POST-REALISM POST-9/11

Francis A. BeerPolitical Science Department

University of Colorado,Boulder, Colorado 80309

beer@colorado.eduhttp://socsci.colorado.edu/~beerball/

Robert HarimanDepartment for the Study of Culture and Society

Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa 50311robert.hariman@drake.edu

http://www.drake.edu/artsci/soange/faculty/Hariman/profile.html

Article prepared for Études Internationales (special issue on “Lathéorie des relations internationales après 11 septembre,

edited by Dario Battistella) (2005).

POST-REALISM POST-9/111

From the fall of the Berlin wall to September 11, 2001,a series of dramatic events has provoked a foundational debate in the theory of international relations. On one sideof the aisle stand the realists, who rely on a long tradition of political analysis. From this perspective, 9/11is an iconic event that demands a return from the euphoria of velvet revolutions to the hard lessons of perpetual conflict. On the other side are those who believe that 9/11consolidates an increasing number of anomalies in the realist paradigm. In this view, 9/11 and its aftermath demonstrate the need for new theoretical efforts. According to this outlook, international relations theory in the 21st century should reflect and construct the field of international relations in more complex and humane ways. Such theory must be attentive to the many worlds of meaning immanent in the global interactions of the 21st century.

Post-realist theory begins with realism and confronts its limitations. This requires re-assessment of how realismboth describes and influences world politics. It also requires reconsideration of the object and method of international studies. Instead of a world limited to nation-states that optimize self-interest and settle accounts by force, post-realism also includes additional actors and motivations that operate through persuasive discourses. Instead of descriptions and explanations grounded only in claims of positive knowledge, post-realism also develops as an interpretative social science that explicates relationships between meaning and action. Thus, post-realism offers more reflexive models of strategic analysis. Such models can recognize a wide range of political actors and constraints while also identifying and countering “post-national” forms of power. As one example, this paper concludes with a brief account of U.S. imperialism as a distinctive cultural formation identifiablein part through discursive analysis. This account also

2

recuperates prudence as a model of political reasoning to counteract the arrogance of power.

Realism and American Power after 9/11

Standard international relations theory relies on the insights of political historians and theorists such as Thucydides, Machiavelli, and Hobbes. Twentieth century realists have included Raymond Aron and Hedley Bull, Hans Morgenthau and Henry Kissinger, Kenneth Waltz and John Mearsheimer. Starting from its roots in the realist canon, realism has also drawn heavily from the fields of diplomatichistory and military science. There has been a strong recentinfluence of political economy in such areas as its emphasison the material bases of political action and the interaction of interdependent preferences in decision processes. Realist theory has, in recent years, produced many branches, including neo-realism, structural realism, rationalism, defensive realism, offensive realism, and hyper-realism. A host of recent works, authored by so-called neo-conservative writers, have taken realist insightsand applied them to shape an aggressive 21st century American foreign policy under the name of the Project for the New American Century.2

Realist theory suggests that the basic structure of theinternational system is one of anarchic power relations, thelaw of the jungle. The struggle for power is general and permanent. More or less sovereign nation states have been, and will continue to be, the primary actors of internationalrelations. National behavior is and must be guided by national interest defined in terms of power. Military poweris particularly important because it allows the direct application of force. War, as the German theorist Carl von Clausewitz famously said, is the continuation of politics byother means. From this perspective, terrorism is simply another form of war, non-state actors another set of players, and the clash of civilizations another form of

3

realism, cultural realism. For the United States, defensive realism includes protecting the American “homeland;” offensive realism envisions geopolitical control of land andoil resources in the global “heartland” of Central Asia. Forrealists, the stubborn persistence of “savage wars of peace”3 in the 21st century will be no surprise.

In the realist worldview, the United States, at the beginning of the 21st century is that last fighter in the ring, the only superpower and a potential global hegemon. Currently ascendant American political elites seem to have both the capability and the intention to achieve world domination. The United States has “soft power” resources that dominate the global economy, global science and technology, and global culture. The American version of democracy, free markets, media, and technology--elections, shopping, Hollywood, and Silicon Valley—appeal deeply to theyoung generations of the 21st century. America speaks the language of peace and prosperity.

At the same time, however, the United States uses the “hard power” resources of military force in “coercive diplomacy,” undertaking short-term wars for the sake of longterm order. The United States has achieved “escalation dominance” at the higher levels of military force. American formal military capabilities seem at least equal to those ofall possible opponents combined. The United States’ technological resources try to make up for the fact that it can not match all opponents in terms of boots or sandals on the ground. American military capabilities extend upward andoutward into the far reaches of space, including the “Star Wars” anti-ballistic missile system and the “high frontier” of the moon and the planets beyond. Because of its ability to achieve vertical envelopment and local concentrations of force, American military capability also extends down into the subterranean recesses of the “spider holes” where individual enemies of the American people like Saddam Hussein may try to hide.

4

American military superiority has helped produce a change in the texture of war, the way in which war is fought. The first and second Gulf Wars and the American attack on Afghanistan suggest the emerging outlines of “asymmetric warfare” in the 21st century. Faced with American domination of the virtual battlefield, the huge opposing physical concentrations of land, sea, and air forces of World Wars I and II may become a thing of the past. Enemy political leaders were previously protected horizontally by their fleets or battalions. This is no longer true. They are now vulnerable to vertical pinpoint attacks from the air and space. On the ground, the balance of local forces is still important. Nevertheless, as the second Gulf War showed, the bionic soldier of the 21st century carries an enormous technological advantage in his or her fighting space. This advantage supports an “army hopping” strategy to bypass opposing force concentrations--like General Macarthur’s island hopping strategy in the World War II Pacific-- and zero in on specific points of political control. Warfare becomes narrower, personalized, and focused on individual leaders rather than on armies, navies, and populations. Political decapitation becomes moreefficient than massed confrontations to produce regime change.

In spite of its advantages in military technology, however, American dominance is far from complete. The UnitedStates has huge demographic disadvantages; it includes a relatively small population in a global ocean of people, notall of whom support the American project. Technology provides the leverage not only for global domination, but also for global resistance. Nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons of mass destruction can, as their name implies, wreak great destruction in small, highly populated spaces. Significant numbers of people seem willing to give up their lives in the name of liberation to oppose foreign domination. Examples include historical national resistance movements like the Vietnamese or Palestinians, or more recently self-selected sub-national or transnational groups

5

like Al-Qaeda. Domination and resistance can become joined in dynamic stalemates, intractable self-renewing struggles.

Moreover, the United States is challenged by rising economies in Asia, whose trained, low cost workers produce quality goods and services at much lower prices. American trade deficits, job losses, and rising indebtedness reflect the problems of America’s position in the competitive globaleconomic marketplace. As realists would recognize, American hegemony faces growing international opposition, even among some major traditional allies in the European Community – France for example. Potential superpowers like China may challenge the United States’ claim to global supremacy. Escaping realist calculation, many factors weaken domestic support for the American global hegemonic project. These include, and are not limited to, the incomplete achievement of democracy and social justice, erosion of civil liberties,alienation of young people, “outsourcing” of entire industries, and repeated deferral of infrastructure investments to fund military expenditures.

Post-Realism after 9/11

Just as there are many realisms wrapped into the largerrealist discourse, there are also many post-realisms. Most international relations theorists are both realists and post-realists. On the one hand, they have been socialized inthe realist culture of the field. On the other hand, they are aware of realism’s deficiencies. They approach realism’sstory of itself and its story of the world with varying degrees of critical caution. Realism offers the great advantage of parsimony, promising to explain a great deal with very little. At the same time, realism has serious deficiencies as positive theory. It fails fully and accurately to describe, explain, and predict international behavior. The events at the Berlin wall, for example, showedthe leaders of a great nation state voluntarily relinquishing power. Those at the twin towers involved

6

members of a sub-national group as major international actors.

