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The Analysis of Regional International Politics: The Integration Versus the Empirical Systems Approach

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

Louis J. Cantori  and
Steven L. Spiegel
Louis J. Cantori
Affiliation:
Louis J. Cantori is a member of the Department of Political Science of theUniversity of Maryland, Baltimore County, and Steven L. Spiegel is in the Department of Political Science of the University of California, Los Angeles, Davis, for their criticisms and comments. Research support for the present project has been provided by the Academic Senate of the University of California, Los Angles.
Steven L. Spiegel
Affiliation:
Louis J. Cantori is a member of the Department of Political Science of theUniversity of Maryland, Baltimore County, and Steven L. Spiegel is in the Department of Political Science of the University of California, Los Angeles, Davis, for their criticisms and comments. Research support for the present project has been provided by the Academic Senate of the University of California, Los Angles.
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Extract

It is argued that the study of regional international politics is important (1) for empirical reasons having to do with the real world saliency of the region as a factor in international politics; (2) for theoretical reasons having to do with the subordinate system as being relatively neglected in scholarship with the exception of the integrationist approach; and (3) for policy reasons having to do with the importance of accurately understanding the dynamics of the region as part of the objective of stabilizing the international system. The dominant approach to regional international politics of the integrationists (neo–functionalists and transactionalists) is then discussed and criticized in terms of the two approaches' normative concerns, the nature of the model utilized, and the theoretical issues that are raised. A major conclusion is that the integrative model used is inappropriate as a vestige of the level of analysis problem, and such theoretical issues as the nature of the dependent variable remain unspecified. It is then argued that the authors' formulation of an empirical systems approach begins to meet these criticisms.

Type
Articles
Information
International Organization , Volume 27 , Issue 4 , Autumn 1973 , pp. 465 - 494
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1973

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References

1 For the works in which these points of view are developed, see: Mitrany, David, A Working Peace System (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1966);Google ScholarHaas, Ernst, Beyond the Nation–State (Palo Alto, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1964);Google ScholarFriedrich, Carl J., Trends in Federalism in Theory and Practice (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1968).Google Scholar Friedrich is one of the foremost expositors of the federalist position, but we do not deal with this approach in the present paper.

2 No attempt will be made here to cite works representative of these approaches. This will be done as they are discussed more extensively below.

3 This is a limitation recognized by Nye, Joseph, “Comparing Common Markets: A Revised Neo–Functionalist Model,” International Organization, Autumn 1970 (Vol. 24, No. 4), 835.CrossRefGoogle Scholar This special issue has been published in a separate volume as Regional Integration: Theory and Research, L. Lindberg and S. Scheingold (eds.), (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1970).Google Scholar Subsequent page references will be made to the special issue of International Organization.

4 For a recent and representative collection of these writers’ statements, see the volume cited in the preceding footnote.

5 Haas, , “The Study of Regional Integration,” in Lindberg, and Scheingold, , Regional Integration, pp. 645–6.Google Scholar

6 A prime and influential instance of this teaching is Jacob, Philip E. and Toscano, James (eds.), The Integration of Political Communities (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1964), p. 9.Google Scholar Jean Barrea has felt impelled to create the special term “external political integration” in order to better deal with “local, regional, continental, or even universal processes of political integration.” See “The Counter–core Role of Middle Powers in Processes of External Political Integration,” World Politics, 01 1973 (Vol. 25), 274, f.n.l.Google Scholar Although his discussion of counter–core middle powers is suggestive, it is somewhat illustrative of the point being made here that while footnoting the works of international integrationists such as Etzioni, Deutsch, Haas et al., his illustrative case study material is drawn from Canadian, Australian, South African and German efforts at national integration.

Etzioni, Amitai, Political Unification (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965),Google Scholar and Fred M. Hayward, “Continuities and Discontinuities between Studies of National and International Political Integration: Some Implications for Future Research Efforts,” in Lindberg and Scheingold, pp. 917–941, have been among the neo–functionalists the most explicit in collapsing the distinction between national and international integration.

