Research the theoretical approach to the ‘Balance of Power’ and how it describes the causes of conflict in the international system.

The appeal of different schools of thought in international relations tends to vary with developments in the real world. Perhaps because the 20th Century was one of unprecedented catastrophe, the dominant tra- dition has been what is known colloquially as “power politics.” In academic circles this family of ideas is known as “realism.” The main themes in this school of thought are that in order to survive, states are driven to seek power, that moral or legal principles that may govern relations among citizens within states cannot control the relations among states, and that wars occur because there is no sovereign in the international system to settle disputes peacefully and enforce judgments. States have no one but themselves to rely on for pro- tection, or to obtain what they believe they are entitled to by right.

Thucydides’ Peloponnesian War, the history of the conflict between Ath- ens and Sparta two and a half millennia ago, is the classic statement of these ideas. The selection included here—the Melian Dialogue—is perhaps the most extreme and frank discussion of power politics, unclouded by diplomatic niceties, ever recorded. Taken alone, the dialogue can appear a caricature, so readers are encouraged to read more of the original work which is rich in commentary on various aspects of balance of power politics, strategy, and the role of ideology and domestic conflict in international relations.1

The tradition of realism can be traced in various forms through Machia- velli, Hobbes, the German schools of Realpolitik and Machtpolitik, to E.H. Carr, Reinhold Niebuhr, Hans Morgenthau and others in the mid-twentieth century. The selections from Machiavelli’s The Prince and Hobbes’ Levia- than that follow capsulize their views of the roots of political ruthlessness, the

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3Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1979). See also Waltz, Man, the State, and War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1959).

similarity of diplomacy and political competition to the state of nature, and the need for leaders who seek to secure their regimes to do things in public life that are condemned in traditional codes of morality.

Readers should avoid the popular misinterpretation of these thinkers as amoral. Rather they should be understood as moral relativists, concerned with the need to secure the prerequisite (power) for achievement of anything moral, a need which may require behavior inconsistent with absolute norms or reli- gious ethics. As Machiavelli argues in the excerpt below, a prince must “not deviate from what is good, if possible, but be able to do evil if constrained.”

In the past century, Morgenthau’s Politics Among Nations2 was the most prominent textbook of realism in the United States. Carr’s Twenty Years Crisis, on the other hand, is distinguished by its pungency, which helps to convey the essence of realism in brief selections. Before pigeon-holing Carr as a strident realist, however, note his eloquent discussion of the serious deficien- cies of the theory in the middle of the excerpts that follow.

The most prominent recent writings in the realist school have been dubbed “neo” or “structural” realism to distinguish their more rigorously scientific formulation of the theory. Neorealists focus less on the questions of human motivation or the nature of political regimes than on the security incentives posed by the structure of the international system. The selection below by Kenneth Waltz, the dean of neorealism, is close to a summary of his master- work, Theory of International Politics.3 Mearsheimer’s hyper-realist argument in favor of the Cold War, in Part I above, derives directly from Waltz’ reason- ing about the stability of a bipolar world (discussed in this selection), and the pacifying effect of nuclear weapons (discussed in the selection by Waltz in Section VIII).

The favorable view of bipolarity among neorealists, however, contradicts traditional balance of power theory. In considering whether a world of only two major powers, as opposed to a world of many, should be less likely to lead to war, compare Waltz and Mearsheimer with Thucydides, Blainey, and Gilpin. The competitions between Athens and Sparta or Rome and Carthage, for example, unlike that between the United States and the Soviet Union, ended in disaster. Where Waltz sees bipolarity as imposing clarity and stabil- ity on the competition, others see it as inherently unstable, a delicate balance between contenders ever striving for primacy. Robert Gilpin sees history as a succession of struggles for hegemony between declining and rising powers, with the struggles normally resolved by a major war. Geoffrey Blainey consid- ers a hierarchical system, in which differences in power are clear, as most sta- ble. When there is no doubt about who would prevail if disagreements were to lead to combat, there is little chance that the strong will need to resort to combat or that the weak will dare. Blainey sees a world of rough parity, in

2Hans Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, 5th edition (New York: Knopf, 1973).

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5A further irony would be that if the liberal explanation for Soviet foreign policy at the end of the Cold War is convincing, the results in terms of international politics are still consistent with realism. The Gorbachev revolution contributed to the destruction of the Soviet Union, even if it did not fully cause it. It was not necessarily inevitable that a more ruthless Soviet leadership would have failed to preserve the empire, at least into the twenty-first Century. In Waltz’ terms, the Soviet Union certainly did “fall by the wayside.”

