158 The Second Image: Implications millennial revisionist theory.63 The revisionists themselves apparently never realized this. The examination of socialist theory and practice provides an example of the continuity and reappearance of thought patterns in international politics and serves as a detailed study of the applicability of the kind of analysis undertaken in this book. It demonstrates that the elaboration and critical comparison of types of thought in international politics can be of use in evaluating analyses and prescriptions widely separated in time and broadly divergent in content. It is at this point not necessary to repeat with reference to the revisionists all of the criticisms raised against liberals. If it is apparent that the same criticisms apply, the purpose of the present chapter is accomplished. 82 Sec above, p. 127. CHAPTER VI. THE THIRD IMAGE International Conflict and International Anarchy For what can be done against force without force? CICERO, The Letters to His Friends with many sovereign states, with no system of law enforceable among them, with each state judging its grievances and ambitions according to the dictates of its own reason or desire—conflict, sometimes leading to war, is bound to occur. To achieve a favorable outcome from such conflict a state has to rely on its own devices, the relative efficiency of which must be its constant concern. This, the idea of the third image, is to be examined in the present chapter. It is not an esoteric idea; it is not a new idea. Thucydides implied it when he wrote that it was "the growth of the Athenian power, which terrified the Lacedaemonians and forced them into war." l John Adams implied it when he wrote to the citizens of Petersburg, Virginia, that "a war with France, if just and necessary, might wean us from fond and blind affections, which no Nation ought ever to feel towards another, as our experience in more than one instance abundantly testifies." J There is an obvious relation between the concern over 1 Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, tr. Jowett, Book I, par. 23. 2 Letter of John Adams to the citizens of the town of Petersburg, dated June 6, 1798, and reprinted in the program for the visit of William Howard Taft, Petersburg, Va., May 19, 1909. 160 The Third Image relative power position expressed by Thucydides and the admonition of John Adams that love affairs between states are inappropriate and dangerous. This relation is made explicit in Frederick Dunn's statement that "so long as the notion of self-help persists, the aim of maintaining the power position of the nation is paramount to all other :onsiderations." 3 In anarchy there is no automatic harmony. The three preceding statements reflect this fact. A state will use force to attain its goals if, after assessing the prospects for iuccess, it values those goals more than it values the pleasures of peace. Because each state is the final judge of its )wn cause, any state may at any time use force to implement its policies. Because any state may at any time use :orce, all states must constantly be ready either to counter Eorce with force or to pay the cost of weakness. The requirements of state action are, in this view, imposed by :he circumstances in which all states exist. In a manner of speaking, all three images are a part of rature. So fundamental are man, the state, and the state .ystem in any attempt to understand international rela-:ions that seldom does an analyst, however wedded to one image, entirely overlook the other two. Still, emphasis in one image may distort one's interpretation of the others. U is, for example, not uncommon to find those inclined to ;ee the world in terms of either the first or the second mage countering the oft-made argument that arms breed lot war but security, and possibly even peace, by pointing jut that the argument is a compound of dishonest myth, :o cover the interests of politicians, armament makers, and athers, and honest illusion entertained by patriots sin-:erely interested in the safety of their states. To dispel the illusion, Cobden, to recall one of the many who have 8 Dunn, Peaceful Change, p. IS. International Anarchy 161 argued this way, once pointed out that doubling armaments, if everyone does it, makes no state more secure and, similarly, that none would be endangered if all military establishments were simultaneously reduced by, say, 50 percent.4 Putting aside the thought that the arithmetic is not necessarily an accurate reflection of what the situation would be, this argument illustrates a supposedly practical application of the first and second images. Whether by educating citizens and leaders of the separate states or by improving the organization of each of them, a condition is sought in which the lesson here adumbrated becomes the basis for the policies of states. The result?