国际政治的现实主义理论

2.国际政治的现实主义理论　A Realist Theory of International Politics^[58]

本节导读

汉斯·摩根索（1904—1980年），犹太人，美国政治学家，20世纪经典现实主义学派的缔造者之一。摩根索出生于德国，先后在柏林大学、法兰克福大学和慕尼黑大学接受教育。由于法西斯对犹太人的迫害，1937年辗转至美国，后加入美国国籍，并在美国多所大学任教和从事研究工作，其中时间最长的是任芝加哥大学政治学教授，冷战初期还曾任美国国务院和国防部顾问。摩根索平生所著甚多，主要作品包括Scientific Man versus Power Politics,1946（《科学人与权力政治》）、Politics Among Nations：The Struggle for Power and Peace,1948（《国家间政治——谋求权力与和平的斗争》）、In Defense of the National Interest,1951（《捍卫国家利益》）、The Purpose of American Politics,1960（《美国政治的目标》）、A New Foreign Policy for the United States,1969（《为美国设计的新对外政策》）等。其中最著名的传世之作是《国家间政治》，该书在学术界享有盛誉，奠定了现实主义国际政治学尤其是权力政治学派的根基，多次再版。

摩根索在《国家间政治》中提出了政治现实主义的概念，论述了关于权力政治的现实主义观点，对美国在冷战时期的外交政策影响深远。该书第二版伊始，摩根索在开篇加入了“现实主义六原则”部分，这也是该书的核心内容：①政治由根植于人性的客观法则所支配；这些法则是客观存在的，可建立起一种合乎理性的理论来反映这些法则。②以权力界定利益的概念是政治现实主义的基本理念，该概念使政治研究具有了理性指导，使从理论高度理解政治成为可能。③以权力界定利益的核心概念是普遍适用的、客观存在的，但其内涵并非是一成不变的，视特定的政治、文化环境而定。④个人和国家需根据普遍性的道德原则来判断政治行为，对于国家而言，为国家生存而审慎行事是政治行为的最高道德追求。⑤不可将特定国家的道德追求与普遍性的道德原则混为一谈，以权力界定利益的概念是我们判断国家行为的标准。⑥政治现实主义强调政治领域的独立性，坚持将权力界定利益作为思维的出发点。

Six Principles of Political Realism

1.Political realism believes that politics,like society in general,is governed by objective laws that have their roots in human nature.In order to improve society it is first necessary to understand the laws by which society lives.The operation of these laws being impervious^[59]to our preferences,men will challenge them only at the risk of failure.

Realism,believing as it does in the objectivity of the laws of politics,must also believe in the possibility of developing a rational theory that reflects,however imperfectly and one-sidedly,these objective laws.It believes also,then,in the possibility of distinguishing in politics between truth and opinion—between what is true objectively and rationally,supported by evidence and illuminated by reason,and what is only a subjective judgment,divorced^[60]from the facts as they are and informed by prejudice and wishful thinking^[61].

Human nature,in which the laws of politics have their roots,has not changed since the classical philosophies of China,India,and Greece endeavored to discover these laws.Hence,novelty^[62]is not necessarily a virtue in political theory,nor is old age a defect.The fact that a theory of politics,if there be such a theory,has never been heard of before tends to create a presumption against,rather than in favor of, its soundness.Conversely,the fact that a theory of politics was developed hundreds or even thousands of years ago—as was the theory of the balance of power—does not create a presumption that it must be outmoded and obsolete^[63].A theory of politics must be subjected to the dual test of reason and experience.To dismiss such a theory because it had its flowering in centuries past is to present not a rational argument but a modernistic prejudice that takes for granted the superiority of the present over the past.To dispose of the revival of such a theory as a“fashion”or“fad^[64]”is tantamount^[65]to assuming that in matters political we can have opinions but no truths.

