Neorealist arguments get misrepresented much more frequently than any other theories’ arguments, and neorealism regularly gets attacked on unfair grounds. In any good scientific environment critique is seen as something positive. But misrepresenting arguments is different: It is morally reprehensible and obstructive to scientific progress. I’d like to point out two examples.

In his famous and often cited article Anarchy is What States Make of It, Alexander Wendt claims that neorealism was incomplete: “Waltz’s three-part definition of structure (…) seems underspecified. In order to go from structure to action, we need to add a forth: the intersubjectively constituted structure of identities and interests in the system” (Wendt 1992: 401). Wendt argues that self-help and power politics do not follow logically or causally from anarchy (Wendt 1992: 394), and that foreign policy identities are  endogenously to the state system, contrary to what neorealism claims: “Waltz seems to think [that foreign interests are exogenously given] and proposes two mechanisms, competition and socialisation, by which structure conditions state action. The content about his conditioning, however, presupposes a self-help system that is not itself a constitutive feature of anarchy” (Wendt 1992: 402-403).

To be clear: I admire Wendt’s work, and think he did an amazing job in bringing IR theory forward. But the statement that neorealism is underspecified is not more than a misrepresentation of neorealism – and I can not imagine that Wendt was not aware of that. Neorealism claims that because intentions are unclear and subject to change, foreign policy can not be based on them. Instead, regardless of a states intentions, it’s material capabilities are a good measure of how dangerous it is or may be in the future. Neorealism’s emphasis of material capabilities thus does not derive from the neglect of intentions, but from the emphasis of uncertainty about the present and future intentions of other states. It is this uncertainty that makes the levels and trends in relative power such a fundamental causal variable (Copeland 2000: 188). Relative power considerations, in turn, lead to power politics. Ironically, it is the very possibility that foreign policies change, as emphasised by Wendt, that pressures responsible leaders to focus on relative capabilities and engage in the great power game.

If we agree with neorealism or not is one question, but to give it a fair treatment when criticising it is another. Neorealism is not underspecified just because Wendt does not agree with its conclusions. This is the most serious misrepresentation of realist arguments known to me.

Robert O. Keohane is another example of a scholar that attacks neorealism with unfair means. Although he does not misrepresent neorealism in a narrow sense, he attacks it on unfair grounds. Keohane consistently claims that he bases his theory on neorealism and is simply advancing it. In 1995, he emphasises this nicely: “By seeking to specify the conditions under which institutions can have an impact and cooperation can occur, institutionalist theory shows under what conditions realist propositions are valid. It is in this sense that institutionalist claims subsume realism” (Keohane 1995: 42; see also Keohane 1984: 29). But at the very beginning of his well-known and even-better-received After Hegemony, Keohane writes: “This book is about how cooperation has been, and can be, organised in the world of political economy when common interests exist. (…) The theory that I develop takes the existence of mutual interests as given. (…) Because I begin with acknowledged common interests, my study focuses on relations among the advanced market-economy countries (…)” (Keohane 1984: 6).  This reveals a major flaw in Keohane’s reasoning: Neorealism is not about political economy, but about international security. It is interested in peace and war in international history. Because it focuses on international security, neorealism claims that states seek relative gains, not absolute gains: “A state worries about a division of possible gains that may favour others more than itself” (Waltz 1979: 106; there is also a vast literature on absolute and relative gains). So Keohane makes a very nice argument about international cooperation – but sells it as a challenge to neorealism it isn’t. Keohane does not even base his theory on the same assumptions. In fact, neorealism does not differ in its analysis of international cooperation in the case that absolute gains (would) exist. Neoliberal institutionalism is no alternative to neorealism, but has been swallowed up by it (Mearsheimer 1995: 85).

How can we explain that neorealism gets such an unfair treatment? (Neo-)realism still is the dominant theory of international relations. Although this is not at all true for Europe (Mearsheimer 2005), it is for the United States. Additionally, there is a liberal and constructivist trend in the IR literature. Liberals started neglecting realism’s relevance after the end of the Cold War. At around the same time, constructivism gained in importance. Thus, in combination, there simply are a whole lot of scholars writing against realism – and some of them seem to do it for the sake of it, attacking a realism that doesn’t even exist. Pragmatic arguments seem not to sell very good, so scholars feel driven to blow their arguments up. Instead of selling them for what they are, they create artificial theoretical stand-offs to make themselves heard.

