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E.H. Carr and the Failure of the Inter-War International System

MA International Relations and World Order

M13 Theories of IR 7515

Joé Majerus

Student Number: 129047454

Due 17 June, 2013

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Peace and international cooperation may not be sustained on a

permanent basis simply by virtue of the illusory belief that states will

invariably seek to preserve these ideals merely because they allegedly

benefit the international community as a whole. Neither will their presumed

adherence to a superior code of morality ultimately suffice on its own to

protect the international order from major disruptions caused by the actions

of one of its constituent sub-units.

As E.H. Carr remarked, ethical standards cannot exist independent of

politics, in particular not without setting them in proper relation to the less

abstract determinants in international relations, notably power.1 It was such a

separation of power from morality which led politicians of the inter-war

period to believe that international cooperation could be perpetuated solely

through the establishment of institutions designed to resolve inter-state

disputes within an international society whose members supposedly all

shared the same goals, even though in reality they clearly didn’t.

Still, as Carr acknowledged, attempts to root moral ideals within the

international order need not necessarily suffer the same fate they did in the

run-up to World War II.2 Importantly, however, one must first become alive

to the highly sensitive constellation of power and morality ultimately

required to prevent the international system from giving rise to such forces

as might before long prove a potential source of its own instability.

By drawing on a critical engagement with E.H. Carr's work as well

as on some particularly illuminating cases in recent modern history in which

the promotion of moral ideals arguably led to the creation of a more

substantive and enduring order of international peace and cooperation, the

essay seeks to make the argument that 'moral ideals' are indeed not per se a

lost cause in international politics, albeit only when morality is essentially

considered a function of power and not vice versa as Carr noted,3 and, what's

more, when they likewise also succeed in enhancing their practical appeal

by providing individual state actors in due time with adequate incentives for

1E.H. Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis 1919-1939: An Introduction to the Study of

International Relations (London: Macmillan, 1939), p. 19. 2Peter Wilson, 'The Myth of the First Great Debate', Review of International Studies, Vol. 24

(Dec 1998), pp. 12-13. 3Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 62.

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conceiving of international cooperation as a viable alternative to war and

aggression for effecting changes in their favour.

Historical analysis of the failures and inherent deficiencies of the

inter-war international order has undeniably produced a wealth of interesting

and instructive scholarly literature,4 yet E.H. Carr’s work still stands out as

one particularly insightful and conclusive study on it. In essence, Carr

attributed the collapse of that order to the presumably unavoidable

confluence of a number of conflicting forces and tendencies which

combined to lay bare with a vengeance the misguided illusion that the

dictates of power politics on individual state behavior could be rendered

immaterial–probably even redundant–through the mere presence of

institutional arbitration and cooperation alone.5

Arguably most detrimental to lasting peace and international stability

was the intrinsically erroneous view that the peculiar balance of power by

which European countries had accommodated each other for nearly 100

years before it was eventually shattered by the First World War might in a

less power-driven form be restored by encouraging the belief that

compliance with international norms and conventions would invariably

work towards the common good of all nations.6 Such presumptions, however,

failed to appreciate that the 19th

century political order had actually never

even in the first place rested on a universal validity of rational principles and

ethical standards; rather it had been primarily the result of a distinct and, by

implication, non-transferable constellation of historical contingencies,7 a

balance of forces peculiar ''to the economic development of the period and

4 See, for instance, Frank McDonough (ed.), The Origins of the Second World War (London:

Continuum International Publishing Group, 2011); R. Boyce, The Great Inter-war Crisis

and the Collapse of Globalization (Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009); Donald Kagan,

On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace (New York: Doubleday, 2009), pp.

281-436. 5 As Peter Wilson noted, it was precisely this analytical quality of E.H. Carr to identify the

correlative nature of both domestic and international issues–war, revolution, social justice,

self-determination, economic distress and power politics–which enabled him to critically

examine major developments in international politics. Peter Wilson, 'Radicalism for a

Conservative Purpose: The Peculiar Realism of E.H. Carr', Journal of International Studies,

Vol. 30:1 (2001), p.135. 6 On the subject of Great Power Politics prior to World War I, see Norman Reich, Great

Power Diplomacy 1814-1914 (New York: Mcgraw Hill Book Co, 1992); Paul W. Schroeder,

"The Nineteenth Century System: balance of power or political equilibrium?", Review of

International Studies, Vol. 15 (1989), pp. 135–153; and Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of

the Great Powers. Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500-2000 (New York:

First Vintage Books, 1989), pp. 143-255. 7 Wilson, 'The Peculiar Realism of E.H. Carr', p.127.