4Kenneth N. Waltz, “Structural Realism After the Cold War,” International Security 25, No. 1 (Summer 2000); William C. Wohlforth, “Realism and the End of the Cold War,” International Security 19, No. 3 (Winter 1994/95); Richard K. Betts, “Not with My Thucydides. You Don’t,” The American Interest 2, No. 4 (March/April 2007).

contrast, as unstable, because it is easier for states to miscalculate the balance of power and their chances of being able to impose their will by either initiat- ing or resisting the use of force. This view is consistent with Gilpin’s, since the challenger in a hegemonic transition is usually one whose power is approach- ing that of the leading state.

How much do the structure of the international balance of power and competition for primacy determine the actions of states? We might ask how one could have predicted the end of the Cold War from realist theories. Was the Soviet Union’s voluntary surrender of control over Eastern Europe in 1989, indeed its entire withdrawal from the power struggle with the West, consistent with such explanations of state behavior? Realists understand that statesmen do not always act in accord with realist norms. But the enormity of the Gorbachev revolution is an uncomfortable exception for the theory to have to bear. Nevertheless, realist scholars offer arguments for why the end of the Cold War should confirm their theories rather than revise them.4

If readers are not fully convinced that realist theories adequately explain the end of the Cold War they might consider another possibility. The greatest irony might be that the end came from the adoption of liberal ideas about in- ternational cooperation by the leadership of the Soviet Union, the superpower that had so tenaciously opposed western liberalism as a model for the world.5 The readings in Part III will present some tenets of the liberal tradition that offer a very different view of the possibilities of peace from the one presented in this section.

—RKB

The Melian Dialogue THUCYDIDES

The Melians are a colony of Lacedaemon [Sparta] that would not submit to the Athenians like the other islanders, and at first remained neutral and took no part in the struggle, but afterwards upon the Athenians using violence and plundering their territory, assumed an attitude of open hostility. Cleomedes, son of Lycomedes, and Tisias, son of Tisimachus, the generals, encamping in their territory with the above armament, before do- ing any harm to their land, sent envoys to negotiate. These the Melians did not bring before the people, but bade them state the object of their mission to the magistrates and the few; upon which the Athenian envoys spoke as follows:—

Athenians: ‘Since the negotiations are not to go on before the people, in order that we may not be able to speak straight on without interruption, and deceive the ears of the multitude by seductive arguments which would pass without refuta- tion (for we know that this is the meaning of our being brought before the few), what if you who sit there were to pursue a method more cautious still! Make no set speech yourselves, but take us up at whatever you do not like, and settle that before going any farther. And first tell us if this proposition of ours suits you.’

The Melian commissioners answered:—

Melians: ‘To the fairness of quietly instructing each other as you propose there is nothing to object; but your military preparations are too far advanced to agree with what you say, as we see you are come to be judges in your own cause, and that all we can reasonably expect from this negotiation is war, if we prove to have right on our side and refuse to submit, and in the contrary case, slavery.’

Athenians: ‘If you have met to reason about presentiments of the future, or for anything else than to consult for the safety of your state upon the facts that you see before you, we will give over; otherwise we will go on.’

Melians: ‘It is natural and excusable for men in our position to turn more ways than one both in thought and utterance. However, the question in this conference is, as you say, the safety of our country; and the discussion, if you please, can proceed in the way which you propose.’

Athenians: ‘For ourselves, we shall not trouble you with specious pretences— either of how we have a right to our empire because we overthrew the Mede, or are now attacking you because of wrong that you have done us—and make a long speech which would not be believed; and in return we hope that you, instead of thinking to influence us by saying that you did not join the Lacedaemonians, although their colonists, or that you have done us no wrong, will aim at what is feasible, holding in view the real sentiments of us both; since you know as well as

Thucydides, The Peloponnesian War, Richard Crawley, trans. (New York: The Modern Library, 1934), Book V.

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we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.’

Melians: ‘As we think, at any rate, it is expedient—we speak as we are obliged, since you enjoin us to let right alone and talk only of interest—that you should not destroy what is our common protection, the privilege of be- ing allowed in danger to invoke what is fair and right, and even to profit by arguments not strictly valid if they can be got to pass current. And you are as much interested in this as any, as your fall would be a signal for the heaviest vengeance and an example for the world to meditate upon.’

Athenians: ‘The end of our empire, if end it should, does not frighten us: a rival empire like Lacedaemon, even if Lacedaemon was our real antagonist, is not so terrible to the vanquished as subjects who by themselves attack and overpower their rulers. This, however, is a risk that we are content to take. We will now proceed to show you that we are come here in the interest of our empire, and that we shall say what we are now going to say, for the preserva- tion of your country; as we would fain exercise that empire over you without trouble, and see you preserved for the good of us both.’

