'Second State Debate' in International Relations: Theory Turned Upside-Down

JOHN M. HOBSON

Abstract. This article argues that conventional understanding of how IR theory conceptualizes the state is in need of revision. By relocating IR theories of the state within the ‘second state’ debate, we find that neorealism underestimates the power of the state in world politics, while neoliberal institutionalism exaggerates its power. Moreover, liberalism, constructivism, Marxism, postmodernism, and ‘second-wave’ Weberian historical sociology, all endow the state with greater degrees of agential power in the international realm than does neorealism. The significance of the second state debate will be not merely to reconfigure our understanding of how IR theory conceptualizes the state, but to turn conventional understanding of IR theory upside-down.

Introduction

In this article I argue that conventional interpretive frameworks for understanding how IR theory conceptualizes the state are highly problematic, and are accordingly in need of revision. In particular, I argue that we can reconfigure traditional understanding through the lens of what I propose to call the ‘second state debate’. In the process, I suggest that we emerge with a more accurate and nuanced understanding of IR theories of the state as well as of IR theory more generally. This essentially involves relocating IR theories of the state within the agent-structure problematic. In particular, I introduce two concepts when understanding the state: (1) domestic agential state power, (2) international agential state power. For the purposes of this article the most significant concept is the international agential power of the state. Here I examine how much agential power each of the major theories of IR accord the state. Of course, the conventional understanding is that neorealism reifies the state (state-centricity) while liberalism, Marxism, constructivism and postmodernism all downgrade the state’s importance (if not ignore it altogether). But viewed through the lens of the second state debate, I argue that neorealism actually underestimates (ignores) the international agential power of the state in world politics, while conversely, neoliberal institutionalism exaggerates the state’s degree of agential power in the international system. Moreover, liberalism, constructivism, Marxism, postmodernism and ‘second-wave’ Weberian historical sociology, all endow the state with much greater degrees of international agential power than does neorealism. In this way then, the significance of the second state debate will be not merely to refine our understanding of how IR theory conceptualizes the state, but to turn conventional understanding of IR theory upside-down. This article proceeds in five parts. Part I lays out the conventional understanding of how IR theory conceptualizes the ‘power’ of the state, through what I call the 395 396 John M. Hobson lens of the ‘first state debate’. Part II introduces the second state debate and its central concepts. These concepts are then applied to understanding neorealism and neoliberal institutionalism in Part III, and Part IV briefly situates the major theories of international relations within five generic forms of state theory that emerge from the second state debate. Finally in Part V, I explore a sociological resolution to the second state debate.

I. State theory in the ﬁrst state debate

Across the spectrum of the social sciences a variety of theorists in different disciplines have situated theories of the state within two generic frameworks. The first comprises normative theories of the state which consider what the most desirable or appropriate form of state and political community might be. The second comprises explanatory theories of the state which consider who controls, or what forces shape, the state and its behaviour. Of course, in practice the line that separates these two generic forms is fuzzy, given that normative concerns often creep into explanatory theory and as one commentator put it, political philosophers often ‘see what they think the state ought to be like in the state as it is’.1 To the extent that it is at all possible to maintain this ‘division’, this article is primarily interested in ‘explanatory’ state theory. The basic claim is that it is possible to discern two state debates within ‘explanatory’ state theory, both of which can be found across a variety of disciplines. Within Sociology, Comparative Politics and Political Science, a ‘first state debate’ emerged in the 1970s but took off in the early 1980s. This was based around the issue of ‘social autonomy versus state autonomy’. Thus neo-Marxists and pluralists argued for the autonomy of social forces over the state,2 while by the late 1970s, neo- Weberians and statists insisted that state autonomy takes precedence over social forces.3 Similarly in the 1980s, within Comparative Political Economy, statists critiqued Marxists and liberals by arguing that the successful rise of the East Asian ‘tigers’ could be explained by the pronounced autonomy that each of these states had over their societies.4 However, I suggest that this first state debate has now been superseded by a second state debate. This new state debate rejects the polarities of its predecessor. In seeking to transcend the ‘state-centric versus society-centric’ problematic, the second state debate in Sociology and Comparative Politics/CPE enquires into how state structures and social forces mutually constitute each other. Thus while many neo-Marxists now concede that states have some autonomy,5 and

1 D. Held, ‘Central Perspectives on the Modern State’, in G. McLennan, D. Held and S. Hall (eds.), The Idea of the Modern State (Milton Keynes, UK: Open University Press, 1984), p. 31. 2 For the former, see especially, R. Miliband, The State in Capitalist Society (London: Quartet Books, 1973); for the latter, see R.A. Dahl, Polyarchy (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1971). 3 The classic statements remain T. Skocpol, States and Social Revolutions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979); and P.B. Evans, D. Rueschemeyer and T. Skocpol (eds.), Bringing the State Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985); also S.D. Krasner, Defending the National Interest (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978). 4 C. Johnson, MITI and the Japanese Miracle (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1982); R. Wade, Governing the Market (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990). 5 P. Cammack, ‘Review Article: Bringing the State Back In?’, British Journal of Political Science,19 (1989), pp. 261–90; B. Jessop, State Theory (Cambridge: Polity, 1990), pp. 275–88; F. Block, Revising State Theory (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987). The ‘second state debate’ in IR 397 statists and neo-Weberians increasingly concede that states are embedded in society,6 so we can conclude that the traditional ‘great divide’ between Marxist and statist theories of the state has considerably narrowed in the second state debate within Sociology and CPE. But what of International Relations (which is the primary focus of this article)? While it is the case that the first state debate in Sociology and Comparative Politics/Economics influenced the discipline of IR, nevertheless its impact has been much greater within IPE than in mainstream International Politics. Moreover when the first state debate in Sociology and Comparative Politics/Economics really took off in the early 1980s, it made no impact within mainstream International Politics because both neoliberal institutionalism and neorealism effectively ignored state- society relations and focused exclusively on the state and the international system. Arguably Robert Keohane’s shift from his ‘pluralist’ phase in the 1970s,7 to his neoliberal institutionalist phase after 1980, was determined by his attempt to challenge Waltzian neorealism on its own grounds, which required him to explicitly bracket state-society relations (see Part III below). It is also possible to discern two state debates in IR, the first of which constitutes the familiar means through which (explanatory) state theory is understood. The first state debate emerged in the 1970s with the rise of interdependence theory and the radical/pluralist challenge to neorealism. As in Sociology and elsewhere, the essence of this first debate lay upon the fundamental issue of state-centrism versus social- centrism. That is, both sides fought over the issue as to whether autonomous states constitute the central actors in world politics. Radical pluralists and Marxists argued that global capitalism and economic interdependence had come to outflank the sovereign state, rendering it increasingly anachronistic,8 which in turn prompted the neorealist counter-attack, which reasserted the continuing primacy of anarchy and the sovereign state.9 Interestingly, this first debate has continued on down to the present as a whole host of writers assert the primacy of globalization or global structures over the state,10 only to be countered by the familiar claims of neorealists.11 However, while this debate is still very much alive, I suggest that it suffers from three fundamental limitations. Because it is founded upon a binary ‘either/or’ logic (either social-centrism or state-centrism), the debate effectively leads into a cul-de-sac

