Book Review: Neoclassical Realism, the State, and Foreign Policy
Diplomacy and Statecraft, Forthcoming
2 Pages Posted: 11 Apr 2015 Last revised: 14 Jun 2017
Date Written: April 10, 2015
Abstract
There are, as the editors of Neoclassical Realism, the State, and Foreign Policy hold, questions of international relations and foreign policies that cannot be answered by dominant theories such as Neorealism or Liberalism. These theories do not investigate domestic variables, or, in the words of Kenneth Waltz, they tend to ignore the "second image" — the state (as well as man, the "first image") — and focus primarily on the "third image," the international system. The heterogeneous approach of so-called Neoclassical Realism sets out to address the other two "images" as well, particularly that of the state. They do so while examining the domestic political system, state and national resources, while at the same time emphasizing the prominent role of the foreign policy executive. Neoclassical Realist theories are thus theories of foreign policy, not international outcomes.
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