Strategic Relations between National Societies: A Sociological Analysis

Strategic Relations between National Societies: A Sociological AnalysisAuthor(s): Roland RobertsonSource: The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Mar., 1968), pp. 16-33Published by: Sage Publications, Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/172811 .

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Strategic relations between national societies: a sociological analysis' ROLAND ROBERTSON

Department of Sociology, University of Essex

In recent years sociologists have begun to pay systematic attention to relations between national societies. Inevitably, problems arise as to the relationship between sociological and other kinds of ana-

lytic treatment of international phenomena, while the appropriateness of prevalent systems of sociological analysis and theory is also necessarily questioned. In probing the basic relations between national societies in sociological terms, the present paper revolves around these issues at various

points. Sociological analysis is brought into

play with the approaches of game theory, political science, and the discipline (or sub-

discipline) of international relations. In this connection two themes assume particular prominence: first, the relevance of strategic action and interaction to sociological anal-

ysis and, second, the general nature of the

political subsystems of national societies as mediators between internal-national and exteral-international processes. As far as the appropriateness of existing sociological approaches is concerned, the primary focus is on the relationship between structural- functional and so-called conflict theory.

This is a very much amended version of a paper given at the Sixth World Congress of Sociology, 1966, in the working group on "Strategic Thinking as a Social Process." I am greatly indebted to my colleague, Andrew Tudor, for his assistance in this revision. I also wish to acknowledge the helpfulness of discussion and previous collaboration with Peter Nettl.

In employing the concept of strategy, it is necessary to heed the comments made by Jessie Bernard over a decade ago. In trying to persuade sociologists of the usefulness of

games-of-strategy analysis in the study of social conflict, she remarked that for many sociologists the major problems of goal attainment in social systems consisted not in strategic considerations, i.e. maximization under adverse conditions, but in engineering considerations (Bernard, 1954). The criticism is still relevant. Allocation of personnel and role-articulation are paramount concerns in much sociological theory; the

problems of conflicting goals and of "getting things done" in the face of opposition are

rarely raised in any acute form (de Kadt, 1965). Of course, the term "strategy" may be used in a more generic sense to include what Bernard calls "engineering" problems. Here, however, for sociological reasons, we define a strategy as a program of actions which a unit adopts in order to achieve a

desired outcome or series of outcomes under

adverse conditions (as a matter of degree), this program being characterized by choices

between alternate courses of action. It will

be noticed that this definition of strategy is still not so exclusive as that utilized by game theorists. The latter stipulates that adverse conditions include, among other factors, a

player whose behavior has to be taken into

consideration and the condition that each

player controls only his own options. The

CONFLICT RESOLUTION VOLUME XII NUMBER 1



STRATEGIC RELATIONS BETWEEN NATIONAL SOCIETIES

preference for a definition midway between that of game theory and very general usage arises from basic sociological considerations. We wish to include in our perspective both the narrow, game-theory definition and the more inclusive approach of operations research and organization theory, so that the two may be related to each other.

Strategic interaction must inevitably be a major point of reference in the study of international relations. In the present anal-

ysis, strategic interaction is treated in two

major respects. First, strategic interaction, and more particularly military-strategic thinking, is focused on as a sociocultural

phenomenon. Second, strategy as a socio-

logical concept is used as a tool with which to "confront" the military-strategic pattern of perception. It is through this latter

application, particularly, that we hope to overcome some of the problems attendant

upon the opposition between structural- functional and so-called conflict schools of

thought, and so avoid contributing to the bifurcation of social theory. This type of

conception allows us to include much of the sociologically relevant work in the field of conflict and bargaining, while pursuing a more comprehensive elaboration of those elements neglected in structural-functional

theory. It is true that compulsion, deter-

rence, punishment, and the deployment of

threats and promises now figure in the Parsonian structural-functional schema, but

even so it is the use of these "by the system" against recalcitrants which appears to be the principal area of application. Thus, insofar as what may be called strategic factors enter into structural-functional anal-

ysis, there is a marked assumption as to

power asymmetry in the relationship between parties to a conflict. Questions of unit-to-unit relations are relatively neglected (Parsons, 1963a, 1963b, 1964, 1966).

Another basic point has to do with the

sociological emphasis upon normative

patterns and the institutionalization (the system level) and the internalization

(member-unit level) of such patterns. Normative patterns may, in fact, permit the use of strategic orientations, but it is

clearly misleading to assume or maintain that the norms of a social system provide for all contingencies of interaction. There are in all social situations conditional factors where normative guidelines are absent as far as the unique properties of that situation are concerned. In fact, it is possible to consider norms as being established through and on the basis of attempts by the interact-

ing parties to resolve Prisoner's Dilemma situations (Blau, 1964; Rapoport, 1964a).2 It is well known that the Prisoner's Dilemma situation cannot be satisfactorily resolved in theoretical terms without the introduction of either psychological or normative-socio-

logical factors. The interplay between conditional (or exigential) and normative elements is extremely important, and the admixture of conditional and normative restraint in international relations is a major illustration. I am not suggesting an analytic bifurcation into normative and strategic approaches. Norms may be part of "the

rules of the game" in one situation, while

in another one they may not be. But there

is a marked tendency in structural-functional analysis to ignore the problem of the

ways in which units seek to accomplish victories over or avoid defeats by other units.

