Human and Global Security: Essay

Essay Question:

What kinds of relationships, according to David Campbell, exist among foreign policy, identity, and security? How useful is Campbell’s formulation in the analysis of United States foreign policy since the end of the Cold War?

1. Introduction

In the recent academic trend of international relations theory, such explanatory variables as identity and interest have been paid more and more attention to interpret incidents that occurred in the international arena after the end of the Cold War. David Campbell's thought-provoking book, Writing Security: Unites States Foreign Policy and the Politics of Identity, offers critical insights on the significance of identity in explaining security issues and foreign policy of states, especially the United States.

The prominent school of thought that emphasizes the importance of identity as a variable is constructivism. Alexander Wendt, one of the most famous constructivists in IR theory, has published many articles on identity. Arguing against rationalism that assumes that identities are exogenously given and fixed, he suggests that “Social identities and interests be treated as dependent variables endogenous to interaction.”(Wendt, 1994, p.387) Identities are constituted or transformed through interaction with “otherness,” “foreign-ness,” “aliens.” In this sense, the (re)production of identities is relational, not independent of interaction with others.

Constructivists argue that change of identity often resulted in change of actors' interest and behavior. In case of states, interest and behavior mean national interest and policy respectively. When a state experiences identity change, like Germany and Japan after the World War Ⅱ, its national interest and policy are changed simultaneously. According to Jepperson, Wendt, and Katzenstein, “change in identity can precipitate substantial change in interests that shape national security policy.” For instance, Price and Tannenwald argue that “a commitment to a “civilized” identity reinforced acceptance of norms defining chemical and nuclear weapons as illegitimate.” (Katzenstein, 1996, p.60)

Campbell's attempt to correlate identity to security for states and, as resolutions to it, foreign policies can be seen as belonging to this academic trend as mentioned above. He mentions that “the boundaries of a state's identity are secured by the representation of danger integral to foreign policy.”(Campbell, 1998, p.3) Security concerns for states are not threatening to the very existence of the states. Rather, states can strengthen their identities with danger because it will increase cohesive forces among the population.

Ironically, then, the inability of the state project of security to succeed is the guarantor of the state's continued success as an impelling identity. The constant articulation of danger through foreign policy is thus not a threat to a state's identity or existence; it is its condition of possibility. (Campbell, 1998, pp.12-3)

In the following section, I will discuss how the relationships among identity, security, and foreign policy are described in Campbell's book. After reviewing those relationships, I will also do literature reviews on identity in IR theory. The literature review includes both theoretical studies and case studies. By so doing, we will be able to understand how useful Campbell's formulation is in analyzing foreign policy since the end of the Cold War, especially that of the United States.

2. Identity and Security

It is a matter of course that security issues for a state mean that it has an enemy, whether potential or overt. If a state is concerned with its own security, it needs to be able to distinguish “self” from “others.”

[I]dentity is constituted in relation to difference. ... the constitution of identity is achieved through the inscription of boundaries that serve to demarcate an “inside” from an “outside,” a “self” from an “other,” a “domestic” from a “foreign.” (Campbell, 1998, p.9)

As mentioned earlier, constitution of identities is relational. It is only possible with others. In other words, a state cannot establish its identities without the existence of “foreign” states. When the foreign states are overt enemies, much stronger identities should be produced. Security conditions can have a big impact upon identity formation. How danger for a state is articulated, that is “discourses of danger,” is a critical element of its identity production.

[T]he state requires discourses of “danger” to provide a new theology of truth about who and what “we” are by highlighting who or what “we” are not, and what “we” have to fear.(Campbell, 1998, p.48)

The state grounds its legitimacy by offering the promise of security to its citizens who, it says, would otherwise face manifold dangers.(Campbell, 1998, p.50)

This “discourses of danger” are not necessarily based on objective proofs of danger. Rather, the discourses of danger are oftentimes conducted without visible evidence. Campbell exemplifies this by using a case of terrorism.

