Unrealistic Realism
Dennis Hoover Saturday, 1 March 2003
Robert D. Kaplan, Warrior Politics: Why Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos (New York: Random House, 2002). 198 pp. $22.95.
Those who follow international affairs—specialists and spectators alike—are frequently in search of a paradigmatic holy grail, the One Big Thing that will provide both descriptive and prescriptive direction in an always-complex world. Little more than a decade ago, the dominant paradigm was one of a (seemingly) permanent struggle between the capitalist West and the communist East. After the Cold War, the roaring Nineties saw many tempted by a more idealistic paradigm—worldwide dominance of liberal democracy, economic globalization, international law ... the end of history.
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