E. H. CARR’S CHALLENGE TO UTOPIAN IDEALISM
In his The TwentyYears’Crisis, E. H. Carr attacks idealism. He lists, the main tenets of idealism as: faith in reason, confidence in progress, a sense of moral rectitude, and a belief in an underlying harmony of interests. Carr disputes the belief of idealism in moral universalism and harmony of interests.
1. Carr argues that standards used to judge policies are the products of circumstances and interests. What a nation regards as moral principles is always determined by its interests. Hence, these principles are not universal. Policies are not, as the idealists claim, based on some universal norms, independent of interests of the parties involved.
2. Carr adds that interests underlie the supposedly absolute principles or universal moral values. There are neither universal values nor universal interests. Those who refer to universal interests are in fact acting in their own interests. They think that what is best for them is best for everyone, and identify their own interests with the universal interest of the world at large.
3. Carr says that the idealist concept of the harmony of interests presupposes that human beings can rationally recognise that they have some interests in common, and that cooperation is therefore possible. Carr calls attention to the reality of conflict of interests. The world is torn apart by the particular interests of different individuals and groups. In this environment, order is based on power, not on morality. Further, morality itself is the product of power, and is embedded in the legal system which a coercive power enforces. Dominant nations claiming to represent the international community impose international moral norms on other countries.
4. Carr considers peace, social justice, prosperity, and international order, and similar universal values which idealists advocate as status quo notions. The powers that are satisfied with the status quo regard the arrangement in place as just and therefore preach peace. On the other hand, the unsatisfied powers consider the same arrangement as unjust, and so prepare for war. Hence, the way to obtain peace, if it cannot be simply enforced, is to satisfy the unsatisfied powers.
However, Carr recognises that “pure realism can offer nothing but a naked struggle for power which makes any kind of international society impossible”. There is a deep yearning in many human beings, both privileged and unprivileged, for peace, order, prosperity, and justice. Idealists fail if in their attempt they do not pay enough attention to the reality of power. But in the world of pure realism, in which all values are made relative to interests, life turns into nothing more than a powergame and is unbearable.
Hans Morgenthau’s Realist Principles
Hans J. Morgenthau is another famous writer who formulated an international relations theory based on realism. He identifies unquenchable human lust for power, the desire to dominate, as the main cause of conflict. He states in his Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, that “international politics, like all politics, is a struggle for power”
Morgenthau uses six principles to show how realism underlies international relations. First, realism is based on objective laws of unchanging human nature. He adopts realism into a theory of international politics and also into a political art or tool of foreign policy.
The second principle of his realist theory is the concept of power or “of interest defined in terms of power”; political leaders “think and act in terms of interest defined as power”. It provides rational perspective on international politics. It serves as a basis for objective analysis delinked from motives, preferences, and intellectual and moral qualities of individual politicians.
In the third principle, Morgenthau explains that though interest defined as power is the operating principle of politics, it can assume various forms depending on times and circumstances. Political and cultural circumstances determine its substance and how it is used.
The fourth principle is about the relationship particularly the conflict between realism and ethics. Morgenthau says, “Universal moral principles cannot be applied to the actions of states in their abstract universal formulation, but …they must be filtered through the concrete circumstances of time and place”. These principles have to be prudential: “there can be no political morality without prudence; that is, without consideration of the political consequences of seemingly moral action”.
The fifth principle is that prudence, and not conviction of one’s own moral or ideological superiority, should guide political action. All state actors, including our own, must be seen as political entities pursuing their respective interests defined in terms of power. A state which views other nations in this light will avoid ideological confrontation, and be able to pursue policies that suitably factor in the interests of other states, while protecting and promoting its own.
Finally, Morgenthau says that power or national interest cannot be subordinated to ethics. However, ethics is still relevant to politics. “A man who was nothing but ‘political man’ would be a beast, for he would be completely lacking in moral restraints. A man who was nothing but ‘moral man’ would be a fool, for he would be completely lacking in prudence” Political art needs a fine balancing of power and morality.
