conflicting estimates of which nation or alliance is the most powerful. Indeed one can almost suggest that war is usually the outcome of a diplomatic crisis which cannot be solved because both sides have conflicting estimates of their bargaining power.
The link between a diplomatic crisis and the outbreak of war seems central to the understanding of war. That link however seems to be misunderstood. Thus many historians, in explaining the outbreak of war, argue that 'the breakdown in diplomacy led to war'. This explanation is rather like the argument that the end of winter led to spring: it is a description masquerading as an explanation. In fact that main influence which led to the breakdown of diplomacy—a contradictory sense of bargaining power—also prompted the nations to fight. At the end of a war the situation was reversed. Although I have not come across the parallel statement—'so the breakdown of war led to diplomacy'—it can be explained in a similar way. In essence the very factor which made the enemies reluctant to continue fighting also persuaded them to negotiate. That factor was their agreement about their relative bargaining position.
It is not the actual distribution or balance of power which is vital: it is rather the way in which national leaders think that power is distributed. In contrast orthodox theory assumes that the power of nations can be measured with some objectivity. It assumes that, in the pre-nuclear era, a statesman's knowledge of the balance of international power rested mainly on an 'objective comparison of military capabilities'.13 1 find it difficult
'The objective comparison of military capabilities': G. H. Snyder in Pruitt and Snyder p 117 According to Wright, p. 1 16, the term "balance of power' implies that fluctuations in power 'can be observed and measured".
Power, Culprits, and Arms 111
rto accept the idea that power could ever be measured with such objectivity. The hovV xception was at the end of wars—the points of time which theorists ignore. Indeed, C'ea^he problem of accurately measuring the relative power of nations which goes far to lt 1S)ain why wars occur. War is a dispute about the measurement of power. War marks the
choice ""'
of a new set of weights and measures.
In peace time the relations between two diplomats are like relations between two merchants. While the merchants trade in copper or transistors, the diplomats' transactions involve boundaries, spheres of influence, commercial concessions and a variety of other issues which they have in common. A foreign minister or diplomat is a merchant who bargains on behalf of his country. He is both buyer and seller, though he buys and sells privileges and obligations rather than commodities. The treaties he signs are simply more courteous versions of commercial contracts.
The difficulty in diplomacy, as in commerce, is to find an acceptable price for the transaction. Just as the price of merchandise such as copper roughly represents the point where the supply of copper balances the demand for it, the price of a transaction in diplomacy roughly marks the point at which one nation's willingness to pay matches the price demanded by the other. The diplomatic market however is not as sophisticated as the mercantile market. Political currency is not so easily measured as economic currency. Buying and selling in the diplomatic market is much closer to barter, and so resembles an ancient bazaar in which the traders have no accepted medium of exchange. In diplomacy each nation has the rough equivalent of a selling price—a price which it accepts when it sells a concession—and the equivalent of a buying price. Sometimes these prices are so far apart that a transaction vital to both nations cannot be completed peacefully; they cannot agree on the price of the transaction. The history of diplomacy is full of such crises. The ministers and diplomats of Russia and Japan could not agree in 1904, on the eve of the Russo-Japanese War; the Germans could not find acceptable terms with British and French ministers on the eve of the Second World War.
A diplomatic crisis is like a crisis in international payments; like a crisis in the English pound or the French franc. In a diplomatic crisis the currency of one nation or alliance is out of alignment with that of the others. These currencies are simply the estimates which each nation nourishes about its relative bargaining power. These estimates are not easy for an outsider to assess or to measure; and yet these estimates exist clearly in the minds of the ministers and diplomats who bargain.
For a crisis in international payments there are ultimate solutions which all nations recognise. If the English pound is the object of the crisis, and if its value is endangered because England is importing too much, the English government usually has to admit that it is living beyond its present means. As a remedy it may try to discourage imports and encourage exports. It may even have to declare that the value of the English pound is too high in relation to the French franc, the German mark and all other currencies, and accordingly it may fix the pound at a lower rate. Whichever solution it follows is not
112    Part II: International Realism
pleasant for the national pride and the people's purse. Fortunately there is less shame an^J humiliation for a nation which has to confess that its monetary currency is overvalue than for a country which has to confess that its diplomatic currency is overvalued. It js-almost as if the detailed statistics which record the currency crisis make it seem anonymous and unemotional. In contrast a diplomatic crisis is personal and emotional. The op ponent is not a sheet of statistics representing the sum of payments to and from all nations: the opponent is an armed nation to which aggressive intentions can be attributed and towards whom hatred can be felt.
A nation facing a payments crisis can measure the extent to which it is living be^ yond its means. As the months pass by, moreover, it can measure whether its remedies have been effective, for the statistics of its balance of payments are an accurate guide to the approach of a crisis and the passing of crisis. On the other hand a deficit in international power is not so easy to detect. A nation with an increasing deficit in international power may not even recognise its weaknesses. A nation may so mistake its bargaining power that it may make the ultimate appeal to war, and then learn through defeat in warfare to accept a humbler assessment of its bargaining position.
The death-watch wars of the eighteenth century exemplified such crises. A kingdom which was temporarily weakened by the accession of a new ruler or by the outbreak of civil unrest refused to believe that it was weaker. It usually behaved as if its bargaining position were unaltered. But its position, in the eyes of rival nations, was often drastically weaker. Negotiations were therefore frustrated because each nation demanded far more than the other was prepared to yield. Likewise the appeal to war was favoured because each side believed that it would win.
In diplomacy some nations for a longer period can live far beyond their means: to live beyond their means is to concede much less than they would have to concede if the issue was resolved by force. A government may be unyielding in negotiations because it predicts that its adversary does not want war. It may be unyielding because it has an inflated idea of its own military power. Or it may be unyielding because to yield to an enemy may weaken its standing and grip within its own land. Whereas an endangered nation facing a currency crisis cannot escape some punishment, in a diplomatic crisis it can completely escape punishment so long as the rival nation or alliance does not insist on war. Thus diplomacy may become more unrealistic, crises may become more frequent, and ultimately the tension and confusion may end in war. . ..
War itself provides the most reliable and most objective test of which nation or alliance is the most powerful. After a war which ended decisively, the warring nations agreed on their respective strength. The losers and the winners might have disagreed about the exact margin of superiority; they did agree however that decisive superiority existed. A decisive war was therefore usually followed by an orderly market in political power, or in other words peace. Indeed one vital difference between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was that wars tended to become more decisive. This is part of the explanation for the war-studded history of one century and the relative peacefulness of the following century. Whereas the eighteenth century more often had long and inconclusive wars followed by short periods of peace, the century after 1815 more often had short and decisive wars and long periods of peace.
Power, Culprits, and Arms 113
NevertheJess, during both centuries, the agreement about nations' bar-ammo power m^ lasted as long as one generation. Even when a war had ended decisively the hierarchy of power could not last indefinitely. It was blurred by the fading of memories of the previous war, by the access.on of new leaders who blamed the old leaders for the defeat, and by the legends and folklore which glossed over past defeats It was blurred by the weakening effects of internal unrest or the strengthening effects of military reor gamsation, by economic and technical change, by shifts in alliances, and by a variety of other influences. So the defeated nation regained confidence. When important issues arose, war became a possibihty. The rival nations believed that each could gam more bv figh,ing than by negotiating. Those contradictory hopes are characteristic of the outbreak of war. .. .
VII
Wars usually end when the fighting nations agree on their relative strength, and wars usually begin when fighting nations disagree on their relative strength. Agreement or disagreement is shaped by the same set of factors. Thus each factor that is a prominent cause of war can at times be a prominent cause of peace. Each factor can oscillate between war and peace, and the oscillation is most vivid in the history of nations which decided to fight because virtually everything was in their favour and decided to cease fighting because everything was pitted against them... .
AIMS AND ARMS I
A culprit stands in the centre of most generalised explanations of war. While there may be dispute in naming the culprit, it is widely believed that the culprit exists.
In the eighteenth century many philosophers thought that the ambitions of absolute monarchs were the main cause of war: pull down the mighty, and wars would become rare. Another theory contended that many wars came from the Anglo-French rivalry for colonies and commerce: restrain that quest, and peace would be more easily preserved. The wars following the French Revolution fostered an idea that popular revolutions were becoming the main cause of international war. In the nineteenth century, monarchs who sought to unite their troubled country by a glorious foreign war were widely seen as culprits. At the end of that century the capitalists' chase for markets or investment outlets became a popular villain. The First World War convinced many writers that armaments races and arms salesmen had become the villains, and both world wars fostered the idea that militarist regimes were the main disturbers of the peace.
Most of these theories of war have flourished, then fallen away, only to appear again in new dress. The eighteenth-century belief that mercantilism was the main cause of war was re-clothed by the Englishman, J. A. Hobson, and tiie Russian exile'. V. 1. Lenin, in the Boer War and in the First World War; and the theme that manufacturers of armaments
114    Part 11: International Realism
were the chief plotters of war was revived to explain the widening of the war in Vietnam The resilience of this type of explanation is probably aided by the fact that it carries its' own solution to war. Since it points to a particular culprit, we only have to eliminate the culprit in order to abolish war. By abolishing dictators, capitalists, militarists, manufac. turers of armaments or one of the other villains, peace would be preserved. Indeed it js-often the passion for the antidote—whether democracy, socialism or free trade—rather than an analysis of the illness that popularises many of these theories of war.
These theories assume that ambitions and motives are the dominant cause of wars As war is increasingly denounced as the scarlet sin of civilisation, it is understandable that the search for the causes of war should often become a search for villains. The search is aided by the surviving records of war. So many of the documents surrounding the outbreak of every war—whether the War of Spanish Succession or the recent War of the Saigon Succession—are attempts to blame the other side. The surviving records of wars are infected with insinuations and accusations of guilt, and some of that infection is transmitted to the writings of those who, generations or centuries later, study those wars. Since so much research into war is a search for villains, and since the evidence itself is dominated by attempts to apportion blame, it is not surprising that many theories of war and explanations of individual wars are centred on the aims of 'aggressors'.
Most controversies about the causes of particular wars also hinge on the aims of nations. What did France and England hope to gain by aiding the Turks against the Russians in the Crimean War? What were the ambitions of Bismarck and Napoleon III on the eve of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870? Who deserves most blame for the outbreak of the First World War? The evergreen examination-question at schools and universities—were the main causes of a certain war political or economic or religious—reflects the strong tradition that ambitions are the key to understanding war.
The running debate on the causes of the Vietnam War is therefore in a rich tradition. Measured by the mileage of words unrolled it must be the most voluminous which any war has aroused, but it is mainly the traditional debate about ambitions and motives. The war in Vietnam is variously said to have been caused by the desire of United States' capitalists for markets and investment outlets, by the pressures of American military suppliers, by the American hostility to communism, by the crusading ambitions of Moscow and Peking, the aggressive nationalism or communism of Hanoi, the corruption or aggression of Saigon, or the headlong clash of other aims. The kernel of the debate is the assumption that pressures or ambitions are the main causes of the war.
II
The idea that war is caused simply by a clash of aims is intrinsically satisfying. It is easy to believe that historians will ultimately understand the causes of war if only they can unravel the ambitions held on the eve of a war by the relevant monarchs, prime ministers, presidents, chiefs of staff, archbishops, editors, intellectuals and cheering or silent crowds. Explanations based on ambitions however have a hidden weakness. They portray ambitions which were so strong that war was inevitable. It is almost a hallmark of such interpretations to describe ambitions—whether for prestige, ideology, markets or
Power, Culprits, and Anns 115
: _-as the fundamental causes, the basic causes, the deepseated, underlying or long-^^"causes Such causes merely need the provocation of minor events to produce war. telTn • nr events ate usually referred to as the occasion for war as distinct from the causes Sometimes the incidents which immediately precede the war are called the short-
ofwar.
; that long-term causes are more powerful.
term causes: the assumpti
This idea of causation has a distinctive shape. Its exponents see conflict as a volcano . h seeming to slumber, is really approaching the day of terror. They see conflict as water W ' n's|0Wiy gathers heat and at last comes to the boil. The events which happen on the eve Wf war add the last few degrees of heat to the volcano or kettle. It is a linear kind of argu-° enf the causes of war are like a graph of temperatures and the last upward movement on the graph marks the transition from peace to war. If in fact such a graph were a valid way of d nicting the coming of war, one would also expect to see the temperature curve move downwards in the last days of a war. One would also expect that if, on the eve of a war, minor incidents could convert the long-term causes of conflict into war, similar incidents could activate the transition from war to peace. No such explanations however are offered for the end of a war. If one believes that the framework of an explanation of war should also be valid for an explanation of peace, the volcano or kettle theories are suspect.
For any explanation the framework is crucial. In every field of knowledge the accepted explanations depend less on the marshalling of evidence than on preconceptions of what serves as a logical framework for the evidence. The framework dominates the evidence, because it dictates what evidence should be sought or ignored. Our idea of a logical framework is often unconscious, and this elusiveness enhances its grip. One may suggest that the explanations of war which stress ambitions are resting on a persuasive but rickety framework.
The policies of a Frederick the Great, a Napoleon and a President Lincoln were clearly important in understanding wars. So too were the hopes of the inner circles of power in which they moved and the hopes of the people whom they led. Likewise the aims of all the surrounding nations—irrespective of their eagerness or reluctance to fight— were important. It is doubtful however whether a study of the aims of many wars will yield useful patterns. There is scant evidence to suggest that century after century the main aims of nations which went to war could be packaged into a simple economic, religious or political formula. There is no evidence that, over a long period, the desire for territory or markets or the desire to spread an ideology tended to dominate all other war aims. It is even difficult to argue that certain kinds of aims were dominant in one generation. Admittedly it is often said that the main 'causes'—meaning the main aims—of war were religious in the sixteenth century, dynastic or mercantile in various phases of the eighteenth century and nationalist or economic in the nineteenth century. It seems more likely, however, that those who share in a decision to wage war pursued a variety of aims which even fluctuated during the same week and certainly altered during the course of the war.
One generalisation about war aims can be offered with confidence. The aims are simply varieties of power The vanity of nationalism, the will to spread an ideology, the protection of kinsmen in an adjacent land, the desire for more territory or commerce, the avenging of a defeat or insult, the craving for greater national strength or independence, the wish to impress or cement alliances   all these represent power in different wrappings.
116    Pari I/: International Realism
i
The conflicting aims of rival nations are always conflicts of power. Not only is power the j issue at stake, but the decision to resolve that issue by peaceful or warlike methods js ] largely determined by assessments of relative power.
Ill
The explanations that stress aims are theories of rivalry and animosity and not theories of war. They help to explain increasing rivalry between nations but they do not explain why the rivalry led to war. For a serious rift between nations does not necessarily end in war It may take other forms: the severing of diplomatic relations; the peaceful intervention of a powerful outside nation; an economic blockade; heavy spending on armaments; the imposing of tariffs; an invasion accomplished without bloodshed; the enlisting of allies' or even the relaxing of tension through a successful conference. Of course these varieties of conflict may merely postpone the coming of war but serious rivalry and animosity can exist for a century without involving warfare. France and Britain were serious rivals who experienced dangerous crises between 1815 and 1900. but the war so often feared did not eventuate.
One may suggest that this kind of interpretation is hazy about the causes of peace as well as war. Its exponents usually ignore the question of why a war came to an end. They thus ignore the event which would force them to revise their analysis of the causes of war. Consider for instance the popular but dubious belief that the main cause of the First World War was Berlin's desire to dominate Europe. Now if such an explanation is valid, what were the main causes of the peace which ensued in 1918? It would be consistent with this interpretation to reply that the crumbling of German ambitions led to peace. And why had those ambitions crumbled? Because by October 1918 Germany's military power—and morale is a vital ingredient of power—was no longer adequate. As the emphasis on aims cannot explain Germany's desire for peace in 1918, it would be surprising if the emphasis on aims could explain Germany's decision for war in 1914. Indeed Germany's aims would not have been high in 1914 if her leaders then had believed that Germany lacked adequate power. Befhmann Hollweg, chancellor of Germany % at the outbreak of war, confessed later that Germany in 1914 had overvalued her strength. 'Our people', he said, 'had developed so amazingly in the last twenty years that wide circles succumbed to the temptation of overestimating our enormous forces in relation to those of the rest of the world.'14
One conclusion seems clear. It is dangerous to accept any explanation of war which concentrates on ambitions and ignores the means of carrying out those ambitions. A government's aims are strongly influenced by this assessment of whether it has sufficient strength to achieve these aims. Indeed the two factors interact quietly and swiftly. When Hitler won power in 1933 and had long-term hopes of reviving German greatness, his ambitions could not alone produce a forceful foreign policy. Hitler's foreign policy in 1933 was no more forceful than his means, in his judgment, permitted.