The umbrella of post-realism covers many schools. It begins, of course, with the base of realism. International liberalism or neo-liberalism also become branches of post-realist theory. Liberals believe that realism focuses too exclusively on nations, short-term national interests, and national power. There are other actors in international relations besides nation states; there are long term interests in cooperation and international institutions; there are motivations other than power. International constructivism, a successor to international functionalism and regime theory, is another form of post-realism. International constructivists take realism to task for its exclusive focus on interests. Like the philosophical idealists of the 19th and early 20th centuries, constructivists believe that ideas and norms are important factors in the creation of the international regimes that structure world politics.4

Post-realism, as we use it here, begins with and incorporates elements from various forms of realism, liberalism, constructivism, as well as contemporary theory and research from such fields as political communication andpolitical psychology to construct its own narrative. Post-realism’s story of the world begins with the identity of theprotagonists. Of course there are nation-states, large and small. There are also international intergovernmental organizations like the United Nations or the European Community, and international non-governmental organizations like the Red Cross. Other transnational actors, for example,include the Catholic Church or the Islamic umma. Thus, in the post-realist world, nation states are important actors, but they are not alone. Post-realism recognizes the multipleagents in the international system. The agents exist in multiple overlapping configurations: individuals, groups, nations, states, and, ultimately, systems. The smaller agents (individuals and groups) and larger agents

7

(nations/states/systems) shape each other. All of the agents combined comprise a network, connected by talk, action, and thought. 5

In the post-realist picture of the world, power does not just grow from the barrel of a gun. There are many otherforms of action and power—political, economic, social, cultural, and scientific. International interactions are complex, and non-material capabilities can be significant. Power has, moreover, important contextual dimensions that are embedded in specific issues and places. Post-realists recognize the complexity of power, particularly the power oflanguage. Hans Morgenthau explicitly acknowledged this, as he concluded his canonical Politics Among Nations with a plea for diplomacy. Talk matters.

Talk matters not just in the diplomatic world, but in the theoretical one as well. Post-realism’s story of international relations theory is, therefore, self-consciously, rhetorical. This element of post-realism challenges the exclusively positivistic bases upon which realism and other international relations theory rests. Post-realism suggests that realism is only partly scientificpositivistic theory, but also--more significantly--a form ofrhetoric representing itself as scientific positivistic theory. Realist theory is thus not only detached scientific observation, but also a very powerful form of speech action,a narrative with hegemonic political force. As realism and post-realism describe, explain, and predict the world, they also construct, shape, and control it.6

8

Having defined actors and forms of action and power, post-realism turns to thought. Post-realism suggests that foreign policy cognition is thicker, denser, hotter than realism believes. There is more to decision-making than simple motivations of national interest defined in terms of power, benefits and costs, ends and means. National elites have singular memories of history and its lessons, unique perceptions that shape their views of policy situations and their political decisions. They are concerned with the 1 The authors would like to thank David Skidmore for his insightful comments. He is, of course, not responsible for the final result.2 See inter alia James Mann, The Vulcans (New York: Viking, 2004); Robert Kagan, Of Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New World Order (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003); Robert D. Kaplan, Warrior Politics: Why Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos (New York: Random House, 2002); Glenn H. Snyder, “Mearsheimer’s World—Offensive Realism and the Struggle for Security,” International Security 27, 1 (Summer, 2002): 149-173; John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy ofGreat Power Politics (New York: Norton, 2001); Michael E. Brown, Sean M. Lynn-Jones, and Steven E. Miller, eds. The Perils of Anarchy: Contemporary Realism and International Security (Cambridge MA: MIT Press, 1995); Project for the New American Century http://www.newamericancentury.org/. It isimportant to note that some traditional realists have opposed the aggressive turn in American foreign policy. When foreign policy is pushed toward extreme actions by ideologues, realism can provide an important critical perspective. 3 Max Boot, The Savage Wars of Peace: Small Wars and the Rise of American Power (New York: Basic Books, 2002). The title is taken from Rudyard Kipling, “The White Man’s Burden,” McClure’s Magazine (Feb. 1899). 4 See inter alia Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 1999); Vendulka Kubálková, Nicholas Onuf,Paul Kowert, eds., International Relations in a Constructed World (Armonk, N.Y. : M.E. Sharpe, c1998); John Gerard

9

legal, ethical and moral rules of their communities, and they can be emotional. Decision-makers are not necessarily bound by the realist narrative, by its characterization or plot. Decision-makers appear in many different forms; they can construct themselves in many different ways. They can and do make a difference.

Post-realism, like realism, recognizes logic and facts;unlike realism, post-realism, as we suggested above, also recognizes rhetoric. Taking a linguistic turn, it emphasizes how discursive forms such as metaphor and narrative are an important means of persuasion. Thus, post-realism relies on criticism and the formulation of alterna-tive perspectives. It involves deconstruction and re-construction, a rereading of texts, a rewriting of concepts and practices to achieve a thorough revision of realist discourse. The turn into post-realism also involves an emancipatory dynamic; a renewed emphasis on agency, action, and freedom; a belief that a post realist can affect his or her world. While sensitive to the claims of objective sci-ence, determinant structures and processes, it sees at the same time that these are human creations, the resultants, the emergent properties, of scientific and political

Ruggie, Constructing the World Polity : Essays on International Institutionalization (London ; New York : Routledge, 1998); Yosef Lapid and Friedrich Kratochwil, eds., The Return of Culture and Identity in IR Theory (Boulder, Colo. : Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1996). 5 Justine Cassell, Joseph Sullivan, Scott Prevost, ElizabethChurchill, eds., Embodied Conversational Agents (Cambridge Mass.: MIT Press, 2000); Robert Jervis, System Effects: Complexity in Political and Social Life (Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998). Robert Axelrod, The Complexity of Cooperation: Agent-Based Models of Complexity and Collaboration (Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press,1997). 6 Francis A. Beer and Robert Hariman, eds., Post-Realism: The Rhetorical Turn in International Relations (East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 1996).

10

practice. Post-realists broaden scientific inquiry to include a complex field of analytical frameworks. These frameworks are shaped in such a way that they are suitable for analyzing not only an objective Other, but also, the more important subjective Self. Post-realism thus implies reflexivity; it suggests self-awareness that is enhanced by a heightened sensitivity to discourse. Finally, post-realismcombines science and interpretation, strategic analysis and criticism, power and prudence as it envisions the evolution of a global civil society.

Post-Realism as Science

Post-realism’s story of the world takes account of scientific theorizing about world politics. One possible post-realist version of the story of war and peace serves asan example. Using three standard levels of analysis, this account includes systemic, regime, and individual explanations of war and peace.7

At the highest level of granularity, post-realism incorporates systemic explanations of war and peace. This 7 Sketches of current theorizing in world politics include Dario Battistella, Théories des relations internationales (Paris: Presses de la Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques. 2003); Amélie Blom et Frédéric Charillon. Théories et concepts des relations internationales (Paris: Hachette Supérieur, 2001); Scott Burchill, Richard Devetak, Andrew Linklater, Matthew Paterson, Christian Reus-Smit, andJacqui True, Theories of International Relations. 2nd ed. (Houndsmills UK: Palgrave, 2001). James E. Dougherty and Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Contending Theories of International Relations, 5th ed. (New York: Addison Wesley Longman, 2001);Jean-Jacques Roche, Théories des relations internationales, (Paris: Montchrestien). See also Jennifer Sterling-Folker,  "Evolutionary Tendencies in Realist and Liberal IR Theory, " pp. 62-109 in William R. Thompson, ed.,Evolutionary Interpretations of World Politics (New York : Routledge. 2001).

11

systemic explanation puts the structure of power in a largercontext. It recasts the international system as a network that contains multiple linked institutions and processes that are grouped in three tendencies – polarization, militarization, and aggregation. The relative strength of each of these determines the larger network’s dynamics. Different configurations predispose the network towards war,while others predispose it towards peace. As realism suggests, polarizing processes like national differentiationconstruct an anarchic but hierarchical international power system. Inequality and instability are also part of the mix.Large, rich, cohesive nation states dominate and compete in world politics. This competition often takes the violent form of war. Polarization thus also implies militarization, for example military alliances and continuing arms races, including the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. International polarization and militarization thus push the international system toward war. There are, however, countervailing forces. Superordinate aggregative structures and processes of global civil society—international law, organization, trade, and communication, for example-- may pull the actors toward post-realism and peace. The discourseof international morality and ethics may also constrain the actors. In this larger view, countervailing realist and post-realist elements produce different systemic moods or states. In some times and places, the international network runs relatively smoothly and peacefully; in other situationsit works more roughly; sometimes it simply blows up. 8

At a lower level of political analysis, post-realism integrates regime explanations of war and peace concentrating on individual states and distributions of power within them. The “democratic peace” hypothesis, for example, suggests that democratic states do not fight each other.9 If one wants peace, according to this theory, one should build democracy. The American emphasis on “regime change” and “liberation” in the second Gulf War is 8 See Francis A. Beer, Peace Against War: The Ecology of International Violence (San Francisco: W. H. Freeman, 1981).