For realism,theory consists in ascertaining facts and giving them meaning through reason.It assumes that the character of a foreign policy can be ascertained only through the examination of the political acts performed and of the foreseeable consequences of these acts.Thus we can find out what statesmen have actually done,and from the foreseeable consequences of their acts we can surmise^[66]what their objectives might have been.

Yet examination of the facts is not enough.To give meaning to the factual raw material of foreign policy,we must approach political reality with a kind of rational outline,a map that suggests to us the possible meanings of foreign policy.In other words,we put ourselves in the position of a statesman who must meet a certain problem of foreign policy under certain circumstances,and we ask ourselves what the rational alternatives are from which a statesman may choose who must meet this problem under these circumstances(presuming always that he acts in a rational manner),and which of these rational alternatives this particular statesman,acting under these circumstances,is likely to choose.It is the testing of this rational hypothesis against the actual facts and their consequences that gives theoretical meaning to the facts of international politics.

2.The main signpost^[67]that helps political realism to find its way through the landscape of international politics is the concept of interest defined in terms of power.This concept provides the link between reason trying to understand international politics and the facts to be understood.It sets politics as an autonomous sphere of action and understanding apart from other spheres,such as economics(understood in terms of interest defined as wealth),ethics,aesthetics^[68],or religion. Without such a concept a theory of politics,international or domestic,would be altogether impossible,for without it we could not distinguish between political and nonpolitical facts,nor could we bring at least a measure of systematic order to the political sphere.

We assume that statesmen think and act in terms of interest defined as power, and the evidence of history bears^[69]that assumption out.That assumption allows us to retrace and anticipate,as it were,the steps a statesman—past,present,or future—has taken or will take on the political scene.We look over his shoulder when he writes his dispatches;we listen in on his conversation with other statesmen;we read and anticipate his very thoughts.Thinking in terms of interest defined as power,we think as he does,and as disinterested^[70]observers we understand his thoughts and actions perhaps better than he,the actor on the political scene,does himself.

The concept of interest defined as power imposes intellectual discipline upon the observer,infuses rational order into the subject matter of politics,and thus makes the theoretical understanding of politics possible.On the side of the actor, it provides for rational discipline in action and creates that astounding continuity^[71]in foreign policy which makes American,British,or Russian foreign policy appear as an intelligible,rational continuum^[72],by and large consistent within itself,regardless of the different motives,preferences,and intellectual and moral qualities of successive statesmen.A realist theory of international politics,then,will guard against two popular fallacies:the concern with motives and the concern with ideological preferences.

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It stands to reason that not all foreign policies have always followed so rational, objective,and unemotional a course.The contingent^[73]elements of personality,prejudice,and subjective preference,and of all the weaknesses of intellect and will which flesh is heir to,are bound to deflect foreign policies from their rational course.Especially where foreign policy is conducted under the conditions of democratic control,the need to marshal popular emotions to the support of foreign policy cannot fail to impair the rationality of foreign policy itself.Yet a theory of foreign policy which aims at rationality must for the time being,as it were,abstract from these irrational elements and seek to paint a picture of foreign policy which presents the rational essence to be found in experience,without the contingent deviations from rationality which are also found in experience.

Deviations from rationality which are not the result of the personal whim^[74]or the personal psychopathology^[75]of the policy maker may appear contingent only from the vantage point of rationality,but may themselves be elements in a coherent system of irrationality.The possibility of constructing,as it were,a counter-theory of irrational politics is worth exploring.

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The difference between international politics as it actually is and a rational theory derived from it is like the difference between a photograph and a painted portrait.The photograph shows everything that can be seen by the naked eye;the painted portrait does not show everything that can be seen by the naked eye,but it shows,or at least seeks to show,one thing that the naked eye cannot see:the human essence of the person portrayed.

Political realism contains not only a theoretical but also a normative element.It knows that political reality is replete^[76]with contingencies and systemic irrationalities and points to the typical influences they exert upon foreign policy.Yet it shares with all social theory the need,for the sake of theoretical understanding,to stress the rational elements of political reality;for it is these rational elements that make reality intelligible for theory.Political realism presents the theoretical construct of a rational foreign policy which experience can never completely achieve.