“[T]errorism” is often cited as a major threat to national security, even though its occurrence within the United States is minimal (notwithstanding the bombings in Oklahoma City and at the World Trade Center in New York) and its contribution to international carnage minor.(Campbell, 1998, p.2)

It can be said, according to Campbell, that danger for a state is a product of subjectivity which is quite susceptible to change constantly. Therefore, Campbell argues that identities through discourses of danger are oftentimes problematic due to the subjectivity, rather than a fixed, pregiven attribute of a state.

[S]tates are never finished as entities; the tension between the demands of identity and the practices that constitute it can never be fully resolved, because the performative nature of identity can never be fully revealed. This paradox inherent to their being renders states in permanent need of reproduction: with no ontological status apart from the many and varied practices that constitute their reality, states are (and have to be) always in a process of becoming. (Campbell, 1998, p.12)

If you take postwar U.S. foreign policy as an example, it will easily make sense. Right after the World War Ⅱ when the threat of the Soviet Union was so imminent for the United States that every kind of sympathy and compromise toward Communism was oppressed intolerantly. At that time, U.S. identity was considered “antithesis of Communism” and the identity contributed to the strong cohesiveness of U.S. society. After the disappearance of the Soviet Union, however, U.S identity has been changed dramatically with the change of characteristics of threat. Since the 1990s, the threat for the U.S. has been terrorism, regional conflicts in the places where U.S. interests are at stake. U.S. identity has become “antithesis of terrorists” or “antithesis of Islam” and so forth. Identity has been invariably exposed to constant change because of diversity of what happened in reality. As identity changes, what the U.S. fears will also change.

One of the greatest contributions of focusing upon the relationship between identity and security like Campbell is that:

[I]ts concern with the constitutive nature of fear and danger is intended to problematize international relations’ realist rendering of fear and danger as either natural conditions or instrumentalities deployed by settled identities. (Campbell, 1998, p.56)

In the next section, based on the relationship between identity and security discussed here, I will delve into the relationship between identity and foreign policy that Campbell mentions in his book.

3. Identity and Foreign Policy

As discussed earlier, the close relationship between identity and security is a basis of debate on the relationship between identity and foreign policy. States must promise security of their citizens from outside invaders. But as states' security goals change simultaneously with change of identity, there must be also a close relationship between identity and foreign policy.

Campbell's purpose on this subject is

to show that it is an impoverished understanding to regard foreign policy as a bridge between preexisting states with secure identities.” (Campbell, 1998, p.61)

Campbell further observes that:

[I]t is not possible to simply understand international relations as the existence of atomized states that are fully fledged intensive entities in which identity is securely grounded prior to foreign relations. (Campbell, 1998, p.61)

States are not necessarily pregiven before foreign relations are established. Rather, through repeated construction of foreign policies, states form or confirm their own existence, and their own identities. In Campbell's term, foreign policy is “a specific sort of boundary-producing political performance.” (Campbell, 1998, p.62) With the boundaries between “inside” and “outside” made by foreign policies, states objectify the self and identities are established. However, these identities are not stable at all. It should be exposed to constant transformation.

Foreign Policy is concerned with the reproduction of an unstable identity at the level of the state, and the containment of challenges to that identity. In other words, Foreign Policy does not operate in a domain free of entrenched contingencies or resistances. (Campbell, 1998, p.71)

Indeed, the real world is replete with examples of this interactive relationship between foreign policy and identity. Campbell provides the change of U.S. foreign policy toward Iraq as an example.

[O]nly a decade earlier, the Iraqi invasion of Iran (an oil-producing state like Kuwait) brought no apocalyptic denunciations or calls to action, let alone a military response, from the United States. (Campbell, 1998, p.1)

Through the interaction with Iraq and Iran, U.S. identity has been forced to change and also foreign policy toward them. At the same time, the foreign policy has certified and reproduced U.S. identity. In this sense, failure of foreign policy means failure of boundary-producing and failure to make people believe legitimacy of the state.

