The Gordian knot is cut! (How to analyze social behavior)

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Theories of State Behavior

The following list illustrates some of the theories that you’ll be reading about. Each one is a specific theory that tries to explain the way states behave. You’ll get plenty of ideas within the books, so I’ll give you the brief outline. Remember though that the authors will take these basic ideas and modify them. Again, these are starting points for theory and the authors are modifying them to build better theory.

Classical realism is a state level theory that argues that all states seek power. That is the first and last principle of state behavior. States seek to increase their power; they seek to decrease the power of their enemies; and everything they do is in the name of amassing power. States see other powerful states as rivals because power, when it is not in your hands, is threatening. People are greedy, insecure, and aggressive, so the states they govern will have those same characteristics. This doesn’t mean war, however. There can be peace, but a durable peace is based upon a stable balance of power – the big players in the international systems are roughly equal in power resources, so therefore no one thinks they can win a war. If you don’t think you can win a war, you generally don’t start one. The US and USSR were rivals in the cold war because they were the two most powerful states after WW II. They were both wary of each other’s power and became enemies. But they did not go to war because they were roughly equal in power.

Neo-realism is a system level theory that is an offshoot of classical realism. It argues all of what classical realism does. However, it sees the cause of all the power struggles and rivalries not as a function of the nature of states, but as a function of the nature of the international system. States are out there alone. There is no world government, no one looking out for states, no rules that can’t be easily broken. The world is anarchy and states do what they can get away with to gain power and they do what they must to protect themselves. Power creates rivalry because it is threatening by its nature. If some other state is more powerful than your state, you have no way to protect yourself but to defend yourself or attack your rival first. A neorealist might say the cold war was caused by the fact that there were only two powerful states that survived WW II. Sine there was no world government or rules of behavior to restrain the rivalry it became the cold war. This theory dominates scholarly thinking today and will be discussed in a lot of the books.

Neo-classical realism is a sort of revival of classical realism. It accepts all of the above about power rivalries, but it suggests that state characteristics (state level variables) play a large role in the behavior of states. States don’t just seek power and they don’t just fear other powerful states, there are reasons that states seek power and there are reasons that states fear other states. It’s a sort of combination of classical and neo-realism that factors in both system level and state level variables. For example, a neo-classical realist might look at the cold war and say that the differences in ideology between the US and USSR was a factor in the US-USSR rivalry that exacerbated the tendency for two powerful states to form rivalries.

Liberalism adds values into the equation. It is often called idealism. It is a state level theory which argues that there is a lot of cooperation in the world, not just rivalry. States don’t just compete or worry about power. States try to build a more just world order. They often do so because they have learned that in many instances cooperation is a better strategy that conflict. States try to create enforceable international law. States are progressive forces for social justice. Liberalism might look at the cold war and examine the different values of the US and USSR and point out the repressive and murderous nature of the Soviet state as the key to the US and USSR animosity. It also might look at the decades-worth of US-USSR cooperation in the midst of the cold war (arms control, the lack of direct conflict).

Neo-liberalism is an offshoot of liberalism. It is a system level version of liberalism and focuses on the way in which institutions can influence the behavior of states by spreading values or creating rule-based behavior. Neo-liberals might focus on the role of the United Nations or World Trade Organization in shaping the foreign policy behavior of states. Neo-liberals might look at the cold war and suggest ways to fix the UN to make it more effective.

Cognitive Theories are those mentioned above which examine the role of psychological processes – perception, misperception, belief systems – on the foreign policy behavior of states. It can be state, organization, or individual level of analysis depending on whether the research is focusing on the psychological dynamics of a state decision maker or the shared perceptions of an organization, or the shared belief systems of a nation. Cognitive theorists might look at the shared images of the US and USSR political leaders had of each other and explain the cold war as the product of these negative images and the inability of either state to reshape the perceptions of the other.

Constructivism is a theory that examines state behavior in the context of state characteristics. All states are unique and have a set of defining political, cultural, economic, social, or religious characteristics that influence its foreign policy. States have identities and those identities define their behavior in the international system. The US has a foreign policy character. Russia has a foreign policy character. The cold war is a product of the clash of those identities. The end of the cold war may be a function of changes in the Russian identity.