The doyen of realist foreign policy spoke to Anatol Lieven about his new book, How States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy, at a recent Quincy Institute event.
This is an edited and abridged transcription of Anatol Lieven and John Mearsheimer’s remarks during a Quincy Institute event on January 29, 2024.
Anatol Lieven: Good morning, everyone. I am Anatol Lieven, director of the Eurasia program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. It is a tremendous honor today to introduce Professor John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago, where he has taught since 1982. He is generally regarded as one of the greatest thinkers on international relations of the past half century, as well as one of the very greatest thinkers from the realist tradition over, well—since it began. He is author of the classic work, the Tragedy of Great Power Politics. Today we will be discussing his latest book, co-authored with Sebastian Rosato, How States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy—an interesting title, since, I think, both of us have often felt that many recent foreign policy decisions have been profoundly irrational. Anyway, John, to begin now, I will just ask you to describe briefly the main thesis of this book.
John Mearsheimer: Well, what happened here, Anatol, is that a number of years ago, Sebastian and I were talking, and we were quite perplexed by the fact that there was this growing consensus in the academic world, and even in the policy world, that states are more likely to be irrational or non-rational than they are to be rational. And we thought this was a rather disturbing finding, not only because we thought it was intuitively wrong, but also because almost all of the key theories in international relations are based on the rational actor assumption, and that would relegate them to the dustbin of history, if states were not rational. And, furthermore, how can policymakers make policy if all the states in the system, or most of the states in the system, are irrational most of the time? So we decided to investigate the matter. What we had to do was we had to come up with a definition of rationality. The definition that we came up with about rationality is a two-part definition. The first part focuses on the individual and the second part focuses on the collectivity because inside a state there are a handful of individuals who are involved in making decisions, so you have to aggregate the decisions or the views of individual policymakers. Anyway, focusing on the individual: Our basic argument is that we are all theoretical human beings. We call this Homo theoreticus. Our basic argument is that to comprehend the world around us, and to be able to make decisions, which is what rationality is all about, you need theories. The question is whether or not the theories that those policymakers employ are credible theories or non credible theories. That’s the key criterion at the individual level. So, we argue that if you see an individual or a group of individuals making a policy that’s based on a credible theory, that is rational. But that’s only part one of our argument. The second part of our argument is that the different individuals involved in the policymaking process have to work together in a collective way, so as to produce a rational decision. And that involves, you know, uninhibited and freewheeling debate among the relevant policymakers. So if you have this sort of open ended freewheeling debate at the collective level, and you come up with a policy that’s based on a credible theory about how the world works, then you are rational in our story.
Anatol Lieven: Now, the book talks about a rational policymaking process based on credible theories. But if there is something profoundly flawed about the basic goal, can the policymaking process be described as wholly rational? How does one reconcile the rationality of the process with the ends or goals and their rationality or lack of it?
John Mearsheimer: The literature on rationality is almost exclusively about the decision-making process, and has hardly anything to say about goals. The basic logic here is if you don’t survive, you cannot pursue those other goals…. Survival should be the number one goal, states can have all sorts of goals that are deeply immoral or unethical. But that doesn’t mean they’re irrational. You cannot measure rationality, you cannot determine whether a state is rational or not, by looking at outcomes—there’s almost universal agreement on this point in the literature as well. You look at the process. The question is does the policymaking elite have a rational policy based on our credible theory, and did they operate collectively in a way that fostered uninhibited debate to produce this policy? And, if the answer is yes, it’s a rational policymaking process. So it’s the process, not the outcomes that matter. And it’s really the process and not so much the goals except for survival.
Anatol Lieven: There’s an interesting tension here between the survival of a state—which I entirely agree with you must be the fundamental goal of any state—and the survival of an empire. But that isn’t really true of the United States. As long as Mexico is weak, and Canada is a friend, there is no existential threat to the United States from other powers. There is, of course, an existential threat to American global hegemony. But can that be defined as an interest of the American state?
John Mearsheimer: The question of whether or not the United States or any other great power should expand, should pursue regional hegemony, or pursue global hegemony, is all a matter of whether or not that state has a plausible theory that underpins that policy.