6 M. Mann, The Sources of Social Power, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993); P.B. Evans, Embedded Autonomy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995); L. Weiss and J.M. Hobson, States and Economic Development (Cambridge: Polity, 1995); J.M. Hobson, The Wealth of States (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997); L. Weiss, The Myth of the Powerless State (Cambridge: Polity, 1998). 7 R.O Keohane and J.S. Nye, Power and Interdependence (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1977). 8 For the former see: J.W. Burton, World Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972); R.W. Mansbach, Y.H. Ferguson and D.E. Lampert, The Web of World Politics (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1976). For the latter, see R.J. Barnett and R.E. Müller, Global Reach (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1974). 9 See S.D. Krasner, ‘State Power and the Structure of International Trade’, World Politics, 28:3 (1976), pp. 317–47; R. Gilpin, US Power and the Multinational Corporation (New York: Basic Books, 1975); K.N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (New York: McGraw Hill, 1979). 10 See, J.A. Camilleri and J. Falk, The End of Sovereignty? (Aldershot, UK: Edward Elgar, 1991); S. Strange, The Retreat of the State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 11 S.D. Krasner, ‘Power Politics, Institutions, and Transnational Relations’, in T. Risse-Kappen (ed.), Bringing Transnational Relations Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), pp. 257–79. 398 John M. Hobson as two polarities face each other in a position of stand-off. Accordingly this debate is incapable of generating new research questions and agendas. Secondly, both sides tend to distort the ‘other’ side where all theories are over-simpliﬁed for the sake of ‘winning the battle’. Thirdly, and indeed ironically, I suggest that this debate suffers from ‘state-blindness’. In fact in one crucial sense, both sides are in fundamental agreement: that states and state behaviour are derived from, or determined by, international structures. The only real point of difference lies with which structures are important (that is, the international political structure for neorealists, and the international economic structure for Marxists/world systems theorists and liberal/radical pluralists). Thus neither side actually considers the possibility that states have agential power to affect international structures. In this vein, I suggest that it is possible to discern a ‘second state debate’ in IR, which produces a more fruitful framework for understanding state theory in IR. Accordingly, I suggest that this debate should supersede the ‘ﬁrst state debate’.

II. Reconﬁguring state theory within IR’s second state debate

Perhaps the most fundamental limitation of the ﬁrst state debate framework is its omission of the ‘international agential power’ of the state in favour of ontologically reifying international structure. Here I seek to relocate the ﬁrst state debate framework within the agent-structure dichotomy. The central question becomes: to what extent do theories of IR attribute to the state agential power to shape the international realm? Here it is necessary to consider not one, but two faces of agential state power—domestic and international. The concept of the domestic agential power of the state is congruent with what Theda Skocpol famously referred to as ‘institu- tional autonomy’.12 Thus a state’s domestic agential power (or domestic autonomy) refers to the ability of the state to make domestic or foreign policy, as well as shape the domestic realm, free of domestic social structural constraints. Applying this concept, it is the case that autonomous states loom large within neorealism as well as Weberian historical sociology, while they take a backseat in Marxism, world systems theory, postmodernism, constructivism and liberalism (even though there are considerable nuances within each theory as is discussed in Part IV below). But when we consider the degree of international agential power that theories attribute to the state, a radically different picture emerges. If the domestic agential power of the state refers to the ability of the state to shape the domestic realm and construct policy free of domestic social structural constraints, so the international agential power of the state connotes the ability of the state to shape the international realm and construct foreign policy free of international structural constraints. Here I differentiate ‘moderate’ from ‘high’ international agential power. High international agential power refers to the ability of states to both shape the international realm as well as overcome international structures and their constraining logic so as to solve the ‘collective action problem’ (thereby creating a peaceful world). Such levels of agency are ascribed to the state by liberals—neoliberal institutionalists and English School rationalists—as well as

12 Skocpol, States,ch.1. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 399 some constructivists.13 Thus for these theorists, when an international system comprises states with high international agential power, cooperation and the mitigation of inter-state competition entails. By contrast, ‘moderate’ international agential power refers to the ability of states to shape the international realm, but is insufficient to enable the mitigation of inter-state conflict. Hence when a system comprises states with moderate international agential power, inter-state conflict results. Both postmodernists and Marxists (though not world systems theorists)14 adopt this position. When we relocate the major IR theories within this ‘agent-structure’ dichotomy a radically different picture emerges. Now the traditional fighters of the first state debate are transposed into new positions. No longer are neorealists located as for- the-state and liberals, Marxists, constructivists and postmodernists as against-the- state. Rather it is the latter that attribute the state with significant causal power to shape the international system, while neorealists deny the state such agency. However, before I go on to elaborate upon the different positions, it is worth pausing for a moment to consider what has led to this second state debate. The first point is that in general, many theorists in various disciplines have become increasingly dissatisfied with the reified polarities of the first state debate, and have sought to find a middle ground. This is arguably a natural part of the process of ‘theory- refinement’. Secondly, within IR, a growing number of theorists have become increasingly dissatisfied with systemic or structuralist theory, and have begun to look both for a ‘theory of the state’ that is non-systemic, as well as for a theory that can reconcile the antinomies of agent-centrism and structuralism. The single most important development here has been the import of sociological frameworks into IR theory. Alexander Wendt’s seminal article on the agent-structure problem is important, in that it sensitizes IR theorists not just to the issue of structuralism and agent-centric analysis, but opens up the possibility of a structurationist synthesis (see Part V below). Looking for a middle ground requires a refocus upon the questions of agency and the state (which is neglected in systemic theory).15 Nevertheless, it would be wrong to assume that all IR theory is problematic. Indeed, one of the central claims of this article is that state theory within IR has only appeared as problematic because it has been read by inadequate interpretative frameworks. Thus I argue that if we relocate IR theory within the second state debate, we find paradoxically a wide variety of positions which suggests more sophistication than has hitherto been acknowledged (even if there is still work to be done in order to construct a fully developed theory of the state).