3

the countries concerned.''8

Failure to recognize that reality then eventually found its most

glaring expression in the concept of the so-called international harmony of

interests, i.e. the assumption that collective security, free trade, the sanctity

of treaties and international arbitration would always serve nations' common

interests.9 Yet unfortunately that doctrine contained one particularly flagrant

imperfection, namely that it only provided for the settlement of international

disputes within the legal framework of the established order, without at the

same time, however, also allowing for far-reaching revisions of its own

inherent failings and shortcomings.10

In consequence, the proclaimed harmony of interests missed to

extend the advantages shared by its most powerful exponents to such nations

as ultimately did not see their concerns sufficiently addressed by it.11

Quite

to the contrary, these countries didn't believe that the preservation of the

status quo helped them advance their own interests and ambitions.12

In a

world facing a serious political, social, economic and moral crisis which not

only took issue with the distribution of power among nations, but, moreover,

also questioned the very basis of its theoretical underpinnings–democracy,

laissez-faire economics, liberalism and self-determination–it was indeed

overly optimistic to presume that a professed harmony of interests would

ensure peace and security without first re-interpreting its own moral

foundations and adapting them to the era's prevailing circumstances and

arrangements.13

Accordingly, the reluctance of satisfied nations to effect the

necessary amendments for accommodating the needs of dissatisfied powers

as well only further hardened the latter's conviction that international

morality and solidarity were ultimately but idle platitudes employed by

privileged nations to ''justify and maintain their dominant position''14

by

masking their ''own interest in the guise of universal interest for the purpose

8 Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 29.

9 Wilson, 'The Peculiar Realism of E.H. Carr', p. 126.

10 Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, pp. 182-184.

11Robert W. Davies, "Edward Hallett Carr, 1892–1982", in: Proceedings of the British

Academy, Volume 69 (1983), p. 486. 12

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis', p. 57. 13

Graham Evans, 'E.H. Carr and International Relations', British Journal of International

Studies, Vol. 1:2 (July 1975), pp. 82-84. 14

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 75.

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of imposing it on the rest of the world.''15

Before long, their vexation with the

international system then translated into open hostility and aggression,

setting them on an arguably inevitable collision course with its defenders

that would eventually see their societies pitted against one another in

history’s most devastating and atrocious conflagration.

In general, E.H. Carr was certainly right that international law and

institutions cannot be relied upon to act as a universal remedy for redressing

inter-state grievances, in particular not within the constraints of an

international order whose members didn't identify the interests of the whole

community with their own.16

In that event, such institutions might even

constitute a potential root cause for international conflict, if only because

differing perceptions with regard to moral precepts and the constitutive

nature of the international system stand to result in different strategies

adopted by states for handling their relations with other nations.

Accordingly, the mere advocacy of such noble principles as universal peace

will hardly ever suffice to persuade dissatisfied nations of their alleged

suitability for generating mutual advantages. It was precisely this divorce of

morality from the far more practical exigencies of states, notably their

dependence on certain elements of power to further their most fundamental

national needs which Carr accurately identified as one of the most

significant flaws in inter-war 'utopian' thought.17

It is only when international law and institutions are widely held of

assisting, or at least of not substantially interfering with national objectives

that they might place the international system on a less fragile and volatile

foundation.18

Dissatisfied states are reluctant to adhere to moral ideals not

because they are less appreciatory of their potential merits; rather they

simply judge them less helpful and conducive in advancing their own

interests as well.19

All states aspire to meet certain indispensable needs,

15

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 71; Wilson, 'The Peculiar Realism of E.H. Carr', pp.

126-127. 16

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 57. 17

Lucian M. Ashworth, 'Where are the Idealists in Inter-War International Relations?',

Review of International Studies, Vol. 32:2 (April 2006), p. 302. 18

Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, pp. 42-43. 19

A particularly instructive confirmation of that reality is, for instance, offered by the 1928

Kellogg-Briand pact to renounce war as a legitimate instrument of national policy, even

though it was already at the time perfectly realised by more perceptive statesmen, notably

US Foreign Secretary Frank Kellogg himself, that such solemn commitments could

ultimately not hinder states from still seeking “recourse to war in self-defence” if they

believed circumstances to demand such action. Frank Kellogg, cited in Ruth Henig, ‘The

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notably political independence, national security and, as far as possible,

economic autarky and prosperity. What distinguishes them, however, are the

at times very different means applied for realising and/or preserving them.20

As Carr noted, powerful nations with the necessary wherewithal routinely

seek to perpetuate their pre-eminent standing by maintaining the status quo

at the expense of potential challengers,21

whereas countries with less

sophisticated methods for procuring vital resources and directing

international capital movements in their favour might accordingly more

easily be tempted to revert to less peaceful devices for asserting their

demands, notably in the form of territorial expansion and bellicose

aggression towards other nations.22

It is on account of these fundamentally opposite strategies employed

by states in relation to their respective power that for as long as there do not

exist appropriate opportunities and incentives for all of them to more readily

forego military violence in their conduct of foreign affairs, appeals to

preserve peace for the common good will never be able to deter inter-state

conflict on their own. Hence, institutions such as the League of Nations were

indeed ill-equipped to meet that noble aspiration, notably as dissatisfied

nations were loath to abide by the norms and regulations of an international

organization which they perceived unwilling of curing its own ills and

inequities. Accordingly, the League thus not only neglected to adequately

account for the element of power in international politics,23

but it was

likewise a fallacy to believe that merely because it presumed to pass

international judgements, resentful nations might in the event more readily

comply with its instructions. As Carr remarked, global peace would

basically remain an elusive enterprise while there still persisted an overly

League of Nations: An Idea before its Time?’, in: Frank McDonough (ed.), The Origins of

the Second World War (London: Continuum International Publishing Group, 2011), p. 40. 20

In a sense, it is thus not so much a question over whether states differ in regard to the

outcomes they wish to achieve than rather about their differences in strategies for attaining

them. See Robert Jervis, 'Realism, Neoliberalism and Cooperation: Understanding the

Debate', International Security, Vol. 24:1 (Summer 1999), pp. 50-51; and Robert Powell,

'Anarchy in International Relations Theory', International Organization, Vol. 48:2 (Spring,

1994), pp. 318-321. 21

Typically they try to do so through their often extensive capital exports as well as their

privileged access to and/or control of foreign markets. Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p.

