Weltpolitik

This chapter considers the rise of Imperial Germany to world power status at the turn of the twentieth century. It argues that Germany’s bid for world power status—Weltpolitik—embodied the recognitive practices constitutive of world power status and was designed to secure recognition from Britain, the system’s preeminent world power. Specifically, in building a powerful fleet of battleships stationed in the North Sea, German leaders reasoned they could alter the political relationship with Britain by creating a display of military force so great that Britain would recognize Germany’s position among the world powers. At the same time, these recognitive practices insulted Germany from the social uncertainty associated with intersubjective identity formation by creating the illusion that its world power status was self-evident rather than dependent on British recognition. The precariousness of its social status was revealed during the First Moroccan Crisis, when in response to acts of misrecognition Germany initiated a serious international crisis that risked war, rousing suspicions among the European great powers that Germany was a revisionist power.

The Struggle for Recognition

This chapter clarifies the relationship between recognition and state identity formation in international anarchy, highlighting the effects of social uncertainty in this process. Acts of recognition are constructive of a state’s identity, providing it with the authority it needs to act in ways that are consistent with its self-understanding and endowing it with a recognized social status in the international order. This inherently social process of identity formation is deeply uncertain because states can never discern beforehand the recognition responses of other states and as a result state interaction is fraught with the danger of misrecognition. In response to this ongoing social uncertainty, states attempt to take independent control over the meaning of their identities by grounding them in concrete material practices. As an effective expression of an identity, the material world gives substance to the recognition-seeking state’s aspiring social identity and allows it to experience its social status as a brute fact, rather than as the uncertain effect of an ongoing political practice of social construction.

Recognition Refused

This chapter explores how Imperial Germany came to be viewed by the established European powers as a revisionist power. It argues that as Germany became more uncertain about its status in the international order, its fear of misrecognition increased and in response it turned to the recognitive practices constitutive of world power status to ameliorate its growing social insecurity. Specifically, Germany’s fear of misrecognition sustained the Anglo-German naval race, making a naval understanding impossible despite repeated British attempts at negotiating an arms control agreement. Moreover, the fear of misrecognition and experience of disrespect led Germany into a second confrontation with Britain over the independent status of Morocco during the Agadir Crisis. Germany’s belligerent foreign policy and willingness to risk war over matters not of vital interest led the European great powers to increasingly view Germany as a revisionist state whose power needed to be contained. The chapter shows how the experience of humiliation drove German foreign policy, contributing to its construction as a revisionist power and destabilizing the international order in the years before the First World War.

Recognition and Rapprochement

This chapter explores how the United States’ growing power and expansionist foreign policy came to be viewed as legitimate, thereby constructing its peaceful rise to world power status. It argues that the acts of recognition that emerged during the Venezuelan Crisis expressed a normative acceptance of American power and were routinized so as to structure Anglo-American relations at the turn of the twentieth century. Specifically, during the Spanish–American War British leaders—drawing from the recognitive speech acts that defined the Anglo-Saxon collective identity—restrained the European great powers from becoming involved in the war, enabling the United States to establish a sphere of influence in the Caribbean and an imperial presence in the Pacific. Likewise, the negotiations between Britain and the United States over the Isthmian Canal highlight the importance of mutual recognition in sustaining a peaceful power transition. The chapter shows how acts of recognition contributed to the social construction of the United States as a legitimate power, despite its aggressive and expansionist foreign policy.

Conclusion

This chapter summarizes the book’s main argument, outlines its contribution to international relations scholarship, and applies the argument to current debates about the rise of China. Two positions dominate current debates about US foreign policy and the rise of China: engagement, which calls for integrating China deeply into the global economy and institutional architecture of the international order; and containment, which sees security competition as an inevitable outgrowth of Chinese power, and calls for the United States to preemptively increase its military presence in the region. This chapter argues that by focusing narrowly on China’s economic and military interests, the current debate misses an important aspect of China’s rise because it fails to consider the social motivations of rising great powers. Building on the core argument of this book, it suggests that only by accepting China’s recognition-claims can the United States facilitate China’s peaceful rise. The chapter concludes by exploring how the United States might navigate a foreign policy that both approaches China as a recognized partner in leading the international order and also protects its regional and global interests—and if such recognition is even possible.

Introduction

This chapter introduces the puzzle of power transitions, summarizes the main argument of the book and locates it in the existing scholarship on power transitions. The conventional wisdom is that power transitions are inherently destabilizing to the international order because shifts in the distribution of power lead rising powers to want to revise the international order to better reflect their own interests. However, as the historical record demonstrates, not all rising powers have been considered revisionist and not all power transitions have led to war. This chapter argues that the existing approaches understate the importance of the social factors that shape the dynamics of power transitions. To address these empirical and theoretical limitations, this book provides a framework, grounded in the struggle for recognition, for understanding the social factors that shape a power transition.

Looking Outward

This chapter considers the rise of the United States to world power status and hegemony in the Western Hemisphere at the turn of the twentieth century. It argues that America’s decision to “turn outward” and establish an imperial presence in the world embodied the recognitive practices constitutive of world power status. Specifically, American leaders envisioned that a powerful naval capability and sphere of influence in the Western Hemisphere would be the backbone of its national greatness on the world stage and lead the established powers to recognize its position among the system’s world powers. The fragility of the United States’s aspiring social identity and the importance of British recognition to that identity became apparent during the Venezuelan Crisis, when the United States initiated an international crisis over its right to become involved in hemispheric disputes. The crisis was defused when British leaders engaged in recognitive speech acts that constructed a shared, Anglo-Saxon identity, which would become the foundation for cooperation between the two adversaries. These recognitive speech acts expressed a normative acceptance of American power and legitimated its status among the world powers.

The Social Construction of Revisionism

This chapter develops a social theory of great power status competition rooted in the struggle for recognition. It argues that great power status—in all its variants—is a kind of state identity, and as a result rising powers need to obtain recognition from the established powers to secure their position in the international order. Consistent with the logic of the struggle for recognition, rising powers adhere to a specific set of recognitive practices—great power voice, exemplary military power, and spheres of influence—that are designed to reduce social uncertainty and give the illusion that the rising power’s social status is not dependent on other states’ recognition responses. When a rising power is recognized by the established powers, its use of these recognitive practices is deemed legitimate and the power transition is peaceful. If the rising power is misrecognized, a self-fulfilling prophecy is set into motion whereby its growing power and assertive foreign policy are perceived to be for revisionist purposes and thus must be contained by the established powers. Revisionism, in this view, is not an intrinsic property of states, but rather is socially constructed through a rising power’s interactions with the established powers.