Ironically enough, it is Haas himself who is more oriented towards the systems literature and less attracted to a model of the nation state than many others following his approach. See, for example, Beyond the Nation–State, pp. 51–85. For further examples of the commitment to the integrative nation state model, see the earlier position of Haas, in The Uniting of Europe (Palo Alto, Calif: Stanford University Press, 1958), p. 16,Google Scholar and Lindberg, “Political Integration as a Multidimensional Phenomenon Requiring Multi–Variate Measurement” in the volume edited by him and Scheingold, pp. 649–731, and Philippe Schmitter, “A Revised Theory of Regional Integration” in ibid., p. 837.

The remainder of the neo–functionalists are not as explicit regarding the nation state outcome of their integrative model. Instead they tend to focus upon the process of integration which leads ineluctably to the nation state as a final product. A major point to be noted here, however, is that this discussion bears directly on the one immediately following below, namely the undefined nature of the dependent variable in the neo–functional approach.

7 Weiner, Myron, “Political Integration and Political Development,” in Political Modernization, Welch, C. (ed.), (Belmont, Calif: Wadsworth Publishing Co., Inc., 1967), pp. 156–7.Google Scholar Reprinted from The Annals, March 1965 (CCCLVIII), 52–64. This idea of the prior existence of the state is also implied by Huntington when he examines the relationship between institutionalization (the creation of the structure of the state) and political participation. Huntington, Samuel, Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, 1969),Google Scholar passim. See also Huntington, Samuel, “The Change to Change,” Comparative Politics, 04 1971 (Vol. 3), 283–322,CrossRefGoogle Scholar for trenchant criticisms of the political development literature and an updating of Huntington's own position.

8 Nye and Koehane have a different conception of the level of analysis problem and have provided a definition of world politics which takes account of transnational and transgovernmental interaction. They argue that “any unit of action that attempts to exercise influence across state boundaries and possesses significant resources in a given issue area is an actor in world politics.” Koehane, Robert O. and Nye, Joseph S. Jr., Transnational Relations and World Politics (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972), p. 383.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also ibid., p. XXIV and p. 380. Though the view presented here stresses the role of the state more centrally than do Koehane and Nye, the influence and activity of transnational actors is nonetheless recognized as a part of the dynamics of world politics.

9 The reference to the level of analysis problem is, of course, to Singer, J. David, “The Level–of–Analysis Problem in International Relations,” World Politics, 10 1961 (Vol. 14), 77–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

For an attempt to argue a contrary view, i.e., that separate models are not necessary for the study of national and international politics, see A. Wayne Penn, “Toward a New Generation of Systems Models in Political Science,” Polity, Spring 1972 (Vol. 4), 272–300.Google Scholar Penn's attempt to establish the utility of monocentric and polycentric models appropriate to both national and international political phenomena remains unpersuasive. For example, he argues that the monocentric model is appropriate to international behavior (as well as more “naturally” to national behavior) because of recent research on the phenomenon of regional integration. The argument of the present paper is such as to call into question the accuracy of such a characterization and, therefore, the appropriateness of a monocentric model for understanding internaitonal behavior.

Further evidence of the awareness of this manifestation of the level of analysis problem, although in reference to systems rathes than neo-functional theory, is to be found in Nicholson, M.B. and Reynolds, P.A., “General systems, The International System, and The Eastonian Analysis,” Political Studies, 02 1967 (vol. 15), 12–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The authors argue that Eastonian analysis is appropriate for ths nation state and not the internaitonal system. Their argument appears to question the direct use o Easton's formulation by LIndberg in Scheingold, pp. 649–731, in the effort to apply a systems theoretical approach to integration.

