The Culture of National Security 0th Edition

by Peter Katzenstein (Editor)

4 ratings

ISBN-13: 978-0231104692

ISBN-10: 0231104693

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Contributors ask whether it is more useful to conceive of the world as arrayed in regional, cultural, institutional complexes or organized along the conventional dimensions of power, alliance, and geography. They argue that perspectives that neglect the roles of culture and identity are no longer adequate to explain the complexities of a world undergoing rapid change.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Beyond the substantive contributions of the individual authors and the extensive debate about the nature and the advantages and disadvantages of fully integrating ideational scholarship into the study of world politics,The Culture of National Security should interest comparativists as a broad and ambitious attempt to apply the insights and tools of sociological and constructivist scholarship to the analysis of concrete political questions.... -- Sheri Berman, Comparative Politics

Historians, policy-makers and analysts of contemporary affairs will find much food for thought here. -- James Jay Carafano, Georgetown University, H-Net Reviews

About the Author

Peter J. Katzenstein is the Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. Professor of International Studies at Cornell University.

Series: New Directions in World Politics
Paperback: 560 pages
Publisher: Columbia University Press (April 15, 1996)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0231104693
ISBN-13: 978-0231104692
Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.4 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Customer Reviews: 4 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #425,006 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #537 in Political History (Books)
- #188 in Military Sciences
- #421 in Political Freedom (Books)

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Doggo

Five Stars

June 9, 2018

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

a must

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Not for the Casual National Security Reader

February 21, 2009

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

My professor chose this book for our Democracy & National Security class. First, I am not a poly-sci major or public policy major so take my words as you wish. This book is dedicated to "the graduate students at Cornell"! By not for the casual ... reader, I mean that unless you know a considerable about world political history (WWII-Early 90s) you will probably not understand what the author(s) are talking about. Many examples given to enhance comprehension involve past international relations action so surely if you don't know that either the example won't help you much.

Please note my review is not to attack the author or the book, it seems like it would be interesting if: 1) I was interested in international relations/foreign policy and 2) If I possessed a working knowledge of previous political incidents (major and minor). You can believe I will be selling this book back, nearly in mint condition; I will have no use for it.

Hope that helped, but if it didn't, "sorry for wasting your time."

Kevin

5 people found this helpful

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Don't Read Much Fiction

A collection of some of the best thinkers on culture in practice

March 27, 2017

Format: Paperback

Editor and renowned author Peter Katzenstein brings together some of the biggest names in constructivist theory in a readable but at times intensely academic study of national security. The host of multilateral, cooperation-focused thinkers, leaders and practitioners have produced a powerful challenge to the assumptions that influence world politics.

The book takes the pillars of international relations (IR) and questions the conventional realist, structuralist and liberal variants. Power, self-interest and competing pride would appear to be the tutor of global politics. But what is often forgotten are the exceptions. Why the exceptions to realist military formation? What are the motives to purely humanitarian interventions?

"The Culture of National Security" describes a world where national interests are constructed through social interaction; institutions evolve through perceptions of behavior; variations in state identity directly influence security interests; military hardware is as much symbolic in nature as it is kinetically effective; budgets balance prestige value; security taboos suggest ethical norms; and finally where "cultural realism saves structural realism the embarrassment of being empirically wrong about how states "think" but in doing so suggests that structures cannot cause realpolitik behavior (pg. 264)."

What prevents warring armies from using chemical weapons when it would have been strategically and tactically advantageous to do so? Taboos and Just War concepts, while perhaps different from one historical era to another and one cultural region to another, have consistently influenced the strategies of nations.

Considering my own long-time efforts working closely with over 20 African partner militaries, 12 European partners and filling a one year military exchange in a South East Asian partner's military staff college, the constructivist potential explained in the book to global military exchanges is insightful. Military exchanges are both a symbolic tool of partnership and tools of state-formation (pgs 112-113).

