Antecedents of RealismLike utopianism in

Antecedents of RealismLike utopianism in international relations
theory, realism has its intellectual roots in older political
philosophy of the West and in the writings of non-Western ancient
authors such as Mencius and the Legalists in China and Kautilya in
India, as well as Thucydides wrote: “What made war inevitable was the
growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta.”
His conception of the importance of power, together with the propensity
of states to form competing alliances, places Thucydides well within
the realist school. Just as Thucydides had developed an understanding
of state behavior from his observation of relations between Athens and
Sparta, Machiavelli analyzed interstate relations in the Italian system
of the sixteenth century. Machiavelli is clearly linked to realist
theory by his emphasis on the ruler’s need to adopt moral standards
different from those of the individual in order to ensure the state’s
survival, his concern with power, his assumption that politics is
characterized by a clash of interests, and his pessimistic view of
human nature.
Thomas Hobbes, like Machiavelli, viewed power as crucial in human
behavior: Man has a “perpetual and restless desire of power after
power that ceaseth only in death.” Hobbes believed that “covenants,
without the sword, are but words and of no strength to secure a man at
all.” Without a strong sovereign, chaos and violence follow: “If
there be no power erected, or not great enough for own security; man
will and may lawfully rely on his own strength and art for caution
against all other men.”
Like other modern realists, Hobbes concerned himself with the
underlying forces of politics and with the nature of power in political
relationships. Although Hobbes believed that a strong sovereign was
mandatory for maintaining order within the political system, he saw
little prospect for fundamentally changing human behavior or the
environment. In his emphasis on strong political institutions for
managing power and preventing conflict, Hobbes paradoxically was closer
to proponents of world government or, to be more precise, world empire
to realists who stress a balance of power among major political groups.
Hobbes regarded the latter condition as analogous to an anarchical
state of nature, but he doubted the possibility of establishing a world
empire. Hegel, more than any other political philosopher, elevated the
position of the state. Although realist writers are usually by no means
Hegelian, Hegel’s belief that the state’s highest duty lies in its
own preservation is found in realist theory. Hegel reasoned that
“since states are related to one another as autonomous entities and
so as political wills on which the validity of treaties depends, and
since the particular will of the whole is in content a will for its own
welfare it follows that welfare is the highest aim governing the
relation of one state to another.” Moreover, Hegel held that the
state has an “individual totality” that develops according to its
own laws. The state has objective reality; that is, it exists apart
from its citizens. Hegel held that the state has moral standards
different from and superior to the individual---a theme that is found
in many realist writings. Among the antecedents of realist theory is
the work of Max Weber, whose writings dealt extensively not only with
the nature of politics and the state, but also with power as central to
politics. Although the richness of Weber’s political thought cannot
be encompassed in a short analysis, suffice it to suggest that, with
respect to realist theory, may of the formulations contained in his
work shaped subsequent generations of writing and scholarship. For
Weber as for later realists, the principal characteristic of politics
is the struggle for power. The power element of political life is
especially evident at the international level because “every
political structure naturally prefers to have weak rather than strong
neighbors. Furthermore, as every big political community is a potential
aspirant to prestige, it is also a potential threat to all of its
neighbors; hence, the big political community, simply because it is big
and strong, is latently and constantly endangered.” Among the
dimensions of politics as a struggle for power, moreover, is that of
economics. In Weber’s thought, economic policy stands in a
subordinate relationship to politics inasmuch as the “power political
interests of nations” encompass an economic struggle for existence.
Among the concerns of realists with which Weber before them was
preoccupied is the ethical problem of intention versus consequences, or
what is also termed the absolute ethic of conviction and the ethic of
responsibility. To adhere to an absolute ethic is to take actions in
keeping with that ethic without regard for their consequences. However,
according to Weber, leaders in an imperfect world confront the need to
behave by a political ethic in which the achievement of “good” may
make the necessary the utilization of less than morally acceptable
means. For Weber the ethic of conviction cannot be separated from an
understanding of the consequences of such action, which in turn gives
concrete meaning to an ethic of responsibility. In contemporary realist
thought the meaning of the ethic of responsibility comes forth in the
notion that each political action must be judged on specific merits
rather than in accordance with some abstract, universal standard. {…}
- Contending Theories of International Relations. James Dougherty and Robert Pfaltzgraff, Jr.