NS&TP 1

MS Social Studies
Fall 2022
Dr. Fiaz Hussain shah
 NS&TP 2

Lec – 4
Elements of National Power
 Lec 4: Deepening & 3

Broadening of Security

Thus, see concept of security moving in two

directions:

 Deepening - from state to individual

 Broadening - from military threats to things like
health, environment, economy etc.
 Lec 4: Theorizing national 4

security
Realism: focuses on the external sources of national
security threats (outside the boundaries of
sovereign state, from the anarchical system)
Critical Theory: analyzes threats inside and outside
the state (Threat of poverty, environmental
degradation and domestic repression of essential
human rights, all reside inside the state.)
 Lec 4: Theorizing national 5

security
Constructivism: security and threats as social
constructions; how we understand these concepts
and processes that can change our understanding;
envisages security communities whereby states
share the collective sense of identity and security
Integrative approaches: combining internal and
external factors into a comprehensive national
security policy (Leffler)
 Lec 4: Theorizing national 6

security
For realists, the fundamental national interest of all
states is national security. The three S’s’:
 Statism: states as central actors; makes security a
pervasive element of foreign policy
 Survival: central goal of all foreign policy; use force
as a legitimate (element) instrument of statecraft
Power vs security debate (offensive vs. defensive
realism)
 Lec 4: Theorizing national 7

security
 Self-help: take appropriate steps to ensure
survival, balance of power as enduring structural
feature
The security dilemma - efforts to build defensive
capabilities in one state can be perceived as
threatening to others, which causes them to build
their own defenses, which can in turn be
threatening to the original state
 Lec 4: Theorizing national 8

security
 Self-help: take appropriate steps to ensure
survival, balance of power as enduring structural
feature
The security dilemma - efforts to build defensive
capabilities in one state can be perceived as
threatening to others, which causes them to build
their own defenses, which can in turn be
threatening to the original state
Lec 4: National Security Strategy 9
 National interests 10

 Vital Interests: Situations, events, or trends that threaten the

survival or security of the nation
 Major Interests: Situations that although threatening the basic
security interests of the nation, can be diminished or eliminated
through compromise,
 Humanitarian Interests: Natural or man-made hazards, or gross
violations of human rights
 Peripheral Interests: Those situations which do not affect the
nation’s defence, or national security, or the integrity and stability of
the international system
 11

