Lecture Note Asst. Prof. Dr. Nur Köprülü

Hague Conferences of 1899 & 1907End of the First World War (1919) Interwar years (1919 – 1939)Establishment of “League of

Nations” 1920Evolution of “Idealism”Wilson’s 14 Principles Idealism – Realism Debate; First

Debate in IR Theories

In the Hague Conferences, the European states pledged to establish an international mechanism to settle disputes among nations

In order to achieve this end; the Hague Conferences had come to the conclusion that there should be an international TRIBUNAL to solve the problmes among states!

This was the first step in the foundation of International Court; like Permanent Court of International Justice in 1920 which has been replaced by the International Court of Justice in 1945 under the UN System.

For that purpose the headquarter of ICJ is located at Hague/ the Netherlands today!

After the end of the WWI, the victorious powers decided to set up an international organization to avoid any other world war and to maintain peace & security at international level.

In order to cope with this situation, the League of Nations was established which was the first political IGO ever established.

Non-intervention into domestic affairs

Self-determination Idea of Collective Security ***Peaceful settlement of disputesPCIJ: Permanent Court of Int JusticeSovereign Equality of states,

particularly respect for political independence.

All these dynamics had demonstrated that there should be a separate discipline to analyze and explore the relations among the states and to re-think how states can avoid wars and achieve peace!

The result was a discussion on IR and how does it operate?

Who are the primary actors of IR?

How we can prevent another WW?

Idealism and realism are two main images of IR.

For example;those scholars or policymakers idenitfy themselves as realists think that “states are the principal actors” and study the IR as comprised of states, rather than putting the emphasis on non-state actors!

Here, idealism – realism demontrates one of the significant step in the foundation of IR as a discipline where there is a discussion on the methodology and the subject matter of IR...

During the inter-war years the main approach of IR was based on idealism

Basic themes of Idealism; 1. “Open diplomacy” openly arrived at!2. Peaceful settlement of disputes3. Wars should be the last resort!4. Collective security5. Idea of international society6. Significance of International

Organizations

Main precessors of Idealist school goes back to J. Locke, J. J. Rousseau, H. Grotius and I. Kant

During the inter-war years, Edward H. Carr criticized the utopian or idealist thinking and evaluates the more extreme versions of realism that posit the divorce of morality from politics in IR. He argues that; “any sound political thought must be based on elements of both utopia (value) and reality (power). Pure realism can offer nothing but a naked struggle for power which makes any kind of international society impossible”... (p. 63 in your textbook)

The former realists were Thucydides, Machiavelli, Hobbes and Clausewitz.

Main concepts of realists;1. States2. Power3. System4. Anarchy 5. Balance of power & stability

States are the key actors IR inter-state system, for example

Stanley Hoffman – realist American policy-maker – thought that “IR is an American Social Science”

IR is conflictual IR is anarchic, due to not only the

absence of a higher authority, but also the clash of interests of states

What does power refer to in realism?- Some realists understand power to be the

sum of economic, military, technological, diplomatic and other capabilities at the disposal of states (see Viotti & Kauppi)

- Others see power not as some absolute value determined for each state as if it were in a vacuum but, rather as capabilities relative to the capabilities of other states!

The power of the United States is evaluted in terms of its capabilities relative to the capabilities of other states...

Realist understanding and definition of power is a static assumption & view of power, not changing.

Power is an attribute of the state that is sum of its CAPABILITIES whether considered alone or relative to others.

That’s why for Hans Morgenthau; “international politics is a quest for power & prestige” when he wrote in his famous book Politics Among Nations (1948).

In IR, the concept of “system” is very important!

The definition of system varies from one theory to another. Realists have a pesimisitic view of international system.

Given that each system has its own power capabilities distribution of power among states; for instance neo-realists think that characteristics of systems can be classified as unipolar, bipolar and multipolar...

The polarity of the system is then measured by the number of Great Powers

Realists emphasize the relative distribution of power capabilities between specific states or alliances and how shifts in these capabilities influence state behavior, interactions, and hence, the possibility of war!!

Conflicts are primarily relational...

So, try to formulate an example in this case...

Cold War Politics?Super Power relations/ Rivarly?

System as anarchy and Its distribution of capabilities is very important...

What is anarchy? Literally, anarchy is reffered to violence,

destruction & chaos For realists anarchy refers to the absence of a

higher authority above states, given the fact that states are the only sovereign actors in IR

No one has the right to dominate another sovereign state; states are rational & unitary actors

There is hierarchy of power, but not a hierarchy of authority in IR

So anarchy absence of a hierachy of authority

Some states are clearly more powerful than others, but there is no recognized authority higher than that of any state (p. 68)

Anarchy is the defining character of the environment within which the sovereign states interact.