To any serious student of international politics it should be clear that although there is a lot of change in the international system, there is some continuity, as well: states are not as important as some decades ago – but still the most important actors in international politics. Security is not as scarce as before – but still scarce and subject to relative power considerations and change. And so on. Sure, theoretical debates have to be abstract and very specific, so we will always have to distinguish one theory from another, thereby emphasising the differences between them. But we should not become obsessed with that. What we need is a more pragmatic scholarship that is not just focused on theoretical details, but tries to explain the real world.

Literature

–
- Copeland, Dale C. 2000. “The Constructivist Challenge to Structural Realism: A Review Essay.” International Security 25(2): 187-212.
- Keohane , Robert O. 1984. After Hegemony. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
- Keohane, Robert O. and Lisa L. Martin. 1995. “The Promise of Institutionalist Theory.” International Security 20(1): 39-51.
- Mearsheimer, John J. 1995. “A Realist Reply.” International Security 20(1): 82-93.
- Mearsheimer, John J. 2005. “E.H. Carr vs. Idealism: The Battle Rages On.” International Relations 19(2): 39-52.
- Wendt, Alexander. 1992. “Anarchy is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of Power Politics.” International Organization 46(2): 391-425.

(Originally published on September 3, 2009)

From the Middle Ages on, the European state system was driven by two developments, namely the external and internal consolidation of the states as we know them today.

The external, territorial shape of states came into being as some rulers started to eliminate their rivals and established their sovereignty over an increasing territory. Simply spoken, they conquered who they could and stopped when they met an equal. Ultimately, the European state system took the shape it still more or less has today.

Internally, rulers incrementally deepened the way they administered the territory they ruled. They started as regional war lords, giving no respect to local people. Later, more and more societal groups became involved in national politics, and the state offered ever more services to its people. Finally, the people themselves were the rulers, being democratically elected politicians.

Rulers were incentivised to expand their power by the competitive character of the international system. To guarantee their survival, they expanded and consolidated their rule. Because no-one protects them, they acquired an ever increasing amount of power, until the European state system stabilised in the form it pretty much still has today.

The fundamental driving force behind the development of the states has to be seen in new technologies of warfare. When knights ruled the battlefields, many individuals could allow to hire some of them – out came the fragmented world of the Middle Ages. With pikes and bows, more men were needed, and less rulers could afford to success in the struggle. A first round of competitors, so to speak, was eliminated. After the invention of fire-weapons, only the rulers of national societies could mobilize enough fighters. Ultimately, the totalitarian wars of the Twenty-first century could only be fought by totalitarian societies.

To mobilise ever more troops, upcoming nationalist trends were instrumentalised and states became nations. To gratify the increasing masses on duty, rulers were forced to bargain with them. The result were social security systems, the inclusions of societal groups in domestic politics, and ultimately universal suffrage.

In sum, looking to protect themselves and to consolidate their power, rulers unintentionally created the state system as we know it. They established how states are organized internally, how they interact, and how they understand international security.

Thus, however directly or indirectly, technology is the fundamental explanatory variable behind our state system and its interaction. The organizational structure of Europe, and ultimately the world, can be attributed to developments in weapon systems. Sure this argument is strongly simplified, but it is not without merits.

That said, it becomes clear that much thought and consideration should be given not just to how technology changes battle fields, but how it changes politics, too. The increasing precision of today’s weapons, the fact that ever less human are needed in future battles – how will these aspects change the way the international political arena will be organized? Will non-state actors be empowered? Will technology free human resources to both fight and prosper? Will it increase the gap between the high-tech haves and the have-nots?

Much of the discussion about the changing nature of international politics is rooted in lofty, philosophical thinking that has few appeal to many of us. The understanding of technology as a main driving force behind the political organization of mankind should give incentives to a fresh group of people to think about these topics. What is needed is knowledge of both technological advancements and historical facts. What is possible is nothing less than to gain a glimpse into our future.

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I would like to highlight the discrepancy between abstract and specific theorizing on the example of the literature on transnational policy diffusion by dividing the literature in two groups

1. The first group of scholars of transnational diffusion are mostly interested in some of the very fundamental questions of international relations, such as the consequences of anarchy and competition, the prospects of war and peace, and the development of the state system. Accordingly they have studied military doctrines (Posen 1984), the structure of armies (Resende-Santos 2007) and the copying of successful foreign policy strategies by other states (“emulation”, Waltz 1979, Resende-Santos 2007). Many researchers on state development in Europe make very general claims about the diffusion of certain fundamental aspects of state organization, which they attribute to systemic aspects (Gourevitch 1978, Tilly 1992). All researchers in this first group heavily rely on qualitative data analysis.
2. The second group of scholars moved away from these general questions because they felt that they could only come to valid results if they researched the topic quantitatively. To be able do so they narrowed their field of interest. They have thereby generated both relevant empirical insights as well as new and advanced quantitative analysis instruments, but their findings remain limited.

