Approaches to the Study of International Politics

After the armies of Imperial Germany invaded Belgium in August 1914, launch­ing one of the most destructive and futile conflicts in history, Prince von Biilow asked the German chancellor why all the diplomatic steps taken to avoid the war had failed. "At last I [Biilow] said to him: 'Well, tell me, at least, how it all happened.' He raised his long, thin arms to heaven and answered in a dull exhausted voice: 'Oh—If I only knew.' 'ⁿ If the German chancellor did not understand all the reasons that had led to war, he and his policy-making col­leagues knew quite well that many of their decisions were likely to end in catastro­phe for both Germany and Europe. He also knew that Germany had only a slight chance of emerging victorious. Since a rational function of war is presum­ably to achieve a political goal at tolerable costs through the application of force, German policy makers in the summer of 1914 were not behaving rationally. Was such behavior unique? More than half a century later, Prime Minister Ian D. Smith of the self-governing colony of Rhodesia defied the British government, the United Nations, and most of the states of Africa by unilaterally declaring the independence of the colony. Smith and his advisers expected that the British government could not immediately prevent steps toward establishing full Rho-desian independence, yet they also knew that the declaration of independence would cause grave economic damage to the country, possible war with other

¹ Prince Bernhard von Biilow,Memoirs of Pnnce von Bulow (Boston: Little, Brown, 1932), Vol. 3, p. 166.

4 Approaches to the Study of International Politics

African states, or civil war between 6 million black Rhodesians and 200,000 white settlers. The British prime minister, Harold Wilson, had attempted to forestall the unilateral declaration by threats and promises conveyed through last-minute conferences and telephone calls with Smith. The last call was placed at six o'clock on a Thursday morning in a desperate bid to head off the illegal declaration. Reporting to the House of Commons on that conversation, Wilson recalled that he had "ended the conversation with a heavy heart, feeling that reason had fled the scene and that emotions, unreasoning . . . emotions at that, had taken command [of Prime Minister Smith] regardless of the conse­quences for Rhodesia, for Africa and for the world."²

Taking a longer-range perspective, other historical parallels that tran­scend time, place, and personalities can be noted. In the eighth century B.C., the princes of newly formed states in China successfully challenged the power and authority of the Chinese emperor, thereby putting an end to the Chinese feudal order. Similarly, in 1648, European diplomats and princes congregated in Westphalia to sign a peace treaty ending the Thirty Years' War. They also declared that henceforth the leader of the Holy Roman Empire could no longer extend its dominion into the territories of princes and sovereigns and that the latter were in no way obliged to respond to the directives of the emperor. This act symbolized the emergence of the modern European nation-state system, replacing the feudal political order that, as in China, had at least theoretically placed an emperor as head, with power radiating down through such lesser political entities as free cities, duchies, and developing dynastic territories.

Every historical occurrence is, of course, unique; the situations in which statesmen construct alliances, decide to go to war, declare independence, or make peace are all different. Yet, when historical phenomena are analyzed from a certain level of abstraction—not just as facts for their own sake—these situations have many common properties. The events the student of international politics attempts to understand may be unique, but, as the cases cited above suggest, they are also comparable. Smith and the German chancellor had to make many of the same kinds of calculations before acting, and both acted knowing that their decisions could easily lead to disaster. Both the Chinese princes and the European sovereigns 2,000 years later were determined to put an end to political orders in which emperors could intervene in subordinates' affairs and territories. Regardless of historical and geographical context, policy makers for different types of political units, whether tribes, city-states, empires, or modern nation-states, have attempted to achieve objectives or defend their interests by funda­mentally similar techniques, of which the use of force and the construction of alliances are only the most obvious examples.

If Thucydides, Frederick the Great, or Louis XIV were to return to life in the latter part of the twentieth century, they would no doubt be astounded by the immense changes in technology, culture, and the lives of average citizens.

² New York Times, November 11, 1965, p. 1.

Approaches to the Study of International Politics

They would not be familiar with such international institutions as the United Nations, the International Court of Justice, or multinational corporations; nor would they understand immediately the rationale behind foreign aid programs or comprehend the destructive capacity of nuclear weapons. But they would recognize the types of threats and rewards modern governments make in attempt­ing to achieve their objectives, the techniques of diplomatic bargaining, and the concern governments have for their international prestige. Certainly they would find little new in the attempts of states to conclude mutually satisfying military alliances or to remain uninvolved in the quarrels of the great powers.

The study of international politics, while it must account for the unique, new, and nonrecurring phenomenon, is also concerned with processes and pat­terns of behavior found typically in many historical contexts. All attempts to understand the disparate aspects of political life at the international level implic­itly assume some regularities of behavior. The diplomatic historian tends to emphasize the uniqueness of the events he or she is describing and explaining, but when employing such concepts as the "balance of power" or "diplomacy," he or she is referring to classes or types of political behavior that transcend specific historical circumstances. Still, the historian concentrates mainly on single events and occurrences that are related to specific times, places, and personali­ties.

It is a bias of social scientists to assume the existence of regular patterns of behavior, to explain these in terms of specified variables,³ and to use historical data primarily to elucidate or illustrate the generalizations they are attempting to make. Students of international politics try to understand and explain the causes and nature of war, imperialism, escalation, crisis, or alliance without having to describe every war, imperialist, escalation, crisis, or alliance in history. A valid generalization is one that can be used to describe all events of a given class. Any general statement about these phenomena must be based, of course, on accurate historical observation; but the social scientist is still concerned pri-

³ A variable can be defined as any phenomenon or condition, a change in which produces a change in another phenomenon or condition. In the physical realm, for example, variations in temperature cause changes in the properties of water. We know from observation that when the temperature goes below a certain point, all other conditions being held constant, water freezes. There is an obvious functional relationship between the two variables, temperature and the state of the water. In the social sciences, relationships between variables may be much more difficult to identify and measure because (1) many variables inducing change may be involved simultaneously, and (2) it may be impossible to hold all other conditions constant while observation or experimenta­tion is taking place. For example, we may wish to examine the conditions associated with outbreak of war. We could see if there is some type of relationship between the incidence of war and spending on armaments. If through a perusal of historical data we found a high correlation between variations in expenditures on armaments (independent variable) and incidence of war (dependent variable), we could say that the two variables are somehow associated. It would still remain for us to define the exact nature of the relationship and investigate other types of variables, such as perceptions of threat or degree of commitment to objectives, that may be involved in the outbreak of war. We can say with confidence that a lowering of temperature causes a change in the state of water, but we could not claim with certainty that rising armaments budgets cause wars, since so many other factors may be involved.

6 Approaches to the Study of International Politics

marily with classes or types of phenomena rather than with the particular details of each illustration. He or she is interested in the German chancellor in 1914 or Prime Minister Smith of Rhodesia as examples of the behavior of important policy makers facing situations of great stress, threat, and consequences; the historian is interested in them as individuals.

THE DEVELOPMENT

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