Development as a Hobbesian dilemma

Third World Quarterly

Volumn 17, Issue 5, 1996, Pages 903-916

  Sørensen, Georg ^a  

^a AARHUS UNIVERSITY   (Denmark)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0141971652     PISSN: 01436597     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/01436599615173     Document Type: Article

References (55)

1. In Hobbes's words: 'Men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish ⋯ in such condition there is no place for industry ⋯ no culture of the earth ⋯ no navigation ⋯ no commodious building ⋯ no knowledge ⋯ no arts: no letters; no society.' Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (with an introduction by Michael Oakeshott), Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1960, p 82.
2. Cf Robert O Keohane, 'Hobbes's dilemma and institutional change in world politics: sovereignty in international society', in H H Holm & G Sørensen (eds). Whose World Order? Uneven Globalization and the End of the Cold War. Boulder, CO: Westview. 1995, pp 165-187.
3. Hobbes, Leviathan, p 82.
4. It is true, of course, that the pursuit of self-interest can have some positive spin-off in terms of security and order and also overall development, because state rulers need some modicum of order and legitimacy to stay in power. My premise here is that self-interest alone is not sufficient to overcome the Hobbesian dilemma. As I shall demonstrate below, this assertion is well borne out in practice. For a recent attempt to explain development failures as well as successes through the actions of the state elite, see Alan Carter. 'The nation-state and underdevelopment'. Third World Quarterly., Vol 16, No (4), 1995, pp 595-619.
5. Martin Wight, International Theory: The Three Traditions. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1992. p 35.
6. Cf Robert H Jackson, Quasi-States: Sovereignty, International Relations and the Third World, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990; and Muhammed Ayoob, The Third World Security Predicament, State Making, Regional Conflict, and the International System. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1995.
7. Cf Robert H Jackson, Quasi-States: Sovereignty, International Relations and the Third World, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990; and Muhammed Ayoob, The Third World Security Predicament, State Making, Regional Conflict, and the International System. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1995.
8. Cf William I Zartmann, 'Posing the problem', in Zartmann Collapsed States. The Disintegration and Restoration of Legitimate Authority, Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1995, p 1.
9. These are the extreme options, of course, and there are many possible combinations in between. For clarity, however, it is helpful to discuss the extreme options.
10. Cf Stephen D Krasner, 'Realism, imperialism, and democracy'. Political Theory, Vol 20, No(1), 1992, pp 38-52; Stephen D Krasner, 'Westphalia and all that', in J Goldstein & R O Keohane (eds), Ideas and Foreign Policy. Beliefs, Institutions, and Political Change, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993. pp 235-265.
11. Cf Stephen D Krasner, 'Realism, imperialism, and democracy'. Political Theory, Vol 20, No(1), 1992, pp 38-52; Stephen D Krasner, 'Westphalia and all that', in J Goldstein & R O Keohane (eds), Ideas and Foreign Policy. Beliefs, Institutions, and Political Change, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993. pp 235-265.
12. Cf Kenneth N Waltz, Man the Stale and War. A Theoretical Analysis, New York: Columbia University Press, 1954; Waltz, Theory of International Politics, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979; Bruce D Porter 'External Conflict and Internal Sovereignty: toward a Neorealist Theory of the State', paper presented to the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, New York, September 1994.
13. Cf Kenneth N Waltz, Man the Stale and War. A Theoretical Analysis, New York: Columbia University Press, 1954; Waltz, Theory of International Politics, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979; Bruce D Porter 'External Conflict and Internal Sovereignty: toward a Neorealist Theory of the State', paper presented to the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, New York, September 1994.
14. Cf Kenneth N Waltz, Man the Stale and War. A Theoretical Analysis, New York: Columbia University Press, 1954; Waltz, Theory of International Politics, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979; Bruce D Porter 'External Conflict and Internal Sovereignty: toward a Neorealist Theory of the State', paper presented to the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, New York, September 1994.
15. David Held, Democracy and the Global Order, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995, p 54. In the English case, Held notes that 'from about the twelfth to the nineteenth century, between 70 and 90 per cent of the English state's financial resources were continuously devoted to the acquisition and use of the instruments of military force, especially in international wars'. (p53)
16. See for example Tom Kemp, Industrialization in the Non-Western World, London: Longman, 1983, pp 18-44.
17. Cf Thomas B Gold, State and Society in the Taiwan Miracle, New York: East Gate Books, 1968, p 50; Georg Sørensen, Democracy, Dictatorship and Development. Economic Development in Selected Regimes of the Third World, London: Macmillan, 1991, p 122.
18. Cf Thomas B Gold, State and Society in the Taiwan Miracle, New York: East Gate Books, 1968, p 50; Georg Sørensen, Democracy, Dictatorship and Development. Economic Development in Selected Regimes of the Third World, London: Macmillan, 1991, p 122.
19. Gold, State and Society in the Taiwan Miracle, p 57. The present security situation of Taiwan remains complex, not least because some groups on the island support reunification with mainland China and some oppose it. It is the early turn-around of the Jiang Kaishek regime which is interesting in the present context.
20. Analysed in detail in Neil H Jacoby, US Aid to Taiwan, New York: Praeger, 1966.
21. Andrew J Nathan, Chinese Democracy, London: Tauris, 1986, p 228.