12

consistent with this body of theory, as are current theorizing and policy in the area of nation-building and peace-building. Presumably, if the United States builds democracy in Iraq and extends it in the Middle East, such democracy will have a pacifying influence. It is not, however, clear how one builds democracy at gunpoint, whetherAmerican enthusiasm for democracy will include directly elected Shiite regimes, or what foreign policy popular democracy in the Middle East will produce.

Whatever the situation may be in local cases, there isstill considerable debate on whether and how the democratic peace actually works. No matter what its historical merits, the implications of the democratic peace for the future are unclear. If democratic institutions achieve a global scope, it is not necessarily true that we shall have reached the end of war. Instead, the dividing line between democracies and dictatorships may dissolve into a post-democratic continuum of political forms, different kinds and degrees ofdemocracies—representative or direct, parliamentary or presidential, for example. The democratic peace hypothesis does not, moreover, imply that democratic states do not go to war. The imperialism of the European democracies, the United States’ Monroe Doctrine and its corollaries, and the continuing American program to make the world safe for democracy through preemptive intervention all suggest that democracies can be belligerent, and that democratic aggressions may simply be redirected to less democratic or less friendly and pliant states in the 21st century.

At the lowest micro-level, post-realism finally includes individual explanations of war and peace 9 See, for example, Joanne S. Gowa, Ballots and Bullets: TheElusive Democratic Peace (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999); Michael E. Brown, Sean M. Lynn-Jones, and Steven E. Miller, eds., Debating the Democratic Peace (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996); Bruce M. Russett, Grasping the Democratic Peace: Principles for a Post-Cold War World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993).

13

concentrating on particular human beings, who are often presented in dramatic settings, as agents. Rationalism, the individualist variant of realism, presents decisions as if they are taken purely on the basis of rational comparison ofcosts and benefits. Individual players in the game of war and peace, from this perspective, advance their own interests and those of the sub-national, national, and transnational groups that they lead. At the same time, individuals make war and peace not just on the basis of material interests, but also on the basis of ideas and images. The role of religion and ideology in the conflicts of the contemporary Middle East and Central Asia are furtherexamples of the importance of non-material dimensions of decision. Finally, recent psychological laboratory experiments show that public thinking about international attacks is more complex and dynamic than simple rationalism.Such individual reactions to attacks depend on a mixture of emotion and reason, the nature of attackers and targets, personality and gender, and a host of other factors that interact over time. One particularly interesting finding of these psychological experiments is that gender makes a difference. Women respond less conflictually than men to reports of international attacks by actors with whom there exists a previous positive connection. Another democratic state or an international ally is a political example of such a prior friendly relationship. On the other hand, if individuals do not see a clear prior positive association with an attacking agent, women respond with a higher degree of violence. Nobody likes to be attacked, but men react morestrongly to attacks by friends, women to attacks by strangers.10 Predispositions matter.

Post-Realism as Interpretation

10 Francis A. Beer, Alice F. Healy, and Lyle E. Bourne, Jr., "Dynamic Decisions: Experimental Reactions to War, Peace, and Terrorism" in Margaret G. Hermann, Ed., Political Psychology as a Perspective on Politics. Advances in Political Psychology Vol. 1 (London: Elsevier, 2004).

14

The post-realist account presented above is consistent with contemporary social science theory and research on war and peace, though it places them in a rhetorical frame. Its language is not, however, value or consequence free; it has effects. For example, how we define wars determines the war and peace patterns that we find and the statistics that we analyze. The inclusion of state or non-state actors, formal declarations of war or peace treaties, direct or indirect casualty levels in initial theoretical definitions of war, all shape subsequent empirical conclusions.

Meanings and Rhetorics

Events, as they occur in the world, are subject to interpretation. They are polysemic with multiple meanings that are neither determinate, unitary, nor stable. 9/11, forexample, had multiple meanings which varied according to thespecific events or dates chosen for attention, the particular actors or observers interpreting them, and the benchmarks chosen for comparison.11

While academics tend to use a “scientistic” discourse, political leaders tend to use a more dramatistic language tospin war and peace.12 In democratic societies, the language of war and peace is not just part of the symphony of vernacular voices.13 It also becomes part of permanent electoral campaign competition. It is commonly believed thatactions speak louder than words, that talk is cheap, and that leaders’ speeches are “just” rhetoric.14 Nevertheless, speech acts and verbal behavior are important, observable dimensions of war and peace. Language mediates between the external objective world and the internal subjective one; it

11 See Francis A. Beer, Meanings of War and Peace (College Station, Texas: Texas A&M University Press, 2001).

15

provides important tools to interpret thoughts and shape events. Leaders may not always say everything that they think or think everything that they say, but they probably say what they think that their followers think -- or want tohear, or need to hear in order to follow -- and what they want other political leaders to believe. Their rhetoric is an important means to mobilize political support and neutralize or destroy political opposition, and it becomes a“second nature” that constrains and motivates both audiencesand persuaders. This rhetoric reflects to some extent the objective fact patterns of international relations. However,the connection between fact and talk is not always either clear or true. In spite of American political rhetoric, where were the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction; what were the connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda; where were the Iraqis among the bombers of 9/11? Nevertheless political rhetoric, true or not, guides societies as they react to international events. For example, the attacks of 9/11 couldhave been characterized, as was the earlier Oklahoma City bombing, as individual criminal acts instead of international acts of war. Palestinians could be depicted asnationalist freedom fighters or insurgents under Israeli occupation rather than inhuman terrorists. Eastern Europe can be conceived as a recent addition to the existing European Community or as an independent actor in the form ofNew Europe. Potatoes can be French fries or freedom fries. Political rhetoric helps give such phenomena meaning.

Metaphors and Narratives12 Kenneth Burke, Language as Symbolic Action, (Berkeley CA:University of California Press, 1966), 23.13 Gerard A. Hauser, Vernacular Voices: The Rhetoric of Publics and Public Spheres (Columbia SC: University of SouthCarolina Press, 1999).14 There are, of course, other modalities of rhetoric. See Robert Hariman, Political Style: The Artistry of Power (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995). Robert Harimanand John Louis Lucaites, Icons of Liberal Democracy: Public Culture in the Age of Photojournalism (forthcoming).

16

The rhetoric of war and peace relies heavily on metaphor and narrative; it develops in phases consistent with those of war and peace; and it is directed through multiple media networks to parallel audiences. Each nation has its own cluster of metaphors, many of which are associated with past wars. Not only military generals, but also political leaders, seem to fight previous wars. American Presidents have used metaphors from prior wars extensively in justifying war policies. Franklin Roosevelt’s“holy war” and Dwight Eisenhower’s “crusade in Europe” drew on the religious wars of the Middle Ages, as did George W. Bush’s reference to a “crusade” against terrorists.15 Such analogies merge well with religious themes in such phrases as “In God We Trust” or “God bless America.” The Munich metaphor was important as Harry Truman went into Korea, and it was also evoked repeatedly prior to the invasion of Iraq.Such usage is obviously strategic, and the strategic implications are further evident from seeing which historical analogies are not evoked. Although France had preceded the United States in Indochina, and there were substantial parallels between French and American experience, American leaders were, ironically, reluctant to use metaphors from these earlier events. Instead, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon relied on Cold War metaphors of falling dominos, and light at the end of a tunnel of darkness. Subsequently, metaphors from prior American military engagements were employed to mobilize support and oppositionduring the political debates about United States wars in theBalkans, the Persian Gulf, and Central Asia. In the “metaphor wars” surrounding the physical wars, the World WarI Balkan powder keg or tinderbox, World War II appeasement at Munich and the Holocaust, and the Vietnam quagmire were all used. Likewise, 9/11 was cast as Pearl Harbor. The applicability and implications of these metaphorical 15 George Herbert Walker Bush, “Remarks by the President Upon Arrival,” September 16, 2001 <http:www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010916-2.html>

17

clusters from past wars were advanced and contested by partisans on different sides of the political debate.16

The primary metaphor for political order is the metaphor of the body, resting on the common human physical condition of embodiment. Louis XIV’s famous statement that he was the state recalls the important connection between the person of the sovereign and the sovereign personality ofthe state. It is, therefore, not surprising that the sovereign “state-as-person,” particularly as a warrior-person, has been important in justifying and motivating war.The “body politic” is a collective simulacrum. The nation-state is a virtual body in which all citizens sacramentally participate. The penetration of that body, as in the sackingof the White House in 1812, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, or the plane crashes of 9/11, are perceived as acts of profane violation. The part stands for the whole; the Presidential residence in 1812, the naval base in 1941, the twin towers in 2001 represent America. The attacks are not just physical, but deeply symbolic. They are humiliating andmust be avenged, whether or not vengeance is taken on the actual perpetrators or on less related or unrelated unpopular scapegoats. The British were beaten back, the Japanese forced into unconditional surrender. After 9/11, ifOsama bin Laden was unreachable and the Saudi regime untouchable, pain and rage could be displaced onto Afghanistan, Iraq, and Saddam Hussein.

