TWENTIETH-CENTURY REALISM

Abstract

The preceding chapter explored the roots of the realist tradition. This chapter looks at the work of twentieth-century realists who typically have seen themselves as participants in a common theoretical enterprise that reaches back at least to Machiavelli (Carr 1946, 63–64; Meinecke 1957) or Thucydides (Morgenthau 1946, 42; Gilpin 1986, 304). Realists such as E. H. Carr and Hans Morgenthau played central roles in establishing international relations as an academic discipline in Britain and the United States. In recent years realism has reestablished its predominance in the academic study of international relations. Realist arguments also remain prevalent in contemporary policy debates. All of this, as well as the continuing relevance of the realist challenge to morality in foreign policy, makes these writers an essential subject for this volume.