Poire/: Culprits, and Arms 117
His military and diplomatic weapons, in his opinion, did not at first permit a bold foreign policy. A. .1. P. Taylor's The Origins of the Second World War, one of the most masterly books on a particular war, reveals Hitler as an alert opportunist who tempered his objectives to the available means of achieving them. When Hitler began to rearm Germany he was guided not only by ambitions but by his sense of Germany's baroain-. jng position in Europe. He would not have rearmed if he had believed that France or Russia would forcefully prevent him from building aircraft, submarines and tanks In the main decisions which Hitler made between 1933 and the beginning of war in 1939 his short-term objectives and his sense of Germany's bargaining position marched so neatly in step that it is impossible to tell whether his aims or his oscillating sense of Germany's strength beat the drum. Opportunity and ambition—or aims and'arms—so acted upon one another that they were virtually inseparable. The interaction was not confined to Berlin; it occurred in the 1930s in London. Pans, Warsaw, Moscow, Rome, Prague and all the cities of power. ...
REFERENCES
Buchan, Alastair. War in Modem Society: an introduction (London, 1968). Clausewitz, Carl von. On War, ed. by F. N. Maude, tr. from German. 3 vols. (London, 1940). Fischer, Fritz. Germany's Aims in the First World War, tr. from German (London, 1967). Gooch, G. P. Studies in Diplomacy and Statecraft (London. 1942).
-. Louis XV: the monarchy in decline (London, ) 956).
Gulick, E. V. Europe s Classical Balance of Power (New York, 1967).
Leonard, Roger A., ed. A Short Guide to Clausewitz on War (London, 1967).
Pruitt, Dean G. and Snyder, R. C, eds. Theory and Research on the Causes of War (Englewood
Cliffs, New Jersey, 1969). Toynbee, Arnold. Experiences (London, 1969).
-. A Study of History, 12 vols. (London, 1934-61).
Wright, Quincy. A Study of War, 2 vols. (Chicago. 1942).
-. A Study of War, abridged by Louis L. Wright (Chicago, 1965).
'Our people'. Fischöl p 637
PART III
International Liberalism: Institutions and Cooperation
Realist theories sometimes dominate academic thinking about international relations, especially in periods when the world finds itself locked in conflict. But realist theories have never been popular in periods of optimism because they seem so fatalistic and unhopeful, and so oblivious to the power of values, cooperative institutions, and logical alternatives to destructive competition.
In the previous section E. H. Carr presented idealism as the alternative to realism. Many sorts of ideals can drive people toward war or away from it: for example, religious militance (the Crusades or the Thirty Years' War), religious pacifism (the Quakers), racist ideology (German fascism), or militarist moral codes (Japanese Bushido). At the moment, however, liberalism—the idealism of the contemporary Western world—is the only major challenge to realism.1 Many theorists also believe that liberal ideas about international life are no less grounded in reality than is realism—that liberalism is not wishful thinking about the "harmony of interests," as Carr presented it, but a description of how the world sometimes does work as well as how it should.
"Liberal" in the sense used here does not mean left-of-center, the colloquial meaning of the word in U.S. politics. Rather it means the broad philosophical tradition that enshrines the values of individual political and economic liberty, the free market of ideas and enterprise—the basic values that unite what passes for left and right in American politics. The United States has been so fundamentally liberal a country in this general sense that most Americans take the basic principles utterly for granted, and are not even
'Radical Islannsm is another form of idealism that challenges .-.ecular liberalism and realism Several selections in Part IX of this volume explore this other set of ideas and motives.
120    Pert ill: liitenuilioiuil Liberalism
Pari IU: International Liberalism 121
conscious of (heir liberalism as a distinct ideology. Debates occur only among different schools within liberalism.2
Three general points distinguish liberal views of international conflict from realism or. in some respects. Marxism:
First, ideas matter. The pen is mightier than the sword, and a society's political and economic values will make it more or less prone to peace, no matter what the structure of the international balance of power may be. "Good" states—liberal republics—are likelv to use force only in what they believe to be self-defense, not for the purpose of rul- ] ing or exploiting others. Societies devoted to free trade will seek profit through exchange and comparative advantage in production rather than through conquest and plunder.
Second, history is progress, a process of development in which the right ideas steadily drive out the wrong, not a cycle in which the fate of nations is to repeat the same follies. With allowances for exceptions and occasional backsliding, the world has been developing from primitive, parochial, short-sighted, and destructive behavior toward modern, cosmopolitan, efficient interchange. This is the conviction that animates Fukuyama's "End of History" and Kant's "Perpetual Peace."
Third, the fact that the international system is anarchic does not bar civility among nations. Under certain conditions, norms of cooperation can help keep countries from each others' throats because governments can recognize their mutual interest in avoiding conflict.3 To realists, insecurity and the possibility of war are inherent in a system of separate states without an overarching authority. To liberals, anarchy may be a necessary cause of war but not a sufficient one. The proximate cause of war is usually that people who are bad, backward, or deluded decide to start it. The causes can be exposed as unnecessary, inimical to selfish material interests as well as moral ones, and can thus be overcome by the spread of liberal values and institutions.
Kant's "Perpetual Peace" is as classic a statement of some aspects of the liberal paradigm as Thucydides' Peloponnesian War is of the realist.4 Kant claims that the tendency to progress is inherent in nature, and that as men and republics improve themselves they will create permanent peace. Michael Doyle supplements Kant's theory with impressive empirical evidence that democratic states do not go to war with each other. True, they have fought many wars with alacrity, but not against each other. If the authoritarian states that democracies tend to fight are disappearing, there should soon be fewer occasions for war. The "democratic peace" theory, which has burgeoned since Doyle revived it, has become in recent years the most influential idea to be adopted by U.S. foreign policy from academic political science. The Clinton
■ jstration proclaimed it as a warrant for enlarging the international community lemocracies. and a reason that activism otherwise seen as humanitarian should °^ Letillered to serve the material interest of the United States; the administration
be considered to
0f Bush the Younger cited it as justification for liberating Iraq from the regime of Saddam Hussein.
Faith in the pacifying effects of liberal practices and institutions animates the think-in" of Western political leaders with a frequency that discredits hyper-realist denigration ofthe effect of domestic politics on foreign policy. This is illustrated in the speeches of British parliamentarian Richard Cobden and American President Woodrow Wilson, excerpted in this section. Both reflect the conviction that international order can be modeled on the domestic legal norms and practices of liberal societies. Among the more contemporary authors in this section, Hedley Bull argues that the international system has become more civil than the state of nature, even without a sovereign to suppress conflict. Keohane and Nye present the case for why modern interdependence among states reduced the utility of force in relations among them, even before the end of the Cold War."1
Liberal arguments of various sorts about the obsolescence of war, declining significance ofthe nation-state, and growing import of cooperative supranational institutions have been popular periodically in the past. One recent instance was the resurgence of such ideas in the 1970s, just after the Vietnam War soured many observers on the utility of force and before the collapse of U.S.-Soviet detente made optimism about basic changes in international relations seem premature. With the reinvigoration of the Cold War at the end of the 1970s, realism became the dominant school of thought again. Then as the end of the Cold War was celebrated and widely seen as a fundamentally new departure in world development, the liberal paradigm again became ascendant in the 1990s. September 11, 2001, shook the confidence many had in the ineluctable triumph of international liberalism and the pacifying effects of globalization. The record of the past two centuries suggests, however, that as long as Western societies remain strong and vigorous, liberalism will be a resilient and durable source of thinking about the causes of peace.
—RKB
-See Louis Han/. The Liberal Tradition in America (New York: Harcouvt, Brace. 195?). The deep roots of liberal assumptions lie behind much of the American behavior that realists criticize as legalistic and moralistic. See George F. Kcnnan. American Diplomacy. 1'HI0-1°)D (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1951).
'See Kenneth A. Oye. ed.. Cooperation Under Anaicln (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1986): and Rohen Axelrod. The LA uliitmn ol Cooperation (New York Basic Books, 1984). ^For an argument ihm reconciles Kam with realism see Kenneth N. Waltz. "Kant. Liberalism, and War." Anu-i icon Tolith al Si: wiu c AY\iew so. No 2 (.lime 1962).
Tor an earlier essay in this vein see Klaus Knorr. On the Utility ol Force in the Niiclcni . Igc (Princeton-Princeton University Press. 1966). Knorr later bad second thoughts about how far the argument was beam laken in literature ofthe earls 1970s, and qualified Ins views. See Knorr. "Is International Coercion Waning or Rising?" International Security I. No. 4 (spring 1977). and "On the Inlern.iuonal l.scs ol Force m the Contemporary World." Orhis 21. No I (spimg 1977).
Perpetual Peace
Immanuel Kant
SECTION II: CONTAINING THE DEFINITIVE ARTICLES FOR PERPETUAL PEACE AMONG STATES
The state of peace among men living side by side is not the natural state (status naturalis); the natural state is one of war. This does not always mean open hostilities, but at least an unceasing threat of war. A state of peace, therefore, must be established, for in order to be secured against hostility it is not sufficient that hostilities simply be not committed; and, unless this security is pledged to each by his neighbor (a thing that can occur only in a civil state), each may treat his neighbor, from whom he demands this security, as an enemy.
First Definitive Article for Perpetual Peace
"The Civil Constitution of Every State Should Be Republican" The only constitution which derives from the idea of the original compact, and on which all juridical legislation of a people must be based, is the republican.
. .. The republican constitution, besides the purity of its origin (having sprung from the pure source of the concept of law), also gives a favorable prospect for the desired consequence, i.e., perpetual peace. The reason is this: if the consent of the citizens is required in order to decide that war should be declared (and in this constitution it cannot but be the case), nothing is more natural than that they would be very cautious in commencing such a poor game, decreeing for themselves all the calamities of war. Among the latter would be: having to fight, having to pay the costs of war from their own resources, having painfully to repair the devastation war leaves behind, and, to fill up the measure of evils, load themselves with a heavy national debt that would embitter peace itself and that can never be liquidated on account of constant wars in the future. But, on the other hand, in a constitution which is not republican, and under which the subjects are not citizens, a declaration of war is the easiest thing in the world to decide upon, because war does not require of the ruler, who is the proprietor and not a member of the state, the least sacrifice of the pleasures of his table, the chase, his country houses, his court functions, and the like. He may, therefore, resolve on war as on a pleasure party for the most trivial reasons, and with perfect indifference leave the justification which decency requires to the diplomatic corps who are ready to provide it. . . .
Perpetual Peace 123
Immanuel Kant. "Perpetual Peace." in Immanuel Kant: On History, Lewis White Beck. ed. and trans. Copyright «':■ l%4 Reprinted by permission of Prentice Hall, Inc.. Upper Saddle River. N.I. Originally published in 1795.
Second Definitive Article for a Perpetual Peace
■'The Law of Nations Shall Be Founded on a Federation of Free States" Peoples, states, like individuals, may be judged to injure one another merely by their coexistence in the state of nature (i.e., while independent of external laws). Each of them may and should for the sake of its own security demand that the others enter with it into a constitution similar to the civil constitution, for under such a constitution each can be secure in his rieht. This would be a league of nations, but it would not have to be a state consists" of nations. That would be contradictory, since a state implies the relation of a superior (legislating) to an inferior (obeying) i.e., the people, and many nations in one state would then constitute only one nation. This contradicts the presupposition, for here we have to weigh the rights of nations against each other so far as they are distinct states and not amalgamated into one.
When we see the attachment of savages to their lawless freedom, preferring ceaseless combat to subjection to a lawful constraint which they might establish, and thus preferring senseless freedom to rational freedom, we regard it with deep contempt as barbarity, rudeness, and a brutish degradation of humanity. Accordingly, one would think that civilized people (each united in a state) would hasten all the more to escape, the sooner the better, from such a depraved condition. But, instead, each state places its majesty (for it is absurd to speak of the majesty of the people) in being subject to no external juridical restraint, and the splendor of its sovereign consists in the fact that many thousands stand at his command to sacrifice themselves for something that does not concern them and without his needing to place himself in the least danger. The chief difference between European and American savages lies in the fact that many tribes of the latter have been eaten by their enemies, while the former know how to make better use of their conquered enemies than to dine off them; they know better how to use them to increase the number of their subjects and thus the quantity of instruments for even more extensive wars.
When we consider the perverseness of human nature which is nakedly revealed in the uncontrolled relations between nations (this perverseness being veiled in the state of civil law by the constraint exercised by government), we may well be astonished that the word "law" has not yet been banished from war politics as pedantic, and that no state has yet been bold enough to advocate this point of view. Up to the present, Hugo Grotius, Pufendorf, Vattel, and many other irritating comforters have been cited in justification of war, though their code, philosophically or diplomatically formulated, has not and cannot have the least legal force, because states as such do not stand under a common external power. There is no instance on record that a state has ever been moved to desist from its purpose because of arguments backed up by the testimony of such great men. But the homage which each state pays (at least in words) to the concept of law proves that there is slumbering in man an even greater moral disposition to become master of the evil principle in himself (which he cannot disclaim) and to hope for the same from others. Otherwise the word "law" would never be pronounced by states which wish to war upon one another; it would be used only ironically, as a Gallic prince interpreted it when he said, "It is the prerogative which nature has given the stronger that the weaker should obey him."
122
124    Pail 111: International Liberalism
States do not plead their cause before a tribunal; war alone is their way of bringing suit. But by war and its favorable issue in victory, right is not decided, and though by treaty of peace this particular war is brought to an end, the state of war, of always finding a new pretext to hostilities, is not terminated. Nor can this be declared wrong, considering the fact that in this state each is the judge of his own case. Notwithstanding, the obligation which men in a lawless condition have under the natural law, and which requires them to abandon the state of nature, does not quite apply to states under the law of nations, for as states they already have an internal juridical constitution and have thus outgrown compulsion from others to submit to a more extended lawful constitution ac- ; cording to their ideas of right. This is true in spite of the fact that reason, from its throne of supreme moral legislating authority, absolutely condemns war as a legal recourse and makes a state of peace a direct duty, even though peace cannot be established or secured ' except by a compact among nations.
For these reasons there must be a league of a particular kind, which can be called a league of peace (foedus pacifiewn), and which would be distinguished from a treaty of peace (pactum pads) by the fact that the latter terminates only one war, while the former seeks to make an end of all wars forever. This league does not tend to any dominion over the power of the state but only to the maintenance and security of the freedom of the state itself and of other states in league with it, without there being any need for them to submit to civil laws and their compulsion, as men in a state of nature must submit.
The practicability (objective reality) of this idea of federation, which should gradually spread to all states and thus lead to perpetual peace, can be proved. For if fortune directs that a powerful and enlightened people can make itself a republic, which by its nature must be inclined to perpetual peace, this gives a fulcrum to the federation with other states so that they may adhere to it and thus secure freedom under the idea of the law of nations. By more and more such associations, the federation may be gradually extended.
We may readily conceive that a people should say, "There ought to be no war among us, for we want to make ourselves into a state; that is, we want to establish a supreme legislative, executive, and judiciary power which will reconcile our differences peaceably." But when this state says, "There ought to be no war between myself and other states, even though 1 acknowledge no supreme legislative power by which our rights are mutually guaranteed," it is not at all clear on what I can base my confidence in my own rights unless it is the free federation, the surrogate of the civil social order, which reason necessarily associates with the concept of the law of nations—assuming that something is really meant by the latter.
The concept of a law of nations as a right to make war does not really mean anything, because it is then a law of deciding what is right by unilateral maxims through force and not by universally valid public laws which restrict the freedom of each one. The only conceivable meaning of such a law of nations might be that it serves men right who are so inclined that they should destroy each other and thus find perpetual peace in the vast grave that swallows both the atrocities and their perpetrators. For states in their relation to each other, there cannot be any reasonable way out of the lawless condition which entails only war except that they, like individual men, should give up their savage (lawless) freedom, adjust themselves to the constraints of public law, and thus establish a continuously growing
Perpetual Peace 125
tate consisting of various nations (civitas gentium), which will ultimately include all the prions of the world. But under the idea of the law of nations they do not wish this, and . c( jn practice what is correct in theory. If all is not to be lost, there can be. then, in place of the positive idea of a world republic, only the negative surrogate of an alliance which averts war. endures, spreads, and holds back the stream of those hostile passions which fear the law though such an alliance is in constant peril of their breaking loose again. Furor impius hints ■ ■ ■ fre"u! horridus ore cruenlo (Virgil). . . .
First Supplement: Of the Guarantee for Perpetual Peace
The guarantee of perpetual peace is nothing less than that great artist, nature (nattira daedala rentm). In her mechanical course we see that her aim is to produce a harmony among men, against their will and indeed through their discord. As a necessity working according to laws we do not know, we call it destiny. But considering its design in world history, we call it "providence," inasmuch as we discern in it the profound wisdom of a higher cause which predetermines the course of nature and directs it to the objective final end of the human race.
