Pub Date : 2023-12-06DOI: 10.1177/00471178231218567
Ryuta Ito
Why did Japan conclude the Japan–Soviet Neutrality Pact in 1941, even though it knew the German-Soviet relations were deteriorating and heading towards a disastrous war? Under the Tripartite Pact, it would be irrational for Japan to approach the USSR, which Germany had decided to invade. This article examines this long-standing puzzle in Japanese diplomatic history (also an anomaly of neorealism) by developing a new neoclassical realist model termed ‘neoclassical realist model of overconfidence’ based on self-deception in evolutionary psychology using scientific realism in the philosophy of science as a metatheoretical foundation. Drawing on neoclassical realism, I argue that Japan’s balancing strategy during 1940–41, which initially reflected the tripolar structure of the international system (independent variable), ultimately resulted in the suboptimal balancing of the Japan–Soviet Neutrality Pact (dependent variable) due to Yosuke Matsuoka’s (Japanese foreign minister) self-deception, including the positive illusion and cognitive dissonance effect (intervening variable).
{"title":"A neoclassical realist model of overconfidence and the Japan–Soviet Neutrality Pact in 1941","authors":"Ryuta Ito","doi":"10.1177/00471178231218567","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231218567","url":null,"abstract":"Why did Japan conclude the Japan–Soviet Neutrality Pact in 1941, even though it knew the German-Soviet relations were deteriorating and heading towards a disastrous war? Under the Tripartite Pact, it would be irrational for Japan to approach the USSR, which Germany had decided to invade. This article examines this long-standing puzzle in Japanese diplomatic history (also an anomaly of neorealism) by developing a new neoclassical realist model termed ‘neoclassical realist model of overconfidence’ based on self-deception in evolutionary psychology using scientific realism in the philosophy of science as a metatheoretical foundation. Drawing on neoclassical realism, I argue that Japan’s balancing strategy during 1940–41, which initially reflected the tripolar structure of the international system (independent variable), ultimately resulted in the suboptimal balancing of the Japan–Soviet Neutrality Pact (dependent variable) due to Yosuke Matsuoka’s (Japanese foreign minister) self-deception, including the positive illusion and cognitive dissonance effect (intervening variable).","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"21 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138594225","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-29DOI: 10.1177/00471178231211499
Mateus Bilhar, Zhaoying Han, Maximilian Ohle, Richard J. Cook
Can hedging be applied to non-Asia-Pacific regions and historical contexts? And, to what extent did Brazil operationalize hedging behavior during the Second World War? Taking these questions, the purpose of this paper is to expand the discourse on hedging twofold: First, to employ it within a South American context; second, to verify hedging historically as a widespread strategic unit-level behavior of small and middle powers amid systemic-level great power competitions. Here, by unboxing Brazil’s hedging behavior during the Second World War, specifically President Getúlio Vargas’s ‘ equidistância pragmática’ (pragmatic equidistance) coping strategy, it is found that Brazil employed hedging behavior with omnidirectional engagement with both the United States and Nazi Germany, yet later abandoned this strategy to fully align with Washington and the Allies in 1942, once Brazilian security and economic interests were aligned.