A good example of this is NATO expansion. I’m a realist, and I thought from the get-go that NATO expansion was going to lead to one heck of a lot of trouble. And it eventually did. Am I then going to say that NATO expansion was irrational or non-rational? I’m not, and why am I not going to say that? Because NATO expansion was based on a handful of plausible theories. NATO expansion was based on the Big Three liberal theories—Democratic Peace Theory, Economic Interdependence Theory, and Liberal Institutionalism. These three liberal theories are widely regarded in the academic world. They’re not considered to be non-credible or foolish theories. So, I think that the policy of NATO expansion was rational in the sense it was based on credible theories. But I also thought at the time that it was flawed, and I believe that I was right. But all of this just highlights that there are different theories, which lead to different policy prescriptions.
Anatol Lieven: So when it comes to NATO expansion, you would, I think, also agree that by the same token, the Russian establishment’s decision to push back very hard against NATO expansion to Ukraine and Georgia was also rational, given the premises on which they were basing their policy.
John Mearsheimer: Oh, no question. We start the book by talking about Putin, and it was commonplace, certainly after February 24, 2022, to make the argument that Putin was irrational, and it was completely crazy for him to invade Ukraine. I think this is not the case at all. I mean, Putin went to great lengths to tell us that NATO expansion was unacceptable: He tried to solve the problem diplomatically, we refused. And what he effectively did in February 2022 is he launched a preventive war. And we’re still in the midst of this horrible war, but I believe he was clearly rational in terms of his own thinking about invading Ukraine, and I think there’s a bit of evidence (we don’t have a lot of evidence at this point) that shows that he consulted others in the decision making process. So I think this is a rational policy. But as you well know, the United States, whenever it’s dealing with an adversary, has a powerful tendency to argue that that person is irrational, or crazy, whether it’s Saddam Hussein or Vladimir Putin. But the fact is, when you’re dealing with someone like Vladimir Putin, I think you’re dealing with a first-grade strategic thinker. You don’t have to like what he’s doing, but he’s not a fool, and I believe that the policy that he pursued in February 2022 can easily be explained on rational actor grounds.
Anatol Lieven: How does the issue of ignorance and intelligence failure relate to the rationality of the decision making process?
John Mearsheimer: We live in a world of uncertainty, great uncertainty, whether you’re Vladimir Putin, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, you name it, we live in a world of uncertainty. And any time you make a major move in international politics, it is difficult to be certain what the end result will be. This is why you can’t equate rationality without outcomes: because we live in an uncertain world. And sometimes, things just don’t work out the way you anticipated, not because you are stupid, but because it is a very complicated world.
Anatol Lieven: To go to [audience] questions, we have a question about groupthink in decision-making, something which is very evident in Washington, D.C. Ben Rhodes coined this term, “the blob,” in terms of a certain degree of universal groupthink. What if you have a situation in which the entire apparatus is giving one set of advice based upon a doctrine, which is simply wrong?
John Mearsheimer: We found that there are three general patterns in terms of how the policy makers interact with each other “inside the room.” The first pattern is that there is no agreement among the policymakers. And nevertheless, after debating the issue, they reach agreement. The second pattern is there’s no agreement initially among the policy makers, and they never reach agreement. And the ultimate decider, the sovereign, in effect, has to make a decision. And then the third case, which is what you’re talking about, is where you get consensus from the get go. The point that I’m trying to make here is that not in every case, but in almost all the cases or most of the cases that we looked at, what you see is that policymakers are very serious, and whether they agree or disagree depends on the particular case.
Anatol Lieven: We have a question, which I know you addressed in the book: the influence on your work of Daniel Kahneman, his research: Thinking, Fast and Slow. Could you describe the relationship with your work to that of Professor Kahneman?
John Mearsheimer: Daniel Kahneman is sort of the intellectual father of the political psychology school of thought. His basic argument, which lots of political scientists—or, to put it slightly differently, lots of I.R. theorists—employ, is the claim that policymakers use heuristics to make decisions, or sometimes the argument is that they use analogies like the Munich analogy. In other words, the argument is that decision makers have the simplifying devices in their head, these heuristics, these rules of thumb, these simple analogies, and that’s what they rely on to make decisions in crises, or for purposes of formulating grand strategy. Our argument is that you can find zero evidence of this in any of the cases that we looked at.