 Grand strategy is a crucial component of a state’s foreign policy: it

is the overall vision of a state’s national security goals, and a
determination of the most appropriate means by which to achieve
these goals
It entails a 3-step process:
 Determine the state’s vital security goals.
 Identify the main source of threats to these goals, internal and
external.
 Ascertain the key political, economic and military resources that
can be employed as foreign policy options to realize national
security goals.
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 National power can be equated with the entirety of a state’s effectiveness
in international politics.
 The content of National power relies on the combination of so many elements and
relative factors that it is tough to find out any accurate and final list at any given
period of time.
 Despite this difficulty, there has been some agreement about certain national power
elements and even about their classification into stable and unstable, tangible and
intangible, human and non-human, etc.
 More possession of these elements does not determine a nation’s power; hence they
should not be termed as the determinants of power
 What determines power is the proper and efficient utilization of these elements.
 At best, they can be called elements or factors, or components of national power.
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 Before discussing these elements in detail, one should consider and assume
certain facts regarding them.
 First, all elements are interrelated and interdependent.
 Second, these cannot be measured with a high degree of accuracy. These
can simply be estimated.
 Third, even a precise estimate of these elements is not always possible as
they are undergoing constant structural and relative changes due to
natural and technological reasons.
 Fourth, national power is never based on any single factor but a
combination of all these elements under a set of circumstances.
 Fifth, these can be broadly classified based on their nature, such as stable
and unstable, tangible and intangible.
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 These elements can be comprehensively divided into five categories. These
are:
 Natural Elements. Geography, natural resources, and population.
 Scientific and Technological Elements. Technology and industrial capacity,
agricultural capacity, and military strength.
 Political Elements. Type of government, bureaucratic organization,
efficiency, leadership wisdom, and quality of diplomacy.
 Social and Ideological Elements. Ideologies, national morale, national
character, social structure, and social cohesiveness.
 External and other Elements. Reputation and image, foreign support,
international strategic position, and intelligence. 
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 Natural Elements:
 1. Geography:
 Since time immemorial, the most stable element upon which a nation’s power
depends is geography.
 Geographical factors such as climate, topography, location, and size influence the
power potential.
 For example, climate acts as one of the determinants of the culture and economy of a
country.
 If the climate is good, there would be a better work culture leading to more
productivity.
 Great powers of modern times have been situated in those regions blessed with a
temperate climate.
 Topography plays an important role in defense of nations. Topographical features
such as mountains, valleys, rivers may determine natural boundaries between nations
and set limits to their natural expansion.
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 Natural Elements:
 1. Geography:
 Mountains like the Himalayas, the Alps, and the Pyrenees and rivers like the Rhine,
the Rio Grande, and Yale served as guards on the boundaries between nations.
 Location determines the extent of a country’s vulnerability to invasion. It is a major
determinant of whether a country is a sea-power or a land-power.
 The achievements of England and Japan on the seas have been due to their being
islands.
 Land-locked countries like Austria,  Hungary, Nepal, Bhutan, etc., are at a
disadvantage compared to states having outlets to the sea.
 States that are located far away from the friction zones of power can pursue an
independent or neutral policy in world affairs, but the same is not true with those
close to the epicenter of world politics.
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 Natural Elements:
 1. Geography:
 Size is yet another natural and tangible factor of power though it is the most
deceptive of power’s physical foundations.
 A large territory, if hospitable and fertile, can accommodate more people and give
more natural resources.
 In the past, the vast size of a state’s territory was of great help to its security.
 It was difficult for the enemy to win and occupy a large territory. But size matters
very little nowadays. Japan, for instance, even though comparatively small, defeated
China and Russia.
 Moreover, larger territories’ utility has also diminished due to the technological
revolution and the invention of Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles.
 Geopolitics as a discipline enables us to understand the application of political
geography to statecraft.
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 Natural Elements:
 2. Natural Resources:
 Natural and quantifiable, and stable elements of power are natural resources that
include raw materials, agricultural products like food and fiber, forests, minerals,
waterfall, soil fertility, etc.
 It is evident that the possession of resources such as coal, iron, uranium, oil, rubber,
bauxite, manganese, other ferrous and non-ferrous metals, non-metallic minerals,
and natural gas is essential to industrial and defense production in nation-states.
 It has been proved that the availability of petroleum at reasonable prices is important
to industrial nations’ good economic health.
 The contemporary prosperity of many Arab countries is due to the availability of
plenty of oil there.
 However, it may be said that the mere possession of natural resources does not
automatically generate power. Their proper utilization through advanced technology
is also essential. 
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 Natural Elements:
 3. Population:
It seems a large population is an asset to the state. But it is not
really so.
The quality of the population is as important as its quantity.
From a quantity three points of view, it is a tangible element
whereas it is intangible qualitatively.
Thus population can serve both as an asset and as a liability.
If people are well-fed, educated, and properly trained, they are
a great source of power.
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 Natural Elements:
 3. Population:
But if they are ignorant, poor, and illiterate, they are a big
burden on the state.
Many qualities of population, such as unity, literacy, loyalty,
character, and spirit of love, sacrifice, and duty, are crucial for
making a country powerful, but they are difficult to measure.
A good population serves as good military personnel, civilians,
workers, producers, and consumers.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 The industrial capacity, agricultural capacity, and military capacity of
a nation depend on the one hand on the availability of natural
resources and raw materials and, on the other hand, on scientific and
technological development. Elements related to the scientific and
technological advancement of a country are:
 1. Industrial Capacity:
 Technology may be said to be a nation’s capacity to convert the endowed resources
into actual power. 
 It can be applied in the economic and industrial sphere, which means better
machines and better and abundant products. No nation in the present world can
become a great power unless it has the capacity to produce tremendous quantities of
goods and services.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 1. Industrial Capacity:
 If a country does not have the technology, industry, and markets to
efficiently process natural resources, it is reduced to the position of a weak
raw material exporting state.
 On the contrary, a country with developed technology but without natural
resources is greatly dependent on importing raw materials from other
countries.
 Technology helps a nation have a stronger economy, stronger industrial
base, stronger transport and communication system, stronger military,
greater capacity to win the war, and influence nations during peace.
 Industrial capacity contributes towards the production Of weapons that are
required for modern warfare.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 1. Industrial Capacity:
