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Verity - UPH Journal of International Relations Faculty of Social and Political Science Pelita Harapan University THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF US NAVAL CAPABILITY IN HOLLYWOOD FILMS Daniel Anugerah Widjaja Universitas Pelita Harapan, Tangerang e-mail: [email protected] ABSTRAK Tersebar di seluruh dunia dan memiliki mobilitas yang sangat tinggi, Angkatan Laut AS adalah salah satu instrumen militer utama yang digunakan untuk mencerminkan kekuatan Amerika Serikat. Karya film Hollywood merupakan salah satu titik unggul kekuasaan lunak (softpower) budaya Amerika Serikat. Angkatan Laut AS banyak tampil dalam karya film Hollywood dari awal produksi perfilman tersebut. Namun, tidak banyak literatur akademik yang menelaah karya film tersebut sebagai sarana konstruksi sosial mengenai citra yang menyangkut Angkatan Laut AS. Penelitian ini menggunakan ilmu sosial interpretatif dan konstruktivisme untuk mengeksplorasi tema-tema yang ada dalam film-film ber- genre angkatan laut. Karya tulis ini juga bertujuan untuk menunjukan bahwa karya-karya tersebut mendukung pencitraan Angkatan Laut AS sebagai kesatuan yang sangat kompeten dan gesit dalam menjalankan tugas dengan nilai moral. Pada akhirnya, penelitian ini berusaha menunjukan efek konstitutif bagi penonton dari film-film tersebut, dan bagaimana hal ini dapat menunjang pencitraan antar-subyektif antara Angkatan Laut dan penonton. Kata Kunci: Konstruktivisme, Kekuatan, Angkatan Laut AS ABSTRACT The US Navy has become of the primary arms of US power projection, deployed worldwide and possessing high mobility. On the other hand, Hollywood cinema has been one of the hallmarks of US cultural soft power. During the time that Hollywood cinema has existed, the US Navy has appeared multiple times within the film art form. However, almost no literature exists that seek to examine these films are vessels for the social construction of ideas around the US Navy. This research uses interpretive social science and constructivism to explore the themes contained within naval films. It argues that these films help construct an image of a mobile and highly competent navy serving a righteous cause. It also argues the constitutive effects the film has on its audience. Keywords: Constructivism, Soft Power, US Navy Background deployed worldwide and field ten carrier When talking about the reach and groups in the worlds three major oceans influence of the United States as that of a (U.S. Department of Navy, 2019). great power, one cannot understate the Against this backdrop of the US Navy’s important role that its military plays. Of the role in US Foreign Policy, Hollywood has five branches of the US Armed Forces, the created many stories. These stories range Navy plays a role like no other in providing from horror to romance to action and the incredible capacity to attack and defend intrigue. These stories whether meaning to in multiple theatres throughout the world. or by coincidence propagate different ideas The Pacific Battles of World War 2 proved that shape public opinion of America and the the Navy’s ability to project the US’ strength US Navy. The images from the movies some 7000 miles from it’s homeland; an construct the ideas of the powerful advantage post-war US pressed as capabilities of the United States. The competition with the USSR began. .” importance of these themes lies within the (Bradford, 2016, p. 260-261). As of 2019, it concepts of identity and ideas that predicate boasts a force of 289 warships the actions of states and societies. Alexander Wendt stresses these precepts in his Social 17 Verity - UPH Journal of International Relations Faculty of Social and Political Science Pelita Harapan University Theory of International relations: laying the reinforce the identity of its users (Pretorius, foundation for constructivism’s examination 2008). of idea-creation through social interaction (Wendt, 1999). Constructivism To analyse the themes and ideas found Understanding the impact that cultural in portrayal of US Naval capabilities and artefacts such as movies have upon the world propose the construction that occurs therein of international relations lends much to the this research asks: (i) How are the US IR school of constructivism. The schools of Navy’s capabilities portrayed in Hollywood thought in Constructivism pursues not only Cinema? (ii) In what ways, does Hollywood knowledge in IR but also how that Cinema construct the US identity as a knowledge came to be. In the words of superpower and ideas of powerful naval Emanuel Adler, “constructivism is a social capabilities? theory about the role of knowledge and knowledgeable agents in the constitution of Literature Review social reality” (Adler, 2015, p. 114). The 20th Century demonstrated that the This theory of international relations use of Seapower and Great Power status assumes knowledge is socially created and goes hand-in-hand. Colin S. Gray offers that communicated constantly. It establishes that into the 20th Century, US Seapower