Jillian Riney
Professor Robert Brathwaite
MC 220
2 October 2018
Reading Quiz #1
Question 2:
Structural realism is the idea that the structure of the international system is the driving force for state behavior. To break this down we must understand that the structure of the international system is that of anarchy, there exists no supreme power or enforcer over states in this system and, because of that, structural realists believe that this system causes states to behave in their own best interests of survival. Within structural realism, there exists two offshoots that equally aim to explain and predict state behavior: defensive realism and offensive realism. Both types of realism are based on five key assumptions: the international system is anarchic, a state’s goal above all else is to survive, all states have offensive capabilities, the intentions of other states are uncertain, and all states act rationally (Brathwaite). While both hold these assumptions, the key difference between defensive and offensive realism is their ideas on the concept of power maximization.
Defensive realism, coined by Kenneth Waltz in his Theory of International Politics, communicates that a state’s main motivation is survival and will only seek to acquire as much power is needed for that. Defensive realists believe that states will act in terms of self-help in order to acquire enough power to survive which creates competition. States react to this competition by taking measure to balance power; they balance externally by aligning themselves with a group of states that may have less power than another but are not perceived as a threat or an aggressor and will balance themselves internally by developing their own military and economy as much as possible (Brathwaite). Due to this, defensive realists see bipolar distributions of power (two states being considered great powers) as less prone to conflict due to the increased predictability of external balancing. These predictions of state behavior are rooted in the main assumption that states will only aim to acquire the exact amount of power needed for survival and nothing more.
Offensive realism, on the other hand, states that states are aggressive power maximizers who will seek to gain as much power as they can in the international system. John Mearsheimer’s Tragedy of Great Power Politics outlines what he sees as the goals of states and then analyzes the various strategies utilized by states in order to maximize their power. Mearsheimer writes that, in offensive realism, the ultimate goal of states is to become the hegemon in their region of the world while preventing others from gaining their own hegemony (Mearsheimer 138). Directly contrasting the defensive realist prediction of power balancing, offensive realists see the practice of buck-passing as much more effective. Buck passing is the act of a state attempting to have another power check an aggressor rather than do it themselves in order to avoid the costs of conflict (139). In an offensive view, states will do whatever is in their capacity to obtain the most power or wealth possible and will not stop even if they have what would be considered “enough” in a defensive view.
Offensive realism and its views on power of states proves itself to be the most accurate in today’s international system. The idea that the more powerful a state is relative to others the less likely it is that their survival will be at risk is prevalent especially in the modern case study of the United States of America. The US has obtained becoming the regional hegemon in the Western hemisphere, there exists no country in this region that would attempt to attack the state because of this. Yet, the US government is still exuding behavior in order to obtain more power than it already has. The US engages in war in attempt to gather more power and has begun to act aggressively in trade deals with neighbors Canada and Mexico in order to continue accumulating more wealth. Offensive realist behavior is the most accurate description of today’s power grabbing and anarchic international system.
Question 3:
According to Sebastian Rosato in his The Flawed Logic of Democratic Peace Theory, Democratic Peace Theory (DPT) is the claim that democracies rarely fight each other because they share commonalties that lessen the chance of war. The theory does not claim that democracies do not go to war with each other because they are inherently more peaceful states, but instead claims that democracies share certain characteristics that make them less likely to.
There exists two logics that underpin the DPT: normative logic and institutional logic. Normative logic supports the view that democracies avoid war due to norm externalization. The mentioned norms aim to encompass nonviolent conflict resolution and negotiation in place of war (Rosato 586). Normative logic theorizes that because of these shared values, democratic states will foster trust and respect for one another which, in turn, will lessen the chance of war. On the other hand, institutional logic supports the idea that accountability in democratic states continues peace. Democratic leaders are made accountable to their people and avoid war over threat of being voted out of power. Institutional logic states that this accountability leads to public constraint against war, group restraint in that democracies trust each other restrain against war, slow mobilization in war due to the amount of convincing needed to act, a lack of surprise attacks due to the need to inform the public of plans, and a heightened access to information about war as a result of avoiding misrepresentation to the people (587).
In Sebastian Rosato’s article, he expresses what he sees as flaws in both of the underpinning logics of the DPT. On the side of normative logic, he argues that democracies rarely adhere to the norms that are supposed to be fostering trust and respect. He supports this with two main arguments: democracies often use force while having no clear agreement about what justifies its use and do not always recognize other democracies. Rosato uses examples of the Britain v. Afghan war (creating a buffer against Russia) and France v. Tunisia war (preventing Italian occupation) to show that democracies have engaged in war outside of reasons of self-defense and outside of their liberal norms they claim to have (588). He claims that these wars often end in human rights abuses as a result of “democratic” nations not seeing other ones as democratic enough and that democracies have failed to externalize their norms. He holds the belief that trust, and respect do not matter as states have proven the will act in their best self-interest no matter the effect on others.
As for the institutional logic approach to DPT, Rosato moves to attack every idea of the logic. He provides data that proves that democratic leaders are actually held less accountable than autocratic ones for engaging in acts of war due to the fact that many autocratic leaders are executed, exiled, or imprisoned afterwards while democratic ones are simply voted out of power (594). He argues that public constraint does not exist as democratic populations remain overall unaffected by war and that the concept of proud nationalism will always allow conflict. As for group constraint, it is impossible for governments to represent the voices of all groups in a nation and anti-war groups are too easily ignored. Additionally, he argues that the ideas of slow mobilization and surprise attacks are simply not true through examples of constitutional ability to overcome legislative power and the 1976 6-day war (596-598).
Rosato makes several strong points against the logics that hold up the Democratic Peace Theory, especially when arguing against institutional logics. However, in his arguments regarding normative logic in stating examples of wars fought outside of reasons of self-defense, he begins to make arguments against concepts not included in normative logic. He attacks democratic states for their actions that were “not in self-defense,” however, the externalized norms listed in the normative theory say very little about actions inside or outside of self-defense. The listed example of Britian v. Afghan war in order to create a buffer against Russia was not a war of self-defense, as he stated, but it was fought in order to protect and continue democracy and therefore follows normative logic. Rosato’s arguments against the underpinnings of DPT in a normative sense focus more on flaws in democracies dealing with other non-democratic forces than actual democratic peace which greatly weakens his arguments.