Even if this strategy is never successful, it motivates individuals to achieve the maximum possible. Sexual selection has led to costly biological adaptations, such as fighting, the growth of heavy weapons (e.g., antlers), risky courtship displays, or adornments that signal genetic quality (e.g., gigantic tails). After graduating from the United States Military Academy (West Point) in 1970, Mearsheimer served for five years as an officer in the air force, rising to the rank of captain. Human evolution explains why people seek control over resources, why some of us (particularly males) will seek to dominate others in order to achieve and maintain a privileged position in a dominance hierarchy, and why we are suspicious and wary of other groups.150 Since the leaders of states are human, they too will be influencedperhaps especially influencedby this evolutionary legacy as they react to the actions of other states and decide how to respond.151,Reference McDermott152,Reference McDermott153. They have enjoyed an absence of competition from gorillas (bonobos only live south of the Congo River, while gorillas only live on the north side of the river), high-quality foliage for food, and dense forest, which reduced vulnerability to ambush and thus, it is thought, the utility of aggression in males.168,169 Accordingly, bonobos may not be a good model for understanding human behavior, for reasons of both phylogenetic history and shared ecology. Rather, chimpanzees appear to have evolved an innate aggression toward other groups, a tendency that causes them to attack neighboring males when the opportunity arises, and leads to greater Darwinian reproductive success over time. Rathbun, Brian C. Mearsheimer's main innovation is his theory of 'offensive realism' that seeks to re-formulate Kenneth Waltz's structural realist theory to explain from a struc-tural point of departure the sheer amount of international aggression, which may be hard to reconcile with Waltz's more defensive realism. Realism, under Mearsheimer's perception, suggests states are rational since they ought to think strategically about their survival (Shadunts, 2016). Chagnon, Wrangham and Glowacki and others have also shown that individuals, as well as the group, may gain significant reputational and reproductive advantages of participation in warfare. } Studies from an evolutionary perspective of the fundamental assumptions of neoliberalism, constructivism, poststructural approaches, Marxist and dependency theories, and other theories of international relations would be welcomed for four reasons. In environments where resources are highly contested, outgroup fear can become extreme. In addition to fighting over resources, we can now fight over ideology as well. Third, we illuminate offensive realisms new explanatory power when wedded to evolution. With regard to U.S. foreign policy, he advocated a strategy of global balancing rather than global hegemony. A superpower such as the United States, he argued, should not try to impose its rule on all continents but should intervene only when another major power threatens to rule a region of strategic importance. Major realist theories and their predictions,154 plus predictions from human evolution. Second, bureaucracies and organizations are designed, run, and led by human beings, whose own dispositions influence how they function. This has been done extensively many times elsewhere.Reference Barkow7,Reference Hodgson and Knudsen8,Reference Barkow, Cosmides and Tooby9,Reference Thayer10,Reference Sidanius, Kurzban, Sears, Huddy and Jervis11,Reference Alford and Hibbing12,Reference Gat13,Reference Rosen14,Reference Pinker15 Furthermore, we do not intend to make the full case for whether states do or do not act as predicted by offensive realism, which has also been done extensively elsewhere.Reference Layne16,Reference Mearsheimer17,Reference Labs18 The article focuses instead on our novel theoretical question: Do the core behavioral assumptions underlying the theory of offensive realism map onto evolved human nature? Evolutionary theory accounts for egoism and explains why cooperation can extend to the family or close kin group but remains difficult between unrelated individuals. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings. It contended that a powerful lobby skews U.S. foreign policy against the countrys national interests by securing unconditional support for Israel. We thank Robert Jervis for bringing this point to our attention. Incorporating ideas from the life sciences into the social sciencesrich in the study of culture and institutions and other influences on political behaviorwill help scholars base their theories in rigorous scientific principles and subject their assumptions to empirical testing.Reference Wilson20,21 Our approach draws heavily on evolutionary anthropology, which recognizes that human behavior is in large part the result of evolved cognitive, physiological, and behavioral mechanisms designed to solve recurrent problems confronted by our ancestors in the environment in which we evolved. Few principles unite the discipline of international relations, but one exception is anarchythe absence of government in international politics. Third, state leaders are the actors who make important strategic decisions from a set of options, and they are potentially affected by their human dispositions and