Huntingdon College | Political Science | Courses | What's New?
PSC 303: International Relations
reader outlines:  Foreign Affairs, ed, Agenda.
Prof. Jeremy Lewis, Huntingdon College
Revised 2 May 2005; please click Reload button for latest version.

The decline of military power and rise of economic power.

• The waning of the Cold War is steadily reducing the importance of military power in world affairs.
• Obviously, since this article has been written, the Cold War ended and therefore the importance of military power is reduced even more.
• As a Soviet-Western war becomes ever more implausible, the ability to threaten or reassure is equally devalued.
• The deference that armed strength could evoke in the dealings of governments over all matters, notably including economic questions, has greatly declined, and seems set to decline further
• Methods of commerce are displacing military methods.
• Examples:
• "Disposable capital in lieu of firepower."
• "Civilian innovation in lieu of military-technical advancement."
• "Market penetration in lieu of garrisons and bases."

• If the players left in the field by the waning importance of military power were purely economic entities, then only the logic of commerce would govern world affairs.
• Thus, ‘World Business’ would replace ‘World Politics.’
• The logic of commerce will still result in fierce competition.
• However, this same logic would lead to alliances between economic entities in any location to "capitalize ventures, vertically integrate, horizontally co-develop, co-produce, or co-market goods and services."
• Commerce is incompatible with conflict.

• The international scene is still primarily occupied by states and blocs of states that control the economy.
• Luttwak introduces the following logic:

• Logic of conflict (encompasses all others)
• Logic of state regulation- maximize economic activity globally or domestically?
• Logic of state action- pay out benefits and offer services transnationally, or restrict advantages to their own residents?
• Promote technology for its own sake or only within their boundaries?

• The basic conflict is do states hold the world economy as priority or their own individual economies.

• Bureaucrats use geo-economics to save their decaying geopolitical role.
• In other words, the bureaucrats themselves are an interest group, and can manipulate fiscal property to preserve their role.
• It is true that in the past geo-economics has played an important role, but it was always overshadowed by strategic priorities and strategic modalities.
• In today’s world, the causes and the instruments of conflicts must be economic.

• Based on history, states will greatly vary in the way they behave geo-economically.
• States and blocs must "share" or compete with individuals and multinationals.

• Thus, the new geo-economic environment can become risky for private investors.

• There is increasing tension between the inherently conflictual nature of states and the understanding by their leaders that whereas war is a "zero-sum* encounter," commercial relations have rarely been, and do not need to be, the same way.

• *Zero-sum is a situation in which a gain for one side entails a corresponding loss for the other side, thus losses cancel out the gains, making the outcome zero.

• Therefore, what the leading nations do with the economic tension will determine the form of the geo-economic world.

I. Introduction
 A. The waning of the Cold War is steadily reducing the importance of military power
 B. Today it is the market that rules world affairs
          C. If the market becomes the main scene of competition then there is no longer a need for military methods
II.  Logic and grammar
 A. The international scene is still primarily occupied by states and blocs of states that control the economy
 B. Logic followed
                    1. They use the logic of conflict when collecting revenue, and maximize outcomes within their boundaries despite the outcomes for other people
          C. This brings about an emergence of Geo-economics - the mixture of conflict with
     methods of commerce
III. The nature of the beast
 A. Bureaucrats use geo-economics to save their decaying geopolitical role
 B. States will tend to act “geo-economically” simply because they are
designed to be defined entities that out do each other
 C. All states fight to exist
 D. Threats to unify a nation must now be economic threats
          E. Military confrontations are no longer considered because you can not enter a non nuclear fight without the fear of nuclear war
 F.  In today’s world the causes and the instruments of conflicts must
be economic
IV. Playing the New Game
 A. States will greatly vary in the way they behave geo-economically
 B. There are more limitations on states and blocs through the geo-economic system
  1. Must share with individuals and large multinational corporations
  2. They can coexist passively or be strongly interactive
  3. Either way the state is the user and the used
 C. This new geo-economic environment can become risky for private investors
V.  There is increasing tension between the intelligence of national
leaders and the conflictual nature of states will determine how geo-economical the world
becomes