For an empirical case in point which argues that precisely because Chinese central goverment autority had declined so drastically in the period 1916–1928, therefore an internaitonal relations theoretical approach is apropriate to the understandign of the politics of the period, see Chi, Hsi-sheng, “The Chinese Warlord System as an International System,” in Kaplan, M. (ed), New Approaches To International Relations (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1968), 405–425.Google Scholar

10 For example, “it must be stressed that the study of regional integration is unique and discrete from all previous systematic studies of political unification because it limits itself to noncoercive efforts” (underscoring in the original). Haas in Lindberg and Scheingold, pp. 607–8.

11 This is a point discussed more fully by Haas, in Beyond the Nation State, pp. 8–10.Google Scholar But see also his “The Study of Regional Integration,” in Lindberg and Scheingold, p. 628.

The neo–functionalists tend to share this pluralistic assumption, which ranges from being implicit in most of the theorists to being explicit as just noted in the case of Haas. On this characteristic as a general political science issue, see Connally, William (ed.), The Bias of Pluralism (New York: Atherton Press, 1969).Google Scholar

12 Nye, , “Comparing Common Markets,” in Lindberg and Scheingold, p. 835.Google Scholar

13 Haas, , “The Study of Regional Integration,” in Lindberg and Scheingold, p. 631.Google Scholar

14 . Ibid., p. 635.

15 ibid., p. 636.

16 ibid., p. 634.

17 ibid., p. 637.

18 ibid., p. 617.

19 ibid., p. 627.

20 Schmitter, , “A Revised Theory of Regional Integration,” in Lindberg and Scheingold, pp. 840–1.Google Scholar Italics provided.

21 This is more than confirmed by the fact that subsequently Schmitter fails to relate the “dependent variable” as described here to the elaboration of his revised theory. The theory is replete with reference to “strategies” and “cycles,” i.e., processes, but the dependent variable goes unexamined.

22 Nye, , “Comparing Common Markets,” in Lindberg, and Scheingold, , pp. 798–9.Google Scholar Italics provided. The inapplicability of the West European inspired model is even a more central concern of Hansen, Roger, “Regional Integration: Reflections on a Decade of Theoretical Efforts,” World Politics, 01 1969 (Vol. 21), 257–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

23 Spiro, Herbert (ed.), The Primacy of Politics (New York: Random House, 1966).Google Scholar

The concept of politics which lies behind these comments is one which stresses the ultimate dependence of domestic and international interactions on relations of power and authority. What is important here, however, is the conceptual nature of the problem. In focusing upon independent variables which tend to be divorced from power and authority, the neo–functionalists are repeating what has come to be identified as a major conceptual problem for the political science discipline as a whole. This conceptual problem is seen as the general failure on the part of scholars to attribute independent variable status to political factors. Instead, politics is often taken to be the dependent variable to be explained by social, psychological, and economic variables. For discussion of the problem, see the volume edited by Lipset, Seymour Martin, Politics and the Social Sciences (London: Oxford University Press, 1969),Google Scholar especially Lipset's, introduction and the contribution of Giovanni Sartori, “From the Sociology of Politics to Political Sociology,” pp. 65–100.Google Scholar See also Rustow, Dankwart, “Modernization and Comparative Politics,” Comparative Politics, 10 1968 (Vol. 1), 37–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24 Schmitter, , “A Revised Theory of Regional Integration,” in Lindberg, and Scheingold, , p. 841.Google Scholar

25 . The failure of the neo–functionalists to do this is the subject of an article by Kaiser, Karl, “The Interaction of Regional Subsystems,” World Politics, 10 1968 (Vol. 21), 84–107.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

26 Etzioni, Amitai, Political Unification (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965), pp. 70–71Google Scholar and Nye, Joseph, “Patterns and Catalysts in Regional Integration,” International Organization, Autumn 1965 (Vol. 19, No. 4), 870–84,CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Nye, , Peace in Parts: Integration and Conflict in Regional Organization (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1971), chapter 3.Google Scholar

27 The external threat proposition is found in Etzioni, pp. 70–71 and the “catalyst” function is found in Nye, “Patterns and Catalysts.” Nye's recognition of the possible negative role of external powers is in Nye, , “Comparing Common Markets,” in Lindberg, and Scheingold, , p. 811.Google Scholar

