Post-Cold War Realism,

Liberal Internationalism,
and the Third World

KELECHI A. KALU¤

ABSTRACT
The end of the Cold War has been an opportune moment for international relations scholars
to examine the explanatory strengths and weaknesses of prevailing theories. Of particular interest
has been how well realism and liberal internationalism explains or fails to explain security and non-
security issues in the Third World. While some scholars argue that the existing systemic theories
are relevant for understanding all states’ actions, others argue that they are irrelevant for explaining
issues affecting the Third World. Yet still, there are perspectives that argue for entirely new analytical
frameworks for understanding Third World issues. The publication of the books by Stephanie G.
Neuman, International Relations Theory and the Third World, William Hale and Eberhard Kienle,
After the Cold War: Security and Democracy in Africa and Asia, and Raymond L. Bryant and Sinead
Bailey, Third World Political Ecology is timely. They offer a new opportunity to assess how well
realism and liberal internationalism explain the behavior of Third World states within the context of
the international system. This research communication will analyze the arguments in the above texts
and conclude with a brief discussion and assessment of the richness of neorealism for understanding
security and non-security issues in the Third World.

International Relations Theory and the Third World

Accepting that realism and liberal internationalis m are inadequate for explain-
ing change in general and, particularly, in the Third World, this collection of essays
by Neuman sets out to bridge the gap between international relations (IR) theory
and its application to the Third World. Neuman (p. 2) argues that mainstream IR
theory is essentially Eurocentric and that despite attack from many quarters, its em-
pirical application to the Third World remains virtually unexamined. DeŽ ning the
framework for the chapters, Neuman examines the relevance to the Third World of
such concepts as “anarchy,” “the international system,” “the state,” “sovereignty,”
and “alliances.” Each chapter is framed around a series of questions: “Does IR The-
ory accurately describe, explain, or predict the behavior of Third World states in

¤
The University of Northern Colorado, Greeley, Colorado 80639, U.S.A.

c Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2001

° JAAS XXXVI, 2
226 KELECHI A. KALU

international affairs? If not, what are its deŽ ciencies? If yes, what are its strengths?”
(p. 14). She concludes the introductio n with two observations. First, that contrib-
utors to the volume are not in agreement on how best to explain the Third World
in the context of the international system. SpeciŽ cally, while some analysts are
of the view that some aspects of IR theory are useful for explaining events in the
Third World, others argue that IR theory, especially realism and neorealism, are
not relevant for understanding change in the international system let alone change
in the Third World. Secondly, Neuman (p. 16) argues that the lack of consensus
among the contributors is superŽ cial. For her, the analysts present the view that,
over all, the normative Eurocentric nature of IR theories makes them irrelevant to
Third World issues.
In “Subaltern Realism” (pp. 31-54), Mohammed Ayoob argues that while
theories are useful for explicating the complex nature of the international system,
time and space (conceptualized in terms of a historical context) affects the
perspectives that scholars bring to their analyses of events. He contends that
the use of biased perspectives leads analysts, in the face of proliferation of
states, to focus on Cold-War centered explanations while ignoring or underrating
issues of war and peace in the “global periphery” (p. 32). Ayoob also argues
that IR theorists’ claim to universalist views while ignoring the Third World,
is dubious because at the end of the Cold War, theoretical differences between
realism and neoliberalism (evident during the Cold War) is virtually non-existent.
Consequently, continued bifurcation of external and domestic factors in IR theory
is not only irrelevant but also fails to capture the internal/external nexus of sources
of con icts and their prevention. While acknowledging that in IR theory, historicity
of state-making, domestic consolidation and legitimation of state power are seen
as central to states’ role, Ayoob questions the relevance of realism, neorealism
and the Westphalian state system and their applications to the Third World. He
concludes that “Subaltern Realism,” which takes domestic factors into account in
analyzing intra and interstate con icts, explains more of the existing con icts in the
international system than either realism or neorealism. Empirically, “state-making
and civil wars” were part of European social formations, therefore, ignoring issues
of war and peace in the “global periphery” where ethnic tensions are erupting into
civil wars has the potential for disrupting peace and security in the international
system.
Even though compared to its rivals realism provides a better framework
for understanding international politics, Carlos Escude (pp. 56-75) asserts that
taking domestic political structure seriously will enhance its explanatory strengths.
Examining the decision to cancel the Condor II Missile Project in 1989, Escude
argues that the Argentine government’s desire to be “admitted to the Brady Plan
and to restructure its foreign debt” (p. 57) forced the government to accede to
external (U.S.) pressure over domestic objection to deactivate the missile project.
 POST-COLD WAR REALISM AND LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM 227

