Realism

Restatements and Renewal

Benjamin Frankel

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135068219
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Realism has been the subject of critical scrutiny for some time and this examination aims to identify and define its strengths and shortcomings, making a contribution to the study of international relations.

III. Expanding Neorealism

Process Variables in Neorealist Theory

GLENN H. SNYDER

THE PRINCIPAL rap against the neorealist theory of international politics is that it does not explain enough. Yes, its critics admit, anarchy and polarity do place broad constraints on the behavior of states, but these constraints are much weaker than other causal factors that the theory omits, both at the systemic level and the level of domestic politics. Hence the theory paints a partial and misleading picture of international life.

This criticism betrays a misunderstanding of what might be called the theoretical dilemma of the social sciences. There are so many causal variables operating in the empirical world that no theory can embrace more than a fraction of them; consequently every theoretical explanation, strictly speaking, is "false." No theory can give a full explanation of reality; it can only spell out the logical relations of the variables within its purview. This means, first, that all theories must fail a strict empirical test; at best they can only be tentatively confirmed by observing parallel tendencies in reality. Second, it means that any purportedly complete explanation of reality must draw on several theories. It may be possible to locate connections between the theories at certain logical nodes, but any attempt to meld them into an integrated whole, taking account of all relevant variables, risks degenerating into mere case-by-case description. For any single theory, it is enough that it highlight "a small number of big and important things"; that is all that Kenneth Waltz, the founder of neorealism, claims for his theory.¹

Nevertheless, the critics have a point. Although it is unfair and naive to criticize neorealism for not explaining everything, the theory is vulnerable to the charge of excessive parsimony, in the sense that the explanatory gain from some further elaboration would exceed the cost in reduced generality. Waltz's theory is about how the structure of the system constrains the be havior of the units—that is, states. He sets aside, correctly, the internal characteristics of states as outside the logical scope of his theory, although he admits their considerable influence in reality. He treats only peripherally the process by which structural and unit influences are transmitted onto behavior and outcomes. It is this latter area that could well be developed further without undue sacrifice of parsimony.

My aim in this essay is to clarify and develop the process dimension and thus to increase the explanatory range of neorealist theory. First, I consider certain factors—notably norms and institutions and nuclear weapons— which some authors have labeled process but which I classify as inherently structural. Second, I attempt to clarify the causal links between structure and interaction by developing the concept of "relationships" as an intervening variable. Third, I suggest a framework for the analysis of interaction.

Structural Modifiers

FIRST, IT is necessary to take account of certain variables which have sometimes been called process but which I would exclude from that category. For instance, Joseph S. Nye, Jr., has pointed to two categories of causal variables that fit neither Waltz's definition of system structure nor the label of unit attributes: (1) non-power incentives; and (2) the ability to communicate and cooperate, both of which he calls "systemic process." In the first category are world economic activity, technological innovation, patterns of transnational interactions, and alterations in norms and institutions. These things "alter the calculation of national interests without necessarily affecting the distribution of power among actors."² Nye is correct to say that these things are systemic rather than unit characteristics, but wrong, I think, to call them "process." That term ought to be reserved for the political relations and interactions that occur between sovereign states. Nye's factors are more accurately described as parts of the context of process rather than process itself.

Barry Buzan is closer to the mark when he calls such factors "interaction capacity." In his view, they are best considered as broad systemic, but nonstructural, factors that "not only affect the ability and willingness of units to interact, but also determine what types and levels of interaction are possible and desired."³ He limits his categories to two—technological capabilities and shared norms and organizations—but some of Nye's other factors, for example, ability to communicate, are subsumed in Buzan's "technology." While these factors are not structural, they are broadly systemic and "they profoundly condition the significance of structure and the meaning of the term system itself."⁴ Nor are they interaction or process, but rather contextual elements that affect the quality and density of interaction.

Both Nye and Buzan are to be commended for rescuing these elements from the unit-level storage bin to which Waltz had consigned them. I prefer, however, the term "structural modifier" to either of their labels. Most of the factors involved are empirical deviations from Waltz's highly abstract "anarchy" and "polarity." They are system-wide influences that are structural in their inherent nature but not potent enough internationally to warrant that designation. They modify the effects of the more basic structural elements on the interaction process, but they are not interaction itself. They are roughly analogous to macroeconomic influences, like interest rates or governmental regulation, on microeconomic relations between firms; they affect the behavior of all actors more or less evenly, but they are different in kind from factors like the number of actors (firms) and the distribution of power among them—variables which clearly determine the structure of the system (market).