War/peace discourse also uses metaphors from other dimensions of life. Family metaphors are important, as in talk about sending our sons and daughters into harm’s way, whether or not those who go are really our sons and daughters. There are, interestingly, again important genderdifferences in the use of such metaphors. An analysis of theCongressional debate before the Gulf War revealed that womenused family metaphors significantly more often than men. The16 See Francis A. Beer and Christ’l De Landtsheer, eds., Metaphorical World Politics (East Lansing MI: Michigan StateUniversity Press, 2004).

18

list of words in the family metaphor cluster include the words brother, children, daughter, family, father, growth, husband, kid, life, love, mother, parents, preserve, protect, sister, son, and wife. Women members of Congress used these words more often in the debate than men--about twice as often. This tendency was uniform across each and every one of the family words. The result was the strongest gender difference across four thematic scales -- realism, idealism, body, and family – that occurred during the Congressional Gulf War Debates.17

Game and sports metaphors are also prevalent in talk about war and peace. Scholars of international relations arefond of mathematical game theory as an analytical tool. In amore popular context, General Schwarzkopf mixed football andreligion when he characterized a military flanking maneuver as a “Hail Mary” play. Macho phrases, taken from other contexts, like “read my lips,” “make my day,” “let’s roll,” or “bring ‘em ‘on,” and images of Presidents chopping brush or landing on aircraft carriers in flight gear also send powerful metaphorical messages. Disease metaphors are another important resource for persuasion. For example, pictures of delousing Saddam Hussein after his capture carrypowerful metaphorical meaning. This image doubles with other caricatures of Middle Eastern political actors as vermin, including rats, spiders, and other predators.

Metaphors of war and peace are included in larger, widely promulgated, narratives of good and evil, what the eminent historian William McNeill called “mythistories,” through which nations shape their collective memories and find their identities.18 These larger narratives form the context and sub-text of daily news stories. From this perspective, the 20th century was a struggle between evil, 17 Francis A. Beer and Laura Brunell, “Women’s Words: Gender and Rhetoric in the Gulf War Debate,” in Beer, Meanings of War and Peace, pp. 106-114.18 See Francis A. Beer and Jeffrey S. Kopstein, “Between Maastricht and Sarajevo: European Identities, Narratives andMyths,” in Beer, Meanings of War and Peace, pp. 150-163.

19

in the form of totalitarian dictatorships, and the forces ofgood, in the form of allied democracies. The plot outline ran roughly as follows:

1. The Cold War was a struggle between ultimate evil, represented by the Soviet Union, and the forces of good, represented by the United States and its allies.2. Under American leadership, the Atlantic Alliance provided a wider umbrella of association and security.3. The Alliance had a center, defined geographically byNorth America and Northwestern Europe and functionally by free market economies.

This narrative, reinforced by events, was the hegemonic discourse, the dominant interpretation, the mythical superframe of world politics for the last half century.

We may look upon the war on terrorism as the 21st century installment in this long-running serial. The war is defined as a “just war” advancing the twin causes of globalization and democratization. It is waged against an “axis of evil,” which recalls the enemy Axis powers of WorldWar II. There is a “clash of civilizations,” which echoes General Eisenhower’s “crusade in Europe,” as well as a millennial historical struggle between the forces of Christianity and Islam. “Wanted dead or alive” – Osama or Saddam – is the American version of evil and retribution in the service of historical “Manifest Destiny” as it has been embodied in western cowboy movies.

This repetitive script for world politics can be easilyunderstood by “ism-analysis.” Anti-fascism gives way to anti-communism, which is, in turn replaced by anti-terrorism. The underlying plot structure remains the same. Only the anterior modifier, the name of the enemy, changes. The plot line of the sequel is as follows.

1. The War on Terrorism is a struggle between ultimate evil, represented by terrorist actors, and the forces of good, represented by the United States and its allies.

20

2. Under American leadership, a loose alliance of anti-terrorist states provides a wide umbrella of association and security.3. This anti-terrorist alliance has a center, defined geographically by the states in the Northern hemisphereand functionally by market economies.

Within this larger narrative are embedded smaller ones like “Operation Iraqi Freedom.”

Such narratives intersect with collective identities. The French philosopher, Paul Ricoeur19 states that "individual and community are constituted in their identity by taking up narratives that become for them their actual history." Self is thus embedded in narrative; narrative is the matrix that identifies, locates, indexes, specifies, andrecognizes the emergent pattern of the self.” In plainer language, this means that national histories reflect and form national identities. To be American for some is to believe in the story of good and evil that pits the democracies against the –isms, us against them. Good and evil are forever joined in conflict. As former Secretary ofState John Foster Dulles put it, there are no neutrals; in the words of George W. Bush, you’re either with us or against us. To disbelieve this story is, in the chilling title of a recent best-selling book, treason.20

Metaphors and narratives form the texture of the rhetoric of war and peace, which changes with the phases of war and peace. At the onset of war, the hot rhetoric of mobilization dominates. There is graphic talk about evil people responsible for atrocities: Osama bin Laden and the victims of 9/11, Saddam’s gassing of the Kurds. As war 19 Paul Ricoeur, The Rule Of Metaphor: Multi-Disciplinary Studies Of The Creation Of Meaning In Language, translated by Robert Czerny, with Kathleen McLaughlin and John Costello(Toronto; Buffalo, NY: University of Toronto Press, 1977), p. 247.20 Ann Coulter, Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism (New York: Crown Forum, 2003).

21

progresses, a cooler rhetoric of disengagement eventually appears. Such distancing talk is more removed from everyday physical experience; it frames events more abstractly in terms of self-congratulation for the benefits of intervention, critical reflection about the costs, and lessons for future policy-making. This cooler, more abstractrhetoric will be increasingly evident as the United States withdraws from Iraq. Together, these alternating discoursesproduce national mobilization to war while maintaining public quiescence regarding executive authority or wisdom.21

The rhetoric of war and peace provides meaning to multiple, diverse, parallel audiences, within and beyond theboundaries of particular nation states. At home, its purposeis to promote unity and patriotism; abroad, it binds allies and deters enemies. It provides cues to domestic and foreignaudiences about leaders’ future plans. Modern media networksdistribute the words and images connecting leaders and followers, friends and foes. Different media, in different national contexts – CNN, BBC, Agence France Presse, or Al Jazeera – interpret conflicts in different directions with different images and commentary. Histories of democracy and imperialism, Iraqi freedom and American invasion, the war game and dead children, are opposite sides of similar coins.22

Post- Realism as Strategy

It is not enough simply to interpret a world of meaningif one has to act. Post-realism has to face the demands of political reasoning under pressure. When the actors are 21 See Francis A. Beer and G. Robert Boynton, “Talking about Dying: Rhetorical Phases of the Somalia Intervention," in Beer Meanings of War and Peace, pp. 117-138.22 See “Globalizing Terror” (with G. R. Boynton) POROI Journal 2, 1 (2003).http://inpress.lib.uiowa.edu/poroi/papers/beer030725_outline.html (accessed March 30, 2004).