Before we more narrowly define the guarantee which nature gives, it is necessary to examine the situation in which she has placed her actors on her vast stage, a situation which finally assures peace among them. Then we shall see how she accomplishes the latter. Her preparatory arrangements are:
1. In every region of the world she has made it possible for men to live.
2. By war she has driven them even into the most inhospitable regions in order to populate them.
3. By the same means, she has forced them into more or less lawful relations with each other. . . .
The first instrument of war among the animals which man learned to tame and to domesticate was the horse (for the elephant belongs to later times, to the luxury of already established states). The art of cultivating certain types of plants (grain) whose original characteristics we do not know, and the increase and improvement of fruits by transplantation and grafting (in Europe perhaps only the crab apple and the wild pear), could arise only under conditions prevailing in already established states where property was secure. Before this could take place, it was necessary that men who had first subsisted in anarchic freedom by hunting, fishing, and sheepherding should have been forced into an agricultural life. Then salt and iron were discovered. These were perhaps the first articles of commerce for the various peoples and were sought far and wide; in this way a peaceful traffic among nations was established, and thus understanding, conventions, and peaceable relations were established among the most distant peoples.
As nature saw to it that men could live everywhere in the world, she also despotically willed that they should do so, even against their inclination and without this ought being based on a concept of duty to which they were bound by a moral law. She chose war as the means to this end. So we see peoples whose common language shows
126    Part III: International Liberalism
that they have a common origin. For instance, the Samoyeds on the Arctic Ocean and a people with a similar language a thousand miles away in the Altaian Mountains are separated by a Mongolian people adept at horsemanship and hence at war;, the latter ; drove the former into the most inhospitable arctic regions where they certainly would not have spread of their own accord. Again, it is the same with the Finns who in the most northerly part of Europe are called Lapps; Goths and Sarmatians have separated them from the Hungarians to whom they are related in language. What can have driven the Eskimos, a race entirely distinct from all others in America and perhaps descended from primeval European adventurers, so far into the North, or the Pescherais as far south as Tierra del Fuego, if it were not war which nature uses to populate the whole earth? War itself requires no special motive but appears to be engrafted on human nature; it passes even for something noble, to which the love of glory impels men quite apart from any selfish urges. Thus among the American savages, just as much as among those of Europe during the age of chivalry, military valor is held to be of great worth in itself, not only during war (which is natural) but in order that there should be war. Often war is waged only in order to show valor thus an inner dignity is ascribed to war itself, and even some philosophers have praised it as an ennoblement of humanity, forgetting the pronouncement of the Greek who said, "War is an evil inasmuch as it produces more wicked men than it takes away." So much for the measures nature takes to lead the human race, considered as a class of animals, to her own end.
Now we come to the question concerning that which is most essential in the design of perpetual peace: What has nature done with regard to this end which man's own reason makes his duty? That is, what has nature done to favor man's moral purpose, and how has she guaranteed (by compulsion but without prejudice to his freedom) that he shall do that which he ought to but does not do under the laws of freedom? This question refers to all three phases of public law, namely, civil law, the law of nations, and the law of citizenship. If I say of nature that she wills that this or that occur, I do not mean that she imposes a duty on us to do it, for this can be done only by free practical reason; rather I mean that she herself does it, whether we will or not (fata volentem due tint, nolentem trahunt).
(1) Even if a people were not forced by internal discord to submit to public laws, war would compel them to do so, for we have already seen that nature has placed each people near another which presses upon it, and against this it must form itself into a state in order to defend itself. Now the republican constitution is the only one entirely fitting to the rights of man. But it is the most difficult to establish and even harder to preserve, so that many say a republic would have to be a nation of angels, because men with their selfish inclinations are not capable of a constitution of such sublime form. But precisely with these inclinations nature comes to the aid of the general will established on reason, which is revered even though impotent in practice. Thus it is only a question of a good organization of the state (which does lie in man's power), whereby the powers of each selfish inclination are so arranged in opposition that one moderates or destroys the ruinous effect of the other. The consequence for reason is the same as if none of them existed, and man is forced to be a good citizen even if not a morally good person.
Perpetual Peace    127
The problem of organizing a state, however hard it may seem, can be solved even race of devils, if only they are intelligent. The problem is: "Given a multitude of ra-al beinas requiring universal laws for their preservation, but each of whom is secretly cfined to"exempt himself from them, to establish a constitution in such a way that, al-'     h their private intentions conflict, they check each other, with the result that their ublic conduct is the same as if they had no such intentions."
P A problem like this must be capable of solution; it does not require that we know how to attain the moral improvement of men but only that we should know the mechanism of nature in order to use it on men, organizing the conflict of the hostile intentions esent in a people in such a way that they must compel themselves to submit to coercive laws. Thus a state of peace is established in which laws have force. We can see, even in actual states, which are far from perfectly organized, that in their foreign relations they approach that which the idea of right prescribes. This is so in spite of the fact that the intrinsic element of morality is certainly not the cause of it. (A good constitution is not to be expected from morality, but, conversely, a good moral condition of a people is to be expected only under a good constitution.) Instead of genuine morality, the mechanism of nature brings it to pass through selfish inclinations, which naturally conflict outwardly but which can be used by reason as a means for its own end, the sovereignty of law, and, as concerns the state, for promoting and securing internal and external peace.
This, then, is the truth of the matter: Nature inexorably wills that the right should finally triumph. What we neglect to do comes about by itself, though with great inconveniences to us. "If you bend the reed too much, you break it; and he who attempts too much attempts nothing" (Bouterwek).
(2) The idea of international law presupposes the separate existence of many independent but neighboring states. Although this condition is itself a state of war (unless a federative union prevents the outbreak of hostilities), this is rationally preferable to the amalgamation of states under one superior power, as this would end in one universal monarchy, and laws always lose in vigor what government gains in extent; hence a soulless despotism falls into anarchy after stifling the seeds of the good. Nevertheless, every state, or its ruler, desires to establish lasting peace in this way, aspiring if possible to rule the whole world. But nature wills otherwise. She employs two means to separate peoples and to prevent them from mixing: differences of language and of religion. These differences involve a tendency to mutual hatred and pretexts for war, but the progress of civilization and men's gradual approach to greater harmony in their principles finally leads to peaceful agreement. This is not like that peace which despotism (in the burial ground of freedom) produces through a weakening of all powers; it is, on the contrary, produced and maintained by their equilibrium in liveliest competition.
(3) Just as nature wisely separates nations, which the will of every state, sanctioned by the principles of international law, would gladly unite by artifice or force, nations which could not have secured themselves against violence and war by means of the law of world citizenship unite because of mutual interest. The spirit of commerce, which is incompatible with war. sooner or later gams the upper hand in every stale. As the power of money is perhaps the most dependable of all the powers (means) included under the state power, states see themselves forced, without any moral urge, to promote honorable
\ZH    Part III: International Liberalism
peace and by mediation to prevent war wherever it threatens to break out. They do s actly as if they stood in perpetual alliances, for great offensive alliances are in the nat^" of the case rare and even less often successful. ' Ure
In this manner nature guarantees perpetual peace by the mechanism of human na sions. Certainly she does not do so with sufficient certainty for us to predict the futn in any theoretical sense, but adequately from a practical point of view, making it ourdnt! to work toward this end which is not just a chimerical one. " ^
Peace Through Arbitration
Richard Cobden
I assume that every one in this House would only sanction war, in case it was im-' eratively demanded on our part, in defence of our honour, or our just interest. 1 take it that every one here would repudiate war, unless it were called for by such motives. I assume, moreover, that there is not a man in this House who would not repudiate war, if those objects—the just interests and honour of the country—could be preserved by any other means. My object is to see if we cannot devise some better method than war for attaining those ends; and my plan is, simply and solely, that we should resort to that mode of settling disputes in communities, which individuals resort to in private life. I only want you to go one step farther, to carry out in another instance the principle which you recognize in other cases—that the intercourse between communities is nothing more than the intercourse of individuals in the aggregate. 1 want to know why there may not be an agreement between this country and France, or between this country and America, by which the nations should respectively bind themselves, in case of any misunderstanding arising which could not be settled by mutual representation or diplomacy, to refer the dispute to the decision of arbitrators. . . .
I should prefer to see these disputes referred to individuals, whether designated commissioners, or plenipotentiaries, or arbitrators, appointed from one country to meet men appointed from another country, to inquire into the matter and decide upon it; or, if they cannot do so, to have the power of calling in an umpire, as is done in all arbitrations. I propose that these individuals should have absolute power to dispose of the question submitted to them.
I want to show that I am practical on this occasion, and, therefore, I will cite some cases in which this method of arranging difficulties has already been resorted to. In 1794 we had a Treaty with America, for the settlement of certain British claims on the American Government. Those claims were referred to four commissioners, two appointed on each side, with the proviso that they should elect unanimously, an arbitrator; in case they should not agree in the choice of an arbitrator, it was provided that the representatives of each country should put the names of certain arbitrators into an urn, one to be drawn out by lot; and this arbitrator and the four commissioners decided by a majority all the cases brought before them. Again, in the Treaty of 1814 with the United States, provision was made for settling most important matters, precisely in the way 1 now propose. Provision was made for settling the boundary between the United States and Canada, for some
Speech in the House of Commons. June 12. 1849. in John Bright and James F Thorold Rogers, eds.. Speeches on Questions of Public Policy by Richard Cobden, M P. Vol II (London: Macmillan and Co.. ! 870).
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Peace Through Arbitration 131
thousands of miles; also for defining the right to certain islands lying on the coast; and for settling the boundary between Maine and New Brunswick. The plan was this: each country named a commissioner; the commissioners were to endeavour to agree on these disputed points; and the matters on which they could not agree were referred to some neutral state. All the matters referred to them—and most important they were—were arranged by mutual conference and mutual concessions, except the question of the Maine boundary, which was accordingly referred to the King of the Netherlands. Afterwards, exception was taken to his decision by the United States; the matter remained open till the time of Lord Ashburton's mission; and it was finally settled by him. But in no case has any such reference ever been followed by war. In 1818 there was a Convention with America, for settling the claims made by that country for captured negroes during the war. It was agreed to refer that matter to the Emperor of Russia; and he decided in favour of the principle of compensation. He was then appealed to by both the Governments to define a mode by which this compensation should be adjudged; and his plan was this: he said, 'Let each party name a commissioner and an arbitrator; let the commissioners meet, and, if they can agree, well and good; if not, let the names of the arbitrators be put into an urn, and one drawn out by lot; and that arbitrator and the two commissioners shall decide the question by a majority.' This method was adopted, and compensation to the extent of 1,200,000 dollars was given, without any difficulty. Hence, it appears that what I propose is no novelty, no innovation; it has been practised, and practised with success; I only want you to carry the principle a little farther, and resort to it, in anticipation, as a mode of arranging all quarrels.
For this reason, I propose an address to the Crown, praying that Her Majesty will instruct her Foreign Secretary to propose to foreign Powers to enter into treaties, providing that, in case of any future misunderstanding, which cannot be settled by amicable negotiation, an arbitration, such as I have described, shall be resorted to. There is no difficulty in fixing the means of arbitration, and providing the details; for arbitration is so much used in private life, and is, indeed, made parts of so many statutes and Acts of Parliament, that there is no difficulty whatever in carrying out the plan, provided you are agreed as to the policy of doing so. Now, I shall be met with this objection—I have heard it already—and I know there are Members of this House who purpose to vote against the motion on this ground: they say, 'What is the use of a treaty of this sort, between France and England, for instance; the parties would not observe the treaty; it would be a piece of waste paper; they would go to war, as before, in spite of any treaty.' It would be a sufficient answer to this objection to say, 'What is the use of any treaty? What is the use of the Foreign Office? What is the use of your diplomacy?' You might shut up the one and cashier the other. 1 maintain, that a treaty binding two countries to refer their disputes to arbitration, is just as likely to be observed as any other treaty. Nay, I question very much whether it is not more likely to be observed; because, I think there is no object which other countries will be less likely to seek than that of having a war with a country so powerful as England. 1 herefore, if any provision were made by which you might honourably avoid a war, that provision would be as gladly sought by your opponents as by yourselves. But 1 deny that, as a rule, treaties are violated; as a rule, they are respected and observed. 1 do not find that wars, generally, arise out of the violation of any specific treaty—they more commonly
. ^ ( 0f accidental collisions: and, as a rule, treaties are observed by powerful States anS<nst the weak, just as well as by weak States against the powerful. I, therefore, sec no aCfficulty specially applying to a treaty of this kind greater than exists with other treaties. There would be this advantage, at all events, in having a treaty binding another country to
fer ill disputes to arbitration. If that country did not fulfil its engagement, it would enter War with the brand of infamy stamped upon its banners. It could not proclaim to the id that it was engaged in a just and necessary war. On the contrary, all the world would t (0 ihat nation as violating a treaty, by going to war with a country with whom they had engaged to enter into arbitration. I anticipate another objection which I have heard made: they say, 'You cannot entrust the great interests of England to individuals or commissioners 'That difficulty springs out of the assumption, that the quarrels with foreign countries are about questions involving the whole existence of the empire. On the contrary, whenever these quarrels take place, it is generally upon the most minute and absurd pretexts—so trivial that it is almost impossible, on looking back for the last hundred years, to tell precisely what any war was about. I heard the other day of a boy going to see a model of the battle of Waterloo, and when he asked what the battle was about, neither the old soldier who had charge of the exhibition, nor any one in the room, could answer the question. . . .
Now, I would ask, in the face of these facts, where is the argument you can use against the reasonable proposition which I now put forward? I may be told that, even if you make treaties of this kind, you cannot enforce the award. I admit it. 1 am no party to the plan which some advocate—no doubt with the best intentions—of having a Congress of nations, with a code of laws—a supreme court of appeal, with an army to support its decisions. I am no party to any such plan. 1 believe it might lead to more armed interference than takes place at present. The hon. Gentleman opposite, who is to move an amendment to my motion (Mr. Urquhart), has evidently mistaken my object. The hon. Gentleman is exceedingly attentive in tacking on amendments to other persons' motions. My justification for alluding to him, on the present occasion, is, that he has founded his amendment on a misapprehension of what my motion is. He has evidently conceived the idea that I have a grand project for putting the whole world under some court of justice. I have no such plan in view at all; and, therefore, neither the hon. Gentleman, nor any other person, will answer my arguments, if he has prepared a speech assuming that I contemplate anything of the kind. I have no plan for compelling the fulfillment of treaties of arbitration. I have no idea of enforcing treaties in any other way than that now resorted to. 1 do not, myself, advocate an appeal to arms; but that which follows the violation of a treaty, under the present system, may follow the violation of a treaty of arbitration, if adopted. What I say, however, is, if you make a treaty with another country, binding it to refer any dispute to arbitration, and if that country violates that treaty, when the dispute arises, then you will place it in a worse position before the world—you will place it in so infamous a position, that 1 doubt if any country would enter into war on such bad grounds as that country must occupy. . . .
Community of Power vs Balance of Powi=fj
Woodrow Wilson
Community of Power vs. Balance of Power
133
. . . The question upon which the whole future peace and policy of the world depends is this: Is the present war a struggle for a just and secure peace, or only for a new balance of power? If it be only a struggle for a new balance of power, who will guarantee, who can be guaranteed, the stable equilibrium of the new arrangement7 Only a tranquil Europe can be a stable Europe. There must be, not a balance of power, but a community of power; not organized rivalries, but an organized common peace.
Foramately we have received very explicit assurances on this point. The statesmen of both of the groups of nations now arrayed against one another have said, in terms that 9 could not be misinterpreted, that it was no part of the purpose they had in mind to crush M their antagonists. But the implications of these assurances may not be equally clear to all,—may not be the same on both sides of the water. I think it will be serviceable if I attempt to set forth what we understand them to be.
They imply, first of all, that it must be a peace without victory. It is not pleasant to say this. 1 beg that 1 may be permitted to put my own interpretation upon it and that it may be understood that no other interpretation was in my thought. 1 am seeking only to face realities and to face them without soft concealments. Victory would mean peace forced upon the loser, a victor's terms imposed upon the vanquished. It would be accepted in humiliation, under duress, at an intolerable sacrifice, and would leave a sting, a resentment, a bitter memory upon which terms of peace would rest, not permanently, but only as upon quicksand. Only a peace between equals can last. Only a peace the very principle of which is equality and a common participation in a common benefit. The right state of mind, the right feeling between nations, is as necessary for a lasting peace as is the just settlement of vexed questions of territory or of racial and national allegiance.
The equality of nations upon which peace must be founded if it is to last must be an equality of rights; the guarantees exchanged must neither recognize nor imply a difference between the big nations and small, between those that are powerful and those that are weak. Right must be based upon the common strength, not upon the individual strength, of the nations upon whose concert peace will depend. Equality of territory or of resources there of course cannot be; nor any other sort of equality not gained in the ordinary peaceful and legitimate development of the people themselves. But no one asks or expects anything more than an equality of rights. Mankind is looking now for freedom of life, not for equipoises of power.
Addr.
less of the President of the tinned States to the U.S. Senate, January " Record: Scale. Vol M. Mil, ('onolcss. _<J session. "
I 'J I 7. Congressional
And there is a deeper thing involved than even equality of right among organized -   - No peace can last, or ought to last, which does not recognize and accept the prin-^Tdiat tiovemmenls derive all their just powers from the consent of the governed, and no ri"ht anywhere exists to hand peoples about from sovereignty to sovereignty as if 'were property. I take it for granted, for instance, if I may venture upon a single exam-that statesmen everywhere are agreed that there should be a united, independent, and utonomous Poland, and that henceforth inviolable security of life, of worship, and of industrial and social development should be guaranteed to all peoples who have lived hitherto under the power of governments devoted to a faith and purpose hostile to their own.