The basic problem is, then, to combine in one perspective both the systemic prob-

2 In structural-functional analysis lip-service is frequently paid to "situational exigencies," but these are rarely-if ever-systematically incorporated. The nearest analysis to such in- corporation is Smelser (1962).

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ROLAND ROBERTSON

lem of how things get done and the problem of how a unit tries to get its way, under what circumstances it may or may not be

successful, and what strategies and tactics it employs to overcome resistance (de Kadt, 1965). Now this point has relevance not

only to unit relations within an indepen- dently-constituted social system but also between such social systems. We must therefore deal with system goals vis-a-vis the goals of other social systems. Provision-

ally the impingement of what are here called counter systems on focal systems can be categorized (1) into the actions and attributes of the counter system which affect the goal-given operation of the focal system, and (2) into the ways in which counter-

system actions and attributes shape or

modify the goals of the focal system. From this point we proceed in succession to dis- cussions of the significance of political processes to strategic relations; orientations of national units; the location of strategic orientations within national units; the pattern of relations between nations; and, finally, competition as opposed to conflict between national societies.

Strategic Relations and Political Processes

Many of the difficulties in analyzing interunit relations stem from inadequate ;examination of the internal characteristics of the units in question. Particularly crucial here are the political subsystems of the

units, bearing in mind that the polity mediates between the internal social system and the wider international or interunit

setting. Usually too little autonomy is

ascribed to political processes in sociological

analysis-and indeed this criticism is, rather ironically, not without relevance to

much of political science. However, it .should be conceded that an emphasis on

political autonomy does not adequately indicate the linkage between national societies and the international system. It ignores the position of military organizations in relation both to political systems and to the wider international system; much remains to be done in the field of military organizations, notably in the sociological analysis of the structures and processes linking domestic political policy with national foreign policy and, in turn, the relation of each of these to military policy.3 On a wider perspective the bearing of societal values,

goals, and norms to all three of these kinds

of policy needs elucidation. Thus it should be emphasized that the political system is

only a focal point. Its focality consists in

the contention that it is this system, being a subsystem of the wider social system, which has proved a stumbling-block in mod-

ern sociological theory-most notably in

approaching the sociological analysis of international relations.

Deutsch's thesis is that political systems should be regarded as steering mechanisms,

responsible both for ordering the internal

performance of the national system and for

regulating goal-achievement in relation to

the physical and sociocultural environments

(Deutsch, 1963). The conception of

national systems as networks of communica-

tion encompasses the processes of goal-

seeking and goal-modification. Efficient

steering based on information transmission is thus viewed as more significant than

3 The immediate problem has to be seen in terms of military organizations as special purpose subunits for dealing with both intra- and extraunit "problems" and the complex relations between these two sets of problems. For in- stance, Janowitz attributes much significance to the nature of civilian-military relations with respect to social and political stability in post- war Western Europe (with some notable excep- tions) (Janowitz, 1965, p. 229).

,CONFLICT RESOLUTION VOLUME XII NUMBER 1

18




power in its coercive or "energic" dimension. But-as far as the national system in its international context is concerned- it is perhaps inadvisable to lay too much stress on the significance of communication at the expense of power. As Etzioni (1965) has put it, "Without communication power is aimless, and without power communication is without impact."

The importance of the system "getting its way" as distinct from "getting things done" (or, as Deutsch implies, "finding its

way") is obviously crucial at the international level. Parsons' analyses of the international system tend to maintain the same

perspective as that employed in the analysis of national systems: in one important re-

spect, power operates as an "emanation" from within participant national systems, which entrust that power to a centralized

agency-the UN (Parsons, 1963c). Thus

power is still regarded as a systemic means of "getting things done," at the international as well as the national system level. This view allows for, but does not focus on, the use of coercion by one nation against another in order to "get its way" (dominat- ing another national system, reducing its

effectiveness, repelling its encroachment, or

attenuating a subordinate relationship). Thus the more traditional definitions of

power have to do with one unit's ability to control the behavior of another unit or

units,4 while the Parsonian definition of

power focuses on the institutionalized process through which n actors are able, the

majority of them having a shared commitment to first-order goals, to resolve their differences and overcome minority resistance. If one does not admit the relevance of both approaches to international rela-

tions, then one is in turn confronted with

4An excellent survey of leading conceptions of power is to be found in March (1966).

choosing between two alternative perspec- tives on relations between nations. The traditional approach is, broadly speaking, consonant with the strategic approach and Parsons' with the cooperative approach to conflict resolution in international relations.

The position taken here is that the combined use of these approaches is a pre- requisite of the systematic analysis of relations between national systems. In very general terms these two approaches cor-

respond to the two distinguished by Hassner as "tendances apocalyptiques et ireniques" in the analysis of international conflict

(Hassner, 1964). Hassner characterizes the

approach of Schelling as standing midway between the two-since Schelling dwells on bargaining and the use of threats and

promises and the making of modi vivendi as an extension and modification of the

gaming perspective. Schelling's approach, however, is substantially one which allows for cooperation on a conditional basis, in the sense that two conflicting units may be in "same-boat" situations, with mutual destruction as a possible outcome of strate-

gic moves (Schelling, 1963). The Parsonian

approach is cooperative not in the sense of

cooperation arising from "material" con-

siderations, but from normative institutionalization and internalization. Thus the

present analysis attempts a synthesis partly in terms of infusing the Schellingian ap-

proach with sociological insights (Schelling, 1963, 1966).

