Thomas Hobbes and international relations: from realism to rationalism

Introduction 1. Life and Times: Childhood - Civil War - Education - Historical context - Influences - Patrons and friends - Works 2. Method: Definition - Experience - Experimentation - Game Theoretic Interpretations - Geometry - Logic - Observation - Reasoning - Resolutive-compositive method 3. Language: Absurdity - Definitions - Indexicals - Meaning - Names and Universals - Ratiocination - Rhetoric - Uses and abuses 4. Political Philosophy: Absolutism - Authorization and Alienation - Commonwealth - Duties of soverseigns and subjects - Equality - Laws of nature - Interest - Liberty - Monarchy and other forms of government - Obligation - Parental authority lies naturally in the mother - Private judgment - Power - Resistance and non-resistance - Rights - Social Contract - Sovereign - State of nature - Subjects - War and Peace 5. Moral Philosophy: Appetite and Aversion - Deliberation - Desire - Duty - Egoism - Equality - Fear - Folly - Good and evil - Human nature - Law of nature - Manners - Prudence - Obligation - Right of nature - Right and wrong - Self-preservation - Small morals, distinguished - Virtue - Wisdom 6. Religion: Anglicanism - Ecclesiology - Episcopacy - Erastianism - God - Hell - Heresy - Independency - Kingdom of Darkness - Miracles - Mohametans - Natural Religion - Presbyterianism - Puritanism - Revelation - Roman Catholicism - Salvation - Scripture - Superstition - Things Indifferent - Toleration - Trinity - Worship / 7. Law: Adjudication - Casuistry - Civil law - Divine law - Educative function of law - Equity - Good laws, defined - International law/ international relations - Judgment - Legislation - Natural law - Positive law - Revenge - Sin and Law - Crime and Punishment 8. Science and Philosophy: Body - Cause - Liberty - Materialism - Motion - Necessity and Contingency - Optics - Passions - Plenism - Reasoning, instrumental - Space and Time - Squaring the circle 9. Epistemology: Belief - History and historical knowledge - Knowledge - Opinion - Sensation and perception / 10. Lessons and Unsolved Mysteries: Hobbes's legacy - Hobbes and liberalism - Right to revolution - Does Hobbes's philosophy presuppose atheism? - What political forms can count as sovereign? - Is Hobbesian sovereignty obsolete in a world of global independence? Bibliography Index

يتناول هذا البحث النقاش[1] بين الواقعية الجديدة وبين الليبرالية الجديدة في إطار حقل العلاقات الدولية ويسلط الضوء على أهم طروحات النظريتين، وخاصة فيما يتعلق بوجهات نظرهما حول هيكل العلاقات الدولية وهل يحكمه الفوضى والصراع أم التعاون. كانت، ولا زالت، دراسة الصراع والتعاون في العلاقات الدولية من المهام الرئيسية للبحث والتحليل بالنسبة لمنظري وباحثي العلاقات الدولية، وأصبح هذا الترابط بين الصراع والتعاون القضية الرئيسية في النقاش بين النظريتين السائدتين في العلاقات الدولية. تعتبر تظريتي الواقعية الجديدة والليبرالية الجديدة من أكثر النظريات تأثيرا على العلاقات الدولية، ويعتبر النقاش بين النظريتين من أكبر واهم النقاشات في حقل العلاقات الدولية. يسعى هذا البحث إلى بيان وشرح الاسهامات النظرية لكل من النظريتين فيما يتعلق بالصراع والتعاون في العلاقات الدولية، ومدى مساهمة طروحات الليبرالية الجديدة، خاصة فيما يتعلق بدور المؤسسات الدولية في زيادة التعاون الدولي، وفي التقليل من هيمنة الرؤية الواقعية في العلاقات الدولية وخاصة فيما يتعلق بسيادة الفوضى والصراع من أجل القوة. تناقش هذه الدراسة أن النقاش بين الواقعية الجديدة وبين الليبرالية الجديدة لم يساهم بشكل كبير في تطوير نظرية العلاقات الدولية، حيث لم يساهم هذا النقاش بشكل كبير في التقليل من هيمنة سياسات القوة في العلاقات الدولية وحل المشاكل الدولية الناتجة عنها.
 [1] المقصود ب (النقاش) هنا هو النقاش النظري بين الواقعية الجديدة وبين الليبرالية الجديدة. وهو أحد (النقاشات الكبرى) أو (الحوارات العظمى)، حسب استخدام الباحثين، في العلاقات الدولية والمؤخوذة من الاصل الانكليزي (Great debates)، والتي تركز على النقاشات النظرية في تطور حقل العلاقات الدولية منذ بداية القرن العشرين. وهي تشمل، في الغالب، ثلاثة نقاشات كبرى: النقاش بين الواقعية وبين المثالية-الليبرالية، والنقاش بين الواقعية وبين السلوكية، والنقاش بين الواقعية الجديدة وبين الليبرالية الجديدة. وهناك من يضيف نقاشا رابعا مهما وهو النقاش بين الوضعية وما بعد الوضعية (انظر مثلا، تيم دان وآخرون، ترجمة ديما الخضرا، 2016؛Lake, 2013; Lapid, 1989 ).