—disarmament, and thus economy, together with peace, and thus security, for all states. If some states display a willingness to pare down their military establishments, other states will be able to pursue similar policies. In emphasizing the interdependence of the policies of all states, the argument pays heed to the third image. The optimism is, however, the result of ignoring some inherent difficulties. In this and the following chapter, by developing and examining the third image in detail, we attempt to make clear what these difficulties are. In preceding chapters we examined the reasoning of a number of men whose thoughts on international relations conform to either the first or second image. In the present chapter, for the sake of varying the treatment and because political philosophy provides insufficiently exploited clues to the understanding of international politics, we shall focus primarily upon the political thought of one man, Jean Jacques Rousseau. For the same pair of reasons, in making comparisons with the first and second images, we shall refer most often to two philosophers who closely followed those patterns—Spinoza for the first image, * Cobden, especially his Speeches on Peace, Financial Reform, Colonial Reform, and Other Subjects Delivered during 1849, p. 135. 162 The Third Image Kant for the second. Though both have been mentioned before, a summary of the reasoning on which they based their views of international relations will make the comparisons more useful. Spinoza explained violence by reference to human imperfections. Passion displaces reason, and consequently men, who out of self-interest ought to cooperate with one another in perfect harmony, engage endlessly in quarrels ind physical violence. The defectiveness of man is the :ause of conflict. Logically, if this is the sole cause, the md of conflict must depend on the reform of men. Spin-jza nevertheless solved the problem, on the national level )nly, not by manipulating the supposedly causal factor )ut by altering the environment in which it operates. This was at once the great inconsistency and the saving ^race of his system. Spinoza moved from the individual nd the nation to the state among states by adding one to he number of his original assumptions. States, he as-umes, are like men; they display both an urge to live and n inability consistently to order their affairs according to lie dictates of reason.6 States, however, can provide gainst their own oppression, whereas individuals, "over-ome daily by sleep, often by disease or mental infirmity, nd in the end by old age," cannot. Individuals, to sur-ive, must combine; states, by their very constitution, are ot subject to a similar necessity.6 Wars among states are ien as inevitable as are defects in the nature of man. Kant's analysis, while on some points similar to Spinoza's, both more complex and more suggestive. Men he de- 5 Though for Spinoza the unity of the state rests ultimately on the ility of the supreme authority to enforce his will, in explaining the havior of states he uses both an organ ism ic and a corporate-trust alogy. For the former, see Political Treatise, ch. ii, sec. 3; ch. iii, sec. 2. r the latter, see ibid., ch. iii, sec. 14, and Theologico-Political Treatise, . xvi (I, 208). 5 Spinoza, Political Treatise, ch. iii, sec. 11. International Anarchy 163 fines as being members of both the world of sense and the world of understanding. If they were wholly of the latter, they would always act according to universally valid, self-imposed maxims. They would follow the categorical imperative. But since they are members of the former as well, impulse and inclination overcome reason, and the categorical imperative is so seldom followed that in the state of nature conflict and violence reign. The civil state appears as a necessary constraint. A number of men acting upon empirical "and therefore merely contingent" knowledge must have a judge among them, and a judge who can enforce his decisions, if violence is to be avoided. After the state is established, men have some chance of behaving morally. Before the state is established, uncertainty and violence make this impossible. Men need the security of law before improvement in their moral lives is possible. The civil state makes possible the ethical life of the individual by protecting the rights that were logically his in the state of nature, though actually he could not enjoy them. The civil state, however, is not enough. Peace among as well as within states is essential to the development of uniquely human capacities. States in the world are like individuals in the state of nature. They are neither perfectly good nor are they controlled by law. Consequently conflict and violence among them are inevitable. But this bit of analysis does not lead Kant to the conclusion that a world state is the answer. Fearing that a world state would become a terrible despotism, stifle liberty, kill initiative, and in the end lapse into anarchy, he must cast about for another solution. The other possibility open to