Realists argue that the absence of a central and overriding authority helps us to explain why states come to rely on power, seeking to maintain or increase their power positions relative to other states.

So IR is a zero-sum gameThere is no trust among statesEach state faces a self-help situation

Given that there is no world government and covenant or agreement to tell states what to do or what not to do; states find themselves in a situation of security dilemma.

«The more one state arms to protect itself from other states, the more

threatened these states become and the more prone they are to resort to arming themselves to protect their own national security interests».

Distribution of power capabilities; Types of Balance of power Bipolar balance of power (two states

with relatively equal power) Multipolar balance of power (three or

more states engaging in check and balances)

These are the two main realist categorization of of particular power distributions.

Concert of Europe Idea and Post-Napoleonic Wars era; multipolar balance of power

Cold War years (1945 – 1990): bipolar balance of power

Cold War Politics (1945 – 1990): - Two Great Powers / Hegemons (US vs USSR)- Two Blocs: Eastern vs Western: “Iron Curtain”- Nuclear deterence- Arms race- Policy of containment (NATO vs Warsaw Pact

Treaty Organization)- Super power discipline

Given the emphasis on state and concern with national security issues, we have seen how the concept of balance of power has played a dominant role in realist thought and theory.

For realists; foreign policies of states are determined by their national interests defined in terms of their power capabilities.

His main book: Politics Among Nations (1948)

For Morgenthau; balance of power refers to;

1. A policy aimed at a certain state of affairs,

2. An objective or actual state of affairs,3. An approximately equal distribution of

power (like during the Cold War years)4. Any distribution of power shifts in favor

of either super power.

His book Politics Among Nations defined the field of international relations theory in 1948 as it heralded the post–World War II paradigm shift in American thinking about diplomacy.

Politics Among Nations emphasized the power interests of states as the driver behind the relations between states.

The period before WWII was on the other hand defined by idealism that focused on values.

Balance of Power has been criticized for leading to WAR as opposed to preventing it!

Functioning as a propaganda tool... Justifying defense spending +

foreign adventuresBut it is still the main concept in

realism!!!

Like North Atlantic Treaty Organization founded in 1949

Warsaw Pact Treaty Organization founded in 1955 and dissolved by the end of Cold War in 1990!!!

That’s why for realists; Cold War bipolarity brought us equal distribution of power – balance of power; an equilibrium.

All states act to increase capabilities but negotiate rather than fight.

All states fight rather than pass up an opportunity to increase their capabilities.

All states stop fighting rather than eliminate an essential state.

All states act to oppose any coalition or single state which tends to assume a position of predominance within the system. (See your textbook)

Please read:

Morton A. Kaplan, System and Process in International Politics (New York, 1957).

A decade after the cold war ended, policy makers and academics foresaw a new era of peace and prosperity, an era in which democracy and open trade would herald the "end of history."

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, John Mearsheimer's masterful new book explains why these harmonious visions remain utopian.

To Mearsheimer, great power politics are tragic because the anarchy of the international system requires states to seek dominance at one another's expense, dooming even peaceful nations to a relentless power struggle.

Mearsheimer illuminates his theory of offensive realism through a sweeping survey of modern great power struggles and reflects on the bleak prospects for peace in Europe and northeast Asia, arguing that the United States's security competition with a rising China will intensify regardless of "engagement" policies.

"This is the definitive work on offensive realism."

Very little possibilitiy of for fundamental and peacful transformation of international politics.

For Robert Gilpin;“the state is the principal actor in that the

nature of the state and the patterns of relations among states are the most

important determinants of the character of international relations at a given moment...

So contemporary nation-state is the ultimate form of political organization”.

Hedley Bull’s article on “Does Order Exist in World Politics?”, from

Anarchical Society, 1977.

Liberal Approaches

For political realists, international politics, like all other politics, is “a struggle for power but, unlike domestic politics, a struggle dominated by organized violence”.

For realists: “All history shows that nations active in international politics are continuously preparing for, actively involved in, or recovering from organized violence in the form of war”

Three assumptions are integral to the realist vision:

First, states as coherent units are the dominant actors in world politics. This is a double assumption: states are predominant; and they act as coherent units.

Second, realists assume that force is a usable and effective instrument of policy. Other instruments may also be employed, but using or threatening force is the most effective means of wielding power.

Third, partly because of their second assumption, realists assume a hierarchy of issues in world politics, headed by questions of military security: the “high politics” of military security dominates the “low politics” of economic and social affairs.

These realist assumptions define an ideal type of world politics.

Political integration among states is slight and lasts only as long as it serves the national interests of the most powerful states.

Transnational actors either do not exist or are politically unimportant.

Only statesmen succeed in adjusting their interests, as in a wellfunctioning balance of power, is the system stable.

In Power and Interdependence; Keohane & Nye analyzed the politics of such transnational issues as trade, monetary relations, and oceans policy ...