The Political Subsystem

It is now necessary to conceptualize the

notion of the political subsystem in the light of the foregoing discussion. The political subsystem of a national society consists in

those structures and processes which have to do with the concretization and attainment of collective goals, in terms of the con-

19



ROLAND ROBERTSON

straints (demands and supports) emanating from all sectors of the social system (including the political subsystem itself) and from other national societies; and the subsystem attempts to institutionalize such norms as are considered necessary in the realization of such goals. It is also postulated that constraints emerging from outside the national society tend to be negative, while those emerging from within tend to be positive. The tendency for negative constraints to become positive is a mani- festation of political-unification-potential (Etzioni, 1965). The operation of negative constraints just as much as positive constraints tends to call for the proliferation of special collectivity and role complexes. These in turn require, for effective operation, continuing processes of normative upgrading.5

Empirically, normative upgrading is un- even and discontinuous, intermittently leading to role ambivalence and collectivity autonomy, such that the various spheres of policy formation become relatively interest- based-producing policy competition and conflict between and among articulators and aggregators of policy. These processes are notably apparent in the relations between domestic policy, foreign policy, and military policy. This is because the last two spheres of policy-formation are externally oriented in a specialist sense, while the first is internally oriented. Participation in an international system, especially one where coercive power is prominent, requires that the national system develop special-purpose, externally oriented structures, and-in general terms -all units to a lesser or greater extent have

5Normative upgrading is the process by which norms are reformulated to cater for the implementation of values under conditions of increasing differentiation of units and spheres of activity.

to develop such structural forms. A key problem, then, is the extent to which such structural forms are relatively independent of or dependent on other structures and processes within the unit in question.

This characterization of the political subsystem includes both inward- and outward- looking aspects; the phenomenon of power likewise appears in both its aspects (getting things done, getting one's way). We have also prepared the ground for analyses taking in both strategic, single-actor interest and cooperative, conflict-resolutive foci. What we now turn to are those international factors which tend to determine the objectives of national societies, the internal constraints on the operation of such factors, and some of the outcomes of the combined impact of the two.

Orientations of National Societies

At this stage it is necessary to spell out in skeletal form some basic considerations at the national-societal level. We must distinguish between the functional imperatives, the purposes, the values, and the goals of a national society. Functional imperatives are conditions which have to be met in order that the system may sustain itself. Purposes consist in the maintenance of the system within an "acceptable" state and of basic relationships between individuals and between social sectors. Values are the broadest possible guides to purposive social behavior, and goals are ends of action which constitute an increment to, a reduc- tion in, or a modification in a given and

specifiable state of affairs. Thus values constrain and guide basic purposes; and goals are concretized ends, realizable within the context of purposes and values-both of the latter being intrinsic to the system in question. Goals are in a sense external to the system and this externality of goals (not,

CONFLICT RESOLUTION VOLUM E XII NUMBER 1

20




of course, only in the sense of internation-

ally external) may result in strains in purposes and values (Miller, 1965; Simon, 1964). The presence of other competing or threatening systems in the environment is an obvious source of such modification. Such presences arise in a number of different ways, including cultural contiguity, geographical contiguity, strategic involvement in cold and hot war situations, economic interdependence, economic dom- ination and economic subservience, and

postcolonial dependence on the "mother

country." (Of course, these are not mutually exclusive.)

To speak of the significant-other relevance of nations means that international

relations, or relations qua relations between

any social units, are independent sources of constraint on goal formulation-to the extent that national-societal goals are best seen in terms of constraint sets (Simon, 1964). The pursuit of any one selected goal, even in terms of a simplistic domestic-foreign dichotomy, becomes, strictly speaking, im-

possible. The aspiration to maximize national security, vis-d-vis one counter-

nation, for example, involves the weighing of the costs of this as against other goals; and this is apart from the fact that significant others as points of reference will have differential impacts on goal-formation and

goal-attainment. The notion of costs is central to the

analysis of social strategy. Basically, this formulation of strategy may be summarized in the formula of "low cost-low power- isolation vs. high cost-high power-involvement." In fact, this strategic dilemma has

much to do with idealist vs. Realpolitik approaches to international relations. Ideal- ism assumes that the nation is "motivated" or should be motivated to act in accordance with ultimate values of the system in ques-

tion, while Realpolitik assumes self-interest

per se to be the basic factor in intersystem relations. Concrete situations, however, al-

ways involve an interplay between the two. It is only when special Realpolitik structures become differentiated that Realpolitik becomes empirically a basic motivational matrix. Such is the case with differentiation of and within military organizations in advanced industrial societies. And it is one of the notable characteristics of some applied strategic theory that it has

reflected aspects of this differentiation process-by tending to adapt itself to the mili-

tary-strategic, instead of to the political- strategic, or even what is here called the

sociopolitical-strategic context.6 The line of argument presented so far

would suggest that no adequate meaning of

strategy is attainable, especially in the international field, unless the level of specificity, and conversely of generality, is stipu- lated. If we say that military and foreign-

policy organizations, including diplomatic units, arise as special-purpose structures

contingent upon the development of sus-

tained relations with other national systems, we do not mean that these are the sole

spheres to which the term strategy has

relevance. The most specific area of appli-

6 The precise degree to which this is the case remains of course a point of considerable con- troversy, one which it is impossible to treat adequately in the present analysis. The vast majority of applied strategic theorists in the United States have evidently accepted as a premise of their work a politicomilitary definition of the relationship between "self" and adversary, and have, therefore, tended to operate in black-and-white terms. (This observation, incidentally, is not as such a political or ideological evaluation of the work of theorists of strategy.) See, inter alia, Wohlstetter, 1964; Rapoport, 1964a, 1964b; Waskow, 1965; Ka- plan, 1966; Lyons and Morton, 1966.