those of their advisers, even if their actions are tempered by checks and balances. realism's 5 assumptions about the international system o 1)the international system is anarchic (no higher ruling body) o 2) states inherently possess some offensive military capability which gives them the wherewithal to hurt and possibly to destroy each other o 3) states can never be certain about the intentions of other states However, it is important to make clear that humans did not descend from either species. Andr Munro was an editor at Encyclopaedia Britannica. However, the persistence of these three traits across domains and over time casts doubt on arguments like these, and strongly counts in favor of an evolutionary explanation instead. First, the group could eliminate or reduce consumption to make the resource last. Second, even if group selection does occur, it can only increase altruism within groups. This match, in turn, should be no surprise because human behavior evolved under conditions of anarchy, which pervaded throughout our evolution as well as in international politics today. In 2007 Mearsheimer coauthored with Stephen M. Walt a best-selling but highly controversial book, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (2007). A dominance hierarchy is created competitively, often violently, and is maintained forcefully, but it can serve to prevent or reduce conflict within a group because it establishes a pecking order that is generally respected. The theory might thus be extended to explain the behavior and actions of many phenomena: the Roman Empire, warfare among Papua New Guinean or Native American tribes, the European conquest of South America, the race for the American west and the failed Mormon and Confederate secessions, the imperialist scrambles over African colonies, institutions like the medieval Catholic Church, commercial organizations from the East India Company to Coca-Cola, the struggles of rival ethnic groups the world over, and the ruthlessness of electoral campaigns. Offensive realists can thus explain more than the behavior of states or great powers. View all Google Scholar citations In short, you do not need group selection to explain altruism. Although Thomas Hobbes claimed to have deduced Leviathan scientifically from motion and the physical senses, he was writing two hundred years before Darwin and so had no understanding of evolution.Reference Hobbes53 International relations scholars have tended to claim to deduce their own theories from Hobbes, or subsequent philosophers who followed him, and we suggest it is time to revisit the idea of foundational scientific principles. We invoke anarchy in all situations in the table because, while our core argument is that evolved dispositions (egoism, dominance, groupishness) give rise to offensive realist behavior today even in the absence of anarchy, these evolved dispositions will be more prominent and influential where regulation is lax. Our point is therefore not that humans are naturally good or naturally bad at all times and in all circumstances, but rather that people have evolved mechanisms for egoism, dominance, and groupishness that are activated and amplified in certain settings. Table2. Those conditions, according to Mearsheimer, create strong incentives for states to behave aggressively toward each other. Because states cannot know with certainty the present or future intentions of other states, he concluded, it is rational for them to attempt to preempt possible acts of aggression by increasing their military might and adopting an assertive position whenever their core security interests are at stake. This is not to deny that they miscalculate from time to time. Also like Waltz, Mearsheimer argues that bipolarity (where two states have the majority of power and international influence) is more stable than multipolarity for three reasons: First, bipolarity provides fewer opportunities for war between the superpowers; second, there will tend to be smaller imbalances of power between the superpowers; and, third, there is less potential for great power miscalculation.29. Conflict may seem costly to all parties involved, winners and losers alike, but what matters for natural selection is whether fighting, despite its costs, can bring net benefits to Darwinian fitness. One reason why an evolutionary explanation of egoism, dominance, and ingroup/outgroup bias is useful is because alternative explanations for these empirical traits have failed. The central issue raised by our theory is what causes states to behave as offensive realists predict. Collective action to attain public goods, however, is much harder to attain because of the threat of free-riders (as demonstrated, for example, by the slow response to climate change, the reluctance of states to accept Syrian refugees, and Eurozone fiscal responsibility). The brain may be responding exactly as it was designed to do, given informational inputs from the environment. Similarly formidable obstacles to cooperation exist in international relations. All three species descended from an (unknown) common ancestor. Hamilton used genetic models to show that, while individual organisms are egoistic, they should be less so in their behavior toward genetic relatives, especially in parent-offspring and sibling relationships.Reference Hamilton87,Reference Hamilton88 This decrease in egoism is because close