“Unsuccessful” instances of foreign policy are those where the double exclusionary practice does not operate, thereby allowing the recognition that the boundaries of domestic society can be disputed, so that the grounds of state legitimation become the site of political contestation about interpretations of “man.” (Campbell, 1998, p.64)

If foreign policy is a boundary-producing political performance, we have to correct the recognition that foreign policy is necessary in order to make agreement with foreign countries or to build confidence with each other and cooperate. Although these purposes are superficially seen as important, the more significant characteristic is its function of making difference with foreign countries.

The state, and the identity of “man” located in the state, can therefore be regarded as the effects of discourses of danger that more often than not employ strategies of otherness. Foreign policy thus needs to be understood as giving rise to a boundary rather than acting as a bridge. (Campbell, 1998, p.51)

This mutually constitutive character of identity and foreign policy is much the case with the United States. As there is no satisfying definition of “America” or “American,” this country continually needs repeated representation of “what we are” and “what we are not.” As the result, U.S. foreign policy is quite susceptible to discourses of danger.

Defined, therefore, more by absence than presence, America is peculiarly dependent on representational practices for its being. Arguably more than any other state, the imprecise process of imagination is what constitutes American identity. ... If the identity of the “true nationals” remains intrinsically elusive and “inorganic,” it can only be secured by the effective and continual ideological demarcation of those who are “false” to the defining ideals. (Campbell, 1998, p.91)

Campbell examines some of prominent historical incidents of the United States—the moment of discovery, colonization, and revolution—and tries to show that this country is now engaging unfinished representations of what “America” is which are oftentimes “a fictional representation of the past.” (Campbell, 1998, p.131) “America is the imagined community par excellence.” (Campbell, 1998, p.91)

4. The Cold War and U.S. Identity

Campbell mentions that the Cold War is a striking example of discourses of danger of the United States. By examining diplomatic records and texts of the U.S., such as NSC-68, he points out that “the practices of Foreign Policy serve to enframe, limit, and domesticate a particular identity”(Campbell, 1998, p.139) including “freedom of choice for individuals,” “democratic procedures for government,” and “a private enterprise economy” under the Eisenhower administration, or “Freedom under God,” “the principles of individual liberty” under the Kennedy administration, or “human rights” under the Carter and Reagan administrations, and so forth.(Campbell, 1998, p.138) All these identities were the products of the way the U.S. interpreted Soviet communism as a threat in the form of “(re)writing security” on diplomatic texts.

Because the modes of representation through which the danger of communism and the Soviet Union have been interpreted replicate both the logic and the figurations of past articulations of danger, it has been argued that the cold war was not dependent on (though clearly influenced by) the Soviet Union for its character. Instead, I have maintained that the cold war was an important moment in the (re)production of American identity animated by a concern for the ethical boundaries of identity rather than by the territorial borders of the state. (Campbell, 1998, pp.167-8)

This character of U.S. foreign policy has been still valid since the end of the Cold War. It can be applicable to the U.S. attitudes toward Iraq and terrorism in the post-Cold War period as I mentioned earlier. Also, this is the case with NATO enlargement to the former communist countries in East Europe, as I will discuss this in the next section by referring to Thomas Risse-Kappen’s piece.

5. Literature Review: Theoretical Studies & Case Studies

Wendt and Miearsheimer

In this section, I will review literature that discusses change of identity.

Alexander Wendt argues that if the interaction keeps for a certain period of time, identities and interests are no more fixed which would certainly lead to structural change. (Wendt, 1994, p.387)

On the other hand, John Mearsheimer criticized Wendt's argument saying that if, as constructivists say, actors' identities and interests are formed by reciprocal interactions, why are some identities and interests chosen and others discarded? In his term, “what determines why some discourses become dominant and others lose out in the marketplace of ideas?” In the same vein, he asks “Why has realism been the hegemonic discourse in world politics for so long?” and “Why is realism likely to be replaced by a more peaceful communitarian discourse?”(Mearsheimer, 1994/1995, p.42) He asserts critical theory, including Wendt's theory, didn't or cannot answer these questions and it fundamentally lacks predictive power.