22

pressed, simple models of political action become especiallyappealing, and it is hard to resist the realist’s seeming monopoly on analytical economy. As we have argued elsewhere, however, realist habits of thought can be the source of strategic blunders, particularly during periods ofcomprehensive change.23 Once again, 9/11 is an object lesson. The attack on three office buildings had a massive symbolic repercussion throughout U.S. society and across theglobe far beyond actual material damage or continuing threat. Thus, from the first, the strategic situation is a complex political scenario defined by publicly negotiated meanings. The U.S. response (particularly in the mobilization to war) demonstrated how large-scale state action is defined by metaphor and narrative, and how such discursive resources for rationalizing state action are continually contested in respect to a wide range of additional perspectives, interests, and issues. Subsequent breakdown of the mission in Iraq and continuing conflict andinstability in the region demonstrate, on the one hand, the failure of simple models of state action in a complex environment, and, on the other hand, the importance of having a strong capability for negotiating cultural differences. In particular, the manner in which military conquest can quickly be contained by local resistance is a stunning demonstration of the costs of cultural illegibilityand inattention to political history. Conquest depends on advantages in weapons and technical information, but as those gaps disappear during occupation, strategic success becomes dependent on interpretation and persuasion.

If nothing else, this reveals one irony of unilateral, preventive war: by forswearing diplomacy—that is, centralized negotiation among highly skilled, professional communicators—the state then stakes its success on thousandsof fragmented interactions among differentially competent, partially ignorant actors who are at a constant disadvantage. That is but one part of the problem, however.The larger dilemma is that strategic analysis has to involve23 Beer and Hariman, eds., Post-Realism.

23

both reductions in complexity in order to identify effectivemeans-ends relationships at several levels of state action, and realistic adaptation to complex environments where meaning, nor force, is the key to success. Thus, once one moves from war to the aftermath of war, one has to move beyond a model of political action that is based primarily on assessments of force. Any successful strategy has to include a “politics of recognition” that valorizes cultural differences and multiple perspectives.24 By moving from a realist model of analysis to a post-realist politics of recognition, one can become oriented not only towards a nuanced account of a previously illegible environment, but also toward action that is more likely to be effective because it is grounded in reciprocally-negotiated definitions.

Any strong strategy also will be reflexive—if only to reflect on its likely blind spots. Thus, there is need to organize different approaches to strategic thinking in orderto identify both characteristic choices and likely oversights. In our initial statement of post-realism, we set out a three-tiered model.25 The first level identifies the fundamental, universal conditions of all strategic encounter. Competitors strive for advantage over each otherto control scarce resources. The keys to victory include realistic assessments of actual strengths and weaknesses as well as rational calculations of probable outcomes. Victoryalso can depend on reacting swiftly to changes in the competitor’s behavior while engaging in tactics of indirection to cloak one’s own intentions. This simple realism is all one needs to know some of the time, and something one always should be aware of. It becomes unreliable, however, once multiple situations overlap, or competitors hold different objectives or different definitions of the situation, or unaccounted and “non-24 Charles Taylor, Multiculturalism and “The Politics of Recognition”, with commentary by Amy Gutmann, ed., et al. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992).25 Beer and Hariman, eds., Post-Realism, pp. 392-404.

24

rational” factors prove consequential, or other complications arise.

The second level of strategic thinking emerges to manage additional complexity. This mentality is developed in response to the hidden variables in the primitive situation, particularly those that emerge with the passage of time. Over time, it becomes evident that the competitiveenvironment is continually changing due to forces that are not controlled by the actors or are unintended consequences of their actions and interactions. In addition, over time the actors’ accumulate knowledge of each other while also becoming constrained by their own past actions. One result is that strategic thinking adapts to this heightened sense of both contingency and constraint by focusing on self-control. Strategy now operates through the ethos of the strategist. Like Machiavelli’s model prince, the strategistis always alert to both danger and opportunity, constantly training for conflict, attuned to the political implicationsof any activity, and exercising disciplined restraint over one’s impulses. In a world where complete victory is rarelyavailable, one must learn to both cut one’s losses and seizeany advantage, and doing so without falling into snares willrequire both constant circumspection and a projection of self that can keep others at bay. This classical realism has had enormous appeal in international affairs, but it remains characteristically self-limiting. The focus on self-control carries with it ego-centric definitions of the strategic situation, merely instrumental understanding of political resources, and ultimately a hermeticism that can lead to stunning failures in perception (as when leading realists were the last to know that the Soviet Union was going to collapse). If competitors are not like the strategist, then the classical realist can be at a loss to explain their actions.

The third level of strategy is devoted to continual revision of prior definitions of the strategic situation in order to identify more comprehensively effective and

25

sustainable actions. Modeled after Karl von Clausewitz’s concept of Kritik but going beyond the formulation of grand strategy, the keys to this higher-order analysis are that, first, from this point onward, strategic thinking becomes explicitly a form of interpretation, and, second, that interpretation has to be focused on range of discourses. Moving above the array of forces and specifically political objectives, the strategist has to recognize how other discourses in and accounts of the situation identify previously unseen or undervalued variables and provide additional resources for understanding and action. Thus, strategy shifts from a calculated assertion of self to the politics of recognition. Social discourses of ethnicity, hospitality, honor, and fashion, cultural discourses of religions, arts, sports, and interaction rituals, economic discourses, institutional discourses, academic discourses, these and more become not merely complications but rather bases for mapping complexity and forging alliances. Strategic thinking has to remain grounded in the primitive conditions of competition as they exist in a specific situation, but it also has to become a hermeneutical practice that accepts an encounter with the other than can change one’s own identity. Such is the cost of peace, and something that often is more difficult than “tough-minded” self-control.

This post-realist conception of strategy integrates crucial elements of the realist mentality with seemingly incommensurable perspectives. Once outside the bounds of academic theory, that is not so difficult as political actors negotiate social and cultural complexity in environments where pragmatism trumps consistency. The post-realist stance does have limitations, however, including notleast the fact that interpretive flexibility takes time—timeto develop the skills and time to apply them. It appears, however, that time is an increasingly scare resource in the United States. The rush to war in Iraq is now being matchedby an equally precipitous disengagement. The likelihood of a sustainable commitment of any sort, much less a

26

sustainable democracy, appears problematic. Such oscillation might be a typical feature of U.S. foreign policy, but it also could be a symptom of more structural considerations that have not yet been adequately theorized.26 Thus, an additional question comes into play for the strategic thinker. Are there factors that have not yet been adequately accounted for? If so, what discourses should be taken seriously in order to understand this next level of complexity? Could there be something that is not operating at the level of primitive operations of power, or the level of agent-driven initiatives, or the level of complex but still localized interaction?

Post-Realism as Criticism

Critical strategic thinking thus leads inevitably to additional features of post-realist critical analysis. We consider here three points of departure: paradoxes and ironies, forms of power, and distortions.

Paradoxes and Ironies

It is not news to consider that war may be a study in paradox, but even so one should consider how particular ironies can reveal overlooked issues. 27 One of the ironies 26 It is not enough, however to rely on a more systematic articulation of simple realism (e.g., neo-realism). That approach elides everything that does not fit into a too-narrow conception of structure. As a result, it cannot recognize those elements that have to be included in a comprehensive account of political motivation. See Yosef Lapid, “Nationalism and Realist Discourses of International Relations,” in Beer and Hariman, eds., Post-Realism, pp. 239-256.27 Zeev Maoz, Paradoxes of War: On the National Art of Self-Entrapment (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990); Andreas Diekmann andPeter Mitter, with contributions by G. Arminger et al., Paradoxical Effects of Social Behavior: Essays in Honor of Anatol Rapoport (Heidelberg: Physica-Verlag, 1986).

