Northeastern Political Science Association

The Individual in International Politics: Solving the Level-of-Analysis Problem Author(s): Robert A. Isaak Reviewed work(s): Source: Polity, Vol. 7, No. 2 (Winter, 1974), pp. 264-276 Published by: Palgrave Macmillan Journals Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3234376 . Accessed: 04/03/2012 08:28
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The Individual in International Politics: Solving the Level-of-Analysis Problem Robert A. Isaak, Fordham University The field of international politics is dominated by two dehumanizing assumptions. Most scholars begin by assuming either that the international system must be their first premise, or that the nation-state is the best point of departure. Whether used separately or combined, these two "levels of analysis" repress a third alternative-the assumption that the study of international politics is meaningless unless one begins by analyzing individuals in interaction with other individuals. The thesis of this essay is that a humanistic science of international politics is only possible by beginning with individual human beings. Furthermore,the phenomenological method can be used to solve the level-of-analysis problem without sacrificing empirical rigor or neglecting "outside deterministicforces" which characterize the reifiednotions of "nation-state"and "internationalsystem." The solution to the level-of-analysis problem is largely a question of language and definition. But definitions are never arbitrary.They grow out of conscious experience and are rooted in theory and method. The theory and method behind the definition of politics used here have been explicated in Politics for Human Beings.' This theory defines politics as a social act that attempts to solve the tension between human needs and social facts. Needs are basic prerequisitesfor healthy human existence, such as physiological, security, love, self-esteem, and self-actualization needs.2 Human beings of all cultures are motivated to satisfy such needs by using or overcoming existing social facts they find in their way. Social facts of everyday life include existing values, personalities, social and political institutions, and rules of the game.3 If, for a moment, this working definition of politics is accepted, one consequence is that individual human needs become the starting point of all politics-domestic or international. The distinction between social and
1. Robert A. Isaak and Ralph P. Hummel, Politics for Human Beings (North Scituate, Massachusetts:Wadsworth-Duxbury Press, 1974). 2. This is the need-hierarchyof psychologist Abraham Maslow listed in order of priority.See Maslow's Motivation and Personality (New York: Harper and Row, 1954). 3. Space limits here preclude an explanation of these five types of social facts or of exactly how Maslow's need scale can be used for political analysis. For details see Politics for Human Beings. For empirical evidence of the universality of Maslow's need hierarchy see Jeanne N. Knutson, The Human Basis of the Polity (Chicago: Aldine-Atherton,1972).

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political reality becomes merely one of awareness or political consciousness. That is, the social realities or facts of my everyday life become politicized for me only to the extent that I become conscious of tension between these facts and the needs of myself or of others. Thus, so-called "objective" levels of analysis dissolve into subjective levels of consciousness. I can view the social acts of people in New York City from a domestic, national or internationalviewpoint-depending upon how I perceive their effects upon human needs. It all depends on how nationalized or internationalizedI am at that moment. Social facts derive their meaning from the people who make them up. This view of social reality is phenomenological. For (roughly speaking) phenomenology is the science of getting beneath the appearances of everyday life. Phenomenologists see the facticity of social life as a never-ending process of human reconstruction in contrast to objectifying scientists who treat socially constructed reality as a "finished"thing to be uncovered and described.4 The attempt to define people as things-to "thingify" social reality-is the fallacy of reification. To thingify groups of people into "objective" nation-states or a single international system is to commit the fallacy of reification with an imperialistic consciousness-at least theoretically speaking. Reification is the attempt to make something real or concrete that is not. A common example is the tendency to anthropomorphize nationstates. For instance, sloppy scholars and space-conscious journalists often write statements such as "England decided to join the Common Market" rather than "Members of Parliament decided .. ." Ronald Laing, the humanistic psychiatrist, called this fallacy "natural scientism: the error of turning persons into things or things into persons, a process of reification that is not itself part of true natural scientific method." Laing continues: "Results derived in this way have to be dequantified and dereified before they can be reassimilated into the realm of human discourse. Fundamentally, the error is the failure to realize that there is an ontological discontin5 uity between human beings and it-beings." Alfred North Whitehead
4. Like other thoughts in this essay this one is derived from hundreds of conversations about everyday life with Ralph P. Hummel, who is presently reconstructing social reality at JerseyCity State College. As Ralph has noted, critics who cite Emile Durkheim's injunction "Treat social facts as things" misuse Durkheim who was aware of how dependent social reality is on the minds of its members and their constant reassertion of its meaning. See Peter Berger and Thomas Luckman, The Social Constructionof Reality (Garden City, New York: Doubleday-Anchor,1967), pp. 185-189. 5. Ronald D. Laing, The Politics of Experience (N.Y.: Ballantine Books, 1967), p. 62.

