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Theory of International Politics
01 Jan 1979-
About: The article was published on 1979-01-01 and is currently open access. It has received 7932 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Global politics & International relations.
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TL;DR: In 2002, Afghanistan began to experience a violent insurgency as the Taliban and other groups conducted a sustained effort to overthrow the Afghan government as mentioned in this paper, and the primary motivation of insurgent leaders was ideological.
Abstract: In 2002 Afghanistan began to experience a violent insurgency as the Taliban and other groups conducted a sustained effort to overthrow the Afghan government. Why did an insurgency begin in Afghanistan? Answers to this question have important theoretical and policy implications. Conventional arguments, which focus on the role of grievance or greed, cannot explain the Afghan insurgency. Rather, a critical precondition was structural: the collapse of governance after the overthrow of the Taliban regime. The Afghan government was unable to provide basic services to the population; its security forces were too weak to establish law and order; and there were too few international forces to all the gap. In addition, the primary motivation of insurgent leaders was ideological. Leaders of the Taliban, al-Qaida, and other insurgent groups wanted to overthrow the Afghan government and replace it with one grounded in an extremist interpretation of Sunni Islam.
142 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that global environmental change decreases the capacity of nation states to fulfill their definitional functions without the cooperation of other states, which further diminishes their resources to fulfill other core functions.
Abstract: This article outlines the theoretical problematique and some empirical knowledge regarding the impacts of global environmental change on the nation state; thereby it also introduces this special issue of Global Environmental Politics. We argue that global environmental change decreases the capacity of nation states to fulfill their definitional functions without the cooperation of other states. The added stress due to environmental change also increases the demand for adaptive capacities of nation states, which further diminishes their resources to fulfill other core functions. Based on an overview of the complex interplay between global environmental change and the nation state, we focus on the various ways in which the nation state may mitigate, or adapt to, the impacts of global environmental change, including horizontal diffusionism and vertical institutionalism. In summarizing the other contributions to this special issue, we further argue that a reconsideration of key theoretical concepts such as sovereignty, agency, and multilevel governance is required in order to improve our understanding of the complexities of global environmental governance.
141 citations
TL;DR: The notion of collective security was introduced by Stromberg and Waltz as discussed by the authors, who argued that if the United States did not join the League of Nations, it would make war inevitable and would also make localized wars impossible.
Abstract: commitments are honored, the system inevitably turns small conflicts into big ones, by requiring states to get involved when it is not in their interest to do so. This was the main reason that realists like Hans Morgenthau and George Kennan fell out with liberal hawks over the Vietnam War. The Cold War redefinition of collective security as the global coalition against communist aggression, in rhetoric from Dean Acheson to Dean Rusk, fed 22. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, p. 112. International Security 17:1 I 20 the domino theory: South Vietnam was important not in itself, but as a matter of principle. Fighting in Vietnam meant avoiding the mistakes of the 1930s in not fighting in Manchuria or Ethiopia. Morgenthau posed the counterproductive effect of the principle: It is the supreme paradox of collective security that any attempt to make it work with less than ideal perfection will have the opposite effect from what it is supposed to achieve. . . . If an appreciable number of nations are opposed to the status quo. . . . the distribution of power will take on the aspects of a balance of power. . . . The attempt to put collective security into effect under such conditions . . . will not preserve peace, but will make war inevitable. . . . It will also make localized wars impossible and thus make war universal. For under the regime of collective security as it actually works under contemporary conditions, if A attacks B, then C, D, E, and F might honor their collective obligations and come to the aid of B, while G and H might try to stand aside and I, J, and K might support A s aggression. . . . By the very logic of its assumptions, the diplomacy of collective security must aim at transforming all local conflicts into world conflicts . . . since peace is supposed to be indivisible. . . . Thus a device intent on making war impossible ends by making war universal.23 Realist arguments against a collective security system for Europe rest on both fearcthat it would not work when needed, or that it would work when it should not. If commitments falter in a crunch, defense against a rogue power will be weaker than if the regular NATO alliance had remained the guarantor of security. If it does work, however, it precludes denying protection to Eastern European countries against each other or a great power. This makes a crisis in that cauldron of instabilities more likely to erupt than to stew in its own juices. Concern with this implication of the classic scheme of collective security for involvement in the Balkans, embodied in Article 10 of the League Covenant (to ”preserve as against external aggression the territorial integrity of all members”), was a specific reason for U.S. domestic opposition to joining that organization over seventy years WHY DOES COLLECTIVE SECURITY KEEP COMING BACK? The Wilsonian ideal of collective security was buffeted by history from all sides in the 1930s, and again after the anti-fascist alliance split. Redefinitions 23. Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, fifth ed. (New York: Knopf, 1973), pp. 411412. See also Stromberg, ”The Idea of Collective Security,” pp. 258-259. 24. Henry L. Stimson and McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (New York Harper, 1948), pp. 102-103. Systems for Peace or Causes of War? I 21 in the first half of the Cold War were also driven from favor-for hawks, by disappointment with the development of the UN after Korea, and for doves, by disillusionment with the crusade in Vietnam. The term’s renewed popularity does not come from a change of mind about the earlier disillusionments, but from the apparent inadequacy of alternative constructs for adjusting to the outbreak of peace, and because some now define the concept in narrow ways that avoid troublesome implications. At the same time, there is no agreement on whether the most troublesome commitment would be to counter aggression by a great power or to pacify wars between Eastern European states over borders and ethnic minorities. Many proponents of a collective security system for post-Cold War Europe are ambivalent or opposed outright to requiring intervention in a new generation of Balkan wars. Richard Ullman proclaims that “Europe’s peace has become a divisible peace,’’ yet endorses a European Security Organization (ESO) that would include “a generalized commitment to collective security. Each member state would commit itself . . . to come to the aid of any other if it is the victim of an armed attack.” The obligation, however, would not extend to little victims. Eastern Europe’s fate is to be excluded as “a vast buffer zone between the Soviet Union and Germany.” If cross-border violence erupts over national minorities in Kosovo or Transylvania, ”the major powers would be unlikely to get involved to an extent greater than through diplomacy and perhaps economic pressure.’’ Besides “walling off ” local conflicts, the benefit of the buffer zone that Ullman anticipates is to facilitate great power confidence in a shift toward defensively-oriented military doctrines.” Similarly, Charles Kupchan and Clifford Kupchan prescribe collective security, yet at the same time make a gargantuan concession to traditional balance of power by endorsing tacit recognition of ”areas of special interest” such as a Russian droit d u regard in Eastern Europe.26 These notions recognize the defects in the Wilsonian ideal type, and they may reassure the great powers about their security, but they de-collectivize collective security. Uncertainty about whether the system would cover Eastern Europe is crucial. There are two essential trends in Europe today: in the West, economic and political integration, consensus on borders, and congruence between nations and states; in the East, the reversdisintegration and lack of con25. Ullman, Securing Europe, pp. 28, 29, 68, 73-74, 78, 147. 26. Kupchan and Kupchan, ”Concerts, Collective Security, and the Future of Europe,” pp. 156157. International Security 173 I 22 sensus or congruence. Will the stability of the West be protected by holding the mess in the East at arm’s length? Ullman believes the new collective system would handle misbehavior by one of the great powers, but not small ones,27 presumably because the stakes are higher. By the same token, however, the costs and risks (such as involvement of nuclear weapons) would be higher too, so the balance of costs and benefits does not obviously make pacification of small wars in Eastern Europe a less attractive objective. It should hardly be as daunting for the system to settle a fight between Hungary and Rumania or between Ukraine and Poland as to confront one between Russia or Germany and the rest of the continent. At the same time, apparent sideshows in Eastern Europe may offer occasions for abrasions and misperceptions among the great powers if they disagree about intervention. One nightmare would be a Russian attack on Ukraine (far less fanciful than a Soviet attack on NATO ever was; Russian vice president Rutskoi has already broached the issue of recovering the Crimea for Russia).28 Under true collective security, members of the system would have to aid Ukraine-doing what NATO would not do for Hungary in 1 9 5 6 t h ~ ~ evoking the danger of escalation and nuclear war. Under realist norms, the West should leave Ukraine to its fate-tragic for the Ukrainians, but safer for everyone else. If we prefer the latter course, why try to dress it up by associating it with collective security? If one is genuinely interested in collective security as something different from traditional spheres of influence and alignments based on power and national interest, it is hard to write off responsibility for dealing with wars involving either great or small states; but if one is primarily interested in avoiding escalation of limited wars into large ones, it is hard to accept advance commitment to engage either sort of challenge before knowing exactly what it is. Since the collective security concept cannot be copyrighted, promoters have the right to amend it to accommodate standard criticisms. Confronted with questions about how the system would handle particular worrisome scenarios, however, some of the revisionists argue not just that the system should be exempted from responsibility for that type of conflict, but that such problems will not arise. 