While all of the mentioned researchers study the diffusion of policies, they do so on very different levels of generalization using very different methodological approaches. This pattern fits well with the general picture of political science. While some scholars are interested in big questions, others are interested in significant results. The saying goes that some study big questions with little results, while other study small questions with much sophisitcation. While some think that the former is no science, others argue that the latter follows the cult of the irrelevant.

Some topics reveal unique opportunities to study fundamental questions of IR with valid data, and I would like to point out one of them: the study of differentiated integration in the European Union. Differentiated integration is defined as the differential validity of EU legal rules across states, thus it is about the different degree to which states are integrated in the European Union. On the one hand, the study of European cooperation goes down to very fundamental aspects of the main theories of international relations. Why do states cooperate? How is their cooperation constituted, why, and how is it changing? Such questions are at the very heart of the study of IR. On the other hand, thanks to the highly legalised character of European integration, data on differentiated integration is vast. It allows to come to convincing conclusions about reasons, timing and development of relevant development in the European Union. Taken together, the topic allows us to ask big questions and achieve significant results.

International relations has long left the most fundamenal questions of the interaction of states to the field of security studies, while it advanced its working procedures in other fields. This has let us, ultimately, with both approaches producing few interesting insights. While the field of security studies has mainly looked at always the same questions, more specific approaches have let us with little to learn. It is time that some researchers try to go back to some of the more fundamental questions of their research areas while relying on sophisticated methods and data. The trick, thereby, is less to do the research itself than finding an interesting field of study that allows to do so. The study of differentiated integration in the European Union is a such.

Ever since 9/11, terrorism receives much attention in both the scholarly literature and the public discourse. I argue that terrorism will be of much less interest in due time. The big threats in international politics still stem from interstate war and conflict, and recently the international security environment has been heating up considerably.

Terrorism is something of a buzz word since 9/11. The public has flocked to the topic just as scholars have. The literature about terrorism is inflationary. But terrorism is as old as mankind. Terrorism can loosely be defined as a strategy of an organized group that tries to achieve a certain political objective through violent and – much more importantly! – terrifying means. Such strategies have been employed ever since. One of the more famous and “recent” examples is given by Gavrilo Princip, the Bosnian-Serb student and member of Young Bosnia, who assassinated Franz Ferdinand of Austria. Young Bosnia is a group that could today easily be defined as a terrorist group. Neither is terrorism the biggest threat to security these days. Terrorism is best at what it received its name for: terrorizing. Not killing. Sure, terrorism is more lethal than before. Globalization and technological innovation allow terrorists to conduct world-wide attacks of high destructive power. But still: comparably few people die from terrorism.

In history, interstate wars posed the biggest security threats, and they do so these days. Major interstate wars are absent at the moment, but the question is why. Some scholars argue that economic interdependence, international institutions, the spread of democracies and liberal values – or all these facts combined – explain the absence of major wars. Other scholars argue that it is the supremacy of the United States that explains it. I agree with the latter explanation. World War II and the Cold War left the United States as the only superpower. No-one could challenge the U.S., and it in turn could act as globocop.

Interstate conflicts are “the next big thing”. The US’ position is weakening, as other powers are rising. (Very) slowly, the world is turning multipolar – again. This means no good. History and theory teach that multipolar systems are competitive and conflict prone. Already, world wide security competition is heating up. Security is a zero-sum game. Interstate war is back on the map of all major states. Just have a look at the military expenditures and military build-ups world wide. China and India have plans to build strong, power-projection capable Navies. Japan reengages in its “defense forces”. Brazil modernizes its armed forces to catch up with its great power aspirations. Europe is developing a strong and independent security pillar. These are no signs of the perpetuality of interstate peace.

In short, terrorists gained in professionalism and destructive power, but the reason they receive so much attention to find mainly in the fact that interstate relations stayed low-profile in recent years. When struggling with major interstate wars, terrorism just won’t seem that important anymore.