27

in the current debate about the invasion of Iraq is the confused identity of the intellectual architects of the war,who have been described as both realists and idealists.28 The cast of characters includes Max Boot, Richard Perle, andPaul Wolfowitz, as well as their mentors and apologists suchas Robert Kagan, Victor Davis Hanson, and Charles Krauthammer. 29 The double labeling may be dismissed as merely journalistic sloppiness or as the effect of an artfulrhetorical campaign by those being labeled, but even if truesome of the time, such dismissals miss an opportunity for analysis. To take just one example, note how Wolfowitz describes himself: "I think I'm a realist, as well as an optimist.” Or, again: “I think I'm a realist, not an

28

idealist. I do believe in those ideals”30 Both the paradigmatic substitution of opposing terms and the parataxis between these last two sentences are signs of trouble in the discursive system. Wolfowitz provides similar vacillations, ruptures, and repairs on a regular basis. Such maneuvers suggest that the language itself is failing to account for something adequately, while it also can be a symptom of systematic distortion of the means of representation. One also should ask whether such failure or28 There are many examples on both sides. See, e.g., David Ignatius, “A War of Choice, and One Who Chose It,” Washington Post, November 2, 2003, p. B1. (The article was retitled “Paul Wolfowitz, Idealist in Chief” in the NationalWeekly Edition.) Ignatius’s conclusion reveals how he is a model of conventional thinking: “The idealism of a Wolfowitzmust be tempered by some very hard-headed judgments about how to protect U.S. interests. . . . The idealists can win this war, but only if they act with brutally honest pragmatism.” On the other side: “Wolfowitz Strikes Again,” Resist! June 4, 2003, <http://resist.twotoprecords.com/archives/000220.html>, accessed March 15, 2004. See also Eric Cox, “Contradictions in Terms: Making Sense of Journalism's Foreign Policy Taxonomy,” In the National Interest, July 2, 2003 <http://www.inthenationalinterest.com/Articles/Vol2Issue26/Vol2Issue26Cox.html>, accessed March 15, 2004. What Cox doesn’t see is how this proliferation (and breakdown) of labels is symptomatic of a larger problem in representation.29 Representative statements include Max Boot, “The Case for American Empire,” The Weekly Standard 7 (October 15, 2001) and Savage Wars of Peace; David Frum and Richard Perle, How to Win the War on Terror (New York: Random House, 2003); Charles Krauthammer, “The Unipolar Moment,” Foreign Affairs 70.1 (1990-1991): 23-33, “The New Unilateralism,” WashingtonPost (June 8, 2001), and many subsequent columns.30 Thom Shanker, “Wolfowitz’s Hotel is Attacked in Baghdad,”New York Times, October 26, 2003, p. A11; “Wolfowitz Criticizes Turkey for Not Backing U.S. on Iraq,” Deputy Defense Secretary's interview with CNN Turk, May 6, 2003,

29

distortion could also be evident in discourses other than journalism, such as the discourse of international relationstheory.

How is it that a foreign policy doctrine can be characterized as both realist and idealist? Or that the U.S. can declare a commitment to creating democracies while directly obstructing democratic self-assertion? Or that the war on terrorism can dedicate almost all resources against astate that did not conduct or support terrorism? Or that the U.S. can be faulted by war critics for abandoning a tradition of multilateralism, when it has a long, almost unbroken record of unilateral decisions?31 Or that Iraqis can be chastised for acting on assertions without proof, by a supporter of an invasion that was based on assertions without proof?32 And why is it that the concept of imperialism has been taken up anew as a central question by both supporters and critics of the invasion, but only marginally by scholars of international relations, who prefer the more antiseptic, ahistorical term of hegemony?33

Formations of Power

To answer these and similar questions together, one needs to recognize that all the principals are caught in thesame dilemma, which is to describe a systemic transformationthat itself defies the current languages of description. Just as the intellectual identities of many analysts are unclear, definitions of central concepts like imperialism are also blurred. The concept of imperialism does need to beresuscitated, and not just seen as a “popular” account of system dynamics better explained through more modern theories of hegemonic international relations; it also has to be adjusted. New contexts imply new meanings. If “imperialism” is too narrow, and “globalization” too broad—and each at times used as an unwieldy account of the other—

U.S. Department of State International Information Programs http://usinfo.state.gov/topical/pol/terror/texts/03050706.htm> accessed March 15, 2004.

30

the fact remains that a particular formation of power is being revealed. This formation is not strictly a feature ofor coincident with the interests and actions of the superpower state, even though it is easily seen as such. Post-realist criticism considers how “imperialism” represents an important political problem with a long history and a rich texture. Imperialism marks a form of power that is both material and cultural; an expansive form of state action and an emergent structure of economic and political practices that can control state action; an optimization of advantages and an irrational drive toward self-destruction. As the ideological mystifications of the Cold War evaporate, and before a new discourse of hegemony is consolidated, it becomes possible to see the outline of that rough beast slouching toward Bethlehem.

The case for imperialism is not difficult to make: a U.S. military budget equaling the combined expenditures of the rest of the world despite the absence of enemy states; 750 official military bases in 120 countries34; a foreign aid budget devoted to large expenditures on military and 31 David Skidmore, “The Hegemon’s Prerogative: Unilateralism,Multilateralism, and American Foreign Policy,” paper presented at the 2004 International Studies Association.32 “[Captain] Prior took the chance to teach the mob a broader lesson: ‘The problem is that you people accuse each other without proof! That’s the problem!’” David Brooks, “Boots on the Ground, Hearts on their Sleeves,” New York Times, December 2, 2003, A31. Brooks is spinning an anecdote reported by George Packer, “War after the War,” NewYorker, November 24, 2003.33 Cf. Noam Chomsky, Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance (The American Empire Project) (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2003); Cynthia Weber, Faking It: U.S. Hegemony in a "Post-Phallic" Era (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999); Robert O. Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984).

31

political elites in client states; ever-tighter couplings between military and commercial interests and institutions; a global pattern of economic and military coercion on behalfof corporate expansion that draws more and more of the worldinto the U.S. economic system; American cultural products, practices, and fashions dominate consumption world-wide; U.S. public discourse proclaims cultural superiority and unsurpassed power while boasting of self-restraint; current policy-makers espouse imperial rule; current interventions prove to be conquest masked as responses to threats that were known to be imaginary. Likewise, many of the argumentsagainst the claim that the U.S. is an imperial power are based on historical errors. Empires need not be based on official designation of colonies, or formal monopolies on trade, or explicit celebration of imperial rule. Nor are empires incompatible with liberalism or pluralism, nor with reliance on surrogate forces, acquiescence with local prerogatives, failure to realize national interests, or disengagement from particular trouble spots. Typically, thecase against American empire depends on comparison of current circumstances with France or Britain during the “Ageof Empire” in the late 19th century, which was in fact a relatively exceptional formation in the history of Western imperialism. In fact, U.S. imperialism is not identical to French or British imperialism, which were not identical to German or Dutch, Spanish or Portuguese imperialism, which were not identical to the Holy Roman or classical Roman Empires, Persian conquest, or Athenian expansion. Nor are these empires exactly the same as those centered further from Europe, in Africa and Asia. Each empire is not like itspredecessors, and has to be different, for imperial success must depend on successful adaptation to newly emergent historical circumstances.35

This is not the whole story, however, because the American empire also has from the beginning been caught in specific contradictions which add to the matrix of paradox and irony. First, American national identity was constituted in explicit opposition to imperial rule, and by

32

means of a language of universal self-determination. Second, imperial expansion was driven by an economic system that was absolutely foundational to American society yet ultimately indifferent to national interest. Third, imperial expansion became a proven vehicle for deferring structural deficiencies within the system, but at the cost of legitimation problems that interfere with rational deliberation. So it is that the U.S. defines control as emancipation, promotes development of a global order that demotes the sovereignty of all nation states, and describes resistance as an attack on a “way of life” that is itself becoming ever more impoverished materially and culturally byinvestment abroad. Another sign is that descriptions of U.S. imperialism, not least by those promoting it, typicallyfeature a historically distinctive ambivalence: the U.S. is the “incoherent,” “adolescent,” “reluctant,” or “accidental”empire.36

If nothing else, such descriptions finesse any moral qualms, but they have another resonance that is worth exploring. American power is thought to be self-limiting, and this is half-right. Key features of the presently emerging formation of U.S. power include both the sense of enormous economic and military power flowing into a vacuum, and the sense that this power is already hamstrung, lacking direction or will, inherently vacillating. The error is in thinking that this is the case, instead of seeing it as, first, a symptom of the symbolic contradiction of being an American empire, and second, a cautionary note, a statement of some version of what should be the case. American imperialism is halting rather than crusading, but that is necessary to maintain its own ideological cover while avoiding more direct accountability. More important, the model of the self-limiting empire is both a fantasy and a prudential model for an inherently expansive society. 34 Chalmers Johnson, The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (New York: Henry Holt, 2004), p. 4 and chapter six. “Actually, there are many more”U.S. sites abroad that are clandestine.