21



ROLAND ROBERTSON

cation of strategy is to the military complex; the next most general is to the political complex in a solely external-orientational

respect; and the most general application is to the political complex in both external- and internal-orientational respects (sociopolitical strategy). It will be noted that the second of these approximates the Clause- witzian notion of strategy, while the idea of sociopolitical strategy superficially approaches Rapoport's idea of an orientation

to international relations which takes in an

elaborate conception of the social welfare

of the population of a society in strategic interaction (Rapoport, 1960). It falls short

of Rapoport's ideal because it fails to include

the welfare of the populations of each inter-

acting unit. There is, of course, no reason

why strategic orientations should not take in

this consideration; and indeed it is necessary to do so in a conflict-resolutive respect, since it can be argued that it is nations like China-with the most explicit and comprehensive ideological position, permeating foreign policy and military policy-that fall into the category of sociopolitical strategy. Thus it should not be thought that socio-

political strategy for a single system is

necessarily any less power-oriented than a

political or military strategy. These observations on the specificity of

strategy may be highlighted and illustrated

by an analysis of national goal-seeking in terms of two themes. First, we consider the structural location of strategic thinking, in its foreign policy and military senses, within the national society. Second, we look at the patterns of relations between nations. The major focus in the latter re-

spect is on strategic interaction (relationships between units), whereas the former exercise involves the examination of policy formation (attributes of individual units

which bear directly on relationships between

units) .7

Structural Location of Strategic Thinking

Probably the basic consideration for the structural context of military strategy is the allocation of roles with respect to military policy and the ways in which strategic decisions are arrived at, both within the

military complex and as between the mili-

tary and political elites. On top of this there are, of course, other factors, such as the operation of lobbies, pressure groups, and interest groups. Particularly important here in societies with what Kissinger calls

bureaucratic-pragmatic leadership (e.g., the

US-Kissinger, 1966) are arms manufac-

turers, certain other business interests, and armed-service organizations. In addition there is a more important distinction which cuts across these, namely, that having to do with civilian-military relations. What- ever the degree of role and collectivity differentiation in particular cases, in the Cold War case the creation of strategic policy in the military sense has certainly become highly specialized. This does not, of course, mean that there has been a clear- cut division of labor such that overall, parametric strategy is taken care of by specialized agencies who are then em-

powered to relocate personnel and resources

accordingly. Rather, it means that there has been a great deal of role and collectivity differentiation without "adequate" normative upgrading, such that many aspects of

strategy among the Western powers have been and still are "settled" by competition

7It should be noted that diplomacy as a functional and structural specialism in interunit relations is not treated in this analysis. Histor- ically it is, of course, one of the most significant. See Numelin (1950).


22




among interest-based sections of the armed forces. Differentiation both within the mili-

tary complex and between the civilian and

military complexes has thus been essentially competitive and resistant to regulated inte-

gration. Structural attempts to upgrade norms in policy-making procedures, through such bodies as the National Security Council in the United States, have often only tended to reflect the existing absence of normative

integration, rather than to remove it (Hunt- ington, 1957, 1961; Waskow, 1962; Kis-

singer, 1961; Hoffman, 1965; Martin, 1962; Brandt, 1965; Snyder, 1964; Etzioni, 1962a; Koldziej, 1965).

This does not mean that military and

political elites have necessarily been in a state of fundamental conflict; we must also take account of the diversion-effect of inter- service dissensus and the "emergence" of some policy decisions through lateral bar-

gaining procedures. Equally important, perhaps, as Janowitz (1965) has remarked, most military organizations in the West have maintained a relatively high degree of

self-regulation. This latter point is especially important in view of the relative

autonomy of the military, taken perhaps with intelligence organizations, notably the CIA.8 Their autonomy tends to consist not in the capacity to aggregate a cohesive, comprehensive, and military strategy, but in the capacity to constrain national goals in particular international-coercive-power directions. This factor has been particularly important in the development of military- strategic thinking as a specialized and, to some considerable extent, independent

8 The US Senate Foreign Relations Commit- tee has recently embarked on an attempt to curb the impact of the CIA in the formulation of American foreign policy (1966). On the CIA in relation to "informal penetration" of national societies, see Scott (1965, pp. 69-110).

activity. As Janowitz (1965, p. 230) has

put it, thermonuclear weapons have led to the strengthening of the boundary between

military and nonmilitary: "At the organiza- tional level the military, although it relies on civilian technologists and scientists, becomes more and more differentiated since

only professionals handle nuclear weapons ... .." Insofar, therefore, as it becomes recognized that international goals are to be inspired by military-strategic considerations and established in broad outline by the "orthodox" strategic thinker, then of course internal-societal goals become sub- ordinated and the garrison state tendency has been set in train, notwithstanding a

high degree of military self-regulation. It is nuclear weapons, operating as an important technological intervening variable, which have called into question the traditional relationships among the armed ser-

vices, notably in terms of the encroachment of other armed services on the air forces.