28 For the standard statements of this position, see Deutsch, Karl W., Nationalism and Social Communication (Cambridge, Mass: The MIT Press, 1966);Google ScholarDeutsch, et al. , Political Community and The North Atlantic Area (Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1957),Google Scholar and The Integration of Political Communities, Philip E. Jacob and James V. Toscano (eds.), (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1964).Google Scholar

29 It could be suggested that Karl Deutsch's concept of the covariance of rewards (i.e., that equal trade–offs take place) contains the provision for negative consequences as well. This might indeed be the case where Deutsch is dealing explicitly with assimilation as part of the process of national integration. The relevant citations appear to be Nationalism and Social Communication, pp. 158–59, and Nerves of Government (New York: Free Press, 1966), pp. 226–28.Google Scholar Where he deals more explicitly with transactional analysis in reference to international relations, however, the negative or conflictual element is present there only logically and implicitly. See especially Deutsch, Karl and Singer, J. David, “Multipolar Power Systems and International Stability,” World Politics, 04 1964 (Vol. 16), 395–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

30 Donald Puchala, a transactionalist strongly influenced by the neo–functionalists, stresses the terminal state of amalgamation more strongly than Deutsch. See “The Pattern of Contemporary Regional Integration,” International Studies Quarterly, 03 1968 (Vol. 12), pp. 38–64.Google Scholar

31 Deutsch, et al. , “Political Community and The North Atlantic Area,” in International Political Communities (New York: Doubleday, 1966), pp. 44–48.Google Scholar

32 See, however, Deutsch, , Nationalism and Its Alternatives (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1969), chapter 4.Google Scholar

33 “What really makes a boundary is a sharp drop in the frequency of some relevant transaction flow.” Ibid., p. 97.

34 Russell, Bruce, International Regions and the International System (Chicago: Rand McNally & Co., 1967).Google Scholar

35 Haas, Ernst, “The Challenge of Regionalism,” in Hoffman, Stanley, Contemporary Theory in International Relations (Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice–Hall, 1960), p. 228.Google Scholar For an analysis of the different time perspectives of the neo–functionalist and transactionalist approaches, see Katzenstein, Peter J., “Hare and Tortoise: The Race toward Integration,” International Organization, Spring 1971 (Vol. 25, No. 2), pp. 290–295.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

36 Nye, J. S., Peace in Parts (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1971), pp. 32–33.Google Scholar

37 Etzioni, Amitai, Political Unification (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965), p. 312.Google Scholar

38 Deutsch, et al. , “Political Community and The North Atlantic Area,” in International Political Communities, p. 25.Google Scholar

39 Donald, Puchala, “International Transactions and Regional Integration,” in Lindberg, and Scheingold, , p. 762.Google Scholar

40 Waltz, Kenneth N., “Conflict in World Politics,” in Spiegel, Steven L. and Waltz, Kenneth N., Conflict in World Politics (Cambridge, Mass: Winthrop Publishers, Inc., 1971), pp. 473–4.Google Scholar Although not specifically regionally oriented, this article represents an intriguing example of the type of systems analysis which is possible under this approach. For an intellectualization of the isolationist position, see Tucker, Robert, The New Isolationism (New York: Universe Books, 1972).Google Scholar

41 Deutsch, et al. , Political Community and the North Atlantic Area. Etzioni questions their assumption that pluralistic security communities are more stable than amalgamated communities (pp. 300ff.).Google Scholar

42 Haas, Ernst, “Reflections on the Joy and Anguish of Pretheorizing,” in Lindberg and Scheingold, pp. 645–646.Google Scholar

43 Leff, Nathaniel H., “Bengal, Biafra, and the Bigness Bias,” Foreign Policy, Summer 1971 (Vol. 1), p. 131.Google Scholar

44 ibid., pp. 135–139.

