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Jan 6, 2006

Mearsheimer on the Tragedy of Great Power Politics


by Liberty and Power


Classical liberal analysis heavily focuses on the impact and dynamics of domestic interventionism. Contemporary exponents of classical liberalism offer much less nourishment when it comes to serious analysis of external interventionism - the projection of state power beyond the geographic boundaries of the state.

While many write about the adverse impact of external interventionism (and an unfortunately growing number actually believe such interventionism has a positive impact), their writing tends to be moralistic (intervention is morally wrong) or polemical (our invasion of Iraq killed innocents and decimated the country). There is very little, if any, systematic theoretical or empirical inquiry into the drivers of state behavior in the international arena.

In searching for the foundations of a contemporary theory of external interventionism, classical liberals would do well to study the work of John J. Mearsheimer, a Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago - in particular, his book on The Tragedy of Great Power Politics published in 2001. His theory of"offensive realism" provides an interesting perspective on the dynamics of state behavior on the global stage consistent with broader classical liberal analysis of the expansionist tendencies of the state.

In international political theory, the realist school provides a healthy balance to the Wilsonian school. Woodrow Wilson and his followers claimed that the state could be harnessed to spread democracy and peace throughout the world (let's leave aside for another day whether policy-makers ever really believed this or whether this idealist perspective served as a convenient cover for more cynical agendas).

In contrast, realists are much more pessimistic about the role of the state in the international arena. In the words of Mearsheimer,"realists hold that calculations about power dominate states' thinking, and that states compete for power among themselves." There are many different schools of realism in international political theory, but Mearsheimer defines his version of"offensive realism" in these terms:

Offensive realists . . . believe that status quo powers are rarely found in world politics, because the international system creates powerful incentives for states to look for opportunities to gain power at the expense of rivals, and to take advantage of those situations when the benefits outweigh the costs. A state's ultimate goal is to be the hegemon of the system.
As this quote suggests, Mearsheimer's offensive realism emphasizes that relations among states tend to be dynamic and unstable. As in economics, equilibrium notions of state power on the international stage tend to distract from a richer and more realistic process view. This is reinforced in the following excerpt:

Great powers are rarely content with the current distribution of power; on the contrary, they face a constant incentive to change it in their favor. They almost always have revisionist intentions, and they will use force to alter the balance of power if they think it can be done at a reasonable price. At times, the costs and risks of trying to shift the balance of power are too great, forcing great powers to wait for more favorable circumstances. But the desire for more power does not go away, unless a state achieves the ultimate goal of hegemony. Since no state is likely to achieve global hegemony, however, the world is condemned to perpetual great-power competition.
In his analysis, Mearsheimer focuses on a sub-set of states that he defines as"great powers."

To qualify as a great power, a state must have sufficient military assets to put up a serious fight in an all-out conventional war against the most powerful state in the world.
Mearsheimer's offensive realism does not differentiate between"good" and"bad" states. It matters little to him whether a country is a democracy or a dictatorship. On the international stage, he maintains, all great powers can be expected to act in a similar, expansionist manner. What matters is not the internal structure of the state, but rather it is the external structure of international politics that drives this expansionist behavior.

Great powers behave aggressively not because they want to or because they possess some inner drive to dominate, but because they have to seek more power if they want to maximize their odds of survival.

What are the characteristics of the external environment that shape this expansionist behavior? Mearsheimer emphasizes the role of imperfect information among five factors:

  • The absence of a central authority
  • Great powers always have some offensive military capability
  • Great powers can never be certain about other states' intentions
  • The primary goal of great powers is survival
  • Great powers are rational actors - they think strategically about survival
Mearsheimer suggests that, because of these factors, great powers are motivated ultimately by three patterns of behavior:"fear, self-help and power maximization."

This external environment explains the title of Mearsheimer's book - The Tragedy of Great Power Politics:

This situation, which no one consciously designed or intended, is genuinely tragic. Great powers that have no reason to fight each other - that are merely concerned with their own survival - nevertheless have little choice but to pursue power and to seek to dominate the other states in the system.
Mearsheimer acknowledges that over the past sixty years there has been relative peace on the international stage, but he does not believe that this reflects a decline in the expansionist urge among great powers. Instead, he attributes the relative absence of global conflict to the distribution of power in each of the major regions. He characterizes Europe as a bi-polar system with the U.S. and Russia as the two great powers and Asia as a balanced multi-polar system with China, Russia and the U.S. as the relevant great powers. In Mearsheimer's terminology, the U.S. remains as a regional hegemon in the Western Hemisphere.