him is that all states so improve that they will act on maxims that can be universalized without conflict. While Kant fears the former solution, he is too cautious and too intelligently critical to hope for the latter. Instead he attempts to combine the two. It 164 The Third Image is the aim of his political philosophy to establish the hope that states may improve enough and learn enough from the suffering and devastation of war to make possible a rule of law among them that is not backed by power but is voluntarily observed.7 The first factor is the internal improvement of states; the second, the external rule of law. But the second, being voluntary, is completely dependent on the perfection with which the first is realized. The "power" to enforce the law is derived not from external sanction but from internal perfection.8 This is a solution according to the second image, that is by the improvement of the separate states, though Kant's own analysis leads one to question his conclusion. At the level of the state, an adequate political system permits individuals to behave ethically; a comparably adequate system is not attainable internationally. Still we are to hope for peace among states. The inconsistency is apparent, though its glare is somewhat dimmed by Kant's confession that he has established not the "inevitability" of perpetual peace but ' For the above comments on man and morality, see "Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals," sees. 2 and 3, in Kant's Critique of Practical Reason and Other Works on the Theory of Ethics, tr. Abbott. On the natural and civil states, see The Philosopy of Lam, tr. Hastie, sees. 8, 9, 41, 42, 44. On the dependence of morality on a condition of peace among states, see "The Natural Principle of the Political Order Considered in Connection with the Idea of a Universal Cosmopolitical History," Eighth Proposition, in Eternal Peace and Other International Essays, tr. Hastie. On the characteristics of the international federation, see "The Principle of Progress Considered in Connection with the Relation of Theory to Practice in International Law," in ibid., pp. 62-65; "Eternal Peace," First and Second Definitive Articles, in ibid.; and The Philosophy of Lau;, tr. Hastie, sec. 61. 8 Each republic, the form of the state that Kant labels good, "unable to injure any other by violence, must maintain itself by right alone; and it may hope on real grounds that the others being constituted like itself will then come, on occasions of need, to its aid." ('"The Principle of Progress Considered in Connection with the Relation of Theory to Practice in International Law," in Eternal Peace and Other International Essays, tr. Hastie, p. 64.) Republics, Kant must assume, will act in accordance with the categorical imperative. International Anarchy lb& only that the existence of such a condition is not unthinkable.8 In Rousseau's philosophy, considered in this chapter as a theory of international relations, emphasis on the framework of state action makes some of the assumptions of Spinoza and Kant unnecessary; it makes other of their assumptions impossible. JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU Montesquieu and, like him, Rousseau, upon looking at attempts of other philosophers to understand a real or hypothetical state of nature, were both moved to make the same critical comment. Montesquieu says of Hobbes that he "attributes to mankind before the establishment of society what can happen but in consequence of this establishment." 10 Both Montesquieu and Rousseau maintain that the state of nature of Hobbes—and the same applies to Spinoza—is a fiction constructed by assuming that men in nature possess all of the characteristics and habits they acquire in society but without the constraints imposed by society. Men before the establishment of society have not developed the vices of pride and envy. Indeed they could not, for they see very little of one another. Whenever chance brings them together, consciousness of weakness and impotency dissuades them from attacking one another. Since none knows either pride or envy, thrift or greed, he will attack another only if driven by hunger to do so.11 9 This interpretation, supported by considering Kant's political thought in the context of his moral philosophy, contrasts with that found in Friedrich's book on Kant, Inevitable Peace. 10 Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Latus, tr. Nugent, Book I, ch. ii. Cf. Rousseau, Inequality, pp. 197. 221-23. Page references are to The Social Contract and Discourses, tr. Cole, which contains The Social Contract, A Discourse on the Arts and Sciences, A Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, and A Discourse on Political Economy. *l Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, tr. Nugent, Book I, ch. iii; Rousseau, Inequality, pp. 227-33. 