relatives share many of the same genesone-half for siblings and parents, one-quarter for aunts, uncles, and grandparents, and one-eighth for cousins. In fact, interactions with people from other groupsunrelated others that may not have shared interestsmay be especially costly or lethal compared to within-group interactions. Aggression may be a risky strategy, but it is a more attractive option than starvation or other lethal dangers. The modern understanding of evolution rejects the simplistic stereotype that selfish genes equates to selfish organisms (Richard Dawkins carefully explained why that is not a logical consequence in The Selfish Gene Reference Dawkins6). The cognitive mechanisms underpinning the three traits were established in an environment very different from the one in which humans now live, but they persist because our brains, biochemistry and nervous systems, which evolved over many millions of years, have remained the same despite the rapid sociological and technological advances of the last few centuries. An exceptional study of realism, and in some respects the fountainhead of offensive realism is Ashley Joachim Tellis, Gat 2006 and Azar Gat, So why do people fight? We recognize that humans are influenced by culture, norms, rational calculation, and moral principles. These types of adaptations not only consume precious time and energy but can also decrease survival in other, nonreproductive domains of life (for example, the plumage of male peacocks limits their ability to fly). If anything, group selection would tend to increase violence, since between-group competition (conflict among strangers) can be more brutal than within-group competition (conflict among kin and fellow group members). No theory is perfect. First, such studies would complement and critique the present study. The first assumption is that there is anarchy in the international system, which means that there is no hierarchically superior, coercive power that can guarantee limits on the behavior of states (Mearsheimer 2001, 30). Our evolutionary approach predicts the same behavior as offensive realism but derives from a different ultimate cause. Rather, as Mearsheimer points out, states do best if they expand only when the opportunity for gains presents itselfthey try to figure out when to raise and when to fold.163 Evolution has been doing this for a long time. Evolutionary theory explains why humans are egoistic, strive to dominate others, and make ingroup/outgroup distinctions. Reckless States and Realism John J. Mearsheimer Abstract Kenneth Waltz opted to reject the rational actor assumption in developing his theory of international politics. The motivation for such conquests does not, of course, involve conscious planning to attain larger territories or more offspring. Like most international relations scholars of his generation, Mearsheimer was deeply influenced by Kenneth Waltz, the founder of the school of international relations known as neorealism. As evolutionary economist Robert Frank has explained, Evidence suggests that we come into the world equipped with a nervous system that worries about rank. Still, humans exhibit an instinctive fight or flight response, just as other animals do, which operates below (and faster than) conscious awareness.Reference Axelrod144,Reference Cronk and Leech145 Befriending or cooperating with a stranger may have benefits, but those benefits are uncertain and limited whereas the costs of trusting an outsider may be lethal. Given the prominence of the concept in present-day international relations theory, it is striking that anarchy only took hold as a central feature of scholarship in recent decades, since the publication of Kenneth Waltzs Theory of International Politics in 1979. Neorealism points to international anarchy, a phenomenon we can evaluate, as the ultimate cause of state behavior. It is hard to escape the conclusion from the ethnographic and archeological evidence from Europe, North America, South American, Australia, and New Guinea that hunter-gatherers both simple and complex engaged in socially sanctioned lethal conflict between independent polities, suggesting an extremely long history of warfare that can ultimately be traced back to early hominins., Terry Jones and Mark AllenReference Allen and Jones58, Humans evolved as a distinct lineage principally in the Pleistocene era (from 2 million to 10,000 years ago), and our analysis therefore requires a discussion of the small-scale hunter-gatherer groups that formed the social and ecological context for that period of human evolution. A states elitesits captains of industry and media and its military and political leadersmay be more likely than average to show these traits in abundance for five reasons. Corrections? Second, the evolutionary approach helps make a given theorys assumptions about human nature explicit, exposing them to empirical validation. Waltzs core concept in Theory of International Politics is the anarchy that reigns in world politics. We do not assume that humans and our primate cousins simply inherited these traits wholesale from a common ancestor. The preeminent evolutionary theorist J.B.S. The key observation is that bonobos are less aggressive than chimpanzees. Haldane thus quipped that he would give his life to save two of his brothers (each sharing half of his genes) or eight of his cousins (each sharing