Closely related to this process, historically facilitating and consolidating it, have been the more political strategies of mobilization and deterrence.

A second aspect of unit properties concerns the attributes of political systems. One of the more important of these is the nature of role and collectivity differentiation with respect to legislating, executing, and

administering policy decisions. Lack of

space precludes a full analysis of this aspect of domestic goals in relation to external

goals; but one of the most important factors has to do with the degree of democracy in the political systems of the interacting units.

For, as Schelling has argued (1963, p. 28), when it comes to convincing one's opponent that a strategic posture is not only firmly intended by the elite but that it is irrevo-

cable, Western political elites have one

major advantage over Communist elites:

23



ROLAND ROBERTSON

they can invoke the possible responses of their electorates in the bargaining processes of the Cold War. On the other hand, an authoritarian or totalitarian unit can invoke an ally's veto instead of the veto of an electorate. This point draws attention to the need for comprehensive analyses of the

political structure of alliances, blocs, and subordinate international systems (Galtung, 1966a; Schelling, 1966, pp. 35-91).

These, of course, are considerations which bear directly on the relational aspects of

strategic interaction. The role of political elites in this process also throws up another vital consideration to which Herz has drawn attention: strategic interaction in the atomic

age has given rise to an international "aris-

tocracy"-the politicomilitary elites of the

major interacting great powers (Herz, 1959; Burton, 1965). Together with the other structural phenomena already discussed, this has tended to attenuate the democratic control of foreign and military policy. As a

garrison state situation is approached, the

commitment-potential of which Schelling speaks is severely reduced, concomitantly tending to bring about greater strategic- bargaining symmetry as between East and West. This tendency, however, should not be confused with the trend toward greater participation of recently-independent nations in world politics, which in international terms could be construed as a democratic tendency. (As far as the UN is concerned, one should be careful in any case to allow for a significant degree of

delegation-autonomy visa-a-vis the domes-

tically-aggregated foreign policies of the

delegates' national societies; see Alker and

Russett, 1965.) Perhaps the only long-term trend which could attenuate the salience of the international "aristocracy" lies in Deutsch's thesis (1966): the domestic affairs of national societies are becoming so compre-

hensive and intense that the attentions (and assets) of political elites are increasingly focused on internal, as opposed to external, affairs.

The Pattern of Relations Between Nations

The objections which have been made to

applying orthodox theories of games of

strategy to the international system have

frequently involved the point that an experi- mental, empirical approach is necessary in order to generalize about what individuals do when confronted with various payoff situations. Strategic theory might thus be corrected by examining individual behavior

(Rapoport, 1960; Rapoport and Chammah, 1965). There is undoubtedly great usefulness in this kind of corrective; but in order to avoid the pervasion of an individualistic

fallacy in the study of international relations it is necessary to examine the international- structural constraints on strategic interaction.9 Table 1 uses Parsons' four types of media of control to categorize the facilities and resources deployed by one unit in order to get another unit to conform to standards of behavior expected by the first unit (the focal unit). 0

9 On the individualistic fallacy, see Scheuch, 1966. He tentatively raises the point as to whether Parsons' media-of-control schema con- stitutes a commission of the individualistic fallacy. Since, however, each of the four media relates directly to a structural attribute of a system of action, it is difficult to see how this argument could be sustained.

10This typology is drawn from Parsons, (1963a, 1963b, 1964). Note that commitments in the Parsonian schema are not conceived of in the same way as the idea of strategic commitment as utilized by Schelling (1963). On the other hand there is some proximity; the capacity of a unit to commit itself to a specific strategic position in Schelling's sense is obviously enhanced by the focal unit being able


24




TABLE 1 MEDIA AND MODES OF CONTROL (AFTER PARSONS)

Media Mode Sanction type Channel

Commitments Activation of commitments Negative Intentional Influence Persuasion Positive Intentional Power Coercion Negative Situational Money Inducement Positive Situational

This typology is used here for two purposes. First, it addresses itself to the

(Parsonian) nonpower dimensions of international relations. Secondly, as a related

task, it gets at the ways in which constraints other than the conditional and coercive are established in the international system. For

example, in a predominantly coercive, trial-

of-strength relationship, if one wants to persuade an actor that cooperation is the

only solution to a strategic impasse, then

appeals have to be made on the ground that there is a common beneficial outcome to such cooperation. Such appeals can be made on two bases: first, by invoking exist-

ing normative guidelines which were origi- nally considered to be irrelevant, or by shift-

ing the solution of the problem to a normative level which lies "above" the

particular confrontation in question; second -and this is perhaps of more immediate

significance-by appealing to some mutual interest which, in effect, establishes new normative guidelines. Even in the case of

propaganda of the most surreptitious kind there may be norm or value creation-at least in a weak sense. Certain general norms or values may be expressed through propaganda and agreed upon as a basis for

interaction, even if hostile interaction; and

propaganda directed at third parties in

attempts to recruit them necessitates the

to convince the counter unit that the commitment in question is fundamental to its value system and will not lightly be abandoned.

stressing of the inherent goodness of the

persuading party. Insofar as such appeals become a regular feature of a system (and it is quite clear that they have become so in the international system), then we can

legitimately speak of the beginnings of the

generalization of influence as a medium of international control.