166 The Third Image From one point of view this criticism of Hobbes is mere quibbling. Montesquieu and Rousseau arrive at a different conclusion simply by starting one step further back in their imaginary prehistory than did either Spinoza or Hobbes. In doing so, however, they emphasize an important point. Because of the difficulty of knowing such a thing as a pure human nature,12 because the human nature we do know reflects both man's nature and the influence of his environment,13 definitions of human nature such as those of Spinoza and Hobbes are arbitrary and can lead to no valid social or political conclusions. Theoretically at least one can strip away environmentally acquired characteristics and arrive at a view of human nature itself. Rousseau himself has advanced "certain arguments, and risked some conjectures," to this end.14 The very difficulty of the undertaking and the uncertainty of the result emphasize the error involved in taking the social man as the natural man, as Hobbes and Spinoza have done. And instead of deriving social conclusions directly from assumed human traits, Montesquieu argues that conflict arises from the social situation: "As soon as man enters into a state of society he loses the sense of his weakness; equality ceases, and then commences the state of war." 15 This estimate of the causes of conflict Rousseau takes up and develops.16 It raises three questions: (1) Why, if the original state of nature was one of relative peace and quiet, did man ever leave it? (2) Why does conflict arise in social situations? (3) How is the control of conflict related to its cause? 12 Rousseau, Inequality, pp. 189-91. 13 Les Confessions, Book IX, in Oeuvres completes de J. J. Rousseau, VIII, 289; "Aucun peuple ne scroit jamais que ce que la nature de son gou verneinen t le feroit fitre." " Inequality, p. 190. i" Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, tr. Nugent, Book I, ch. iii. Italics added, is See especially Inequality, pp. 234 ff. International Anarchy 167 For Spinoza and Hobbes, the formation of state and society was an act of will that served as a means of escape from an intolerable situation. Similarly Rousseau at Limes, in his explanation of the establishment of the state, seems to assume the purely willful employment of art and contrivance.17 At other times, Rousseau describes the establishment of the state as the culmination of a long historical evolution containing elements of experience, perceived interest, habit, tradition, and necessity. The first line of thought leads to the Social Contract; the second to the explanation found in A Discourse on the Origin of Inequality. The seeming contradiction is eliminated by the fact that Rousseau considers the first a philosophical explanation of what happened by historical processes; the second, a hypothetical reconstruction of those processes.18 In the early state of nature, men were sufficiently dispersed to make any pattern of cooperation unnecessary. But finally the combination of increased numbers and the usual natural hazards posed, in a variety of situations, the proposition: cooperate or die. Rousseau illustrates the line of reasoning with the simplest example. The example is worth reproducing, for it is the point of departure for the establishment of government and contains the basis for his explanation of conflict in international relations as well. Assume that five men who have acquired a rudimentary ability to speak and to understand each other happen to come together at a time when all of them suffer from hunger. The hunger of each will be satisfied by the fifth part of a stag, so they "agree" to cooperate in a project to trap one. But also the hunger of any one of them will be satisfied by a hare, so, as a hare comes within reach, 17 See, e.g., Social Contract, pp. 4, 7 (Book I, chs. i, iv). 18 In Inequality, pp. 190-91, he refers to the state of nature as "a state which no longer exists, perhaps never did exist, and probably never will exist; and of which it is, nevertheless, necessary to have true ideas." Cf. ibid., p. 198. 168 The Third Image one of them grabs it. The defector obtains the means of satisfying his hunger but in doing so permits the stag to escape. His immediate interest prevails over consideration for his fellows.19 The story is simple; the implications are tremendous. In cooperative action, even where all agree on the goal and have an equal interest in the project, one cannot rely on others. Spinoza linked conflict causally to man's imperfect reason. Montesquieu and Rousseau counter Spinoza's analysis with the proposition that the sources of conflict are not so much in the minds of men as they are in the nature of social activity. The difficulty is to some extent verbal. Rousseau grants that if we knew how to receive the true justice that comes from God, "we should need neither government nor laws." 2t} This corresponds to Spinoza's proposition that "men in so far as they live in obedience to reason, necessarily live always in harmony one with another." 