I speak of this, not because of any desire to exalt an abstract political principle which has always been held very dear by those who have sought to build up liberty in America, but for the same reasons that I have spoken of the other conditions of peace which seem to me clearly indispensable,—because I wish frankly to uncover realities. Any peace which does not recognize and accept this principle will inevitably be upset. It will not rest upon the affections or the convictions of mankind. The ferment of spirit of whole populations will fight subtly and constantly against it, and all the world will sympathize. The world can beat peace only if its life is stable, and there can be no stability where the will is in rebellion, where there is not tranquility of spirit and a sense of justice, of freedom, and of right.
So far as practicable, moreover, every great people now struggling towards a full development of its resources and of its powers should be assured a direct outlet to the great highways of the sea. Where this cannot be done by the cession of territory, it can no doubt be done by the neutralization of direct rights of way under the general guarantee which will assure the peace itself. With a right comity of arrangement no nation need be shut away from free access to the open paths of the world's commerce.
And the paths of the sea must alike in law and in fact be free. The freedom of the seas is the sine qua non of peace, equality, and cooperation. No doubt a somewhat radical reconsideration of many of the rules of international practice hitherto thought to be established may be necessary in order to make the seas indeed free and common in practically all circumstances for the use of mankind, but the motive for such changes is convincing and compelling. There can be no trust or intimacy between the peoples of the world without them. The free, constant, unthreatened intercourse of nations is an essential part of the process of peace and of development. It need not be difficult either to define or to secure the freedom of the seas if the governments of the world sincerely desire to come to an agreement concerning it.
It is a problem closely connected with the limitation of naval armaments and the cooperation of the navies of the world in keeping the seas at once free and safe. And the question of limiting naval armaments opens the wider and perhaps more difficult question of the limitation of armies and of all programmes of military preparation. Difficult and delicate as these questions are, they must be faced with the utmost candour and decided in a spirit of real accommodation if peace is to come with healing in its wings, and come to stay. Peace cannot be had without concession and sacrifice. There can be no sense of safety and equality among the nations if great preponderating armaments are henceforth to continue here and there to be built up and maintained. The statesmen of the world must plan for peace and nations must adjust and accomodate their policy to it
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as they have planned for war and made ready for pitiless contest and rivalry. The question ' of armaments, whether on land or sea, is the most immediately and intensely practical question connected with the future fortunes of nations and of mankind.
1 have spoken upon these great matters without reserve and with the utmost expljc. itness because it has seemed to me to be necessary if the world's yearning desire f0r • peace was anywhere to find free voice and utterance. Perhaps I am the only person in high authority amongst all the peoples of the world who is at liberty to speak and hold nothing back. I am speaking as an individual, and yet 1 am speaking also, of course, as the responsible head of a great government, and I feel confident that 1 have said what the ■ people of the United States would wish me to say. May 1 not add that 1 hope and believe that I am in effect speaking for liberals and friends of humanity in every nation and of', every programme of liberty? I would fain believe that 1 am speaking for the silent mass -of mankind everywhere who have as yet had no place or opportunity to speak their real hearts out concerning the death and ruin they see to have come already upon the persons and the homes they hold most dear.
And in holding out the expectation that the people and Government of the United : States will join the other civilized nations of the world in guaranteeing the permanence of peace upon such terms as I have named 1 speak with the greater boldness and confi- ; dence because it is is clear to every man who can think that there is in this promise no ! breach in either our traditions or our policy as a nation, but a fulfillment, rather, of all \ that we have professed or striven for. 1
I am proposing, as it were, that the nations should with one accord adopt the doc- j trine of President Monroe as the doctrine of the world: that no nation should seek to ex- : tend its polity over any other nation or people, but that every people should be left free : to determine its own policy, its own way of development, unhindered, unthreatened, un- , afraid, the little along with the great and powerful.
I am proposing that all nations henceforth avoid entangling alliances which would ' draw them into competitions of power, catch them in a net of intrigue and selfish rivalry, | and disturb their own affairs with influences intruded from without. There is no entan- 1 gling alliance in a concert of power. When all unite to act in the same sense and with the 1 same purpose all act in the common interest and are free to live their own lives under a ] common protection. \
1 am proposing government by the consent of the governed; that freedom of the seas 1 which in international conference after conference representatives of the United States | have urged with the eloquence of those who are the convinced disciples of liberty; and : that moderation of armaments which makes of armies and navies a power for order -merely, not an instrument of aggression or of selfish violence.
These are American principles, American policies. We could stand for no others. And they are also the principles and policies of forward looking men and women everywhere, of every modern nation, of every enlightened community. They are the principles of mankind and must prevail.
Liberalism and World Politics
Michael W. Doyle
Promoting freedom will produce peace, we have often been told. In a speech before the British Parliament in June of 1982, President Reagan proclaimed that governments founded on a respect for individual liberty exercise "restraint" and "peaceful intentions" in their foreign policy. He then announced a "crusade for freedom" and a "campaign for democratic development" (Reagan, June 9, 1982).
In making these claims the president joined a long list of liberal theorists (and propagandists) and echoed an old argument: the aggressive instincts of authoritarian leaders and totalitarian ruling parties make for war. Liberal states, founded on such individual rights as equality before the law, free speech and other civil liberties, private property, and elected representation, are fundamentally against war, this argument asserts. When the citizens who bear the burdens of war elect their governments, wars become impossible. Furthermore, citizens appreciate that the benefits of trade can be enjoyed only under conditions of peace. Thus the very existence of liberal states, such as the U.S., Japan, and our European allies, makes for peace.
Building on a growing literature in an international political science, I reexamine the liberal claim President Reagan reiterated for us. I look at three distinct theoretical traditions of liberalism, attributable to three theorists: Schumpeter, a brilliant explicator of the liberal pacifism the president invoked; Machiavelli, a classical republican whose glory is an imperialism we often practice; and Kant.
Despite the contradictions of liberal pacifism and liberal imperialism, 1 find, with Kant and other liberal republicans, that liberalism does leave a coherent legacy on foreign affairs. Liberal states are different. They are indeed peaceful, yet they are also prone to make war, as the U.S. and our "freedom fighters" are now doing, not so covertly, against Nicaragua. Liberal states have created a separate peace, as Kant argued they would, and have also discovered liberal reasons for aggression, as he feared they might. I conclude by arguing that the differences among liberal pacifism, liberal imperialism, and Kant's liberal internationalism are not arbitrary but rooted in differing conceptions of the citizen and the state.
LIBERAL PACIFISM
There is no canonical description of liberalism. What we tend to call liberal resembles a family portrait of principles and institutions, recognizable by certain characteristics - -tor
Michael W. Dovle. "Liberalism and World Politics." The AnuTictin Polilu-til Sc-icncc Review. Vol. SO. No. 4 (December 1086). Reprinted with permission of Michael W. Doyle and the American Political Science Association.
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example, individual freedom, political participation, private property, and equality 0f opportunity—that most liberal states share, although none has perfected them all. Joseph Schumpeter clearly fits within this family when he considers the international, effects of '■■ capitalism and democracy. ... j
Democratic capitalism leads to peace. As evidence, Schumpeter claims that ; throughout the capitalist world an opposition has arisen to "war, expansion, cabinet diplomacy"; that contemporary capitalism is associated with peace parties; and that the industrial worker of capitalism is "vigorously anti-imperialist" In addition, he points out that the capitalist world has developed means of preventing war. such as the Hague Court and that the least feudal, most capitalist society—the United States—has demonstrated i the least imperialistic tendencies (Schumpeter, 1955, pp. 95-96). An example of the lack of imperialistic tendencies in the U.S., Schumpeter thought, was our leaving over half of Mexico unconquered in the war of 1 846-48.
Schumpeter's explanation for liberal pacifism is quite simple: Only war profiteers and military aristocrats gain from wars. No democracy would pursue a minority interest and tolerate the high costs of imperialism. When free trade prevails, "no class" gains from forcible expansion because
foreign raw materials and food stuffs are as accessible to each nation as though they were in its own territory. Where the cultural backwardness of a region makes normal economic intercourse dependent on colonization it does not matter, assuming free trade, which of the "civilized" nations undertakes the task of colonization. (Schumpeter, 1955, pp. 75-76)
Schumpeter's arguments are difficult to evaluate. In partial tests of quasi-Schumpeterian propositions, Michael Haas (1974, pp. 464-65) discovered a cluster that associates democracy, development, and sustained modernization with peaceful conditions. However, M. Small and J. D. Singer (1976) have discovered that there is no clearly negative correlation between democracy and war in the period 1816-1965—the period that would be central to Schumpeter's argument (see also Wilkenfeld, 1968; Wright, 1942, p. 841).
Later in his career, in Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy. Schumpeter (1950, pp. 127-28) acknowledged that "almost purely bourgeois commonwealths were often aggressive when it seemed to pay—like the Athenian or the Venetian commonwealths." Yet he stuck to his pacifistic guns, restating the view that capitalist democracy "steadily tells .. . against the use of military force and for peaceful arrangements, even when the balance of pecuniary advantage is clearly on the side of war which, under modern circumstances, is not in general very likely" (Schumpeter, 1950, p. 128). A recent study by R. .1. Rummel (1983) of "libertarianism" and international violence is the closest test Schumpeterian pacifism has received. "Free" states (those enjoying political and economic freedom) were shown to have considerably less conflict at or above the level of economic sanctions than "nontrec" states. The free states, the partly free states (including the democratic socialist countries such as Sweden), and the nonfree states accounted for 24%. 26%, and 61%, respectively, of the international violence during the period examined.
These effects are impressive but not conclusive for the Schumpeterian thesis. The data arc limited, in this test, to the period 1976 to 1980. It includes, for example, the
Liberalism and World Politics 137
Afchan War. the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia. China's invasion of Vietnam. ^Tanzania's invasion of Uganda but just misses the U.S.. quasi-covert intervention in a"    i„ M075) and our not so covert war against Nicaragua (1981- ). More importantly.
ludes the cold war period, with its numerous interventions, and the long history of lte nial wars (the Boer War, the Spanish-American War, the Mexican Intervention, etc.) c°at marked the history of liberal, including democratic capitalist, states (Doyle. 1 983b: Chan. l984:Weede, 1984).
The discrepancy between the warlike history of liberal states and Schumpeter's pacifistic expectations highlights three extreme assumptions. First, his "materialistic monism" leaves little room for noneconomic objectives, whether espoused by states or individuals. Neither glory, nor prestige, nor ideological justification, nor the pure power of ruling shapes policy. These nonmaterial goals leave little room for positive-sum gains, such as the comparative advantages of trade. Second, and relatedly, the same is true for his states. The political life of individuals seems to have been homogenized at the same time as the individuals were "rationalized, individualized, and democratized." Citizens—capitalists and workers, rural and urban—seek material welfare. Schumpeter seems to presume that ruling makes no difference. He also presumes that no one is prepared to take those measures (such as stirring up foreign quarrels to preserve a domestic ruling coalition) that enhance one's political power, despite detrimental effects on mass welfare. Third, like domestic politics, world politics are homogenized. Materially monistic and democratically capitalist, all states evolve toward free trade and liberty together. Countries differently constituted seem to disappear from Schumpeter's analysis. "Civilized" nations govern "culturally backward" regions. These assumptions are not shared by Machiavelli's theory of liberalism.
LIBERAL IMPERIALISM
Machiavelli argues, not only that republics are not pacifistic, but that they are the best form of state for imperial expansion. Establishing a republic fit for imperial expansion is, moreover, the best way to guarantee the survival of a state.
Machiavelli's republic is a classical mixed republic. It is not a democracy—which he thought would quickly degenerate into a tyranny—but is characterized by social equality, popular liberty, and political participation (Machiavelli, 1950, bk. 1, chap. 2, p. 112; see also Huliung, 1983, chap. 2; Mansfield, 1970; Pocock, 1975, pp. 198-99; Skinner, 1981, chap. 3). The consuls serve as "kings," the senate as an aristocracy managing the state, and the people in the assembly as the source of strength.
Liberty results from "disunion"—the competition and necessity for compromise required by the division of powers among senate, consuls, and tribunes (the last representing the common people). Liberty also results from the popular veto. The powerful few threaten the rest with tyranny, Machiavelli says, because they seek to dominate. The mass demands not to be dominated, and their veto thus preserves the liberties ot the state (Machiavelli, 1950, bk. 1, chap. 5, p. 122). However, since the people and the rulers have different social characters, the people need to be -managed" by the few to avoid having their recklessness overturn or their recklessness undermine the ability ol the stale to
138    Part 111: International Liberalism
expand (Machiavelli, 1950, bk. 1, chap. 53, pp. 249-50). Thus the senate and the consuls plan expansion, consult oracles, and employ religion to manage the resources that the energy of the people supplies.
Strength, and then imperial expansion, results from the way liberty encourages in. creased population and property, which grow when the citizens know their lives and • goods are secure from arbitrary seizure. Free citizens equip large armies and provide soldiers who fight for public glory and the common good because these are, in fact, their own (Machiavelli, 1950, bk. 2, chap. 2, pp. 287-90). If you seek the honor of having your state expand, Machiavelli advises, you should organize it as a free and popular republic like Rome, rather than as an aristocratic republic like Sparta or Venice. Expansion thus calls for a free republic.
"Necessity"—political survival—calls for expansion. If a stable aristocratic republic is forced by foreign conflict "to extend her territory, in such a case we shall see her foundations give way and herself quickly brought to ruin"; if, on the other hand, domestic security prevails, "the continued tranquility would enervate her, or provoke internal dissensions, which together, or either of them separately, will apt to prove her ruin" (Machiavelli, 1950, bk. l,chap. 6, p. 129). Machiavelli therefore believes it is necessary to take the constitution of Rome, rather than that of Sparta or Venice, as our model.
Hence, this belief leads to liberal imperialism. We are lovers of glory, Machiavelli announces. We seek to rule or, at least, to avoid being oppressed. In either case, we want more for ourselves and our states than just material welfare (materialistic monism). Because other states with similar aims thereby threaten us, we prepare ourselves for expansion. Because our fellow citizens threaten us if we do not allow them either to satisfy their ambition or to release their political energies through imperial expansion, we expand.
There is considerable historical evidence for liberal imperialism. Machiavelli's (Polybius's) Rome and Thucydides' Athens both were imperial republics in the Machiavellian sense (Thucydides, 1954, bk. 6). The historical record of numerous U.S. interventions in the postwar period supports Machiavelli's argument (Aron, 1973, chaps. 3-4; Barnet, 1968, chap. 11), but the current record of liberal pacifism, weak as it is, calls some of his insights into question. To the extent that the modern populace actually controls (and thus unbalances) the mixed republic, its diffidence may outweigh elite ("senatorial") aggressiveness.
We can conclude either that (1) liberal pacifism has at least taken over with the further development of capitalist democracy, as Schumpeter predicted it would or that (2) the mixed record of liberalism—pacifism and imperialism—indicates that some liberal states are Schumpeterian democracies while others are Machiavellian republics. Before we accept cither conclusion, however, we must consider a third apparent regularity of modern world politics.
LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM
Modern liberalism carries with it two legacies. They do not affect liberal states separately, according to whether they are pacifistic or imperialistic, but simultaneously.
Liberalism and World Politics     139
The first of these legacies is the pacification of foreign relations among liberal states, purine the nineteenth century, the United States and Great Britain engaged in nearly continual strife; however, after the Reform Act of 1832 defined actual representation as the formal source of the sovereignty of the British parliament, Britain and the United States neootiated their disputes. They negotiated despite, for example, British grievances during the Civil War against the North's blockade of the South, with which Britain had close economic ties. Despite several Anglo-French colonial rivalries, liberal France and liberal Britain formed an entente against illiberal Germany before World War 1. And from 1914 to 1915, Italy, the liberal member of the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria, chose not to fulfill its obligations under that treaty to support its allies. Instead, Italy joined in an alliance with Britain and France, which prevented it from having to fight other liberal states and then declared war on Germany and Austria. Despite generations of Anglo-American tension and Britain's wartime restrictions on American trade with Germany, the United States leaned toward Britain and France from 1914 to 1917 before entering World War I on their side.
Beginning in the eighteenth century and slowly growing since then, a zone of peace, which Kant called the "pacific federation" or "pacific union," has begun to be established among liberal societies. More than 40 liberal states currently make up the union. Most are in Europe and North America, but they can be found on every continent, as Appendix 1 indicates.
Here the predictions of liberal pacifists (and President Reagan) are borne out: liberal states do exercise peaceful restraint, and a separate peace exists among them. This separate peace provides a solid foundation for the United States' crucial alliances with the liberal powers, e.g., the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and our Japanese alliance. This foundation appears to be impervious to the quarrels with our allies that bedeviled the Carter and Reagan administrations. It also offers the promise of a continuing peace among liberal states, and as the number of liberal states increases, it announces the possibility of global peace this side of the grave or world conquest.