Observing the uses of external pressure, Escude argues that the international system
is characterized by three kinds of states — those that command, the ones that obey,
and the rebel states. For him, and contrary to Waltz’s anarchic perspective, the
international system is best characterized as hierarchical, with the command states
representing the major states and most of the Third World states representing those
that obey. The rebel states, such as Libya, Iraq, and Iran are those that attempt
to challenge existing international norms. He argues that Argentina’s Condor II
Missile Project represents a peripheral state’s challenge to existing norms. And,
where the domestic political/societal structure cannot tolerate a high level of cost
for the economy, the command states exert prolonged pressure to bring such
rebel states into compliance. He Ž nds that, “incorporating state/society factors,
peripheral realism is a corrective to, rather than an abandonment of, the realist
paradigm” (p. 60) in the search for a more complete IR theory.
Extending the discourse on the relevance of domestic factors to IR theory,
Steven R. David in “The Primacy of Internal War,” (pp. 78-101) argues that
contrary to neorealism, “it is more accurate to assume a world of international
order and domestic anarchy” (p. 78). In the tradition of “Second Image Reversed,”1
David argues that the external behavior of states is conditioned by domestic
causes — in this case, internal war. Drawing from classical realism, David argues
that  awed human nature characterized by greed, fear, and the search for honor
partly explains the reasons for internal wars. But, from a neorealist perspective,
he also argues that internal and external wars occur for the same reasons. He
supports this by claiming that “anarchy on the domestic level is not quite the
same as anarchy on the international level, [because] many of the implications
of neorealism simply do not apply to what happens within states” (p. 79). This
discarding of anarchy (a central assumption of neorealism), while accepting its
con ict-prone characteristic, requires further explication than David provides.
Although neorealism yields signiŽ cant insights to our understanding of internal
wars, it does not claim to explain them. Neorealism is a theory of state action
and should therefore be evaluated at that level. While there is something to be
said about the need for a second image reversed analysis of international politics,
IR scholars are yet to collapse the bifurcation of the internal and external factors
into a theoretically empowering framework. The application of neorealism in the
context examined in “The Primacy of Internal Wars” ignores the dynamic origins
of internal con icts, especially in Africa. Prescription for external intervention as
discussed in David’s article only extends and sustains expansionist policies with
tendencies for promoting a neocolonialist stance for the new millennium . In light
of the above, we must ask, to what extent will a strong central authority with the
ability and willingness to impose its will on weak states (pp. 80-82) be sustained
in both democratic and non-democratic nations?
228 KELECHI A. KALU

