There is little doubt that John Mearsheimer is one of the most prominent, and controversial, thinkers in the field of international relations alive today. His most important work, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (2014, New York: Norton), continues to be the de facto handbook to the theory of offensive realism and this theoretical lens has played a very prominent role in the debate over the underlying causes of the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine. Coauthor Sebastian Rosato, a professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame, is, like Mearsheimer, a thinker from the broadly realist school of international relations.
However, How States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy is not rooted in realism. Rather, Mearsheimer and Rosato are seeking to defend the epistemological basis upon which the entire field of international relations is founded; to defend the position that states (or specifically the individual policymakers) in international politics generally act rationally most of the time. While this may not seem to be a controversial proposition at first glance, it is often called into question or openly denied. The authors cite many examples of this argument when it comes to the behavior of Russia and Vladimir Putin in particular, and a similar argument has often been made regarding the leadership of Iran and their supposed desire to usher in an eschatological apocalypse.
Read the rest at The Independent Review: https://www.independent.org/publications/tir/article.asp?id=1974
Note: The views expressed on Mises.org are not necessarily those of the Mises Institute.
Full story here Are you the author?
You Might Also Like
Separating Information from Disinformation: Threats from the AI Revolution
2024-03-21
Tu ne cede malis, sed contra audentior ito
Website powered by Mises Institute donors
Mises Institute is a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent the law allows. Tax ID# 52-1263436
Can an Easy Money Policy Increase Employment of “Idle Resources”?
2024-01-11
Whenever an economy falls into a recession, many economists point out that the economic slump means there will be idle capital and labor. Resources that could be employed are now unemployed because the economic slump has softened aggregate demand for goods and services.
So-called experts believe the government must increase the overall demand in the economy since stronger demand will permit idle resources to be employed again. Hence, many economists recommend that the central bank adopt an easy monetary stance to strengthen aggregate demand.
It appears to be quite simple: boost expenditure on goods and services and this, in turn, will strengthen the overall output in the economy by the multiple of the expenditure, thanks to the Keynesian multiplier. According to Ludwig von Mises,
Here,
It Began with Carl Menger: The Austrian Intellectual Triumph
2024-01-08
Near the end of the nineteenth century, the European intellectual scene witnessed a remarkable theoretical contest known as the “battle of methods,” or in German, Methodenstreit. This intellectual clash stood out due to the confrontation between the precepts of methodological and subjective individualization, equipped with a subjectivist and individualizing worldview of the method. It was represented by figures such as Carl Menger (considered the founder of the Austrian School and its theoretical bases) and the German Historical School, and it was guided by the collectivist and historicist assertions of economic science, whose exponents included Gustav von Schmoller and Lujo Brentano.
The conflict, prevalent in the 1880s and 1890s, was driven by fundamental differences regarding the
Why the Fed Sends Mixed Messages on Rate Cuts
2024-01-05
The Fed’s Federal Open Market Committee released the minutes to its December meeting yesterday, and the minutes further strengthen the view held by many Wall Street investors and observers that the Fed plans to implement rate cuts by the middle of 2024. Specifically, the most recent Fed survey of market participants "suggested that the first reduction in the policy rate would occur in June."
This contrasts only slightly with the FOMC members themselves, who, in their own internal survey (i.e., the Summary of Economic Projections,or SEP) overwhelmingly suggests a cut to the policy rate of at least 50 basis points this year. Or as the minutes put it: "almost all participants indicated that, reflecting the improvements in their inflation outlooks, their baseline projections implied that a
Tags: Featured,newsletter
