Anti-Climacus

THE REALIST RESPONSE: Not that the below should give you the impression that this warms my heart any more. Justin makes a good point here:

"But I am not under any illusion that any "rule-based framework" will ever constrain a state from pursuing its interests based on one calculation: power and self-aggrandizement.  Now, it may be the case that a layer of institution makes a state act (or, more often, talk) differently in pursuing those goals.  But the UN will do precisely nothing to prevent the U.S. from bombing Iran if it wants to, China from attacking Taiwan if it wants to, or Sudan from murdering its citizens if it wants to."

That is, all of Matt's examples are of states doing things their national interest would've dictated them wanting to do anyway. If he wants to prove his point, he should find a case where a state doesn't do something that's clearly in its interests because of an institution. I'll not hold my breath on that one.

But then we get to the problem:

" I think the Gulf War was a mistake, because I think it was based on a faulty calculation that a shakeup of who controlled Kuwait's oil would cause unacceptably high economic costs to the United States."

Realists, it seems to me, countenance states doing whatever ends up being in their interests to do, unconstrained by even something as shaky as norms. So if you have any inclination that there might need to be a place for moral judgments to enter into (and effect) state action, this theory doesn't have room for it.