In the Parsonian schema power-coercion is also to be seen primarily as a medium of system control, in that it has to do with the making of binding decisions in and between collectivities. It does not rest on

force, but in conflictful situations it may lead to the resort to force. If we are to retain our original caveat about Parsons'

conceptualization of power, we have to allow for the use of power by system A

against system B. But apart from this revision it is still possible to apply the notion of power as a partially generalized means of

getting things done internationally. The UN provides examples of enforcement of decisions on members through the making of binding decisions on the basis of elaborated rules, as also occurs from time to

time with respect to international law gener- ally. These may be seen both in terms of

the operation of generalized power (i.e.

systemically) and in terms of one system using the enforcement procedure against another nation.

One can readily contend that generalization of power (in the Parsonian sense) at the international level has not gone very

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ROLAND ROBERTSON

far, in spite of the UN. However, our

argument about norms emerging from

strategic interaction in nongeneralized- power situations is very important. For in

any case it is central to Parsons' schema that there should be normative and valua- tive underpinnings (or, on the "cybernetic" hierarchical model, "overpinnings") to the utilization of both power-coercion and inducement of a utilitarian kind. In fact the same thing can be said about the non-

generalization of money as can be said about power in the international system: take for example the strategic, relatively normless (in the sense of norms not being shared and internationally regularized) inducements of international aid, which may range from so-called humanitarian aid to the case of aid as bribery. On the other hand the fact that aid has developed partly around, and has also tended to generate, certain normative patterns is indicative of the general point: the nongeneralized use of a mode of control may under certain conditions yield internationally institutionalized patterns. The "pure" strategic use of aid is of course widespread-aid used solely to build up the required response pattern on the part of the recipient-what might be called "conditioning through aid." Even so, when aid-giving is based on considerations

having to do with the quality of the potential system-recipient, then this involves the

establishment, if only in embryo, of international norms other than those concerned

merely with regulating political relations between national systems.11

Raymond Aron's position is not far removed in conceptual form from the Parson-

11 Cf. Kaplan (1964, p. 162) for the way in which instrumental orientations in aid-giving and aid-receiving may become genuinely cooperative and give rise to a solidary international community.

ian schema. In speaking of the "paralyzing" effect of the "atomic taboo" he argues that the atomic weapon, "like the gold reserves used to back currency, is buried in the

ground, and accumulated in stockpiles, although always ready to be used. To

paraphase Clausewitz, one might say that nuclear weapons allow firm commitments to be honored and credit operations to be

paid in cash. But nuclear weapons are not

employed physically, any more than gold is removed from the storage vaults" (Aron, 1966, pp. 497-98). The difficulty with this

position is that it implies that "going onto the nuclear weapons standard" is something which in and of itself makes for power- generalization. In other words, the "standard" is accorded more priority than the medium of control, which is not entailed in the logic of the Parsonian schema; and insofar as any normative outcome is allowed for in contemporary international relations it is solely in terms of the direct conse-

quences of the condition-based balance-of- terror as between East and West.12 For

example, such a view allows for little or no normative autonomy in the so-called revolution of rising expectations-the premium placed on literacy and education, health, and so on among the nations of the "third world."1l

There are clearly many dangers in applying theories of social systems in toto to the

global or any other international system. As Haas has remarked, to argue as if the international system were autonomous and

self-maintaining would allow "no projective analysis of the intersystemic variety . . ."

12 This may be a rather controversial point, since Parsons himself has argued that nuclear- ideological polarization is itself an elemental form of "order" (Parsons, 1961).

13 On the importance of "institutionalized cultural diffusion" at the international level, see Scott (1965), pp. 167 and 140-55.


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TABLE 2 MEDIA AND CONDITIONS OF ACTION CONTROL

A* B*

Presence of generalized media Generalized media Foreshortened media Absence of generalized media

Attitudinal Relational Attitudinal Relational (to counter-unit) (unit-to-unit) (to counter-unit) (unit-to-unit)

Aa Ab Ac Ba Bb Bc

1. Commitment to Value Commitments Moral blackmail Challenge to Value values consensus (i.e. to system) values conflict

2. Conformity to Normative Influence Appeal to inter- Deny Normlessness normative regulation est in maintain- normative obligations ing relationship regulation

3. Acknowledgment Organized Power Compulsion Use of, or Violence; of binding interdepen- threat to mutual obligations dence use, force deterrence

4. Trust in basis Instrumental Inducements Compromising Exert Exploitative of utilitarian utilitarian gift economic inducement relationship coordination pressure

* A/B is a continuum relationship.

(Haas, 1963). As we have shown, strategic interaction is an important form of interaction even in highly integrated systems where the unit-to-unit relations are construed in terms of values, norms, and highly generalized media of control; where integrative factors are relatively inoperative, as in the

global system, then it becomes all the more

important to allow for strategic processes. On the other hand, there appears to be no

good reason why the media of control adumbrated by Parsons should not be applied to the international system in a flexible

and, initially at least, paradigmatic manner.

This, in effect, is what we have already begun to do in this section. Table 2 shows a reworking of the Parsonian schema.