Of course, the probability of the outbreak of war in any given year between any two given states is low. The occurrence of a war between any two adjacent states, considered over a long period of time, would be more probable. The apparent absence of war between liberal states, whether adjacent or not, for almost 200 years thus may have significance. Similar claims cannot be made for feudal, fascist, communist, authoritarian, or totalitarian forms of rule (Doyle, 1983a, p. 222), nor for pluralistic or merely similar societies. More significant perhaps is that when states are forced to decide on which side of an impending world war they will fight, liberal states all wind up on the same side despite the complexity of the paths that take them there. These characteristics do not prove that the peace among liberals is statistically significant nor that liberalism is the sole valid explanation for the peace. They do suggest that we consider the possibility that liberals have indeed established a separate peace—but only among themselves.
Liberalism also carries with it a second legacy: international "imprudence" (Hume, 1963, pp. 346—47). Peaceful restraint only seems to work in liberals' relations with other liberals. Liberal states have fought numerous wars with nonliberal states. (For a list ol international wars since 1816 see Appendix 2.)
1-40    Pari III: International Liberalism
liberalism and World Politics    141
Many of these wars have been defensive and thus prudent by necessity. Liberal states have been attacked and threatened by nonliberal states that do not exercise an ] special restraint in their dealings with the liberal states. Authoritarian rulers both stin, ulate and respond to an international political environment in which conflicts of prestige, interest, and pure'fear of what other states might do all lead states toward war. War; and conquest have thus characterized the careers of many authoritarian rulers and ru] ing parties, from Louis XIV and Napoleon to Mussolini's fascists. Hitler's Nazis, and Stalin's communists.
Yet we cannot simply blame warfare on the authoritarians or totalitarians, as many of our more enthusiastic politicians would have us do. Most wars arise out of calcula--tions and miscalculations of interest, misunderstandings, and mutual suspicions, such asl those that characterized the origins of World War 1. However, aggression by the liberal^ state has also characterized a large number of wars. Both France and Britain fought expansionist colonial wars throughout the nineteenth century. The United States fought a similar war with Mexico from 1846 to 1848, waged a war of annihilation against the American Indians, and intervened militarily against sovereign states many times before and after World War 11. Liberal states invade weak nonliberal states and display striking distrust in dealings with powerful nonliberal states (Doyle. 1983b).
Neither realist (statist) nor Marxist theory accounts well for these two legacies. While they can account for aspects of certain periods of international stability (Aron, 1968, pp. 151-54; Russett, 1985), neither the logic of the balance of power nor the logic of international hegemony explains the separate peace maintained for more than 150 years among m states sharing one particular form of governance—liberal principles and institutions. g Balance-of-power theory expects—indeed is premised upon—flexible arrangements of geostrategic rivalry that include preventive war. Hegemonies wax and wane, but the liberal peace holds. Marxist "ultra-imperialists" expect a form of peaceful rivalry among capitalists, but only liberal capitalists maintain peace. Leninists expect liberal capitalists to be aggressive toward nonliberal states, but they also (and especially) expect them to be imperialistic toward fellow liberal capitalists.
Kant's theory of liberal internationalism helps us understand these two legacies. ... j [See the selection by Kant in Part III. (Ed.)] | Liberal republics will progressively establish peace among themselves by means of | the pacific federation, or union (foedus pacificum), described in Kant's Second Definitive Article. The pacific union will establish peace within a federation of free states and securely maintain the rights of each state. The world will not have achieved the "perpetual peace" that provides the ultimate guarantor of republican freedom until "a late stage and after many unsuccessful attempts" (Kant, UH, p. 47). At that time, all nations will have learned the lessons of peace through right conceptions of the appropriate constitution, great and sad experience, and good will. Only then will individuals enjoy perfect republican rights or the full guarantee of a global and just peace. In the meantime, the "pacific federation" of liberal republics—"an enduring and gradually expanding federation likely to prevent war"- brings within it more and more republics -despite republican collapses, backsliding, and disastrous wars—creating an ever-expanding separate peace (Kant. PP, p. 105). Kant emphasizes that
I c-in be shown that this idea of federalism, extending gradually to encompass all states and thus leading to perpetual peace, is practicable and has objective reality. For if by good fortune one powerful and enlightened nation can form a republic (which is by nature inclined to seek peace), this will provide a focal point for federal association among other states. These will join up with the first one. thus securing the freedom of each state in accordance with the idea of international right, and the whole will gradually spread further and further by a series of alliances of this kind. (Kant. PP. p. 104)
- -phe. pacific union is not a single peace treaty ending one war, a world state, nor a state of nations. Kant finds the first insufficient. The second and third are impossible or -; otentially tyrannical. National sovereignty precludes reliable subservience to a state of nations; a world state destroys the civic freedom on which the development of human capacities rests (Kant, UH, p. 50). Although Kant obliquely refers to various classical interstate confederations and modern diplomatic congresses, he develops no systematic organizational embodiment of this treaty and presumably does not find institutionalization necessary (Riley, 1983, chap. 5; Schwarz, 1962, p. 77). He appears to have in mind a mutual nonaggression pact, perhaps a collective security agreement, and the cosmopolitan law set forth in the Third Definitive Article.. . .
Perpetual peace, for Kant, is an epistemology, a condition for ethical action, and, most importantly, an explanation of how the "mechanical process of nature visibly exhibits the purposive plan of producing concord among men, even against their will and indeed by means of their very discord" (Kant, PP, p. 108; UH, pp. 44^15). Understanding history requires an epistemological foundation, for without a teleology, such as the promise of perpetual peace, the complexity of history would overwhelm human understanding (Kant, UH, pp. 51-53). Perpetual peace, however, is not merely a heuristic device with which to interpret history. It is guaranteed, Kant explains in the "First Addition" to Perpetual Peace ("On the Guarantee of Perpetual Peace"), to result from men fulfilling their ethical duty or, failing that, from a hidden plan. Peace is an ethical duty because it is only under conditions of peace that ail men can treat each other as ends, rather than means to an end (Kant, UH, p. 50; Murphy, 1970, chap. 3). In order for this duty to be practical, Kant needs, of course, to show that peace is in fact possible. The widespread sentiment of approbation that he saw aroused by the early success of the French revolutionaries showed him that we can indeed be moved by ethical sentiments with a cosmopolitan reach (Kant, CF, pp. 181-82; Yovel, 1980, pp. 153-54). This does not mean, however, that perpetual peace is certain ("prophesiable"). Even the scientifically regular course of the planets could be changed by a wayward comet striking them out of orbit. Human freedom requires that we allow for much greater reversals in the course of history. We must, in fact, anticipate the possibility of backsliding and destructive wars—though these will serve to educate nations to the importance of peace (Kant, UH, pp. 47-48).
In the end, however, our guarantee of perpetual peace does not rest on ethical conduct. As Kant emphasizes,
we now come to the essential question regarding the prospect of perpetual peace. What does nature do in relation to the end which man's own reason prescribes to hint as a duty. i.e. hou
142    Part 111: International Liberalism
Liberalisn) and World Politics
143
does nature help to promote his moral purpose:' And how does nature guarantee that
m;in nuoln fn Ar, h\/ rhp» Imcs nf hit: frf*^A,~,™ tU,,t A^^r- ■ . i. .    . ^t
liberal and nonliberal governments, can lead to restrictions on the range of con-
man ought to do by the laws of his freedom (but does not do) will in fact be done between societies, and this can increase the prospect that a single conflict will de-
nature's compulsion, without prejudice to the free agency of man'? . . . This does not
°ugh
that nature imposes on us a duty to do it, for duties can only be imposed by practical reas0n On the contrary, nature does it herself, whether we are willing or not: facta rolemem dualnt nolentem tiudunt. (PP, p. 112)
The guarantee thus rests, Kant argues, not on the probable behavior of moral angels, but" on that of "devils, so long as they possess understanding" (PP, p. 112). In explaining t(le: sources of each of the three definitive articles of the perpetual peace, Kant then tells us« how we (as free and intelligent devils) could be motivated by fear, force, and calculated! advantage to undertake a course of action whose outcome we could reasonably anticipate to be perpetual peace. Yet while it is possible to conceive of the Kantian road to peace in these terms, Kant himself recognizes and argues that social evolution also makes the conditions of moral behavior less onerous and hence more likely (CF, pp. 187-89; Kelly, 1969, pp. 106-13). In tracing the effects of both political and moral development, he builds an account of why liberal states do maintain peace among themselves and of how it will (by implication, has) come about that the pacific union will expand. He also explains how these republics would engage in wars with nonrepublics and therefore suffer the "sad experience" of wars that an ethical policy might have avoided. . . .
Kant shows how republics, once established, lead to peaceful relations. He argues that once the aggressive interests of absolutist monarchies are lamed and the habit of respect for individual rights engrained by republican government, wars would appear as the disaster to the people's welfare that he and the other liberals thought them to be. Yet these domestic republican restraints do not end war. If they did, liberal states would not be warlike, which is far from the case. They do introduce republican caution—Kant's "hesitation"—in place of monarchical caprice. Liberal wars are only fought for popular, liberal purposes. The historical liberal legacy is laden with popular wars fought to promote freedom, to protect private property, or to support liberal allies against nonliberal enemies. Kant's position is ambiguous. He regards these wars as unjust and warns liberals of their susceptibility to them (Kant, PP, p. 106). At the same time, Kant argues that each nation "can and ought to" demand that its neighboring nations enter into the pacific union of liberal states (PP, p. 102). . . .
A further cosmopolitan source of liberal peace is the international market's removal of difficult decisions of production and distribution from the direct sphere of state policy. A foreign state thus does not appear directly responsible for these outcomes, and states can stand aside from, and to some degree above, these contentious market rivalries and be ready to step in to resolve crises. The interdependence of commerce and the international contacts of state officials help create crosscutting transnational ties that serve as lobbies for mutual accommodation. According to modern liberal scholars, international financiers and transnational and transgovernmental organizations create interests in favor ot accommodation. Moreover, their variety has ensured that no single conflict sours an entire relationship by setting off a spiral of reciprocated retaliation (Brzezinski and Huntington, 1963, chap. 9; Keohanc and Nye, 1977, chap. 7; Neustadt, 1970; Polanyi, 1944. chaps. 1-2). Conversely, a sense of suspicion, such as that characterizing relations
1
nets between
ine an entire relationship. teM   -in°le constitutional, international, or cosmopolitan source is alone sufficient.
' athe^and only together) they plausibly connect the characteristics of liberal poli-bUtt0gd economies withsustained liberal peace. Alliances founded on mutual strategic
tiesand eco.iu....v.o ......---------.....
'nterest among liberal and nonliberal states have been broken; economic ties between liberal and nonliberal states have proven fragile; but the political bonds of liberal rights and interests have proven a remarkably firm foundation for mutual nonaggression. A separate peace exists among liberal states.
In their relations with nonliberal states, however, liberal states have not escaped from the insecurity caused by anarchy in the world political system considered as a whole. Moreover, the very constitutional restraint, international respect for individual rights, and shared commercial interests that establish grounds for peace among liberal states establish grounds for additional conflict in relations between liberal and nonliberal societies.
CONCLUSION
Unlike Machiavelli's republics, Kant's republics are capable of achieving peace among themselves because they exercise democratic caution and are capable of appreciating the international rights of foreign republics. These international rights of republics derive from the representation of foreign individuals, who are our moral equals. Unlike Schum-peter's capitalist democracies, Kant's republics—including our own—remain in a state of war with nonrepublics. Liberal republics see themselves as threatened by aggression from nonrepublics that are not constrained by representation. Even though wars often cost more than the economic return they generate, liberal republics also are prepared to protect and promote—sometimes forcibly—democracy, private property, and the rights of individuals overseas against nonrepublics, which, because they do not authentically represent the rights of individuals, have no rights to noninterference. These wars may liberate oppressed individuals overseas; they also can generate enormous suffering.
Preserving the legacy of the liberal peace without succumbing to the legacy of liberal imprudence is both a moral and a strategic challenge. The bipolar stability of the international system, and the near certainty of mutual devastation resulting from a nuclear war between the superpowers, have created a "crystal ball effect" that has helped to constrain the tendency toward miscalculation present at the outbreak of so many wars in the past (Carnesale, Doty, Hoffmann, Huntington, Nye. and Sagan, 1983, p. 44; Waltz, 1964). However, this "nuclear peace" appears to be limited to the superpowers. It has not curbed military interventions in the Third World. Moreover, it is subject to a desperate technological race designed to overcome its constraints and to crises that have pushed even the superpowers to the brink of war. We must still reckon with the war fevers and moods of appeasement that have almost alternately swept liberal democracies.
Yet restraining liberal imprudence, whether aggressive or passive, may not be possible without threatening liberal pacification. Improving the strategic acumen oi our
144    Part III: International Liberalism
APPENDIX 1
Liberal Regimes and the Pacific Union, 1700-1982
Period
Period
18th Century
Swiss Cantons" French Republic, 1790-1795 United States.'1 1776-Total = 3
1800-1850
Swiss Confederation United States France, 1830-1849 Belgium, 1830-Great Britain, 1832-Netherlands, 1848-Picdmom, 1848-Denmark, 1849-Total = 8
1850-1900
Switzerland United States Belgium Great Britain Netherlands Piedmont, -1861 Italy.-1861 Denmark, -1866 Sweden, 1864-Greece, 1864-Canada, 1867-France, 1871-Argentina, 1880-Chile, 1891-Total = 14
1900-1945
Switzerland United States Great Britain Sweden Canada
Greece, .1911; 1928 1936 Italy. - 1922 Belgium. -1940 Netherlands, 1940
1900-1945 (com.) Argentina. -1943 France. -1940 Chile,-1924, 1932-Australia, 1901 Norway, 1905-1940 New Zealand, 1907-Colombia, 1910-1949 Denmark, 1914-1940 Poland, 1917-1935 Latvia, 1922-1934 Germany, 1918-1932 Austria, 1918-1934 Estonia, 1919-1934 Finland. 1919-Uruguay, 1919-Costa Rica, 1919-Czechoslovakia, 1920-1939 Ireland, 1920-Mexico, 1928-Lebanon, 1944-Total = 29
1945-b
Switzerland
United States
Great Britain
Sweden
Canada
Australia
New Zealand
Finland
Ireland
Mexico
Uruguay, -1973 Chile, -1973 Lebanon. - 1975 Costa Rica. -1948: 1953-Iceland. 1944-France, 1945 Denmark. 1945 Norway, 1945 Austria, 1945-
Period
1945 (com.) Brazil, 1945-1954, 1955-1964 Belgium, 1946-Luxemburg, 1946-Netherlands. 1946-Italy, 1946-Philippines, 1946-1972 India, 1947-1975. 1977-Sri Lanka, 1948-1961; 1963-1971; 1978-Ecuador, 1948-1963; 1979-
Israel, 1949-West Germany, 1949-Greece, 1950-1967; 1975-
Peru, 1950-1962;
1963-1968; 1980-
EI Salvador, 1950-1961
Turkey, 1950-1960;
1966-1971
Japan, 1951 —
Bolivia 1956-1969; 1982-
Colombia, 1958-
Venezuela, 1959-
Nigeria, 1961-1964;
1979-1984
Jamaica, 1962-
Trinidad and Tobago,
1962-
Senegal, 1963-Malaysia. 1963-Botswana, 1966-Singapore. 1965-Portugal, 1976-Spain. 1978-Dominican Republic, 1978-
Honduras, 1981 Papua New Guinea. 1982-Total - 50
Liberalism and World Politics
1 have drawn up this approximate list ol "Liberal Regimes" according to the four
14s
^ unions described as essential: market and private properly economies: polities ihai an-
'nS"nally sovereign; citizens who possess juridical lights; and "republican" (whether republican CX'e rliaineniary monarchy), repiescntative government. This latter includes the requirement 01   the legislative branch have an eflective role in public policy and be formally and
nlp_.|iiivt'ly (either inter- or intra-pariy) elected. Furthermore, I have taken into accouni whetht'i male suffrage is wide (i.e., 30%) or, as Kant (AIM, p. 139) would have had it, open bv . cl,jCvement" to inhabitants of the national or metropolitan territory (e.g., to poll-tax pavers or householders)- This list of liberal regimes is thus more inclusive than a list ol democratic regimes or polyarchies (Powell, 1982, p. 5). Other conditions taken into account here are that female sufh"1"1* 's "1'inu-'c' whhin a generation of ils being demanded by an extensive female suffrage movement and that representative government is internally sovereign (e.g., including, and especially over military and foreign affairs) as well as stable (in existence for at least three years) Sources for these data are Banks and Overstreet (1983). Gasiil (19S5), The Europa Yearbook. /9,s5 (1985). Langer (1968), U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office (1980). and U.S. Department ol State (1981). Finally, these lists exclude ancient and medieval "republics," since none appears to fit Kant's commitment to liberal individualism (Holmes, 1979).