Consolidation
China is often seen as a benevolent and charming nation, and the official credo in Chinese foreign policy circles is exactly that: Remain calm and benevolent, do not threaten anyone, consolidate your position. For the optimists, China’s integration in the global markets, its economic and cultural importance, its cooperation in international institutions and very generally the strong influence of international law on international politics mirror a new era in which politics is different from the past. The security dilemma no longer exists, wars are obsolete. The rise of China means more wealth for its citizens and will finally bring democracy along. Ultimately, the whole world profits from a more stable and prosperous China.

Escalation
More recently, and contradicting the above view, the “china threat” view is gaining immense support. After China coerced Japan into freeing the captain of a fishing boat, newspapers and the public seem to partially opinion.  Thus by today, many are focusing on China being or becoming a security problem. These claims are substantiated by the fact that China is building capabilities that justify serious doubts regarding China’s self-alleged peaceful rise. Consider the development of Anti Ship Ballistic Missiles, advanced submarine capabilities, and plans to build an aircraft carrier. Given these developments, other states react to China. Japan is redefining its security strategy, South Korea is cooperating heavily with the United States, and so are the Southeast Asian nations. East Asia in general is building up its military forces as has been rarely seen before. And, of course, we all know that the United States is not so happy about China becoming more and more powerful.

This very incomplete picture suffices to show the seriousness and alarmedness of those interested in the topic – or shaping it. By today, many think that a point of no return has been reached. China has engaged in the build-up of weapon systems and acted diplomatically in a way that has shattered hopes in the region that it may remain benevolent. The United States have identified China as the most important competitor in a way that does not allow them to shy away anymore. In the long term, we might not be able to avoid the looming catastrophe. The situation is escalating, step after step, and ultimately leads into war. This is the pessimists opinion on the rise of China.

Stagnation
Both of the above scenarios are dependent on the notion that China grows as it has so far. This is not written in stone, however. While China’s economy is growing at yearly double-digits since three decades by now, it is not said that it will be able to do so another three decades. In fact, many writers expect serious challenges soon. Some speak of a serious housing bubble, others point to the growing inequalities in China, still others to deep structural problems in its economy. Also, China’s society is deeply divided. Not just do those hundreds of millions of peasants and construction workers hardly earn a living, but China’s land borders are potentially conflictive, and its minorities hostile.

Conclusion
The consequences of the rise of China are first and foremost dependent on how this rise further develops. Then, situational dynamics also play an important role. As usual, international politics is too complicated to give some easy message. Usually, I would tend to the prediction that China’s rise will be relatively stable; this keeps in line with my theoretical thinking that international politics is always potentially conflictive, but that it usually works. Then again, observing the recent escalations in the relationship between China and Japan, I tend to think that this will get out of hands. Lastly, I am also less and less convinced of China’s stability. I guess it is wait and see. For me, however, the pessimists have the better arguments.

(This article was first published on offiziere.ch)

Tensions in East Asia are rising, and increasingly so. Unfortunately, the topic does not get enough attention in Europe.

War-making and state-making are closely connected. According to one of the most convincing theories in the field, war-making has shaped European states’ domestic structure and therewith defined the current state system: Since the middle ages, leaders had to centralize their state apparatus, expand their scope and extract ever more resources from their people, thereby consolidating both their external shape and their internal institutions. In the course of doing so, they increasingly had to cope with the demands of their populations, thus developing things like social security systems and, ultimately, representative institutions. The main motor of this development was competition in the international system, stemming from anarchy (Tilly 1992).

The most important reason why states had incentives to increase their size and centralize their domestic control lies in developments in warfare. First the pikes and bows meant the end of the Knight, thus making the King more reliable on its population for military duty. Then fire-weapons and artilleries gave advantage to the ruler with simply the bigger army, thus giving incentives to rulers to expand and consolidate their state apparatus. Ultimately, the total, industrialised war could only be fought by totalitarian societies.

War is thus closely linked to the development of the European states and the European state system; ultimately, indeed, this applies globally. Today, unfortunately, this topic is more or less neglected and mostly treated by scholars outside the field of International Relations. And it is the field of security studies that advances almost no interesting thoughts on the area. Given the understanding brought forward above, this is remarkable. In the words of John Ruggie (1993: 143):

No epochal thoughts [have] been expressed by any serious specialist [in security studies on sovereignty and modernity], (…) despite the fact that changes in military technology and in the relations of force are widely acknowledged to have been driving factors of political transformation throughout human history.