one-eighth of his genes).Reference Haldane89,90 Inclusive fitness provides a biological basis for the common intuition that individuals favor those who are close genetic relatives.Reference Betzig91. Second, critics of offensive realism point to countering factors such as the democratic peace or international institutions. Combining the previous two considerations (leaders and sex) raises another problem: If leaders are especially egoistic and domineering, and if sex is a primary cause, does this not mean that we predict state leaders will undertake actions (consciously or subconsciously) that serve to maximize their own personal reproductive opportunitiesperhaps at the expense of state interests? Cooperation and peace efforts often fail precisely because people have too rosy a view of human nature and thus fail to structure incentives effectively. Natural selection generates contingent behavior because it is more effective than blind aggression. He received a D.Phil. Total loading time: 0 1-49; Robert Gilpin, War and Humans evolved in a state of nature where competition for resources and dangers from other humans and the environment were great. The fundamental differences and similarities between our theory of offensive realism and Mearsheimers arecaptured in Table4. First, offensive realism fails to explain why costly wars sometimes occur against the interests of the states that initiate them. Destined for War gets its Thucydides wrong, but its intentionsto warn that China and the US are on course to stumble into an unwanted warare noble. Our ancestors not only lived in a state of anarchy for millions of years, but they also evolved in that state of anarchy and consequently developed cognitive and behavioral adaptations specifically to survive and reproduce effectively under conditions of anarchy. Ethological studies have shown that hierarchical dominance systems within a primate groups social network can reduce overt aggression, although aggression increases again when the alpha male is challenged.Reference Knauft116,Reference Flack, Girvan, de Waal and Krakauer117,Reference de Waal118. The third contribution of our theory is that it identifies a more explicit role for leaders (see Table3). Indeed, a wide range of empirical evidence from psychology and neuroscience suggests instead that humans, especially men, not only want to be leaders but also enjoy the pursuit of power (as well as its material fruits).156,Reference Robertson157,158 The force of this motivation is frequently revealed in victors expressions of the satisfaction of conquest. When the stakes are high, such as in 1914, 1939, 1941, or 1962, or today in the Middle East, Ukraine, or the East and South China Seas, offensive realism does not seem so foreign. Competition for resources results in situations where consumption by one individual or group diminishes the amount available for others, or where one individual or group controls the distribution of resources and thus can deny them to others.Reference Meggitt63,Reference Keeley64, In the Pleistocene era, any group facing a shortage of resources (or a need for more, as the group expands) could have adopted one or a combination of three basic strategies. According to Waltz, the need for security leads states to favour the status quo and to adopt a defensive position toward their competitors. Clearly, when it comes to the many distinctive physiological and behavioral changes humans have undergone, ecology has been as or more important than phylogeny (hence, the field of evolutionary anthropology focuses on hunter-gatherer analogues, not nonhuman primate analogues). However, if unconstrained from having to fit evolutionary insights into any particular existing school of thought, evolutionary theory may offer its own, unique theory of international relations that shares features of offensive realism (and perhaps other theories too) but is distinct from them all. for this article. Humans may pursue self-interest and power by many means, including, for example, patience and reciprocity as well as coercion and violence. We should therefore expect instances of evolutionary mismatch in which evolved behaviors lead to poor decisions in modern settings. We see several reasons why human behavior is an important predictor of state behavior in the context of this article. The rest of the 500-plus page book more closely outlines. This parallels the primatologists argument that the efforts of chimpanzees to seek territorial expansion and as much power as possible represents an adaptive strategy to ensure survival and promote the success of future generations. Behavior varies considerably, just as standard offensive realism predicts for states, and countervailing forces would sometimes mitigate power-maximization strategiesalthough the very need for and difficulties of those countervailing forces help to demonstrate the fact that offensive realist behavior remains an underlying problem. Variations of Realism Working from these core assumptions realists have developed three major explanatory frameworks: l Classical or Human Nature Realists (Hans Morgenthau) l Structural or Defensive (a. k. a. neo-realists) Realists (Kenneth Waltz) l Offensive Realists (John Mearsheimer) l 3 First, neorealism does not rely on noumenal ultimate causation, and, second, it explains and predicts variations in the likelihood of war in international