114. 22

Charles Jones, E.H. Carr and International Relations: A Duty to Lie (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1998), p. 29. 23

Jonathan Haslam, The Vices Of Integrity: E.H. Carr, 1892–1982 (London/New York:

Verso, 1999), p. 70.

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idealistic belief in the ''normative power of morally decent but ultimately

irrelevant bodies'' such as the League of Nations.24

Unable to generate a

common interest capable of not only encouraging states to acquiesce to its

institutional regulations, but of also overriding their more self-centred

ambitions, recourse to war consequently never ceased to be regarded by

vengeful nations as an expedient alternative for satisfying their own

interests.25

By implication, however, it also follows that self-help and aggression

do not a priori mandate the foreign policies of individual state actors.26

Hence, 'Wilsonian ideals' of enduring peace, security and cooperation might

indeed be able to receive greater currency if states were not to conceive of

international politics primarily as a global and self-fulfilling zero-sum game

in which one actor's gains automatically entail losses for another one. By the

same token, the exercising of aggressive power must not solely be put down

to a presumed absence of moral ideals in inter-state relationships, but

arguably even more so to their perceived hollowness and inherent double

standards.27

In that context, responsibility for maintaining peace and international

cooperation will indeed primarily rest with dominant powers' willingness to

effect a constant re-evaluation and re-adjustment of the status quo, notably

by addressing unjust practises of the international system of their own

volition instead of unwisely handing over the initiative for doing so to

revisionist challengers of it.28

In particular, they need to avail themselves

more systematically of their 'soft' powers29

to convince other nations that

peace and cooperation are more than merely artful institutions to further

24

Michael Cox, 'E.H. Carr and the Crisis of Twentieth-Century Liberalism: Reflections and

Lessons', Journal of International Studies, Vol. 38:3 (May 2010), p. 528. 25

S. Brown, The Causes and Prevention of War (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994), pp.

123-124. 26

Opposite views are in particular advanced by prominent offensive realists such as John

Mearsheimer in John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York:

W.W. Norton & Company, 2001). 27

In Carr's appreciation, these principles not only failed to “provide any absolute and

disinterested standard for the conduct of international affairs, yet were, moreover, also “but

unconscious reflexions of national policy based on a particular interpretation of national

interest at a particular time.” Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 111. 28

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, pp. 152-153. 29

For Joseph Nye, 'Soft Power' is essentially about “co-opting and shaping the preferences

of

people rather than coercing them”. Joseph S. Nye, Soft Power: The Means to Success in

World Politics (Cambridge, M.A.: Perseus Books Groups, 2004), p. 5.

7

their own self-enrichment.30

Such need for allowing peaceful change to take

place should, however, not only be enjoined upon state actors by moral

considerations, as Carr duly remarked,31

but also because already for purely

practical reasons any such measured modifications are ultimately much

preferable to a potentially far more radical and violent upheaval in

international politics.

Accordingly, Carr was right that ''to establish methods of peaceful

change is[…]the fundamental problem of international morality and of

international politics''32

and that its solution ''must be based on a compromise

between morality and power.''33

Above all, however, international relations

need to be characterized by a widespread compliance with the principles of

'self-sacrifice' and 'give-and-take', i.e. of attaching equal value to the

grievances of both strong and challenging nations.34

Conciliation and mutual accommodation are therefore key to the

longevity of any international order, and the instruments or institutions most

suited for doing so might arguably indeed best be found along the path of

economic reconstruction.35

However, there is one significant qualification to

be made here, one which Carr only insufficiently addresses himself.

Undeniably he is right to argue that seeking ''the consent of the governed by

methods other than coercion'' can help 'Wilsonian ideals' acquire a more

universal validity in international politics.36

Still, that approach nevertheless

fails to specify that it is ultimately just as important to consider the factors of

not only when to offer such conciliation and cooperation, but essentially also

of whom to extend it to. Accordingly, Carr might have been a bit hasty to

dismiss ideological differences between disparate modes of societal

30

Carr above all draws attention to the proclaimed “Sanctity of Treaties” as an especially

sophisticated implement “used by the ruling nations to maintain their supremacy over

weaker nations on whom the treaties have been imposed.” Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p.

174. 31

Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 191. 32

Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 202. 33

Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 192. 34

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, pp. 149-150. 35

By 'economic reconstruction' Carr does not only mean the granting of relief credits to

distressed nations or the provision of foreign loans for stimulating their export trade, but on

a more fundamental note also the widespread acceptance that in order to permanently

achieve the ideals of international peace, stability and security, national policies will out of

principle have to take into consideration the welfare and societal content of other countries

as well. Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, pp. 218-220. 36

Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, p. 217.

