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Abstract ▼ AI-Helper

This article aims at revisiting structural balance of power theory through Einstein’s theory of relativity. Waltz has attempted to explain the international politics by focusing on distribution of power among great powers and concluded that balance of power necessarily tends to appear over time. Wal...

This article aims at revisiting structural balance of power theory through Einstein’s theory of relativity. Waltz has attempted to explain the international politics by focusing on distribution of power among great powers and concluded that balance of power necessarily tends to appear over time. Waltz’s theory of balance of power, however, has long been criticized for failing to explain particular behaviors of states. Waltz does not accept such criticism because he argues that such unit level analysis is not in the realm of his structural theory, but that of a theory of foreign policy. In this respect, the problem is how to improve Waltz’s systemic theory without adding any other unit-level variables such as perception. For this, Einstein’s relativity theory provides highly important implications for the progress of the balance of power theory. Einstein achieved a great success of improving Newtonian mechanics by specifying the mechanism by which gravity is transmitted: the warping of space which Newton left unexplained. By analogy, explaining a state’s foreign policy requires understanding curvature(the degree of the warping of space) generated by distribution of power among states. This is because states decide their particular foreign policy not by power itself but by curvature made by power. This implies that states could opt for buck-passing or bandwagoning other than balancing.

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