6/9/2019 Hans Morgenthau -- Britannica Online Encyclopedia

Hans Morgenthau
Hans Morgenthau, in full Hans Joachim Morgenthau, (born February 17, 1904, Coburg,
Germany—died July 19, 1980, New York, New York, U.S.), German-born American political
scientist and historian noted as a leading analyst of the role of power in international politics.

Educated rst in Germany at the Universities of Berlin, Frankfurt, and Munich, Morgenthau
did postgraduate work at the Graduate Institute for International Studies in Geneva. He was
admitted to the bar in 1927 and served as acting president of the Labour Law Court in
Frankfurt. In 1932 he went to Geneva to teach public law for a year, but because of Adolf
Hitler’s rise to power in Germany in 1933, he stayed on until 1935. In 1935–36 he taught in
Madrid, and in 1937 he took up residence in the United States, where he became a
naturalized citizen in 1943. He served on the faculties of Brooklyn (New York) College (1937–
39), the University of Missouri–Kansas City (1939–43), the University of Chicago (1943–71), the
City College of the City University of New York (1968–74), and the New School for Social
Research (1974–80).

In 1948 Morgenthau published Politics Among Nations, a highly regarded study that
presented what became commonly known as the classical realist approach to international
politics. In this work, Morgenthau maintained that politics is governed by distinct immutable
laws of nature and that states could deduce rational and objectively correct actions from an
understanding of these laws. Central to Morgenthau’s theory was the concept of power as
the dominant goal in international politics and the de nition of national interest in terms of
power. His state-centred approach, which refused to identify the moral aspirations of a state
with the objective moral laws that govern the universe, maintained that all state actions seek
to keep, demonstrate, or increase power. He called for recognition of the nature and limits of
power and for the use of traditional methods of diplomacy, including compromise.

A contributor to numerous scholarly periodicals and journals of opinion, Morgenthau was

also the author of Scienti c Man vs. Power Politics (1946), In Defense of the National Interest
(1951), Dilemmas of Politics (1958), The Purpose of American Politics (1960), Politics in the
Twentieth Century (1962), and Truth and Power (1970).

This article was most recently revised and updated by André Munro, Assistant Editor.

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6/9/2019 Hans Morgenthau -- Britannica Online Encyclopedia

CITATION INFORMATION
ARTICLE TITLE: Hans Morgenthau
WEBSITE NAME: Encyclopaedia Britannica
PUBLISHER: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
DATE PUBLISHED: 13 February 2019
URL: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Hans-Morgenthau
ACCESS DATE: June 08, 2019

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