8

organization, notably between Fascism and Democracy.37

Admittedly, conciliation of resentful nations such as Germany and

Japan could have gone a long way towards preserving international peace

and stability as Carr maintained.38

Importantly, however, a genuine

willingness of dominant powers to not merely employ the League's

institutions for their own ends, but to also actively help dissatisfied countries

redress their economic and political grievances as well, was ultimately but

one part of the solution. As a brief historical survey will show, it is important

to remember that resentful nations may actually not always be pacified by

the prospect of international equality or common gains. After all, much also

depends on a nation's domestic character, given that its distinctive political

make-up will basically determine the degree of international cooperation

deemed suitable by its rulers for assisting their country achieve its primary

objectives. Thus if cooperation should for whatever reasons rather be judged

inimical to the realisation of its projects, than conciliation might likewise not

deter that nation from resorting to more aggressive power politics.

Accordingly, Carr incorrectly believed that appeasement would work

irrespective of whom it was ultimately addressed to.39

Put differently, he

failed to perceive that the Allies were dealing with two different Germanys

during the inter-war period, one in general responsive to international

conciliation, while the other–pervaded by nationalistic fanaticism–

categorically refused to even consider in the first place such an option,

notably as it was on principle deemed utterly unfit for accomplishing their

leaders’ long-term schemes and intentions.40

Undeniably, the international order established by the treaty of

Versailles was one that dissatisfied nations rightly believed to operate at

their disadvantage, a condition only made worse by the League's apparent

37

Jones, E.H. Carr and International Relations, p. 29. 38

Jones, E.H. Carr and International Relations, p. 31. 39

As Richard Crossman had observed early on, Nazi-Germany was not simply a ‘classical

power’ seeking systemic change, but rather had set out to radically transform the very

nature of the international system itself. Wilson,’ The Myth of the First Great Debate’, pp.

3-4. 40

Nazi-Germany's true ambitions were after all not only borne out by the conduct of its

foreign policy in the 1930s, but even before that the belligerent mind-set of its leaders was

hardly veiled in secrecy, notably in Hitler's own writings Mein Kampf and the unedited

‘Zweites Buch'. On Hitler's premeditated international objectives, see in particular J. Noakes

and G. Pridham, Nazism 1919-1945. Volume 3: Foreign Policy, War and Racial

Extermination (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1997), p. 8.

9

incapacity for rectifying its own deficiencies.41

As a result, such views

basically undermined the credibility and legitimacy of the very institutions

and laws it sought to promote. Importantly, however, it was not a foregone

conclusion that further accommodation with Germany, notably in the field of

rearmament, couldn't have led to a more benign approach of its leaders in

foreign affairs. While such concessions might indeed have prompted them to

push for still greater demands, they could nevertheless also have

substantially boosted the political reputation and position of the Weimar

government, above all that of its Chancellor Gustav Stresseman, the

arguably most genuinely peace-minded figurehead in German politics.42

In that context, it is important to understand that the principal reason

why Germany wished to rearm was not because it was per se bent on

pursuing a more aggressive foreign policy43–at least not in military terms,

but rather on account of the perception that its international competitors

were actually not willing to comply with the arms limitation terms they had

agreed to in 1919 either.44

That failure of the Allies to follow suit on their

self-declared objective for general disarmament as a result only reinforced

the impression of revisionist countries that the League of Nations was

ultimately less an organization of all nations than merely one of its primary

beneficiaries.45

That is why political observers such as Winston Churchill were only

partially right in maintaining that Germany was actually more after the

recovery of lost territories than obtaining equality of status.46

The truth of

the matter is that its government above all hoped that a compromise on

disarmament issues would provide it with the very diplomatic success it so

desperately needed in view of public opinion for suppressing the harmful

41

Michael Cox, 'E.H. Carr and the Crisis of Twentieth-Century Liberalism', pp. 527-528. 42

Accordingly, the fact that his foreign policy ultimately failed to win widespread approval

within German society, but instead increasingly came to be met with harsh criticism and

resentment, can thus not solely be put down to the volatile nature of the international order,

nor to the major economic slump that soon was to upset it. Ruth Henig, 'The League of

Nations', p. 41. 43

In that regard, it is thus highly debatable whether Germany would in any event have

become an aggressive power by the end of the 1930s as John Mearsheimer contends.

Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p. 199. 44

Ruth Henig, 'The League of Nations', pp. 43-44. 45

John W. Coogan, 'Wilsonian diplomacy in war and peace', in: Gordon Martel (ed.),

American Foreign Relations Reconsidered 1890-1993 (New York: Routledge, 1994), p. 85. 46

Z. Steiner, The Lights that failed: European International History 1919-1933 (Oxford:

Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 786-792.