Multiple channels connect societies, including: informal ties between governmental elites as well as formal foreign office arrangements; informal ties among nongovernmental elites; and transnational organizations (such as MNCs).

These channels can be summarized as interstate, transgovernmental, and transnational relations. Interstate relations are the normal channels assumed by realists.

Transgovernmental applies when we relax the realist assumption that states act coherently as units; transnational applies when we relax the assumption that states are the only units.

The agenda of interstate relationships consists of multiple issues that are not arranged in a clear or consistent hierarchy.

This absence of hierarchy among issues means, among other things, that military security does not consistently dominate the agenda.

Many issues arise from what used to be considered domestic policy, and the distinction between domestic and foreign issues becomes blurred. (Source: Viotti & Kauppi, IR Theory, Longman)

Military force is not used by governments toward other governments within the region, or on the issues, when complex interdependence prevails.

These issues are considered in several government departments (not just foreign offices), and at several levels.

Inadequate policy coordination on these issues involves significant costs.

Different issues generate different coalitions, both within governments and across them, and involve different degrees of conflict.

These actors are important not only because of their activities in pursuit of their own interests, but also because they act as transmission belts, making government policies in various countries more sensitive to one another.

As the scope of governments’ domestic activities has broadened – like corporations, banks – and to a lesser extent “trade unions” have made decisions that transcend national boundaries, the domestic policies of different countries impinge on one another more and more. (Viotti & Kauppi, IR Theories, Longman)

Foreign affairs agendas—that is, sets of issues relevant to foreign policy with which governments are concerned—have become larger and more diverse.

No longer can all issues be subordinated to military security. As Secretary of State Henry Kissinger described the situation in 1975 ...

When there are multiple issues on the agenda, many of which threaten the interests of domestic groups but do not clearly threaten the nation as a whole, the problems of formulating a coherent and consistent foreign policy increase.

In 1975; energy was a foreign policy problem, but specific remedies, such as a tax on gasoline and automobiles, involved domestic legislation opposed by auto workers and companies alike

During the Cold War each superpower used the threat of force to deter attacks by other superpowers on itself or its allies; its deterrence ability thus served an indirect, protective role, which it could use in bargaining on other issues with its allies.

This bargaining tool was particularly important for the United States, whose allies were concerned about potential Soviet threats and which had fewer other means of influence over its allies than did the Soviet Union over its Eastern European partners.

The United States had, accordingly, taken advantage of the Europeans’ (particularly the Germans’)

desire for its protection and linked the issue of troop levels in Europe to trade and monetary negotiations.

International organizations also allow small and weak states to pursue linkage strategies. In the discussions on a New International Economic Order, Third World states insisted on linking oil price and availability to other questions on which they had traditionally been unable to achieve their objectives.

Small and weak states have also followed a strategy of linkage in the series of Law of the Sea conferences sponsored by the United Nations.

Marxist Approaches; a.World System Theoryb.Gramscian Theories

Critical International Theory

Post-Modernism

Case Studies from current international

system

o How to analyze? o Level of analysis Problem in IRHistorical BackgroundEmergence of Bath Party in 1963Syria after 2000Implications of Syrian Crisis on

Lebanese politics.

Politics, Power and civil war ...

Ethnic groups Arab 90.3%, Kurds, Armenians, and other

9.7% Religions Sunni Muslim 74%, other Muslim (includes

Alawite, Druze) 16%, Christian (various denominations) 10%, Jewish (tiny communities in Damascus, Al Qamishli, and Aleppo)

In the aftermath of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War:

Led to a change in the political power particularly in Iraq & Syria

In 1970 – Hafız Al-Asad took the control of the political power in Syria

Both Iraq & Syria will then ruled by single party regimes

The Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party (also spelled Ba'th or Baath which means "resurrection" or "renaissance"

It is a secularist political party with strong socialist and Arab nationalist interests, opposed to what it sees as "Western imperialism" and calling for the "renaissance" or "resurrection" of the Arab World and its unity in one united state.

Its main ideas are: "Unity, Liberty, Socialism" (wahda, hurriya, ishtirakiya) — refers to Arab unity, freedom from non-Arab control and interference, and Arab socialism rather than to European socialism, or communism.

The party was founded in Damascus, Syria in 1940 by the Syrian intellectuals Michel Aflaq, and Salah al-Bitar, and since its inception has established branches in different Arab countries, although the only countries it has ever held power in are Syria and Iraq.

In Syria it has had a monopoly on political power since the party's 1963 coup.

Ba'athists also seized power in Iraq in 1963, but were deposed some months later.

They returned to power in a 1968 coup and remained the sole party of government until the 2003 Iraq invasion. Since then they have been banned in Iraq.

