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Politics Among Nations: Revisiting a Classic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 March 2016

Christoph Frei
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Extract

When introducing Politics Among Nations to his readers in the fall of 1948, Hans Morgenthau was explicit about the volume's ultimate purpose. His book was neither “disinterested” nor did it mean to offer “knowledge for its own sake.” Rather, the author meant to render both a real and practical service to his fellow countrymen. A series of factors had “completely reversed” the geopolitical status of the United States. It now held a position of predominant power in the world, and hence of foremost responsibility. Therefore, “the understanding of the forces that mold international politics and of the factors that determine its course has become more than an interesting intellectual occupation. It has become a vital necessity.”

Type
Roundtable: Morgenthau in America
Information
Ethics & International Affairs , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , Spring 2016 , pp. 39 - 46
Copyright
Copyright © Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs 2016 

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References

NOTES

1 Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1948), p. 8.

2 Hans J. Morgenthau, letter to Frederick S. Dunn, December 11, 1941, HJM-B16. The abbreviation HJM-B16 designates the location of the item (Box 16) within the collection of Morgenthau's literary estate on deposit at the Library of Congress. Morgenthau's private papers are in the safekeeping of the Leo Baeck Institute in New York.

3 As author: Scientific Man vs. Power Politics (1946), Politics Among Nations (1948), In Defense of the National Interest (1951); as editor: Peace, Security, and the United Nations (1946), Principles and Problems of International Politics (1950, with Kenneth W. Thompson), Germany and the Future of Europe (1951).

4 Hans J. Morgenthau, letter to Cyril James, November 13, 1952, HJM-B37.

5 Hans J. Morgenthau, “Der Kampf der deutschen Staatslehre um die Wirklichkeit des Staates” (Inaugural Lecture at the University of Geneva, 1932), HJM-B110, p. 28.

6 For a comprehensive account, see Christoph Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau: An Intellectual Biography (Baton Rouge, La.: Louisiana State University Press, 2001). A detailed contextualization of Morgenthau's juridical writings has been offered by Oliver Jütersonke, Morgenthau, Law and Realism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010).

7 Morgenthau, Hans J., “Théorie des Sanctions Internationales,” Revue de Droit International et de Législation Comparée 16 (1935), p. 827 Google Scholar.

8 Hans J. Morgenthau, Positivisme Mal Compris et Théorie Réaliste du Droit International (Madrid, 1936), p. 20.

9 Outline “Plan for Work” in HJM-B25.

10 Examples are legion: they include the concept of politics in general; of maintaining, increasing, demonstrating power; the policies of status quo, imperialism, and prestige; the function of ideology; the balance of power; the reality of international law, of international morality, and world public opinion; the limits of the judicial function in international relations; the limited potential of international organization; peace through transformation (world state); peace through accommodation (diplomacy).

11 Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 7.

12 William E. Scheuerman, Hans Morgenthau: Realism and Beyond (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2009), p. 102.

13 Boulding, Kenneth E., “The Content of International Studies in College: A Review,” Conflict Resolution 8, no. 1 (1964), pp. 66–67 Google Scholar.

14 Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 413.

15 Ibid., p. 445.

16 Scheuerman, Hans Morgenthau, p. 102.

17 Michael C. Williams, The Realist Tradition and the Limits of International Relations (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 82.

18 Robbie Shilliam, German Thought and International Relations: The Rise and Fall of a Liberal Project (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), p. 194; Jütersonke, Morgenthau, Law and Realism, p. 183; Frei, Hans J. Morgenthau, pp. 110–12.

19 On the very first page of the first edition, the author quotes an observation on the part of Grayson Kirk with an enthusiasm that is almost palpable: “The political scientist is moving into the international field at last.” Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 3.

20 Cornelia Navari's contribution to this forum; Scheuerman, Hans Morgenthau, pp. 103–109.

21 Preface to third edition (1960).