To the extent that existing theories of international politics are rooted in the
intellectual traditions of European social formations, K.J. Holsti, (pp. 104-132)
asserts that their explanatory strengths for state behavior in the Third World
remain suspect. He argues that even though liberals may not deliberately seek to
exclude much of the Third World, their studies not only exclude them, but also
peripherialize issues of war beyond the shores of the West. According to Holsti,
Dependency theory has not fared better either. Largely a set of proposition s or
hypotheses of economic underdevelopment , Dependency theory ignores issues of
war — within and between states — in the Third World. During the Cold War,
most western scholarship on the Third World was characterized by a search for
understandin g communist tendencies in the periphery. But with the end of the
Cold War, rather than rethinking the extent to which state behavior and con icts
in the Third World can be explained by IR theory, neorealism and liberalism have
replaced communism with ethnic con icts. This unwillingness to constructively
resituate scholarly endeavors leads Holsti to conclude that “Neorealism and
neoliberalism are particularly deŽ cient because they arose in the context of
European and Cold War international politics, where problems in the peripheries
had no independent or signiŽ cant ontological status” (p. 124).
Since neorealist and neoliberal parochialism on Third World security studies
are likely to continue, we must ask, how valid is the criticism against these theories,
especially neorealism? In “Third World Thinking and Contemporary International
Relations,” (pp. 133-157) Donald J. Puchala examines the extent to which IR
theory can be applied to explaining state behavior from the perspective of Third
World scholars. Using an epistemologica l viewpoint, Puchala argues that “[t]he
language of the Third World theorists is militant. The vocabulary is military: they
speak of enemies, war, battleŽ elds, assaults, victories, and defeats. They assume
that struggle, con ict, and confrontation are normal modes of human affairs”
(p. 148-149). This important study deserves two observations . First, to the extent
that a signiŽ cant number of scholars of Third World origin have been exposed
to formal western education, the rite of passage for the terminal degrees require
mastery of one European language or the other. Further, to the extent that those
languages are the most important aspects of western culture — it names and
deŽ nes individual and collective identities — in their writings, scholars of Third
World origin are more likely to re ect these European-language in uences. Thus,
a more plausible claim would consider the fact that the militant language noted by
Puchala is more consistent with western epistemologica l social formations rather
than with indigenous African or Asian vocabularies. Most scholars of Third World
origin speak in militant terms because they write from “third world” conditions ;
creations of European social formations and expansion. Such writings evidence
the empowering realization that the choice of methodologica l individualis m does
 POST-COLD WAR REALISM AND LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM 229

not preclude bias in focus or analysis; a signiŽ cant impetus for writing the books
under review.
Secondly, the notion that scholars of Third World origins are not interested
in the same conceptual categories as western theorists such as “states,” “power,”
“war” and “peace” (see pp. 150-151), is limited in ignoring the internal-externa l
nexus in foreign policy decisions that informs most Third World realities.
Amitav Acharya’s “Beyond Anarchy,” (pp. 159-211) articulates the impera-
tive of taking seriously the impact of domestic factors in IR theory. Acharya ex-
plores the bipolarity-multipolarit y debates within the context of international sta-
bility. Against the background of structural theoretical claims that the Cold War
suppressed many potential con icts in the Third World, Acharya examines the
extent to which the Third World would be con ict-prone in the aftermath of the
Cold War. He argues that by focusing on systemic factors and major power rela-
tions during this period, western scholars ignored actual trends regarding con ict
and order in the Third World. Thus, pessimism “about Post-Cold War instability
in the Third World are based on a considerable amount of false alarm and exag-
geration” (p. 164). Consistent with the arguments by Holsti, David, and Escude,
Acharya opines that by relying on systemic attributes for their analysis, neoreal-
ists were “neither interested in, nor capable of, addressing the indigenous roots of
Third World con icts” (p. 169). He argues that a theoretical and complete view
of the international system would show that the Cold War was characterized by a
high number of con icts in the Third World, far more than occurred within and
between the major states. A number of these con icts, Acharya notes, were ini-
tiated and sustained out of the self-interest of the superpowers. However, survey-
ing potential sources of post-Cold War con icts in the Third World (pp. 169-177),
Acharya is hopeful that instances of democratic transitions, especially in the case of
Africa, will result in consolidation and, therefore, a more stable international sys-
tem. Agreeing with liberal internationalis t views, Acharya argues that East-West
cooperation has resulted in a renewed commitment to multilateralism and collec-
tive security. Given that the end of the Cold War has led to increased domestic
instability in West Africa, increased domestic tranquility in Southeast Asia and the
Middle East (p. 180), he sees a multipolar international system as more likely to
dampen Third World crises than a bipolar structure. Acharya concludes that, when
judged against Third World security experience during the Cold War, the claim by
structural realists that bipolarity promotes stability is tenuous (p. 190).
The concluding chapter by Barry Buzan examines the common thread in each
of the previous chapters and notes that each author focuses their study on a speciŽ c
level of analysis: system-versus unit-levels. He further notes the virtual consensus
of the authors regarding the weaknesses of mainstream IR theory when applied to
Third World security and non-security issues. He points out a need for conceptual
clariŽ cation, especially of legal sovereignty and the operation of power in the
230 KELECHI A. KALU