It is quite clear that the three right-hand columns have been and still are most appli- cable to relations between national societies. But even this observation entails the admis- sion of three nonpower dimensions to international relations. It also provides for a fuller and more comprehensive representa- tion of what is involved in a war situation.

For if all the conditions of subcolumns Bb or Be (whichever way one looks at a relational system) "wholly" obtain, then we

may speak sociologically of war prevailing. Particularly significant, however, is the

possibility of relating horizontal relations to vertical relations in the schema. It has

already been argued, for example, that out of a confrontation based primarily on condition Ba3 there may be shifts towards A2

(under Aa, Ab, and Ac), either "passing through" or bypassing Ba2. In many strategic-interaction situations of the Cold War type, however, we find that a strategic mix consisting of all the media of control in subcolumn Ba will be employed. This in itself is automatically much more inclusive and less restrictive than theorists of

games of strategy typically allow for, but does nevertheless incorporate the various

aspects of strategy which Schelling has

brought into the discussion. Thus strategy which is not simply mili-

tary-based but has a strong political premise will tend to incorporate elements of appeal

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ROLAND ROBERTSON

to mutual benefits on self-interested bases and moral blackmail, with the probability of shifts towards columns A-since appeals to the counter-system in terms of "ideal" factors always bring into the dispute the

possibility of normative regulations.14 Hence the significance of ideology as a mythical justification in many conflict situations. But while ideology may serve to rigidify a conflictful relation, it also serves to intro- duce comparative-normative considerations. When appeals to third parties are important, as in the present international scene, the

major basis for recruitment thereby comes to be ideological, since the third parties themselves are not necessarily part of the conditional environment. This last observation incidentally points up the important difference between neutrality (a condition- based posture) and nonalignment (a more

comprehensive posture, taking in not only coercive-power considerations, but also economic and normative ones). On the other hand, of course, nuclear stalemate as between the US and the USSR is also a condition which allows some nations to

indulge in adventurous foreign policies and

military strategies. The analysis of media of control, both in

unit-to-unit and in systemic terms, brings up one extremely important point about international relations and the difference between intrasocietal and international

strategic processes. This is that the degree of generalization of norms and commitments can be regarded in another way as the

degree of detachment on the part of an

14 Etzioni's concept of "self-encapsulating conflict" is relevant here. Encapsulation is "the process by which conflicts are modified in such a way that they become limited by rules (the 'capsule') ." The major difference between intra- and intersocietal processes of this kind is that, in the latter case, third-party and systemic pressures are not so strong (Etzioni, 1964).

actor, be the actor an individual, a col-

lectivity, or a national system, vis-a-vis normative patterns. The (hypothetical) completely-integrated system will manifest

among its actors "total" internalization of relevant values and norms, whereas, insofar as there are shared normative guidelines in the international system, the detachment of the actor from relevant norms is great. With

greater detachment, norms are more available as instruments for actors. A high degree of instrumentality in respect of norms is thus a feature of systems, like the

global international system, in which either

symmetrical or asymmetrical conditionality holds. In the former case the norms arise from the felt necessity of cooperation in order to survive on the part of each interact-

ing unit; in the latter case the norms are

imposed by one unit on another and, since the response of the subordinate is to utilize the norms against the superordinate, the

superordinate in turn becomes embroiled in the same game. Thus a distinction should be made between consummatory internalization on the one hand and instrumental internalization on the other.15 A significant example of the latter is provided by dis- armament negotiations in which each unit tries to put forward proposals which it is calculated the counter-unit cannot afford to

accept (Burton, 1965, p. 50).

Competitive Societal Modernization

The line of analysis offered up to this

point with respect to unit and relational

aspects of strategy has involved both the

15 Another form of distinction is possible: as between implementative and regulative norms. The latter characterize the international system, while the former do not obtain there-at least at the global level-because international norms are not directly implementative of a shared system of values (Parsons, 1961).


28




probing of a particular set of phenomena and, in a sense, exposing the limited per- spectives of people who deal with these

phenomena, some of whom are social or behavioral scientists (notably theorists of

strategy), with others being influenced by or calling on the analytic resources of such scientists. It is in this latter respect that

Rapoport has been so concerned to reject a particular perspective even when it is confined to "the ivory tower" and is in

origin purely formal and nonempirical (Rapoport, 1964a, 1964b, 1965). But this is where the real complexity arises: insofar as such scientific activity is an empirical process, and insofar as the international

system is likely to remain resiliently coercive in many of its exchanges as far as East- West relations are concerned, the social

scientist, if he is to remain on any reason- able interpretation intellectually responsible, has to steer an extremely difficult path. On the one hand, for example, his awareness of his possible impact requires him to point to noncoercive and noneconomic dimensions of the global international system and pick out embryonic developments for public perusal; on the other hand his commitment to empirical reality means that he should not stray into the arena of "sociological utopianism."

With this Scylla-Charybdis situation in

mind, I conclude my analysis with some observations on discernible tendencies within the global international system which, if they develop further, would bring the idea of sociopolitical strategy firmly onto the scene of international relations. But this kind of sociopolitical strategy would involve numerous normative elements and

competitive rather than conflictful strategic interaction.