10

fascist disease that was presently running rampant within its society.47

According to Carr, Allied intractability to thus help Stresseman secure an

acceptable revision of the Versailles Treaty consequently greatly assisted the

rise of Social-Nationalism in Germany.48

Yet once Hitler had seized power, any attempts to appease him were

arguably a vain and fruitless enterprise from the start.49

Granted, the mere

fact that that approach ultimately failed to preserve peace must not detract

from its at least theoretical potential for doing so as Carr rightly believed,

albeit if and only if, as he failed to discern, it had been directed at the right

time at the right political leaders.50

The tragedy with appeasement was not

that it was a misconceived policy per se, but rather that its underlying

promise to maintain peace and inter-state cooperation basically lacked the

willingness of all parties involved to commit themselves in equal part to the

unequivocal observance of these high-minded principles. In consequence,

the entrenchment of these ideals failed to precede the ascent of

intransigently resentful enemies which, in marked contrast to their

predecessors, clearly preferred aggressive power politics over peaceful

reconciliation for achieving their goals.51

To that degree, Carr rightfully

blamed unfair international structures for courting Germany's growing

embitterment and thereby abetting the spread of fascism. Importantly,

however, a more conciliatory international environment, one in which peace

and cooperation truly benefited the entire community of states, could only

have secured international stability when dealing with a Germany that was

likewise genuinely interested in the pursuit of these ideals. As Hitler-

Germany, however, clearly wasn't, it is therefore difficult to imagine how

short of substantive territorial concessions it could have been placated to a

satisfactory degree. In other words, it was thus essentially less a question

over whether appeasement could ever have worked at all than basically one

47

Ruth Henig, 'The League of Nations', p. 43. 48

Haslam, The Vices of Integrity, p. 59. 49

Jeffrey Record, ‘Appeasement: A Critical Evaluation Seventy Years On’, in: Frank

McDonough (ed.), Origins of the Second World War (London: Continuum International

Publishing Group, 2011, pp. 223-237. 50

Carr would later admit that he had at the time failed to see Hitler-Germany's true

intentions. Davies, Edward Hallett Carr, pp. 483-84. 51

For a balanced appraisal of appeasement policies during the inter-war period, see in

particular R.A.B. Dimuccio, ‘The Study of Appeasement in International Relations:

Polemics, Paradigms, and Problems’, Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 35:2 (March 1998).

pp. 245-259; and Frank McDonough, Neville Chamberlain, Appeasement and the British

Road to War (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998).

11

of how, when and, above all, with whom it might have done so.

The same observation also holds true for pre-WWII Japan, a country

in which there had never developed any pronounced affinity, let alone

identification with the international order. Importantly, however, the

translation of its frustration with international politics into open hostility was

likewise not so much a pre-determined inevitability than but the effect of

foregoing developments which, on balance, greatly accelerated the country's

international defection. In particular, one must not confound the especially

militaristic form of Japanese nationalism that caused millions of innocent

people in Far-East Asia such indescribable pain and suffering in the 1930s

with a putatively innate or premeditated desire of its society to inescapably

follow such despicable a course of action irrespective of its internal political

composition.

Above all, one must not disregard the fundamental break that

occurred in Japanese politics during the inter-war period, a deviation from

previous policies which although it may have stood in some continuity with

deeper, long-term strands of modern Japanese history,52

still cannot be

interpreted as but the logical and natural evolution of its distinct political

system. Once again, intense nationalism was essentially but the symptom of

larger historical trends at work in the background,53

a disease which

undeniably the Japanese government itself lacked the determination to blight

as early and rigorously as it might have, yet one which the international

community as well only insufficiently helped to prevent from gaining in

strength in the first place.

International practices such as the extremely ill-received decision to

deny Japan racial equality in the Covenant of the League of Nations,54

for

instance, considerably increased domestic perceptions that the country was

52

See in particular M.G. Sheftall, 'An Ideological Genealogy of Imperial Era Japanese

Militarism, in: Frank McDonough (ed.), Origins of the Second World War (London:

Continuum International Publishing Group, 2011), pp. 50-65. 53

The emergence of popular imperialistic movements was in no small measure a direct

corollary of the increasingly acute perception shared within large parts of the Japanese

population that the western model of democracy and free-market economics was by nature

rife with grave social injustices and economic malpractices, leading to rising rates of

unemployment, corporate corruption and, as a result, the gradual erosion of Japan's

capability to satisfy its most basic national needs and interests. John Toland, The Rising

Sun. The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire 1936-1945 (New York: Pen &

Sword Military Classics, 1971), pp. 5-6. 54

Margaret MacMillan, Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World (New York:

Random House, 2003), p. 321.

12

basically asked to conform to the rules of an international order which by all

accounts rather sought to perpetuate than do away with the double standards

and preferential treatment of a few privileged nations in international

politics.55

Thus when the perceived dissonance between national interests

and continued compliance with international norms came close to breaking

point in the early 1930s, it ultimately took but one final decisive straw such

as the non-sanctioned incursion of Japanese forces in northern China to once

and for all set the country on a far less peaceable course.56

Belief in

advancing matters of important national concern through peaceful

accommodation had by that point already reached such low levels of

approval that the idea of satisfying these needs by different, more radical

avenues was now able to find favour with much broader parts of the

country's ruling elite, or at any rate not meeting any sizeable opposition from

it.57

It may arguably indeed have been a one-way street from the invasion

of Manchuria to the Sino-Japanese War of 1937, given that Japan was from

that moment onwards irrevocably in the grip of militaristic Imperialism.58

Yet notwithstanding that fact, it is on the other hand an altogether different

matter whether the country was also of necessity bound to tread that utterly

fateful and destructive path from the very beginning,59

in particular though if

it might not after all have been possible to induce it to subscribe on a more

permanent basis to the ideals of international peace and cooperation by

attempting to align its national concerns more systematically with

international standards at a time when there actually still existed some

55

A sentiment arguably most fittingly conveyed by the words of Foreign Minister Makino

