Realism in International Relations
What is Realism?
“A paradigm based on the premise
that world politics is essentially and unchangeably a struggle among
self-interested states for power and position under anarchy, with each
competing state pursuing its own national interests”
-
Kegley & WittKopf, p31
Realism is a one of the most historical and
dominant theory in international relations. And Realism has been the most
influential theory to understand practical international scenarios in the
world. Anyway throughout the history realism has been developed by different
and famous political philosophers. Kautilya, Sun Tzu, Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbs
can be named as few of the famous realists. But the founder of this school of
thought was Thucydides. To understand realism there should be some idea about
what these philosophers said about this school of thought.
Realist ground themselves in long and old
tradition. The ancient Indian political thinker kautilya in his book “Arthashasthraya”
mentioned that rulers should use power to advance their interests for
self-protection and to consolidate a benevolent despotic regime. In here
kautilya tried to show how the power should be used to controlled states and
protect a regime. Even this was a main policy of Realism it’s still not clear
what kautilya wanted back then. Anyway Thucydides in his book history of the
Peloponnesian War mentioned that main reason for this war was growth of
Athenian power and fear this caused in Sparta was the main reason for war. In
other words Security dilemma. This was the main root for the idea about realism
but since international relations didn’t exist that time it wasn’t the origin
of the theory. In centuries after Machiavelli wrote the book called “The Prince”
and this book contains a lot main policies in realism like power and struggle
for power. By the “Leviathan” that was written by Hobbs he mainly showed that
how modern states works. And then modern time philosophers like E.H.Carr also
helped to expand the views of this theory too. With the help of all those
political philosophers the major roots for realism was established just like
that.Realism was mainly developed in the post second world war time. After the
second world Hans Morgenthau, the pre-eminent scholar of the realist school
systemize this school of thought with his book “Politics among Nations”. This
book became the standard text book for realists in the international System.
Anyhow after taking a summary of all the views of
the philosophers above mentioned realists came for a central idea about what
realism is? Realism in international relations is mostly about power and its
exercise by states. Realists primarily emphasize on power, national interest,
Security and the centrality of the nation state. They believe in the constancy
of human nature which can be both good and evil.
Realism is mainly concerned with the world’s real
politics. It’s more of a practical theory to understand different situations in
the international system. Realists maintain that the principal actors in the
international arena are states, each acting in its rational self-interest
within an environment of international anarchy. In the ongoing struggle for
power in world politics, through the pursuit of national interest, policymakers
use rational tools, including diplomacy, economic power and ultimately military
force to attain the goals of foreign policy.
Realism can be divided in to two main parts as
Classical Realism and Neo Realism. Classical realism is simply the principles
that above mentioned. According to Classical realism it is fundamentally the
nature of humans that pushes states and individuals to act in a way that places
interests over ideologies. Classical realism is an ideology defined as the view
that the “drive for power and the will to dominate that are held to be
fundamental aspects of human nature”.
But realists have reinvented their ideology in the
post-cold war era. This reinvented realists known as the Neo Realists. Neo Realists
rejected the fact that super national institutions can supplant. Kennath Waltz
was the foremost thinker in the neo realist school of thinking. Waltz brought
structural system for the international relations. According to him states seek
to survive within anarchical system in international structure. There are four
main Polar in the world according to Waltz. Polarity means number of
independent power centres in the world. It can be a Uni polar system, Bipolar,
Tripolar or Multipolar system. Waltz stated that main difference between
national and international politics that decisively the behaviours of states in
the absence of a higher authority in the system. Because of this it leads to a
Security dilemma situation.
There are another two types of realism which are
not popular that much. They are Defensive realism and offensive realism.
According to defensive realism scholars said that states are mostly trying to
maximize their security. What offensive realist said is states are trying to
maximize the power of the states.
This is what realism is. It’s more practical and
more effective theory in the system. And it is the best way of understanding
contemporary world events.
If we looked at current major incidents like US
President Donald Trump meets Kim Jon Un it’s about maintaining the power of the
world. What America needed was get along side with North Korea so Russia won’t
be involve with Korea for some time. With that USA can maintain the unipolar
system and there superpower status in the world will not be questioned.
And another example is recently the USA has been to
Indonesia and India and pledged to strengthen their mutual exiting ties and
relationships. From the political perspectives, we can see that the US does so
simply and mainly to balance its power with china who apparently seems cunning
and bullying over many worlds issues
There are four main assumptions
in the realist theory of international system.
- States are the most important actors :-
According to the realism is that the nation state is the main actor in
the international system. Because only the state, given its claim to
sovereignty, possesses the monopoly of legitimate force to groups within its
territory and also between itself and other states and international
organizations. This has been the position since 1648, during the Treaty of
Westphalia where a number of European powers came together to end various wars
(such as the 30 Years War). In this meeting, they agreed to the idea of
state-sovereignty, where no outside actor can dictate the domestic or foreign
policies of another state (although realists see the principle of sovereignty
being only as good as the physical ability to protect one’s sovereignty). Multy
national cope rations and transnational actors acknowledged by realists and
they are of secondary importance. Kenneth waltz argue that states are the basic
actors in the international system by arguing that the behaviour of other
actors in conditioned and delimited by state decisions and state power.