At the same time political realism considers a rational foreign policy to be good foreign policy;for only a rational foreign policy minimizes risks and maximizes benefits and,hence,complies both with the moral precept^[77]of prudence and the political requirement of success.Political realism wants the photographic picture of the political world to resemble as much as possible its painted portrait.Aware of the inevitable gap between good—that is,rational—foreign policy and foreign policy as it actually is,political realism maintains not only that theory must focus upon the rational elements of political reality,but also that foreign policy ought to be rational in view of its own moral and practical purposes.

Hence,it is no argument against the theory here presented that actual foreign policy does not or cannot live up to it.That argument misunderstands the intention of this book,which is to present not an indiscriminate^[78]description of political reality,but a rational theory of international politics.Far from being invalidated^[79]by the fact that,for instance,a perfect balance of power policy will scarcely be found in reality,it assumes that reality,being deficient in this respect,must be understood and evaluated as an approximation to an ideal system of balance of power.

3.Realism assumes that its key concept of interest defined as power is an objective category which is universally valid,but it does not endow that concept with a meaning that is fixed once and for all.The idea of interest is indeed of the essence of politics and is unaffected by the circumstances of time and place.Thucydides’statement,born of the experiences of ancient Greece,that“identity of interests is the surest of bonds whether between states or individuals”was taken up in the nineteenth century by Lord Salisbury’s^[80]remark that“the only bond of union that endures”among nations is“the absence of all clashing interests.”It was erected into a general principle of government by George Washington:

A small knowledge of human nature will convince us,that,with far the greatest part of mankind,interest is the governing principle;and that almost every man is more or less,under its influence.Motives of public virtue may for a time, or in particular instances,actuate men to the observance of a conduct purely disinterested;but they are not of themselves sufficient to produce persevering conformity to the refined dictates and obligations of social duty.Few men are capable of making a continual sacrifice of all views of private interest,or advantage,to the common good.It is vain to exclaim against the depravity of human nature on this account;the fact is so,the experience of every age and nation has proved it and we must in a great measure,change the constitution of man,before we can make it otherwise.No institution,not built on the presumptive truth of these maxims can succeed.

It was echoed and enlarged upon in our century by Max Weber’^[81]observation:

Interests(material and ideal),not ideas,dominate directly the actions of men.Yet the“images of the world”created by these ideas have very often served as switches determining the tracks on which the dynamism of interests kept actions moving.

Yet the kind of interest determining political action in a particular period of history depends upon the political and cultural context within which foreign policy is formulated.The goals that might be pursued by nations in their foreign policy can run the whole gamut^[82]of objectives any nation has ever pursued or might possibly pursue.

The same observations apply to the concept of power.Its content and the manner of its use are determined by the political and cultural environment.Power may comprise anything that establishes and maintains the control of man over man.Thus power covers all social relationships which serve that end,from physical violence to the most subtle psychological ties by which one mind controls another.Power covers the domination of man by man,both when it is disciplined by moral ends and controlled by constitutional safeguards,as in Western democracies,and when it is that untamed^[83]and barbaric force which finds its laws in nothing but its own strength and its sole justification in its aggrandizement.

Political realism does not assume that the contemporary conditions under which foreign policy operates,with their extreme instability and the ever present threat of large-scale violence,cannot be changed.The balance of power,for instance,is indeed a perennia^[84]element of all pluralistic^[85]societies,as the authors of The Federalist papers^[86]well knew;yet it is capable of operating,as it does in the United States, under the conditions of relative stability and peaceful conflict.If the factors that have given rise to these conditions can be duplicated on the international scene, similar conditions of stability and peace will then prevail there,as they have over long stretches of history among certain nations.