politicsparticularly among great powers. This collective benefit points to the special and much more significant role of anarchy at a higher levelanarchy between groups. This perspective does not deny the importance of institutions, norms, and governance in international politics. Indeed, Wrangham and Glowacki find evidence that after warriors killed members of a neighboring society, the killers group benefited as a whole via territorial expansion83precisely as has been shown for intergroup killings by chimpanzees. The recent crises of the Euro and migration have shown in stark terms that individual states continue to exploit the opportunity to free-ride on others if they can, and even the most powerful states, such as Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, have been reluctant or unwilling to make sacrifices to protect other states. Like egoism, the desire to dominate is a trait of human nature (which, as with egoism, we stress does not necessarily apply to every individual or situation but is a statistical tendency underlying behavior). That is, there is no ultimate authority in international politics comparable to a domestic government that can adjudicate disputes and provide protection for citizens.Reference Waltz25,Reference Waltz26 Without governmental authority, Waltz argues, the international system is a self-help system, where states must provide for their own protection through arms and alliances. Evolutionary theory can also explain dominance. Core Assumptions of Realism (5) 1. Behavior intention models, for example, assume people have: a linear time orientation (the future has meaning), an internal locus of control, and the ability to think in probabilistic terms. Of course, human behavior is not a direct extension of the behavior of other animals, but, as we have explained, the ecological setting in which our own species evolved made these same traits as or even more important for humans. When the stakes are high and ones livelihood or survival is threatened, the traits of egoism, dominance, and fear of outgroups come to the forea conclusion we can draw from any number of conflicts in the Balkans, Northern Ireland, Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Nigeria, India, and elsewhere. We realize international cooperation is prevalent, but that does not mean such cooperation is easy to obtain. Indeed, the competition for mates is subject to a special type of evolutionary selection processsexual selection, as opposed to standard natural selection. However, our contention is that significant aspects of political behavior could be given a stronger foundation if we acknowledge the powerful and basic biological principles that are chronically ignored in the political science literature, as well as the conditions under which they become exacerbated or suppressed. Thus, humans may consider other variables, such as the possibility of future trade or cooperation, when assessing outgroups. Chimpanzees do at least have some important ecological similarities to humans. We argue that evolutionary theory also offers a fundamental cause for offensive realist behavior (see Table1). Omissions? Mearsheimer outlines five "bedrock" assumptions on which offensive realism stands: (1) the international system is anarchic; (2) great powers inherently possess some offensive military capability; (3) states can never be certain about the intentions of other states; (4) survival is the primary goal of great powers; and (5) great powers are 5-57; Eric J.Labs, "Beyond Victory: Offensive Realism and the Expansion of War Aims,"Security Studies,Vol. States do not cooperate, except during temporary alliances, but constantly seek to diminish their competitors power and to enhance their own. Where these conditions are tempered, such as in the modern peaceful democracies of Western Europe, these cognitive and physiological mechanisms are likely to be more subdued. This realist assumption, however, is incorrect . Individual differences are important because political leaders may be more likely than the average person to display egoism, dominance, and groupishness. However, even fellow realists have found problems and inconsistencies with Waltz's structural realism. These adaptations in turn serve as a foundation for offensive realismwhat Mearsheimer independently identified as self-help, power maximization, and fear. In 1982 he became a professor of political science at the University of Chicago, where he was appointed the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science in 1996. We do not propose a nave transplant of nature red in tooth and claw (to quote Tennyson) into international politics. As such, an evolutionary account does not necessarily expect animals, humans, or states to act as offensive realists all the time and in all situations. He argues, like Waltz, that the anarchic international system is responsible for much troublesuspicion, fear, security competition, and great power warsin international politics. What made war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta.. What is the logic for risking life and limb in engaging in violent aggression against other groups? Rather, we suggest it is an example of what biologists call evolutionary convergencesimilar traits arising in different settings because they are good solutions to a common problem.
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