 The Next Patterns of Conflict -         World politics is entering a new phase

 -         Huntington’s hypothesis is that culture differences will replace ideological and economic
 differences as the basis for conflict
 -         After Peace of Westphalia and the beginning of a modern international system, the conflicts
 between states were between heads of state (princes, absolute monarchs, etc.) with the
 intentions to expand borders, armies, and economies
 -         With the creation of nation states, the clash came between nations; as R.R. Palmer stated in
 1793, “The wars of kings were over; the wars of peoples had begun.”
 -         This phase of conflict ended with WWI, and then yielded with the clash of ideologies
 (Examples: Russian Revolution, fight against communism, fascism-Nazism, liberal democracy)
 -         All three of these phases (wars between princes, nation-states, then ideologies) were
 “Western civil wars”
 -         After Cold War, conflicts now between West and non-West civilizations and among
 non-West civilizations
 The Nature of Civilizations
 -         During the Cold War the world was divided into First, Second, and Third Worlds
 -         Huntington believes the world should now be divided in terms of culture and civilization
 -         Definition of a civilization is a cultural entity that have distinct cultures at different levels of
 cultural heterogeneity (Example: a northern Italian village as a distinct culture from that of a
 southern Italian village, however, both Italian villages have a distinct culture from German villages)
 -         The highest cultural grouping is a civilization, defined by language, history, religion, customs,
 institutions, and self-identification of its people
 -         A civilization may be populous (China), small (the Anglophone Caribbean); it may join
 together many nation-states (the West) or only one (Japan)
 -         Civilizations may blend, overlap, and may include sub civilizations; they also divide, merge,
 expand, and disappear

 Why Civilizations will Clash
 -         The future will have seven or eight major civilizations: Western, Confucian, Japanese,
 Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American and possibly African civilization
 -         Differences among civilizations are basic (history, language, religion, tradition, culture)
 -         Reasons for the clash among civilizations:
 1. These fundamental differences are stronger than ideological and political regimes
 2.  The world is becoming smaller with increasing interactions which intensify the differences
 3.  The nation-state is not a source of identity due to social change and modernization;
 civilization and the revival of religion provides a source of identity
 4.  The dual role of the West (a dominating power and a former source of education and the
 new idea of de-Westernization and looking within your own culture)
 5.  Culture is harder to change than politics and economics; it is harder to turn Estonians into
 Armenians than it is to democratize the former Soviet Union
 6.  Economic regionalism is increasing, with the importance of regional economic blocs
 (NAFTA); will this work between different cultures or must it stay within a culture?

     -     The new way of thinking: Us versus Them
     -     The clash of civilizations occurs at two levels:
       1.  Micro-level:  Civilizations that share borders will confront one another, perhaps violently
       2.  Macro-level:  States from different civilizations will compete for military or economic
 power, for international institutions and for the right to promote their political and religious values

 The Fault Lines Between Civilizations
 -         Cold War ended with the end of the Iron Curtain’s division of ideologies
 -         The cultural division of Europe has since emerged
 -         The most significant “fault line” between these cultural divisions runs between Finland and
 Russia and between the Baltic States and Russia, cutting through Belarus and Ukraine,
 separating the more Catholic western Ukraine from Orthodox eastern Ukraine, separating
 Transylvania from the rest of Romania, and separating Yugoslavia from Croatia and Slovenia
 (also the former boundary from the Ottoman and Hapsburg empires)
 -         To the north and west of this line: Protestant and Catholic who share common experiences
 of feudalism, the Renaissance, the Industrial Revolution and who are better off economically
 -         To the south and east:  Orthodox and Muslims who belonged to the Ottoman or Tsarist
 empires who were not shaped by W. European history and who generally struggle
 economically; they are also less likely to be democratic
 -         This division: The Velvet Curtain
 -         The West and Islamic Middle East have a history of fighting that dates back 1300 years
 -         Still tension today (Example: Saddam Hussein attacked Israel to “stand up” against the
 West during the Gulf War)
 -         Another counter to the Arab culture is the “pagan, animist, and now increasingly Christian
 black peoples to the south”
 -         Conflict exists between Orthodox and Muslim peoples, also between Muslim and Hindu
 (India/Pakistan), China and its neighbors, Japan and the US
 -         Levels of violence in conflict vary with the most extreme being “ethnic cleansing”
 -         New basis for coalitions and alliances is the “kin-country” syndrome among nation-states
 with shared culture; Examples include conflicts in the Soviet Union, the Gulf War and the
 conflict in Yugoslavia
 -         Conflicts also occur between states and groups within the same civilization; however, these
 are less intense and less likely to enlarge into a bigger war
 -         Next World War will be between civilizations
 The West Versus the Rest
 -         The West currently dominates other civilizations, with superior military power; the only
 economic rival is Japan
 -         The West’s desires translate to worldly desires because of its power (Example: decisions
 of the International Monetary Fund)
 -         The West imposes on other nations economically and politically (especially in the United Nations)
 -         The Western culture has permeated the rest of the World superficially, however, there are
 fundamental differences that will never merge
 -         The West believe that their culture could be a “universal civilization” but it will never
 happen because of the core differences among cultures
 -         The “rest” will respond to the West in certain projected ways:
 1.  Non-Western states will isolate themselves completely (the cost of this is high, because
 international trade and coalitions are so beneficial to a country)
2  Non-Western states will attempt to join the West and accept its values
 3.  Non-Western states will attempt to balance the West by developing cooperative economies
 and militaries without losing separate cultural identities