What is true of the general character of international relations is also true of the nation state as the ultimate point of reference of contemporary foreign policy. While the realist indeed believes that interest is the perennial standard by which political action must be judged and directed,the contemporary connection between interest and the nation state is a product of history,and is therefore bound to disappear in the course of history.Nothing in the realist position militates^[87]against the assumption that the present division of the political world into nation states will be replaced by larger units of a quite different character,more in keeping with the technical potentialities and the moral requirements of the contemporary world.

The realist parts company with other schools of thought before the all-important question of how the contemporary world is to be transformed.The realist is persuaded that this transformation can be achieved only through the workmanlike manipulation of the perennial forces that have shaped the past as they will the future. The realist cannot be persuaded that we can bring about that transformation by confronting a political reality that has its own laws with an abstract ideal that refuses to take those laws into account.

4.Political realism is aware of the moral significance of political action.It is also aware of the ineluctable^[88]tension between the moral command and the requirements of successful political action.And it is unwilling to gloss^[89]over and obliterate that tension and thus to obfuscate both the moral and the political issue by making it appear as though the stark facts of politics were morally more satisfying than they actually are,and the moral law less exacting^[90]than it actually is.

Realism maintains that universal moral principles cannot be applied to the actions of states in their abstract universal formulation,but that they must be filtered through the concrete circumstances of time and place.The individual may say for himself:“Fiat justitia,pereat mundus(Let justice be done,even if the world perish),”but the state has no right to say so in the name of those who are in its care. Both individual and state must judge political action by universal moral principles, such as that of liberty.Yet while the individual has a moral right to sacrifice himself in defense of such a moral principle,the state has no right to let its moral disapprobation^[91]of the infringement of liberty get in the way of successful political action,itself inspired by the moral principle of national survival.There can be no political morality without prudence;that is,without consideration of the political consequences of seemingly moral action.Realism,then,considers prudence—the weighing of the consequences of alternative political actions—to be the supreme virtue in politics.Ethics in the abstract judges action by its conformity with the moral law;political ethics judges action by its political consequences.Classical and medieval philosophy knew this,and so did Lincoln when he said:

I do the very best I know how,the very best I can,and I mean to keep doing so until the end.If the end brings me out all right,what is said against me won’t amount to anything.If the end brings me out wrong,ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.

5.Political realism refuses to identify the moral aspirations of a particular nation with the moral laws that govern the universe.As it distinguishes between truth and opinion,so it distinguishes between truth and idolatry^[92].All nations are tempted—and few have been able to resist the temptation for long—to clothe their own particular aspirations and actions in the moral purposes of the universe.To know that nations are subject to the moral law is one thing,while to pretend to know with certainty what is good and evil in the relations among nations is quite another. There is a world of difference between the belief that all nations stand under the judgment of God,inscrutable^[93]to the human mind,and the blasphemous^[94]conviction that God is always on one’s side and that what one wills oneself cannot fail to be willed by God also.

The lighthearted equation between a particular nationalism and the counsels of Providence^[95]is morally indefensible,for it is that very sin of pride against which the Greek tragedians and the Biblical prophets have warned rulers and ruled.That equation is also politically pernicious,for it is liable to engender the distortion in judgment which,in the blindness of crusading frenzy,destroys nations and civilizations—in the name of moral principle,ideal,or God himself.

On the other hand,it is exactly the concept of interest defined in terms of power that saves us from both that moral excess and that political folly.For if we look at all nations,our own included,as political entities pursuing their respective interests defined in terms of power,we are able to do justice to all of them.And we are able to do justice to all of them in a dual sense:We are able to judge other nations as we judge our own and,having judged them in this fashion,we are then capable of pursuing policies that respect the interests of other nations,while protecting and promoting those of our own.Moderation^[96]in policy cannot fail to reflect the moderation of moral judgment.

6.The difference,then,between political realism and other schools of thought is real,and it is profound.However much the theory of political realism may have been misunderstood and misinterpreted,there is no gainsaying^[97]its distinctive intellectual and moral attitude to matters political.