27. Ullman, Securing Europe, p. 68. 28. Celestine Bohlen, “Russian Vice President Wants to Redraw Borders,” New York Times, January 31, 1992, p. A9. Systems for Peace or Causes of War? I 23 Conceptual Confusion and System Dysfunction If revisions of the collective security idea are used to cover arrangements that fit better under other basic concepts like traditional alliance formation, or are used to dignlfy an arrangement other than a functioning security system, they make it less likely that effects of the system can be predicted from its design. Since collective security is an emergency safety system, and cannot be tested in peacetime the way a real machine can, dysfunctions due to confusions in design may not be evident until the time when the system is most needed. CONFUSION OF CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES Since the collapse of communism it has not always been clear whether the invocation of collective security is meant to enforce peace or to celebrate it. Less emphasis is usually placed on how the system would restore peace in the face of war than on why war (or at least war worthy of concern) will not arise. Ullman writes: If one were to rely on the historical record of generalized commitments to collective security, one could not be hopeful. . . . But it is arguable that the conditions now emerging in Europe make the past a poor predictor. . . . No major state has revisionist ambitions that its leaders think they could satisfy by sending troops across borders. . . . A genuine congruence of interests and goals sharply distinguishes the present from previous eras. . . . it is unlikely th
141 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the effects of party politics and presidential election cycles on U.S. recourse to force abroad were examined and a game-theoretic model was proposed to generate predictions about these effects.
Abstract: This article examines the effects of party politics and presidential election cycles on U.S. recourse to force abroad. I analyze a game-theoretic model to generate predictions about these effects. In the unique time-consistent equilibrium outcome of the one-shot game, policy varies across political parties. In a subgame–perfect equilibrium outcome of the repeated game, the use of force is invariant to the partisan composition of government. In neither case does policy respond to the electoral cycle.An empirical analysis supports the predictions of the repeated game. Between 1870 and 1992, U.S. recourse to force abroad responds neither to partisan politics nor to the domestic political calendar. It responds only to changes in U.S. power status and to the advent of general wars.
140 citations
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5,295 citations
01 Jan 1976
TL;DR: For centuries knowledge meant proven knowledge, proven either by the power of the intellect or by the evidence of the senses as discussed by the authors. But the notion of proven knowledge was questioned by the sceptics more than two thousand years ago; but they were browbeaten into confusion by the glory of Newtonian physics.
Abstract: For centuries knowledge meant proven knowledge — proven either by the power of the intellect or by the evidence of the senses. Wisdom and intellectual integrity demanded that one must desist from unproven utterances and minimize, even in thought, the gap between speculation and established knowledge. The proving power of the intellect or the senses was questioned by the sceptics more than two thousand years ago; but they were browbeaten into confusion by the glory of Newtonian physics. Einstein’s results again turned the tables and now very few philosophers or scientists still think that scientific knowledge is, or can be, proven knowledge. But few realize that with this the whole classical structure of intellectual values falls in ruins and has to be replaced: one cannot simply water down the ideal of proven truth - as some logical empiricists do — to the ideal of’probable truth’1 or — as some sociologists of knowledge do — to ‘truth by [changing] consensus’.2
4,969 citations
4,163 citations
17 Feb 1966
TL;DR: This book contains the collected and unified material necessary for the presentation of such branches of modern cybernetics as the theory of electronic digital computers, Theory of discrete automata, theory of discrete self-organizing systems, automation of thought processes, theoryof image recognition, etc.
Abstract: : This book contains the collected and unified material necessary for the presentation of such branches of modern cybernetics as the theory of electronic digital computers, theory of discrete automata, theory of discrete self-organizing systems, automation of thought processes, theory of image recognition, etc. Discussions are given of the fundamentals of the theory of boolean functions, algorithm theory, principles of the design of electronic digital computers and universal algorithmical languages, fundamentals of perceptron theory, some theoretical questions of the theory of self-organizing systems. Many fundamental results in mathematical logic and algorithm theory are presented in summary form, without detailed proofs, and in some cases without any proof. The book is intended for a broad audience of mathematicians and scientists of many specialties who wish to acquaint themselves with the problems of modern cybernetics.
2,922 citations