"There arc domestic variations within these liberal regimes: Switzerland was liberal only in certain cantons; the United States was libera! only north of the Mason-Dixon line uniil 1865, when it became liberal throughout.
''Selected list, excludes liberal regimes wilh populations less than one million. These include all slates categorized as "free" by Gastil and those "partly free" (tour-fifths or more free) states with a more pronounced capitalist orientation.
foreign policy calls for introducing steadier strategic calculations of the national interest in the long run and more flexible responses to changes in the international political environment. Constraining the indiscriminate meddling of our foreign interventions calls for a deeper appreciation of the "particularism of history, culture, and membership" (Walzer, 1983, p. 5), but both the improvement in strategy and the constraint on intervention seem, in turn, to require an executive freed from the restraints of a representative legislature in the management of foreign policy and a political culture indifferent to the universal rights of individuals. These conditions, in their turn, could break the chain of constitutional guarantees, the respect for representative government, and the web of transnational contact that have sustained the pacific union of liberal states.
Perpetual peace, Kant says, is the end point of the hard journey his republics will take. The promise of perpetual peace, the violent lessons of war, and the experience of a partial peace are proof of the need for and the possibility of world peace. They are also the grounds for moral citizens and statesmen to assume the duty of striving for peace.
This list excludes covert interventions, some of which have been directed by liberal regimes against other liberal regimes—for example, the United States' effort to destabilize the Chilean election and Allende's government. Nonetheless, it is significant that such interventions are not pursued publicly as acknowledged policy. The covert destabi-li/ation campaign against Chile is recounted by the Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities (1975, Covert Action in Chile. 1963-73).
146    Part III: International Liberalism
Liberalism and World Politics 147
APPENDIX 2
International Wars Listed Chronologically
^PENPLX2jContinued)
British-Maharattan (1817-1818)
Greek(1821-1828)
Franco-Spanish (1823)
First Anglo-Burmese (1823-1826)
Javanese (1825-1830)
Russo-Persian (1826-1828)
Russo-Turkish (1828-1829)
First Polish (1831)
First Syrian (1831-1832)
Texas(1835-1836)
First British-Afghan (1838-1842)
Second Syrian (1839-1940)
Franco-Algerian (1839-1847)
Peruvian-Bolivian (1841)
First British-Sikh (1845-1846)
Mexican-American (1846-1848)
Austro-Sardinian (1848-1849)
First Schleswig-Holstein (1848-1849)
Hungarian (1848-1849)
Second British-Sikh (1848-1849)
Roman Republic (1849)
La Plata (1851-1852)
First Turco-Montenegran (1852-1853)
Crimean (1853-1856)
Anglo-Persian (1856-1857)
Sepoy (1857-1859)
Second Turco-Montenegran (1858-1859) Italian Unification (1859) Spanish-Moroccan (1859-1860) Italo-Roman (1860) ltalo-Sicilian (1860-1861) Franco-Mexican (1862-1867) Ecuadorian-Colombian (1863) Second Polish (1863-1864) Spanish-Santo Dominican (1863-1865) Second Schleswig-Holstein (1864) Lopez(1864 1870) Spanish-Chilean (1865-1866) Seven Weeks (1866) Ten Years (1 868 1878) Franco-Prussian (1870-1 871) Dutch-Achiiiesc (1873-1878) Balkan (1875 -1877)
Russo-Turkish (1877-1878) Bosnian (1878)
Second British-Afghan (1878-1880) Pacific (1879-1883) British-Zulu (1879) Franco-lndochinese (1882-1884) Mahdist (1882-1885) Sino-French (1884-1885) Central American (1885) Serbo-Bulganan (1885) Sino-Japanese (1894-1895) Franco-Madagascan (1894-1895) Cuban(1895-1898) halo-Ethiopian (1895-1896) First Philippine (1896-1898) Greco-Turkish (1897) Spanish-American (1898) Second Philippine (1899-1902) Boer (1899-1902) Boxer Rebellion (1900) I linden (1903)
Russo-Japanese (1904-1905) Central American (1906) Central American (1907) Spanish-Moroccan (1909-1910) Italo-Turkish (1911-1912) First Balkan (1912-1913) Second Balkan (1913) World War 1(1914-1918) Russian Nationalities (1917-1921) Russo-Polish (1919-1920) Hungarian-Allies (1919) Greco-Turkish (1919-1922) Riffian(1921-1926) Druze(1925-1927) Sino-Soviet(1929) Manchurian (1931-1933) Chaco(1932-1935) Italo-Ethiopian (1935-1936) Sino-Japanese (1937-1941) C'hangkufeng (1938) Nomohan (1939) World War II (1939- 1945)
International Wars Listed Chronologically
Russo-Finnish (1939-1940) Franco-Tha, (1940-1941) Indonesian (1945-1946) jndochin«e< 1945-1954) Madagascan (1947-1948) First Kashmir (1947-1949) Palestine (1948-1949) Hyderabad (1948) Korean (1950-1953) Algerian (1954-1962) Russo-Hungarian (1956) Sinai (1956) Tibetan (1956-1959) Sino-Indian (1962) Vietnamese (1965-1975) Second Kashmir (1965)
Six Day (1967) Israeli-Egyptian (1969-1970) Football (1969) Bangladesh (1971) Philippine-MNLF (1972-) Yom Kippur(1973) Turco-Cypriot (1974) Ethiopian-Entrean (1974-) Vietnamese-Cambodian (1975-) Timor (1975-) Saharan(l975-) Ogaden(1976-)
Ugandan-Tanzanian (1978-1979) Sino-Vietnamese (1979) Russo-Afghan (1979-) Iran-Iraqi (1980—)
NOTE: This table is taken from Melvin Small and J. David Singer (1982, pp. 79-80). This is a partial list of international wars fought between 1816 and 1980. In Appendices A and B, Small and Singer identify a total of 575 wars during this period, but approximately 1 59 of them appear to be largely domestic, or civil wars.
Following the argument of this article, this list also excludes civil wars. Civil wars differ from international wars, not in the ferocity of combat, but in the issues that engender them. Two nations that could abide one another as independent neighbors separated by a border might well be the fiercest of enemies if forced to live together in one state, jointly deciding how to raise and spend taxes, choose leaders, and legislate fundamental questions of value. Notwithstanding these differences, no civil wars that I recall upset the argument of liberal pacification.
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Christian Detmold, trans. New York: Modern Library. Mansfield, Harvey C. 1970. Machiavelli's New Regime. Italian Quarterly, 13:63-95. Murphy, Jeffrie. 1970. Kant: The Philosophy of Right. New York: St. Martins. Neustadt, Richard. 1970. Alliance Politics. New York: Columbia University Press. Pocock, J. G. A. 1975. The Machiavellian Moment. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Polanyi, Karl. 1944. The Great Transformation. Boston: Beacon Press.
Posen, Barry, and Stephen Van Evera. 1980. Over-arming and Underwhelming. Foreign Policy, 40:99-118.
Powell, G. Bingham. 1982. Contemporary Democracies. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Riley, Patrick. 1983. Kant's Political Philosophy. Totowa, N.I: Rowman and Littlefield. Rummel, Rudolph J. 1979. Understanding Conflict and Min; 5 vols. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications. Russe», Bruce. 1985. The Mysterious Case of Vanishing Hegemony. International Organization, 39:207-31.
Schumpeter, Joseph. 1950. Capitalism. Socialism, and Democracy. New York: Harper Torchbooks. ----■ 1955. The Sociology of Imperialism. In Imperialism and Social Classes. Cleveland:
World Publishing Co. (Essay originally published in 1919.) Schwarz, Wolfgang. 1962. Kant's Philosophy of f aw and International Peace. Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research, 23:71-80. Shell. Susan. 1980. The Rights of Reason. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Sk inner, Quentm. 1981. hiuchiavelli. New York: 1 111] and Wang.
iyjc|vln and .1. David Singer. 1976. The War-Proneness of Democratic Regimes. The SlTia"; ■isith'in Journal of International Relations, 1 (4):50 69.
[982. Resort to Arms. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications. '     H des 1954- The Peloponnesian War. Rex Warner, ed. and trans. Baltimore: Penguin.
' K>n and Commonwealth Office. 1980. A Yearbook of the Commonwealth 1980. London: U.K. r°re'r' HtvfSO.
Coivress. Senate. Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respecl to U'S IntenWnce Activities. 1975. Covert Action in Chile. 1963- 74 . 94th Cong., 1st sess..
Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office. tj s Department of State. 1981. Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. Washington, DC.:
US Government Printing Office. ■ w |E Kenneth. 1964. The Stability of a Bipolar World. Daedalus, 93:881-909. Walzer Michael. 1983. Spheres of Justice. New York: Basic Books.
WedeErich. 1984. Democracy and War Involvement. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 28:649-64. WMkenfield, Jonathan. 1968. Domestic and Foreign Conflict Behavior of Nations. Journal of
Peace Research, 5:56-69. Wright. Quincy. 1942. A Study of History. Chicago. Chicago University Press. Yovel. Yirmiahu. 1980. Kant and the Philosophy of Histoiy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Society and Anarchy m International Relations^!
HedleyBuii\
Whereas men within each state are subject to a common government, sovereign states ml their mutual relations are not. This anarchy it is possible to regard as the central fact of m.t ternational life and the starting-point of theorizing about it.2 A great deal of the most fruit-! ful reflection about international life has been concerned with tracing the consequences iq1 it of this absence of government. We can, indeed, give some account in these terms of what? it is that distinguishes the international from the domestic field of politics, morals and law
One persistent theme in the modern discussion of international relations has been that as a consequence of this anarchy states do not form together any kind of society; and that if they were to do so it could only be by subordinating themselves to a common authority. One of the chief intellectual supports of this doctrine is what may be called the domestic analogy, the argument from the experience of individual men in domestic so-' ciety to the experience of states, according to which the need of individual men to stand: in awe of a common power in order to live in peace is a ground for holding that states' must do the same. The conditions of an orderly social life, on this view, are the same among states as they are within them: they require that the institutions of domestic society be reproduced on a universal scale. . . .
The view that anarchy is incompatible with society among nations has been especially prominent in the years since the First World War. It was the First World War that gave currency to the doctrine of a 'fresh start' in international relations and set the habit of disparaging the past. Nineteenth century thought had regarded both the existence of international society and its further consolidation as entirely consistent with the continuation of international anarchy. The ideas of 1919 were in part a mere extension of the liberal, progressive strand ofthis nineteenth century anarchist view: the strengthening of international law, the creation of new procedures for arbitration, the establishment of permanent institutions for cooperation among sovereign states, a reduction and limitation of armaments, the pressure of public opinion, the aspiration that states should be popularly
Society and Anarchy in International Relations 151
« and that their boundaries should coincide with the boundaries of nations. But there k8Se voiced also a view that is not to be found in Cobden or Gladstone or Mazzini: a ^ • n of international anarchy itself, expressed on the one hand in the view that the '^'value of the League and the United Nations lay not in themselves, but in their pre-
^e'dfina'cause-a world government; and on the other hand in the endorsement of world -SUIT1 rnnient as an immediately valid objective, and a depreciation of the League and its ^°   c-nr as destined to 'failure' on account of their preservation of state sovereignty.
Reprinted by permission of Harvard University Press and Taylor & Francis Ltd. from Hedley Bull, "Society and Anarchy in International Relations," in Diplomatic Investigations: Essays in the Theotr of Inter-italionnl Politics, edited by Herbert Butterfield and Martin Wight, Cambridge. Mass.: Harvard University Press. <<■■ George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1966.
'A number of the leading ideas in this essay derive, in a process in which they may have lost their original shape, from Martin Wight; and a number of others from C. A. W. Manning. -Anarchy: 'Absence of rule: disorder; confusion' (O.E.D.). The term here is used exclusively in the first ol these senses. "1 he question with which the essay is concerned is whether in the international context it is to be identified also u iih the second and the third.
The twentieth century view of international anarchy is not, however, something new. 5 h a doctrine was stated at the outset of modern international history and has since found a succession of embodiments. The European system of sovereign states did not, of course, arise as a result of the outward growth and collision of hitherto isolated communities. Its origin lay in the disintegration of a single community: the waning on the one hand of central authorities, and on the other hand of local authorities, within Western Christendom, and the exclusion of both from particular territories by the princely power Throughout its history modern European international society has been conscious of the memory of the theoretical impérium of Pope and Emperor and the actual impérium of Rome. When in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries the question was raised of the nature of relationships between sovereign princes and states, order and justice on a universal scale were readily associated with the idea of a universal state: not merely because the supremacy of the prince was observed to be a condition of order within the confines of the state, but also because order throughout Western Christendom as a whole was associated with the vanished authority of the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire. The idea that international anarchy has as its consequence the absence of society among states, and the associated but opposite idea of the domestic analogy, became and have remained persistent doctrines about the international predicament.
The first of these doctrines describes international relations in terms of a Hobbesian state of nature, which is a state of war. Sovereign states, on this view, find themselves in a situation in which their behavior in relation to one another, although it may be circumscribed by considerations of prudence, is not limited by rules or law or morality. Either, as in the Machiavellian version of this doctrine, moral and legal rules are taken not to impinge on the sphere of action of the state: the political life and the moral life being presented as alternatives, as in the theory of quietism. Or, as in the Hegelian version, moral imperatives are thought to exist in international relations, but are believed to endorse the self-assertion of states in relation to one another, and to be incapable of imposing limits upon it. In this first doctrine the conditions of social life are asserted to be the same for states as they are for individuals. In the case of Hobbes, whose views we shall examine more closely, government is stated to be a necessary condition of social life among men, and the same is said to hold of sovereign princes. But the domestic analogy stops short at this point; it is not the view of Hobbes, or of other thinkers of this school, that a social contract of states that would bring the international anarchy to an end either should or can take place.
The second doctrine accepts the description of international relations embodied in the first, but combines with it the demand that the international anarchy be brought to an end. Where the domestic analogy is employed to buttress this doctrine, it is taken further, to embrace the concept of the social contract as well as that of the state of nature. This search
150
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for an alternative to international anarchy may be sustained by the memory of an alterna > tive actually experienced, as in the backward-looking tradition of a return to Roman ort0 ' Western Christian unity. The other variety, the forward-looking tradition of which we may take Kant to be representative, finds its sustenance in the belief in human progress, in the possibility of achieving in the future what has not been achieved in the past.
Even as these two doctrines were taking shape there was asserted against them both the third possibility of a society of sovereign states; and along with it the beginnings of the idea that the conditions of order among states were different from what they were among individual men. Like the two doctrines against which it has been directed, this third doctrine consists in part of a description of what is taken to be the actual character of relations between states, and in part of a set of prescriptions. The description is one which sees sovereign states in intercourse with one another as consciously united together for certain purposes, which modify their conduct in relation to one another. The salient fact of international relations is taken to be not that of conflict among states within the international anarchy, as on the Hobbesian view; nor that of the transience of the international anarchy and the availability of materials with which to replace it, as on the Kantian view; but co-operation among sovereign states in a society without government. The prescriptions which accompany this account of the nature of international relations enjoin respect for the legal and moral rules upon which the working of the international society depends. In place of the Hobbesian view that states are not limited by legal or moral rules in their relations with one another, and the Kantian view that the rules to which appeal may be had derive from the higher morality of a cosmopolitan society and enjoin the overthrow of international society, there are asserted the duties and rights attaching to states as members of international society.
Two traditions, in particular, have advanced this third conception on an international society. One is the body of theory to which modern international law is the heir, which depicts states as constituting a society in the course of showing them to be bound of a system of legal rules: whether these rules are thought to derive from natural law or positive law, whether the subjects of the rules are taken to be states or the men who rule them, and whether the rules are regarded as universally valid or as binding only upon the states of Christendom or Europe. In the system of sixteenth century writers like Vitoria and Suarez, and of seventeenth century thinkers like Grotius and Pufendorf, the idea of the domestic analogy was still strong; the alternative notion of the uniqueness of international society was fully worked out only by the positivist international lawyers of the nineteenth century. The other tradition is that of the analysis of the political relations of states in terms of the system of balance of power. According to such analyses states throughout modern history have been engaged in the operation of a 'political system' or 'states-system', which makes its own demands upon their freedom of action and requires them in particular to act so as to maintain a balance of power as a product of policies consciously directed towards it, and in so far as they have asserted that states are obliged to act so as to maintain it, they must be taken also to embody the idea of international society and of rules binding upon its members. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the predominant theories of the law of nations and of the balance of power were held by diiferent groups of persons and in their respective content were largely antithetical. But
: jj e eighteenth century the two streams converged, as in the writings of Vattel inlerna-m | law came to take account ofthe balance of power, and in the writings of Burke and n° Gentz the political maxim enjoining the preservation of a balance of power came k'be defined in a more legalistic way. In the nineteenth century the predominant doc-'° moved close together: although it may still be doubted whether either theory can '""reconciled to the other without sacrifice of an essential part of its content.