- All states within the system are unitary and rational actors :-
The second assumption is the state viewed as a
unitary actor and a rational actors. For realists a country faces the outside
world as an integrated unit. A common assumption among realist is that
political differences within the state are ultimately resolved ,namely the
government speakers with one voice for the states as a whole. On way particular
issue, realists assume that state as a unitary actor has one policy. Of course
there may expectations ,but realists support the argument that state is an
integrated actor For instance ,when a foreign ministry express policies
different from ministry of defence, actions is taken to bring these alternative
position to not so much important, higher authorities will intervene to prevent
alternative views.
This is why foreign policy is given significant
attention in realist political thought. They argue that regardless of any
internal differences, the unified position will be one that is of the interest
of the state.
Realists believe that the state is a rational actor
also states goal are oriented and their goal are consistent. Also state are
assumed to derive strategies to achieve their goals and they are cost sensitive
.States make cost benefit analysis of every alternative they evaluate
alternatives and select the ones that maximizes their benefits. Thus states can
change their strategies in the face of changes in extremal constraints and
opportunities. Realists are aware of the limit of this claim .Particularly
government al decision makers may not have all the information and knowledge
they will need for achieving their objectives.
As states are rational and define their interests
in terms of their power realists assume that all states behave in a standard
manner. Based on the rationally assumption International system is composed of
states that have the same patterns of behaviour.
- That the international political system is anarchic as there is no supranational authority that can enforce rules over the states,:-
Supranational authorities are the institutions who
negotiated power is delegated to an authority by governments of member states.
But because of this anarchical system in international relations realists
strongly believed that no supranational union or authority can control or rules
states. What actually happened is states ruled over supranational authorities
when they seek there national interests.
- That all states desire power so that they can ensure their own self-preservation :-
All realists seem to say that the international
system is one of tension and conflict. Because of this all the states try to
gain more and more power. They look for maximize power on their countries
because then states be able to ensure own self - preservation. Maximizing power
in states is a national interest for many countries. After the Second World War
it’s not just about military powers or nuclear powers that states try to gain.
Since economic strength often translates to power in the international system
states try to gather more and more economic powers. For self-preservation
states have overriding there 'national interest' as mainly national security
and survival. In pursuit of national security, states strive to amass
resources. And if needed states will go on to war also for ensure there
protection. For this self-preservation states are maximizing all the powers
that they can achieve and try to be a powerful institution in the international
system.
They are the main assumptions of the realism. Both
Realist thoughts and Neo realist thoughts based on these assumptions.
Critiques
for Realism
Realism is extremely realistic as a theoretical
framework for analysing conflict in the contemporary international system.
Realism emphasizes the persistent role of sovereign territorial nation-states
in international relations, although, it does not account for the emergence of
non-state actors and violent terrorists organizations. Realism assumes that
states practice ‘self-help’ to ensure the state’s ‘survival’ by means of power,
which is measured in terms of military capabilities, however, it does not
acknowledge international institutions that are supposed to foster economic
cooperation and reduce the need for power maximization. Realism’s central theme
of ‘the balance of power’ has been undermined in the post-Cold War, and more
importantly, in the post 9/11 eras.
Realism’s main concept of ‘the balance of power’
has not been realized in the traditional sense since the end of the Cold War,
which faces realists with the conundrum as to why unchallenged US hegemony
dominates the contemporary international system. The US is disproportionately
more powerful than most nations in the world, but as synder states, ‘Yet no
combination of states or other powers can challenge the United States
militarily, and no balancing coalition seems imminent.’ If this holds true the
very backbone of Realism’s theoretical contentions are snapped and left
paralyzed. In light of these arguments it would seem that the difficulties
Realism faces renders it obsolete as an IR theory.
Another main critic for realism is rejects the
significance of international institutions like the United Nations which since
1945 has been meant to establish international norms, cooperation, and
collective security. International institutions are supposed to reduce the
likeliness for states to pursue aggressive policy that result in inter-state
conflict, which validates their usefulness.
In spite of this, Realists have argued that ‘balance
of power’ political considerations are still relevant and continued to be
applied in the contemporary international system. Realism offers two arguments
in its defence. First, Realism predicts nations seeking to balance against the
preponderance of another state may develop nuclear capabilities to secure their
own survival. Recently North Korea has claimed that is holds nuclear weapons,
which may signal to other nations not to consider an attack against their
sovereignty. According to Robert Jervis ‘Whatever these weapons can do, they
can deter all-out invasion, thus rendering them attractive to any state that
fears it might be in the Pentagon’s gun sights.’ Realism’s emphasis on military
power in this context is practical and realistic. Secondly, Realists argue the
inability or reluctance of states to balance against US hegemony is because
states are either not in the position to balance or do not see the value of
balancing. Realism anticipates ‘band-wagoning’, which means states align
themselves with the hegemon. This is happened because other states are too weak
to go against this hegemon and they decide to go along with the hegemony. So
Balance of power concept is kind of disprove here.
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