 The Torn Countries
 -         As people begin to identify themselves by civilizations, those countries that are composed
 of a number of different civilizations (Soviet Union and Yugoslavia) will break apart
 -         These countries as well as countries with homogenous cultures but cannot choose which
 civilization they belong to are called torn countries
 -         These countries usually try to associate with the West though they are not of the Western
 civilization (Example: Turkey during the Gulf War and attempting to join the EU and Mexico
 with NAFTA)
 -         Russia is the most globally significant torn country; President Yeltsin wanted to be part of
 the West, but the Russian people are divided over the issue)
 -         In order to redefine its civilization identity, a country must do the following:
 1.  Political and economic elite supportive of the transition
 2.  The general public must be willing to comply
 3.  Dominant groups in the recipient civilization must be willing to comply also

 The Confucian-Islamic Connection
 -         The Muslim, Confucian, Hindu and Buddhist societies have the most trouble joining the
 Western civilization
 -         The Confucian-Islamic Connection formed to counter the West because they cannot join
 the West
 -         While most Western countries are reducing their military power, China, North Korea and
 several Middle Eastern countries are expanding their military (They are the “Weapon States”)
 -         Weapons include nuclear, biological, chemical, ballistic missiles, intelligence, and other
 electronic capabilities they are buying from the West or developing on their own
 -         There is a strong Confucian-Islamic cooperation  with weapons and weapons technology
 -         New arms race: One side develops military power while the other side attempts to prevent
 global arms build-up

 Implications for the West
 -         Nation-states will not disappear and be replaced by groups of civilizations
 -         Huntington’s theory simply attempts to identify the importance the clash of civilizations will
 have on the future and future conflicts
 -         This is the new wave of international relations
 -         Implications are short-term and long-term
 -         Short-term implications: The West should promote better cooperation and unity within its
 civilizations, and especially with Japan and Russia; the West should reduce the arms in
 Confucian and Islamic states; the West should exploit the differences between Confucian and
 Islamic states; the West should strengthen international institutions that promote Western ideas
 -         Long-term implications: Modernity does not necessarily mean Western; Japan is the only
 country to date that is both non-western and modern; Non-Western states will continue to
 grow and be a threat to the West
 -         The clash of civilizations will lead to more understanding of other civilizations and will
 attempt to identify commonalities among civilizations
 -         Instead of a universal civilization, different civilizations are going to have to learn to coexist

• We are often told that promoting freedom will produce peace.
• In a speech before the British Parliament, President Reagan said that governments founded on a respect for individual liberty exercise "restraint" and "peaceful intentions in their foreign policy.
• Reagan joined the list of liberal theorists with the old argument that asserts liberal states, founded on such individual rights as equality before the law, free speech and other civil liberties, private property, and elected representation are fundamentally against war.
• Doyle discusses 3 theoretical traditions of liberalism attributable to 3 theorists: Schumpeter, Machiavelli, and Kant. The 3 theoretical traditions are: liberal pacifism, liberal imperialism, and Kant’s liberal internationalism.

• Liberalism is characterized by individual freedom, political participation, private property, and equality of opportunity.
• In Schumpeter’s "Sociology of Imperialisms" he saw the interaction of capitalism and democracy as a foundation of liberal pacifism.
• He defines imperialism as "an objectless disposition on the part of a state to unlimited forcible expansion."
• Modern imperialism, according to Schumpeter, resulted from the combined impact of a "war machine," warlike instincts, and export monopolism.
• Schumpeter’s theme is that capitalism and democracy are forces for peace.
• The further development of capitalism and democracy means that imperialism will eventually disappear.
• Capitalism produces an unwarlike disposition because the people’s energies are daily absorbed in production.
• Democratic capitalism leads to peace.
• Schumpeter also points out that the capitalist world has developed a means for preventing war.
• Only war profiteers and military aristocrats gain from wars.
• No democracy would pursue a minority interest and tolerate the high costs of imperialism.

