disservice.^67 In assuming that distrust is natural, we have done too little research on
empathy and trust and spent too little effort in devising policies to promote trust.^68
International relations scholars have put almost all of our eggs in the fear basket.
There is potentially a great deal to gain by examining our long-held assumptions
about human nature.
For example, research on fear suggests that long-held assumptions of deterrence
theory are probably not simply wrong but dangerously so. Research in political
psychology has shown that ‘deterrence is inadequate as an explanatory theory of
international relations because the growing body of empirical evidence’ does not
support the theory.^69 Recent research on fear implies that the notion that deterrence
threats can be manipulated with great confidence is folly. We cannot expect
decision-makers to respond to threats by doing elaborate (or even boundedly
rational) calculations of costs, risks and benefits, yet policy-makers are still counselled
as if this were possible. This is not simply because signalling resolve is difficult. Fear,
and also anger and perceived humiliation, affect the ways people reason and react
to threats: fear is a powerful source and re-enforcer of both the cognitive and
motivated biases that interfere with the communication and reception of deterrent
threats. Fear can become institutionalized and self-reinforcing.
To the extent that our theories, uninformed by research on fear, have guided
decision-makers and shaped foreign policies by promoting the use of threats, they
have made the world more dangerous rather than less. The path to decreased
tension, conflict resolution, and improved security lies in re-examining the rela-
tionship between ‘human nature’, political practices and institutions and in devising
policies that actually decrease fear and enhance trust.
Notes
1 I thank Ken Booth, Karin Fierke, Joshua Goldstein, Peter Katzenstein, Robert Keohane,
Markus Kornprobst, Peter Liberman, Catherine Lutz, Lisa Martin, Rose McDermott,
Barry O’Neill, Janice Stein and Kenneth Waltz for comments.
2 Hans Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, Sixth edition,
revised by Kenneth Thompson (New York: Knopf, 1985), p. 4.
3 There are, of course, other realists besides Hobbes and Morgenthau who I could have
discussed. However, Hobbes and Morgenthau are used here as exemplars.
4 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 4.
5 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 5.
6 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 119.
7 Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, pp. 38–40.
8 Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (New York: Penguin, [1651], 1986) p. 161.
9 Hobbes, Leviathan, p. 196.
10 Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics(New York: Random House, 1979)
p. 66.
11 Kenneth N. Waltz, Man, the State and War(New York: Columbia University Press,
1959).
12 Waltz, Man, the State and War, p. 27.
13 Waltz, Man, the State and War, pp. 28–29.
14 Waltz, Theory of International Politics, p. 18.
15 Waltz, Man, the State and War, p. 166.
Rethinking ‘man’ 173