Anatol Lieven: So, in other words, the endless endless references to Munich and appeasement that one reads in the media, and in politicians, speeches, and sometimes in President speeches, that this is basically just for public consumption, it’s for the masses, it doesn’t really affect how they themselves think?
John Mearsheimer: I think that’s true. International politics is a deadly serious business; we all understand that the stakes are enormously high here. Would you expect in that kind of situation that people are going to use or policymakers are going to use simple rules of thumb or simple analogies? I don’t think that that makes sense. And I think that when you look at the evidence, my point is born out.
Anatol Lieven: There’s a question about your attitude to the issue of Taiwan, and American commitments to Taiwan and the status of Taiwan. Some people have felt that there is an inconsistency there between the positions you’ve taken with regard to U.S. policy towards Russia and U.S. policy towards China. Can you explain your contrasting views on these issues?
John Mearsheimer: I think from an American perspective, what you don’t want is any other great power in the world to be become a regional hegemon, you don’t want Imperial Germany or Nazi Germany to dominate Europe, you don’t want Imperial Japan to dominate Asia, and you don’t want the Soviet Union to dominate either Europe or Asia. And I think that there is no possibility of Russia being a regional hegemon in Europe. And, therefore, I think the United States should have good relations with Russia. I think it makes no strategic sense at all, to pick a fight with Russia. I think China, on the other hand, is, at this point in time, a peer competitor; it’s much more powerful than Russia is and is a threat to dominate Asia. I think it’s in the American interest not to allow China to dominate Asia.
Anatol Lieven: There’s a question which follows rather naturally on the impact of nuclear weapons on decision making and calculations of rationality. Because in other words, if one’s looking at the fundamental issue of state survival, how great is the risk of annihilation, that it is wrapped in genuine annihilation, total destruction of the state and society? Is it reasonable to run for the sake of a broader concept of security?
John Mearsheimer: I think that if the United States or NATO more generally were to intervene in Ukraine, and we in the West started pushing back, and the Russians were in a situation where they looked like they were going to be defeated in Ukraine, I believe they would use nuclear weapons. So I’m adamantly opposed to NATO getting inside of Ukraine, I think it’s a prescription for disaster. I think when you think about the consequences of a nuclear war, it really, to put it in crude terms, scares the living bejesus out of you. And as I always emphasize, when I talk about these issues, thankfully, we’ve never had a nuclear war. And the end result is that we don’t know much about nuclear escalation. With regard to China, I think, you know, the dangers are there, as well as they are in Ukraine. I think that it is possible that you could have a war over the South China Sea, you could have a war over Taiwan. I think that that war would almost certainly start as a conventional war, I find it hard to imagine the Chinese or the Americans using nuclear weapons initially in a conflict between the two sides. But if a conventional war broke out, and one side was losing, I mean, if the Chinese were losing, and this war was taking place right off their coast, and the Americans were pounding the Chinese mainland, do I think that the possibility of nuclear escalation would be real? I certainly do. Am I going to sleep well at night knowing those risks are out there? Absolutely not. And this just highlights to me what a dangerous business International Relations is and why it’s so important that policymakers behave in a rational manner.
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Former President Jacob Zuma of South Africa, who has been suspended by the African National Congress, could undermine its chances in this year’s elections.
South Africa’s minister of justice, Ronald Lamola, and the South African ambassador to the Netherlands, Vusimuzi Madonsela, in the International Court of Justice on Thursday.
South Africa’s minister of justice, Ronald Lamola, and the South African ambassador to the Netherlands, Vusimuzi Madonsela, in the International Court of Justice on Thursday.
To Make America Great Again, there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Just protect America’s ability to make it.
In July 2023, my TAC colleague Jude Russo reviewed former U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer’s book No Trade Is Free. “An impression that emerges from Lighthizer’s account is how moderate the Trump trade policy was,” Russo wrote. “The American tariff load post-Trump is still lower than that in comparable economies, including those of our putative allies in the European Union.”