Intellectually,the political realist maintains the autonomy of the political sphere, as the economist,the lawyer,the moralist maintain theirs.He thinks in terms of interest defined as power,as the economist thinks in terms of interest defined as wealth;the lawyer,of the conformity of action with legal rules;the moralist,of the conformity of action with moral principles.The economist asks:“How does this policy affect the wealth of society,or a segment of it?”The lawyer asks:“Is this policy in accord with the rules of law?”The moralist asks:“Is this policy in accord with moral principles?”And the political realist asks:“How does this policy affect the power of the nation?”(Or of the federal government,of Congress,of the party, of agriculture,as the case may be.)

The political realist is not unaware of the existence and relevance of standards of thought other than political ones.As political realist,he cannot but subordinate^[98]these other standards to those of politics.And he parts company with other schools when they impose standards of thought appropriate to other spheres upon the political sphere.It is here that political realism takes issue^[99]with the“legalistic-moralistic approach^[100]”to international politics.That this issue is not,as has been contended,a mere figment of the imagination,but goes to the very core of the controversy,can be shown from many historical examples.

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This realist defense of the autonomy of the political sphere against its subversion by other modes of thought does not imply disregard for the existence and importance of these other modes of thought.It rather implies that each should be assigned its proper sphere and function.Political realism is based upon a pluralistic conception of human nature.Real man is a composite of“economic man,”“political man,”“moral man,”“religious man,”etc.A man who was nothing but“political man”would be a beast,for he would be completely lacking in moral restraints^[101].A man who was nothing but“moral man”would be a fool,for he would be completely lacking in prudence.A man who was nothing but“religious man”would be a saint,for he would be completely lacking in worldly desires.

Recognizing that these different facets of human nature exist,political realism also recognizes that in order to understand one of them one has to deal with it on its own terms.That is to say,if I want to understand“religious man,”I must for the time being abstract from the other aspects of human nature and deal with its religious aspect as if it were the only one.Furthermore,I must apply to the religious sphere the standards of thought appropriate to it,always remaining aware of the existence of other standards and their actual influence upon the religious qualities of man.What is true of this facet of human nature is true of all the others.No modern economist,for instance,would conceive of his science and its relations to other sciences of man in any other way.It is exactly through such a process of emancipation from other standards of thought,and the development of one appropriate to its subject matter,that economics has developed as an autonomous theory of the economic activities of man.To contribute to a similar development in the field of politics is indeed the purpose of political realism.

It is in the nature of things that a theory of politics which is based upon such principles will not meet with unanimous approval—nor does,for that matter,such a foreign policy.For theory and policy alike run counter to two trends in our culture which are not able to reconcile themselves to the assumptions and results of a rational,objective theory of politics.One of these trends disparages^[102]the role of power in society on grounds that stem from the experience and philosophy of the nineteenth century;we shall address ourselves to this tendency later in greater detail. The other trend,opposed to the realist theory and practice of politics,stems from the very relationship that exists,and must exist,between the human mind and the political sphere.For reasons that we shall discuss later the human mind in its dayby-day operations cannot bear to look the truth of politics straight in the face.It must disguise,distort,belittle,and embellish^[103]the truth—the more so,the more the individual is actively involved in the processes of politics,and particularly in those of international politics.For only by deceiving himself about the nature of politics and the role he plays on the political scene is man able to live contentedly as a political animal with himself and his fellow men.

Thus it is inevitable that a theory which tries to understand international politics as it actually is and as it ought to be in view of its intrinsic^[104]nature,rather than as people would like to see it,must overcome a psychological resistance that most other branches of learning need not face.A book devoted to the theoretical understanding of international politics therefore requires a special explanation and justification.

思考题

1.For realism,what does theory consist in when a certain foreign policy is being analyzed?

2.Why is the concept of interest defined in terms of power particularly important for realism?

3.What is the normative element of realism?

4.Is it in a country’s interest to try to establish its moral principles as universal principles?

5.Why does the realist defend the autonomy of the political sphere?