Our reconceptualization of "political system" and the empirical generalizations

associated with it enable us here to pinpoint the nature of the external referents of national societies in the contemporary world. It has been suggested elsewhere that the term "modernization" refers most

appropriately to the attempts by political elites to enhance the quality and effectiveness of "their" respective societies relative to qualities of significant-other societies in their environment (Nettl and Robertson, 1966, 1968; Robertson and Tudor, 1968). This attempt by political elites to enhance their societies in terms of criteria drawn

selectively from other national societies entails an important shift from elite-orientation to structure-orientation (Galtung and

Ruge, 1965; Hanreider, 1965). Traditional

balance-of-power approaches, either from the point of view of political elites or of social scientists, assume elite actions and characteristics to be the major references in international orientations, whereas a structure-orientation consists in the tendency to focus on sociocultural characteristics and national assets as the pivotal bases of orientation. It would appear that North-South relations are more structure-oriented in this sense than East-West relations, but it is a moot point which set of relations is the more resilient. The recent findings of Alker and Russett (1965) demonstrate that in the United Nations the East-West dimension predominates over the North-South dimension.16 But in more general international terms this is not necessarily the case, since the UN channels international relations into specific power-political terms.

16 The terms "North" and "South" are not of course used here in a strict geographical sense. Broadly they indicate, respectively, privileged and underprivileged nations. The distinction between North and South thus has to do with the general theme of "developed" and "underdeveloped" national societies.

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ROLAND ROBERTSON

On the other hand, of course, the UN itself has been largely responsible for at least

introducing structure-orientations to the international scene; and to this extent normative elements having to do with North- South issues are constantly interwoven with "brute" power elements.

Thus it may be argued that East-West relations may be seen primarily in foreign- policy and military-strategic terms, while North-South relations may be regarded not so much as strategic, interactional, and conflictful, but rather as strategic, comparative, and competitive. In the first case

strategic involvement consists in attempts to compromise or defeat the counter-system; in the latter, strategy concerns the attempt to outdo the counter-system through mak-

ing the best use of societal resources in order to be regarded as a "better" national

society. The strategic component in the

strategic-competitive case becomes particularly obvious and relevant when a national

system perceives more than one dimension of competition, such that it has to formulate a strategy of modernization in terms of the

relationships between rank dimensions (in the sense of a system of international strati-

fication) (Etzioni, 1962b; Galtung, 1964, 1966a, 1966b, 1966c; Lagos, 1963; Nettl and Robertson, 1968; Robertson and Tudor, 1968). A specific strategy of modernization will depend on the number of perceived rank dimensions of competition, the extent to which the rank dimensions are independent of each other, the rank profile of the national system, and the sociocultural

characteristics, facilities, and resources of the national system.

Strategic modernization would thus consist in the weighing-up of the best means to enhance international status in rank- dimensional terms and of relating these to the general national-societal costs involved

in such a strategy. (In this context "strat-

egy" takes on the more inclusive connota- tions indicated at the beginning of the

present analysis.) It is, of course, an open empirical question as to the existence of a

plurality of perceived, independent rank dimensions. And this is where the relation-

ship between East-West forms of interaction become confusedly intertwined with North-South relationships, since national

power in a coercive sense is frequently perceived as being a determinant of other

objectively isolable rank-dimensions, and there has been a tendency-less evident

perhaps in recent years-for Northern nations to spread the notion that economic advance alone will raise the general status of a national system. The ambivalences and tensions induced by such conflicting interpretations are also exacerbated by imbalances in the international distribution of resources, facilities, and assets. It should be strongly emphasized that there is no

guarantee, even if the perceived rank dimensions are multiplied and separated and the spheres of available international com-

petition increased, that international tension will necessarily be reduced; since the realistic possibility of enhancing status relative to privileged national systems may not be sufficient to enable the system in question to strive on an independent, a col-

laborative, or a politically-unified basis for enhanced status without attendant aggres- sion towards other national, international, or supranational units (Galtung, 1964; Robertson and Tudor, 1968). It is precisely this phenomenon which points up the link-

age between the inclusive and the exclusive

(game-theory) definitions of strategy. Thus, without a consolidating structure

of values and norms (and corresponding media), social and -economic goal-generalization at the international level involves


30




tensions of various kinds, even though it holds promise of a shift from coercive-power strategic interaction to competitive strategic modernization.

I have tried to bring the idea of strategy more firmly into the center of sociological thinking by emphasizing the significance of

political factors in relationships between the units with which the sociologist deals. Some of the ways in which special-purpose, strategic subunits arise and the ways in which these are related in different respects to the master-unit, the national society, have been discussed. Different modes of interaction between national societies were elaborated and these in turn were linked, in the final section, with some trends in the international system which run counter to many of the more usually stressed modes of interaction. In each of our two types of

strategy the political system figures prom- inently. In the case of conflictful strategy the political sphere is susceptible to fissure, since special-purpose units are proliferated to cope with, or even to promote, conflict. In the case of competitive strategy the

political sphere is "ideally" more highly integrated and is more genuinely akin to Deutsch's characterization of a steering- mechanism. My aim throughout has been to incorporate relevant sociological insights into the analysis of relations between

nations, at the same time allowing empirical characteristics of the international system to guide the invocation of such insights. I believe that approaches of this kind can

bring significant advances in the analysis of international relations.

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Strategic Relations between National Societies: A Sociological Analysis

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