1970 Hafız al-Asad became the President of Syrian Republic

1973 New Constitution was adopted

1973 Arab-Israeli War (Egypt & Syria)

1978 – 79 Camp David Accords!Syria was left alone in resisting

againts IsraelSyrian main concern was how to

prevent “Jordan & Lebanon” to recognize Israel

1975 – 1989 Civil War in Lebanon

Origins & Syrian intervention

Ethnic groups Arab 95%, Armenian 4%, other 1%

Religions Muslim 59.7% (Shia, Sunni, Druze,

Isma'ilite, Alawite or Nusayri), Christian 39% (Maronite Catholic, Greek

Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, Syrian Catholic, Armenian Catholic, Syrian Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Assyrian, Copt, Protestant),

other 1.3% *17 religious sects recognized

Lebanon has become an independent country in 1946 like Syria

1932 National Census 1943 National Pact

establishment of a confessional political system based on ethnic & sectarian – religious – affiliations!!

Since 1946 Lebanon has been established on a confessional system where the political power is distributed/ allocated on the basis of population size.

Political Power is vested in the hands of three main branches:

1. President of the Republic will be elected from the Maronite community

2. Prime-minister will be elected from Sunni Community;

3. Speaker of the Parliament: will be elected from Shia community

Origins/ Roots of the Civil War in Lebanon:

1. Change in the demographic structure

2. 1970 – 71 Civil War in Jordan (Black September Episode)

3. Camps of the PLO in Southern Lebanon

Two camps were involved in the Civil War: The Lebanese Front (LF) & Lebanese National Movement (LNM)

Syrian intervention in 1976 Israeli interventon in 1978 Israeli intervention in 1982 (Sabra &

Shatila)

Ta’if Accords 1989 in Saudi Arabia: An Arab League meeting – “Syrian

presence” in Lebanon was sustained with 30,000 troops until the assassination of Refiq Al-Hariri in 2004.

1989 Ta’if AgreementThis agreement actually mentioned

the need for reforms that would promote uniformity and consensus in the fields of education and the media; but it gave no indication of how this could be attained.

73

The Taif Agreement resulted in a greater political representation for the Muslim population, which had become a numerical majority. The Agreement provided for an equal allocation of seats in Parliament for Muslims and Christians (the number of seats was increased from 99 to 128).

In addition, seats were to be divided proportionately between the various denominations and proportionately between the districts.

74

The (Maronite) President ceded powers to the (Sunni) Prime Minister and to the Council of Ministers, while the position of the (Shiite) Speaker gained importance as his term of office was extended to four years.

Positions in the civil service would rely on 'capability and specialization' instead of the 'sectarian representation base' (which meant that jobs would not be allocated to members of a specific denomination).

75

14 February 2005 – Assassination of Refiq al-Hariri, a Sunni, who was the prime-minister of Lebanon in the post-Ta’if era

Hariri took the great support of US and Saudi Arabia during his period of pm

The UN Report on Lebanon: Resolution 1559 – Withdrawal of Syria from Lebanon after 30 years.

After Hariri, Fuad Sinyora, a Suuni, became the new pm in the country until the 2009 parliamentary elections

2006 Lebanese – Israeli War: Hezbollah’s charater of being resistence non-state

actor against Israel has become more apparent in this war

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• Hezbollah, as a Shi’a organization, took the support of General Michel Aoun (a prominent Christian leader in the country who also served as a president during early 1990s).

• The growing opposition led by Hezbollah & Aoun proponents called for “reformation

• Assassination of Pierre Gemayel (Minister of Industry & grandson of Phalangist Pierre Gemayel) in 21 November, 2006 has triggered the tensions in the country.

77

Saad Hariri declared the same day that; “Syria is the guilty party”

Syria on the contrary condemned the assassination

Velid Canbulat (Walid Jamblutt, leader od Druze community) has urged “the necessity of dissasociating Lebanese politics from Syria”!

This statement demonstrates Druze shift as compared to the civil war era

78

• Emile Lahud, president of the country directed the discussions

• “Who wins then? It’s not Syria obviously, Syria’s allies are the losers”. Reference: The Guardian, 23 November 2006...

• Death of Pierre Gemayel has led to the solidification of the 14 March Coalition.

• They protested Michel Aoun, Nebih Berri, and Emile Lahud in the demonstrations & during the funeral of Hariri.

79

• Two main camps in Lebanon today:

“Lebanese Forces” vs “Patriotic Movement”

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Crisis in UkraineArab Uprisings / Spring: Case studiesGlobal Terrorism: Cases from Nigeria

& ISIS/ ISIL

Baylis & Smith, Globalization of World Politics, Oxford University Press, 2013.

Beverly Milton Edwards, Contemporary Politics in the Middle East, Polity Press, 2011.

A.LeRoy BENNETT, International Organizations: Principles and Issues, NJ: Prentice Hall, 6th edition, 2002.

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