According to Hans Morgenthau, ‘the application of domestic legal experience to international law is really the main stock in trade of modern international thought’ (1946, 113). More recently, Charles Beitz made a similar point when he remarked that ‘most writers in the modern tradition of political theory, and many contemporary students of international politics, have conceived of international relations on the analogy of the [Hobbesian] state of nature,’ and that ‘perceptions of international relations have been more thoroughly influenced by the analogy of states and persons than by any other device’ (1979, 179, 69). What the two writers are pointing to is the prevalent influence upon international thought of what some theorists of international relations call the ‘domestic analogy’. This analogy, however, has had its critics. Indeed, among many professional writers on International Relations, reliance on the domestic analogy appears no longer to be considered as a very respectable thing. This analogy is associated with ‘all that was wrong’ about the theory and practice of international relations before E. H. Carr (1939) wrote a telling critique of the League of Nations approach to the problem of world order. Moreover, those, such as C. A. W. Manning, who endeavoured to win for International Relations the status of an academic discipline saw in the modern states system unique qualities which, in their judgement, could best be appreciated if the habit of thought cultivated for the understanding of domestic social phenomena could be discarded (Suganami 1983).

In this chapter, we first discuss the existing research on China’s public opinion and foreign policy and suggest that the general, public-targeted survey research faces three analytical weaknesses. We then introduce our unique “opinion survey and textual analysis” approach, which integrates survey research techniques and traditional textual analyses of Chinese international relations (IR) scholars’ writings. We argue that our book makes two contributions to the study of China’s international relations. On one hand, we fill an intellectual gap in the study of Chinese IR scholars’ perceptions of international relations in the 2010s through a unique analytical approach integrating opinion surveys and textual analysis. On the other hand, through the eyes of Chinese IR scholars, we make sense of what Chinese policy makers may think about the world.

When Locke develops his view of the state of nature, he keeps in mind the recents works of Thomas Hobbes. Nevertheless, the weight of the will of God in Locke’s theory makes his ‘state of nature’ less dangerous and lonely than Hobbes’s one. So, while the basis of the two systems are similar, the models of the commonwealths that arise from them are diametrically opposite: if Hobbes wants to defend the absolute power of the English Crown, Locke supports the parliamentary principle of the dawning Whig party. Keywords: state of nature, natural law, liberty, equality.

The Analysis of the Relationship between God, Religion and Politics in Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan and De Cive

We saw in the last chapter how Hobbes starts on his own construction of what he calls, using traditional terms, the ‘laws of nature’. As well as the laws of nature, Hobbes also describes what he calls ‘the state of nature’. For example, the place where he first proposes the foundational assumption of his law of nature – that ‘reason’ dictates ‘to every man for his own good to seek after peace’ – is in a chapter he calls ‘Of the estate and right of nature’ [Elements, chap. 14]. Before the laws of nature come the rights of nature, and these rights are exercised in the estate, or state, of nature. This supposed natural state, or, more precisely, this condition of people without government, is called in Hobbes's next work, De Cive, the ‘state of nature’ (statum naturae) [Pref. 11]. Hobbes seems to have invented this useful term. He thinks that the state of nature is a state of war; as he puts it in the Elements, ‘the estate of men in this natural liberty is the estate of war’ [14.11]. That is, he thinks that the condition of people without government is one of active or potential conflict (for Hobbes includes under ‘war’ not only actual fighting but any ‘time wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known’ [Lev 13.8, p. 62]). So in Hobbes's state of nature, everyone is actually fighting or is threatened by fighting.

The state of nature of Hobbes is like a reflection of the depression of 1640s that prevailed in the United Kingdom. The basic concept that determines the state of nature is individuality. This phenomenon is the expression of individuality, the beginning of Renaissance but not of full competence, of expressing individuality, liberating oneself from doctrinal teachings and medieval conceptions. According to Hobbes, human beings are individuals who have the desire and choice to choose. The person's ability to use his will and preference determines his happiness or unhappiness. The emotions of feeling, fear, desire etc. which are the basic characteristics of human life, are not merely physical and factual phenomenon, but a moral phenomenon that becomes evident by loving, enjoying or disliking, desiring or avoiding oneself. For Hobbes, human life is competition and struggle. As a creature that thinks of the future, human beings are constantly struggling to secure their future ambitions. It is the basic survival condition of a person that wants to be sovereign. It is inevitable that people who are equal in terms of physical and mental force will fight everyone in natural condition. This paper tries to elucidate Thomas Hobbes’ understandings of the concepts of philosophy, state and state of nature. This article will further try to shed light on the Thomas Hobbes’s views on International Relations