{"title":"Brazil’s pragmatic equidistance: hedging and the Second World War","authors":"Mateus Bilhar, Zhaoying Han, Maximilian Ohle, Richard J. Cook","doi":"10.1177/00471178231211499","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231211499","url":null,"abstract":"Can hedging be applied to non-Asia-Pacific regions and historical contexts? And, to what extent did Brazil operationalize hedging behavior during the Second World War? Taking these questions, the purpose of this paper is to expand the discourse on hedging twofold: First, to employ it within a South American context; second, to verify hedging historically as a widespread strategic unit-level behavior of small and middle powers amid systemic-level great power competitions. Here, by unboxing Brazil’s hedging behavior during the Second World War, specifically President Getúlio Vargas’s ‘ equidistância pragmática’ (pragmatic equidistance) coping strategy, it is found that Brazil employed hedging behavior with omnidirectional engagement with both the United States and Nazi Germany, yet later abandoned this strategy to fully align with Washington and the Allies in 1942, once Brazilian security and economic interests were aligned.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"13 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139214590","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-23DOI: 10.1177/00471178231205412
Maximiliano Facundo Vila Seoane
Amidst the transition to the fifth generation of mobile telecommunications (5G), the US has launched a diplomatic campaign to prevent other states from acquiring such technologies from Chinese providers. In reply, China has launched a similar campaign to rebut being perceived as a security threat. However, the outcomes of such influencing campaigns in other states have been varied. This article argues that mediated public diplomacy and securitisation theory offer complementary ways to research the competition between the US and China in terms of influencing the policies of foreign states. Empirically, it examines the cases of Brazil and Chile, where the US campaign against Chinese 5G suppliers was successful in setting the agenda. However, neither the increased economic interdependence of Brazil and Chile with China nor their close political cultural congruency with the US, though, are enough to explain the different outcomes of the US campaign against Chinese 5G providers in each country. Indeed, Chile rejected the US securitisation move, while in Brazil it was successful, but partial in that it only refers to government 5G, not commercial 5G. The article argues that the degree of consensus among national political elites and other non-state actors to endorse or reject the US narrative explains such differences.
{"title":"Mediated public diplomacy and securitisation theory: the US campaign against Chinese 5G in Brazil and Chile","authors":"Maximiliano Facundo Vila Seoane","doi":"10.1177/00471178231205412","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231205412","url":null,"abstract":"Amidst the transition to the fifth generation of mobile telecommunications (5G), the US has launched a diplomatic campaign to prevent other states from acquiring such technologies from Chinese providers. In reply, China has launched a similar campaign to rebut being perceived as a security threat. However, the outcomes of such influencing campaigns in other states have been varied. This article argues that mediated public diplomacy and securitisation theory offer complementary ways to research the competition between the US and China in terms of influencing the policies of foreign states. Empirically, it examines the cases of Brazil and Chile, where the US campaign against Chinese 5G suppliers was successful in setting the agenda. However, neither the increased economic interdependence of Brazil and Chile with China nor their close political cultural congruency with the US, though, are enough to explain the different outcomes of the US campaign against Chinese 5G providers in each country. Indeed, Chile rejected the US securitisation move, while in Brazil it was successful, but partial in that it only refers to government 5G, not commercial 5G. The article argues that the degree of consensus among national political elites and other non-state actors to endorse or reject the US narrative explains such differences.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"51 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-11-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139245930","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-20DOI: 10.1177/00471178231211509
Alex Gould
The concept of ‘flag of convenience’ is ubiquitous in literature on maritime governance. First popularised by the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), it has served as a touchstone concept in maritime policy discourse, and as a metaphor for the interaction between state and corporate actors in both maritime affairs and the globalised economy more broadly. This article argues, however, that the conceptions of public and private as ontologically separate that underpin existing literature on maritime governance have obscured notable shifts in the practices of flags of convenience in recent decades. More specifically (and drawing on assemblage theory), it argues that while flags of convenience have been framed exclusively as entities that allow shipping interests to escape regulatory control, certain open registers have been re-constituted as hubs of knowledge and materiality that ease and accelerate commercial circulation in a variety of ways. The article concludes by drawing attention to the volatility of the politics and practices of flag statehood at large; additionally, it highlights the insights that can be yielded for International Relations by the examination of maritime governance using novel theoretical tools.