13 I have in mind here what I call ‘international society-centric’ constructivism, found, for example, in M. Finnemore, National Interests and International Society (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996); and for a summary see J.M. Hobson, The State and International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 149–55. 14 This distinction is explained in Hobson, State and International Relations,ch.4. 15 A. Wendt, ‘The Agent-Structure Problem in International Relations Theory’, International Organization, 41:3 (1987), pp. 335–70; also, B. Buzan, C. Jones and R. Little, The Logic of Anarchy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), chs. 6–7; F. Halliday, ‘State and Society in International Relations: A Second Agenda’, Millennium, 16:2 (1987), pp. 215–29. 400 John M. Hobson

III. Traditional IR theory reconﬁgured within the second state debate

Neorealism’s ‘passive-adaptive’ state with no international agential power

The key writer here is Kenneth Waltz. It would not be unfair to suggest that Waltz’s position on the state was sealed from the outset. Waltz’s theory was constructed around the continuity assumption. Waltz’s principal observation is that the conduct of IR has never changed: that it has always stayed the same, by which he means that IR has always comprised a never-ending conflict (potential or actual) between political entities, whether these be empires, city-states or nation states.16 Waltz then proceeded to construct a parsimonious neorealist theory that could explain such continuity. To explain ‘continuity’ Waltz began by rejecting what he confusingly called ‘reductionist theory’, which seeks to explain IR in terms of its component parts. Rather than examine the units (that is, states or state-society relations) and endow them with agency to affect the international realm, Waltz chose to ignore them and posit the centrality of the international system as the sole causal deter- mining variable of IR. Why? As he points out, there are a myriad of changes that constantly occur at the domestic level. But given that for Waltz, IR—or that which is to be explained—never varies, it is problematic to place importance upon the units. ‘If changes in international outcomes are linked directly to changes in actors [which are constantly changing], how can one account for similarities of outcomes that persist or recur even as actors vary?17 Waltz’s conception of the state was sealed from here on in because it was vital for him to ignore the state and domestic forces in the making of international outcomes. How was this achieved? The key to Waltz’s third image approach lies with his definition of the international political structure (IPS). The essential point here is that for Waltz, the IPS was to be defined by excluding domestic variables. Unlike domestic political systems, the IPS has two rather than three tiers. The first tier comprises the ordering principle of anarchy. Drawing on the Hobbesian domestic analogy, Waltz assumed that in the ‘state of nature’ (that is, where no higher authority exists), the units are condemned to follow self-help in a constant ‘war of all against all’. This is for the simple reason that only the presence of a higher authority could prevent such an outcome.18 Waltz’s third tier comprises the distribution of capabilities. Under anarchy, the distribution of capabilities is uneven; there is always a limited number of strong states or great powers, with the majority of states being more or less weak. All states must follow self-help or face the consequences—decline or extinction at the hands of the predatory great powers. ‘As in economics, competitive systems are regulated by the ‘rationality’ of the more successful competitors. Either their competitors emulate them or they fall by the wayside’.19 But surely the inclusion of state capability allows the domestic aspect of states back in? No, he answers, because ‘what emerges is a

16 Waltz, Theory, p. 66; Waltz, ‘Reflections on Theory of International Politics: A Response to My Critics’, in R.O. Keohane (ed.), Neorealism and Its Critics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986), pp. 329–30. 17 Waltz, Theory, p. 65. 18 Ibid., p. 102. 19 Ibid., pp. 76–7. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 401 positional picture, in which states are understood by their placement in the system as opposed to their individual attributes’.20 What then of the second tier? The essence of Waltz’s approach to the international agential capacity of the state lies with his treatment of the second tier (that is, the character of the units). For Waltz the units—states—are all undifferentiated. They are functionally alike (like- units). That is, they are all sovereign entities which hold a dual monopoly of the means of violence and of rule-making. Accordingly, they do not specialize in a domestic interdependent division of labour, but take on all functions of government. And they all function in the same way: namely to promote their own survival in a hostile anarchic world of competing states. In this respect, he grants them absolute or very high levels of domestic agential power in that they are free to pursue policy in the absence of domestic social structural constraints. But the most significant point is that, despite this, they are not free to pursue policy simply as they choose, but must adapt and conform to the survival requirements dictated by the structure of the inter-state system.21 And they are all functionally alike precisely because of the socializing effects of anarchy and the uneven distribution of power capabilities. Of course the units vary in all manner of ways—whether in terms of regime form (authoritarian or democratic), ideology (Christian or Islamic), or forms of economic production (capitalist or socialist). But these attributes are purposely ignored. This is because all states, regardless of their domestic properties, have throughout history engaged in inter-state competition, which suggests that domestic variables cannot be singled out to explain uniform international outcomes.22 State action is governed by the international structure rather than the domestic attributes of states. It is precisely this argument that makes the ‘billiard ball’ metaphor so apt. States are like billiard balls for Waltz, not simply because they constantly clash, but more because their internal properties—like billiard balls—do not vary. States are ‘black-boxed’ and are assumed to be solid, rather than comprising changing domestic configurations which inform how they behave in the inter-state system. If state behaviour in the inter-state system is determined by international structure, how then do states behave? States employ two main adaptive strategies of self-help through which they conform to the structure’s survival dictates: what I call emulation and balancing.The first adaptive strategy requires that states emulate the successful practices of the leading states if they are to survive. There is a constant demonstration process in play such that if one state gets ahead of the others by introducing a particular military innovation, the others must follow and imitate it for fear of becoming vulnerable to attack. In effect, all states must constantly emulate the practices of the leading states in order to minimize the relative power gap between them and potential predators. It should, however, be pointed out that a great deal of confusion exists over this point. It is often assumed that Waltz is arguing that states will always emulate. Thus critics assume that Waltzian neorealism can be falsified if it can be demonstrated that states do not always emulate—a claim that has been made especially by ‘structural

20 Ibid., p. 99. 21 Ibid., p. 96. 22 Ibid., p. 66. 402 John M. Hobson realists’ 23 as well as ‘neoclassical’ realists.24 But this position is problematic because Waltz does not say that states will always emulate: merely that if they don’t, they will be punished by the system through decline or extinction. As he put it: ‘[a] self-help system is one in which those who do not help themselves [that is, adapt], or who do so less effectively than others, will fail to prosper, will lay themselves open to dangers, will suffer’.25 Thus for Waltz, states must emulate the leading states or suffer the consequences. In sum, all states will converge on similar functions and similar domestic structural configurations (that is, centralized sovereign states with a monopoly of the means of violence), as they individually seek to promote their own survival. But the problem that confronts states is that no matter how well they emulate the leading states, most will be unable to close the relative power gap between them and the great powers. However hard it tries, Cuba will be unable to compete with the United States on an equal footing. Accordingly, states must employ a second adaptive strategy: that of balancing. Here the weak states align themselves with others so as to insulate or insure themselves against potential predatory attack by stronger powers. In the process, states unintentionally reproduce anarchy because in reducing the ‘relative power gap’ between all states, it becomes impossible for any one particular state to take all the others over; hence anarchy is perpetuated. So what of Waltz’s theory of the state? It should be clear by now that Waltz has succeeded in omitting the state from his theoretical or explanatory schema. Inter- national outcomes are determined solely by the IPS, which is explicitly defined through the rigid omission of the units. The key point is that the state drops out as an explanatory variable in his schema. Thus Waltz explicitly argued that his theory of international politics contains no ‘theory of the state’ (by which he meant that states have no international agential power).26 His definition of the state may be summarized as follows: that the sovereign ‘positional’ state, imbued with a high degree of domestic agential power, follows its national interest or survival imperative, but has no international agential power and must adapt (that is, conform) to the short term anarchical requirements of the inter-state system (via emulation and balancing), which in turn unintentionally functions to reproduce the international structure.However,we would be unable to end our discussion here because some writers have recently argued that this reading is problematic. There are in fact two interpretations of Waltz: what I call a minority ‘statist’ or agent-centric reading,27 and a dominant systemic reading, which I have articulated above.28 Because the issue of state agency constitutes the centrepiece of this article, it is therefore, vital to resolve this particular debate.