Melians: ‘And how, pray, could it turn out as good for us to serve as for you to rule?’

Athenians: ‘Because you would have the advantage of submitting before suffering the worst, and we should gain by not destroying you.’

Melians: ‘So that you would not consent to our being neutral, friends instead of enemies, but allies of neither side.’

Athenians: ‘No; for your hostility cannot so much hurt us as your friend- ship will be an argument to our subjects of our weakness, and your enmity of our power.’

Melians: ‘Is that your subjects’ idea of equity, to put those who have nothing to do with you in the same category with peoples that are most of them your own colonists, and some conquered rebels?’

Athenians: ‘As far as right goes they think one has as much of it as the other, and that if any maintain their independence it is because they are strong, and that if we do not molest them it is because we are afraid; so that besides extending our empire we should gain in security by your subjection; the fact that you are islanders and weaker than others rendering it all the more important that you should not succeed in baffling the masters of the sea.’

Melians: ‘But do you consider that there is no security in the policy which we indicate? For here again if you debar us from talking about justice and invite us to obey your interest, we also must explain ours, and try to persuade you, if the two happen to coincide. How can you avoid making enemies of all existing neutrals who shall look at our case and conclude from it that one day or another you will attack them? And what is this but to make greater the enemies that you have already, and to force others to become so who would otherwise have never thought of it?’

Athenians: ‘Why, the fact is that continentals generally give us but little alarm; the liberty which they enjoy will long prevent their taking precau- tions against us; it is rather islanders like yourselves, outside our empire, and

THUCYDIDES / The Melian Dialogue 71

s ubjects smarting under the yoke, who would be the most likely to take a rash step and lead themselves and us into obvious danger.’

Melians: ‘Well then, if you risk so much to retain your empire, and your subjects to get rid of it, it were surely great baseness and cowardice in us who are still free not to try everything that can be tried, before submitting to your yoke.’

Athenians: ‘Not if you are well advised, the contest not being an equal one, with honour as the prize and shame as the penalty, but a question of self- preservation and of not resisting those who are far stronger than you are.’

Melians: ‘But we know that the fortune of war is sometimes more impar- tial than the disproportion of numbers might lead one to suppose; to submit is to give ourselves over to despair, while action still preserves for us a hope that we may stand erect.’

Athenians: ‘Hope, danger’s comforter, may be indulged in by those who have abundant resources, if not without loss at all events without ruin; but its nature is to be extravagant, and those who go so far as to put their all upon the venture see it in its true colours only when they are ruined; but so long as the discovery would enable them to guard against it, it is never found want- ing. Let not this be the case with you, who are weak and hang on a single turn of the scale; nor be like the vulgar, who, abandoning such security as human means may still afford, when visible hopes fail them in extremity, turn to in- visible, to prophecies and oracles, and other such inventions that delude men with hopes to their destruction.’

Melians: ‘You may be sure that we are as well aware as you of the diffi- culty of contending against your power and fortune, unless the terms be equal. But we trust that the gods may grant us fortune as good as yours, since we are just men fighting against unjust, and that what we want in power will be made up by the alliance of the Lacedaemonians, who are bound if only for very shame, to come to the aid of their kindred. Our confidence, therefore, after all is not so utterly irrational.’

Athenians: ‘When you speak of the favour of the gods, we may as fairly hope for that as yourselves; neither our pretensions nor our conduct being in any way contrary to what men believe of the gods, or practise among them- selves. Of the gods we believe, and of men we know, that by a necessary law of their nature they rule wherever they can. And it is not as if we were the first to make this law, or to act upon it when made: we found it existing before us, and shall leave it to exist for ever after us; all we do is to make use of it, knowing that you and everybody else, having the same power as we have, would do the same as we do. Thus, as far as the gods are concerned, we have no fear and no reason to fear that we shall be at a disadvantage. But when we come to your notion about the Lacedaemonians, which leads you to believe that shame will make them help you, here we bless your simplicity but do not envy your folly. The Lacedaemonians, when their own interests of their country’s laws are in question, are the worthiest men alive; of their conduct towards others much might be said, but no clearer idea of it could be given than by shortly saying that of all the men we know they are most conspicuous

72 PART II International Realism: Anarchy and Power

in considering what is agreeable honourable, and what is expedient just. Such a way of thinking does not promise much for the safety which you now unrea- sonably count upon.’