Take, for example, norms and institutions. In a domestic society these are clearly structural: they create the hierarchy of power and differentiation of function that are the hallmarks of a well-ordered domestic polity, but that are present only rudimentarily in international society. In principle, they are also structural internationally, because they exert roughly similar influence on all actors, and since with further development they would begin to produce the same sort and size of effects that they do domestically. For theoretical purposes, however, it would be unwise to give structural status to international institutions because of their weakness compared to the more basic structural components. They would then distort the calculation of the latter's effects. Waltz is right in saying that theorists should not attempt to deal with mixed organizing principles.⁵ They should work out the logical consequences of whatever principle is dominant in the realm under study; then, if there are mixed cases organized partially according to another principle, its effects can be analyzed ad hoc, or according to some other theory about that principle. Once the effects of anarchy and power distribution are established theoretically, outcomes that deviate from these effects may be explainable in terms of norms and institutions that modify them. The adjective "structural" signifies that system-wide norms are more akin to system structure than to internal state characteristics. By so considering them, and removing them from the category of unit attributes where Waltz places them, analysis of the latter category can concentrate on matters which do vary from unit to unit.

Military technology may also be treated as a structural modifier. Technological change affects all great powers, at least potentially; thus it is inherently a systemic variable, not a unit attribute. It is not fully structural since it does not markedly affect either anarchy or the distribution of resources, yet it is akin to structure through its effects on the nature of military resources. Technological change should be treated as a modifier of theoretical conclusions reached from structural analysis alone. In that role it may have substantial effects in increasing the determinacy of structural analysis.

The structure of the European system, for example, was multipolar both before and after 1870. Before then, however, alliances were usually made after wars began rather than prior to war. Only after 1870 did it become typical practice to form alliances in peacetime. The explanation apparently is that by that time technology had increased the speed of mobilization and warfare to the point where it was no longer possible to organize effective alliances after a war had started. Thus a significant change in the political behavior of states occurred because of a system-wide technological change.

Nuclear weapons might be considered a structural modifier, thereby resolving the vexed question whether they are a structural condition or a unit attribute. Waltz classifies them as a unit attribute. Others argue that the effects of the nuclear revolution are so dramatic that they qualify as structural. Thus, Steve Weber has argued (before the end of the cold war) that while the weapons are not themselves structural, they have brought about a condition, nuclear deterrence, which has engendered a structural change—the "joint custodianship" of the international system by the superpowers. In other words, nuclear weapons have sharply modified the system's organizing principle of anarchy, thus permitting the superpowers to assume a pseudogoverning function for the system, and for Weber this amounts to a structural change.⁶ The reasoning is persuasive, yet it seems more accurate to regard nuclear weapons not as full-blown structural components, but as merely modifiers of basic structural effects. They modify the effects of anarchy by inhibiting aggression and ameliorating the "security dilemma,"⁷ but they do not change the structural fact of anarchy. They also modify the effects of polarity by their "equalizing" effects. As with norms and institutions, nuclear capabilities are potentially structural. If all or most states possessed invulnerable nuclear forces, a structural change would indeed have occurred. The consequences of anarchy would then be substantially different and polarity would take on a different meaning.⁸ Similarly, if international institutions developed sufficient independent power and authority, at some point they would cease being structural modifiers and become a defining characteristic of structure itself. It is a mistake, however, in the meantime to call them "process." That label ought to be reserved for the dynamic interactions and relationships of states within existing structures.

Relationships

IN THE NEOREALIST perspective, causal influences on behavior are found either in system structure or in the internal characteristics of states, although the theoretical focus is on the structural effects. The processes by which these influences make themselves felt, however, are not specified,⁹ nor is behavior itself, the dependent variable, analyzed in any detail. For Waltz, behavior is either "relations" or "interaction," or sometimes both, and indeed, in his writings, these two terms often appear to be synonymous.¹⁰ In my view, however, they each mean, or ought to mean, something quite different. Interaction is behavior: actual communication between states, or some physical action, such as armament or war, that impinges on others. Relations or relationships¹¹ are not behavior itself, but the situational context of behavior: the conflicts, common interests, alignments and power relations that motivate and shape behavioral choice. Relationships lie between structure and interaction; they are the conduit through which structural effec...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Restating the Realist Case: An Introduction
• I. REFLECTING ON REALISM
• II. CHALLENGING NEOREALISM
• III. EXPENDING NEOREALISM
• IV. APPLYING REALISM
• V. RECONCILING REALISMS
• Bibliography
• Index