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6021. The Right to Be Right: Civil-Military Relations and the Iraq Surge Decision

Author:
Peter D. Feaver
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
On January 10, 2007, President George W. Bush announced in a televised prime-time address to the nation a bold, even risky, new strategy in the Iraq War. The United States' military and political fortunes in the war had eroded so sharply over the preceding year that President Bush had authorized a thorough internal review to deter - mine why the current strategy was not succeeding and what, if anything, could be done about it. The review had concluded that the United States was on a trajectory that would end in defeat unless the president authorized a new strategy and committed new resources to it. Bush used the televised address to describe in broad strokes the results of the review and the new strategy, which the media quickly dubbed the “surge strategy,” because its most controversial provision involved sending have new brigade combat teams (BCTs) to Iraq, a commitment that grew to a total of nearly 30,000 additional troops—this at a time when public support for the Iraq War was strained to the breaking point.
Topic:
Intelligence
Political Geography:
United States and Iraq

6022. "The Security Curve and the Structure of International Politics: A Neorealist Synthesis"

Author:
Davide Fiammenghi
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Realist scholars have long debated the question of how much power states need to feel secure. Offensive realists claim that states should constantly seek to increase their power. Defensive realists argue that accumulating too much power can be self-defeating. Proponents of hegemonic stability theory contend that the accumulation of capabilities in one state can exert a stabilizing effect on the system. The three schools describe different points along the power continuum. When a state is weak, accumulating power increases its security. This is approximately the situation described by offensive realists. A state that continues to accumulate capabilities will eventually triggers a balancing reaction that puts its security at risk. This scenario accords with defensive realist assumptions. Finally, when the state becomes too powerful to balance, its opponents bandwagon with it, and the state's security begins to increase again. This is the situation described by hegemonic stability theory. These three stages delineate a modified parabolic relationship between power and security. As a state moves along the power continuum, its security increases up to a point, then decreases, and finally increases again. This modified parabolic relationship allows scholars to synthesize previous realist theories into a single framework.
Topic:
Security

6023. "Preventing Enemy Coalitions: How Wedge Strategies Shape Power Politics"

Author:
Timothy Crawford
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
States use wedge strategies to prevent hostile alliances from forming or to disperse those that have formed. These strategies can cause power alignments that are otherwise unlikely to occur, and thus have significant consequences for international politics. How do such strategies work and what conditions promote their success? The wedge strategies that are likely to have significant effects use selective accommodation—concessions, compensations, and other inducements—to detach and neutralize potential adversaries. These kinds of strategies play important roles in the statecraft of both defensive and offensive powers. Defenders use selective accommodation to balance against a primary threat by neutralizing lesser ones that might ally with it. Expansionists use selective accommodation to prevent or break up blocking coalitions, isolating opposing states by inducing potential balancers to buck-pass, bandwagon, or hide. Two cases—Great Britain's defensive attempts to accommodate Italy in the late 1930s and Germany's offensive efforts to accommodate the Soviet Union in 1939—help to demonstrate these arguments. By paying attention to these dynamics, international relations scholars can better understand how balancing works in specific cases, how it manifests more broadly in international politics, and why it sometimes fails in situations where it ought to work well.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
Soviet Union and Germany

