5. Strategic Culture

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey S. Lantis ◽  
Darryl Howlett
Keyword(s):  
Security Policy ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Weapons Of Mass Destruction ◽  
Strategic Culture ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Theoretical Issues

This chapter examines the scholarly and policymaking relevance of strategic culture in the contemporary world. Strategic culture may challenge and at the same time enrich prevailing neo-realist assumptions regarding strategy and security. It bridges material and ideational explanations of state behaviour, adding valuable perspectives to understand different countries' contemporary security policy choices. The chapter first considers approaches that address the relationship between culture and nuclear strategy during the cold war before discussing theoretical issues related to strategic culture, including the contribution of constructivism to security studies; the question of ‘ownership’ of strategic culture; and whether non-state, state, and multi-state actors can possess distinctive strategic cultures. It also reviews recent work that explores the link between strategic culture and the acquisition of and threats to use weapons of mass destruction.

6. Strategic Culture

2018 ◽  
pp. 89-107
Author(s):  
Jeffrey S. Lantis ◽  
Darryl Howlett
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
International Security ◽  
Weapons Of Mass Destruction ◽  
Strategic Culture ◽  
Mass Destruction ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Theoretical Issues

This chapter discusses the ways that strategic culture can be relevant to scholarship and policymaking with regard to international security. It first provides an overview of three main approaches to the study of culture and strategy, paying attention to political culture as well as the relationship between strategic culture and nuclear deterrence. It then examines various sources of strategic culture identified in the literature, along with theoretical issues related to strategic culture. In particular, it explores the link between constructivism and strategic culture, the question of continuity in state behaviour and how strategic cultural dilemmas can cause changes in security policy, and the ‘keepers’ of strategic culture. The chapter also asks whether non-state, state, and multistate actors can possess distinctive strategic cultures before concluding with an analysis of the role of strategic culture in the acquisition of — and threats to use — weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).

Introduction: Strategy in the Contemporary World:

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Baylis ◽  
James J. Wirtz
Keyword(s):  
Computer Systems ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Military Power ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
Revolution In Military Affairs ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Strategic Studies

This edition explores the role of military power in the contemporary world and the changes that have occurred over the last decade. It examines the debates about whether there has been a revolution in military affairs and the future of warfare, given the phenomenal pace of innovation in electronics and computer systems, which is often referred to as cyberwar. It also considers the strategic implications of the changing structure of global politics and the role of U.S. military power in a world in transition, along with the continuing relevance of various theories of peace and security. This introduction discusses strategic studies, criticisms levelled against strategic studies, and the relationship between strategic studies and security studies.

What Happened to Soviet Security Studies?: An Essay on the State of the Field

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 196-210
Author(s):  
Brian D. Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
North America ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Security Issues ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Weapons Procurement ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Expert Community

Security issues were a central part of Soviet studies. This article considers how the study of security issues has changed with respect to Russia and Eurasia since the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. It highlights a series of positive changes: a broadening of vision beyond Moscow, more engagement with mainstream social science, greater attention to security issues internal to post-Soviet states, and the creation of an expert community that spans North America, Europe, and Eurasia. At the same time, I argue that scholarship on Russian and Eurasian security issues has become less strategic, in the sense this word is used by Richard Betts – about the interaction of political ends and military means, rooted in an appreciation of military science. The academy, especially in North America, has become a less welcoming place for scholars working on Russia and Eurasia who care about previously central issues in the field such as nuclear strategy, weapons procurement, military doctrine, and defense planning.

Through a Missile Tube Darkly: ‘New Thinking’ about Nuclear Strategy

1993 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 661-671 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin S. Gray
Keyword(s):  
National Security ◽  
International System ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Strategic Culture ◽  
Global Security ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
New Thinking ◽  
The Relationship

Just as the ideas of arms control comprise a picnic basket for sunny international weather, so much of the allegedly ‘new thinking‘ on strategy and security claims to have ‘matched us with His hour’.1 The challenge, purportedly is between realist and ‘transformationist‘ approaches to security,2 between national security and common (or global) security,3 and – of course – between old and new thinking. We are told that ‘[t]here is scope to change the strategic culture of world politics’.4 Some of us old thinkers are a little puzzled by the content of a quotation such as that, since the same authors have written breezily and optimistically, albeit contingently, to be fair, that ‘[t]he “nature” of the [international] system would be changed because of the changed conceptions – strategic cultures – of the units‘.5 The relationship between strategic culture and cultures would stand some careful discussion, while the merit in the claim that there is scope to change ‘the strategic culture of world politics’, whatever that very big idea may mean, remains to be seen.6

CHANGES IN FRANCE’S STRATEGIC CULTURE AFTER THE COLD WAR

2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (32) ◽  
pp. 273-292
Author(s):  
Stanisław Zarobny
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
International Security ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Strategic Culture ◽  
Social Authority ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Global Relations

The author of the article attempted to examine the main conditions and characteristics of the French strategic culture, a country with huge arms traditions and the high social authority of the armed forces in society. All this means that France has made a huge contribution to the development of theory and practice in the field of military art and strategy, as well as in shaping the order of international security. The main strategic documents of France and its activity in the international arena confirm the traditional line of French security policy and strategic culture. It is a political culture of a superpower conscious of its great past which still radiates into current and global relations of France.