“The Trump administration completely changed the trade policy paradigm, and the Biden administration has adopted many of its solutions wholesale,” he continued. “Hardly the stuff of wide-eyed fire-breathing economic madness.”
But there might yet be some fire-breathing in President Donald Trump’s second term in the form of universal baseline tariffs.
As we prepare to enter the new year, former President Trump seems well-positioned to recapture the White House. Trump continues to expand his advantage over the rest of the GOP primary field, and President Joe Biden’s approval ratings are abysmal. But, as Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman recently told Politico, “there’s a whole lifetime in politics between now and next November.” If anyone understands this, it’s Trump. On New Year’s Day 2020, he was set to sail smoothly into a second term. Three months later, the country was in Covid-induced lockdowns.
Nevertheless, if Trump does make a triumphant return to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the New York Times has provided a peek at what the Trump administration’s trade policy might look like this go around. Its mastermind is none other than Robert Lighthizer.
In February 2023, Trump unveiled a rough sketch of his trade policy in a second term. The “America First trade plan” has three main tenets: universal baseline tariffs, decoupling from China, and bolstering domestic workers and manufacturing.
In typical Trump fashion, the proposal to impose universal baseline tariffs is light on details. The original “Agenda47” document released by the Trump campaign does not provide a specific tariff rate, but during an interview with Fox Business in August, Trump floated 10 percent. “I think we should have a ring around the collar” of the American economy, Trump added. He did not elaborate on whether the universal tariff rate will compound upon or replace pre-existing tariffs. The New York Times interviewed Lighthizer about Trump’s America First trade plan and asked “if an imported product was now taxed at 5 percent, would that rate rise to 10 percent or to 15 percent?” Lighthizer reportedly told the Times the new tariff rate would be 15 percent.
Some Trump administration alumni have doubts over whether the president has the authority to impose universal tariffs. Former Deputy Assistant to the President for international economics Clete Willems told the Times that “the president’s authority to enact across-the-board tariff hikes is unclear, and I’m skeptical Congress is going to endorse it.”
Though Lighthizer did not rule out Congress providing legislation as a strategy to meet Trump’s goals, he told the Times that the president has “clear authority” to impose such tariffs thanks to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930.
Title I of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, signed into law in 1977, amended the Trading With the Enemy Act of 1917 to permit the president to regulate economic transactions with foreign countries or nationals without being at war. Title II, however, states that the authority of the president to regulate economic activity is limited to times of a national emergency.
Under Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930, the president also has the authority to levy “new or additional duties” on imports from countries that have “discriminated” against the U.S. in trade. If the president, after an investigation into a foreign actor’s trade practices, finds evidence of discriminatory behavior, he has the authority to impose tariffs up to 50 percent of the imported product’s value. The statute specifies two kinds of discrimination. The first is if the foreign country has placed an “unreasonable charge, exaction, regulation, or limitation” on American made products that is “not equally enforced upon the like articles of every foreign country.” The second is if the foreign country discriminates “in fact” against American goods “in respect to customs, tonnage, or port duty, fee, charge, exaction, classification, regulation, condition, restriction or prohibition” to disadvantage U.S. goods in the market.
Which leads Lighthizer to conclude “[the president] has the legal authority to do it and he’s got two routes.” But Lighthizer added, “[Trump] hasn’t made that choice as far as I know.”
“If all you chase is efficiency—if you think the person is better off on the unemployment line with a third 40-inch television than he is working with only two—then you’re not going to agree with me,” Lighthizer told the Times. “There’s a group of people who think that consumption is the end. And my view is production is the end, and safe and happy communities are the end. You should be willing to pay a price for that.”
As for the Trump campaign, the February 2023 release claims that Trump’s proposal to impose universal baseline tariffs “is firmly rooted in American history”: “America used to impose tariffs on over 95% of all imports, and for decades the federal government took in over 80% of its revenue by taxing foreign producers through tariffs—not by taxing American workers and businesses.”
After all, the slogan is Make America Great Again, not Make America Great. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Just protect America’s ability to make it.
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To ignore geothermal would inflict a substantial wound, one that would be difficult to heal.