In opposition to one of the book's suggestions, humanitarian interaction does not always belie realism. Its scope is limited by capacity and often determined by the giver and recipient's cultural identity. Even if purely humanitarian motives might possibly influence a would-be competitor to shift its previously aggressive stance, "cultural allies" still interact more often humanitarian-wise than cultural dissidents. Organizations sharing linguistic backgrounds and other economic and cultural similarities are easily identified in donor-recipient agendas.

The editor, Peter J. Katzenstein, takes seriously the warning against selective cultural vignettes in support of IR theory. But the contributing authors also realize that the theories contributing to balance of power & threat emphasize historical lessons drawn from United States, Russia, Japan, China, Germany, World War alliances, post-war security structures and Middle East politics. While re-analyzing the world powers to suggest cultural and individual influences to national interest and strategy, the rest of the world is tacitly treated as collateral to the very "power" schemes that the book attempts to correct.

Historical events have a way of entrenching identity shere shifting to a world system more reflective of contemporary power centers would be painful, as Alexander Wendt admits. The United Nations still operates by post-WWII criteria and a contemporary NATO influenced by the 1956 Suez crisis. As David Levy once argued, we attach greater worth to heirlooms of power and identity than to bargaining chips only recently obtained or merely part of a future promise. Change is difficult; especially when it transforms the identity of a global system.

What explains Germany and Japan's post-WWII security stance, other than the "shock" of war? Is it possible that with a lack of a military outlet for security posture, national security culture compensates in other areas easily measured, like economic power; and areas less tangible, like national pride and cultural exclusivity?

The Arab League is considered by many to be the least effective of the regional communities yet still heavily influenced by identity. Which identity (between Arab, Islam, kingdom, "oildom", Mediterranean, Shi'a, Sunni, Wahhabi, etc) and when is the key to digesting the strengths and weaknesses of Stephen Walt's very thoughtful "balance of threat" theory based on a close analysis Arab state alliances. Even while the Arab League transformed to recognize state sovereignty and the right for each state to define its own threat, this realist "victory" is tapered by a better understanding of the region's many identities.

Pressures of identity partly explain why Middle East leaders make contradictory public and private statements; now more-so under the unceasing scrutiny of social media. Regional threats and evolving organizational identities also explain why for some states Muslim Brotherhood affiliates are banned as terrorists (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, UAE), and yet in others are a core of government power (Turkey, Tunisia, Morocco).

Peter Katsenstein finishes with a wonderful final chapter. He is able to show deep respect for differing viewpoints and at the same time humility towards the book's own conclusions yet to be fully formed. How are norms formed? When does an action become a norm and to what extent must it be violated in order to surrender its "norm" status. What constitutes a "shock" that has power to accelerate a usually sluggish cultural shift? Competing IR theories argue for competing norms. Which ones will rise to the podium, and how long will they last... and why?

The world of realpolitik has Henry Kissinger to bat for its theories in practice. While the "Culture of National Security" is an excellent study of history and suggestions for practice, it is not a grand strategy (for that, try Paul D. Miller). But I get the distinct impression that constructivist club membership requires more than a sprinkling of culture and identity in one's theory or grand strategy. As Katsenstein explains, Henry Nau is a realist who has added the culture factor; Joseph Nye a liberal with a dose of identity analysis. If nothing else, there is much to be shared between schools and strategies.

Sources of blunt power and influence, if still an influential domain of realist thought, are no less important than cultural sources of national pride and linguistic heritage. It just so happens that Hobbes' brutish pride needs both a realist and constructivist perspective to fully capture the human potential to both nastiness and cooperation.

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Daria I. Novak

Worth Reading for Policy Makers and Academics

August 11, 2006

Format: Paperback

I am assigning this book as required reading in my Culture and National Security class. Every page has something of value. It should be read cover-to-cover by undergrad, grad students and professors. If our policy makers in Washington absorbed the information contained in this volume they would have a much better understanding of why our policy goals often fail in other parts of the world. Katzenstein fulfills a critical need by helping us to better understand the impact of culture on national security. The book will make both academicians and policy makers stop, think and re-evaluate how they analyze the world today.

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The Culture of National Security 0th Edition