National interests and geopolitics in the Trump-age: the return of realism in foreign policy analysis
On April 11, a roundtable discussion was held at the Institute for Foreign Affairs and Trade (IFAT) with the title “National interests and geopolitics in the Trump-age: the return of realism in foreign policy analysis”. Péter Marton, associate professor of the Corvinus University of Budapest, Gergely Romsics, senior research fellow of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and Márton Ugrósdy, director of IFAT took part in the panel moderated by Máté Szalai, a senior research fellow at IFAT and an assistant lecturer at CUB. During the first part of the roundtable, discussion was mostly concentrated on realism as an analytical tool and its applicability, after which the focus shifted to the changes that have occurred in the world political order in the past few years, and the role of China, Russia, and the US in these events.
At the beginning of the discussion, Máté Szalai outlined the basic principles of the realist school (citing Jack Levy), highlighting state-centrism, the anarchic nature of the international system, the rationality of political actors and the fixed nature of their interests, as well as security- and profit-maximizing behaviour as a general phenomenon in politics. Nowadays, many scholars argue that this analytical framework – after its set-back in the 1990s – returned to the forefront of research. Participants agreed with the narrative, arguing that it is due to changes taking place in the world order itself: after the cold war, a unipolar order emerged in which the United States became the sole global superpower. In such a situation, when there are no serious challengers, realism lost its interpretative power. Nonetheless, in the last few years, as Russia and China questions the hegemony of the United States more and more and a new power competition is observable between them, the realist interpretative framework became attractive again.
The second part of the discussion was devoted to the interpretation of Russian, Chinese and American foreign policy in a realist framework. The panellists mostly agreed that the foreign policy of Trump (e.g. emphasizing transactionalism) is partly built on the realist idea. On the other hand, there is an unusual dichotomy in the current American behaviour: while many decisions seem incoherent individually, but – as Gergely Romsics put it – taking a step back, one can observe a consistent, comprehensive framework.
In the case of Russia, the speakers found it harder to find such an ideological framework behind Putin’s actions. One consistent factor is based around the two countries’ Cold War past: Moscow’s opposition to the USA. As a result, Russia ignores other, more pressing threats, such as China.
Talking about Chinese foreign policy, the participants agreed that it is quite difficult to interpret Beijing’s behaviour in a realist framework, primarily due to the fact that Chinese decision making operates in a “black box”, which deprives outside actors of observing its internal dynamics. The most pressing dilemma concerning Chinese foreign policy is whether Beijing’s rise will be facilitated by peaceful or aggressive means. It may be argued that there is little consensus even among the Chinese political elite regarding this matter.
During the Q&A session, the panellists analysed the future of the current world system. They agreed that the role of nation states will be reduced and the Westphalian order will be transformed. Gergely Romsics pointed out that even contemporarily, one can see the coexistence of a pre-Westphalian, a Westphalian and a post-Westphalian world order – while the latter one is mostly limited to the Western world, emerging middle powers represent the traditional state-centric view. On the other hand, Péter Marton highlighted the unpredictable nature of the future, highlighting the importance of technological innovations for example in bio-engineering and its unforeseeable effects on world politics.