context of structural theory. Buzan categorizes the authors into pragmatists and
radicals. Given the frustrations of seemingly incapable states in the Third World,
pragmatists’ (e.g., Ayoob and David) projects revolve around how to make Third
World states more complete, sovereign, and strong, which are capable of competing
against European states. According to Buzan, the radicals (e.g., Holsti and Puchala)
are not prepared to accept the imposed Westphalian state system on the Third World
as a fait accompli (p. 218). While the problem for the pragmatists is how to improve
on the existing state system in the Third World, the radicals offer no alternatives to
replace existing state structures and/or policies.
Buzan argues that the idea that states are like units can be relaxed to allow for
the existence of two-worlds within the international system. As evidence, he cites
historical coexistence of the “civilized” with the “barbarians,” “pre-modern” and
“modern” social formations. In that sense, perhaps Wallerstein’s “world system”
analysis or the larger center-periphery worldviews derived from Marxism could
be more effectively incorporated into international politics theory. The task for
the twenty-Ž rst century is how to structure the relationship between the developed
North and the underdeveloped South.

Security and Democracy in Africa and Asia

Although, both texts are structured around the end of the Cold War, Hale and
Kienle’s volume, unlike the Neuman’s collection, is not informed by a common
theoretical and/or analytical framework. While both books came out of conference
papers, contributors to Neuman’s book were given speciŽ c questions to guide their
analysis. The core impetus for After the Cold War: Security and Democracy in
Africa and Asia by Hale and Kienle is to redress the analytical imbalance that
continues to marginalize issues of security and democracy in Africa and Asia.
They argue that except for Korea, most African and Asian countries did not occupy
center-stage during the Cold War; and, at its end, the Cold War impacts on Africa
and Asia deserve analysis. In particular, they ask, to what extent has states in Africa
and Asia lost international in uence at the end of the Cold War? Has the end of the
Cold War, and therefore superpower rivalries, changed the regional power status of
some states in Africa and Asia? To what extent has the end of superpower rivalries
affected domestic political structures in these regions, and to what extent is the
current drive for global political and economic liberalization likely to be sustained
in Africa and Asia? (p. 1).
The contributors to the book argue that in general, the end of the Cold War
has left an ideological vacuum that was Ž lled by the former USSR support for
central state planning as a counterweight to capitalism. The loss of this signiŽ cant
paradigmatic alternative has increased instances of oppositio n forces’ challenges
for regime transformation in many states. As a corollary to the foregoing, the Leftist
 POST-COLD WAR REALISM AND LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM 231

movements in much of Africa and Asia have lost credibility and ideological appeal
for political participation . And, with increased IMF and World Bank demand for
political and economic conditionalitie s for aid, authoritarian regimes have resorted
to force and violence in order to hold on to power. The implication here is that most
transitions , especially in Africa, have occurred without transformations.
Indeed, the general expectation that the end of the Cold War with its “peace
dividend” would redirect military aid to development of the South has not been
met. As Fred Halliday (p. 17) argues, the end of the Cold War has resulted
in the redirection of both direct foreign investment and economic aid from the
Third World to the former East European communist states, with serious regime
consequences for states in Africa and Asia. Halliday aptly argues that the absence
of historicity and speciŽ city in studying con icts in the Third World led to analyses
of these con icts as Cold War driven. Thus, at the end of the Cold War, the Arab-
Israeli and Indo-Pakistani con icts among others, which predate the Cold War,
remain unresolved. Charles Tripp in “The Sudanese Civil War in International
Relations” (pp. 43-81) also argues that the Cold War had little or no effect on
the Sudanese Civil War and hence its end has not impacted that unresolved
con ict. Thus, in situations where con icts result from processes of social and
state formation, as is currently the case in many African states, a plausible analysis
of such con icts must include issues of politicized ethnicity as signiŽ cant to the
framework for resolving pressing issues of scarce economic resources. As Graham
E. Fuller (pp. 82-98) argues, with the end of the Cold War, many states in the Third
World, especially those of Central Asian states, whose policies revolved around
communism, are now suffering from identity crisis, characterized by ethnicity.
Resolving such crisis without the erstwhile support from external intervention is
necessarily characterized by growing pains.
Focusing on the impact of the Cold War on Africa, Christopher Clapham
(pp. 99-114 and 274-285) argues that the end of the Cold War coincided with
serious internal crises, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The lack of regime
legitimacy, economic crises, and incapacity of SSA states to manage economic
development and distributio n resulted in internal con icts that escalated with the
end of the Cold War. Clapham argues that African states beneŽ ted from the
“paradox of impotence,” in which their irrelevance to the strategic interests of the
superpowers, except for the Horn of Africa, led the superpowers to ignore them,
while these states in turn played the superpowers off against each other (p. 101).
Furthermore, with the end of the Cold War, aid allocation to SSA states dried up as
former East European communist states became more strategically important for
the west, especially for members of the OECD. Thus, to the extent that domestic
stability characterized by good governance in SSA states becomes the norm, the
post-Cold War order will help resolve internal and external contradiction s and
marginalization of African states.
232 KELECHI A. KALU

