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Neorealism or structural realism is a theory of international relations that emphasizes the role of power politics in international relations, sees competition and conflict as enduring features and sees limited potential for cooperation. The anarchic state of the international system means that states cannot be certain of other states' intentions and their security, thus prompting them to engage in power politics.
International relations (IR) are the interactions among sovereign states. The scientific study of those interactions is called international studies, or international affairs. In a broader sense, it concerns all activities between states—such as war, diplomacy, trade, and foreign policy—as well as relations with and among other international actors, such as intergovernmental organisations (IGOs), international nongovernmental organisations (INGOs), international legal bodies, and multinational corporations (MNCs). There are several schools of thought within IR, of which the most prominent are realism, liberalism, and constructivism.
International relations theory is the study of international relations (IR) from a theoretical perspective. It seeks to explain constitutive effects in international politics. The three most prominent ideological schools of thought are realism, liberalism, and constructivism. As theories, they provide ethnical guidance for policy.
The Concert of Europe was a general consensus among the great powers of 19th-century Europe to maintain the European balance of power, political boundaries, and spheres of influence. Never a perfect unity and subject to disputes and jockeying for position and influence, the Concert was an extended period of relative peace and stability in Europe following the Wars of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars which had consumed the continent since the 1790s. There is considerable scholarly dispute over the exact nature and duration of the Concert. Some scholars argue that it fell apart nearly as soon as it began in the 1820s when the great powers disagreed over the handling of liberal revolts in Italy, while others argue that it lasted until the outbreak of World War I and others for points in between. For those arguing for a longer duration, there is generally agreement that the period after the Revolutions of 1848 and the Crimean War (1853-1856) represented a different phase with different dynamics than the earlier period.
In Ethics and political philosophy, in social contract theory, religion, and international law, the term state of nature describes the hypothetical way of life that existed before people organised themselves into societies. Philosophers of the state of nature theory propose that there was an historical period before societies existed, and seek answers to the questions: What was life like before civil society?, How did government emerge from such a primitive start?, and What are the hypothetical reasons for entering a state of society by establishing a nation-state?
A great power is a sovereign state that is recognized as having the ability and expertise to exert its influence on a global scale. Great powers characteristically possess military and economic strength, as well as diplomatic and soft power influence, which may cause middle or small powers to consider the great powers' opinions before taking actions of their own. International relations theorists have posited that great power status can be characterized into power capabilities, spatial aspects, and status dimensions.
In international relations, multilateralism refers to an alliance of multiple countries pursuing a common goal.
"China's peaceful rise", sometimes referred to as "China's peaceful development", was an official policy and political slogan in China under former General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Hu Jintao which sought to assure the international community that China's growing political, economic, and military power would not pose a threat to international peace and security.
Kenneth Neal Waltz was an American political scientist who was a member of the faculty at both the University of California, Berkeley and Columbia University and one of the most prominent scholars in the field of international relations. He was a veteran of both World War II and the Korean War.
In international relations, the security dilemma is when the increase in one state's security leads other states to fear for their own security. Consequently, security-increasing measures can lead to tensions, escalation or conflict with one or more other parties, producing an outcome which no party truly desires; a political instance of the prisoner's dilemma.
Collective security can be understood as a security arrangement, political, regional, or global, in which each state in the system accepts that the security of one is the concern of all, and therefore commits to a collective response to threats to, and breaches of peace. Collective security is more ambitious than systems of alliance security or collective defense in that it seeks to encompass the totality of states within a region or indeed globally, and to address a wide range of possible threats. While collective security is an idea with a long history, its implementation in practice has proved problematic. Several prerequisites have to be met for it to have a chance of working. It is the theory or practice of states pledging to defend one another in order to deter aggression or to target a transgressor if international order has been breached.
Power transition theory is a theory about the nature of war, in relation to the power in international relations. The theory was first published in 1958 by its creator, A.F.K. Organski, in his textbook, World Politics (1958).