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claimed that this error derives from "the fallacy of misplaced concreteness." Whitehead wrote: "This fallacy consists in neglecting the degree of abstraction involved when an actual entity is considered merely so far as it exemplifies certain categories of thought. There are aspects of actualities which are simply ignored so long as we restrict thought to these categories." 6 "The international system" and "the nation-state-as-actor" levels of analysis are restrictivecategories in Whitehead's sense. The aspect of reality which these reified categories neglect or ignore is the individual or humanistic aspect. I. System and Nation-State Reifications

Over ten years ago, J. David Singer published an article in World Politics called "The Level-of-Analysis Problem" which dismissed phenomenological approaches to international politics on dubious groups. Since then, Singer's two favorite levels of analysis-the "systemic" and the "nationstate-as-actor"-have normally been taken for granted as the major categories of international political analysis in textbooks in the field. Even when authors include a section on decision-making or personality variables the decision-maker is normally viewed from the systemic or nation-state level of analysis.7 Singer's influential article is an excellent example of the reification so commonplace in the theoretical literatureof internationalpolitics.8 Though
6. Alfred North Whitehead,Process and Reality (N.Y.: MacMillan, 1929), p. 11. Political scientists can learn from philosophers and phenomenologists not to take either the world or their firstassumptionsfor granted.Albert Camus (an existentialist and as such an intellectual offspringof Edmund Husserl's phenomenologicalmovement) wrote in The Myth of Sisyphus: "Beginning to think is beginning to be undermined. Society has but little connection with such beginnings."Likewise to create a humanisticscience of politics, political scientistsmust begin by undermining themselves and their field as it exists today. Established elites, organizations, and theories of political science have little to do with such creative beginnings.Humanistic politics begins by rethinkingand reconstructingexisting social facts in terms of human needs. 7. Examples include K. J. Holsti, InternationalPolitics (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1967); John Spanier, Games Nations Play (N.Y.: Praeger, 1972); and Hans Morgenthau,Politics Among Nations (N.Y.: Alfred Knopf, 1972). Note that Spanier's and Morgenthau's texts even reify nations in their titles! David Edwards'sCreating A New World Politics (N.Y.: David McKay, 1973) is a noteworthy exception but is more an essay than a comprehensivetheoretically-grounded text. 8. J. D. Singer,"The Level-of-AnalysisProblem",WorldPolitics (October, 1961); and K. Knorr and S. Verba, The InternationalSystem (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1961).

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his argument is difficult to summarize because of its complexity, the effort must be made due to the significance of the "level-of-analysis" term which he helped to popularize. This term presupposes some sort of "system" in layers-perhaps viewed as a conceptual cone split up horizontally into floors, beginning with a large "macro"top and narrowinginto the smallest "micro" bottom. One can imagine the researcher as a pin-ball, sometimes bouncing back and forth between levels, but more likely getting stuck on one dimension for too long a time. Moreover, using the rhetoric of "levels" within "systems" deemphasizes the human origins of this perspective to the point of excluding them, giving the levels and system an illusion of objective reality which they do not actually have in themselves. As Theodore Roszak has noted, "Objective consciousness begins by dividing reality into two spheres, which would seem best described as In-Here and Out-There. By In-Here is meant that place within the person to which consciousness withdraws when one wants to know without becoming involved in or committed to that which is being known." 9 Reifying the OutThere of nations and the internationalsystem necessarily means repressing the In-Here of human origins and needs. Singer's argument begins by assuming the baggage of systems theory: "The observor may choose to focus upon the parts or upon the whole, upon the components or upon the system." 10In this framework individuals can only be studied as components of a system. Singer laments the tendency of texts to roam up and down the ladder of complexity vertically from the total system to coalitions to elites and so forth. He writes "though most of us have tended to settle upon the nation as our most comfortable resting place, we have retained our propensity for vertical drift, failing to appreciate the value of a stable point of focus." The problem, of course, could just be the opposite for systems theorists who follow Singer's advice: their points of focus are often too stable, to the extent of reifying a one dimensional viewpoint. Singer then proceeds to examine the implications of "two of the more widely employed levels of analysis: the international system and the national sub-systems." The systemic level of analysis is most comprehensive, but loses the necessary "dearth of detail." He does point out that the system-oriented model "tends to lead the observer into a position which exaggerates the impact of the system upon the national actors and conversely, discounts the impact of the actors on the system." But such a crucial obser9. Theodore Roszak, The Making of a Counter Culture (N.Y.: DoubledayAnchor, 1969), p. 218. 10. This and all further quotations from Singer are from his article, "The Levelcited above. of-Analysis-Problem,"