Nobukai upon saying that “we are not too proud to fight but we are too proud to accept a

place of admitted inferiority in dealing with one or more of the associated nations. We want

nothing but simple justice.” Quoted in Paul Gordon Lauren, Power And Prejudice: The

Politics And Diplomacy Of Racial Discrimination (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press,

1988), p. 90. 56

As is well known by now, neither the officially elected Japanese government nor the High

Command of its armed forces had instigated the aggressive action taken single-handedly by

the Kwantung Army's renegade leadership in Manchuria in 1931. John Toland, The Rising

Sun, pp. 8-9. 57

John Keegan, Fateful Choices. Ten Decisions That Changed the World 1940-1941 (New

York: The Penguin Press, 2007), pp. 139-140. 58

Keegan, Fateful Choices, pp. 141-142. 59

Prior to the radicalization of Japanese politics by nationalist elements following the

Manchuria incident in 1931, the 'Washington Agreement' signed in 1922 between Japan,

China and the major western powers to guarantee the over-all stability of the greater Far

Eastern region was after all widely upheld by a more conciliatory Japanese government.

Akira Iriye, The Origins of the Second World War in Asia and the Pacific (London/New

York, 1987), pp. 2-4; Ian Nish, Japanese Foreign Policy 1869-1942 (London, 1977), pp.

133-42.; Keegan, Fateful Choices, pp. 138-139.

13

prospect for reconciling those in charge of its foreign policy to a non-violent

and peaceful amendment of the order they operated in.

That ultimately is the quintessential prerequisite for achieving long-

term peace and cooperation in international relations. The need for

institutions to provide states with practicable reasons to equate power and

national interest with the observance of international norms and universal

ideals,60

starting with the rationale that the latter's allure needs to form the

cornerstone upon which international institutions are built instead of merely

trusting them to develop that appeal in the process. It was precisely such

failure to endow 'Wilsonian ideals' with the practical capacities for

accomplishing a true international harmony of interests which ultimately

discredited them in the eyes of dissatisfied nations. The Allies were not

wrong to endorse these principles in the first place, and their advocacy alone

certainly didn't cause the breakdown of the international order. What did,

however, was their own inherent corruption as a result of the international

system's unwillingness to extend their benefits in equal measure to other

nations as well, so that they eventually even no longer came to be seen as

'ideals' at all.

'Wilsonian ideals' such as peace, cooperation and self-determination

can help to create a more stable and secure international environment.

Importantly, however, their successful implementation not only calls for

visionary thinking to enshrine these ideals in the operations of the

international system, but also for the unremitting resolve of an ‘unoppressive

ascendancy’ to see them vindicated through an exemplary conduct of its own

foreign affairs.61

The ability to forge such a link between power and morality, of

actively encouraging the idea that the pursuit of economic power through

institutional interaction rather than military aggression can indeed lead to

mutually beneficial gains, accounts in no small measure for why the post-

WWII world order envisioned by the United States ultimately proved of

such long-lasting permanency. In accordance with E.H. Carr's understanding

60

Andrew Linklater, 'The Transformation of Political Community: E.H. Carr, Critical

Theory and International Relations', Review of International Studies, Vol. 23:3 (Jul. 1997),

p. 332; E.H. Carr, The Future of Nations: Independence of Interdependence (London:

Macmillan, 1941), p. 55. 61

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 217.

14

that the best prospects for international conciliation lie along the lines of

economic reconstruction,62

American statesmen not merely sought to rebuild

a world likely to be perceived by other countries of serving but their own

national ends, but rather one which was equally capable of meeting the

latter's requirements as well. Instead of openly challenging them, ever more

nations now came to appreciate the structures and workings of the

international system,63

if only because they were offered ample opportunities

for achieving their own goals within it as well.64

In addition, initiatives such

as the Economic Recovery Programme (Marshall Plan) likewise

strengthened the belief that domestic survival and prosperity would

ultimately best be ensured by embracing international cooperation.65

However, economic re-construction does in itself arguably still not

go far enough in attempting to entrench 'Wilsonian ideals' more firmly in

international politics. If peace and cooperation are to thrive and mature on a

truly permanent basis, they require not only a redress of previous ills and

failures; far more importantly they essentially also demand a pre-emption of

the very same to begin with. In other words, not so much an economic re-

construction as basically an economic pre-construction.

That conception, in principle, lay at the heart of the European

integration process following WWII.66

Earlier plans for institutionalizing

inter-state cooperation in Europe had ultimately remained largely 'utopian' in

character precisely because they had failed to reconcile the seemingly ever

62

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, p. 218. 63

For instance, the UN provided international arbitration–however limited–for settling

territorial disputes; institutions such as the IMF offered financial relief to economically

hard-pressed countries; and the worldwide system of open markets not only gave countries

access to vital resources previously outside their immediate domestic reach, but also

enabled them to translate their economic power into substantial capital profits. Paul

Kennedy, The Parliament of Man: The Past, Present and Future of the United Nations

(New York: Random House, 2006); and Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, The Wise Men:

Six Friends and the World They Made (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986). 64

Following the tradition of the 'English School', one might say that the international

system gradually began to approach, though arguably not yet fully attain, a state in which

the maintenance of the rules and arrangements established among nations came to be

understood as a mutually shared objective. On the basic theories and assumptions of the

'English School' or 'Liberal Realism', see Hedley Bull, The Anarchical Society: A Study of

Order in World Politics (London: MacMillan, 1984); Hedley Bull and Adam Watson (eds.),

The Expansion of International Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984); Barry

Buzan, From international to world society? English school theory and the social structure

of globalisation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). 65

Tony Judt, Post-War. A History of Europe since 1945 (London: The Penguin Press, 2005),

pp. 89-99. 66

On European integration, see further Judt, Post-War, pp. 153-164; and Desmond Dinan,

Europe Recast: A History of European Union (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004).