33

Thus, the focus on the constraints on power becomes a litmus test of ideological mystification. The question is, to what extent can one acknowledge the fact of empire in a society where empire has to be denied? “The Empire State” can only refer to New York, the term a trace of aspirations that now have to be written in code or qualified on behalf of the seemingly different ideal of global order. Although imperialism certainly operates through economic, institutional, and military practices, it also depends on a sophisticated array of discourses to project power, constitute subjects, legitimize policies, and evade analysis. Imperialism has been the elephant in the living room of international relations theory, and the dark matter that silently distorts democratic deliberation. The mixed metaphors point to varied articulations of a common condition, one in which the modern regime of security and rights is valorized, economic and cultural domination is euphemized as “soft power,”37 and the reciprocal

35 Cf. Niall Ferguson, Empire : The Rise And Demise Of The British World Order And The Lessons For Global Power (New York : Basic Books, 2003); Charles A. Kupchan, The End of the American Era : U.S. Foreign Policy and the Geopolitics of the Twenty-First Century (New York : Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 2002); John Newhouse, Imperial America: TheBush Assault on the World Order (New York: Knopf, 2003); Emmanuel Todd, Après l’empire (Paris Gallimard, 2003); Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Empire (Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 2000); Christopher Simpson. Universities and Empire : Money and Politics in the Social Sciences during the Cold War (New York: New Press: distributed by W.W. Norton & Co., 1998); Roxanne Lynn Doty, Imperial Encounters (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996);Edward Said, Culture and Imperialism (New York : Knopf : Distributed by Random House, 1993); Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Empire: 1875-1914 (New York: Random House, 1987); John Bagot Glubb, The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival (London: Blackwood, 1978).

34

dependencies between the several modalities of power are unmarked.

Post-realism draws on discourse analysis to understand historically specific articulations of imperial power. In the present circumstances, the focus has to be on the expansion and justification of American economic and military policies. This imperial formulation includes an oscillation between confident attempts to make history fulfill Enlightenment ideals, to realize a global civil society on American terms, and evasive deferrals of democracy, justice, and public reason to a horizon of impending globalization. It also includes a characteristic doctrine of assimilation—one that exports assimilation through a culture of retail consumption rather than allowingit to occur through incorporation. And it requires a peculiar application of terror—one that imports terror as aninstrument of political control rather than using it solely on the periphery. It is a model of power that emphasizes advantage over adaptation, and that is resolutely opposed tothe idea of alternative modernities.

In this essay we can only outline a few points for a post-realist anatomy of imperial power. The first point is a simple one of relabeling: U.S. foreign policy is driven inpart by the structure of motivation, rationalization, and denial that is imperialism in practice. A label is only that, but it is also a frame, necessary perhaps as a psychological maneuver, and essential if one is to refit political discourse to better engage with current political 36 Michael Mann, Incoherent Empire (London: Verso, 2003); James Kurth, “The Adolescent Empire,” The National Interest 48 (Summer 1997); Sebastian Mallaby, “The Reluctant Imperialist,” Foreign Affairs (Mar/April 2002); Jackson Diehl, “The Accidental Imperialist,” Washington Post Weekly Edition (Jan. 6-12, 2003).37 See Joseph S. Nye, Jr., The Paradox of American Power: Whythe World's Only Superpower Can't Go It Alone (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002).

35

realities in the light of past historical experience. By relabeling actors and actions as imperialistic, one can explain current anomalies in the application of more familiar categories. Is U.S. policy realist or idealist? Both and neither, because it is something else that draws onand reorganizes elements of both mentalities. The imperialist trusts in brute necessity, exploiting advantages, and the use of raw power, and does so to extend civilization by emancipating people from other structures ofdomination. Is there a basic tendency in U.S. foreign policy, or is it a case study in vacillation? Both and neither, because the contradiction of an American empire produces expansion that is constant yet ambivalent and so generally disposed to half-measures.

Distortions

Much is not explained by recourse to “imperialism,” of course, but it is better to be proved wrong and to refine one’s analysis of what is the case—perhaps the elephant is not so large after all—than it is to distort all other termsas they are used to explain away what is actually there. This interest in recognizing distortion moves beyond simple relabeling (recognition) to consider how representation is affected by the imperial formation. “Representation” here refers to the discourses used to describe international relations, and, for the moment, particularly the public discourses of journalism, commentary, and statements of political leaders. “Distortion” refers to the distensions and ruptures in discourse as it is applied to phenomena thatrepeatedly contradict the worldview that the discourse projects. For example, the alcoholic who is supposed to be a “good father” comes to be described as “tired.” “Not now,sweetheart, daddy is tired.” “Why is daddy always tired?” “Why are you bothering him? Do your homework.” Of course, daddy is tired, but that is the least of it. Or, “U.S. forces supported Iraqi police as they returned fire against the ambush.” “Why did the Iraqi police need support?” “Whydon’t you support the troops?”

36

Three means of distortion are particularly active at the moment: abstraction, amnesia, and terror. Each is well-suited to the task of projecting while denying imperial power. Abstraction is the natural language of the metropoleand its system of administration.38 Whether seeing a world of provinces or markets, or tabulating populations or resources, or collecting taxes or profits, or supplying camps or bases, the imperial imagination has to be a bureaucratic imagination. The world is the world that can be written, mapped, marked into functionally equivalent, universally legible units of administration. And what cannot be seen, or should not be seen, must be forgotten. As abstraction is also the sine qua non of international relations theory, the disciplinary discourse can inculcate a“trained incapacity” to criticize imperial practices.

Amnesia becomes the complementary mechanism of abstraction, for that which disrupts the map of fields and forces, or challenges the moral legitimacy of control, has to become invisible. Thus, the conquering state quickly becomes enmeshed in a complex politics of revelation and deception: revelation of those crimes that would justify invasion by a morally and culturally superior state, and burial of those crimes committed while invading, occupying, and extracting. The necessary casualty is not truth, but irony. One side-effect is a great deal of waste motion: Theenergy expended on the control of public memory in the United States in the past year has been truly remarkable.39 38 This claim is indebted to James C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998).39 Note the effort on both sides: “President Bush and four top advisors made a combined 237 misleading public statements on the threat posed by Iraq, Democrats charged ina congressional report released on Tuesday.” “Democrats Tally ‘Misleading’ Iraq Statements,” Reuters, March 16, 2004<http://www.reuters.com/printerFriendlyPopup.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=4583383> accessed March 18, 2004.

37

The result is a general degradation of common knowledge and social trust, increased fragmentation of the public, and a foreign policy developing with little relationship to eitherinterests or ideals.

These highly cognitive mechanisms of abstraction and amnesia require a third: terror. Ism-analysis, which we discussed earlier, suggests that terrorism is the half-sister of imperialism. There is no Pax Romana without crucifixion, no empire without barbarians, and global order requires “war without end.” Empire depends on the use of terror on the periphery to project power amidst extreme ratios of ruler to ruled, and it depends on terror in the metropole to quell dissent regarding the massive dispersion of resources outward and upward. The “endocolonization” that guts the social and economic infrastructure of the imperial state—as happened within the Roman system, and is happening in the U.S.—is not something that can be hidden merely by temporary infusions of cash.40 Just as important,the imperial state depends on a process of identity construction that exacerbates the dialectic of self and other. As empire produces hybridization, it paradoxically becomes more committed to the use of fear of the Other to maintain quiescence. As the Other becomes more evident within oneself, the projection of danger has to become all the more gargantuan, disconnected from past experience, and abstract. Can a “clash of civilizations” be far behind?41

40 Paul Virilio and Sylvère Lotringer, Pure War, trans. Mark Polizzotti (New York: Semiotext (e), 1983); Catherine Lutz, Homefront: A Military City and the American 20 th Century (Boston: Beacon Press, 2001).41 Robert A. Divine, Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2000); Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York: Simon & Schuster, c1996); Michael T. Klare, War without End: American Planning for the Next Vietnams (New York: Knopf, 1972).

38

Thus, it is becoming apparent to some critics that 9/11was a gift from the gods of empire. The massive activation of terror within the body politic was like a hit of some pure narcotic. It wears off, of course, and the demands andhabits and friction of daily life slowly reassert themselvesto restore a more realistic orientation toward the world—as anyone going through airport security has experienced. But the discursive articulation continues, constantly bringing the war home, continually redefining the world as a world ofpower containing terror. It is only a matter of time before,once again, life will imitate art. The perversity is this: people will be killed, and that act will be used to rescue the system that invites the killing.