Preface to the Second Edition. 1. The International Orders. From Vienna to Versailles-The Rise of the Nation State. The Challenge of Internationalism. Sovereignty. Federalism and the International 'State of Nature'. The Law of Nature and Nations. Summary. 2. Realism, Morality and Law. The Hobbesian State of Nature. Realism. National Interest and Moral Responsibility. Moralism and the Domestic Analogy. Factual and Moral Disanalogy. Legalism. 3. War. Christian Attitudes to War. The Case for Pacifism. Just Wars. Justice Ad Bellum. Force and Violence. Justice In Bello. The Principle of Double Effect. 4. Weapons of Mass Destruction. The Argument So Far. Modern Warfare. Consequentialism. Deterrence. Threats, Bluffs and Conditional Intentions. Mutually Assured Destruction. Summary. 5. Humanitarian Intervention. Intervention and the Challenge to Legalism. Autonomy and the Nation State. Non-intervention and States as Persons. Consequentialism and Non-intervention. The Definition of Intervention. Intervention and Just War Theory. Intervention, the Rule of Law and the Duty to Intervene. Summary. 6. Terrorists, Guerillas and War on Terror. The Definition of Terror. Freedom Fighters. Terrorism. Guerilla Warfare. Torture and the War on Terrorism. Summary. 7. North and South, Aid and Trade. Absolute and Relative Poverty. Poverty and Cost/Benefit Analysis. Lifeboat Ethics. Taking Stock of the Arguments. Social Justice and Welfare Rights. Basic Rights, National Boundaries and International Justice. Aid and Trade: the World Bank and the WTO. Summary. 8. Globalization, Cosmopolitanism and the Environment. Globalization. Cosmopolitanism and Subsidiarity. Environmental Disaster. Environmental Ethics. Shallow and Deep Ecology. The Gaia Hypothesis. Globalization, Environment and International Relations. Bibliography. Index

The aim of this paper is to dissect the causal nexus between trust, institutions and cooperation in international relations (IR) and to highlight the theoretical and empirical potential of bringing trust from the periphery to the centre of our debates about international cooperation. My central argument is that the concept of trust allows us to explain particularly risky forms of international cooperation where the costs of being exploited outweigh the potential gains of cooperation, actors have an incentive to defect if others cooperate, and uncertainty about others' preferences and constraints cannot be fully reduced by international institutions. As most institutions in IR remain incomplete, scholars of international cooperation should hence pay more attention to trust-based forms of risk absorption. Moreover, the paper argues that the creation of trust is best conceptualised as a process of costly signalling. In order to test the causal link between trust and cooperation, the paper analyses Germany's consent to give up the Deutschmark and to create a common European currency in 1989. Germany's initial mistrust regarding France's trustworthiness in monetary affairs could be overcome by the exchange of costly signals. I show that the creation of trust was a necessary part of a causal mechanism bridging the analytical gap between Germany's general preferences for monetary cooperation and the actual creation of European Monetary Union under conditions of risk and uncertainty.

This book assesses the impact of norms on decision-making. It argues that norms influence choices not by being causes for actions, but by providing reasons. Consequently it approaches the problem via an investigation of the reasoning process in which norms play a decisive role. Kratochwil argues that, depending upon the strictness the guidance norms provide in arriving at a decision, different styles of reasoning with norms can be distinguished. While the focus in this book is largely analytical, the argument is developed through the interpretation of the classic thinkers in international law (Grotius, Vattel, Pufendorf, Rousseau, Hume, Habermas)