Exploring “Prospects for Asian Security after the Cold War,” (pp. 115-133)
David Shambaugh argues that the Asian PaciŽ c region is entering the new
millennium at peace, but regrets that the end of the Cold War has exposed latent
rivalry and long smoldering scores that need to be settled. Possible dyadic con icts
to watch are the Korean peninsula, the Taiwan Strait, and the Indo-Pakistani border
(p. 117). Central to concerns about con ict in the Asian PaciŽ c region is the
question of China’s status inconsistency ; with increased military and economic
strengths, the balance of regional power is likely to shift to the PRC, which is likely
to attract offshore powers to initiate alliances to contain Chinese power (p. 131).
According to Shambaugh, these and issues of access to strategic resources are
likely to cause regional con icts in the years ahead.
For Rosemary Foot, “Thinking globally from a Regional Perspective” (pp. 134-
153) allows for an assessment of how policy makers and analysts in ofŽ cial
capacities in the Chinese, Indonesian, and Malaysian foreign ministries think
about the impact of the post-Cold War era on their respective states. Against
the backdrop of neorealism and liberal internationalism , Foot argues that these
states miss the bipolar structure, which allowed them to play the superpowers
off against each other. For her, the “unipolar moment” has important but negative
economic consequences for the Third World (p. 136). SpeciŽ cally for the Chinese,
the ofŽ cials are concerned that the loss of the “strategic triangle” is tantamount to
a loss of political leverage for the PRC. In the larger context, the United States,
more than ever before is therefore emboldened to impose its values and intervene
in domestic affairs of Third World states (p. 137). Consequently, in the cloak of
economic globalization and political liberalization (which no African and Asian
states can afford to ignore), the United States has managed the global transitions
such that the North-South argument has not only survived but has intensiŽ ed in the
post-Cold War era (p. 146).
In “International versus Domestic Pressures for Democratisation in Africa,”
Michael Bratton plausibly argues that while the end of the Cold War impacted de-
mocratic transitions in Sub-Saharan Africa, the external factors are less signiŽ cant
compared to the domestic processes that challenged the status-quo regimes. He
convincingly argues that demand for political transitions in Africa is grounded in
Africa’s historicity characterized by actions of state elites and social movements
at the domestic level. For Bratton, Cold War U.S. foreign-aid went mostly to dic-
tatorial regimes in Africa, whose values to the United States had more to do with
the regimes’ stability and the access these regimes provided for expropriation and
exploitatio n of oil and natural gas concessions than their democratic ideologies did
(p. 170). The U.S. post-Cold War moralistic stances in promotion of democracy
and the International Financial Institutions ’ political and economic conditionali-
ties have largely played subordinate roles in promoting democratic transitions in
Africa (p. 175). He concludes by noting the ineffectiveness of the political and
 POST-COLD WAR REALISM AND LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM 233

economic conditionalitie s for democratic transitions against wealthy African states