6024. International Relations studies in Asia: distinctive trajectories

Author:
Muthiah Alagappa
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
This article investigates and explains the development of International Relations studies (IRS) in China, Japan, and India. Beginning in early 1980s IRS experienced exponential growth in China and is becoming a separate discipline in that country. Despite early starts, IRS in Japan and India is still an appendage in other disciplinary departments, programs, and centers although growing interest is discernible in both countries. Continued rise of Asian powers along with their growing roles and responsibilities in constructing and managing regional and global orders is likely sustain and increase interest in IRS in these countries and more generally in Asia. Distinctive trajectories have characterized the development of IRS in China, Japan, and India. Distinctiveness is evident in master narratives and intellectual predispositions that have shaped research and teaching of IR in all three countries. The distinct IRS trajectories are explained by the national and international context of these countries as well as the extensiveness of state domination of their public spheres. Alterations in national circumstances and objectives along with changes in the international position explain the master narratives that have focused the efforts of IR research communities. Extensiveness of state domination and government support, respectively, explain intellectual predispositions and institutional opportunities for the development of IRS. IRS in Asia has had a predominantly practical orientation with emphasis on understanding and interpreting the world to forge suitable national responses. That orientation contributed to a strong emphasis on normative–ethical dimensions, as well as empirically grounded historical, area, and policy studies. For a number of reasons including intellectual predispositions and constraints, knowledge production in the positivist tradition has not been a priority. However, IR theorizing defined broadly is beginning to attract greater attention among Asian IR scholars. Initial interest in Western IR theory was largely a function of exposure of Asian scholars to Western (primarily American) scholarship that has been in the forefront in the development of IR concepts, theories, and paradigms. Emulation has traveled from copying to application and is now generating interest in developing indigenous ideas and perspectives based on national histories, experiences, and traditions. Although positivism may gain ground it is not deeply embedded in the intellectual traditions of Asian countries. Furthermore, theorizing in the positivist tradition has not made significant progress in the West where it is also encountering sharp criticism and alternative theories. Asian IR scholarship would continue to emphasize normative–ethical concerns. And historical, area, and policy studies would continue to be important in their own right, not simply as evidentiary basis for development of law-like propositions. It also appears likely that Asian IR scholarship would increasingly focus on recovery of indigenous ideas and traditions and their adaptation to contemporary circumstances. The net effect of these trends would be to diversify and enrich existing concepts, theories, methods, and perspectives, and possibly provide fresh ones as well. The flourishing of IRS in Asia would make the IR discipline more international.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, and Government
Political Geography:
Japan, China, America, India, and Asia

6025. Development of International Relations theory in China: progress through debates

Author:
Yaqing Qin
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
The development of International Relations theory (IRT) in China has been framed by three debates since 1979. The first was about China's opening up to the outside world. It started with the question of whether the world was characterized by 'war and revolution' or 'peace and development' between orthodox and reformist scholars and continued to focus on China's interest between orthodox scholars and the newly rising Chinese realists. It resulted in a wide acceptance of the reformist argument that peace and development characterized our era and of the realist view that China was a normal nation-state and should have its own legitimate national interest. The second started in the early 1990s and centered on the better way of realizing China's national interest. It was between Chinese realists and liberals. While the former emphasized national power, the latter proposed the alternative approach of international institutions. The third debate was on China's peaceful rise. It evolved at the turn of the century, when all the three major American IRTs, realism, liberalism, and constructivism, had been introduced into China and therefore the debate was more a tripartite contention. Realists believed that it was impossible for any major power to rise peacefully, while liberals and constructivists both supported the peaceful-rise argument. Liberals stressed more the tangible benefits derived from international institutions and constructivists explored more China's identity in its increasing interaction with international society. Although it was Chinese constructivists who explicitly discussed the identity issue, all the three debates and all the debating sides have reflected this century puzzle since the Opium War – China's identity vis-à-vis international society. These debates have helped push forward the IRT development in China and at the same time established Western IRT as the dominant discourse. A new round of debate seems likely to occur and may center on the question of the world order. This time it may help the newly burgeoning but highly dynamic Chinese IRT to develop and contribute to the enrichment of IRT as knowledge of human life.
Topic:
International Relations and Development
Political Geography:
China, America, and Europe

6026. International Relations studies and theories in Japan: a trajectory shaped by war, pacifism, and globalization

Author:
Kazuya Yamamoto
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
A common view of Japan's International Relations (IR) studies in the post-World War II period is that they are characterized by pacifism and historical approaches. This paper argues that while pacifism has continued to serve as the basis of them, the approaches adopted by researchers have become increasingly diversified. Specifically, although the main issues for Japanese IR studies in the postwar period (i.e. defense strategy, world political economy, and global issues) have been consistently addressed by researchers on the basis of pacifism, the theoretical orientation of researchers has continually become stronger. Finally, this paper argues that both changing and continuous characteristics of IR studies in Japan have been supported by global developments, and concludes that this trend will continue into the near future.
Topic:
International Relations, Globalization, Political Economy, and War
Political Geography:
Somalia

6027. Something old, something new, something borrowed: rerepresentations of anarchy in International Relations theory

Author:
Marcus Holmes
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
There are many stories to be told regarding the development of International Relations (IR) theory in the United States over the last century. Some have pointed out IR's evolutionary properties, emphasizing the debates that have produced fitter theory with empirical reality. Others have argued that the development has been largely scientific with knowledge built hierarchically through time. In this article, I propose an alternative view of American IR's development. Specifically, I argue that IR theory is best understood through heterarchical organization, with core ideas and concepts rerepresented in new ways, and various levels of analysis, over time. In making this argument I trace duel processes of borrowing ideas from other disciplines and rerepresenting those ideas in new forms in order to solve vexing theoretical problems. The article demonstrates how conceptions of anarchy have been significantly affected by other disciplines and relates those conceptions to views of international security both at home and abroad, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region.
Topic:
International Relations
Political Geography:
United States, America, and Asia