True to his characterization of realists as pessimists, Mearsheimer warns that this relative balance of power is unstable and that the prospects for conflict will be shaped by the emergence of potential hegemons within either Europe or Asia. In particular, he is most concerned about the growth of China:"China is the key to understanding the future distribution of power in northeast Asia." In fact, Mearsheimer ends his book by arguing that U.S. policy on China is misguided and that policy-makers should seek to slow the rise of China:"the United States has a profound interest in seeing Chinese economic growth slow considerably in the days ahead."

One need not agree with Mearsheimer's policy recommendations in order to see the insight of his basic analysis regarding international state behavior. He helps us to better understand the powerful expansionist tendencies of states. Of course, his perspectives could become even more persuasive when coupled with classical liberal analysis of the interventionist dynamic at work within domestic economies. Using this lens, the behavior of states on the international stage seems less like tragedy and more like destiny.

For Mearsheimer, there is little connection between the international behavior of states and the domestic economy and society. In fact, he goes out of his way to sever any connection in his effort to demonstrate that all great powers will act in a similar fashion, regardless of the domestic characteristics of the country.

Yet, in doing so, he throws the baby out with the bath water. He fails, as a result, to trace out the deep and rich connections between domestic interventionism and foreign interventionism. For example, he ignores the important role that foreign interventionism plays in mobilizing domestic support for the state. Whether we are talking about democracies or dictatorships, state leaders have often used foreign interventionism as a way to distract attention from domestic troubles and to overcome domestic divisions by focusing attention on an external enemy.

Like all structural/institutional analysts, Mearsheimer does not give adequate attention to the role of individuals, ideology and interests in driving behavior. From his perspective, structure dictates behavior and, from his perspective, it is the external structure of international relations that really matters. By combining Mearsheimer's insights with a perspective grounded in methodological individualism and a richer understanding of the domestic economic and social context of state power, it will be possible to develop a much more compelling perspective on the complex interplay between domestic and foreign interventionism.

While not sufficient as a full theory of international relations, Mearsheimer's perspective helps us to better understand why states behave the way they do on the international stage - as libertarians, if we wish to have impact, it is not sufficient to assess the morality of state actions, it is critical to understand the dynamics of interventionism so that we can develop effective strategies to roll back state power.


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Robert Higgs - 1/7/2006

Realism beats Wilsonianism, no doubt. But the basic problem with realism is that it treats states themselves as actors, often as actors who do what they do only because of what they are: states try to expand because that's just what states do.

As Grinder and Hagel aptly suggest, libertarians, owing to their devotion to methodological individualism, can do much better. They ask: cui bono? They recognize, too, that the bono may take various forms, sometimes consisting of raw monetary profits, as the leftists are inclined to emphasize, but sometimes consisting of ideological gains or enhancements of political or institutional position. Before states can survive in the international competition, leaders must ensure their survial in the internal competition against political rivals. In that quest, all the factors that bear on domestic politics and economics, inter alia, come into play. Indeed, many foreign policies would prove wholly unsustainable except that they entail benefits for domestic constituents (e.g., so-called foreign aid is typically tied to U.S. exports; and U.S. imperialistic ventures abroad bring a flood of orders for munitions, shipping, supplies, etc., placed with domestic companies).

I deal with such matters, most recently, in my book Resurgence of the Warfare State: The Crisis since 9/11 (Independent Institute, 2005).

Mark Brady - 1/7/2006

Thank you. This is a most welcome contribution to Liberty & Power.

Some readers may be interested to know that Peter Gowan reviewed John Mearsheimer's The Tragedy of Great Power Politics here in New Left Review. It's a while since I read this review but I remember that it was quite a favorable review. He recognized that the book had considerable merits but criticized the book for failing to recognize that the behaviour of states in the international system cannot be dissociated from the internal dynamics of the political orders they protect. I see a parallel here with your observation that "his perspectives could become even more persuasive when coupled with classical liberal analysis of the interventionist dynamic at work within domestic economies."