23 Buzan et al., Logic, pp. 119–31. 24 A label that Gideon Rose applies to various neorealists such as Randall Schweller, Fareed Zakaria and Thomas Christensen; G. Rose, ‘Review Article: Neoclassical Realism and Theories of Foreign Policy’, World Politics, 51:1 (1998), pp. 144–72. 25 Waltz, Theory, p. 118. 26 Waltz, ‘Reﬂections’, p. 339. 27 R.K. Ashley, ‘The Poverty of Neorealism’, in R.O. Keohane (ed.), Neorealism, pp. 271–3; Wendt, ‘Agent-Structure Problem’, pp. 340–4; cf. Buzan et al., Logic, chs. 6–7. 28 J.G. Ruggie, ‘Continuity and Transformation in the World Polity: Toward a Neorealist Synthesis’, in R.O. Keohane (ed.), Neorealism, pp. 134–5; M. Hollis and S. Smith, ‘Beware of Gurus: Structure and Action in International Relations’, Review of International Studies, 17:4 (1991), pp. 393–410. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 403

The minority statist view holds that Waltz invokes an individualist ontology which gives primacy to the actions and (international) agency of the state, such that the system is the product of prior state behaviour. Here the system is epiphenomenal to (that is, completely determined by) state interests; a position which precisely inverts the ‘systemic’ interpretation developed in this article. Proponents of the agent- centric interpretation typically cite various arguments that Waltz has made, most notably:

1. That structures ‘do not determine behaviours and outcomes … [and] may be successfully resisted’; 29 2. That ‘[i]nternational-political systems, like economic markets, are individualist in origin, spontaneously generated, and unintended … [S]tructures are formed by the co-action of their units’;30 that ‘[n]either structure nor units determine outcomes. Each affects the other;’31 that structure ‘shapes and shoves rather than determines’;32 3. That the structure is ‘not fully generative’.33

In defending the systemic interpretation, I shall critically respond to each point in turn. Firstly, while Waltz often tells us that structure is sometimes resisted, it is central to his theory that such ‘chiliastic’ recalcitrance can never be successful and will always be punished by the system.34 As he put it, ‘Chiliastic [that is, recalcitrant] rulers occasionally come to power. In power most of them quickly change their ways. They can refuse to do so, and yet hope to survive, only if they rule countries little affected by the competition of states’.35 But given that in the modern world all states are part of the same state system and are all therefore equally affected by the competition of states, it is logically impossible for any state to buck the system and survive. Put differently, if a modern state could buck the system Waltz would have undermined his whole theory. As Hollis and Smith point out, if the ‘statist’ interpretation was correct, Waltz would have produced a ‘reductionist’ theory (in Waltz’s terms)—the very ‘other’ that he has negatively deﬁned himself against.36 Regarding point two, while it is true that Waltz frequently claims that the units spontaneously give rise to the system and that the units reproduce anarchy (implying the priority of the units over the system), nevertheless they do so precisely because they follow adaptive self-help policies that are dictated by the imperatives of the system itself. Moreover, only if it could be demonstrated that states intentionally reproduce the system, could the ‘statist’ interpretation be correct (as in English School rationalism). But Waltz never strays from his central claim: that states reproduce anarchy through the unintended consequences of their adaptive/ conformist behaviour. And ﬁnally, with respect to Waltz’s third point—that the system is not ‘fully generative’—while it is true that Waltz genuinely recognizes that a great deal of

29 Waltz, ‘Reflections’, p. 343. 30 Waltz, Theory,p.91. 31 Waltz, ‘Reflections’, pp. 328, 338. 32 Waltz, Theory, pp. 73–4. 33 Waltz, ‘Reflections’, p. 328. 34 Waltz, Theory, p. 128; Waltz, ‘Reflections’, p. 343. 35 Waltz, Theory, p. 128. 36 Hollis and Smith, ‘Beware of Gurus’, p. 400. 404 John M. Hobson social and political life is not generated by the structure, nevertheless the key point is that everything which is not generated by the system is for Waltz irrelevant to international politics, and is denigrated as mere ‘process’. For Waltz, the state system is self-constituting and self-reproducing, which in effect suggests that it is in fact fully generative (despite Waltz’s rhetoric to the contrary). Moreover, while states are for Waltz prior to the system, nevertheless once in place, state behaviour is determined by the system and not vice-versa. One final response that Waltz might make is of relevance here. In the famous reply to his critics,37 he argued that in an earlier book, he produced an approach that paid considerable attention to the internal or domestic political forces that shaped the foreign policy of particular states (Britain and the US), thereby implying that states can have international agential power.38 But there is a problem of tautology here. What Waltz in effect is saying is that the only way to take into account the international agential power of the state is to focus on the ‘foreign policy of particular states’. But in Theory of International Politics he insisted that a theory of foreign policy is not a genuine theory of IP; that the only ‘genuine’ theory of IP is one that explicitly brackets the international agential power of states,39 and merely seeks to ‘tell us a small number of big and important things’.40 Thus to invoke his 1967 argument in this context amounts to little more than circular reasoning. For if a theorist was to integrate the international agential power of the state into a theory of International Politics, Waltz would simply dismiss this as a ‘theory of foreign policy’, rather than a genuine ‘theory of International Politics’. Thus invoking his 1967 book on foreign policy in his ‘reflections’ piece does not, in his own terms, rebut my claim that he neglects from his theory of international politics the concept of the international agential power of the state. But most problematic is his rigid claim that only a ‘theory of foreign policy’ can grant the state international agential power (in contrast to systemic theory). For such a dichotomy is surely wrong, given that it is perfectly possible to develop a ‘theory of IP’ (as Waltz defines it) which simultaneously accords the state international agential power (see Part III below for a discussion of neoliberal institutionalism). Thus in sum, I conclude that the ‘statist’ or ‘international agent-centric’ interpretation of Waltz is problematic because it ultimately rests on the assumption that states have autonomy from anarchy and the distribution of power—a logical impossibility for Waltz. In short, for Waltzian neorealism, states have no international agential power and are unequivocally ‘all product and … not at all productive’.41 Contra Wendt, this is a thoroughly systemic or holistic rather than individualist ontology.42 It is surely one of the extreme ironies of IR, that the theory which supposedly accords the state the most prominence in IR, ends up by denying the state any agential power in the international realm. And yet a further paradox here is that while Waltz in fact denies the state any agential power to affect the international system, liberals of all persuasions argue that the state has very high