But, on this point, Wendt suggests two conditions for new identities and interests to emerge: “(1) the density and regularity of interactions must be sufficiently high and (2) actors must be dissatisfied with preexisting forms of identity and interaction.”(Wendt, 1992, p.414) This Wendt’s suggestion seems still empirically weak as many critics say, even though he said “Constructivists have a normative interest in promoting social change.”(Wendt, 1995, p.74) But, according to Wendt, even neorealists can’t explain structural change without incorporating social factors in their analyses.(Wendt, 1995, p.79) As mentioned above, when actors are “dissatisfied with preexisting forms of identity and interaction,” and “a system of expectations that may be mutually reinforcing” changes, a systemic change occurs. (Wendt, 1995, p.80)

The problem is, even if there were some empirical evidences to prove the emergence of new identities and interests, there is no guarantee that Mearsheimer can be satisfied, because there is no consensus between them on what theory is dominant currently, although most liberalists and constructivists acknowledge that realism had been dominant for so long until the Cold War was over. Mearsheimer never believes that policy-making leaders “are dissatisfied with preexisting forms of identity and interaction” that are, for Mearsheimer, well characterized by realism. Moreover, both disagree in interpretation of some historical incidents. While Wendt interprets Gorbachev’s reforms as a proof that “he wants to free the Soviet Union from the coercive social logic of the cold war” and “has rejected the Leninist belief in the inherent conflict of interest between socialist and capitalist states”(Wendt, 1992, p.421), Mearsheimer argues, in contrast, that “His decision to shut down the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe can very well explained by realism.”(Mearsheimer, 1994/1995, p.46) In addition, Wendt gives positive evaluation to Gorbachev’s decision to withdraw Soviet troops from Afghanistan because it was “unilateral initiatives and self-binding commitments of sufficient significance that another state is faced with “an offer it cannot refuse””(Wendt, 1992, p.421) which undoubtedly Mearsheimer can never believe. I doubt that Mearsheimer will be pleased with empirical studies of constructivism as long as such disagreement on interpretation of history and the current trend of international theory is out there.

Zehfuss

According to Maja Zehfuss, “Wendt has much refined his argument since he published his influential 1992 article.” (Zehfuss, 2001, p.318) Receiving some criticisms against his suggestion on identity change, Wendt distinguished corporate identities, part of which is “ontologically prior to the states system” (Wendt, 1996, p.50) and “exogenously given”(Wendt, 1999, p.328), from social identity, which is made through repeated social interaction. In the case of the former, “states actors enter the interaction having some pre-existing ideas about who they are even beyond their awareness of their individuality and their ability to act.”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.321)

Basically, however, Wendt keeps thinking that identity transformation is possible, saying “identities may be hard to change, but they are not carved in stone.”(Wendt, 1999, p.21) Based on that recognition, Wendt “discusses whether and under which conditions identities are more collective or more egoistic.”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.318)

Nevertheless, Zehfuss also mentions that

identity is not only significant for Wendt's constructivism; it is also problematic.”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.327)

According to Zehfuss, “it fails to address how discourse should be analysed.”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.326) This view overlaps with Mearsheimer's question that “what determines why some discourses become dominant and others lose out in the marketplace of ideas?” Zehfuss asserts that constructivists cannot omit this question because “the assumption that states are pre-given, unitary actors depends on it[this omission].”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.326) Wendt's constructivism is still unable to solve the question of ‘how’ and ‘why,’ rather than ‘whether.’

Furthermore, according to Zehfuss, difference of identity and behavior remains unclear in Wendt's constructivism. Zehfuss argues:

in his [Wendt's] approach we are forced to infer actors' self-understanding from nothing but their behaviour. If an identity matters only in its realization in certain types of behaviour, then it is difficult to see what should justify calling it ‘identity’ rather than ‘behaviour’.” (Zehfuss, 2001, p.327)

This certifies difficulty of testing unobservable ideas like identities and interests, which is still annoying many researchers, not only constructivists.

