The key observation is that bonobos are less aggressive than chimpanzees. Note: In all cases, we argue, holding onto the status quo is not always good enough to ensure survival. Our argument may be useful for three reasons. Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. By contrast, our theory posits that a tendency toward offensive realist behavior, however modulated by other tendencies, would have conferred a fitness advantage in the environment in which humans evolved and should thus have led to dispositions to seek and like power. Clearly, when it comes to the many distinctive physiological and behavioral changes humans have undergone, ecology has been as or more important than phylogeny (hence, the field of evolutionary anthropology focuses on hunter-gatherer analogues, not nonhuman primate analogues). It is also worth noting that offensive realism may often be derided because we do not want it to be true. Table4. in evolutionary biology from Oxford University and a Ph.D. in political science from Geneva University. John Mearsheimer's Theory of Offensive Realism and the Rise of China Human evolution explains why people seek control over resources, why some of us (particularly males) will seek to dominate others in order to achieve and maintain a privileged position in a dominance hierarchy, and why we are suspicious and wary of other groups.150 Since the leaders of states are human, they too will be influencedperhaps especially influencedby this evolutionary legacy as they react to the actions of other states and decide how to respond.151,Reference McDermott152,Reference McDermott153. By contrast, as rational actor theorists would expect, hunter-gatherers are averse to the risk of fighting symmetric battles with roughly equivalent numbers on each side.82 Importantly, sustained instances of imbalances of power over evolutionary history would have led to the selection of contingent aggression. Egoism, dominance, and ingroup/outgroup bias are widespread because they increased survival and reproductive success compared with other strategies and were therefore favored by natural selection. This foundation permits us to reach realist conclusions about international politics, such as the importance of power in interstate relations, without having to believe in Morgenthaus animus dominandi. The remainder of the article proceeds as follows. State as primary actor 2. Cooperation is extremely hard to achieve and requires special conditions. The evolution of offensive realism - Cambridge Core For their exceptional advice and comments, we thank lafur Darri Bjrnsson, Dan Blumstein, Miriam Fendius Elman, John Friend, David Galbreath, Azar Gat, Matthew Gratias, Valerie Hudson, Patrick James, Robert Jervis, Robert Keohane, Charles Lees, Anthony Lopez, Curt Nichols, Rose McDermott, Steven Pinker, Michael Price, Stephen Peter Rosen, Rafe Sagarin, Dominic Tierney, Monica Toft, Peter Turchin, Mark Van Vugt, Richard Wrangham, Remco Zwetsloot, and the anonymous reviewers. This article is dedicated to the memory of Rafe Sagarin, an exceptional ecologist, colleague, and friend who devoted much of his life to bridging the gap between the life and social sciences. Hostname: page-component-75b8448494-spc8s John Mearsheimer's Theory and its Major Assumptions|Realism #realpolitik International Relations & Politics 13.4K subscribers Subscribe 153 2.4K views 6 months ago Talk given on December. Second, our argument makes two contributions to the theory of offensive realism: We ground the theory in human evolution (instead of the international system), and we extend it into new domains (beyond the interaction of states as units of analysis). First, such studies would complement and critique the present study. Although warfare is a high-stakes collective action problem, warriors are willing to participate because over evolutionary time the dividends have tended to outweigh the costs.84,Reference Wrangham and Glowacki85. 1-49; Robert Gilpin, War and Many criticisms of international relations theories focus on these unsubstantiated or contested assumptions about underlying human nature. Classical realists (such as Thucydides, E.H. Carr, Arnold Wolfers, and Hans Morgenthau) and offensive realists share the assumption that states seek to maximize power - that states are relentless seekers of power and influence.Specifically, for classical realists "nations expand their political interests abroad when their relative power increases . Indeed, the possibility of even more intense security competition in the Sino-American relationship, between India and Pakistan, and in the Middle East highlights the importance of making the theorys logic explicit and revealing and testing its foundations. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. First, ambitious leaders self-select themselves into seeking high-profile roles in the first place.Reference Ehrenhalt191 Second, strong leaders are selected into power over weak-willed or hesitant candidates.Reference Todorov, Mandisodza, Goren and Hall192,Reference Van Vugt and Ahuja193 Third, leaders rise to the top of their respective hierarchies through an intensively competitive process that compels them to be increasingly attentive to self-interest and self-preservation.Reference Shenkman194 Fourth, once in power, decision-makers tend to heed hawkish rather than dovish advice.Reference Kahneman and Renshon195 Fifth, the experience of power itself is well known to corrupt, precisely because being a leader elevates ones sense of worth and power.196 Taking these phenomena together, a skeptic of our argument that humans are generally egoistic, dominance-seeking and groupish may nevertheless concede that the small subset of humans that become political leaders tend to express these traits. The strength of dominance hierarchies in humans is debated and varies empirically, but such hierarchies are always evident in some form or other. Anarchy is, ironically, the ordering principle of the global state system and the starting point for most major theories of international politics, such as neoliberalism and neorealism.42,Reference Keohane43,Reference Jervis44,Reference Nye45 Other theoretical approaches, such as constructivism, also acknowledge the impact of anarchy, even if only to consider why anarchy occurs and how it can be circumvented.Reference Wendt46,Reference Onuf47 Indeed, the anarchy concept is so profound that it defines and divides the discipline of political science into international politics (politics under conditions of anarchy) and domestic politics (politics under conditions of hierarchy, or government). Offensive realism, more than other major theories of international relations, closely matches what we know about human nature from the evolutionary sciences. Structural Realism/Offensive and Defensive Realism One reason why an evolutionary explanation of egoism, dominance, and ingroup/outgroup bias is useful is because alternative explanations for these empirical traits have failed. However, the persistence of these three traits across domains and over time casts doubt on arguments like these, and strongly counts in favor of an evolutionary explanation instead. We now explore the adaptive logic of these behaviors in turn. In short, you do not need group selection to explain altruism. However, rapid advances in the life sciences offer increasing theoretical and empirical challenges to scholars in the social sciences in general and international relations in particular, who are therefore under increasing pressure to address and integrate this knowledge rather than to suppress or ignore it. Egoism, dominance, and ingroup/outgroup distinctions have previously been attributed to variables such as culture, economics, or religion.148,149 For example, Karl Marx and his followers identified egoism as a result of capitalism and called for its suppression and the triumph of class consciousness. Under an iron fist, even the most egotistical, dominating, and xenophobic actor will be prevented from realizing his or her goals. Our evolutionary approach predicts the same behavior as offensive realism but derives from a different ultimate cause. IR Terms to remember Flashcards | Quizlet Natural selection has led to a variety of contingent, context-dependent adaptations for maximizing survival and reproduction that include cooperation and alliances as well as self-help and aggression. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science (Northwestern University) and has written numerous articles Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Second, we introduce key evolutionary concepts that explicate the human behaviors upon which offensive realism depends. John Mearsheimer is one of these theorists. The preeminent evolutionary theorist J.B.S. Second, the evolutionary approach helps make a given theorys assumptions about human nature explicit, exposing them to empirical validation. Still, humans exhibit an instinctive fight or flight response, just as other animals do, which operates below (and faster than) conscious awareness.Reference Axelrod144,Reference Cronk and Leech145 Befriending or cooperating with a stranger may have benefits, but those benefits are uncertain and limited whereas the costs of trusting an outsider may be lethal. Utah's Office of Licensing, which provides oversight to youth residential treatment centers, has conducted 341 investigations in the past five years at Provo Canyon School's four campuses. Ethological studies have shown that hierarchical dominance systems within a primate groups social network can reduce overt aggression, although aggression increases again when the alpha male is challenged.Reference Knauft116,Reference Flack, Girvan, de Waal and Krakauer117,Reference de Waal118. They can only be regional hegemons. Feature Flags: { Sexual selection has led to costly biological adaptations, such as fighting, the growth of heavy weapons (e.g., antlers), risky courtship displays, or adornments that signal genetic quality (e.g., gigantic tails). Haldane thus quipped that he would give his life to save two of his brothers (each sharing half of his genes) or eight of his cousins (each sharing one-eighth of his genes).Reference Haldane89,90 Inclusive fitness provides a biological basis for the common intuition that individuals favor those who are close genetic relatives.Reference Betzig91. First, as with other realist theories, Mearsheimer assumes that the . Unsatisfied with military life, he decided to pursue graduate studies rather than become a career officer. Bradley A. Thayer is professor of political science at the University of Iceland.

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