37 Waltz, ‘Reﬂections’, p. 345, n. 5. 38 Waltz, Foreign Policy and Democratic Politics (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1967). 39 Waltz, Theory, ch. 1, and pp. 71–2, 121–3. 40 Waltz, ‘Reﬂections’, pp. 329, and pp. 344, 345. 41 Ruggie, ‘Continuity’, p. 151. 42 A. Wendt, ‘Bridging the Theory/Meta-Theory Gap in International Relations’, Review of International Studies, 17:4 (1991), pp. 388–9. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 405 levels of international agential power (see below and the ‘third generic’ state theory discussed in Part IV).

State-centric liberalism: the proactive state with high international agential power

At the opposite end of the ‘international agential power spectrum’ lies ‘state-centric liberalism’, of which neoliberal institutionalism is a prominent variant. It is often thought that neoliberal institutionalism diminishes the importance of the state and exaggerates the power of international regimes/institutions. At least this is the assumption that emerges through the lens of the first state debate. Accordingly neorealists, in attempting to rebut neoliberals, have gone to considerable lengths to show that states are prior to international institutions and are not constrained by them. But this view is highly problematic. For neoliberals, regimes are in fact analytically reduced to the power-maximizing interests of states. Seen through the lens of the second state debate, neoliberalism turns out to actually reify the international agential power of the state over international structures. This conclusion might not surprise all IR theorists, but it will surprise those scholars who continue to portray Keohane as a ‘modified neorealist’. It is however, true that Keohane has often argued that realism should not be disbanded, but offers an excellent first cut into constructing an adequate theory of world politics.43 And moreover, in arguably his most important work, After Hegemony, Keohane begins by asserting that his neoliberal institutionalist approach adopts three central neorealist premises. Firstly, Keohane argues that the state is a rational egoist that is motivated not by self-abnegation or other ‘idealist’ motivations but by utility-maximizing interests; secondly, that world politics is often characterized by conflict rather than cooperation and indeed, that it is ‘the spectre of conflict’ which elicits the need for states to cooperate in the first place.44 And thirdly, Keohane supposedly adopted a systemic approach and black-boxed the state.45 The rationale for this was poten- tially ingenious, since it enabled him to insulate himself from the anticipated neorealist reply that his overall theory was wrong because its underlying assumptions about the state and the system are problematic. Thus he was able to claim that by ‘starting with similar premises about motivations, I seek to show that [neo]realism’s pessimism about welfare-maximizing cooperation is exaggerated’.46 Indeed it was this motive—to meet neorealism on its own grounds—that prompted Keohane to shift away from his 1970s ‘pluralist’ phase into his 1980s ‘neoliberal institutionalist’ phase. But I shall argue however, that Keohane did not in fact adopt neorealist premises as he claimed to have done.

43 R.O. Keohane, ‘Realism, Neorealism and the Study of World Politics’, in Keohane (ed.), Neorealism, pp. 17–18. 44 R.O. Keohane, After Hegemony (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), p. 54. 45 Keohane, After Hegemony, pp. 26–9, 69; also, R.O. Keohane, ‘Institutionalist Theory and the Realist Challenge After the Cold War’, in D. Baldwin (ed.), Neorealism and Neoliberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), p. 294; R.O. Keohane, International Institutions and State Power (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1989), p. 8. 46 Keohane, After Hegemony, pp. 29, 67. 406 John M. Hobson

While Waltz conceptualizes the states system as one of a realm of necessity, Keohane implicitly sees it as a realm of possibility. Keohane begins by accepting that under anarchy there is a ‘collective action problem’, such that states are tempted to defect from cooperation and go it alone. And Keohane accepts that the international system is one that is characterized by anarchy, which constrains or pushes states to follow self-help and defection. But Keohane makes two fundamental changes: first, that defection occurs not so much because of anarchy, but mainly because of the uneven distribution and density of information. It is primarily because states lack information about each other that they come to distrust each other. And second, Keohane argues that anarchy is not hard and self-constituting but is highly malleable, such that it can be modified and remoulded by the purposeful actions of states to suit their interests. In essence, Keohane argues that by enhancing the density of information, states can learn to trust each other and shift from behaviour that is dominated by short-term relative gains preferences (that is, defection) to cooperative behaviour that is based on maximizing long-term absolute gains. How is this achieved? States voluntarily set up international institutions which enhance the density of information. While conceding that a hegemon can help to set up institutions in the first place, Keohane argues that this is not a necessary prerequisite for the setting up of institutions. Moreover, institutions can outlast hegemony precisely because states value institutions and therefore seek to maintain them. And they value them precisely because of the pay-offs that they provide: that is, regimes enable states to enhance their long-term utility gains. Regimes lengthen the ‘shadow of the future’ and create a permissive environment for cooperation in a number of ways. First, through iterated games of interaction, states learn to cooperate. Thus the process of retaliation or tit-for-tat provides major disincentives to defect and major rewards for cooperation.47 Paradoxically, the possibility of ‘retaliation’ is crucial to the effective functioning of regimes; paradoxically because for neorealists, it is retaliation that provides the basic disincentive for cooperation to occur in the first place. Second, the notion of issue-linkage provides disincentives for defection. Thus because regimes are ‘nested’ in a multiplicity of issue areas, a state might resist the temptation to defect in one area for fear that it will face defection from states in other areas in which it seeks cooperation.48 Thirdly, states come to value their reputation, which can only be maintained through sustained cooperation and their ability to resist the temptation to defect.49 The key point is that while defection might enhance a state’s short-term power interests (assuming that others resist defection), nevertheless all states will be best off in the long run if they choose to cooperate in iterated games of interaction.50 What then of Keohane’s theory of the state? While Keohane claimed to have begun by adopting neorealist premises, I argue here that he in fact ‘failed’ in this regard. A pure systemic theory would derive the state from the requirements of international structure (as in the passive-adaptive theory of the state found in neorealism). But the fundamental point for Keohane is that states can buck the constraining effects of international anarchy and can

