CEVAP:

realist theory of international relations has four main assumptions upon which further various hypotheses are built to analyze certain events and/or phenomena. First of all, states are the central and most important actors of world politics. Thus, states, whatever form they have, are seen as main units of analysis to study international relations that are shaped in an anarchical world of which the most distinctive feature is lack of a central government. State, as it has been claimed, is considered to be central institution for understanding politics and naturally, international relations. At this point, it must be made clear that anarchy is not to be confused with chaos; quite the contrary. Anarchy may be consistent with order, stability, and regulated forms of interaction between independent units” (Holsti, 1995: 5). In that sense, anarchy means that for the actors, in the absence of a superior authority capable of organizing the relations between sovereign units, relying upon themselves for their goals, security and survival is the only option. Another insight derived from this first assumption is that non-state actors have lesser importance, if not any, for the study of world politics. International organizations have no capacity to do more than its member states want to do and they have very little influence on state behavior (Mearsheimer, 1994). Other nonstate actors such as terrorist groups, multinational corporations etc. play a secondary role at best, in realist perspective. So, the “system” referred frequently by realists is consisted of sovereign states and network of their complex interactions. Secondly, from the realist point of view, state is seen as a unitary actor. “For purposes of theory building and analysis, realists view the state as being encapsulated by a metaphorical hard shell or opaque, black box.” (Viotti and Kauppi, 2012: 39). In this logic, when it comes to international issues, a country speaks with one voice and faces the hostilities of international arena as an integrated unit. The government resolves domestic political differences and the state as a unitary actor, has one policy for every issue it has to deal with. So, as unitary actors, states are seen, in this framework, as monoliths that try constantly to maximize their power. Third realist assumption is based on the belief that, incarnated in the leader, states are, in essence, rational (purposive) actors. Hence, they seek to maximize at the international scene, their interests defined in terms of power. As stated by Hans Morgenthau (1997), “international politics, like all politics, is a struggle for power. Whatever the ultimate aims of international politics, power is always the immediate aim” (31). This powercentered vision is shared by Edward Carr who stated in his Twenty Years’ Crisis that “[P]olitics are, then, in one sense always power politics” (Carr, 1981: 103). Thus, through a rational decision-making process, states choose, from a set of alternatives that serves to primarily stated objectives in optimum way. “Rationality and statecentrism is often defined as main realist premises” (Donnely, 2013: 54) and they play a critical role, along with the acceptance of state as a unitary actor, to facilitate to apply rational choice models to important phenomena such as balance of power, deterrence, the use of force etc. Fourth and the last main realist assumption puts emphasis on hierarchy of issues according to which the ones related to national and international security are located at the top. “Military and related political issues dominate world politics.” (Viotti and Kauppi, 2012: 40). In that logic, military, strategic issues that concerns security of state are often referred to as “high politics” whereas socio-economic topics remains in the field of “low politics”. In that context, the hierarchy mentioned here schematize the realist vision of political issues regarding their importance and primacy over one another.