It is the validity of this third conception of an international society, either as a deception ofthe past or as a guide for the present and the future, that is called in question ' D the doctrine that the international anarchy is, or has become, intolerable.
II
The theorists of international society have been able to question the applicability to relations between states of each of the three elements in Hobbes' account of the state of nature In the first place they have often remarked that sovereign states do not so exhaust their strength and invention in providing security against one another that industry and other refinements of living do not flourish. States do not as a rule invest resources in war and military preparations to such an extent that their economic fabric is ruined; even if it may be argued that the al location of resources to war and armaments is not the best al location from the point of view of economic development. On the contrary the armed forces ofthe state by providing security against external attack and internal disorder, establish the conditions under which economic improvement may take place within its borders. The absence of universal government and the fragmentation among sovereign states of responsibility for military security is not incompatible, moreover, with economic interdependence. The relative economic self-sufficiency of states as compared with individuals, has often been taken to explain why states are able to tolerate a looser form of social organization than that enjoyed by individuals within the modern state. At the same time, these theorists may point to the mutual advantages which states derive from economic relationships; and argue that trade, symbolic as it is of the existence of overlapping through different interests, is the activity most characteristic of international relationships as a whole.
As regards the second feature of the Hobbesian state of nature, the absence in it of notions of right and wrong, it is a matter of observation that this is not true of modern international relations. The theorist of international society has often begun his inquiries, as Grotius did, by remarking the extent to which states depart from rules of law and morality, and by uttering a protest against this situation in asserting the binding character of the rules. However, he has also been able to draw attention to the recognition of legal and moral rules by statesmen themselves, and to traditions of positive law and morality which have been a continuous feature of international life. International action which, although it is contrary to recognized principles of international law and morality, is accompanied by pretexts stated in terms of those principles, attests the force in international relations of notions of right and wrong, just as docs action which conforms to them. By contrast, action which in addition to involving a violation ofthe legal and moral rules of international society is accompanied by no legal and moral pretext, action
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155
which, to use Grotius' terms, is 'not persuasive' as well as 'not justifiable", is wjj . taken by legal theorists to be quite uncharacteristic of the behavior of member states of modern international society (as well as to be hostile to its working in a way in whiCn illegal behavior accompanied by a pretext is not).
The element in the Hobbesian state of nature which appears most clearly to apply to international relations is the third. It is the fact of war which appears to provide the chief evidence for the view that states do not form a society. On the one hand, if we take the modern state to illustrate the idea of a society, one of its salient features is that in it, apart from certain residual rights of self-defense, the private use of force is proscribed. But on the other hand, it cannot be denied that sovereign states in relation to one another are in a state of war, in Hobbes' sense that they are disposed to it over a period of time. It must be conceded also that this war is one of all against all. At any single moment in the history of the modern states-system, it is true, certain states will not be disposed to war against certain other states. That is to say, certain pairs of states will be pursuing common purposes and will be allied to one another; certain other pairs of states will be pursuing purposes which are different but do not cross, and will therefore treat one another with indifference; and certain pairs of states, although they have purposes which are conflicting, nevertheless share such a sense of community that (as now among the English-speaking states) war is not contemplated as a possible outcome of the conflict. But if we consider the states-system not at a single moment but in motion throughout the whole of its life (say, from 1648) then we shall find that every state that has survived the period has at some point or other been disposed to war with every other one.
The theorist of international society has sought to deal with this difficulty not by denying the ubiquity of war, but by questioning the relevance of the model of the modern state. If sovereign states are understood to form a society of a different sort from that constituted by the modern state—one, in particular, whose operation not merely tolerates certain private uses of force but actually requires them—then the fact of a disposition to war can no longer be regarded as evidence that international society does not exist. Theorists of the law of nations and of the system of balance of power have thus sought to show that war does not indicate the absence of international society, or its break-down, but can occur as a part of its functioning. Thus some international legal writers have seen in war a means by which the law of international society is enforced by individual members; others have seen in it a means of settling political conflicts. Theorists of the balance of power have seen war as the ultimate means by which threats to the international equilibrium are redressed. It may even be argued, in line with these theories, that the element in international relations of a 'war of all against all' so far from being detrimental to the working of international society, is in a certain sense positively favorable to it. For if the enforcement of law depends upon the willingness of particular law-abiding states to undertake war against particular law-breaking ones, then ihe prospects of law enforcement will be best if every state is willing to take up arms against any state that breaks the law. The fact that at any one time certain states are unwilling to contemplate war with certain other states, either because they are allied to them, or because they are indifferent to one another's policies, or because they arc bound by a particular sense of community, is an obstacle to the enforcement of international law. In the
way die balance of power is best preserved if states are willing to take up arms ^nst any s[ate mat threatens the balance, to focus their attention upon its recalcitrance •this respect and to disregard all special claims it may have on them. 111  if then, we were tempted to compare international relations with a precontractual täte of nature among individual men, it might be argued that we should choose not Hobbes' description of that condition, but Locke's. In the conception of a society without vernmetit. whose members must themselvesjudge and enforce the law, which is therefore crude and uncertain, we can recognize the international society of many thinkers in ' the tradition of international law. And although Locke's speculations about life of men in anarchy will leave us dissatisfied, we may turn to modern anthropological studies of accrual societies of this kind, which have been forced to consider what, in the absence of explicit forms of government, could be held to constitute the political structure of a people.3 Such studies widen our view of the devices for cohesion in a society, and suggest a number of parallels in the international field.
There are a number of these which are worth exploring. One which has received some attention from international lawyers is the principle of the 'hue and cry'. Another is the place of ritual. Another is the principle of loyalty—among kinsmen in primitive society, among allies in international society. International society and certain sorts of primitive society would seem also to be alike in respect of the function performed within them by the principle that might is right. This we are inclined to dismiss as the contrary of a moral principle, a mere way of saying that the question of right does not arise. This, indeed, is what, according to Thucydides, the Athenians said to the Melians: they did not appeal to the principle that might is right, but said that the question of right arose only when the parties were equal, which in this case they were not. Yet in international relations the parties are frequently not equal, and the society of states has had to evolve principles which will take account of this fact and lead to settlements. The rule that the will of the stronger party should be accepted provides a means of going directly to what the outcome of a violent struggle would be, without actually going through that struggle. To say that the principle that might is right fulfills a function in international society is not to provide a justification of it or to regard it as a necessary element in international life; but it is to argue that the working of a social order may be recognized even in a feature of relations between states sometimes taken to demonstrate the absence of any kind of order.4 We must, however, at some point abandon the domestic analogy altogether. Not only is this because the attempt to understand something by means of analogies with something else is a sign of infancy in a subject, an indication of lack of familiarity with our own subject matter. But also because international society is unique, and owes its character to qualities that are peculiar to the situation of sovereign states, as well as to those it has in common with the lives of individuals in domestic society. One of the themes that has accompanied the statement of the idea of international society has been that anarchy
3M. Fortes and F. E. Evans-Pnlchard. African Political Systems (Oxford University Press. 1940). p. <i. 4On the functioning of the principle that might is right in primitive and in international society, see Ernest Gellncr. "How to Live in Anarchy". The I istener. April 3. 1958. pp. 57«> 8.V
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Society and Anarchy in International Relations 157
among states is tolerable to a degree to which among individuals it is not. This has be recognized in some measure even by those who originated the description of interna'^ tional relations in terms of the Hobbesian state of nature.
In the first place, as we have noted, it is not consequent upon the international anar 1 chy that in it there can be no industry or other refinements of living; unlike the individual]
fore violence does not now confront the state with the same sort of prospect it has yS held for the individual.7
This second difference, that states have been less vulnerable to violent attack by one
.her than individual men, is reinforced by a third contingency of great importance; anotnei t      i ______,i____i________i i_____ ,,
in Hobbes' state of nature, the state does not find its energies so absorbed in the
that in so
far as states have been vulnerable in this sense they have not been equally so.
Pursuit!
of security that the life of its activities is that of mere brutes. Hobbes himself recognize] this when having observed that persons of sovereign authority are in 'a posture of war-he goes on to say: 'But because they uphold thereby the industry of their subjects, there! does not follow from it that misery which accompanies the liberty of particular men'51 The same sovereigns that find themselves in the state of nature in relation to one another! have provided with particular territories, the conditions in which the refinements of hfe| can flourish.
In the second place states have not been vulnerable to violent attack to the same degree that individuals are. Spinoza, echoing Hobbes in his assertion that 'two states are in the same relation to one another as two men in the condition of nature,' goes on to add 'with this exception, that a commonwealth can guard itself against being subjugated by another, as a man in the state of nature cannot do. For, of course, a man is overcome by sleep every day, is often afflicted by disease of body or mind, and is finally prostrated by old age; in addition, he is subject to other troubles against which a commonwealth can make itself secure.'6 One human being in the state of nature cannot make himself secure against violent attack; and this attack carries with it the prospect of sudden death. Groups of human beings organized as states, however, may provide themselves with a means of defense that exists independently of the frailties of any one of them. And armed attack by one state upon another has not brought with it a prospect comparable to the killing of one individual by another. For one man's death may be brought about suddenly, in a single act; and once it has occurred, it cannot be undone. But war has only occasionally resulted in the physical extinction of the vanquished people. In modern history it has been possible to take Clausewitz's view that 'war is never absolute in its results' and that defeat in it may be merely 'a passing ^ evil which can be remedied.' Moreover, war in the past, even if it could in principle I lead to the physical extermination of one or both of the belligerent peoples, could not be thought capable of doing so at once in the course of a single act. Clausewitz, in holding that war does not consist of a single instantaneous blow, but always of a succession of separate actions, was drawing attention to something that in the past has always held true and has rendered public violence distinct from private. It is only in the context of recent military technology that it has become pertinent to ask whether war could not now both be 'absolute in its results' and 'take the form of a single, instantaneous blow,' in Clausewitz's understanding of these terms; and whether
A lobbes. Leviathan (Everyman ed.), p. 65.
''Spinoza. Traclaius Politicus. ch. iii, para. I I. The Political Works ed A. G. Wernham (Clarendon Press. 1958). p. 295.
u hbes builds his account of the state of nature upon the proposition that 'Nature hath , men so equal, in the faculties of body and mind . .. (that) the weakest has strength nougn to !'ie stronSest-'8 1S m's equal vulnerability of every man to every other '{ha' ^n Hobbes' view, renders the condition of anarchy intolerable. In modern interna-f*tional society, however, there has been a persistent distinction between Great Powers and fr'stnall Great Powers have been secure against the attacks of small Powers; and have had to fear on'y otner Great Powers, and hostile combinations of Powers. We have only to think of the security enjoyed by Great Britain in the nineteenth century to appreciate that the insecurity which is a feature of the Hobbesian state of nature, in so far as it exists in international society, is not distributed equally among all its members. It is interesting to find Gentz writing of 'the European Commonwealth' that 'The original inequality of the parties in such a union as is here described is not an accidental circumstance, much less a casual evil; but is in a certain degree to be considered as the previous condition and foundation of the whole system.'9 A footnote follows: 'Had the surface of the globe been divided into equal parts, no such union would ever have taken place; and an eternal war of each against the whole is probably the only event we should have heard of If Great Powers are relatively safe from attack and do not stand in need of the protection of a central authority, then by the same token they are themselves in a position to attack others and to withstand the pressures which other states may seek to bring to bear upon them. If an even distribution of strength among states would seem unfavorable to the development of international society, it is also true that great discrepancies in strength may obstruct its working or even prove irreconcilable with it. One of the central contentions of theorists of the balance of power has been that if international society is to be maintained, no one state may be in a position to dominate the rest. Other writers have gone beyond this, to assert with Gentz himself, in a doctrine in which the principle of the balance of power becomes difficult to disentangle from that of collective security, 'That if that system is not merely to exist, but to be maintained without constant perils and violent concussions, each member which infringes it must be in a condition to be coerced, not only by the collective strength of the other members, but by any majority of them, if not by one individual.'10 Ancillon, writing sixteen years later, saw the same principle at work in the early development in Italy of the principle of equilibrium: 'Le voisinage d'un grand nombre d'etats, trop inegaux pour resister fun a l'autre, y avait fait saisir. suivre et
7I have deliberately excluded from this essay any consideration of how far recent military technology should lead us to alter the answers that have been given to these questions in the past. sHobbes. op cir. p. 63.
''rriednch von Gentz. Fragments upon the Balance of Power in Europe (London. Peltier. 1 806). p. 63. '"llrnl. p. 62.
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i pliquer tie bonne heure ces maximes de prudence qui servcnl de sauvegarde au droit et qui allaient passer de ce petit theatre sur un theatre plus yaste.'11
A fourth point of contrast that has often been remarked is that states in their ec0 nomic lives enjoy a degree of self-sufficiency beyond comparison with that of individ ual men. Thus while it has been one of the themes of theorists of international society t0 stress the mutual dependence of states in trade, at the same time their relative economic independence of one another, by contrast with individuals, has provided support for the argument that states are able to tolerate a form of society looser than that which js crowned by a government.
As against the Hobbesian view that states find themselves in a state of nature which is a state of war. it may be argued, therefore, that they constitute a society without a government. This society may be compared with the anarchical society among individual men of Locke's imagining, and also with primitive anarchical societies that have been studied by anthropologists. But although we may employ such analogies, we must in the end abandon them, for the fact that states form a society without a government reflects also the features of their situation that are unique. The working of international society must be understood in terms of its own, distinctive institutions. These include international law, diplomacy and the system of balance of power. There may be others which should be ranked alongside these; it is arguable, for example, that collaboration among the Great Powers to manage the affairs of international society as a whole and impart to them a de--gree of central direction—seen in operation in the series of conferences from Westphalia to Potsdam, and finding its most perfect embodiment in the Concert of Europe—also represents such an institution, even though it has functioned only intermittently.
Ill
The idea that sovereign states find themselves in a Hobbesian state of nature, as well as standing on its own as a description of what international politics is like, is also to be found linked to demands for the establishment of a universal state. In doctrines like that of Kant in Perpetual Peace, the Hobbesian domestic analogy is applied to international relations, but in this case taken further to embrace not only the idea of the state of nature but also that of the social contract.
The Kantian view of international relations involves a dilemma. If states are indeed in a Hobbesian state of nature, the contract by means of which they are to emerge from it cannot take place. For if covenants without the sword are but words, this will be true of covenants directed towards the establishment of universal government, just as it will hold true of agreements on other subjects. The difficulty with the Kantian position is that the description it contains of the actual condition of international relations, and the prescription it provides for its improvement, are inconsistent with one another. Action within the context of continuing international anarchy is held to be of no avail; but at the
".I. P. F. Ancillon. Tableau des Revolutions du Svsteme Politique de I'Eitro/'e. depuis la Fin du Quin: ieine Steele (Pans. Anselm et Pwhard 1823). vol. 1. pp. 262-3.
Society and Anarchy in International Relations 159
time it is in the international anarchy that the grand solution of the international S&cial contract is held to take place.
S   The advocate of a universal state can show his scheme to be feasible as well as de-rable only by admitting that international relations do not resemble a Hobbesian state
of nature:
that in it covenants without the sword are more than words and the materi-
Is may he f°und with wmcn t0 bring about collaboration between sovereign govern-ments But to make this admission is to weaken the case for bringing the international anarchy to an end. For the establishment of a universal government cannot then be reaped as a sine qua non of the world order. If a Hobbesian description of the international state of nature is abandoned for a Lockean one, then the case for a fundamental change is simply that which Locke presents for a contract of government: that to crown the anarchical society with a government would be to render it more efficient.
However, such a case might still be a quite formidable one. It may rest essentially on something which the Lockean description of international society itself admits: that in it the private use of force is tolerated or even in certain circumstances required. The international society described by the international lawyers and the theorists of balance of power is one in which war has a permanent and perhaps even a necessary place. The argument for proceeding from anarchy to government may therefore be stated, as Kant states it, in terms of the possibility and desirability of perpetual peace.
It is a facile view according to which a universal state would abolish war because war is a relationship between sovereign states and sovereign states would have been abolished. Either we may take war to mean any kind of organized violence between large groups of human beings, in which case the statement is false. Or we may understand the term in the narrow sense of a contention between sovereign states, in which case although the statement is true it is misleading. War in this latter sense comprises only one area of the spectrum of possible violence; if the elimination of war in this special sense of public war were to occasion the re-establishment of the various forms of private war, this could not necessarily be counted a gain.
If, however, a universal state should be understood as providing, just as does the system of sovereign states, a particular solution to the problem of the management of violence, rather than a means of transcending it, this is not to say that it is an inferior solution. It may be argued that the propensities for violence that are inherent in any form of political organization on a world-scale, will be better managed through the medium of a single authority entrusted with the legitimate exercise of force, than through many such authorities; just as this is the case in the smaller geographical context of the nation-state. Such an argument might well be sustained; yet the traditional arguments upholding international society against universal government would first have to be met.