47 R. Axelrod and R.O. Keohane, ‘Achieving Cooperation under Anarchy: Strategies and Institutions’, in D. Baldwin (ed.), Neorealism,p.91. 48 Keohane, After Hegemony,p.89. 49 Ibid., pp. 103–6. 50 R. Axelrod, The Evolution of Cooperation (New York: Basic Books, 1984). The ‘second state debate’ in IR 407 remould the international structure to suit their utility-maximizing interests. In short, the international system is now conceived as a realm of possibility, in which states can construct international regimes which enable them to buck the logic of anarchy and solve the collective action problem. Moreover, states are not punished by bucking the logic of anarchy, as they are for Waltz. States are in fact rewarded by bucking anarchy because it enables them to maximize their long term utility-gains: a position which fundamentally contradicts Waltz’s structuralist approach. This view in fact concurs with Grieco’s claim that Keohane’s theory of the state is decidely non-realist.51 We can now see why Keohane downgrades the autonomy of international structure. First, anarchy is downgraded and can be overcome by the ability of states to recast it through international institutions. Second, regimes do not limit state power: they in fact enable states to optimize it. Third, regimes are not autonomous of states. They are in fact created by states and for states.52 Thus ‘[i]nstitutions are necessary … in order to achieve state purposes;53 and moreover, ‘institutions empower governments rather than shackling them’.54 Finally, regimes enhance the domestic agential power of the state, enabling it to resist domestic interest group pressures (for example, by signing up to the free trade regime, states can resist protectionist pressures from particular domestic interest groups). In sum, regimes do not limit state behaviour per se; they merely limit sub-optimal short-term defection, thereby enabling states to enhance their long-run gains. Thus contra the neorealist critique, Keohane does not exaggerate the autonomy of institutions over states: he in fact analytically reduces regimes to state power interests. All this suggests that for Keohane, the state has very high international agential power to overcome the constraining effects of international anarchy, thereby enabling it to solve the collective action problem. Keohane’s theory of the state may be summarized as follows: that the ‘rational egoistic state’, armed with high domestic agential power, maximizes its long-term interests by creating regimes, which enhance the state’s international agential power to buck or avoid conforming to international anarchy.

IV. Five generic theories of the state within the second state debate

Thus far, I have sought to explain the two extreme positions found in the second state debate. In the process I have inverted conventional understanding by arguing that it is neoliberal institutionalism that reiﬁes the international agential power of the state, while neorealism downgrades or even underestimates its agential power. In this section I provide a brief overview of some of the key approaches to the state found in IR as viewed within the second state debate. Here I suggest that ﬁve generic theories emerge in the second state debate.

51 J. Grieco, ‘Anarchy and the Limits of Cooperation: A Realist Critique of the Newest Liberal Institutionalism’, in D. Baldwin (ed.), Neorealism, pp. 116–42. 52 Keohane, ‘Institutionalist Theory’, pp. 273–4. 53 Keohane, After Hegemony, p. 245 (his emphases). 54 Ibid., p. 13 (his emphases). 408 John M. Hobson

(1) The passive-adaptive state with no international agency

The first generic approach is that of international-systemic theory, which exaggerates the centrality of international structure and denies the state any international agential power. This genre includes Waltzian neorealism, modified neorealism,55 ‘first-wave’ Weberian historical sociology,56 and some, though not all, world systems theorists.57 While they vary as to the degree of domestic agential power that they ascribe to the state, they all ultimately argue that states are in effect, Träger—that is, passive victims of international structure. The main difference between them lies in the particular international structure that they privilege or single out. Neorealists and first-wave Weberians focus on the international anarchic political structure while world systems theorists privilege the capitalist world economy.

(2) The ‘socially-adaptive’ state with moderate international agential power

In the second type of theory, the state is granted moderate international agential powers but has only low or moderate domestic agential powers. Thus within the domestic realm, social structure takes precedence over the state-as-agent. In short, states must adapt or conform to the logic of domestic structures or non-state actors. But in so doing they gain a moderate degree of international agential power to create a conflictual international system. Thus for classical Marxists, domestic class struggles prompt states to respond by engaging in military competition. Lenin’s theory of war and imperialism is perhaps the clearest example.58 Thus as capitalism reached its highest stage of development at the end of the nineteenth century, so economic crisis set in. This led the ‘monopoly combines’ (finance capital) to export capital to the colonies as they searched for monopoly outlets for excess capital that could not be absorbed at home. As the competition between different national monopoly-capitalist combines intensified, so states engaged in warfare in order to protect the economic interests of their bourgeoisie. Thus while states had only low domestic agential power and had to meet the requirements of capital, so in the process they created a conflictual inter-state system. For Lenin, states have moderate rather than high international agential power because they have insufficient agency to create a peaceful international system. For this to occur, states would have to be able to buck the domestic class struggle: a prospect that Lenin vehemently denied.59 For neo-Marxists, however, the state has a moderate degree of domestic agential

55 I include the works of Gilpin and Krasner in this category; see Hobson, State and International Relations, pp. 30–44. 56 I include Charles Tilly and Theda Skocpol in this category; see Hobson, State and International Relations,ch.6. 57 I differentiate ‘classical’ world systems theory, which denies the state any international agential power, from ‘neoclassical’ world systems theory, which grants the state moderate international agential power; see Hobson, State and International Relations, pp. 134–42. For the former, see I. Wallerstein, The Modern World System, vol. 1 (London: Academic Press, 1974); for the latter see, G. Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century (London: Verso, 1994); A.G. Frank and B.K. Gills, The World System (London: Routledge, 1996). 58 V.I. Lenin, Imperialism (London: Martin Lawrence, 1933). 59 V.I. Lenin, State and Revolution (New York: International Publishers, 1932), p. 8. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 409 power (that is, short term ‘relative autonomy’ from class interests). Nevertheless, once again the state gains moderate international agential power in that it creates a relatively conflictual world.60 Postmodernists argue that states have barely any domestic agential power in that they must conform to the ‘logic of representation’ and must pursue normative statecraft.61 Nevertheless in ‘writing’ the state, states gain moderate international agential power and construct a conflictual world. States engage in normative statecraft which requires them to create an imaginary domestic political community that appears as unified and harmonious (without which the state would have nothing that it could claim to legitimately represent). States come to draw a series of boundaries between themselves and other states, as well as within their own domestic political communities. States must create the appearance of a unified self so as to appear legitimate. This is achieved by creating a series of ‘others’, which are constructed as threatening. Thus state A depicts as threatening those states that construct their identity in ways that pose an alternative to that of A. Accordingly these ‘others’ must be punished through military intervention so that state A can reproduce its ‘self’.62 Similarly, domestic ‘others’ that do not conform to the pure racial and heterosexual conception of the self must also be repressed, so as to maintain the appearance of a unified and pure self.63 All this implies that states have moderate international agential power, in that their domestic activities—that is, normative statecraft—lead them to create a threatening and conflictual world. And as with Marxism, states are denied high international agential power because so long as states exist, warfare and repression will continue to constitute the character of IR.64