I heartfully agree with this quote. The opinion that the study of international security is not dependent on knowledge from outside this area is nonsense. International security as it is relevant today is an aspect of the fundamental internal and external organization of political units – thus, it is subject to this organization. As the modes of political interaction and warfare change, so will the field of international security. I think there is much room for creative minds to work on this topic – notably while remaining in a realist or materialist framework.

Literature
–
- Ruggie, John G. 1993. “Territorality and Beyond: Problematizing Modernity in International Relations”, International Organization 47(1): 139-174.
- Tilly, Charles. 1992. Coercion, Capital, and European States AD 990-1992. Cambridge: Blackwell.

Southeast Asia is of vital importance for the future of international politics. In light of the rise of China, the South China Sea holds the most important lines of communication and transportation in the world. These lines can easily be controlled from the numerous little islands in the region. Whoever controls these little pieces of earth is in a powerful position.

Sea Lanes

As all strategically important regions do, the South China Sea attracts some disputes. China claims that both the Spratly and the Paracel Islands belong to its territory. Numerous regional states such as Vietnam, the Philippines, or Malaysia negate that proposition. And of course the United States also have a vital strategic interest in the region.

At the beginning of this century, the regional minor powers reacted to their situation by showing a slight tendency to align with China. This has been the case mostly because China advertised benevolent intentions ( the so called “charm offensive”) and because its military forces stayed relatively weak and defensive in nature. More recently, this has changed. China has acquired substantial offensive capabilities and even considers to construct its first aircraft carrier. It has modernized its forces and acted aggressively in the South China Sea. All these developments culminated in 2008, when satellite imagery revealed that China secretly prepared vast amounts of naval capabilities on the Hainan Island. Many have observed that the Hainan Island discovery has changed the regional distribution of threat. China’s intentions were increasingly questioned and its capabilities seen as more aggressive.

The Spratly Islands and the Paracel Islands

While rising China started to frighten its neighbours, it also led to a renewed interest in the United States. Indeed, one of the most significant achievements of the Obama administration is the re-evaluation of its relations with Southeast Asia. This becomes clear from developments such as high-level meetings and the early appointment of representatives for the region. As a result, by today, Southeast Asian nations tend to balance the power of China by aligning with the United States. And the US is heating the dispute up.

Hillary Clinton is cited as follows from the recent ASEAN regional security meeting in Vietnam: “The United States has a national interest in freedom of navigation, open access to Asia’s maritime commons and respect for international law in the South China Sea”. This directly contradicts China’s territorial claims and thus clearly has to be understood in that respect. The fact that the statement has been made in the context of ASEAN also is telling by itself. In fact it means: We are ready to engage in the region if China tries to occupy it, and we are clearly on the side of ASEAN. The United States is even more directly threatening China right now. While mostly overseen in Europe, the ongoing US-South Korean military exercise is clearly understood as a challenge to China’s hegemony in the South China Sea in Asia.

(Originally published on March 31, 2010)

The democratic peace theory states that democracies do not fight each other. They may fight non-democracies, but not each other. The proponents of the DPT think that history tells us that this is true. In only very few cases have democracies threatened force to each other, and in only a couple – some say in none – have they fought a war. There are four main explanations for the democratic peace. First, some scholars claim that democracies inherit norms of peaceful conflict resolution that they also display in their external relations. Second, it might be that democratic institutions such as competitive elections and powerful legislatures prohibit executives from going to war. Third, some argue that democracies trade heavily with each other and that thus war would be only costs, but no gains. Fourth, one may argue that democracies are mostly liberal societies, and that liberalism produces all of the above effects (see Gowa 1999 for a review of these arguments).

Now, no theory is without its critics:

