Redirecting History in the Study of International Relations: Pt 2
This is my second blog post in a series I am doing on history. In my first blog post, I mentioned that I will do a series arguing the opposite thesis of this series, namely that an appeal to history can explain problems in international relations today.
Before we get into that, I wanted to mention a post I recently published with my favorite sections from Sun Tzu’s “Art of War”.
This blog post will be shorter than the last one (Pt1) and the last one in this series (Pt3).
Here’s Part One, if you haven’t read it already: (I recommend reading in succession)
The Art of War: Summary
Sun Tzu devotes chapters to topics on terrain (ch.10), offensive strategy (ch.3), energy (ch.5), attack by fire (ch.12), marches (ch.9), dispositions (ch.4), maneuver (ch.7), and the employment of secret agents (ch.13), among other things. In comparison to Thucydides, he writes in a normative, rather than descriptive style, since his work is meant to serve as a manual for generals and military leaders.
Sun Tzu is, thus, detail-oriented in his writing as can be intuited from the titles of the chapters. For example, he asks his readers to only fight downhill and “not ascend to attack” (181), or that war is based on “deception” and that pretending to be inferior in combat encourages ignorance (96, 97). From a stylistic perspective, I prefer the writing of Sun Tzu over that of Thucydides. Sun Tzu focuses on war exclusively, whereas Thucydides also mentions the walls and structures of buildings. Furthermore, Sun Tzu provides a clearer vision of his perspective. In comparison, we can vaguely decipher what Thucydides thought about justice from the Mytilenian Debate or Melian Dialogue.
“Sun Tzu is detail-oriented in his writing.”
Sun Tzu vs. Thucydides: Two Distinct Realist Approaches
Moreover, I appreciate Sun Tzu’s originality as much as I did with that of Thucydides. Thucydides may have invented scientific historical analysis but he did not develop a completely novel tactical approach to an undeveloped military system as Sun Tzu did. In comparing texts, it is important to remember that Sun Tzu wrote at a time in Chinese history when war was almost entirely undeveloped. The writer and translator Samuel B. Griffith writes that we can only fully appreciate Sun Tzu’s originality at the time when we compare war efforts in the fifth and fourth centuries BC with that of earlier periods (49). Before 500 BC, war in China was primarily ritualistic; hostility to one another was only permitted when the seasons prevented the harvesting of crops (49). There was no concept of massacring cities, ambushing or taking advantage of adversaries (49).
It was only after 500 BC that “[T]he science of tactics was born” (56). Despite the appreciation I have for Sun Tzu’s originality, I once again, question whether his advice to look for birds gathering above campsites, to know if they are empty, can be applied today (190). Sun Tzu should be celebrated and should still be read, but he can not advise on contemporary problems. In many ways, we read classical realists because we glorify history. Machiavelli was another writer that contributed to the realists’ glorification of history.
Notably, his writing is more relevant to us today than the two previous texts I have analyzed. I will summarize Machiavelli’s text, The Discourses, and then provide a critique to his analysis of history in Part Three of this series.
Citations
- Carr, E. H. The Twenty Years’ Crisis, 1919–1939. Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2016, doi:10.1057/978–1–349–95076–8.
- Heilke, Thomas. “Realism, Narrative and Happenstance: Thucydides’ Tale of Brasidas.” American Political Science Review, vol 98, #1, 2004, pp. 121–38.
- Hobbes, Thomas. “Leviathan By Thomas Hobbes.” By Thomas Hobbes, Free PDF, Ebook | Global Grey, Global Grey Ebooks, 2019, www.globalgreyebooks.com/leviathan-ebook.html.
- Huntington, Samuel P. “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs, vol. 72, no. 3, 1993, pp. 22–49. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/20045621. Accessed 23 Feb. 2020.
- Machiavelli, Niccolo, et al. The Discourses. Penguin Books, 2003.
- Thucydides, et al. The Landmark Thucydides a Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War.
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keep reflecting.