45 For prominent discussions of the meaning of the balance of power, see Inis Claude. Power and International Relations (New York: Random House, 1962);Google Scholar Martin Wight, “Balance of Power,” and Butterfield, Herbert, “Balance of Power,” in Wight, and Butterfield, (eds.), Diplomatic Investigations (London: Allen and Unwin, 1966);Google Scholar and Haas, Ernst, “The Balance of Power: Prescription, Concept, or Propaganda,” in Rosenau, James N. (ed.), International Politics and Foreign Policy, first ed. (Glencoe, Ill: Free Press, 1961), pp. 318–329.Google Scholar Kaplan, of course, uses the term to apply to a specific model; we are using it synonymously with the structure of relations of any region.

46 . This approach can be seen as intermediary between conventional systems analyses of international politics and historical sociology as it has evolved in the writings of Raymond Aron and Stanley Hoffmann. See especially Aron, , Peace and War, translated by Howard, Richard and Fox, Annette Baker, (New York: Doubleday and Company, 1966).Google Scholar

47 Kaplan, Morton, System and Process in International Politics (New York: John Wiley, 1957).Google Scholar

48 Kaplan himself recognizes this difference in perspective by referring to what he calls “parameter oriented” systems: Kaplan, Morton, “International Systems” in International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, Sills, David L. (ed.), (New York: The Macmillan Company and The Free Press, 1968), Vol. 15, p. 482ff.Google Scholar His main criticism appears to be that this orientation is not made explicit by the scholars concerned. We have conceded this to a degree, and of course argue in the present paper that we are not asking this explicitly. In fact, Kaplan's conclusion to the article just cited is that in the process of making historical empirical applications of systems concepts, the variables included in the theory should probably be related to other important variables affecting state behavior (p. 485). This is the substance of our argument regarding the empirical systems approach, although we are concerned with the subordinate rather than the dominant or international system.

Singer's systematic formulation is more empirical than that of the conventional systems theorists, but he too assigns independent variable status to the system. See Singer, J. David, General Systems Taxonomy for Political Science (New York: General Learning Corporation, 1971),Google Scholar and Singer, , “The Global System and Its Subsystems: A Developmental View,” in Rosenau, James (ed.), Linkage Politics (New York: Free Press, 1969), pp. 21–43.Google Scholar

The present authors were stimulated in their thinking regarding this question by remarks made in the Berkeley Colloquium on regionalism and by a reading of the unpublished paper by Lustick, Ian, “Toward A Useful Concept of Subsystem in International Politics,” a University of California, Berkeley, Department of Political Science master's essay.Google Scholar

49 Such a focus upon intervening variables in order to understand systemic outcomes resembles that of Rosecrance, Richard in Action and Reaction in World Politics (Boston: Little, Brown, 1963)Google Scholar in his effort to apply system concepts historically. Rosecrance's analysis can be said to be “vertical” in time, whereas the present authors’ efforts are “horizontal.”

50 A slightly more abstract way to put the case is in terms of Easton's distinction between empirical and symbolic or theoretical systems in systems theory construction (Easton, David, A Framework for Political Analysis [Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice Hall, 1965], p. 26).Google Scholar The empirical systems analyst's points of departure are, in the case of the present authors' formulation, cohesion, communication, and power, which are utilized to explain the structure of relations of the region. Cantori, Louis J., and Spiegel, Steven L., The International Politics of Regions: A Comparative Approach (Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice–Hall, 1970), pp. 10–20.Google Scholar

51 The elaboration of the structure of relations variables is found in Cantori and Spiegel, pp. 17–20.

52 Brecher, Michael, The New States of Asia (London: Oxford University Press, 1963),Google Scholar chapter VI entitled, “The New States in World Politics,” pp. 153–191, especially pp. 155–161, and Cantori and Spiegel, pp. 25–37.

53 See Young, Oran R., “Political Discontinuities in The International System,” World Politics, 04 1968 (Vol. 20), pp. 369–392,CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Domingues, Jorge I., “Mice That Do Not Roar: Some Aspects of International Politics in the World's Peripheries,” International Organization, Spring 1971 (Vol. 25, No. 2), pp. 175–209.Google Scholar In the latter, regions are somewhat more carefully delineated.