• A first group of critics claims that the DPT is dependent on definitions and that students of the democratic peace adjust definitions of war and democracy to produce the desired results. Two examples: First, the Spanish-American War in 1898 might be an instance of a war between two democracies. Now some scholars claim that Spain was a democracy, others that it was not. Depending on the definition used, both groups offer convincing arguments. Second, some authors claim that the American Civil War 1861-1865 was an internal dispute and that it thus can not be taken in account with regard to the DPT; the DPT only speaks about interstate wars. But if democracy has any causal effect, shouldn’t it have worked also in that dispute? Does it make a difference if a case does fit into some definition of “interstate war” – or should we simply have a look at its explanatory value? Other cases of interest are Finland during the Second World War, the Franco-Prussian War 1870 and the question if Wilhelmine Germany was a democracy or not. These definitional issues have profound consequences for the value of the democratic peace theory and therefore substantially challenge it.
• A second group of critics claims that the democratic peace is statistically insignificant. What are the odds anyway that two states fight each other? Wars are rare and the exception in any case. If we want to examine the DPT, so their argument goes, it is more fruitful to look at instances where two democracies had a crisis but did not go to war. It is in these instance that we should find the causalities brought forward by the DPT. Christopher Layne has found out that those crises between democracies that did not turn into war have been resolved peacefully because of other variables than those expected by the DPT. In the Fashoda-Crisis in 1898, for instance, France and Great Britain did not go to war because Great Britain’s forces simply were overwhelming.
• The theoretically most relevant critique of the DPT comes from structural realists. Waltz, most prominently, claims that the causes of war are found in both the structure and the internal organisation of states, but that the former are more important than the latter. In this reasoning, the democratic peace theory can be nothing but wrong – or, if the democratic peace theory is right, structural realism is wrong.

This leaves us with an additional, interesting insight surrounding the topic. In my personal reading I discovered that the literature on the development of the european state system is impressively insightful with regard to the DPT. Many authors on the european state system attribute the internal organisation of states to structural aspects. Relying on this literature, Layne notes that democracies have been established where the systemic level of threat was low and that thus both democracy and peace would be caused by structure. Similarly, Huntley thinks that the democratic peace has structural roots. In general, thus, this literature asks if there might be a common cause of democracy and peace. Such thoughts might be heavily expandable. I think it is here that we should proceed our analysis.

–
Literature
- Gowa, Joanne. 1999. Ballots and Bullets: The Elusive Democratic Peace. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
- Huntley, Wade L. 1996. “Kant’s Third Image: Systemic Sources of the Liberal Peace”, International Studies Quarterly 40.
- Layne, Christopher. 1994. “Kant or Cant: The Myth of the Democratic Peace”, International Security 19(2).
- Waltz, Kenneth N. 2000. “Structural Realism After the End of the Cold War”, International Security 25(1).

That international politics works well becomes clear from everyday’s news. Wars are rare, conflicts the exception, crises outstanding events. The bad news transported in the media represents only a small percentage of all good and positive developments all around the world at any single moment. In general, the development of humanity is a unique success story. Not just do we grow richer, wiser and do our technologies steadily advance, but also did the world become a safer place since quite some time.

Indeed, international politics is working better and better. International institutions, economic development and interdependence, information technology, the spread of democracy, human rights movements, regional integration – those are just a few catchwords to highlight the growing stability of international relations. Theory as well teaches us that international politics is working better and better. Liberal, institutionalist and constructivist theories make important claims about why politics today is not the same as before, and why it today is more peaceful than ever.

Nonetheless realist theories, especially their most recent approach structural realism, seem not to be able to cope with these positive developments. This is not true. Structural realism claims that international politics is essentially a competitive self-help realm and thus conflictive. It argues that this is the case because politics is defined by anarchy, which has been a stable aspect of international relations over the last centuries. Accordingly, the fundamental nature of politics has not changed. But contrary to conventional wisdom, this claim does not imply the notion that wars, conflicts or crises are a constant factor of international politics. All that structural realism says is that conflicts always loom in the background. Accordingly, peaceful times do not devaluate the theory. Indeed, I would say that most structural realists would agree with the notion that today’s international politics is, thanks to the above mentioned developments, less likely to escalate than in previous days. All they would reject is that the nature of international politics has more fundamentally changed than that. No realist would rule out the possibility of major interstate war, thus the most lethal of all potential conflicts, for instance, while many liberal scholars do.

These days, to sum up, international politics is more stable and more likely to remain peaceful then ever before, but this does not necessarily mean that we have to believe in eternal peace. Indeed, the main explanatory variable for structural realists, polarity, is shifting in an unwishable direction towards multipolarity. And the most fundamental positive claim made at the beginning of this post, namely that we live in more peaceful times than ever, can very quickly turn out to be wrong. Just think that the First and Second World Wars have been the deadliest in the history of mankind, and it becomes clear that not all is well with human development.

Nonetheless, given its complexity, international politics works surprisingly well. Let us hope that it remains so, but let us not forget that a peaceful world is not simply factual and by no means can be expected to last forever. And let us not forget that at this very moment, countless people suffer from violence, diseases, and hunger.