These arguments have often rested on a preference for liberty in international relations over order or security: the liberty of states and nations from domination by a central power, and of individuals from the reach of a tyrannical government whose ubiquitous authority must deny them the right of foreign asylum. It may well be replied to this that order or security is the prime need of inlemational society, and that liberty should if necessary be sacrificed to it. International anarchy, however, may be preferred on mounds of order also.
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Government, involving as it does a legal monopoly of the use of force, provide means for maintaining order: but it is also a source of dissension among conflict' a groups in society, which compete for its control. If government authority, once it is c 8 tured, may be wielded so as to deny the resort to force by private individuals or group" it is also the case that the existence of the governmental mechanism constitutes a prj^ in political conflict, which raises the stakes in such conflict to a level above that it woula otherwise be. In the typical modern nation-state order is best preserved when confljct takes the form of a competition between the contending forces for control of a singl government, rather than that of competition among governments. Yet the political com! munity is also familiar in which the reverse is the case; in which the dangers to order arising from the coexistence of sovereign governments are less than those involved in the attempt to hold hostile communities in the framework of a single polity. The partition of India in 1947 had this rationale. It is possible also to view the problem of order in the world community in this way. Formidable though the classic dangers are of a plurality of sovereign states, these have to be reckoned against those inherent in the attempt to contain disparate communities within the framework of a single government. It is an en- -tirely reasonable view of world order at the present time that it is best served by living with the former dangers rather than by attempting to face the latter.
Power and Interdependence
Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye
For political realists, international politics, like all other politics, is a struggle for
power
but, unlike domestic politics, a struggle dominated by organized violence. In the
vvords of the most influential postwar textbook. "All history shows that nations active in international politics are continuously preparing for, actively involved in, or recovering from organized violence in the form of war."1 Three assumptions are integral to the realist vision. First, states as coherent units are the dominant actors in world politics. This js a double assumption: states are predominant; and they act as coherent units. Second, realists assume that force is a usable and effective instrument of policy. Other instruments may also be employed, but using or threatening force is the most effective means of wielding power. Third, partly because of their second assumption, realists assume a hierarchy of issues in world politics, headed by questions of military security: the "high politics" of military security dominates the "low politics" of economic and social affairs.
These realist assumptions define an ideal type of world politics. They allow us to imagine a world in which politics is continually characterized by active or potential conflict among states, with the use of force possible at any time. Each state attempts to defend its territory and interests from real or perceived threats. Political integration among states is slight and lasts only as long as it serves the national interests of the most powerful states. Transnational actors either do not exist or are politically unimportant. Only the adept exercise of force or the threat of force permits states to survive, and only while statesmen succeed in adjusting their interests, as in a well-functioning balance of power, is the system stable.
Each of the realist assumptions can be challenged. If we challenge them all simultaneously, we can imagine a world in which actors other than states participate directly in world politics, in which a clear hierarchy of issues does not exist, and in which force is an ineffective instrument of policy. Under these conditions—which we call the characteristics of complex interdependence—one would expect world politics to be very different than under realist conditions. .. .
We do not argue, however, that complex interdependence faithfully reflects world political reality. Quite the contrary: both it and the realist portrait are ideal types. Most situations will fall somewhere between these two extremes. Sometimes, realist assumptions will be accurate, or largely accurate, but frequently complex interdependence will
From Robert O. Keohane and Joseph s. Nye. Power end Interdependence: World Polities in Transition. 2nd ed. Glenview. IL: Scott. Foresman. 1989. pp. 20-27. Copyright *  I«89 by Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye Reprinted by permission of Pearson Fdtication. Inc.. Glenview. IL. 'Mans .1. Morgcnthau. Politics Among Notions: The Struggle lot Power end Pence. 4th oil. (New York: Knopf. !%7). p. 36.
1M
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Poiver and Interdependence 163
provide a better portrayal of reality. Before one decides what explanatory model to ply to a situation or problem, one will need to understand the degree to which realist complex interdependence assumptions correspond to the situation.
THE CHARACTERISTICS OF COMPLEX INTERDEPENDENCE
Complex interdependence has three main characteristics:
(1) Multiple channels connect societies, including: informal ties between governmental elites as well as formal foreign office arrangements; informal ties among nongovernmental elites (face-to-face and through telecommunications); and transnational organizations (such as multinational banks or corporations). These channels can be summarized as interstate, transgovernmental, and transnational relations. Interstate relations are the normal channels assumed by realists. Transgovernmental applies when we relax the realist assumption that states act coherently as units; transnational applies when we relax the assumption that states are the only units.
(2) The agenda of interstate relationships consists of multiple issues that are not arranged in a clear or consistent hierarchy. This absence of hierarchy among issues means, among other things, that military security does not consistently dominate the agenda. Many issues arise from what used to be considered domestic policy, and the dis-tinction between domestic and foreign issues becomes blurred. These issues are consid- Ě ered in several government departments (not just foreign offices), and at several levels. Inadequate policy coordination on these issues involves significant costs. Different issues generate different coalitions, both within governments and across them, and involve different degrees of conflict. Politics does not stop at the waters' edge.
(3) Military force is not used by governments toward other governments within the region, or on the issues, when complex interdependence prevails. It may, however, be important in these governments' relations with governments outside that region, or on other issues. Military force could, for instance, be irrelevant to resolving disagreements on economic issues among members of an alliance, yet at the same time be very important for that alliance s political and military relations with a rival bloc. For the former relationships this condition of complex interdependence would be met; for the latter, it would not. . . .
Minor Role of Military Force
Political scientists have traditionally emphasized the role of military force in international politics. . . . Force dominates other means of power: //'there are no constraints on one's choice of instruments (a hypothetical situation that has only been approximated in the two world wars), the state with superior military force will prevail. If the security dilemma lor all states were extremely acute, military force, supported by economic and
resources, would clearly be the dominant source of power. Survival is the primary "^of a" states, and in the worst situations, force is ultimately necessary to guarantee 8°a .  ) jni)s military force is always a central component of national power. surVyet particularly among industrialized pluralist countries, the perceived margin of fety has widened: fears of attack in general have declined, and fears of attack bv one nother are virtually nonexistent. France has abandoned the tons azitnuts (defense in all "'directions') strategy that President de Gaulle advocated (it was not taken entirely seriously even at     tmle)- Canada's last war plans for fighting the United States were abandoned half a century ago. Britain and Germany no longer feel threatened by each other. Intense relationships of mutual influence exist between these countries, but in most of them force is irrelevant or unimportant as an instrument of policy.
Moreover, force is often not an appropriate way of achieving other goals (such as economic and ecological welfare) that are becoming more important. It is not impossible to imagine dramatic conflict or revolutionary change in which the use or threat of military force over an economic issue or among advanced industrial countries might become plausible. Then realist assumptions would again be a reliable guide to events. But in most situations, the effects of military force are both costly and uncertain.2
Even when the direct use of force is barred among a group of countries, however, military power can still be used politically. Each superpower continues to use the threat of force to deter attacks by other superpowers on itself or its allies; its deterrence ability thus serves an indirect, protective role, which it can use in bargaining on other issues with its allies. This bargaining tool is particularly important for the United States, whose allies are concerned about potential Soviet threats and which has fewer other means of influence over its allies than does the Soviet Union over its Eastern European partners. The United States has, accordingly, taken advantage of the Europeans' (particularly the Germans') desire for its protection and linked the issue of troop levels in Europe to trade and monetary negotiations. Thus, although the first-order effect of deterrent force is essentially negative—to deny effective offensive power to a superpower opponent—a state can use that force positively—to gain political influence.
Thus, even for countries whose relations approximate complex interdependence, two serious qualifications remain: (1) drastic social and political change could cause force again to become an important direct instrument of policy; and (2) even when elites' interests are complementary, a country that uses military force to protect another may have significant political influence over the other country.
In North-South relations, or relations among Third World countries, as well as in East-West relations, force is often important. Military power helps the Soviet Union to dominate Eastern Europe economically as well as politically. The threat of open or covert American military intervention has helped to limit revolutionary changes in the Caribbean, especially in Guatemala in 1954 and in the Dominican Republic in 1965.
-For ;i valuable discussion, see Klaus Knorr, The Power of Nations: The Political Economy o) International Relations (New York: Basic Books, 1975).
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Power and Interdependence 165
Secretary of State Kissinger, in January 1975. issued a veiled warning to members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) that the United States miaht use force against them "where there is some actual strangulation of the industrj alized world."-'
Even in these rather confiictual situations,.however, the recourse to force seems leSs likely now than at most times during the century before 1945. The destructiveness of nu clear weapons makes any attack against a nuclear power dangerous. Nuclear weapons are mostly used as a deterrent. Threats of nuclear action against much weaker countries* may occasionally be efficacious, but they are equally or more likely to solidify relations' between one's adversaries. The limited usefulness of conventional force to control so-i cially mobilized populations has been shown by the United States failure in Vietnam as well as by the rapid decline of colonialism in Africa. Furthermore, employing force on-one issue against an independent state with which one has a variety of relationships is likely to rupture mutually profitable relations on other issues. In other words, the use of force often has costly effects on non-security goals. And finally, in Western democracies popular opposition to prolonged military conflicts is very high.4
It is clear that these constraints bear unequally on various countries, or on the same countries in different situations. Risks of nuclear escalation affect everyone, but domestic opinion is far less constraining for communist states, or for authoritarian regional powers, than for the United States, Europe, or Japan. Even authoritarian countries may be reluctant to use force to obtain economic objectives when such use might be ineffective and disrupt other relationships. Both the difficulty of controlling socially mobilized populations with foreign troops and the changing technology of weaponry may actually enhance the ability of certain countries, or nonstate groups, to use terrorism as a political weapon without effective fear of reprisal.
The fact that the changing role of force has uneven effects does not make the change: less important, but it does make matters more complex. This complexity is compounded by differences in the usability of force among issue areas. When an issue arouses little interest or passion, force may be unthinkable. In such instances, complex interdependence may be a valuable concept for analyzing the political process. But if that issue becomes a matter of life and death—as some people thought oil might become—the use or threat of force could become decisive again. Realist assumptions would then be more relevant.
It is thus important to determine the applicability of realism or of complex interdependence to each situation. Wilhout this determination further analysis is likely to be confused. Our purpose in developing an alternative to the realist description of world politics is to encourage a differentiated approach that distinguishes among dimensions and areas of world politics—not (as some modernist observers do) to replace one oversimplification with another.
The Political Processes
of Complex Interdependence
i
-'Business Heek. January 13, 1975.
••Stanley Hoffmann. 'The Acceptability of Military Force." and Laurence Martin. "The Utility of Militär)- force, in Force in Modern Sociales: Its Place in International Politics (Adelphi Paper International Infinite lor Strategic Studies. 1973). See also Knorr. The Power of Nations.
Three
mam characteristics of complex interdependence give rise to distinctive political
rocesses, which translate power resources into power as control of outcomes. As we ar-P e(j earlier, something is usually lost or added in the translation. Under conditions of cornP'ex in,cl'dePenc'ence me translation will be different than under realist conditions, and our predictions about outcomes will need to be adjusted accordingly.
In the realist world, military security will be the dominant goal of states. It will even affect issues that are not directly involved with military power or territorial defense, jvjonmilitary problems will not only be subordinated to military ones; they will be studied for their politico-military implications. Balance of payments issues, for instance, will be considered at least as much in the light of their implications for world power generally as for their purely financial ramifications. McGeorge Bundy conformed to realist expectations when he argued in 1964 that devaluation of the dollar should be seriously considered if necessary to fight the war in Vietnam.5 To some extent, so did former Treasury Secretary Henry Fowler when he contended in 1971 that the United States needed a trade surplus of $4 billion to $6 billion in order to lead in Western defense.6
In a world of complex interdependence, however, one expects some officials, particularly at lower levels, to emphasize the variety of state goals that must be pursued. In the absence of a clear hierarchy of issues, goals will vary by issue, and may not be closely related. Each bureaucracy will pursue its own concerns; and although several agencies may reach compromises on issues that affect them all, they will find that a consistent pattern of policy is difficult to maintain. Moreover, transnational actors will introduce different goals into various groups of issues.
Linkage Strategies
Goals will therefore vary by issue area under complex interdependence, but so will the distribution of power and the typical political processes. Traditional analysis focuses on the international system, and leads us to anticipate similar political processes on a variety of issues. Militarily and economically strong states will dominate a variety of organizations and a variety of issues, by linking their own policies on some issues to other states' policies on other issues. By using their overall dominance to prevail on their weak issues, the strongest states will, in the traditional model, ensure a congruence between the overall structure of military and economic power and the pattern of outcomes on any one issue area. Thus world politics can be treated as a seamless web.
Under complex interdependence, such congruence is less likely to occur. As military force is devalued, militarily strong states will find it more difficult to use their overall
Tlenrv Brandon. The Retreat of American Power (New York: Doubleday. 1974). p. 218. '•International Implications 0/ the New Economic Policy. LIS. Congress. House of Representatives, Com-mitlee on Fotemn Affairs. Subcommittee on Foreign Economic Policy, Hearings. September 16. 1971.
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dominance to connol outcomes on issues in which they are weak. And since the distribution of power resources in trade, shipping, or oil, for example, may be quite different, patterns of outcomes and distinctive political processes are likely to vary from one set of issues to another. If force were readily applicable, and military security were the highest foreign policy goal, these variations in the issue structures of power would hot matter very much. The linkages drawn from them to military issues would ensure consistent dominance by the overall strongest states. But when military force is largely immobilized, strong states will find that linkage is less effective. They may still attempt such links, but in the absence of a hierarchy of issues, their success will be problematic.
Dominant states may try to secure much the same result by using overall economic power to affect results on other issues. If only economic objectives are at stake, they may succeed: money, afterall, is fungible. But economic objectives have political implications, and economic linkage by the strong is limited by domestic, transnational, and transgov-ernmental actors who resist having their interests traded off. Furthermore, the international actors may be different on different issues, and the international organizations in which negotiations take place are often quite separate. Thus it is difficult, for example, to imagine a militarily or economically strong state linking concessions on monetary policy to reciprocal concessions in oceans policy. On the other hand, poor weak states are not similarly inhibited from linking unrelated issues, partly because their domestic interests are less complex. Linkage of unrelated issues is often a means of extracting concessions or side payments from rich and powerful states. And unlike powerful states whose instrument for linkage (military force) is often too costly to use, the linkage instrument used by poor, weak states—international organization—is available and inexpensive.
Thus as the utility of force declines, and as issues become more equal in importance, the distribution of power within each issue will become more important. If linkages become less effective on the whole, outcomes of political bargaining will increasingly vary by issue area.
The differentiation among issue areas in complex interdependence means that linkages among issues will become more problematic and will tend to reduce rather than reinforce international hierarchy. Linkage strategies, and defense against them, will pose critical strategic choices for states. Should issues be considered separately or as a package? If linkages are to be drawn, which issues should be linked, and on which of the linked issues should concessions be made? How far can one push a linkage before it becomes counterproductive? For instance, should one seek formal agreements or informal, but less politically sensitive, understandings? The fact that world politics under complex interdependence is not a seamless web leads us to expect that efforts to stitch seams together advantageously, as reflected in linkage strategies, will, very often, determine the shape of the fabric.
The negligible role of force leads us to expect states to rely more on other instruments in order to wield power. For the reasons we have already discussed, less vulnerable states will try to use asymmetrical interdependence in particular groups of issues as a source of power; they will also try to use international organizations and transnational actors and flows. States will approach economic interdependence in terms of power as well as its effects on citizens' welfare, although welfare considerations will
Power and Interdependence 167
limit their attempts to maximize power. Most economic and ecological interdependence involves the possibility of joint gains, or joint losses. Mutual awareness of potential gains and losses and the danger of worsening each actor's position through overly rigorous struggles over the distribution of the gains can limit the use of asymmetrical interdependence.
Agenda Setting
Our second assumption of complex interdependence, the lack of clear hierarchy among multiple issues, leads us to expect that the politics of agenda formation and control will become more important. Traditional analyses lead statesmen to focus on politico-military issues and to pay little attention to the broader politics of agenda formation. Statesmen assume that the agenda will be set by shifts in the balance of power, actual or anticipated, arfd by perceived threats to the security of states. Other issues will only be very important when they seem to affect security and military power. In these cases, agendas will be influenced strongly by considerations of the overall balance of power
Yet, today, some nonmilitary issues are emphasized in interstate relations at one time, whereas others of seemingly equal importance are neglected or quietly handled at a technical level. International monetary politics, problems of commodity terms of trade, oil, food, and multinational corporations have all been important during the last decade; but not all have been high on interstate agendas throughout that period.
Traditional analysts of international politics have paid little attention to agenda formation: to how issues come to receive sustained attention by high officials. The traditional orientation toward military and security affairs implies that the crucial problems of foreign policy are imposed on states by the actions or threats of other states. These are high politics as opposed to the low politics of economic affairs. Yet, as the complexity of actors and issues in world politics increases, the utility of force declines and the line between domestic policy and foreign policy becomes blurred: as the conditions of complex interdependence are more closely approximated, the politics of agenda formation becomes more subtle and differentiated.