(3) The ‘socially-adaptive’ state with high international agential power

The third generic type of state theory captures those approaches which argue that states have only low/moderate domestic agential power but high international agential power. Within the domestic realm, social structure takes precedence over the state, and the state is thereby denied domestic agential power. Classical liberalism grants the state only low domestic agency: it must conform or adapt to the economic needs of individuals within market society. However, in the process the state gains considerable international agential power such that it can shape or create a peaceful international system. Thus for classical liberals, the state must withdraw from the

60 See, for example, R.W. Cox, Production, Power and World Order (New York: Columbia University Press, 1987). 61 R.K. Ashley, ‘Living on Borderlines: Man, Postructuralism and War’, in J. Der Derian and M.J. Shapiro (eds.), International/Intertextual Relations (Lexington: Lexington Books, 1989), pp. 300–13; R.B.J. Walker, Inside/Outside (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), ch. 8. 62 C. Weber, Simulating Sovereignty (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995); D. Campbell, ‘Global Inscription: How Foreign Policy Constitutes the United States’, Alternatives, 15 (1990), pp. 263–86. 63 V. Spike Peterson, ‘Security and Sovereign States: What is at Stake in Taking Feminism Seriously?’, in V. Spike Peterson (ed.), Gendered States (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1992), pp. 31–64; C. Sylvester, Feminist Theory and International Relations in a Postmodern Era (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994). 64 J. Bethke Elshtain, ‘Sovereignty, Identity, Sacrifice’, in V. Spike Peterson (ed.), Gendered States, p. 150. 410 John M. Hobson domestic and international economies and follow a laissez-faire policy, which in turn leads to the creation of an increasingly interdependent world, in which warfare becomes unnecessary.65 New liberalism, as found in the works of John A. Hobson, insists that while states have moderate domestic agential power, they nevertheless have high international agential power and can create a peaceful international realm.66 Some variants of constructivism are also situated here, most notably what I call international society-centric constructivism.67 Unlike the ‘state-centric’ constructivist approach of Peter Katzenstein,68 ‘international society-centric’ constructivism pays no attention to the domestic agential power of the state, given that, firstly, it is fundamentally interested in the relationship between the state and international society, and secondly, that for Finnemore in particular, the domestic properties of states are explicitly bracketed.69 But the significant point is that it has an ambivalent position with regard to the degree of international agential power that it ascribes to the state. In the first instance the state is granted only very low amounts given that the state must adapt or conform to the logic of the international social or normative structure. But as states conform to the international normative structure, so they gain very high degrees of international agential power, such that that they can buck the logic of inter-state competition and solve the collective action problem. In the process states create a peaceful, cooperative and more equitable international social realm.

(4) The ‘proactive’ state with high domestic- and high international-agential powers

The fourth type of theory ascribes the state with both high domestic- and high international-agential power. In the process state-agency is privileged while international as well as domestic structures are wholly downgraded. State-centric liberalism (neoliberal institutionalism and English School rationalism) is the out- standing example of this genre. Of course, for English School rationalists, states are not interested in maximizing their power interests as they are for neoliberal institutionalists. Nevertheless, states have high international agential power because they can buck the logic of anarchy by intentionally creating an orderly and cooperative international society of states. States achieve this by setting up informal normative modes of behaviour (the balance of power, systemic warfare, diplomacy, great power management and international law).70 Accordingly, international agential state capacity is reiﬁed while domestic and especially international structures are downgraded.

65 See for example, D. Ricardo, The Principles of Political Economy and Taxation (London: Dent, 1969), especially p. 81. 66 J.A. Hobson, Towards International Government (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1915); J.A. Hobson, The Morals of Economic Internationalism (New York: Houghton, 1920). For overviews see: Hobson, State and International Relations, pp. 74–81; D. Long, Towards a New Liberal Internationalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 67 For example, M. Finnemore, National Interests. 68 P.J. Katzenstein, Cultural Norms and National Security (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996). 69 Finnemore, National Interests,ch.1. 70 H. Bull, The Anarchical Society (London: Macmillan, 1977), pp. 101–229; M. Wight, Systems of States (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1977), ch. 5. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 411

(5) The ‘constitutive’ state with varying domestic- and varying international-agential power

The fifth generic theory is represented by what I call ‘second-wave’ Weberian historical sociology, which is situated on the borders of the first, second, third and fourth generic types of state theory.71 All theories of the state discussed in this article, I suggest, are in some way deficient. Either they reify international and domestic structures at the expense of the state, or they reify state-agency at the expense of international and domestic structures. By contrast, this fifth theory attempts to resolve the second state debate by producing a ‘structurationist’ synthesis in which the state is granted agential power to shape domestic and international/ global structures, but is simultaneously constrained by such structures.72 However it must be noted that such a synthetic operation is no straightforward task, because as in human transplant operations, donor parts often do not take. In effecting this operation I suggest that there are four basic tasks that need to be undertaken. The first basic task must be to reconfigure the ontological nature of the agents and structures so as to make them compatible, and thereby prevent any rejection of the ‘donor’ by the ‘host’. This requires the application of a ‘both/and’ logic and the simultaneous recognition that structures are what I call ‘double-edged’. In this schema, structures (domestic, international and global) are double-edged in that they constitute both ‘realms of constraint’ and ‘realms of opportunity’. That is, they both ‘constrain’ and ‘enable’ states. Thus while structures require states to adapt to their imperatives (as in structuralist theory), structures also constitute what I call ‘resource pools’ into which states-as-agents dip so as to enhance their various interests and to mitigate or buck the logic of structures (as in agent-centrism). Combining these two insights leads to a synthesis which, I argue, suggests one possible resolution to the second state debate. To achieve the required structurationist synthesis we need to rethink or reconceptualize the state’s relations with domestic society as well as global/international society. How can this be achieved? The second basic task to be undertaken is to bracket the state’s relationship with the international realm and focus upon the domestic state-society relationship. Here I argue that it is problematic to exaggerate the power of domestic social forces over the state no less than it is to exaggerate the power of the state over such non-state forces (as occurred in the first state debate). Applying a ‘both/and’ logic requires that we reject viewing state-society relations in terms of a ‘trade-off’ (that is, ‘either/or’ logic), such that strong social power implies weak state agential power and weak social power implies strong state agential power. One way of solving this is to recognize that high state agential power implies strong social power, while weak social power implies low state power. The key here is to recognize that states enhance their governing capacity when they make synergistic linkages with domestic social