1. Introduction: Strategy in the Contemporary World

2018 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
John Baylis ◽  
James J. Wirtz
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Weapons Of Mass Destruction ◽  
Irregular Warfare ◽  
Future Prospects ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Causes Of War ◽  
Strategic Studies

This book examines strategy in the contemporary world. Part I considers the enduring issues that animate the study of strategy and tackles topics ranging from the causes of war to questions about culture, morality, and war. Part II deals with issues that fuel strategic debates, with chapters on terrorism and irregular warfare, nuclear weapons, arms control, weapons of mass destruction, conventional military power, peacekeeping and humanitarian intervention, and cyberwar. Part III discusses critical and non-Western approaches to the study of strategy and security that have emerged in recent years and concludes by reflecting on future prospects for strategic studies. This introduction provides an overview of strategic studies, criticisms that are made of strategic studies, and how strategic studies relates to security studies.

The Politicisation of Security: Controversy, Mobilisation, Arena Shifting.

2019 ◽  
pp. 3-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonas Hagmann ◽  
Hendrik Hegemann ◽  
Andrew W. Neal
Keyword(s):  
Security Policy ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Special Kind ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Political Activity ◽  
Security Strategy ◽  
The Relationship

While security has always been political, it has for the most part been considered a special kind of politics that closes down political activity and debate. This introduction reviews recent theoretical and empirical developments to argue that a research agenda that re-engages security through the prism of politicisation is better able to elucidate the growing range of actors, arenas and arguments visible in contemporary security governance. Based on recent literatures from Political Science and European Studies that – so far – have been largely ignored by Security Studies, it develops an analytical framework around three dimensions: controversy, mobilisation and arena-shifting. It showcases the relevance of this perspective through brief empirical illustrations on the post-Snowden controversy, public participation on security strategy-making, and the role of parliaments in security policy. The overall aim is to reopen conceptual questions on the relationship between security and politics, inspire innovative empirical work to study the diverse politics around security, and allow for more differentiated normative inquiries into the ambivalent consequences of politicisation.

scholarly journals Globality and Entangled Security: Rethinking the Post-1945 Order

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fiona B. Adamson ◽  
Kelly M. Greenhill
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
National Security ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Global Perspective ◽  
International Context ◽  
Security Environment ◽  
Global Nature ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Important Form

Abstract In this essay we argue for the utility of moving from a “national” to an “entangled global” perspective on security. Focusing on the post-1945 international context, we discuss how the concept of “globality” can inform and reframe our understanding of transnational security dynamics and help move us beyond traditional state-centric frameworks. Such a move enables a better understanding of historical events and contemporary security dynamics than classical “national security” frameworks alone. After outlining the rationale behind our call for expanding the aperture in the study of security, we theorize security entanglement as a particularly important form of globality with its own internal dynamics and show how the entanglement framework allows us to rethink the post-1945 security environment and events within it. We then focus on three illustrative forms of security entanglement that have been underexplored in security studies: the global nature of the Cold War; dynamics of decolonization and its legacies; and the relationship between migration and security. We conclude by discussing the implications of security entanglement for future visions of world security.

Nuclear Strategy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick M. Morgan
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
American Military ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Military Planning ◽  
The Stability ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cold War

Nuclear strategy involves the production of nuclear weapons for political ends as well as the goals, means, and ways in which they are, or are planned to be, used. The roots of nuclear strategy can be traced to World War II, when nuclear scientists, as well as American and British high-level officials, began thinking about how nuclear weapons could be harnessed. Several ideas then emerged that became central to nuclear strategy, but largely ignored in early postwar American military planning. Aside from war-fighting, the United States’s grand strategy and national security policy soon focused on containment as the way to deal with communism around the world. Containment was politically and intellectually well-suited for emphasizing nuclear deterrence as a means of preventing the Cold War from escalating into war. The theory and resulting strategy was dominated by two problems: the stability problem and the credibility problem. As for actually fighting a nuclear war, strategies include demonstration explosions to curb enemy military actions, preventive and preemptive attacks, and retaliation after being attacked. The design and implementation of nuclear postures and strategies have been beset by numerous deficiencies, such as accidents with nuclear weapons and delivery systems. Fortunately, nuclear strategy did not give rise to what many feared—a self-sustaining security dilemma that made insecurity overwhelming and impossible to dispel.

The Cold War and After

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Trachtenberg
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
International System ◽  
Theoretical Perspective ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Policy Issues ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Book Deal ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Historical Issues ◽  
Shed Light

What makes for war or for a stable international system? Are there general principles that should govern foreign policy? This book explores how historical work can throw light on these questions. The essays in this book deal with specific problems—with such matters as nuclear strategy and U.S.–European relations. But the book's main goal is to show how in practice a certain type of scholarly work can be done. The book demonstrates how, in studying international politics, the conceptual and empirical sides of the analysis can be made to connect with each other, and how historical, theoretical, and even policy issues can be tied together in an intellectually respectable way. These essays address a wide variety of topics, from theoretical and policy issues, such as the question of preventive war and the problem of international order, to more historical subjects—for example, American policy on Eastern Europe in 1945 and Franco-American relations during the Nixon–Pompidou period. But in each case, the aim is to show how a theoretical perspective can be brought to bear on the analysis of historical issues, and how historical analysis can shed light on basic conceptual problems.

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