An Essay on Neorealism and Foreign Policy

Abstract

As interest has risen in the study of foreign policy since the end of the Cold War, many scholars have grappled with the relevance of theories of international politics for examining the foreign policies or more appropriately, the external behavior of states. Realism, in all its variants, having been the dominant theory of world politics in the U.S. for half a century, has become a fashionable target of students of foreign policy. Even more so, many apparent adherents to the realist school have sought to differentiate themselves from other realists. One can thus find classical realism, neorealism, and even neoclassical realism, defensive and offensive realism, among others. The debates thus far have suffered from the shortcomings of earlier debates: a misconception of the relation between realism, especially neorealism, and foreign policy. Ultimately, these works constitute neither alternative theories of international politics, nor refinements of neorealism. Indeed, in many cases they present little conflict with neorealism.