What is the peace of Westphalia?
Set of treaties with the treaties of OsnaBruck and Munster, ending the Thirty Years War.
- Effectively entrenched the principle of cuius region, eius religio.
- Moderated the intensity and severity of war in Europe.
What is the first balance of power term?
1) Balances as distribution of power
When balance of power is used in the descriptive sense it refers to a changing balance of power for example because of a state becoming Communist. Another way to use it is to describe a situation in which power is distributed equally.
Hegemonic stability theory: a strong dominant power is the best guarantee of stability. One side has preponderance of power so that the others dare not attack it.
Hegemonic transition theory: when the strongest power begins to slip, as it inevitably will, or as a new aspirant for hegemony arises, war is particularly likely. A declining hegemon or states fearing a rising power will take desperate measures to protect their position, whereas a rising power will gamble to attain hegemony.
Changes in the distribution of power among leading states may be one factor that helps explain war and instability, but such changes are not the whole story.
Why did British-American War of 1895 not happen? Realists point to the rise of Germany as a more proximate threat to Britain. Liberals point to the increasingly democratic nature of the two English-speaking countries and to the transnational cultural ties between the old leader and the new challenger.
What is the second balance of power term?
Balance as policy
Refers to a deliberate policy of balancing.
- Lord Palmerston’s dictum Leaders who embrace a balance-of-power policy are almost certainly also likely to hold an essentially realist view of international politics.
- Often referred to by Realpolitik
- A key instrument of maintaining the balance of power is alliance: agreements that sovereign states enter into with each other to ensure their mutual security.
What is the third balance of power term?
Balance as theory
Balance of power as a theory: describes a more or less automatic equilibration of power in the international system, called balance-of-power theory: predicts that states will act to prevent any one state from developing a preponderance of power. Leaders will embrace the theory because they cannot afford not to.
- Helping the underdog because if you help the top dog it may eventually turn around and eat you.
- Reasons balance-of-power predictions could be wrong: (1) some countries may see no alternative, so side with stronger country, (2) perceptions of threat, often influenced by proximity, (3) growing role of economic interdependence and (4) ideology
What is the fourth balance of power term?
Power of Historical multipolar system. Used to describe histrorical cases of multipolarity.
- Requires a number of countries that follow a set of rules of the game that are generally understood
- Looks at the two dimensions of systems, structure and process.
What are the three periods that can be identified as distribution of power? (neorealist view)
- Napoleon and his defeat at Waterloo. Other great powers united in a coalition to defaaet France
- Rise of Germany 1971-1907. it unified with Italy
-Bipolarity of alliances,
The European balance of power had lost all flexibility. Two sets of alliances developed and rigidified: The Triple Entente (GB, FR, Rus) and The Triple Alliance (Ger, Aus-Hun, Ita). The polarization of the European balance of power into two tight blocs resulted in an inability to maintain balance à outbreak -> WWI
What are the five periods of Process?
Classical realist & constructivits view
- Concert of Europe. European great powers sought to maintain order in part by holding periodic congresses in which they deliberated jointly and attempted to strike agreements that would both preserve the balance of power and the stem of revolutionary tide of liberal nationalism. Certain interventions were accepted.
- Loose Concert. The concert was less active and somewhat less effective. lead to ceased funtion.
- Nationalism and the unification of Germany and Italy. Balance-of power system was far less moderate and marked by five wars
- Bismarck’s Revived Concert. In the Bismarckian balance of power the new Prussian-led Germany played the key role. Bismarck played flexibly with a variety of alliance partners and tried to divert France into imperialistic adventures oversea to distract its attention away from the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine that it lost to Germany at the conclusion of the Franco-Prussian War. He implanted an alliance system, which was built on flexibility and complexity
- Bismarck dead, loss of flexibility. His successors failed to keep up the system and Germany became involved in imperialism and attempted to change Britain’s naval supremacy
What are the orgins of WWI on a system level of structure?
- Rise of german power. industry, millitary, “Tirpitz Plan”= second largest Navy.
- Increased rigidity in the alliance system. Tightens relations with AUS-HUN, loss of flexibily =security dillema
What are the orgins of WWI on a system level of Process?
- Continued rise of nationalism, stronger than socialism and captialism
- Rise of complacency about peace. Frustration over diplomatic compromises tht solved conflicts. growing accept of social darwinism; “survival of the fittest:”
- German policy. To much focus on haard power and neglecting soft power. GER tried to schock GB into friendship, but let to the arms of France and Russia.
What are the orgins of WWI on a domestic social level?
- Bankers believed war would be bad for buisiness, so capitalism wasn’t a cause, as lenin claimed.
- The international crisis of the declining AUS-HUN and Ottoman empire, treatened by the rise of nationalism. Ottoman government was weak, corrup, so an easy target for nationalists. Serbia took the lead for Balkan countries that wanted to be independent. AUS-HUN went to war beacuse the war to weaken serbia en prevent an nationalism magnet. NOT BECAUSE OF THE MUDER OF FRANZ FERDINAND.
- The domestic political situation in Germant: social problems. Efforts for hegemony were a distraction from poor domestic integration of German society. Expansionist policies to provide foreign adventures instead of domestic reform. Expansionism viewed as an alternative to social democracy.
- Crisis instabilty in summer 1914. favoring of rapid mobilization and deployment.
What are the orgins of WWI on a individual level?
- Mediocrity of the leadership on eve of WWI. Aus-Hun emperor Franz Joseph was putty in the hand of his duplicitous foreign minister. In Russia Tsar Nicholas was an isolated aristocrat with incompetent people. Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm led his country into a risky policy without any skill or consistency.
- Sycophantic German diplomats were filing overly rosy reports from most other great power capitals to please their vindictive superiors in foreign ministry
Was WWI inevitable?
No
Four counterfactually options for WWI
- Simple local war: Kaiser Wilhelm prevents escalation -> Austro-Serbian war
- One-front war: If a general hadn’t lied about the possibility of altering mobilizing schedules, there would only be mobilization on the eastern border of Germany.
- Two front war without GB: if Germany had not invaded Belgium the liberal Brits who were in charge in parliament couldn’t have used the violation of Belgian neutrality as an argument
- War without US: If Germany didn’t start a submarine war against allied and US ships or send the Zimmerman telegram US wouldn’t have been involved since Wilson won elections on the platform of staying out of war.
What are the two important ways that todays world is different of 1914?
- Nuclear weapons
2. The ideology of war.