To summarize:Power or interest makespolitics an independent field of study.Rational stateactors pursue their national interests. This premise can be the basis for a rational theory of international politics. Such a theory ignores as irrelevant the morality, religious beliefs, motives or ideological preferences of individual political leaders. It implies that states should avoid moral crusades or ideological confrontations, and look for compromise on the basis of satisfaction of their mutual interests alone. This is how conflicts can be prevented.
Following criticisms are usually made against Morgenthau’s realism.
1. Considering every individual as driven by a perpetual quest for power is questionable. Human beings are seldom in a single-minded pursuit of power. They are influenced by many goals and beliefs imbibed through family traditions and education.
2. Morgenthau introduces a normative (or ethical) principle of rationality into his theory. He considers a rational foreign policy “to be a good foreign policy”. For him, rationality consists in calculating the costs and benefits of all alternative policies and selecting that which maximises national power. Foreign policy failures occur when statesmen depart from a rational course aimed at minimizing risks and maximizing benefits. His critics say that all this is theorizing quite at variance with the real state of human affairs. It may be true that even statesmen act irrationally at times; but we cannot deny that foreign policy should be invariably based on cool, rational calculation.
3. The fundamental concept of Morgenthau’s realism, power, is ambiguous. It can be either a means or an end in politics. But if power is only a means for gaining something else, it does not define the nature of international politics in the way Morgenthau claims. It does not allow us to understand the actions of states independentlyfrom the motives and ideological preferences of their political leaders. It cannot serve as the basis for defining politics as an autonomous sphere. Morgenthau’s principles of realism are thus open to doubt. International politics cannot be studied independently of the wider historical and cultural context.
Neo-realism: Kenneth Waltz’s International System
Kenneth N. Waltz reformulated realism in international relations in his book Theory of International Politics. His version is called structural realism or neorealism. Waltz abandoned Morgenthau’s speculations on human nature andthe struggle for power. He argues that states in the international system, like firms in a domestic economy, seek survival. “Internationally, the environment of states’ actions, or the structure of their system, is set by the fact that some states prefer survival over other ends obtainable in the short run and act with relative efficiency to achieve that end”
According to Waltz, classical realists and idealists err alike in focusing on the individual state, and on ideological, moral and economic issues. They are unable to see the international system in isolation by separating it from the associated socio-political domain which obscures it. One can understand the primary determinants of international politics only by viewing it without the distracting background.
Waltz’s neorealist theory serves a limited purpose. It cannot help in formulating domestic or international policies. His theory helps only to explain why states behave in similar ways despite their different forms of government and diverse political ideologies, and why, despite of their growing interdependence,the overall picture of international relations is unlikelyto change.
Waltz explains that states continue to behave uniformly over long periods because of the constraints which the structure of the international system imposes on them. Anarchy, or the absence of central authority, is the ordering principle of the international system. The units of the international system are states. Waltz considers non-state actors as relatively unimportant. Since all states want to survive, and anarchy presupposes that each state has to take care of itself, no cooperative mechanisms like division of labor or functional differentiation exist among them. Nations perform similar functions, but have differential capabilities due to differences of their strengths.
Consequently, Waltz sees power and state behaviour in a different way from the classical realists. Morgenthau claimedthat states seek to rationallymaximisetheirpower. In contrast,Waltz assumes that each state seeks security and would therefore concentrate on the distribution of power in the international system.
No matter what may be the distribution of power among states, anarchy continues to be the ordering principle of international relations. This forces states to adopt the logic of self-help. In this connection, Waltz gives two reasons for rejecting the neoliberal ideas that interdependence even in the anarchic international system leads to cooperation. The reasons are insecurity and unequal gains. In the context of anarchy, each state is uncertain about the intentions of others. It is afraid that the possible gains which accrue to it from cooperation may be less than those to others and thus lead it to depend on others. “States do not willingly place themselves in situations of increased dependence. In a self-help system, considerations of securitysubordinate economicgain to political interest.”