6028. The development of International Relations theory in the UK: traditions, contemporary perspectives, and trajectories

Author:
Chris Brown
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
British International Relations (IR) theory is distinguished by a concern with institutions and norms, and by an emphasis on history, philosophy, and law rather than the formal methods of the social sciences; in both respects, but especially the latter, it differs from American IR theory. The origins of British IR theory are traced, and the importance of the 'English School' (ES) is stressed, partly because of the work it stimulates, but also because of its role as a brand which helps to establish the independence of British IR from the otherwise dominant American profession. Along with ES scholarship (pluralist and solidarist), political theory and IR, and critical theory, including critical security studies, are the major areas where contemporary IR theory in Britain is located. This is likely to persist, but the generally critical approach taken to social scientific theorizing may be changing, with the increasing importance of historical sociology and critical realist work. It may also be the case that the privileged status of IR theory in British IR may be under challenge.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, and Political Theory
Political Geography:
United Kingdom and America

6029. Non-Western International Relations Theory

Author:
James Mayall
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
This is an important book, which is long overdue. As the centre of gravity in world politics moves, slowly but inexorably, from West to East, we will all need to know how world affairs are understood and interpreted in both the new power centers and, just as importantly, in countries that have no pretensions to great power status themselves, but must coexist in the neighborhood of the new giants. At least we all need to know about it on the plausible assumption that in the future, as in the recent past, the process of global integration will continue. If, in the face of some future catastrophe, we retreat into our separate civilizational and cultural comfort zones, it may not matter so much. This is not an impossible future, but given the power, reach, and rapid development of modern communications and information technology, it seems a highly improbable one.
Topic:
International Relations

6030. Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia the Middle East

Author:
Matake Kamiya
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
Institution:
Japan Association of International Relations
Abstract:
For those who live in the American International Relations community, Etel Solingen's Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia the Middle East undoubtedly represents a stunning success of the study of nuclear proliferation. In 1994, Solingen published an influential article in this field of research, 'The Political Economy of Nuclear Restraint', in International Security, and argued that countries with ruling coalitions pursuing economic liberalization have stronger incentives to refrain from developing nuclear weapons than those with 'inward-looking, nationalist, and radical-confessional coalitions'. Based on the review of cases in South Asia, on the Korean Peninsula, in the Middle East, and in Latin America, she concluded that the former are internationalist in nature and are unwilling to damage international trade and investment by going nuclear, whereas the latter are more likely to pursue nuclear weapons because they care much less about the economic costs of nuclearization. In Nuclear Logics, Solingen expands such findings of her 1994 article and argues even more persuasively that 'internationalizing models of political survival make the development of nuclear weapons less likely than inward-looking models' (p. 46). Starting from 'the puzzle of contrasting historical trajectories' across East Asia and the Middle East since the late 1960s (p. 4), Solingen conducts the first ever 'systematic efforts' (p. 11) to explain why East Asia has largely moved toward denuclearization while the norm among the core Middle East powers has been nuclearization. Criticizing four alternative theories of nuclear choices of states, i.e. neorealism, neoliberal institutionalism, constructivism, and 'theories about democracy and foreign policy', as insufficient to solve her puzzle, Solingen insists that the study of nuclear proliferation must pay more attention to the effects of internationalization on domestic politics and nuclear policy. According to Solingen, '[w]hereas inward-looking models might have regarded nuclear weapons as assets in the arsenal of building regime legitimacy, outward-oriented ones regarded them as liabilities' (p. 277) and the two distinct patterns of nuclear choices in the Middle East and East Asia during the 'second nuclear age' can be well explained by the heavy regional concentrations of respective models in respective regions. In East Asia, the concentration of leaders who stake their political survival on economic growth through integration into the global economy reinforced individual, domestic incentives of leaders to avoid nuclearization across the borders. In the Middle East, the concentration of leaders who resist internationalization by trade protection, import substitution, and state entrepreneurship had the opposite effect. In fact, Solingen's careful case studies of four 'nuclear aspirants' in East Asia and five in the Middle East successfully demonstrate that '[t]he nuclear choices of all pertinent cases' in the two regions since the 1960s 'are compatible with domestic survival models' (p. 277).
Topic:
International Relations, Nuclear Weapons, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
America, Middle East, East Asia, and Korea