John Mearsheimer
speaker
2,303 appearances
7 recordings
5 series
first heard Nov 2023
last heard 28 May
John Mearsheimer’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 5 in all, peaking in May 2026 with 4.
Appearances
Over time, the various leaders of the United States went to great lengths to turn that country into the dominant power in the Western Hemisphere.
And then once that was achieved in 1900, we've gone to great lengths to make sure that there's no peer competitor in the system.
We just want to make sure that we're number one.
And my argument is that this is not peculiar to the United States.
If I'm China, for example, today,
I would want to dominate Asia the way the United States dominates the Western Hemisphere.
They'd be fools not to.
If I were Imperial Germany, I'd want to dominate all of Europe the way the United States dominates the Western Hemisphere.
Why?
Because if you dominate all of Europe, assuming you're Imperial Germany or Napoleonic France, then no other state in the area or in the region can threaten you because you're simply so powerful.
And again, what I'm saying here is that the structure of the international system really matters.
It's the fact that you're in this anarchic system where survival is your principal goal and where I can't know your intentions, right?
You're another state.
I can't know that at some point you might not come after me.
You might.
And if you're really powerful and I'm not, I'm in deep trouble.
Well, I think for many centuries now, the big divide within the world of international relations theory is between realism and liberalism.
These are time-honored
bodies of theory.
And before I tell you what I think the differences are between those two bodies of theory, it is important to emphasize that there are differences among realists and differences among liberals.
Showing 661–680 of 2,303 · page 34 of 116
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