21 The idea is a truism. If men were perfect, their perfection would be reflected in all of their calculations and actions. Each could rely on the behavior of others and all decisions would be made on principles that would preserve a true harmony of interests. Spinoza emphasizes not the difficulties inherent in mediating conflicting interests but the defectiveness of man's reason that prevents their consistently making decisions that would be in the interest of each and for the good of all. Rousseau faces the same problem. He imagines how men must have behaved as they began to depend on one another to meet their daily needs. As long as each provided for his own wants, there could be no conflict; whenever the combination of natural obstacles and growth in population made cooperation necessary, conflict arose. Thus in the 19 Ibid., p. 238. so Social Contract, p. 54 (Book II, eh. vi); et Political Economy, p. 296. 21 Spinou, Ethics, Part IV, prop, xxxv, proof. International Anarchy 169 stag-hunt example the tension between one man's immediate interest and the general interest of the group is resolved by the unilateral action of the one man. To the extent that he was motivated by a feeling of hunger, his act is one of passion. Reason would have told him that his long-run interest depends on establishing, through experience, the conviction that cooperative action will benefit all of the participants. But reason also tells him that if he foregoes the hare, the man next to him might leave his post to chase it, leaving the first man with nothing but food for thought on the folly of being loyal. The problem is now posed in more significant terms. If harmony is to exist in anarchy, not only must I be perfectly rational but I must be able to assume that everyone else is too. Otherwise there is no basis for rational calculation. To allow in my calculation for the irrational acts of others can lead to no determinate solutions, but to attempt to act on a rational calculation without making such an allowance may lead to my own undoing. The latter argument is reflected in Rousseau's comments on the proposition that "a people of true Christians would form the most perfect society imaginable." In the first place he points out that such a society "would not be a society of men." Moreover, he says, "For the state to be peaceable and for harmony to be maintained, all the citizens without exception would have to be [equally] good Christians; if by ill hap there should be a single self-seeker or hypocrite . . . he would certainly get the better of his pious compatriots." 22 If we define cooperative action as rational and any deviation from it irrational, we must agree with Spinoza that conflict results from the irrationality of men. But if we 22 Social Contract, pp. 135-36 (Book IV, ch. viii). Italics added. The word "equally" is necessary for an accurate rendering of the French text but does not appear in the translation cited. 170 The Third Image examine the requirements of rational action, we find that even in an example as simple as the stag hunt we have to assume that the reason of each leads to an identical definition of interest, that each will draw the same conclusion as to the methods appropriate to meet the original situation, that all will agree instantly on the action required by any chance incidents that raise the question of altering the original plan, and that each can rely completely on the steadfastness of purpose of all the others. Perfectly rational action requires not only the perception that our welfare is tied up with the welfare of others but also a perfect appraisal of details so that we can answer the question: Just how in each situation is it tied up with everyone else's? Rousseau agrees with Spinoza in refusing to label the act of the rabbit-snatcher either good or bad; unlike Spinoza, he also refuses to label it either rational or irrational. He has noticed that the difficulty is not only in the actors but also in the situations they face. While by no means ignoring the part that avarice and ambition play in the birth and growth of conflict,23 Rousseau's analysis makes clear the extent to which conflict appears inevitably in the social affairs of men. In short, the proposition that irrationality is the cause of all the world's troubles, in the sense that a world of perfectly rational men would know no disagreements and no conflicts, is, as Rousseau implies, as true as it is irrelevant. Since the world cannot be defined in terms of perfection, the very real problem of how to achieve an approximation to harmony in cooperative and competitive activity is always with us and, lacking the possibility of perfection, it is a problem that cannot be solved simply by changing men. Already Rousseau has made it possible to 23 A Lasting Peace, tr. Vaughan, p. 72. On p. 91 Rousseau refers to men as "unjust, grasping and setting their own interest above all things." This raises the question of the relation of the third image