The shale boom is the overlooked revolution of the early 21st century. Despite the indifference of the mainstream media and the ignorance of many politicians, shale brought America energy self-sufficiency. It has provided cheaper oil and gas, slowed deindustrialization, reduced dependence on coal, and freed America from many geopolitical constraints. It has allowed the U.S. to support its allies and contributed to the development of technology that could spark a new energy revolution. Anyone who overlooks this example of dynamic cooperation between the private sector and smart government policy is disregarding the conditions of American sovereignty.
If maintaining the competitiveness of U.S. industry and lowering energy costs for consumers seem straightforward benefits of the shale boom, the geopolitical benefits are altogether underappreciated. It is worth recalling, however, the price the U.S. paid for its dependence on oil imports.
Until the late 1960s, America was able to secure a sufficient supply on its own. However, growing demand meant that domestic extraction was no longer enough, and the U.S. had to turn to overseas sources. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia and OPEC became stronger and more assertive, upsetting the global balance of oil power. The U.S. experienced this firsthand when it chose to support Israel with airlifts during the Yom Kippur War. The embargo imposed on America by Middle Eastern oil producers dealt a blow to the economy and triggered a discussion about energy independence. However, as Victor McFarland points out in Oil Powers: A History of U.S.-Saudi Alliance, “even as presidents from Ford to both Bushes emphasized the importance of ‘energy independence,’ the country had in fact become more and more dependent, particularly on the Middle East, and more and more embroiled in the region’s politics.” Successive administrations announced their plans to achieve self-sufficiency, yet none of them put forth a solution that would truly address the problem. The national interest suddenly seemed inextricably tied to the distant Middle East.
Washington thus had to foster close relations with Saudi Arabia, the largest producer among OPEC members. Amid a post-Vietnam malaise, Riyadh exerted pressure on a U.S. grappling with concerns over oil supplies, nudging it toward a more hawkish position. This anxiety about energy was reflected not only among the political elite, but also among the general public. McFarland recalls that during Carter’s presidency, almost as many Americans supported intervening in the Gulf if access to oil was cut off as defending Western Europe against the Soviets. A striking example of Saudi influence on U.S. security policy was sending weapons to Yemen in 1979. Dependence on Saudi oil not only led to changes in U.S. foreign policy, but also reshaped parts of the U.S. economy, with one of the underrated factors behind financialization being the petrodollar.
In 1974, the Treasury Department proposed lifting restrictions on foreign activity in the U.S. financial markets to attract funds from OPEC states. McFarland notes that the Treasury kept Saudi investments secret, due to public concerns about the impact of petrodollars, so it designed a special mechanism that allowed it to hide Saudi purchases of U.S. debt. As we learn from Oil Powers, “the government created special arrangements to attract billions of dollars of Saudi money into U.S. Treasurys and Fannie Mae securities, adopting techniques long used by offshore investment hubs to lure foreign capital.”
Riyadh’s financial interests also played a significant part in the Carter administration’s decision to defend the dollar at all cost. Its weakening in the late 1970s caused concern among the Saudis, two-thirds of whose financial assets were denominated in the greenback. The Kingdom’s diplomats pressed Washington to curb its depreciation. The U.S. side feared that if the dollar lost value, Saudi Arabia would not only raise prices to compensate for its losses, but also consider pricing oil in other currencies, further eroding the dollar’s position. The possibility of those events unfolding has overshadowed concerns about slowing growth and increasing unemployment. There are also reasonable grounds to believe that the effort to calm Riyadh was behind Volcker shock. In any event, it is certain that Saudi Arabia held excessive influence over U.S. economic policy.
Shale has opened up geopolitical room for maneuver to America. The United States ceased to be dependent on foreign oil supplies. Before the energy revolution could materialize, however, several important circumstances had to align. While there is no doubt that historically low interest rates played a role in kick-starting the shale boom, they should not be considered the sole or most important factor. America does not owe fracking only to the Federal Reserve.
The federal government’s contribution can hardly be overstated. State investment in R&D related to horizontal drilling, spearheaded by the Department of Energy, was crucial, as was the development of microseismic imaging at Sandia National Laboratory. The industrial policy targeting shale gas involved tax credits, and initial demonstration projects received subsidies.
