Norm Dynamics in Multilateral Arms Control: Interests, Conflicts, and Justice

Chapter Six. Established and Rising Great Powers: The United States, Russia, China, and India

CHAPTER SIX Established and Rising Great Powers The United States, Russia, China, and India Marco Fey, Andrea Hellmann, Friederike Klinke, Franziska Plümmer, and Carsten Rauch Theories of international relations conventionally regard great powers as the most important actors in international politics. Research on norms, however, has placed little emphasis on their activities (see chapter 1). Research on great powers, in turn, has for the most part neglected the role of norms and focused mainly on material aspects. Highlighting the role of the normative fabric of the international system in this volume compels us to look at the roles great powers play as norm entrepreneurs in arms control regimes. The theory of hegemonic stability (first articulated by Kindleberger 1973) makes the robustness of norms contingent on the productive, protective, and enforcing role of hegemonic great powers, but this theory has lost popularity with the appearance of Keohane’s “After Hegemony” (1984). However, even if, as Keohane argues, a regime can be alive and well in the absence of a hegemon, great powers can still exert considerable influence on the creation, development , and decay of norms and regimes. Hegemonic stability theory, however, is of limited value because it only deals with one type of great power: those that have invested heavily in the existing order and can thus be expected to have a stake in maintaining and improving it. As power transition theory (Organski 1958; Tammen et al. 2000) reminds us, rising powers may be less satisfied with the norms of the day that may deny them proper participation and status. Being denied the fulfillment of their ambitions , they view the existing order as unjust and try to change it by repealing existing norms and replacing them with norms that better fit their own [164] chapter six interests and values. This notion stands in some contradiction to the proposition in norm research that middle powers have broad opportunities for norm entrepreneurship within an established order. Thus, some rising powers may have chosen to engage as norm entrepreneurs before they began to rise and, from this perspective, might have acquired some ownership in the existing regimes . This would lead to stabilizing rather than challenging activities. We regard the United States and Russia as established great powers. While the United States has been the dominant power since the end of World War II, the position of Russia is somewhat delicate as it was never a global hegemon but instead was the primary challenger to the us-led international order. Both, however, played a pivotal role in the creation of the regimes under scrutiny here, given the assumption of nuclear parity. They should act valiantly in a) defending and enforcing the regimes and b) opposing norm change; something that the United States—as the permanent number one—is expected to do even more than Russia. China and India are rising great powers. Both were great empires in the past but were subjected to repression and humiliation during the era of imperialism. They were comparatively weak when the current world order was established in the aftermath of World War II and remained on the periphery of world politics during the Cold War. From the 1980s (China) and 1990s (India) onward, both started a spectacular rise. They can thus be expected to put forward alternative norms to those existing and to justify their proposals by arguing that the present order is profoundly unjust. They might also be more hostile toward those regimes that had been established before their rise began (npt and bwc) than toward those that have been established later (e.g., cwc, un PoA). THE UNITED STATES: COVERING THE WHOLE SPECTRUM OF NORM ENTREPRENEURSHIP With the establishment of a “balance of terror” between the United States and the Soviet Union in the post–World War II era, arms control became increasingly relevant. More than any other power, the United States shaped the international order and its arms control treaties and regimes. In particular, it engaged proactively in establishing, strengthening, enforcing, and advancing the norm of wmd nonproliferation, covering the whole spectrum of entrepreneurship . The us record is ambivalent, however, because Washington has, at times, also worked toward weakening norms of disarmament and peaceful uses. Established and Rising Great Powers [165] us Arms Control Politics and Policies Depending on the respective administration, since World War II us foreign policy has oscillated between unilateralist and multilateralist approaches. Common to all is a belief in...