to the first, which will be discussed in ch. viii, below. International Anarchy 171 dispense with two of the assumptions of Spinoza and Kant. If conflict is the by-product of competition and attempts at cooperation in society, then it is unnecessary to assume self-preservation as man's sole motivation; for conflict results from the seeking of any goal—even if in the seeking one attempts to act according to Kant's categorical imperative. FROM NATURE TO STATE In the state of nature, for Rousseau as for Spinoza and Kant, men are governed by "instinct," "physical impulses," and "right of appetite"; and "liberty ... is bounded only by the strength of the individual." Agreements cannot bind, for "in default of natural sanctions, the laws of justice are ineffective among men." 2* Without the protection of civil law, even agriculture is impossible, for who, Rousseau asks, "would be so absurd as to take the trouble of cultivating a field, which might be stripped of its crop by the first comer?" To be provident is impossible, for without social regulation there can be no obligation to respect the interests, rights, and property of others. But to be provident is desirable, for it makes life easier; or even necessary, for population begins to press on the amount of food available under a given mode of production. Some men unite, set up rules governing cooperative and competitive situations, and organize the means of enforcing them. Others are forced to follow the new pattern, for those outside the organized society, unable to cooperate effectively, cannot stand up against the efficiency of a group united and enjoying the benefits of a social division of labor.25 It is clear that in moving from the state of nature to 24 Social Contract, pp. 18-19 (Book I, eh. vüi); p. 34 {Book II, eh. vi). 2B Inequality, pp. 212, 249-52. The dialectical development, in which . each step toward the social state produces difficulties and near disasters, is especially interesting. 172 The Third Image the civil state man gains materially. But there are more than material gains involved. Rousseau makes this clear in a brief chapter of The Social Contract, which Kant later followed closely. "The passage from the state of nature to the civil state," Rousseau says, "produces a very remarkable change in man, by substituting justice for instinct in his conduct, and giving his actions the morality they had formerly lacked." Man prior to the establishment of the civil state possesses natural liberty; he has a right to all he can get. This natural liberty he abandons when he enters the civil state. In return he receives "civil liberty and the proprietorship of all he possesses." Natural liberty becomes civil liberty; possession becomes proprietorship. And in addition "man acquires in the civil state, moral liberty, which alone makes him truly master of himself; for the mere impulse of appetite is slavery, while obedience to a law which we prescribe to ourselves is liberty." 2fl THE STATE AMONG STATES For Rousseau as for Kant the civil state contributes to the possibility of the moral life, though Rousseau conceives of the contribution as a more positive one, somewhat in the manner of Plato and Aristotle. But what of the condition among the civil states themselves? At this point, Spinoza reverted to the analysis he had applied to individuals in the state of nature where, he thought, conflict had resulted from the defective reason of man. Kant too reverted to his analysis of the original conflict among men, but in his case the explanation included both the nature of the conflicting units and their environment. The explanations of Rousseau and Kant are similar, but Rousseau's is the more consistent and complete. The social contract theorist, be he Spinoza, Hobbes, 28 Social Contract, pp. 18-19 (Book. I, ch. viii). International Anarchy 173 Locke, Rousseau, or Kant, compares the behavior of states in the world to that of men in the state of nature. By defining the state of nature as a condition in which acting units, whether men or states, coexist without an authority above them, the phrase can be applied to states in the modern world just as to men living outside a civil state. Clearly states recognize no common superior, but can they be described as acting units? This question we must examine before considering Rousseau's schematic description of the behavior of the state among states. Rousseau, like Spinoza, occasionally uses corporate-trust and organismic analogies. The first is implied in his statement that the sovereign cannot do anything derogatory to the continued existence of the state. The end of the state is "the preservation and prosperity of its members." 2T The organismic analogy is reflected in his statement that "the body politic, taken individually, may be considered as an organized, living body, resembling that of man." As a living being, "the most important of its cares is the care of its own preservation." 