Reviewed by: Chinese Perspectives on International Relations: A Framework for Analysis Harvey Nelsen (bio) Gerald Chan . Chinese Perspectives on International Relations: A Framework for Analysis. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991. xvii, 193 pp. Hardcover $65.00, ISBN 0-312-21909-1. This is a book in which it is easy to trace the author's intellectual journey. Gerald Chan began with the hope of providing the world's first English-language study of international relations as formulated and practiced in China. But he found that the Chinese are still in the early stages of development and sophistication in that academic field. So he changed the focus of the book to the foundations of Chinese foreign policy, although he does not announce this to his readers. He finds that in China the field of international relations is policy-driven rather than academically [End Page 75] driven as in the West. But Chan fails to take the last step and admit that the perception of international relations therefore becomes only one of several foundations for foreign-policy making. This does not mean that the author has failed, however. His extensive use of Chinese sources—including interviews—provides us with valuable materials on Chinese perceptions. He also analyzes in some depth the differences between Chinese and Western perspectives on international relations. The book is somewhat dated in the sense that globalization receives only three brief mentions. Since Western scholarship is obsessed with the topic, it is hard to believe that the Chinese are not devoting more effort to figuring out how China will fit into such an international system. At the end of the book, Chan comes back to international relations as a field in China, but that is anticlimactic. His description is disheartening: there have been but a handful of conferences and a score of scholars working in the field. And Chan is quick to point out that the heavy hand of the CCP restricts creativity. This is an excellent book for understanding how the Chinese perceive their role in the world. It would be useful as an assigned text in a graduate seminar on Chinese foreign policy, or perhaps for a student to report on in a graduate seminar on international relations. For an undergraduate text, I prefer In the Eyes of the Dragon: China Views the World, edited by Yong Deng and Fei-ling Wang (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999). The latter does not try to provide the theoretical perspective emphasized by Chan, but it does cover a broad spectrum of Chinese perceptions and interests. In the Eyes of the Dragon also contains valuable normative perspectives, making explicit proposals about how the United States should view and treat China. [End Page 76] Harvey Nelsen Harvey Nelsen is a professor in the International Studies Program, Department of Government and International Affairs, University of South Florida. He has written on Chinese foreign policy, military affairs, and, more recently, on the Chinese state. Copyright © 2003 University of Hawai'i Press

In this article authors analyze sources and bases of political culture of Indonesia, reveal features of national approaches to the international relations, and also consider influence of national peculiarities on the international relations and foreign policy perception in Indonesia. The relevance of the study is due to a low degree of research of the influence of political culture, ideas, traditions and ideologies on the Indonesian foreign policy. The purpose of the research is to identify the characteristics and to analyze the development of Indonesian political thinking, the ideological and conceptual foreign policy foundations. This article is an interdisciplinary paper at the junction of the theory and history of international relations, cultural studies, sociology, ethnology. The authors apply a combination of system, comparative and historical (historical-genetic) method. Also, the authors rely on the school of constructivism in international relations. The results of the study are presented in the form of conclusions containing analysis of the influence of ideological, ethnic and political factors on the perception of international relations and world political processes by Indonesian society.

SummaryThe aim of this article is to explore in what respects Thomas Hobbes may be regarded as foundational in international thought. It is evident that in contemporary international relations theory he has become emblematic of a realist tradition, but as David Armitage suggests this was not always the case. I want to suggest that it is only in a very limited sense that he may be regarded as a foundational thinker in international relations, and for reasons very different from those for which he has become infamous. In the early histories of international thought Hobbes is a cameo figure completely eclipsed by Grotius. In early histories of political literature, the classic jurists were often acknowledged for their remarkable contributions to international relations, but Hobbes is referred to exclusively as a philosopher of a positvist ethics and absolute sovereignty. It is among the jurists themselves that Hobbes is believed to have made important conceptual moves which set the problems for international thought for the next three centuries. He conflates natural law and the law of nations, arguing that they differ only in their subjects—the former individuals, the latter nations or states. This entailed transforming the sovereign into an artificial man, not in the Roman Law sense of an entity capable of suing and being sued; rather, as a subject not party to a contract, but created by a contract among individuals who confer upon it authority. This subject is not constrained by the contractors, but is, as individuals were in the state of nature, constrained by the equivalent of natural law, the law of nations in the international context. Throughout, the methodological implications are drawn for modern historians of political thought and political philosophers who venture to theorise about international relations.

An examination of the ways cyberspace is changing both the theory and the practice of international relations. Cyberspace is widely acknowledged as a fundamental fact of daily life in today's world. Until recently, its political impact was thought to be a matter of low politics—background conditions and routine processes and decisions. Now, however, experts have begun to recognize its effect on high politics—national security, core institutions, and critical decision processes. In this book, Nazli Choucri investigates the implications of this new cyberpolitical reality for international relations theory, policy, and practice. The ubiquity, fluidity, and anonymity of cyberspace have already challenged such concepts as leverage and influence, national security and diplomacy, and borders and boundaries in the traditionally state-centric arena of international relations. Choucri grapples with fundamental questions of how we can take explicit account of cyberspace in the analysis of world politics and how we can integrate the traditional international system with its cyber venues. After establishing the theoretical and empirical terrain, Choucri examines modes of cyber conflict and cyber cooperation in international relations; the potential for the gradual convergence of cyberspace and sustainability, in both substantive and policy terms; and the emergent synergy of cyberspace and international efforts toward sustainable development. Choucri's discussion is theoretically driven and empirically grounded, drawing on recent data and analyzing the dynamics of cyberpolitics at individual, state, international, and global levels.