Melians: ‘But it is for this very reason that we now trust to their respect for expediency to prevent them from betraying the Melians, their colonists, and thereby losing the confidence of their friends in Hellas and helping their enemies.’

Athenians: ‘Then you do not adopt the view that expediency goes with security, while justice and honour cannot be followed without danger; and danger the Lacedaemonians generally court as little as possible.’

Melians: ‘But we believe that they would be more likely to face even dan- ger for our sake, and with more confidence than for others, as our nearness to Peloponnese makes it easier for them to act, and our common blood insures our fidelity.’

Athenians: ‘Yes, but what an intending ally trusts to, is not the goodwill of those who ask his aid, but a decided superiority of power for action; and the Lacedaemonians look to this even more than others. At least, such is their distrust of their home resources that it is only with numerous allies that they attack a neighbour; now is it likely that while we are masters of the sea they will cross over to an island?’

Melians: ‘But they would have others to send. The Cretan sea is a wide one, and it is more difficult for those who command it to intercept others, than for those who wish to elude them to do so safely. And should the Lace- daemonians miscarry in this, they would fall upon your land, and upon those left of your allies whom Brasidas did not reach; and instead of places which are not yours, you will have to fight for your own country and your own confederacy.’

Athenians: ‘Some diversion of the kind you speak of you may one day experience, only to learn, as others have done, that the Athenians never once yet withdrew from a siege for fear of any. But we are struck by the fact, that after saying you would consult for the safety of your country, in all this dis- cussion you have mentioned nothing which men might trust in and think to be saved by. Your strongest arguments depend upon hope and the future, and your actual resources are too scanty, as compared with those arrayed against you, for you to come out victorious. You will therefore show great blindness of judgment, unless, after allowing us to retire, you can find some counsel more prudent than this. You will surely not be caught by that idea of disgrace, which in dangers that are disgraceful, and at the same time too plain to be mistaken, proves so fatal to mankind; since in too many cases the very men that have their eyes perfectly open to what they are rushing into, let the thing called disgrace, by the mere influence of a seductive name, lead them on to a point at which they become so enslaved by the phrase as in fact to fall wilfully into hopeless disaster, and incur disgrace more disgraceful as the companion of error, than when it comes as the result of misfortune. This, if you are well advised, you will guard against; and you will not think it dishonourable to submit to the greatest city in Hellas, when it makes you

THUCYDIDES / The Melian Dialogue 73

the moderate offer of becoming its tributary ally, without ceasing to enjoy the country that belongs to you; nor when you have the choice given you between war and security, will you be so blinded as to choose the worse. And it is certain that those who do not yield to their equals, who keep terms with their superiors, and are moderate towards their inferiors, on the whole succeed best. Think over the matter, therefore, after our withdrawal, and re- flect once and again that it is for your country that you are consulting, that you have not more than one, and that upon this one deliberation depends its prosperity or ruin.’

The Athenians now withdrew from the conference; and the Melians, left to themselves, came to a decision corresponding with what they had main- tained in the discussion, and answered, ‘Our resolution, Athenians, is the same as it was at first. We will not in a moment deprive of freedom a city that has been inhabited these seven hundred years; but we put our trust in the fortune by which the gods have preserved it until now, and in the help of men, that is, of the Lacedaemonians; and so we will try and save ourselves. Meanwhile we invite you to allow us to be friends to you and foes to neither party, and to retire from our country after making such a treaty as shall seem fit to us both.’

Such was the answer of the Melians. The Athenians now departing from the conference said, ‘Well, you alone, as it seems to us, judging from these res- olutions, regard what is future as more certain than what is before your eyes, and what is out of sight, in your eagerness, as already coming to pass; and as you have staked most on, and trusted most in, the Lacedaemonians, your for- tune, and your hopes, so will you be most completely deceived.’

The Athenian envoys now returned to the army; and the Melians showing no signs of yielding, the generals at once betook themselves to hostilities, and drew a line of circumvallation round the Melians, dividing the work among the different states. Subsequently the Athenians returned with most of their army, leaving behind them a certain number of their own citizens and of the allies to keep guard by land and sea. The force thus left stayed on and besieged the place. . . .

Summer was now over. The next winter the Lacedaemonians intended to invade the Argive territory, but arriving at the frontier found the sac- rifices for crossing unfavourable, and went back again. This intention of theirs gave the Argives suspicions of certain of their fellow-citizens, some of whom they arrested; others, however, escaped them. About the same time the Melians again took another part of the Athenian lines which were but feebly garrisoned. Reinforcements afterwards arriving from Athens in con- sequence, under the command of Philocrates, son of Demeas, the siege was now pressed vigorously; and some treachery taking place inside, the Me- lians surrendered at discretion to the Athenians, who put to death all the grown men whom they took, and sold the women and children for slaves, and subsequently sent out five hundred colonists and inhabited the place themselves.

