High Quality
Open the downloaded document, and select print from the file menu (PDF reader required).
Power, Politics, and Perception: Neoclassical Realism and Middle East WarsMatriculation # : 080001779Word Count: 5,2622008-12-08
The modern Middle East is an inter-state arena with a long history of conflict and war.From the 1948 Arab-Israeli War to the current war in Iraq, the modern Middle East appears to be a region which best epitomizes neorealism’s claim that the anarchy and insecurity of astate system is the principal determinant of conflict. However, constructivists claim thatrealism’s neglect of the incongruence between identity and sovereignty, as well as betweennation and state within the Middle East, proves realism inept to explain the entirety of causesof conflict in the region.
In this study, I argue that while both constructivism and neorealismdo contribute much to the debate of what explains conflict in the Middle East, a neoclassicalrealist approach does so more thoroughly and accurately due to its inclusion of first, second,and third image variables.
Understanding Neoclassical Realism
Since Neoclassical Realism’s acceptance as a distinct school of international relationsthought by Gideon Rose in 1998, it has been described by numerous scholars as bridging thegaps between classical realism, neo-realism, constructivism, liberalism, and foreign policyanalysis.
1
Constructivist IR theory is most closely associated with the work of Alexander Wendt. See Alexander Wendt,
Social Theory of International Politics, (
Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1999). Neorealist IR theory is mostclosely associated with the work of Kenneth Waltz. See Kenneth N. Waltz,
Theory of International Politics
,(New York: McGraw-Hill, 1979).
2
Brian Rathbun, "A Rose by Any Other Name: Neoclassical Realism as the Logical and NecessaryExtension of Structural Realism,"
Security Studies
17 (2008): 294-321; Gideon Rose. "Neoclassical Realismand Theories of Foreign Policy."
World Politics
51 (1998): 144-172; Jennifer Sterling-Folker, "RealistEnvironment, Liberal Process, and Domestic-Level Variables,"
International Studies Quarterly
41 (1997): 1-25;Randall Schweller, “The Progressiveness of Neoclassical Realism,” in
Progress in International RelationsTheory: Appraising the Field
, eds. Colin Elman and Miriam Fendius Elman, (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003);Jeffrey W. Taliaferro, "State Building for Future Wars: Neoclassical Realism and the Resource-Extractive State,"
Security Studies
15 (2006): 464-495.
2
It explicitly incorporates both external and internal variables… The scope andambition of a country's foreign policy is driven first and foremost by its place inthe international system and specifically by its relative material power capabilities. This is why [it] is realist. The impact of such power capabilities onforeign policy is indirect and complex, because systemic pressures must betranslated through intervening variables at the unit level. This is why [it] isneoclassical.
Neoclassical realism is therefore both an extension and a response to Waltzianneorealism which—unlike the works of pre-Waltzian realists—makes no claim to explainforeign policy or specific historical events.
This response is accomplished by neoclassicalrealism’s addition of “domestic politics, internal extraction capacity and processes, state power and intentions, and leaders’ perceptions of capabilities and relative power” to explainforeign policies.
The addition of these variables distinguishes neoclassical realism from other realist schools of thought and creates a unique four-level model for understandinginternational relations.
Foreign Policy Model of Neoclassical Realism
The starting point and independent variable in the neoclassical realist model is neo-realism’s anarchic international system. This structural environment of self-help and the balance-of-power is the primary determinant of state’s interests and behaviors in neoclassicalrealist theory.
Neoclassical realism is predominantly concerned with how relative power establishes the fundamental parameters of a state’s foreign policy.
This is where neoclassicalrealists diverge between offensive and defensive neoclassical realists. The offensive variant —the larger contingent—contends that “instead of assuming that states seek security… statesseek to control and shape their external environment” and furthermore, “they are likely to
3
Rose, 146.
4
Schweller,
Progressiveness,
317-320.
5
Ibid, 317.
6
See Appendix 1.
7
Sterling-Folker, 1-5.
8
Here power is broadly defined here as “the capabilities or resources… with which states can influenceeach other.” See William Wohlforth,
The Elusive Balance, Power and Perceptions during the Cold War
, (Ithaca:Cornell University Press, 1993), 4.
3
Add a Comment