Harvard students had Monday off for President’s Day and I made use of my free time by checking in on the final day of this years Harvard Speech and Debate tournament. A good friend of mine from high school was in town coaching his student in the tournament, and the guy made it all the way to finals, though he won the tournament last year so it was not much of a surprise. The debate concerned whether or not the US should ratify the Rome Statute, thus joining the International Criminal Court.
My friend’s student affirmed arguing that by joining the ICC the US would contain the spread of anti-Americanism, which poses a serious threat to US security. The negative responded through the realist paradigm of international relations – a doctrine which argues that the international realm is “anarchic” and full of nation-states that cannot be trusted and pursue solely their own interests. The most interesting moment of the round came in cross-examination when the affirmative asked, “Why is the international arena anarchic?” To which the negative responded, roughly, “It just is.” It was a disappointing end to such an interesting back and forth.
This got me thinking – is the international arena really anarchic? The obvious answer is that it is anarchic because there is not a “world government” to enforce global laws. This seems to dodge the question. Consider, for example, Section 2 of Article III of the US Constitution, which states that the power of the Judiciary “shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority.” The important part for this conversation is that last part pertaining to treaties. All treaties ratified by the Senate are to be enforced as if they were US law. This means that if the US were to say, join the ICC, it would be bound to prosecute its own soldiers if they violated the statutes of the ICC. The international arena starts to look a lot less anarchic with considerations like this in hand.
I don’t bring this up to suggest that the international arena is just as un-anarchic as the domestic arena, that is certainly not the case. Instead, I think this suggests that if the international arena is really anarchic, it’s only because its members have made it such. This may seem unsurprising, but is in fact a key doctrine of constructivism, an alternative understanding of international relations. Constructivism offers the, in my opinion, quite reasonable notion that if realism is the case this is simply because realist relations have been constructed between nations; realism is contingently, rather than necessarily true. This is the type of realization that motivates a less belligerent, less bellicose, American foreign policy.
It is certainly a stretch to blame all of our international image problems on an unfounded belief in realism. But it does seem right that part of our problem is treating anti-American states as if those states are necessarily anti-American, instead of anti-American because of a series of American actions. If we were able to act so as to anger huge portions of the world, then constructivism suggests we are also able to act so as to please huge portions of the world. And if any country has the ability to construct a new international order, one that is not anarchic, it is certainly the US.
In its assertion that the international arena is anarchic it thus seems realism merely begs the question – “do we want an anarchic international arena?” While realism as a doctrine rejects the possibility of such a question, in practice this rejection is an antagonistic “yes.” We should answer “no.”