54 Binder, Leonard, “The Middle East Subordinate International System,” World Politics, 04 1958 (Vol. 10), pp. 408–429,CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Zartman, I. W., “Africa as a Subordinate State System in International Relations,” International Organization, Summer 1967 (Vol. 21, No. 3), pp. 545–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

55 See Brecher, Michael, “International Relations and Asian Studies: The Subordinate State System of Asia,” World Politics, 01 1963 (Vol. 15), pp. 213–35,CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Bowman, Larry W., “The Subordinate State System of Southern Africa,” International Studies Quarterly, 09 1968 (Vol. 12), pp. 231–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

56 Haas, Michael, “International Subsystems: Stability and Polarity,” The American Political Science Review, 03 1970 (Vol. 64), pp. 369–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

57 Cantori, Louis J. and Spiegel, Steven L., The International Politics of Regions (Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice–Hall, 1970).Google Scholar

58 See the review of the regional literature by Banks, Michael, “Systems Analysis and the Study of Regions,” International Studies Quarterly, 12 1969 (Vol. 13), pp. 335–360.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

59 For a similar effort at formulating propositions in another context, see Cobb, Roger and Elder, Charles, International Community: A Regional and Global Study (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970), passim.Google Scholar

60 See Nye and Koehane, Transnational Relations and World Politics. For an earlier example of this interconnection, see our treatment of the communications pattern variable and the intrusive system. In the latter case, for example, we have dealt with the multinational corporation as one of nine modes of participation of external powers in the international relations of a region. Cantori, and Spiegel, , The International Politics of Regions, p. 13 and pp. 27–8, respectively.Google Scholar

The transnational relations approach represents an interesting and consistent progression in the thinking of at least one of its co–authors in the case of Nye. The approach is rich and suggestive, but the tendency to deny the centrality of the nation state on the part of the neo–functionalists is still present, except now rather than the nation state diminishing in the process of regional integration, it is seen as becoming supplemented by, and fragmented into, transnational governmental and non–governmental aspects. (Nye, and Koehane, , Transnational Relations and World Politics, p. 383).Google Scholar

61 See, for example, Allison, Graham, Essence of Decision (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1971);Google ScholarHalperin, Morton H., “The Decision to Deploy the ABM: Bureaucratic Politics in the Johnson Administration,” World Politics, 10 1972 (Vol. 25), pp. 62–95;CrossRefGoogle ScholarAllison, Graham T. and Halperin, Morton H., “Bureaucratic Politics: A Paradigm and Some Policy Implications,” World Politics, 1972 Supplement, pp. 40–79;Google Scholar and Neustadt, Richard E., Alliance Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970).Google Scholar

62 For example, there is the quotation of President Johnson: “In many areas, the keys to economic and social development lie largely in the settling of old quarrels and the building of regional solidarity. Regional cooperation is often the best means of economic progress as well as the best guarantor of political independence.” “Message from President Johnson to the Congress” (February 1, 1966), Department of State Bulletin, LIV (February 28, 1966), p. 323.

While Nixon foreign aid policy has retreated, to a degree, from the warmth of the Johnson embrace of regionally focused aid, it nonetheless remains important. For example, see the speech of Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs David Newsome on January 22, 1972, where extensive remarks are made regarding regionally focused aid in Africa: “Aid to Africa—A Moral and Economic Necessity,” Department of State Bulletin, LXVI (02 14, 1972), pp. 203–204.Google Scholar

63 For two recent analyses which attempt to examine the alternatives in West Europe's future, see the report of the Institute for War and Peace Studies, Columbia University, for the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, “Arms Control and European Security in the 1970's,” and Buchan, Alastair Francis, Europe's Futures, Europe's Choices: Models of Western Europe in the 1970's (New York: Columbia University Press for the Institute for Strategic Studies, London, 1969).Google Scholar