{"title":"The customer is always right? Flags of convenience and the assembling of maritime affairs","authors":"Alex Gould","doi":"10.1177/00471178231211509","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231211509","url":null,"abstract":"The concept of ‘flag of convenience’ is ubiquitous in literature on maritime governance. First popularised by the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), it has served as a touchstone concept in maritime policy discourse, and as a metaphor for the interaction between state and corporate actors in both maritime affairs and the globalised economy more broadly. This article argues, however, that the conceptions of public and private as ontologically separate that underpin existing literature on maritime governance have obscured notable shifts in the practices of flags of convenience in recent decades. More specifically (and drawing on assemblage theory), it argues that while flags of convenience have been framed exclusively as entities that allow shipping interests to escape regulatory control, certain open registers have been re-constituted as hubs of knowledge and materiality that ease and accelerate commercial circulation in a variety of ways. The article concludes by drawing attention to the volatility of the politics and practices of flag statehood at large; additionally, it highlights the insights that can be yielded for International Relations by the examination of maritime governance using novel theoretical tools.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"3 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139255931","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-20DOI: 10.1177/00471178231205407
Lance Y. Hunter, Joseph W. Robbins, M. H. Ginn
A small number of studies have examined the effect terrorism has on political ideology and vote choice cross-nationally. However, scholars yet to understand how terrorist attack type influences vote choice based on the political ideology of incumbent governments. Thus, we examine the effect domestic and transnational terrorist attacks have on vote choice in legislative elections while accounting for the ideology of the incumbent government. In examining 56 democracies from 1975 – 2014 from various regions and levels of development, we find that domestic attacks, and not transnational, significantly effect both right and left party votes shares when the incumbent party in government is of a similar ideology. We attribute these results to the perception of instability that accompanies domestic attacks and the effects it has on voters’ evaluations of political parties. These findings have important implications for understanding how terrorism influences electoral behavior.
{"title":"Domestic terrorism, incumbency, and legislative vote shares","authors":"Lance Y. Hunter, Joseph W. Robbins, M. H. Ginn","doi":"10.1177/00471178231205407","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231205407","url":null,"abstract":"A small number of studies have examined the effect terrorism has on political ideology and vote choice cross-nationally. However, scholars yet to understand how terrorist attack type influences vote choice based on the political ideology of incumbent governments. Thus, we examine the effect domestic and transnational terrorist attacks have on vote choice in legislative elections while accounting for the ideology of the incumbent government. In examining 56 democracies from 1975 – 2014 from various regions and levels of development, we find that domestic attacks, and not transnational, significantly effect both right and left party votes shares when the incumbent party in government is of a similar ideology. We attribute these results to the perception of instability that accompanies domestic attacks and the effects it has on voters’ evaluations of political parties. These findings have important implications for understanding how terrorism influences electoral behavior.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"53 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139255273","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-20DOI: 10.1177/00471178231211500
Eviatar Matania, Udi Sommer
After years of highlighting the importance of cyber elements to the battlefields of the 21st Century, many observers are perplexed to see how conventional the war in Ukraine seems to be. We argue, nonetheless, that the war in Ukraine is another step in an incipient shift in international relations and international security inextricably linked with the cyber era. The cyber era has ushered in a key change in the sense that companies, in addition to nation-states, now play a role with meaningful and substantial consequences for the geostrategic upshots of the conflict. Key elements in this new IR reality are formed in the vision and spirit of the tech titans – Google, Microsoft, Meta, Apple and Amazon. The cyber commons, which includes elements that had not existed as shortly as two decades ago, and that are almost purely a product of the inventiveness and entrepreneurship of the tech titans – such as cloud computing or social media – is now part and parcel of the way states identify themselves, recognize their friends and foes, protect themselves and attack others, and operate internally and externally.
{"title":"Tech titans, cyber commons and the war in Ukraine: An incipient shift in international relations","authors":"Eviatar Matania, Udi Sommer","doi":"10.1177/00471178231211500","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231211500","url":null,"abstract":"After years of highlighting the importance of cyber elements to the battlefields of the 21st Century, many observers are perplexed to see how conventional the war in Ukraine seems to be. We argue, nonetheless, that the war in Ukraine is another step in an incipient shift in international relations and international security inextricably linked with the cyber era. The cyber era has ushered in a key change in the sense that companies, in addition to nation-states, now play a role with meaningful and substantial consequences for the geostrategic upshots of the conflict. Key elements in this new IR reality are formed in the vision and spirit of the tech titans – Google, Microsoft, Meta, Apple and Amazon. The cyber commons, which includes elements that had not existed as shortly as two decades ago, and that are almost purely a product of the inventiveness and entrepreneurship of the tech titans – such as cloud computing or social media – is now part and parcel of the way states identify themselves, recognize their friends and foes, protect themselves and attack others, and operate internally and externally.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"51 4","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139257172","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-03DOI: 10.1177/00471178231205400
Holger Janusch
In international relations theory, civilian and normative power can be seen as the most ambitious attempts to develop a new ideal of actor that is normatively preferable to classical concepts such as great power, empire, and hegemon as it wields power in a different way. However, these attempts fail from a theoretical perspective primarily because the concepts cannot be clearly differentiated from hidden hegemony. Guided by Habermas’ notion of communicative power, this article develops a new ideal type for transnational norm diffusion that escapes the trap of hidden hegemony. This ideal promotes communicative power by: (1) exercising institutional power to enable open and free discourse, (2) abstaining from using compulsory power to impose its own norms but just to guarantee the option of voice and exit for all affected persons, and (3) reducing unconscious structural power, productive power, and soft power through the inclusion of reflexivity and self-criticism. This type of inclusive foreign policy based on self-restraint and reflexivity must originate from solidarity in domestic civil society to gain the trust of others. The concept of communicative power offers an alternative theoretical template to how dominant actors can exercise power in international politics.
