Understanding International Relations Third Edition Chris Brown with Kirsten Ainley Tai Lieu Chat Luong UNDERSTANDING INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Also by Chris Brown International Relations Theory: New Normative Approaches Political Restructuring in Europe (editor) International Relations in Political Thought (editor with Terry Nardin and N. Rengger) Understanding International Relations Third Edition Chris Brown with Kirsten Ainley © Chris Brown 1997, 2001, 2005 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP.
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First edition 1997 Second edition 2001 Third edition 2005 Published by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world.
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin’s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan® is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries.
ISBN-13: 9781–4039–4663–8 hardback ISBN-10: 1–4039–4663–9 hardback ISBN-13: 9781–4039–4664–5 paperback ISBN-10: 1–4039–4664–7 paperback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Brown, Chris, 1945– Understanding international relations / Chris Brown with Kirsten Ainley – 3rd ed. cm Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1–4039–4663–9 – ISBN 1–4039–4664–7 (pbk.B76 2005 327—dc22 2004066392 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 Printed in China Contents Preface to the Third Edition viii Preface to the Second Edition x Preface to the First Edition xii List of Abbreviations xvi 1 Introduction: Defining International Relations 1 Perspectives and theories 7 Conclusion 15 2 The Development of International Relations Theory in the Twentieth Century 19 Introduction 19 Liberal internationalism and the origins of the discipline 20 The ‘realist’ critique of liberal internationalism 24 The post-war synthesis 28 International Relations and the behavioural sciences 31 Challenges to the realist synthesis 33 Pluralism and complex interdependence 35 3 International Relations Theory Today 40 Introduction: rational choice theory and its critics 40 From realism to neorealism 41 From neorealism to neoliberalism 45 Constructivism and the ‘English School’ 48 Critical, poststructuralist and ‘postmodern’ international thought 52 Conclusion 58 4 The State and Foreign Policy 63 Introduction 63 The state and International Relations 63 Foreign and domestic policy: the ‘decision’ as focus 69 Conclusion: from foreign policy to power 77 5 Power and Security 80 Introduction: statecraft, influence and power 80 Dimensions of power 81 v vi Contents Power, fear and insecurity 91 Conclusion: managing insecurity 94 6 The Balance of Power and War 97 Introduction 97 The balance of power 98 The political conception of war 103 War in the twentieth century 106 Conclusion: the end of state-centric International Relations? 111 7 Global Governance 116 Introduction: sovereignty, anarchy and global governance 116 Functionalism 118 Integration theory, federalism and neofunctionalism 122 Global economic institutions: Bretton Woods and after 125 International regimes and regime theory 129 Global governance and (collective) security 133 8 The Global Economy 141 Introduction 141 The growth of the world economy 142 Problems and perspectives 145 Structuralism 151 The new global economy 156 The end of the South? 159 9 Globalization 164 Introduction 164 A new economy? 165 Neoliberalism and its critics 167 New global problems – ‘Westfailure’? 172 Global civil society? 178 10 The International Politics of Identity 185 Introduction 185 Politics in industrial societies 186 Identity politics post-1989 190 Globalization and postindustrial society 193 Democracy promotion, Asian values and the ‘clash of civilizations’ 197 Pluralism and international society 201 Conclusion 203 Contents vii 11 International Relations and the Individual: Human Rights, Humanitarian Law and Humanitarian War 207 Introduction 207 Universal human rights 208 Rights and international law 213 Humanitarian intervention 221 Conclusion 228 12 US Hegemony and World Order 232 Introduction 232 An American century – again? 232 Ideology and US strategic doctrine 237 The significance of 9/11 240 The United States and Europe: Mars and Venus? 242 America, the war on terror and the non-Western world 245 Empire? 248 World order in the twenty-first century 250 Bibliography 255 Index 286 Preface to the Third Edition The most important change to the third edition of Understanding International Relations is that this is now a collaborative book. Kirsten Ainley wrote Chapter 11, revised Chapters 2–6, carried out bibliographical work for the entire book, and read and commented on every chapter. This collaboration has worked remarkably well; Kirsten has produced an outstanding chapter, and the book as a whole is much improved by her contribution. In short, this is now her book as well as mine, although, since the basic structure and many of its idiosyncrasies are inherited from earlier editions, I remain, in the last resort, solely responsible for its content.