 It provides international rewards in the form of consumer goods and the
shape of markets for foreign goods.
 It enables a nation to persuade other nations by providing technical and
economic assistance in soft loans, aid, grants, etc. The industrial capacity of
a nation thus is a great source of wealth and power.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 2. Agricultural Capacity:
 Agriculture is a crucial component of national power.
 Itis more relevant for developing countries where agriculture tends to be
the national economy’s major sector.
 International trade of a developing country heavily depends upon
agricultural products and products manufactured with agricultural content
(e.g., jute, cloth, and sugar).
 These become goods for export, facilitating imports of machinery and raw
material for the industrial sector.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 3. Military Strength:
 Scientific and technological development is the sustaining factor for the
armed forces, without which the military strength cannot be dependable and
self-reliant.
 Indigenous capacity to produce different kinds of modern and sophisticated
weapons is necessary; otherwise, the nation cannot sustain prolonged
warfare.
 Consequently, notwithstanding their technological backwardness, many
countries have acquired military strength by buying weapons from the
advanced countries, which have contributed to their military might.
 In the beginning, most states increase their strength in this way and later on
build up their technological capability for defense production and forces.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 3. Military Strength:
 Military strength is relevant both in war and peace. No one can win a war
without a strong military base.
 In peacetime, diplomacy is also significantly affected by the leverages that
rivals wield due to their respective military might. Military strength involves
two main things-armed forces and weapons.
 To analyze their role in national power, one has to consider their size and
quantity, quality and technological sophistication, mobility and deployment,
leadership, and morale.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 3. Military Strength:
 The size and number of armed forces are of great importance.
 Even the age of space battles and push-button warfare has not undermined
the general importance of numbers.
 Therefore, a country with large size of defense forces will always be
relatively in a better position.
 Equally important is the weapons and equipment’s supplied to them.
 A state with a small armed force but armed with sophisticated weapons and
quality equipment can easily defeat another state with a much larger armed
force using old weapons.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 3. Military Strength:
 Thus the quality of the army and arms ammunition is also very crucial along
with their quantity.
 The quality of forces depends on the training’s nature, physical endurance,
and the troops’ morale.
 Next is the question of mobility and deployment. It stands for a state’s
ability to deploy its armed might in locations inside and outside its territory.
 The chief indicator of mobility is a state’s ability to transport and effectively
support military Operations on land, sea, and air.
 Military leadership also plays a great role in the actual military Operations
during a war. By their skill, military commanders can jolt a superior enemy
and term the defeat of his side into victory.
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 Scientific and Technological Elements:
 3. Military Strength:
 The morale of forces, i.e., their willingness to sacrifice for the nation, is no
less a factor contributing to military strength.
 The military alliances and bases also contribute to an important aspect of the
military element.
 A state with several such alliances and bases is potentially stronger.
 The military component of national power is dependent upon the nation’s
financial resources and its technological, industrial, and economic
development.
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 Political Elements:
 1. Type of Government:
 Statesformulate and conduct their foreign policy through their
governments.
 Ifa government’s foreign policy is unified, specific, representative of the
popular will, stable, and at the same time flexible, it can do wonders for the
nation and its power position.
 The government also regulates social discipline based on the coordination of
all efforts in its community.
 Good rapport between the government and people bring greater allegiance
of people towards the country. Such allegiance is a prime factor in the
development of national power.
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 Political Elements:
 1. Type of Government:
 It is not easy to say which type of government is the most powerful.
 The relationship between the type of government and national power has not been
resolved since Aristotle’s times.
 There are various forms of government in the present world, such as communist,
democratic, authoritarian, etc.
 Past international relations prove that both democratic and authoritarian types of
governments have successfully regulated the behavior of other states, and, therefore,
to that extent, both of them have been powerful nations.
 Authoritarian regimes can make swift and flexible foreign policy decisions as their
decision-makers are few and relatively Unaccountable.
 But it should be considered whether quick decisions by unaccountable decision-
makers are necessarily wise decisions.
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 Political Elements:
 1. Type of Government:
 The features of checks and balances of democratic governments subject
decisions to greater scrutiny and presumably guard against whimsical and
hasty decisions.
 The yardstick to measure a type of government’s superiority can be its
efficiency to achieve set national goals and the ability to mobilize people’s
support.
 Democratic and constitutional government is based on a consensus of
fundamentals; it is likely to operate with sustained popular support. In this
way, it will be better positioned to impose greater discipline and persuade
people to make sacrifices for achieving national objectives and national
growth.
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 Political Elements:
 2. Bureaucratic Efficiency
 3. Leadership
 First, leadership utilizes the other national power components like
geography, resources, population, industrial capacity, technology, etc. This
does with the qualities that it possesses.
 Second, it coordinates other elements of national power.
 Third, it allocates resources between military and civilian programs.
 Fourth, it decides the nature of relations with other states and declares war
and peace. Decisions and actions of leaders have a direct bearing on the
power of the state.
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 Political Elements:
 2. Bureaucratic Efficiency
 3. Leadership
 4. Quality of Diplomacy
 5. Quality of Judicial system
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 Social and Ideological Elements:
 1. Ideology
 2. National Morale
 High national morale or willingness to sacrifice contributes to
building national power in peacetime, in a national crisis, and wars. It
directly impacts the vigor and human dynamics with which
government mobilizes and utilizes the other tangible elements of
power.
 3. National Character
 National character is the trait of people towards all walks of national life. It
is the outcome of the evolutionary process and the previous generations’
attitude, which is transmitted to the next generations. Each nation has a
distinct character. It is also a product of a specific social environment.
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 Social and Ideological Elements:
 4. Social System and Cohesiveness
 If society is integrated and coordinated, it will be capable of a unified
effort to consolidate its power further. On the other hand, if it is
disintegrated and suffers from internal dissensions, it will dilute its
power and prestige.
 5. Accidents
 Sometimes accidents and unforeseen events also put spoke in the wheel of
power. For instance, “the sudden death of a great leader, an earthquake, a
famine, an epidemic of a dread disease such as the plague, a
misunderstanding or a breakdown in communication during a crisis, and
many other unforeseen events may deeply affect the power relationship of
nation-states.
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 External Elements:
 1. Image and Reputation
 2. Foreign Support and Dependency
 3. International Strategic Position
 4. Intelligence