“where incumbent political leaders have captured domestic economic resource
 ows” (p. 184).
In the end, whether the issue is “Authoritarianism Liberalized,” “Good Gov-
ernance,” or “Indian Communism,” a plausible analysis of the impact of the post-
Cold War on security and non-security issues in the Third World require a clear
articulation of domestic factors. Taking domestic factors seriously allows for clear
and veriŽ able strategic interactions of actors — both states and non-state — their
goals, interests, the resources, and strategies they bring to the political negotiation
arena. Understanding how individuals and groups are motivated by the goals they
seek — maintaining or changing existing norms, rules and/or institution s — are
necessary to the analytical framework for those studying and writing about change
in the Third World. The bifurcation of economics and politics and/or international
and domestic analytical dimensions so prevalent in international relations theory
lead to obfuscation of salient but sometimes non-quantiŽ able variables for under-
standing why con icts and economic underdevelopmen t persist in the Third World.

Third World Political Ecology

Bryant and Bailey have labored to re(center) politics in the analysis of Third
World issues, and speciŽ cally the centrality of politics in understanding human-
environmental interactions within the context of environmental change. Moving
away from the earlier dichotomy of population growth and environmental decay,
the authors seek “to introduce readers to the Ž eld of Third World political ecology
in terms of a general evaluation of the political role of different types of actors
in human-environmenta l interaction in the Third World” (p. 24). In addition to
highlightin g the issues of politics, the authors seek to integrate theoretical and
comparative insights and therefore specify the goals, interests, motivations, and
strategies of actors involved in the struggle for the control of the environment
in the Third World. Bryant and Bailey argue that to the extent that scholars
appreciate the role of human agency in the politics and study of environmental
change, it becomes clear that third world political ecology involves the struggle
between different actors with speciŽ c interests for the control of the environment.
Conceptualizing “politicised environment” in three dimensions — everyday (e.g.,
deforestation and salinisation) , episodic (e.g.,  ooding, high winds/storms), and
systemic (e.g., nuclear fallout, pesticide concentrations in the human food chain),
the authors argue that in pursuing their speciŽ c goals and interests, most actors
contribute to environmental change (pp. 29-33).
The book is a consummate academic text that traces the intellectual origin of
environmental studies, especially within the discipline of Anthropology and Ge-
ography. Arguing that the analytical framework of earlier scholars using structural
234 KELECHI A. KALU

analysis was apolitical, they propose a new theoretical framework — politicised en-
vironment — for studying Third World development in general and, in particular,
environmental change. Based on their conceptualization of the framework of politi-
cised environment, the authors analyze the role and importance of several authors,
who in pursuing their speciŽ c interests, often work at cross-purposes with serious
implications for the environment. Key actors explored in the book are the “state”
(Chapter 3), which according to the authors has grown in power. In the process
of using its power to promote economic growth, “the state has served to enhance
environmental degradation” (p. 72). The rise of multilateral institution s (Chapter
4) and these institutions ’ acceptance of the capitalist economic system as the best
mode of economic production is seen by the authors as promoting the interests and
goals of the advanced industrialize d countries, which is inimical to environmental
preservation in the Third World (pp. 100-102). The authors also explore the role
of such actors as “Businesses” (Chapter 5), “Environmental Non-Governmental
Organisations” (Chapter 6), and “Grassroots Actors” (Chapter 7).
In the end, Bryant and Bailey conclude this invaluable text with greater
appreciation of the role and centrality of politics in understandin g environmental
change and crises in the Third World. The text also highlights the existence
of inter-organizationa l and intra-group con icts that often clash in the process
of competition for the control of development policies. What is not clear or
convincing in the book is the extent to which political ecology, characterized by
the centrality of politics, is a different Ž eld from international political economy.
Indeed, the book is a legitimate call for a political economy-based research for
scholars interested in Third World issues. The rich references and suggestion s for
further research is a gold mine for those interested in research in the area of political
ecology.