74 PART II International Realism: Anarchy and Power

Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince, Luigi Ricci and E. R. P. Vincent, trans. (Modern Library, 1950), Chapters 15, 17, 18.

Doing Evil in Order to Do Good NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI

OF THE THINGS FOR WHICH MEN, AND ESPECIALLY PRINCES, ARE PRAISED OR BLAMED It now remains to be seen what are the methods and rules for a prince as regards his subjects and friends. And as I know that many have written of this, I fear that my writing about it may be deemed presumptuous, differing as I do, especially in this matter, from the opinions of others. But my inten- tion being to write something of use to those who understand, it appears to me more proper to go to the real truth of the matter than to its imagination; and many have imagined republics and principalities which have never been seen or known to exist in reality; for how we live is so far removed from how we ought to live, that he who abandons what is done for what ought to be done, will rather learn to bring about his own ruin than his preserva- tion. A man who wishes to make a profession of goodness in everything must necessarily come to grief among so many who are not good. Therefore it is necessary for a prince, who wishes to maintain himself, to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge and not use it, according to the necessity of the case.

Leaving on one side, then, those things which concern only an imaginary prince, and speaking of those that are real, I state that all men, and especially princes, who are placed at a greater height, are reputed for certain qualities which bring them either praise or blame. Thus one is considered liberal, an- other misero or miserly (using a Tuscan term, seeing that avaro with us still means one who is rapaciously acquisitive and misero one who makes grudging use of his own); one a free giver, another rapacious; one cruel, another merci- ful; one a breaker of his word, another trustworthy; one effeminate and pusil- lanimous, another fierce and high-spirited; one humane, another haughty; one lascivious, another chaste; one frank, another astute; one hard, another easy; one serious, another frivolous; one religious, another an unbeliever, and so on. I know that every one will admit that it would be highly praiseworthy in a prince to possess all the above-named qualities that are reputed good, but as they cannot all be possessed or observed, human conditions not permitting of it, it is necessary that he should be prudent enough to avoid the scandal of those vices which would lose him the state, and guard himself if possible against those which will not lose it him, but if not able to, he can indulge them with less scruple. And yet he must not mind incurring the scandal of those

NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI / Doing Evil in Order to Do Good 75

vices, without which it would be difficult to save the state, for if one considers well, it will be found that some things which seem virtues would, if followed, lead to one’s ruin, and some others which appear vices result in one’s greater security and well-being. . . .

OF CRUELTY AND CLEMENCY, AND WHETHER IT IS BETTER TO BE LOVED OR FEARED Proceeding to the other qualities before named, I say that every prince must desire to be considered merciful and not cruel. He must, however, take care not to misuse this mercifulness. Cesare Borgia was considered cruel, but his cruelty had brought order to the Romagna, united it, and reduced it to peace and fealty. If this is considered well, it will be seen that he was really much more merciful than the Florentine people, who, to avoid the name of cruelty, allowed Pistoia to be destroyed. A prince, therefore, must not mind incur- ring the charge of cruelty for the purpose of keeping his subjects united and faithful; for, with a very few examples, he will be more merciful than those who, from excess of tenderness, allow disorders to arise, from whence spring bloodshed and rapine; for these as a rule injure the whole community, while the executions carried out by the prince injure only individuals. And of all princes, it is impossible for a new prince to escape the reputation of cruelty, new states being always full of dangers. Wherefore Virgil through the mouth of Dido says:

Res dura, et regni novitas me talia cogunt Moliri, et late fines custode tueri.

Nevertheless, he must be cautious in believing and acting, and must not be afraid of his own shadow, and must proceed in a temperate manner with prudence and humanity, so that too much confidence does not render him incautious, and too much diffidence does not render him intolerant.

From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved more than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved, if one of the two has to be wanting. For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, a nxious to avoid danger, and covetous of gain; as long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours; they offer you their blood, their goods, their life, and their children, as I have before said, when the necessity is remote; but when it approaches, they revolt. And the prince who has relied solely on their words, without making other preparations, is ruined; for the friendship which is gained by purchase and not through grandeur and nobility of spirit is bought but not secured, and at a pinch is not to be expended in your service. And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared; for love is held by a chain of obligation which,