2a Rousseau, however, cautions that the analogy is loosely used. The identity of individual and state motivation is a possible coincidence, not, as in Spinoza, a necessary assumption. And he defines with considerable care what he means when he describes the state as a unit complete with will and purpose. In this respect, Rousseau can be considered as distinguishing two cases: states as we find them and states that are constituted as they ought to be. Of the first, he makes clear, there can be no presumption that the interest of the state and the action of the sovereign coincide. Indeed in 27 Ibid., pp. 16-17 (Book I, ch. vii); p. 83 (Book III, ch. ix). 28 Political Economy, p. 289: Social Contract, p. 28 (Book II, ch. iv). Cf. Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, tr. Nugent, Book X, ch. ii: "The life of governments is like that of man. The latter has a right to kill in case of natural defense: the former have a right to wage war for their own preservation." 174 The Third Image most states it would be strange if they did, for the sovereign, far from caring for the interests of his state, is seldom moved but by personal vanity and greed. Even to such states organismic and corporate analogies have a limited application, for in one way the state is still a unit. The sovereign, so long as he retains sufficient power, carries out his will as though it were the will of the state, j? This parallels Spinoza, who simply assumes that in international affairs the state must be considered as acting on 1 behalf of all its members. Rousseau adds to this an anály- \ sis, which, supplemented and borne out by the subsequent : history of nationalism, reveals that the state may become a unit in a deeper sense than the philosophy of Spinoza can comprehend. Rousseau argues that under certain conditions a state will actualize the general will in its de- ; cisions, the general will being defined as the decision of :; the state to do what is "best" for its members considered ! collectively. The unity of the state is achieved when there -,, exist the conditions necessary for the actualization of the general will. ^ From this abstract formulation one can scarcely derive ■• an answer to the question that interests Rousseau: Under -i what conditions will the state achieve the unity that he .■ desires for it? Fortunately it is quite easy to make Rous- : seau's formulation concrete. Public spirit or patriotism, ;: he says, is the necessary basis of the good state. In the ľ primitive tribe, economic interdependence and pressure i from outside produced group solidarity. Amid the greater i complexities of the eighteenth century, Rousseau fears that the spirit of solidarity found in the social or political'; groups of a simpler era has been lost. "There are today," ; he writes, "no longer Frenchmen, Germans, Spaniards, j Englishmen . . .; there are only Europeans." All have the same tastes, passions, and morals because none receives" a distinctive shaping of his character from his national in-f International Anarchy 175 stitutions.29 Patriotism is, he thinks, in danger of being lost in a welter of counterpassions arising from sub- or transnational interests. How, among so many other interests, can patriotism grow? This is the question Rousseau asks. He answers: If children are brought up in common in the bosom of equality; if they are imbued with the laws of the State and the precepts of the general will; if they are taught to respect these above all things; if they are surrounded by examples and objects which constantly remind them of the tender mother who nourishes them, of the love she bears them, of the inestimable benefits they receive from her, and of the return they owe her, we cannot doubt that they will learn to cherish one another mutually as brothers, to will nothing contrary to the will of society, to substitute the actions of men and citizens for the futile and vain babbling of sophists, and to become in time defenders and fathers of the country of which they will have been so long the children.30 In such a state, conflict is eliminated and unity is achieved because, from a negative point of view, equality prevents the development of those partial interests so fatal to the unity of the state; from a positive point of view, the inculcation of public feeling imparts to the citizen a spirit of devotion to the welfare of the whole.81 The will of the state is the general will; there is no problem of disunity and conflict. In studying international politics it is convenient to think of states as the acting units. At the same time, it does violence to one's common sense to speak of the state, which is after all an abstraction and consequently inani- ae Considerations sur le Gouvernement de Pologne, in Vaughan, ed.. The Political Writing? of Jean Jacques Rousseau, II, 432. The following, used below, are also cited from this work: Projet de Constitution pour la Corse and extracts from Emile. 30 Political Economy, p. 309.