A Critical Review Essay of Schmidt, Zakaria, et al. (2013)

Steven Castellano A Critical Review Essay Main ThemesAccording to Schmidt, the elements of national power approach defines power in terms of the possession of specific resources by a state. (p. 529-30) The relational power approach defines power as the ability of a state to get another state to do something the other would not do otherwise. The relational power approach defines power in the specific issue area it is exercised and the elements of national power approach assumes power is fungible and aggregate. (p. 530) Neoclassical realists argue that the power-seeking behaviors states adopt cannot be explained by anarchy and power distributions alone, and the desire for power is derived from both the individual and structural level. They use the elements of national power approach but add a variety of domestic variables rather than just relative capabilities to help determine a state’s actual power to explain foreign policy behavior. (p. 542-3) They believe as a state’s capabilities increase that state will seek greater influence and control over the states around it and influence will be scaled back when power resources decline. (p. 546) According to Zakaria, Snyder’s book gives little weight to systemic causes which is a central flaw since overexpansion [defined by Snyder as unsuccessful expansion and the dependent variable of his book] must be measured by looking at the success in the international arena. (p. 184-5) Much of the success of expansionist foreign policy must be attributed to the relative power a state has- a systemic factor. (p. 186-7) Snyder defines a state’s ability to learn from mistakes by the outcomes, a poor measure because such outcomes are also linked to a state’s relative power. (p. 189) According to Walt, balancing is more common than bandwagoning because states prefer an alignment that preserves most of their freedom of action as opposed to subordination under a

potential hegemon, although certain circumstances can increase the tendency to bandwagon to some extent. (p. 15-6) In alliances, security considerations also take precedence over ideological preferences and alliances based on ideology are less likely to persist when more pragmatic interests interfere with such alliances. (p. 24) According to Schweller, democracies are particularly slow to balance against threats because balancing is not the status quo policy prior to the rise of a threat and democratic policymaking has many obstacles. (p. 172) The more vulnerable a regime, the more likely the state will search for allies than build up arms themselves to balance a threat. (p. 175) The more social divisions in a state, the more likely it is to rely on alliances to balance against a threat and the more social cohesion in a state, the more able the state will be to balance against a threat on their own. A high level of political and social integration will make a state more likely to balance against threats and low levels of political and social integration will make a state more likely to underbalance. (p. 180) The level of agreement among elites on a target to balance against has a similar relationship to the likelihood of a state to balance or underbalance (p. 181-2) According to Mearshimer, Waltz argues his theory cannot explain state behavior [instead it explains international outcomes] and a separate theory is needed for foreign policy that focuses on domestic political factors. (p. 245) Waltz’s theory does not have a rational actor assumption and, thus, it is severely limited in its ability to explain the outbreak of specific wars, an important part of world politics. Waltz’s argument that balancing is the tendency in the international system is less convincing without a rational actor assumption because it will be less likely that threatened states will recognize threats and choose to balance against them. (p. 248) Critical Evaluation-

Schmidt contends that as a state’s capabilities increase the state will seek greater influence and control of neighboring states and this influence and control will decrease when the power resources of the state declines. (p. 546) At times, the inverse is true. Power resources waning could be a motivation for a state to seek greater influence and control of its neighbors. Imperial Japan in the 1930s and early 1940s was motivated by a lack of power resources to adopt colonial and expansionist foreign policy. Japan has chosen not to pursue as much control over its neighbors as they did under colonial/imperial foreign policy as their power resources have greatly increased since 1945, the exact opposite of Schmidt’s contention. Walt claims there are certain circumstances that will increase the tendency of states to bandwagon rather than balance. (p. 16) Polarity is not covered as one of them and would have greatly affected the discussion. In the context of polarity, balancing and bandwagoning may become blurred when there is more than one great power since bandwagoning with one power can be balancing against another. In unipolarity, the tendency to bandwagon may increase since there is only one option for a state to benefit from allying with a great power. Schweller discusses social cohesion/division determining how likely a state will rely on alliances to balance against threats. (p. 180) He overlooks that a state may rely on alliances in order to balance against threats due to their military capability just as much as social cohesion/division. Similarly, Mearsheimer does not bring up that there may be little beyond state behavior that influences international outcomes with the assumption of anarchy in his critique of Waltz. Likewise, Zakaria fails to argue against the possibility that domestic factors, such as form of government, could make states better able to judge what expansions will be successful or not.