The fracking boom could not be designed or imposed, and that was not the federal government’s intention. While the private sector experimented, the state focused on reducing the “hurdle rate” for companies. It removed regulatory barriers and crafted incentives to encourage them to take risks and explore new methods and technologies. As Arnab Datta and Skanda Amarnath explain, “These policy choices came from different federal entities with different missions (sometimes wholly unrelated to energy policy). But they worked together over decades, in concert and in succession, to help companies overcome the hurdle rate for risky investments in shale production.”
Is the shale boom fading? Many experts seem to think so. It has entered its mature stage, as consolidations like Exxon Mobil’s purchase of Pioneer Natural Resources may indicate. However, there are optimistic voices. Harold Hamm, one of the trailblazers of the shale revolution, maintains that the next boom is yet to come. He places his faith in new technologies that are expected to open up previously inaccessible rocks. Some analysts argue that AI and Big Data will unlock undiscovered potential, while the entry of big players like Exxon means focusing even more brain power on finding new technological solutions.
Predicting the path of technological development is challenging, but perhaps foreseeing innovation spillovers is even harder. In the case of fracking, it is enabling next-gen geothermal energy.
Beneath our feet lie untapped energy resources—if we dig deep enough. The heat released by the decay of radioactive elements from the earth’s interior is inexhaustible. If geothermal energy could be harnessed, not only would it be completely clean, but it would be available non-stop, regardless of the weather, unlike solar or wind. By reducing the need for energy storage, critical for intermittent renewables, it would also lessen dependence on materials and products integrated into Chinese supply chains.
Until now, geothermal energy has been utilized on a larger scale in only a handful of countries, such as Iceland, with its particular geological conditions at the intersection of two tectonic plates, or Kenya, due to its volcanic activity. Yet, thanks to the shale revolution, advanced drilling and fracking technologies have opened a new chapter for unconventional geothermal energy, offering the possibility of rapid scale-up. Unique geological conditions are no longer necessary; drilling deep enough anywhere will lead to heat resources. As Eli Dourado of the Center for Growth and Opportunity at the University of Utah argues, “with the improvements in exploration, drilling, and subsurface engineering emerging from the shale boom of the last decade, geothermal energy in the United States can scale to terawatts of electricity production within 20 years.” Importantly, if drilling can be done anywhere, clashes with environmental movement can be avoided. Another possibility is to repurpose closed coal plants; their turbines could be used to generate power from geothermal sources.
The problems that will face the development of the new generation of geothermal energy are twofold. First, there is seismic risk. As researcher Austin Vernon notes, the general population has a low tolerance for it, and in Europe this has led to shutting down of some projects. However, it is important to remember that these seismic effects represent a spectrum, and that improving seismic monitoring technology will reduce this risk further.
The second problem is one of political will. While today hydrogen and carbon capture can count on targeted state support, geothermal receives far less attention. Faced with high interest rates, this new, potentially revolutionary technology will be starved for capital. But the government approach to shale provides a useful blueprint for intelligent industrial policy. In 2020, the Trump administration allocated $28 million for geothermal research, emphasizing that “geothermal energy is an important part of the Administration’s diverse, all-of-the-above energy strategy.” However, this won’t be enough.
Europe provides a cautionary tale here. On the Old Continent, shale was never given a proper chance. A massive backlash from the environmental movement and a lack of determination on the part of political elites has led to a situation where state after state has banned this technology. Certainly, the United States can boast exceptionally good geology, but numerous countries in Europe also had the potential. The consequences of this abdication, however, extend beyond the high cost of energy today; they have also resulted in the squandering of the pivotal opportunity to be part of the geothermal revolution. In the U.S., engineers have perfected their technologies and methods through successive iterations while fracking and drilling American rocks. No one in Europe has accumulated comparable experience under local conditions. America’s opportunity here is unique.
With Chinese dominance of clean tech supply chains, OPEC+ gravitating closer to Beijing, and regulatory burdens overwhelming nuclear energy, the U.S. drive for energy self-sufficiency needs new foundations. In 2016, Trump stated that “America’s incredible energy potential remains untapped,” while mentioning a “self-inflicted wound.” To ignore geothermal would inflict a substantial wound, one that would be difficult to heal.
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