Zehfuss even mentioned that “constructivism and identity may be in a dangerous liaison[.]”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.341) For, the more constructivists stress identity change, which means a change “from one relatively stable identity to another”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.335), the more difficult for them to explain a “contingent, elusive and even contradictory character”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.341) of identity, like an example of Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) showed in Zehfuss’s article(2001). This problem comes from the very fact that Wendt's constructivism is a systemic theory in which “states must be treated as given”(Zehfuss, 2001, p.336). A systemic theory needs stable agencies, which leads to the neglect of domestic politics, another weakness of Wendt's constructivism. Although identity is a significant variable for Wendt's argument, Zehfuss concluded, “the impossibility of clearly delineate identity” makes Wendt's constructivism unable to work.

Risse-Kappen: Collective Identity of NATO

The survival of NATO even after the Cold War for which NATO had been existed until the extinction of the USSR has been a main stage for social constructivists. If the threat perception against the Soviet Union withered away, it was no doubt that with it NATO would cease to exist. But, in reality, it continues to exist and is even expanding toward the east in Europe that was in the socialist camp for a long time. Risse-Kappen argues that dominant alliance theory based on realist assumptions “reveals its indeterminacy with regard to the origins of, the interaction patterns in, and the endurance of NATO.”(Katzenstein, 1996, p.364)

On the NATO's origin, extant alliance theory is unconvincing.

If material capabilities are all that counts in world politics, one would have expected Western Europe to align with the Soviet Union rather than with the U.S.(Katzenstein, 1996, p.359)

So is the case of the interaction patterns. In Waltzian structural realism,

great powers do not need allies under bipolarity, they also do not need to listen to them.(Katzenstein, 1996, p.362)

But Risse-Kappen cites such incidents as the Suez crisis and the Cuban missile crisis in which European allies had a huge influence on the U.S. national interests at stake and its policy formation in the middle of the incidents. Moreover, above mentioned already, dominant alliance theory cannot explain the endurance of NATO after the end of the Cold War.

What constituted NATO, “the pluralistic security community” was, Risse-Kappen observes, institutional constraints and norms. That is, democratic values and norms worked as an adhesive among NATO countries.

Democracies not only fight each other, they are likely to develop a collective identity facilitating the emergence of cooperative institutions for specific purposes. These institutions are characterized by democratic norms and decision making rules that liberal states tend to externalize when dealing with each other. The enactment of these norms and rules strengthens the sense of community and the collective identity of the actors.(Katzenstein, 1996, p.397)

By incorporating social and ideational factors into the analysis of the transatlantic security alliance, the origin, the cooperation patterns, and the endurance after the Cold War of NATO do make sense. As Risse-Kappen told, these institutional constraints and norms peculiar to democracies had a decisive role in settling the Cuba crisis in 1962 and in upsetting Britain, France and Israel in the Suez crisis in 1956. These two incidents attested to the existence of collective identity among democratic countries.

One problem is that it doesn't necessarily fit all democracies. For instance, the U.S.-Japan security alliance is as well institutionalized as the European security community, but “the collective identity component seems to be weaker.”(Katzenstein, 1996, p.398) Risse-Kappen concludes that:

[t]he U.S.-Japanese example, then, shows that there is some variation with regard to both institutionalization and identity components in alliances among democracies.(Katzenstein, 1996, p.398)

If the causal pathway Jepperson, Wendt, and Katzenstein posit (Katzenstein, 1996, p.53, figure 2.2) is taken as valid, we have to sophisticate the analysis of the extent to which norms are institutionalized and the depth of identity that such norms achieve.

6. Problems of Identity Analysis

To summarize these studies above mentioned, there seem some problems regarding studies using identity as an independent variable.