• Machiavelli argues, not only that republics are not pacifistic, but that they are the best form of state for imperial expansion.
• Machiavelli’s republic is not a democracy-which he thought would quickly degenerate into a tyranny-but is characterized by social equality, popular liberty, and political participation.
• Liberty results from "disunion" and the popular veto.
• The powerful few threaten the rest with tyranny, Machiavelli says, because they seek to dominate.
• The mass demands not to be dominated, and their veto thus preserves the liberties of the state.
• Expansion calls for a free republic.
• Machiavelli argues that we seek to rule, or at least, to avoid being oppressed.

• Modern Liberalism carries with it two legacies.
• First, is the pacification of foreign relations among liberal states.
• Kant calls the zone of peace beginning in the 18^th century "pacific federation" or "pacific union."
• The predictions of liberal pacifists are that liberal states will exercise peaceful restraint.
• The characteristic of a low probability of war suggests that liberals indeed established a separate peace-but only among themselves.
• The second legacy of liberalism is international "imprudence."
• Peaceful restraint only seems to work in liberals’ relations with other liberals.
• Many wars have been defensive and thus prudent by necessity.
• Kant argues that we can study neither the systematic relations of states nor the varieties of state behavior in isolation of each other.
• Kant also argues that perpetual peace will be guaranteed by the ever-widening acceptance of three articles of peace.

• Kant argues that peace is an ethical duty because it is only under conditions of peace that all men can treat each other as ends, rather than means to an end.
• These domestic restraints do not end war, but introduce republican caution or "hesitation."
• Liberal wars are only fought for popular, liberal purposes.

• Kant, Machiavelli, and Schumpeter rest on fundamentally different views of nature.
• Schumpeter’s humans are individualized, rationalized and democratized while Machiavelli’s citizens are diverse in their goals, seeking to rule or fearing being dominated. Kant’s citizens are individualized and capable of appreciating moral equality.
• Kant’s is the state that solves the problem of governing individualized equals.
• Kant’s republics are capable of achieving peace among themselves because they exercise democratic caution.
• The promise of perpetual peace, the violent lessons of war, and the experience of a partial peace are proof of the need for and the possibility of world peace

John Mearsheimer’s “Back to the Future: Instability in Europe After the Cold War” makes a number of strong arguments “about nuclear proliferation, the peacefulness of democratic states, and the impact on military conflict of economic interdependence and international institutions such as the European Community.”  Keohane feels Mearsheimer underestimates international institutions’ impacts on world politics in Europe.

John Mearsheimer stresses the importance of “anarchy” on a global basis.  The Cold War Western European experience shows anarchy does not always prevent cooperation.  We cannot always use anarchy as our explanation for military conflict.  “States seek to maximize expected utility.”  Expected utility is reliant on expectations of the consequences of substitute methods of action, such as judgments of probability.  Leaders must also anticipate other states’ likely actions and not just depend on “anarchy”.

Professor Mearsheimer believes states seek absolute gains where security is assured.  When security is scarce, states find relative gains more important.  The European international system has structural features that have created conditions that states have emphasized absolute gains and are able to cooperate with each other extensively.

Robert Keohane feels the strength and nature of international institutions are crucial determining factors of expectations and state behavior.  States often follow the regulations and guidelines of international institutions.  They like to show their willingness to cooperate because this reinforces their stability.  The states do not eschew their own interests while cooperating and searching for influence.  Germany for example, can acquire both wealth and influence by building European institutions which assures other states of their stability and security.  On the other hand, when states collapse, it can be extremely hard to reconstruct as few other states wish to do business and build relationships with a group they find unstable.

Economic interdependence does not always leads to cooperation.  Keohane feels states are self-interested and can seek relative and absolute gains, and this interdependence can lead to conflict.  His argument claims international institutions help form the expectations which are crucial determining factors of state behavior.

Emphasizing institutions is important from a policy perspective since human action spurs more of a response than either fundamental political tendency like hyper-nationalism.  If the next decade is characterized by constant patterns of institutional cooperation, military conflict in Europe will be less likely.  Students of world politics must ask questions to prevent conflict in the future.  They should ask how international institutions should structure themselves within Central and Western Europe, as well as between Europe and other powerful states.  A fear-driven slide in the direction of military conflict would be devastating for the current generation and those to follow.