CHRIS BROWN In the Preface to the last edition a fuller account of globalization in future editions was promised and we hope we have delivered on this promise in the third edition. However, the second edition was published in the Spring of 2001, six months before the attacks on America on 9/11; just for once, the cliché is appropriate – things really will never be the same again, and inevitably this third edition reflects the fallout from 9/11 and its causes which, of course, are by no means unconnected to the processes we summarize as globalization. Chapters 1 to 6 – which trace the history of the discourse of International Relations (IR) and its core concepts – remain more or less as in previous editions, with a few additional illustrations and examples, and fully updated guides to further reading. Chapters 7–9, ‘Global Governance’, ‘The Global Economy’ and ‘Globalization’, reorganize material to be found spread over five chapters of the last edition.
Some purely historical material has been eliminated, and there has been some pruning, but this change is largely a matter of reorganization rather than extensive cutting. One substantive change is that there is no longer a chapter devoted to the South. This is a deliberate move as the category of the South no longer makes sense in terms of either the world economy or of world political, social or cultural factors. However, it must be stressed that this does not mean that issues of global inequality are neglected, that the problems of poorer countries are sidelined, or that theories of international relations that address these problems are marginalized.
On the contrary, such issues crop up continually through the second half of the book, and actually are given more attention precisely because they are not ghettoized into a separate chapter. Chapters 10–12 are substantially new, although they contain some mate- rial that appeared in the first and second editions. Chapter 10 examines the viii Preface to the Third Edition ix new international politics of identity, the revival of religion as a factor in IR, and the post-1989 revival of nationalism. Chapter 11 focuses on the rise of the individual as an international actor, the politics of human rights, recent developments in international criminal law, and the notion of humanitarian intervention.
Chapter 12 addresses the issue of American hegemony. As will be apparent, these three chapters are all, in very different ways, about both globalization and 9/11. We would like to thank Michael Ainley, Michael Cox, Kimberly Hutchings and Nathalie Wlodarczyk for their comments on particular chapters, our publisher, Steven Kennedy and an anonymous reviewer for Palgrave Macmillan for his/her enthusiasm for the text. CHRIS BROWN London, 2004 KIRSTEN AINLEY Preface to the Second Edition For this second edition of Understanding International Relations I have preserved the basic order of presentation and structure of the book – although I have eliminated the rather unnecessary division into ‘Parts’.
All chapters have been revised and updated, and some more substantial changes have been made. The two chapters on general theory (2 and 3) have been reorganized and, in the case of 3, substantially rewritten; Chapter 2 is now a short history of international relations theory in the twentieth century, while Chapter 3 provides an overview of contemporary theory, giving due weight to ‘constructivism’ and other post-positivist movements. Chapter 9 has been substantially recast to acknowledge the importance of Gramscian international political economy. The biggest changes come in the final two chapters, for two reasons.
The first edition of this book was written in the mid-1990s, and was still influ- enced by a ‘post-Cold War’ mindset. This must now be abandoned; teachers of IR may still do a double-take when they see ‘St Petersburg’ on the Departures Board at Heathrow, but for our students the Cold War really is history. We need to stop thinking about the future of world politics in terms drawn from the ideological and strategic conflicts of the second half of the twentieth century. The second major change concerns the ‘G’ word – globalization.
The first edition of Understanding International Relations treated the notion in passing and with scant respect; this was a mistake. It is important not to accept the more extreme claims made on behalf of globalization, but it requires a particular insensitivity to the way of the world to deny that there are changes going on in the world economy and in global society of such magnitude that we are required to rethink most of the categories with which we have been wont to interpret international relations. The final two chapters now reflect these two re-orientations – perhaps insufficiently, but a fuller account of the impact of globalization will have to wait for the third edition, if such there be. I am grateful to all those who have suggested ways in which the first edition could be improved, and to the many scholars who pointed out errors therein – there were so many of the latter that I am inclined to think that any errors that remain are their fault.
Steven Kennedy has been, as always, an exemplary and enthusiastic publisher. Tim Dunne has commented help- fully on early drafts of several chapters. Since writing the first edition, I have moved from the University of Southampton to the London School of Economics. Once again I have had the pleasure of teaching an introductory x Preface to the Second Edition xi International Relations course, this time to what must be one of the keenest and best-prepared group of students in the country; my thanks to them, and I add IR100 (LSE) to the list of courses acknowledged in the Preface to the first edition.
London, 2000 CHRIS BROWN Preface to the First Edition This is a textbook, an introduction to the discipline of International Relations. The aim is to present within a relatively small compass an overview of the current state of International Relations theory. This book could be used as a text for undergraduate-level introductory courses, but it could also serve as a general introduction to theory for the increasing number of postgraduate students of the subject. It is sometimes assumed that postgraduates need a different literature from undergraduates; this seems to me not to be the case – good students at all levels need to have their minds engaged and stim- ulated, and this book is written on the assumption that all of its readers will have enquiring minds and be willing to put in the effort required to understand ideas that are sometimes quite complex.