15

elusive ideal of a true and perennial European peace with the more practical

and utilitarian considerations of individual state actors. By accordingly

meeting these more functional needs–notably territorial security, protection

from foreign aggression as well as the opportunity for increasing their

economic power by engaging in a fully integrated continental market

system–the ECSC and its successor organizations then substantially helped

to reduce tensions between former enemies not so much because adherence

to international arrangements was by default recognized as the most

conducive instrument for furthering national interests, but rather because

cooperation was in fact early on perceived as a powerful mechanism capable

of not only assisting states achieve their own objectives and thus establish a

truer international harmony of interests,67

but of likewise also providing

them with the necessary structures for guarding against the pernicious forces

(nationalism, international strife) and notoriously unstable conditions that

any non-integrated international system was otherwise likely to experience

in the absence of a higher governing authority.68

Ultimately, that process of political rapprochement thus not only

constituted a reaction to past failures and deficiencies in inter-state

relationships, but rather its underlying twin concept of economic re- and pre-

construction simultaneously also laid the foundations for an era of

unprecedented peace, prosperity and cooperation by seeking to eliminate at

the outset all those influences that frequently tempt state actors to pursue a

more selfish foreign policy. To a degree, such pre-emptive strategies were

thus by and large consistent with E.H. Carr's own proposals for regional

integration, for instance when he called upon Britain to help re-structure

international relations in Europe so as to avert another devastating

nationalist war.69

Regardless of the UK's eventual involvement in the

European integration process, it still more or less reflected his own

67

In that context, it should be remembered that Carr was not per se opposed to the idea of an

international harmony of interests. Importantly, however, it would first be necessary to

consciously create a new one reflective of the fundamentally changed political environment

of the 20th

century. Peter Wilson, 'The Myth of the First Great Debate', Review of

International Studies, Vol. 24 (Dec 1998), p. 13. 68

The extent to which that early cooperation would eventually expand into a continental

organization capable of influencing states' interests, loyalties and strategies could of course

not have been foreseen by its initiators. In a sense, it may be said to have been a positive

'spillover effect' of the very institutions they had helped to establish for the purpose of

cementing ties between individual nations. Robert Jervis, 'Realism, Neoliberalism and

Cooperation', p. 59. 69

Wilson, 'The Peculiar Realism of E.H. Carr', p. 133.

16

recommendations in terms of the basic structures and conditions required for

constructing a truly peaceful international order, notably political pluralism,

functional differentiation and economic interdependence.70

Finally, a similar approach for fostering international cooperation by

allowing for peaceful change to happen in a timely fashion also widely

informed the 'Clinton Doctrine' on democratic enlargement in the 1990s,71

at

whose heart stood the belief that expanding the scope of democracies and

free-market economies would best guarantee long-term international

stability.72

In so doing, it was, however, perfectly understood that democratic

systems could not merely be transplanted into a political vacuum from one

country to another, but rather that it necessitated the presence of specific

conditions in order for them to take hold and flourish in the first place.73

In

analogy to Carr, it was thus realised that the mere right to self-determination

would by itself not be able to achieve international peace and security.74

Accordingly, the 'Clinton Doctrine' basically aspired to create a

favourable international environment in which potentially destabilizing

forces–often the consequence of previous failures to integrate disfavoured

regions more durably into the international community by letting their

citizens benefit as well from the cherished ideals of freedom, liberty and

economic prosperity–would essentially not even be allowed to arise in the

70

More precisely, Carr demanded the establishment of a much broader and inclusive form of

political organization, characterized not only by a devolution of national powers, but above

all by a firm commitment to reduce socio-economic inequalities among nations. Carr, The

Future of Nations: Independence of Interdependence (London: Macmillan, 1941), p. 54;

Wilson, 'The Peculiar Realism of E.H. Carr', p. 135. 71

The principal tenets of the 'Clinton Doctrine' were repeatedly outlined in a number of

successive reports on American National Security Strategy. See in particular B. Clinton, A

National Security Strategy of Engagement and Enlargement (Washington D.C.: The White

House, February 1996), http://nssarchive.us/NSSR/1996.pdf [accessed 14 May 2013]; B.

Clinton, A National Security Strategy For a New Century (Washington D.C.: The White

House, December 1999), http://nssarchive.us/NSSR/2000.pdf [accessed 14 May 2013];

and B. Clinton, “Remarks by the President on Foreign Policy”, San Francisco, Feb. 26.