22. See the lucid analysis of the situation in B Womack, 'The party and the people: revolutionary and postrevolutionary politics in China and Vietnam', World Politics, Vol 29, No (4), 1987, especially pp498-499.
23. Of course the Maoist leadership is to blame for the fact that the mistaken policies with horrible consequences in human suffering were continued for some time after they had proven wrong, apparently for reasons having to do with intra-elite power struggles. Cf Sørensen, Democracy, Dictatorship and Development.
24. Cf John J Mearsheimer, 'The false promise of international institutions', International Security, Vol 19, No (3), 1995, pp 5-49.
25. Substantial statehood means state power in three respects: (a) national capabilities; (b) political capacity; and (c) institutional coherence. Cf Ayoob, The Third World Security Predicament, p 21.
26. Analysed in detail in Jackson, Quasi-States.
27. See Robert H Jackson, 'The weight of ideas in decolonization: normative change in international relations', in Goldstein & Keohane Ideas and Foreign Policy, pp 111-139.
28. Raymond W Copson, Africa's Wars and Prospects for Peace, New York: ME Sharpe, 1994. p 29.
29. Sean Kelly, America's Tyrant. The CIA and Mobutu of Zaire, Washington, DC: American University Press, 1993.
30. Keohane, 'Hobbes's dilemma', p 171.
31. 'Individuals must be lured by incentives to undertake the socially desirable activities [that constitute economic growth]. Some mechanism must be devised to bring social and private rates of return into closer parity ⋯ A discrepancy between private and social benefits or costs means that some third party or parties, without their consent, will receive some of the benefits or incur some of the costs. Such a difference occurs when property rights are poorly defined, or are not enforced. If the private costs exceed the private benefits, individuals ordinarily will not be willing to undertake the activity even though it is socially profitable.' D C North & R P Thomas, The Rise of the Western World, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973, pp 2-3, quoted in Keohane, 'Hobbes's dilemma', p 171.
32. 'Individuals must be lured by incentives to undertake the socially desirable activities [that constitute economic growth]. Some mechanism must be devised to bring social and private rates of return into closer parity ⋯ A discrepancy between private and social benefits or costs means that some third party or parties, without their consent, will receive some of the benefits or incur some of the costs. Such a difference occurs when property rights are poorly defined, or are not enforced. If the private costs exceed the private benefits, individuals ordinarily will not be willing to undertake the activity even though it is socially profitable.' D C North & R P Thomas, The Rise of the Western World, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973, pp 2-3, quoted in Keohane, 'Hobbes's dilemma', p 171.
33. The following paragraph draws on Sørensen, Democracy, Dictatorship and Development, p 82.
34. United Nations Development Programme, (UNDP), Human Development Report 1991, New York: Oxford University Press, 1991.
35. Cf Georg Sørensen, Democracy and Democratization. Processes and Prospects in a Changing World, Boulder, co: Westview Press, 1993, p 80.
36. See Pranab Bardhan, The Political Economy of Development in India, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1984; and Sørensen, Democracy, Dictatorship and Development.
37. See Pranab Bardhan, The Political Economy of Development in India, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1984; and Sørensen, Democracy, Dictatorship and Development.
38. Dankwort A Rustow, 'Transitions to democracy', Comparative Politics, Vol l, No (3), 1970, p 350.
39. Marina Ottaway, 'Democratization in collapsed states' in Zartmann, Collapsed States, p 243.
40. Ibid.
41. See L Diamond, J J Linz & S M Lipset (eds), Democracy in Developing Countries. Vol. 4: Latin America, Boulder, co: Lynne Rienner, 1989.
42. Robert H Jackson, 'The security dilemma in Africa', in B L Job (ed), The Insecurity Dilemma. National Security of Third World States, Boulder, co: Lynne Rienner, 1992, p 91.
43. See Christopher Bennett, Yugoslavia's Bloody Collapse - Causes, Course and Consequences, London: Hurst and Company, 1995.
44. Zartman, Collapsed States, p 268.
45. Such proposals are spelled out in detail in Ted Robert Gurr, 'Peoples against states: ethnopolitical conflict and the changing world system', International Studies Quarterly, Vol 38, No (3), 1994, pp 364-368. Gurr is quite optimistic about the prospects for managing such conflict.
46. Ottaway, 'Democratization in collapsed states', p 245.
47. Ibid, p 246.
48. K M Bask & A Sørensen, 'Governance, Ethnicity and Nationalism in Uganda', MA thesis, Roskilde University: International Development Studies, 1995.
49. G Almond & G B Powell, Comparative Politics: A Developmental Approach, Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1978; SP Huntington. Political Order in Changing Societies, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1968.
50. G Almond & G B Powell, Comparative Politics: A Developmental Approach, Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1978; SP Huntington. Political Order in Changing Societies, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1968.
51. P B Evans, 'Predatory, developmental and other apparatuses: a comparative political economy perspective on the Third World state', Sociological Forum, Vol 4, No (4), 1989, pp 561-588; Georg Sorensen, 'Democracy, authoritarianism and state strength', in G Sørensen (ed), Political Conilitionalily, London: Frank Cass, 1993, pp6-35.
52. P B Evans, 'Predatory, developmental and other apparatuses: a comparative political economy perspective on the Third World state', Sociological Forum, Vol 4, No (4), 1989, pp 561-588; Georg Sorensen, 'Democracy, authoritarianism and state strength', in G Sørensen (ed), Political Conilitionalily, London: Frank Cass, 1993, pp6-35.
53. See for example J Healey & M Robinson, Democracy, Governance, and Economic Policy: Sub-Saharan Africa in Comparative Perspective, London: ODI, 1992.
54. J Lonsdale, 'States and social processes in Africa: a historiographical survey', African Studies Review, Vol 24, 1981, p 139.
55. For this argument, see for example Jackson, Quasi-States.