{"title":"Communicative power as a new ideal type in international relations","authors":"Holger Janusch","doi":"10.1177/00471178231205400","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231205400","url":null,"abstract":"In international relations theory, civilian and normative power can be seen as the most ambitious attempts to develop a new ideal of actor that is normatively preferable to classical concepts such as great power, empire, and hegemon as it wields power in a different way. However, these attempts fail from a theoretical perspective primarily because the concepts cannot be clearly differentiated from hidden hegemony. Guided by Habermas’ notion of communicative power, this article develops a new ideal type for transnational norm diffusion that escapes the trap of hidden hegemony. This ideal promotes communicative power by: (1) exercising institutional power to enable open and free discourse, (2) abstaining from using compulsory power to impose its own norms but just to guarantee the option of voice and exit for all affected persons, and (3) reducing unconscious structural power, productive power, and soft power through the inclusion of reflexivity and self-criticism. This type of inclusive foreign policy based on self-restraint and reflexivity must originate from solidarity in domestic civil society to gain the trust of others. The concept of communicative power offers an alternative theoretical template to how dominant actors can exercise power in international politics.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"39 14","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135820360","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-31DOI: 10.1177/00471178231205408
Paul D. Beaumont, Katharina Glaab
Critical security studies have shed invaluable light on the diffuse governmental technologies and pernicious effects of the EU’s bordering practices. While scholars have focused upon the experience of precarious migrant groups, this article suggests that extending our critical gaze to include seemingly privileged migrants can further understanding of just how far the insecurity produced by the EU’s migration regime reaches. Focusing on the migration process of international students in Norway, this article inquires into how these migrants experience, theorize and negotiate the EU’s visa regime and its governmental technologies. We show how their subjective understandings of ‘broad’ and ‘narrow’ hierarchies of the visa regime play out in their bureaucratic encounters, influencing their everyday lives. Ultimately, the article shows how the regime’s disciplinary effects extend further than prior critical research has appreciated.
{"title":"Everyday migration hierarchies: negotiating the EU’s visa regime","authors":"Paul D. Beaumont, Katharina Glaab","doi":"10.1177/00471178231205408","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231205408","url":null,"abstract":"Critical security studies have shed invaluable light on the diffuse governmental technologies and pernicious effects of the EU’s bordering practices. While scholars have focused upon the experience of precarious migrant groups, this article suggests that extending our critical gaze to include seemingly privileged migrants can further understanding of just how far the insecurity produced by the EU’s migration regime reaches. Focusing on the migration process of international students in Norway, this article inquires into how these migrants experience, theorize and negotiate the EU’s visa regime and its governmental technologies. We show how their subjective understandings of ‘broad’ and ‘narrow’ hierarchies of the visa regime play out in their bureaucratic encounters, influencing their everyday lives. Ultimately, the article shows how the regime’s disciplinary effects extend further than prior critical research has appreciated.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"352 ","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135813615","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-31DOI: 10.1177/00471178231205394
Avi Siegal
This essay elucidates the deep affinity between the political theories of E.H. Carr and Reinhold Niebuhr. Central to this affinity was their shared advocacy of an ongoing dialectic between vision and critique, or (in their words) utopianism and realism. The immediate justification for this essay is the surprising dearth of extended comparisons of Carr and Niebuhr, even though Carr in The Twenty Years’ Crisis acknowledges a particular debt to Niebuhr and cites Niebuhr seven times in that work. Comparing Carr and Niebuhr also reveals the Marxist roots of their dialectical approach and highlights their adamant refusal to proclaim themselves ‘realists’. The essay thus encourages the discipline of international relations to seek its genealogy in the tradition of radical political thought and to reassess the common assumption that Carr and Niebuhr are founders of the modern realist approach. In the author’s view, the ‘ultimate optimism’ of Carr and Niebuhr, though widely underappreciated, is compelling.
