Gilpinian realism and international relations

International Relations

Volumn 25, Issue 4, 2011, Pages 499-511

  Wohlforth, William C ^a  

^a DARTMOUTH COLLEGE   (United States)

Author keywords

Balance of power; International relations theory; Kenneth Waltz; Paradigms; Realism; Robert Gilpin

Indexed keywords

EID: 83155160826     PISSN: 00471178     EISSN: 17412862     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0047117811411742     Document Type: Article

References (39)

1. Robert Gilpin, War and Change in World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
2. In this essay, I use 'IR' to denote the academic discipline and 'international relations' to denote its subject.
3. Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1979).
4. In a survey of some 1400 IR scholars in the US and Canada, Gilpin was ranked 10th (in 2004) and 12th (in 2006) among scholars 'who have had the greatest impact on the field of international relations over the past 20 years'. In both years, Keohane, Waltz and Wendt were numbers 1, 2 and 3, respectively.
5. Daniel Maliniak, Amy Oakes, Susan Peterson and Michael Tierney, The View from the Ivory Tower: TRIP Survey of International Relations Faculty in the United States and Canada, available at: www.wm.edu/irtheoryandpractice/trip/surveyreport06-07.pdf. Cumulative citations in all political science journals on JSTOR for Waltz's Theory total 773, while Gilpin's War and Change garners 326; citations in the top five US journals (American Political Science Review, International Organization, International Security, International Studies Quarterly and World Politics) sum to Theory: 486, War and Change: 199.
6. Robert O. Keohane, 'Theory of World Politics: Structural Realism and Beyond', in Ada Finifter (ed.), Political Science: The State of the Discipline (Washington, DC: American Political Science Association, 1983).
7. Rickard K. Ashley, 'The Poverty of Neorealism', International Organization 38 (Spring, 1984): 225−286.
8. John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: Norton, 2001).
9. Note, however, that the Arab oil embargo and other developments in the international political economy helped propel that subfield within IR, in which Gilpin's work played a key role.
10. Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, 'Toward a Scientific Understanding of International Conflict: A Personal View', International Studies Quarterly 29(2), 1985, pp. 121-136
11. John A. Vasquez, The Power of Power Politics: From Neorealism to Neotraditionalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)
12. Jeffrey W. Legro and Andrew Moravscik. 'Is Anybody Still a Realist?', International Security, 21(2), 1999, pp. 5-55.
13. Gilpin, War and Change, p. 2.
14. Robert Gilpin, Political Economy of International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987).
15. Stephen G. Brooks, 'Dueling Realisms', International Organization, 51(3), 1997, pp. 445-477.
16. Gilpin, War and Change, pp. 19-22.
17. 'Security Seeking under Anarchy: Defensive Realism Revisited', International Security, 25(3), 2000-2001, pp. 128-161.
18. William C. Wohlforth, 'Realism and the End of the Cold War', International Security, 19(3), 1994−5, p. 14.
19. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, p. 203.
20. Mary Elise Sarotte, 'Perpetuating U.S. Preeminence: The 1990 Deals to "Bribe the Soviets Out" and Move NATO In', International Security, 35(1), 2010, pp. 110-137.
21. Robert Jervis, 'The Remaking of a Unipolar World', Washington Quarterly, 29(3), 2006), p. 7.
22. Robert Pape, 'Soft Balancing Against the United States', International Security, 30(1), 2005, pp. 7-45
23. Christopher Layne, 'The Unipolar Illusion Revisited: The Coming End of the United States' Unipolar Moment', International Security, 31(2), 2006, pp. 7-41.
24. John Vasquez, 'The Realist Paradigm and Degenerative versus Progressive Research Programs', American Political Science Review, 91(4), 1997, pp. 899-912.
25. Gilpin, War and Change, pp. 146-154.
26. W. C. Wohlforth et al., 'The Balance of Power in World History', European Journal of International Relations, 13(6), 2007, pp. 44−60
27. Richard Little, Stuart Kaufman and W. C. Wohlforth (eds), The Balance of Power in World History (CITY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
28. Paul Kennedy, 'The (Relative) Decline of America', The Atlantic, August 1987. Though he did not use the term, he provided a more fulsome definition in his magisterial Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (New York: Random House, 1987), p. 533: it has been a common dilemma facing previous even as their relative economic strength is ebbing, the growing foreign challenges to their position have compelled them to allocate more and more of their resources into the military sector, which in turn squeezes out productive investment and, over time, leads to the downward spiral of slower growth, heavier taxes, deepening domestic splits over spending priorities, and a weakening capacity to bear the burdens of defense.
29. G. John Ikenberry, 'America's Imperial Ambition', Foreign Affairs, September-October 2002, pp. 000-00
30. Jack L. Snyder, 'Imperial Temptations', The National Interest, Spring 2003, p. 3.
31. As Lawrence Kotlikoff and Niall Ferguson note, 'The key point - and here the resemblance with Kennedy's earlier argument ends - is that this overstretch has almost nothing to with the United States' overseas military commitments. It is the result of America's chronically unbalanced domestic finances.'
32. 'Going Critical: American Power and the Consequences of Fiscal Overstretch', NYU, Stern School of Business Working Paper, May 2003, p. 2.
33. Gilpin, War and Change, chapter 4.
34. Karen Rasler and William R. Thompson. The Great Powers and Global Struggle, 1490-1990 (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1994)
35. George Modelski, Long Cycles in World Politics (London: Macmillan, 1988)
36. Immanuel Wallerstein, The Modern World System, 3 vols. (New York, Academic Press, 1974-89).
37. To be sure, some blame for this can be laid at Gilpin's door. For example, War and Change failed to acknowledge and explore the commonalities and differences between Gilpin's theory of hegemonic war and the variant developed by A. F. K. Organski in World Politics (New York: Knopf, 1958), and subsequently developed as power transition theory.
38. James D. Fearon, 'Rationalist Explanations for War', International Organization, 49(3), 1995, pp. 379-414
39. Dan Reiter, 'Exploring the Bargaining Model of War', Perspectives on Politics, 1(1), 2003, pp. 27-44.