Waltz

1
Waltzs Neorealism
2
Balance of Power as a Reaction to a Threat
Napoleon, 1802-1815
Major Powers FRA, UK, RUS, PRUS, AUS
After French Revolution (1789), Napoleon
Bonaparte rises to power. -- Consul (1802) --
Emperor of France (1804) Continues military
campaigns to build empire and feed war machine.
-- Poses major threat to Europe
UK, RUS, PRUS, AUS form coalitions against FRA
-- Napoleon defeated (1814) -- Congress of
Vienna (1814) -- Napoleon returns (1815) --
Waterloo (1815)
3
BoP as a Peaceful Equilibrium Concert of
Europe, 1815-1848
After Napoleonic Wars, Congress of Vienna
continues (1815) Defeated France let back into
club Quadruple Alliance Austria,
Britain, Prussia, Russia Congresses held to
attempt to resolve issues. Buffer
states/territory traded.
4
Bipolarity vs Multipolarity
1792
1815
1854
1866
1870
1914
1939
Napoleonic Wars
Crimean War
Franco-Prussian War
WW I
WW II
(peaceful)
Concert of Europe
Austro-Prussian War
Multipolar loose, shifting alliances, Britain as
balancer four or five Great Powers
1945
1990
Cold Waror Long Peace
?
Bipolar (two Great Powers, tight blocs)
5
Bipolarity vs Multipolarity

• Internal balancing is more reliable
• External balancing can give rise to
  miscalculations that lead to general war
• Large influence of small allies
• Deterrence fails because there is an incentive to
  defect from commitments
• As numbers grow, strategic complexity grows
  geometrically
• Uncertainty is the leading cause of war

6
Structural Theories WWI
Multipolar System

• Abandoning an ally invites ones own destruction
  
• In a moment of crisis, the weaker or more
  adventurous party (Austria) is likely to
  determine its sides policy
• Its partners (Germany) can afford neither to let
  the weaker member be defeated nor to advertise
  their disunity by failing to back a venture even
  while deploring its risks

7
Structural Theories WWI
Balance of Power

• The Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance were
  approximately balanced
• The defeat of any great power would give the
  opposing coalition a decisive advantage in the
  overall European balance of power
• Britain entered the war to prevent Germany from
  upsetting the balance of power on the continent

8
Structural Theories WWI
Alliance System

• The establishment of the Triple Entente and the
  Triple Alliance divided the European powers into
  two camps
• While seen as a form of self-protection, the
  alliances also had the potential to escalate
  small crises into major wars
• When Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, this
  brought Serbias ally Russia into the war, which
  brought Germany, France, and Britain into the war

9
Strengths of Structural Realism

• Parsimony
• Focus on systemic effects
• Power is defined as capabilities
  (non-tautological)
• Explanatory power is in the constraints, not in
  the preferences
• Collective action
• Probabilistic predictions