lends it beneath the material objects that populate the the ability to be mobile, while its addition of world is ideas that dictate how actors view sea-based air power also allows great navies those objects—as opposed to realists who to penetrate targets in-land (Gray, 1994). take material objects at their face value. The Once in this position of primacy, Stephen M way in which humans view and think of Walt pointed out how the US strived to object matters as much as the objects provide security for its allies and the liberal themselves, “constructivists hold that world order (Walt 2002). This commitment normative or ideational structures are just as to protect it allies and interests globally important as material structures” (Reus- translates to the choices made in its defense Smit, 2016, p. 196). It is these ideas that acquisition; Robert C. Rubel points to the sublimate into the motivations and F35 and LCS programs as shift to include behaviour of state and non-state actors, as policing as well as war-fighting scenarios the way they view the world affects their (Rubel, 2016). actions. Moreover, constructivism iterates As this paper engages with ideas of Pop- the importance of studying the ways in Culture it must also examine the trends that which these ideas are created and then exists in media, Michelle C. Pautz and communicated: Megan K. Warnement handily points out the How agents perceive the world is positive depiction of the US Armed forces in important in explaining their actions, and American Cinema vis-à-vis other federal they always have an element of choice in organizations unfavourable (Pautz, 2013). defining their identities and interests. Yet, examinations into the how the idea However, in addition to idealism, a key of military power constructed and what feature of constructivism is holism or exactly gives military equipment its weight structuralism, the view that social structures is a relatively unexplored field of have effects that cannot be reduced to agents international relations research. Of the few and their interactions. Among these effects is examinations, Robert R. Ross inspects how the shaping of identities and interests, which advancing naval capability is as much tied to are conditioned by discursive formations--by nationalist narratives as it is to national the distribution of ideas in the system--as security (Ross, 2018). Joelien Pretorius on well as by material forces, and as such are the other hand, analyses how the language of not formed in a vacuum. (Wednt, 199, p. national security is used the create and 137) 18 Verity - UPH Journal of International Relations Faculty of Social and Political Science Pelita Harapan University By studying the process by which ideas type of balance that the United States needs are formed and communicated, it allows for to strike as a world power (Nye, 2011). a better understanding of identities: ideas that actors hold regarding themselves. These New Public Diplomacy identities can in turn act as a guide for New Public Diplomacy as iterated by normative behaviour: what it acceptable or Jan Melissen, expands its assumptions to unacceptable for an actor to do. Deeper still, include non-state actors in the efforts of when these ideas work in tandem with actor diplomacy, “it does not see public ideas about other actors, these patterns of diplomacy, or indeed diplomacy in general, behaviour over time reinforce the ideas that as a uniquely stately activity, even though it they are born from. These cycles of idea stresses the practice of states” (Melissen, creation and reinforcement is what 2005, p. 12). It expands to include and study Alexander Wendt calls cultures and can NGOs organisations, but also proponents of come to define entire eras of International arts, music, movies, and other aspects of Relations (Wendt, 1999). pop-culture in its ability to delivery of Soft and Smart Power information (Schneider, 2005) Having established the importance of New Public diplomacy also views the constructivist ideas of identity, ideas, and distinction between information intended for culture; Nye’s idea of Soft power, and Smart domestic audience and that intended for the Power are important to laying the foreign public to be less relevant in a freer groundwork for this research. Nye highlights communication age (Mellisen, 2005). A the distinction between Hard and Soft power state's ability to compartmentalize or keep as the effect or push and pull: “soft power is consistent is less and less relevant in the age the ability to affect others through the co- of an internet that connects the publics of optive means of framing the agenda, different states so easily. persuading, and eliciting positive attraction Great Powers in order to obtain preferred outcomes” (Nye, While statistical data has played a large 2011, p. 20). The same resources that a state part in determining and justifying the great uses to coerce (Hard Power) can also be used power status in the study of international to co-opt (soft power).

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