Concluding Assessment
The general impetus for the three books reviewed here is the end of the Cold
War and the extent neorealism and liberal internationalis m — both systemic theo-
ries — are helpful for explaining change and behavior of states in the Third World.
Based on the arguments in these books, structural theories from neorealism and
international political economy (without revision) are inadequate for explaining
security and non-security issues that affect the Third World. However, given that
our research questions determine our choice of methodology and analytical frame-
works, most of the contributors failed to interrogate neorealism and liberal inter-
nationalism on their terms. Instead, and without proposing a viable alternative re-
search programs, most of the contributors assess the utility of existing theories by
extrapolating from these theories conclusions that they did not claim to explain, but
by what the authors think these theories should explain. For example, even though
 POST-COLD WAR REALISM AND LIBERAL INTERNATIONALISM 235

there are problems with Waltz’s neorealist theory, its structural differentiation , as
Buzan aptly restates, is in the functions that states perform within the context of
the international system. Within this differentiation and given the absence of an in-
ternational government with powers of enforcement of rules and regulations, states
become major actors in the international system by meeting a basic requirement
of sovereignty. To the extent that states in the international system, but especially
states in the Third World, claim the right to sovereignty, each state ipso facto ac-
knowledges its responsibilit y to work towards maintaining that sovereignty. Failure
to do so results in domination by a stronger international actor.
To a large extent, self-help is an important factor in understandin g the logic
of neorealist theory and how it applies to security and non-security issues in
the Third World. The principle of self-help suggests that states must depend on
themselves for survival, choosing when and how to participate in the international
political and economic system. In the absence of a world government, each state is
responsible for advancing its national interests as deŽ ned by its own government.
The extent to which a Third World state’s interests are achieved at home and abroad
is therefore relative to the power of other states in the international system. The
type of constraints and opportunitie s that international regimes provide contribute
to this factor. On the other hand, anarchy ensures that, the dominant powers
in the international system will establish international regimes that re ect their
national interests; the less powerful states may choose whether to participate in
such regimes or not. Exploiting available opportunitie s will depend on the interests
of elites, as well as in their competence to rationally calculate means to ends. As the
contributors to Neuman’s and Hale and Kienle’s books acknowledge that the elites
in the Third World are mostly self-interested rather than general welfare-seeking
agents. This point is cogently evident in Bryant and Bailey’s concept of “politicised
environment.” The limited presence of activist-scholar s of Third World origin
whose research programs give policy direction to political leaders in Africa and/or
Asia is noted with concern. Here the problem is not the relevance of international
relations theory to Third World issues. Rather, what is missing are committed
scholars whose research methodologie s and theoretical frameworks inform policy
issues relevant to the Third World. Ultimately, committed scholarship on security
and non-security issues in the Third World may not need an alternative theoretical
framework from neorealism and liberal internationalism . Rather, constructive
application of the existing framework in the tradition of second image reversed has
the potential to yielding insights on issues of persistent ethnic con icts, democratic
transitions, and environmental degradation.
Analytically, insights from geometric concepts can help to further simplify the
above argument. A circle is the set of all points equidistant from a point on a plane.
Although the center of a circle is not part of a circle, concentric circles share a
common center and parts of the plane. Circles that are tangential to each other
236 KELECHI A. KALU

only share one point. A major claim of neorealism is the centrality of states as
the most important actor in the international system. Thus, the state is the center,
while non-state actors form the circles. Conceptually, then, the center (read states)
dictates the position of all the other points. Within the context of “like units” the
structural functional differentiation in the neorealist argument only suggests that
every state seek to maintain its most cherished interests, security. Consequently,
it is the distribution of capabilities (which when broadly deŽ ned would include
effective and competent political leadership) that determines which states are
more successful in advancing their national interests. Unwilling to grasp these
important relationships , a number of the contributors to the volumes reviewed here
implausibly conclude that Third World states are tangential to the international
system. Nothing could be further from the reality.

NOTE

1 See Peter Gourevitch 1978. “The Second Image Reversed: The International Sources of
Domestic Politics.” International Organization 32(4):881-913.

REFERENCES

B RYANT , Raymond L. and Sinead B AIL EY

1997 Third World Political Ecology. London and New York: Routledge.
H A LE , William and Eberhard K IEN L E , eds
1997 After the Cold War: Security and Democracy in Africa and Asia. London and New York:
Tauris Academic Studies.
N E UM AN , Stephanie G., ed.
1998 International Relations Theory and the Third World. New York: St. Martin’s Press.