Offensive realism is a structural theory in international relations that belongs to the neorealist school of thought and was put forward by the political scholar John Mearsheimer in response to defensive realism. Offensive realism holds that the anarchic nature of the international system is responsible for the promotion of aggressive state behavior in international politics. The theory fundamentally differs from defensive realism by depicting great powers as power-maximizing revisionists privileging buck-passing and self-promotion over balancing strategies in their consistent aim to dominate the international system. The theory brings important alternative contributions for the study and understanding of international relations but remains the subject of criticism.
In international relations theory, the concept of anarchy is the idea that the world lacks any supreme authority or sovereignty. In an anarchic state, there is no hierarchically superior, coercive power that can resolve disputes, enforce law, or order the system of international politics. In international relations, anarchy is widely accepted as the starting point for international relations theory.
The balance of power theory in international relations suggests that states may secure their survival by preventing any one state from gaining enough military power to dominate all others. If one state becomes much stronger, the theory predicts it will take advantage of its weaker neighbors, thereby driving them to unite in a defensive coalition. Some realists maintain that a balance-of-power system is more stable than one with a dominant state, as aggression is unprofitable when there is equilibrium of power between rival coalitions.
Defensive neorealism is a structural theory in international relations that is derived from the school of neorealism. The theory finds its foundation in the political scientist Kenneth Waltz's Theory of International Politics in which Waltz argues that the anarchical structure of the international system encourages states to maintain moderate and reserved policies to attain national security. In contrast, offensive realism assumes that states seek to maximize their power and influence to achieve security through domination and hegemony. Defensive neorealism asserts that aggressive expansion as promoted by offensive neorealists upsets the tendency of states to conform to the balance of power theory, thereby decreasing the primary objective of the state, which they argue to be the ensuring of its security. Defensive realism denies neither the reality of interstate conflict or that incentives for state expansion exist, but it contends that those incentives are sporadic, rather than endemic. Defensive neorealism points towards "structural modifiers," such as the security dilemma and geography, and elite beliefs and perceptions to explain the outbreak of conflict.
Randall L. Schweller is Professor of Political Science at the Ohio State University, where he has taught since 1994.
Revisionist state is a term from power transition theory within the wider field of international relations. It describes states whose objective is to change or put an end to the current system.
The Tragedy of Great Power Politics is a book by the American scholar John Mearsheimer on the subject of international relations theory published by W.W. Norton & Company in 2001. Mearsheimer explains and argues for his theory of "offensive realism" by stating its key assumptions, evolution from early realist theory, and its predictive capability. An article adapted from the book had previously been published by Foreign Affairs.
Classical realism is an international relations theory from the realist school of thought. Realism makes the following assumptions: states are the main actors in the international relations system, there is no supranational international authority, states act in their own self-interest, and states want power for self-preservation. Classical realism can be differentiated from the other forms of realism since it places specific emphasis on human nature and domestic politics as the key factor in explaining state behavior and the causes of inter-state conflict. Classical realist theory adopts a pessimistic view of human nature and argues that humans are not inherently benevolent but instead they are self-interested and act out of fear or aggression. Furthermore, it emphasizes that this human nature is reflected by states in international politics due to international anarchy.
References
- ↑ Tenembaum, Yoav J. (6 November 2012). "International Relations: It's time to revise how we talk about revisionist powers". Oxpol: The Oxford University Politics Blog. Retrieved 18 August 2019.
- 1 2 3 Davidson, J. (2016). The Origins of Revisionist and Status-Quo States. Springer. ISBN 9781137092014 . Retrieved 18 August 2019.
- ↑ Power Transition Theory, summary. Richard W. Chadwick
- ↑ the Concert of Europe (1815-54)
- Lemke, Douglas; Reed, William (1996). "Regime types and status quo evaluations: Power transition theory and the democratic peace". International Interactions. 22 (2): 143–164. doi:10.1080/03050629608434886.
- Li, K. W.; Kilgour, D. M.; Hipel, K. W. (2005). "Status quo analysis in the graph model for conflict resolution". Journal of the Operational Research Society. 56 (6): 699–707. doi:10.1057/palgrave.jors.2601870. S2CID 35293088.