71 I include the works of Mann, Sources, vol. 2, and Hobson, Wealth of States; for a summary, see Hobson, State and International Relations, pp. 192–213, 223–35. 72 Here I adapt and apply the analysis developed by a range of authors, notably A. Giddens, The Constitution of Society (Cambridge: Polity, 1984); N. Thrift, ‘On the Determination of Social Action in Space and Time’, Society and Space, 1:1 (1983), pp. 23–57; R. Bhaskar, Dialectic: The Pulse of Freedom (London: Verso, 1993); D. Layder, Understanding Social Theory (London: Sage, 1994); M.S. Archer, Realist Social Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995). 412 John M. Hobson forces.73 This requires that we conceptualize states as having varying reflexive domestic agential power, where the more reflexive or embedded the state is within society, the more both benefit. But while cooperating with social forces enhances governing capacity, it also places limits upon, and circumscribes certain parameters within which states exercise their governing capacity. For example, historically, absolutist states enhanced their power when they came to cooperate with strong domestic capitalist forces, not least because this enabled them to greatly augment their revenue bases, even if this required them to make all sorts of political concessions to capital (for example, property rights, rule of law, and so on).74 The third task is to bracket the state’s relationship with the domestic realm and focus upon the state-international society relationship. Here I argue that it is as problematic to exaggerate the international agential power of the state as it is to exaggerate the constraining power of international structures. Applying a ‘both/and’ logic, I suggest that states can enhance their power when they make ‘synergistic linkages’ with other states (especially, though not exclusively through regimes) as well as with non-state actors. This requires that we conceptualize states as having varying reflexive international agential power. Thus states can embed themselves in capitalist globalization which, while producing economic benefits also requires various political concessions.75 Similarly, states can cooperate with other states in order to enhance their economic interests and to buck the logic of inter-state competition (for example, through the GATT and WTO), even if this requires them to ignore short term ‘defection’ temptations. Moreover, synergistic linkages can enable states to conform or adapt to the requirements of international and global structures (normative, economic and military). Again, those absolutist states that conformed to, or cooperated with, international financial capitalists were able to greatly augment their revenues in times of crisis (such as war), and were thereby able to conform or adapt to the requirements of inter-state competition. Those that failed to cooperate were often found out through fiscal crisis and subsequent defeat in war (for example, imperial Spain, the French ancien régime in 1789. Similarly, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan integrated into the capitalist world economy through export-oriented industrialization, which enabled them to enhance their economic power base, not least so that they could enhance their military power in order to adapt or conform to inter-state competition.76 In sum, I argue that states are constitutive rather than purely adaptive (as in structuralism) or purely autonomous (as in agent-centrism), in that they constitute, and are constituted by, domestic, international and global structures. But the most important move to be made here (that is, the fourth basic task) entails from one simple point: that neither the domestic nor international realms are separate or mutually exclusive. Two points are of note here: first, that there is a ‘dual reflexivity’ of the internal and external realms such that they are ‘co-constitutive’;

73 See Hobson, Wealth of States, ch. 7; Hobson, State and International Relations, ch. 7; Weiss and Hobson, States and Economic Development. 74 Weiss and Hobson, States and Economic Development, chs. 2–3. 75 Hobson, State and International Relations, pp. 223–35; I. Clark, Globalisation and International Relations Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999); L. Weiss, ‘Globalization and National Governance: Antinomy or Interdependence?’, Review of International Studies 25:5 (1999), pp. 1–30. 76 Weiss and Hobson, States and Economic Development, chs. 5–6. The ‘second state debate’ in IR 413 second, that the state is ‘Janus-faced’ such that it is not only constrained by both realms, but also shapes or constitutes them by playing one off from the other.The fourth basic task involves conceptualizing the state as residing within the ‘vortex of the domestic and international/global realms’, such that it constitutes and is constituted by all these spheres. In essence, states engage in ‘exit’,77 as well as ‘adaptive’ strategies; where the former refers to the ability of the state to escape structural constraints (at the domestic, international and global levels), while the latter refers to the state conforming to such constraints. Thus the state can dip into the international realm which is in part a ‘resource pool’ both to enhance its domestic interests or buck the logic of domestic structures (first exit strategy), and to conform or adapt to domestic social structures (first adaptive strategy). Moreover, the state can transform its domestic realm both to enhance its interests externally or overcome international/ global structures (second exit strategy), and to conform to the requirements of such structures (second adaptive strategy). Regarding the ‘first exit strategy’, the Russian state in the late nineteenth century dipped into the international economy and taxed international trade so that it could undermine the domestic interests of the dominant industrial class, in much the same way that the British state maintained free trade so as to push through the income tax against the fiscal interests of the dominant economic classes.78 And states after 1945 joined the GATT in part so that they could better resist the rent-seeking activities of particular industrial groups. Or, states invoke external military crisis (or face military crisis) which enhances their ability to push through domestic economic reforms which fundamentally go against the interests of their dominant class (for example, Tsarist Russia was only able to undermine the nobility after the Crimean War defeat in 1855; Japan did the same after 1853).79 Conversely, in employing the ‘first adaptive strategy’ the German and British states pursued their preferred trading policies after 1879 in part so as to shore up the trading interests of their dominant classes and thereby conform to the domestic ‘logic of capital’. States employed the ‘second exit strategy’ when, for example, having enhanced their domestic agential power and having pushed through the income tax (against the fiscal interests of the dominant classes), they were then able to sign up to the collective GATT free trade regime which enabled them to buck the logic of inter- state economic competition. That is, highly reflexive international agential state power in the realm of trade only entails once states have generated highly reflexive domestic agential power. And states employ the ‘second adaptive strategy’ when, for example, they reform their domestic economies and promote neo-liberal policies so as to conform to the global economy. In sum, the significant point is that this structurationist synthesis entails recog- nizing that states are socially embedded within domestic and international society, while simultaneously having varying degrees of international agential power to reform international structures as well as to mitigate their constraining logic. In this way, I argue, this sociological approach provides a means to solve the ‘second state debate’ and thereby move us beyond the sterility of the ‘first state

77 A phrase I borrow from A.O. Hirschman, ‘Exit, Voice and the State’, World Politics, 31:1, pp. 90–107. 78 See Hobson, Wealth of States, chs. 3 and 4 for a full discussion. 79 See Weiss and Hobson, States and Economic Development, chs. 3 and 4. 414 John M. Hobson debate’. Ultimately, though, whether the reader is persuaded by my attempted resolution is not the main issue here. For the most signiﬁcant claim made in this article is that IR theories of the state can be better understood through the framework of the second state debate rather than through conventional or traditional frameworks.