1999, https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/clintfps.htmD.C. [accessed 14 May 2013]. 72

In that context, emphasis was primarily placed on attempts for dealing with the underlying

grievances of distressed countries by actively encouraging regional integration and

establishing better trade relations with them. See National Security Advisor Anthony Lake,

“From Containment to Enlargement,” Sept. 21, 1993,

https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/lakedoc.html [accessed 14 May 2013]; and Douglas

Brinkley, ‘Democratic Enlargement: The Clinton Doctrine’, Foreign Policy, 106 (Spring

1997), pp. 120-121. 73

Above all economic prosperity, rule of law, judicial accountability, free and fair elections,

equal access to public resources and institutions, etc. Ronald Dahl, On Democracy

(Harrisonburg, Virginia: R.R. Donnelly, 1998), pp. 83-99. 74

Michael Cox, 'E.H. Carr and the Crisis of Twentieth-Century Liberalism', p. 527.

17

first place.75

After all, it were ultimately not only material dangers that might

threaten peace, but also forces of a less tangible, yet possibly just as

subversive and destructive order, notably in the form of aggressive

nationalism in a politically and economically unstable, recently disintegrated

former communist bloc in Eastern Europe.76

Following that premise,

Clinton's foreign policy consequently aimed to provide countries with

sufficient incentives to view the networks and institutions through which

they work as the most practicable means for satisfying their own national

interests and ambitions as well.77

In a sense, the over-all process of European integration thus

ultimately constituted the sort of political internationalism that E.H. Carr

believed to form an indispensable prerequisite for encouraging nation-states

to relinquish at least part of their sovereignty for determining affairs within

their own territories.78

By coupling national self-determination, in Carr's

view an inherently dangerous conception when operating on its own, to

economic interdependence and the expansion of the political community,

international integration did indeed not suddenly override national

affiliations, but it was certainly instrumental in ending the ''destructive phase

of nationalism.''79

The fact that efforts to further peace and international stability

through institutional cooperation couldn't prevent the breakdown of the

inter-war political order does not mean that these ideals are by definition ill-

suited for organizing international relations along less detrimental lines. As a

close reading of E.H. Carr will reveal, it was less the creation of

international institutions as such, but rather the way in which they were

75

Anthony Lake, Laying the Foundation for a Post-Cold War World. National Security in

the 21st

Century (Chicago, Illinois: Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, 24 May 1996),

http://www.fas.org/spp/starwars/offdocs/tl240596.htm [accessed 14 May 2013]. 76

Charles Krauthammer, ‘The Unipolar Moment’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 70:1 (‘America and

the World’ 90/91), pp. 32-33. 77

In the process, the United States granted Russia substantial credits to facilitate its

transition to a full-fledged capitalist democracy; led the way in expanding NATO; and,

through the latter's enlargement, also actively sought to assist Europe's newly free nations to

accomplish the overall objective of an even greater European integration. Brinkley,

‘Democratic Enlargement: The Clinton Doctrine’, pp. 122-125; Bill Clinton, My Life (New

York: Random House, 2004), pp. 780-786. On NATO enlargement, see in particular R.D.

Asmus, Opening NATO’s Door: How the Alliance Remade Itself for a New Era (New York:

Columbia University Press, 2002), pp. 20-29. 78

Linklater, 'E.H. Carr, Critical Theory and International Relations', p. 329. 79

E.H. Carr, Nationalism and After (London: Macmillan, 1945), pp. 56-59; 67.

18

misappropriated by powerful nations that he found fault with. If moral ideals

are separated from states' practical exigencies or believed of satisfying but

those of privileged nations, then their endorsement surely won't be able to

avoid inter-state conflict. The pivotal question is therefore not if institutions

can produce international peace and cooperation but rather how and by what

means they may do so. Hence, status quo powers should indeed not only

take into consideration other nations' well-being as well as Carr advised,80

but also seek to counteract pro-actively those forces that might readily

exploit a country's perceived international discrimination for turning it

directly against dominant powers themselves.

Attempts to only subsequently redress systemic injustices may after

all not only prove costly, but arguably even impossible when dealing with

regimes which by their very ideological nature favour offensive power

politics over mutual accommodation, so that not even a truly conciliatory

international environment might deter them from seeking recourse to war

and aggression. Consequently it is imperative for international structures to

affect political actors' preferences in such ways that they ultimately won't

contribute themselves to the rise of nationalistic or belligerent influences.

That is why the conditions of peaceful change need to be social and

economic before legal and political, sub-structural rather than only super-

structural.81

If moral ideals are capable of thus anticipating national

grievances instead of being judged to inhibit the pursuit of domestic interests,

they might indeed help to establish a less unidirectional harmony of interests

and thereby make inter-state relations less vulnerable to international strife

as Carr maintained.82

Failing such a quality at pre-emptive accommodation,

'Wilsonian ideals' alone arguably cannot protect the international community

from similar disasters as the one that brought the inter-war period to such an

abrupt end. It is only when their practical implementation lives up to the

very morality they profess that they may ultimately receive a more universal

and permanent standing in international relations as some specific historical

developments have shown.

80

Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis, pp. 219-220. 81

Peter Wilson, 'The Myth of the First Great Debate', pp. 12-13. 82

Notably in the later chapters of The Twenty Years' Crisis as well as in particular in

Conditions of Peace. E.H. Carr, Conditions of Peace (London: Macmillan, 1942).

19

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