Waltz II

In this post I would like to make a few observations about Waltz's project, its limitations given the current construction of the world, and place it in a context that recognizes the historical use life his the analysis.

Waltz's project

Waltz narrowly defines his project, and in turn our discipline, as, "...to explain how peace can be more easily achieved requires an understanding of the causes of war."(2) or more straight forwardly on page 12, "Where are the major causes of war to be found?" This project is limited by Waltz's limited definition of war that is implicit throughout his writings. Waltz understands war as the world conflict between the great powers (think WWI and WWII)

The limitations to this definition are obvious, if IR scholars are only concerned with large military conflicts between great powers, like the first and second world war, then a great deal of human suffering, related to relations between states, is defined off of our radars. As subcomendante Marcos pointed out in 1997

"Since the end of the Second World War until 1992, there have been 149 wars in all the world. The results are 23 million dead, and therefore there is no doubt about the intensity of this Third World War [the so called "cold war"] (Statistical source: UNICEF)... from the sands of Playa Giron, in Cuba, to the Mekong Delta in Vietnam; from the unbridled nuclear arms war to the savage blows of the State in the tormented Latin America; from the ominous maneuvers of the armies of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to the CIA agents in the Bolivia which oversaw the assassination of Che Guevara..."*

Contextualizing Waltz

Waltz points out that "Peace as it is often said, is a problem of the 20th Century"(12) Waltz then goes on to point out the that moral philosophers, not of the 20th century, have dealt with the question of peace for generations. I think he is too quick to dismiss the relevance of the 20th century to his own writing.

Waltz's peace, the absence of war between the great powers, is distinct from the peace of the political philosophers that he cites, Hobbes(absence of civil war), Bowin (also rebellion and civil war, see p.81), St. Augustine(absence of internal strife, see p.31), Machiavelli (absence of civil strife) and Luther (absents of "Murderous, thieving hordes of peasants").

Waltz's peace comes at the end of two world wars, at a time when nuclear weapons were possessed by the two world powers and it seemed likely that the next 'war,' in the Waltzian sense, would mean the destruction of Humanity and that a Waltzian ‘peace’ would allow for the continuation of the species.

In this context, his narrow definition of the field seems like a great idea. IR is the science of preserving humanity.

A brief reflection on method

I found it interesting, as PTJ pointed out, there are no regression models here. Further, Waltz does not limit his study of war and peace to empiricism, and finds empirical tools of limited use. "The correlation of events means nothing or at least should not be taken to mean anything, apart from the analysis that accompanies it...Prescription is logically impossible without analysis."(13-14)

Perhaps contemporary IR scholars who seem obsessed with using the tools of econometrics to explain IR, could learn a thing or two from Waltz's emphasis on analysis.

*http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/mexico/ezln/1997/jigsaw.html