Essentials of International

Relations
EIGHTH EDITION

Chapter 5
The State and the Tools of Statecraft

Karen A. Mingst
Ivan M. Arreguín-Toft
Heather Elko McKibben

Copyright © 2018 W. W. Norton & Company

 Learning Objectives

• Define the state, the major actor in international relations

• Explain how the various theoretical perspectives view the state
• Explain the various tools of statecraft
 Learning Objectives 2

• Analyze how democracies behave differently than nondemocracies

• Understand the models that help us explain how states make foreign policy
decisions
• Analyze the major contemporary challenges to the state
 The State Defined

• Territorial base
• Stable population
• An effective government to which the population has allegiance
• Recognized diplomatically by other states
 Legal Criteria Are Not Absolute

• Territory not always well defined

• Population changes
• People not always obedient to government
• Unclear how many other states need to grant diplomatic recognition
 A Nation Defined

• Group of people who share a set of characteristics:

 Language
 History
 Ethnicity
 Customs
 Relationship between State and Nation

• Nation-state: Denmark, Italy

• Nations spread across several states: Kurds in Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran;
Somalis in Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Djibouti
• States with several nations within borders: India, Russia, South Africa
• Ethnonationalists
 Federal arrangements
 Irredentism: join with fellow ethnonationalists in other states to create new states
 Separation and the right to form a new state
 Tools of Statecraft

• States use a variety of techniques to exert influence in international

relations. These include:
 Diplomacy
 Economic statecraft
 Force
• All three techniques require credibility
 Ability
 Incentive
 The Art of Diplomacy

• Influencing the behavior of others by negotiating

• Taking a specific action or refraining from action
• Appealing to the foreign public for support of a position
• Requires credible parties with believable statements, likely positions, and the ability to back up
positions with action
• Complicated by Putnam’s two-level games and as a culture-bound activity
 Public diplomacy
 Track-two diplomacy
 The Use of Economic Statecraft

• Positive sanctions
 Reward for moving in the desired direction
 Grant-trading privileges
 Granting of most-favored-nation (MFN) status to China
 Permit trading in sensitive products
 The Use of Economic Statecraft 2

• Engagement / positive sanctions

 “Carrot”
 Entice states through rewards for desired behaviors
 Relaxation of sanctions on Cuba by the Obama administration in 2014
 The Use of Economic Statecraft 3

• Negative sanctions
 “Stick”
 Threaten or take actions that punish the state for an undesirable move
 Freeze target state’s assets
 Islamic State and al-Nusra Front

 Comprehensive sanctions
 U.S. sanctions against Iraq in 1990–2003
 The Use of Economic Statecraft 4

• Smart sanctions: targeted sanctions focusing on specific individuals and

groups to avoid the high humanitarian costs of general sanctions
 Somalia (ban on charcoal industry, the main source of income for al-Shabaab)

• Smart sanctions seen as a cheaper option than general sanctions

 The Use of Force

• Compellence: threat of the use of force to get target state to do something or

undo an act already undertaken
 Example: prelude to the 2003 Iraq War: the United States threatened Saddam
Hussein that if certain actions were not taken, war would follow
• Deterrence: threatening or actually punishing a target state if it takes an
undesired action
• In both cases, intentions must be communicated clearly and openly
 Models of Foreign Policy Decision Making

• How do different theories explain the process through which foreign policies
get made at state level?
 State as a single decision maker
 Rational
 State as composed of multiple actors
 Debate and negotiation
 The Rational Model: The Realist Approach

• Rational model: realist approach

 States are unitary rational actors that aim to maximize their strategic objectives
• Most appropriate in the presence of
 Crisis situation
 Short time to react
 Incomplete information about decision making in other states
 Bureaucratic/Organizational Model

• Organizations: importance of standard operating procedures and processes

within different organizations
 Decisions depend on precedents
 Decisions apt to be incremental
• Bureaucratic politics: pull and haul of different interests among
departments, groups, or individuals
• Most often involving issues not related to security
 Bureaucratic/Organizational Outcomes

• Organizational
 Decisions depend heavily on precedent
 Major changes unlikely
 Conflict can occur between groups with different goals and procedures
 Bureaucratic/Organizational Outcomes 2

• Bureaucratic
 Decisions emerge from the “tug-of-war” between departments, groups, and
individuals
 Outcomes depend on relative strength of the players
 The Pluralist Model

• Societal groups may play very important roles in the foreign policies adopted
by states
• Societal groups have a variety of ways of forcing favorable decisions or
constraining adverse decisions of governments
• Government decisions reflect diverse societal interests
 Outcomes of the Pluralist Model

• Bargaining among domestic actors

 Example: interest groups, public, mass movements, multinational corporations
(MNCs)
• Most often emerges in noncrisis, economic situations
• Time allows for the mobilization of media and public opinion, lobbying,
organizing of transnational networks, and direct contact with government
officials
 Constructivist Alternatives

• Constructivist model
 Decision makers’ interpretation of country’s historical experiences
 Leaders’ interpretation of salient international norms
 Constructivist Alternatives 2

• Influence of country’s history and culture is important, along with

geography, values, and experience
• Leader’s interpretations of salient norms and values
• The constructivist view is a more holistic approach to decision making
 Democracies, Autocracies, and
Foreign Policy

• Kant: democracy changes international politics by eliminating war; the

public restrains leaders
• Democratic peace theory:
 Major finding: democracies do not fight each other
• Potentially divergent findings
 Democracies are not overall more pacifist than are nondemocracies
 Autocracies are just as peaceful toward each other as are democracies
 Explaining Divergent Findings

• Different assumptions by the researchers

• Different operationalizations of concepts (democratic government; war)
• Different time periods
• Yet basic finding from research is that democracies do not fight each other
 Finding is statistically significant
 Challenges to the State

• Globalization
 Growing integration of the world in terms of economics, politics, communications,
and culture
• Transnational movements
 Religious or ideological movements, whose believers are united in wanting to change
states and society
 Environmental, human rights, and development movements
 Challenges to the State 2

• Ethnonational movements
 National subgroups have demands; some want autonomy and others want separation
• Transnational crime
 Growing increase in crime that transcends borders
 Facilitated by more and faster transportation routes, rapid communication, and
electronic financial networks
 Challenges to the State 3

• Fragile states
 Pose both an internal and an external threat
 Fail to perform one of the state’s vital functions—protection of
its people
 Examples: South Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, Syria
 Lecture Slides

ESSENTIALS OF
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
This concludes the Lecture Slide Set
for Chapter 5
E I G H T H EDITION
by
Karen A. Mingst
Ivan M. Arreguín-Toft

Heather Elko McKibben

© 2018 W. W. Norton & Co., Inc.