First, when identity transformation is incorporated into analysis, constructivists assume each identity as stable and given. According to Zehfuss, identity change means for constructivists a change “from one relatively stable identity to another” (Zehfuss, 2001, p.335). This perspective ignores the process of identity building which often involves identities that are contradicting each other. All of three writers had nothing to say about identity building (creation). In other words, they didn't answer the question: Where do norms come from? For example, the Gorbachev administration led “New Thinking” reform which was triggered by the desire to join “Western civilized” countries. But we cannot know from Herman's piece how the identity as “a civilized country” emerged. Moreover, one norm might be produced by the influence of other norms. But in their analyses, the interaction among norms themselves is put into a black box. As Kowert and Legro point out:

Most studies of norms, including those in this volume, focus only on a single, specific norm―or, at most, on a small set of norms.”(Katzenstein, 1996, p.485)

Second, all of three writers don't clarify their method to measure the strength of norms. The robustness of norm varies in each case. For example:

some behavioral violations of norms do not necessarily invalidate the norms. At a certain point violations clearly do begin to undermine norms.”(Katzenstein, 1996, p.484)

The former case is the Suez crisis described in Risse-Kappen's piece which “did not lead to a collapse of the Atlantic security community or to the illegitimacy of its norms.” The typical latter case is Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) of nuclear weapons which became a mere façade after India, Pakistan and possibly North Korea developed their own nukes. Non proliferation norm is now almost dead. How do we draw a line between robust norms and dead norms?

[B]y what criteria can one assess norm robustness (independent of the very outcomes one seeks to explain)?”(Katzenstein, 1996, p.484)

Judging from the problems above mentioned, identity as an influential variable for IR theories needs far more sophistication of the concept regarding robustness (depth) of norms (identities) or relationship among norms according to which policy outcomes extraordinarily vary.

7. Conclusion

Studies of international relations in terms of identity politics proved its great contribution to the field. Those studies pose plausible qualifications to conventional understandings of IR, especially realist arguments. For example, while (neo)realists cannot explain why Germany and Japan haven’t increased their political-military power since the World War Ⅱeven though they could, identity analysis can. Although the two countries have enough economic and political power to have aggressive military forces, what they have done is precisely the opposite, as Thomas U. Berger says. (Katzenstein, 1996, pp.317-8) This is much more the case with the United States, because of the historical character of its nation-building, that is, the absence of fixed definition of “America.” With the demise of the Soviet Union, the U.S. has been forced to face a tough situation in which its identities are severely challenged and problematized. Such incidents as U.S. military intervention in Bosnia, and Iraqi war are well explained by incorporating identity as a variable. The U.S. identity has shifted from an “anticommunist” country to an “anti-dictatorship” or “anti-totalitarianism” country, though this never means the latter identities are fixed and autonomous.

References

Campbell, David. (1996) “Violent Performances: Identity, Sovereignty, Responsibility,” in Yosef Lapid and Friedrich Kratochwil, eds., The Return of Culture and Identity in IR Theory, pp.163-80, Boulder and London: Lynne Rienner Publishers.
―――― (1998) Writing Security: United States Foreign Policy and the Politics of Identity, Revised Edition, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Katzenstein, Peter J. ed. (1996) The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics, Columbia University Press: N.Y.
Mearsheimer, John J. (1994/1995) “The False Promise of International Institutions,”　International Security, 19-3, pp.5-49.
Wendt, Alexander (1994). “Collective Identity and the International State,” American Political Science Review, 88-2, pp.384-96.
―――― (1996) “Identity and Structural Change in International Politics,” in Yosef Lapid and Friedrich Kratochwil, eds., The Return of Culture and Identity in IR Theory, pp.47-64, Boulder and London: Lynne Rienner Publishers.
―――― (1999) Social Theory of International Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Zehfuss, Maja.(1999) Social Theory of International Politics, Cambridge.
―――― (2001) “Constructivism and Identity: A Dangerous Liaison,” European Journal of International Relations, 7-3, pp.315-348.