{"title":"‘Ultimate optimism’: the twin critical visions of E.H. Carr and Reinhold Niebuhr","authors":"Avi Siegal","doi":"10.1177/00471178231205394","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231205394","url":null,"abstract":"This essay elucidates the deep affinity between the political theories of E.H. Carr and Reinhold Niebuhr. Central to this affinity was their shared advocacy of an ongoing dialectic between vision and critique, or (in their words) utopianism and realism. The immediate justification for this essay is the surprising dearth of extended comparisons of Carr and Niebuhr, even though Carr in The Twenty Years’ Crisis acknowledges a particular debt to Niebuhr and cites Niebuhr seven times in that work. Comparing Carr and Niebuhr also reveals the Marxist roots of their dialectical approach and highlights their adamant refusal to proclaim themselves ‘realists’. The essay thus encourages the discipline of international relations to seek its genealogy in the tradition of radical political thought and to reassess the common assumption that Carr and Niebuhr are founders of the modern realist approach. In the author’s view, the ‘ultimate optimism’ of Carr and Niebuhr, though widely underappreciated, is compelling.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"206 ","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135870392","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-25DOI: 10.1177/00471178231205399
Gordon M. Friedrichs, Áine Fellenz
International leadership failure by states is an underdeveloped concept in International Relations. Existing approaches commonly equate leadership with hegemony, arguing that leadership success and failure are contingent on primacy or shared material interests among states. In this article, we introduce a role theoretical approach, which defines international leadership as a social role that emerges from shared expectations among states pertaining to leadership purpose, group cohesion and time horizon. Accordingly, leadership failure occurs when role expectations between states diverge and states are unable to generate commensurate role-taking via alter-casting. Four leader-follower constellations can be distinguished: leadership enactment, denial, rejection and vacuum. The paper utilizes this theoretical heuristic to understand two cases of leadership failure. The first case involves Brazil’s attempted leadership role in response to the Latin American migration crisis following the political crisis in Venezuela. The second case examines Indonesia’s attempted leadership role in the South China Sea dispute. The empirical findings contribute to existing work on hegemony and leadership in international relations theory by showing that leadership failure comes in different variants and these variants are contingent on shared role expectations and alter-casting capacity of states involved.
{"title":"When leaders disappoint: rejection and denial of leadership roles in international politics","authors":"Gordon M. Friedrichs, Áine Fellenz","doi":"10.1177/00471178231205399","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00471178231205399","url":null,"abstract":"International leadership failure by states is an underdeveloped concept in International Relations. Existing approaches commonly equate leadership with hegemony, arguing that leadership success and failure are contingent on primacy or shared material interests among states. In this article, we introduce a role theoretical approach, which defines international leadership as a social role that emerges from shared expectations among states pertaining to leadership purpose, group cohesion and time horizon. Accordingly, leadership failure occurs when role expectations between states diverge and states are unable to generate commensurate role-taking via alter-casting. Four leader-follower constellations can be distinguished: leadership enactment, denial, rejection and vacuum. The paper utilizes this theoretical heuristic to understand two cases of leadership failure. The first case involves Brazil’s attempted leadership role in response to the Latin American migration crisis following the political crisis in Venezuela. The second case examines Indonesia’s attempted leadership role in the South China Sea dispute. The empirical findings contribute to existing work on hegemony and leadership in international relations theory by showing that leadership failure comes in different variants and these variants are contingent on shared role expectations and alter-casting capacity of states involved.","PeriodicalId":47031,"journal":{"name":"International Relations","volume":"29 2","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135216024","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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