The Post-Realist Planet

Against this self-validating circulation of imperial discourse, the post-realist offers politics of recognition and norms of prudence. All power depends on one’s capacity to see and define the other; a politics of recognition contests the assumptions and effects of the dominant gaze.42

This redefinition is ultimately about the question of agency: who has the power to act in a situation? By contesting the power of recognition—the terms on which one is recognized as a subject—there can be a shift from domination to co-production. This shift is the key to civilorder in all domestic polity, but one that encounters special obstacles in the international sphere. These are not insurmountable, however, particularly when one recognizes the imperial structures for what they are. By shifting to the co-production of meaning, agency, and 42 As Roxanne Doty has suggested insightfully, realism can’t recognize the “social logic” of imperial relationships. Realist theory not only elides how power depends on identitythat is constructed through articulations of difference, butalso refuses to take seriously the primary medium in which identity construction occurs—i.e., discourse. Roxanne Lynn Doty, “The Logic of Différance in International Relations,” in Beer and Hariman, eds., Post-Realism, p. 331-345.

39

political relationships, one can learn how power can become susceptible to a range of influences that can in turn restrain, soften, and diffuse its operation.

The central question is whether globalization is to be merely a facade for empire or if, as post-realism implies, the hard lump of imperialism can be dissolved in the ocean of globalization. The post-realist perspective sounds idealistic, but it in fact addresses a fundamental weakness in realist thinking. At its best, the realist is grounded in Francis Bacon’s maxim that “nature to be controlled must be obeyed.”43 Something happens, however, when people becomefascinated with power, as many a myth reminds us. There is a two-fold development: the user of power becomes addicted to its use, while power itself becomes its own sovereign, anautonomous, self-perpetuating force in human affairs, alienated from and active over the human practices that bring it into existence. So it is that the realist can seemto account for imperialism, while actually losing sight of how imperial power becomes a self-perpetuating cultural formation more independent and directive of both individual agency and structural determination than realist theory can allow. The same holds for various idealist perspectives: they, too, can see only the opportunities for realization oftheir precepts without regard for the larger Leviathan that is not limited sovereign power alone. Once captured by thetensions within the modern dialectic of security and rights,one can account for a great deal of international affairs without having to admit how a central deformation of the system remains unidentified.44

The common language of Western politics does provide one term for recognizing the imperial deformation of perception, reason, and relationships. That term is hubris,translated today as arrogance. A (Democratic) U.S. secretary of state justifies unilateral use of force by claiming that “We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall and we see further than other countries into the future. "45 A (Republican) President justifies preemptive

40

war by declaring that “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists,” and by claiming that the U.S. has been“called to a unique role in human events” on behalf of “the cause of all mankind.”46 This is hubris, and it is not enough merely to name it. There is need to develop countervailing norms of political reason. Post-realism takes that step by reformulating strategic thinking as an exercise in prudence.

Instead of taking a rhetoric of self-restraint at face value, the post-realist recognizes that empires are by theirnature not self-limiting; they expand continually, even at the expense of the metropole. Thus, the internal restraint on empire has to be an act of political will, and it has to create conditions or mechanisms to realize that intention. The post-realist does not vest that capability in either thepolitical leadership or the rule of law, but rather in practices and vocabularies of political deliberation. A theoretical template here is taken from economics, and for good reason: capitalism depends for its survival on democratic practices that limit economic domination and maintain competition—practices that the capitalist class continually tries to eliminate. So it is with the system ofstates. Concrete models for prudential action can be taken from political history (e.g., the Algerian War), political thought (e.g., Richelieu or Montesquieu), or political 43 Francis Bacon, The New Organon, and Related Writings, edited with an introduction by Fulton H. Anderson (New York,Liberal Arts Press, 1960), Book I, section 3.44 For analysis of the regime of security and rights, see Michel Foucault, “Two Lectures,” from Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977 (New York: Pantheon, 1980). Although empire is not limited to disciplinary power, it likewise cannot be seen clearly within a framework limited to sovereign power and juridical restraint. The realist is attuned to the reduction of law to power within that system, and the idealist is attuned to its need for some recognition of rights, but neither can account for other forms of power.

41

institutions (e.g., the Assemblée Nationale). In more general terms, we believe that prudence in the contemporary moment requires commitment to regulative principles, of which we cite four as examples: orientation toward mutual advantage (which, in turn, depends on recognition of the other’s relative autonomy and commitment to co-production ofpolicy); respect for the particular achievements of liberty within each society (which rejects one, liberal, Enlightenment model of national development); a doctrine of 45 Madeleine K. Albright, Interview on NBC-TV "The Today Show" with Matt Lauer, Columbus, Ohio, February 19, 1998, asreleased by the Office of the Spokesman, U.S. Department of State. The full exchange was:

MR. LAUER: Will you speak for me, Madame Secretary, to the parents of American men and women who may soon be asked to go into harm’s way,and who get the feeling that many countries in therest of the world are standing by silently while their children are once again being asked to cleanup a mess for the rest of the world?SECRETARY ALBRIGHT: Well, let me say that there are, a couple of dozen countries that are with us on this that are providing a variety of equipment,support and are willing to be with us. So there isa misunderstanding about saying that there is no coalition; there is. And the truth is that in the Gulf War, we did most of the work, too. There’s noquestion that we, with the British and French, dida large proportion of the work.Let me say that we are doing everything possible so that American men and women in uniform do not have to go out there again. It is the threat of the use of force and our line-up there that is going to put force behind the diplomacy. But if wehave to use force, it is because we are America; we are the indispensable nation. We stand tall andwe see further than other countries into the future, and we see the danger here to all of us. Iknow that the American men and women in uniform

42

military power which concentrates on flexible response and minimal disruption of civilian infrastructure (contrary to the current war on terror); a pragmatism in negotiations that is not so much “hard-headed” as it is reflexively awareof how power is self-limiting (while relying on shared ideals as means for creating good will).

These ideas start to comprise a program for using powerwithout becoming addicted to it. The goal is to sustain thepolitical system, while remaining aware how that system makes people into instruments of its own destruction. Perhaps not so ironically, the result is much the same whether one selects empire or democracy as the practice to be sustained: in each case, the unchecked growth of imperialpower poses a serious threat. “Imperialism” is a clunky term in international relations, but it still marks what is too often overlooked: power develops into a self-perpetuating cultural formation that exceeds any original intentions and co-opts those practices that would keep it incheck.

Post-realism is one attempt to correct the co-optation of international theory. The first step is to draw on methods for the analysis of political discourse, as that is a window on the realities that realism denies. The next

are always prepared to sacrifice for freedom, democracy and the American way of life.

Note also how both the question and the answer are a seamless text.46 George Herbert Walker Bush, Address to a Joint Session ofCongress and the American People, September 20, 2001; State of the Union Address, January 29, 2002, January 28, 2003. The president also goes out of his way to assure the world that the American story is “the story of a power that went into the world to protect but not possess, to defend but notto conquer” (Inaugural Address, January 20, 2001). Again: “We exercise power without conquest” (State of the Union Address, 2003). Again: “We have no desire to dominate, no ambitions of empire” (State of the Union Address, 2004).

43

step is to move beyond narrow models of discursive manipulation to critical reflection on how international theory limits understanding of the complexity of political practice. Such reflection includes questioning the habitualdemarcations between international and domestic politics, and between academic and public discourses. Then, by not just “mapping” but also engaging with politically significant forms of cultural articulation, one can begin todevelop richer models of political action. Such models haveto return at some point to questions of political choice, and so post-realism goes beyond a narrow definition of political rationality and strategic calculation to articulate models of prudence as they are available in theory, history, and contemporary practice.47 If it is to be a prudential theory, the full articulation of post-realism has to end with recognition of its own limitations and the need to collaborate with others in the continuing historical task of fully describing, explaining, predicting,and constructing a complex, emerging global society.

47 See Robert Hariman, ed., Prudence: Classical Virtue, Postmodern Practice (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003); Francis A. Beer and Robert Hariman, "Would It Be Prudent? Forms of Reasoning in World Politics," Rhetoric and Public Affairs 1 (1998): 299-330.

44