268 Research Notes &Provocations vationdoes not deterSingerfromusingthe systemicperspective. He conof is no means one could tinues,"this, course, by inevitable; conceivably look upon the systemas a ratherpassiveenvironment in whichdynamic statesact out theirrelationships ratherthanas a socio-political entitywith a dynamicof its own."Note here how in shiftingfrom the "systemic" to "thenation-state-as-actor" level of analysis,Singermerelyskipsfromone level of reification(that is, the system"witha dynamicof its own") to another (that is, anthropomorphized states that "act out their relationships"). Both levels of reificationtend to squeezeout individuals,subconstructs.Indeed, in the only sumingthem underlarger,deterministic he comparesthem analogously place Singerreally refersto individuals, differwidelyin to anthropomorphized nation-states: "Justas individuals what they deem to be pleasureand pain, or gain and loss, nationsmay differwidelyin whattheyconsiderto be the nationalinterest,andwe end up having to break down and refine the larger category."Now oddly does not indown"of the conceptof nation-state enough,this "breaking in "thephesees because of the cludeindividual pitfallsSinger perceptions issue." nomenological II. The Attackon the Phenomenological Perspective choice: issue"as a rigideither-or "thephenomenological Singerdescribes "do we examineour actor'sbehaviorin terms of the objectivefactors which allegedlyinfluencethat behavior,or do we do so in terms of the of "objective factors"-upon sevtior-analysis in termsof perceptions view of causation, if one embraces a eralgrounds:(1) phenomenological for model he will tend to use a phenomenological purposes explanatory infactorswhichmay "objectively" of "outside" deterministic regardless fluencethe situationthat he may not perceive;(2) althoughperceptual to establish causal(as opposedto correlational) linkages maybe necessary betweenforcesin the international systemand the behavior relationships transto traceeveryperception, of nations,one is "byno meansrequired andresponseor inputandoutputin mission,andreceiptbetweenstimulus of thenationor anyotherhumangroup"; orderto explainthebehavior (3) is subjectto a host of errors;informeddeduction, empiricalobservation model (that is, "the inferenceor analogybasedon a coherenttheoretical international just as reliableas those system") can provideexplanations "basedupon a misleadingand illusive body of data, most of which is andconceptsforeignto political to analysisonlyby techniques susceptible of the policyscience and history;"(4) dimensionsand characteristics
actor's perception of these 'objective factors'?"Singer rejects the latter op-

ResearchNotes &Provocations 269 discernible(at least not maker's fieldmay not be empirically phenomenal in an accurate, of suchdatais if and the fashion); so, gathering systematic or and clear of inefficient uneconomical one will tend to shy it; and (5) if the nation-state is visualizedas a distinctentity apartfrom its individual the phenomenological will tendto be rejected; for, "if members, approach our actorcannoteven have a phenomenal field,thereis little pointin employinga phenomenological Singerdoes point out that disaapproach." with anyof assumptions 1, 2, 4, and 5 abovewouldbe sufficient greement for adopting thephenomenological grounds approach. The assumptions abovearefar frombeingself-evident truths.To refute themexhaustively wouldtake severalvolumes.But to poke a few holes in themtakesless space.Considering whichstatesthat a the firstassumption, model causation lead of tends to to phenomenological phenomenological of "outside" facts, it can be arguedthat a social explanations regardless scientist can includeperceptual so linksin a causalchainwithoutbecoming intoxicated with the link thathe fails to includethe restof the chainin his Takethe notorious explanation. examplewhichSingercites: an individual will fall to the groundwhensteppingout of a tenth-story windowregardless of his perception of gravitational such is a major forces,yet perception factorin whetheror not he steps out of the windowin the firstplace. To facts of gravitaboth the "objective" explainthis social event adequately, tion and window-height and the perceptions of the walkermustbe taken intoaccount.To adoptthe phenomenological does not meanthat approach one tendsto ignorephysicalor sociologicalaspectsof concretesituations. makes clear that every observeror participant Rather,phenomenology selectscertainaspectsout of factsin experience that are relevant to him at thattime.Factsarenotpureandsimplein socialor international situations. They are complex and preinterpreted by those who would recordthem. Many prominentthinkersshare this notion of "fact"includingWilliam James,JohnDewey,HenriBergson,andAlfredSchutz.Thelatephenomethisviewpoint nologistAlfredSchutzexpressed lucidly: All our knowledgeof the world, in common-senseas well as in scientificthinking,involves constructs,i.e., a set of abstractions, idealizations formalizations, generalizations, specificto the respective level of thoughtorganization. Strictlyspeaking,there are no such thingsas facts, pure and simple. All facts are from the outset facts selectedfrom a universal contextby the activitiesof our mind.They facts, eitherfacts looked at as deare, therefore,alwaysinterpreted or facts contached from their context by an artificialabstraction sideredin theirparticular setting.In eithercase, theycarryalongtheir

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interpretationalinner and outer horizon. This does not mean that, in daily life or in science, we are unable to grasp the reality of the world. It just means that we grasp certain aspects of it, namely those which are relevant to us either for carrying on our business of living or from the point of view of a body of accepted rules of procedures of thinking called the method of science.11 Of course, whether we are phenomenologists or systems theorists will make a great deal of difference as to which aspects of facts we emphasize. And I believe that Singer'smain purpose was to make this important point. But he did not carry this idea far enough to clarify the ethical and political value assumptions involved. Phenomenologists fall into the school of "methodological individualism" which maintains that any statement concerning a collectivity must in principle be reducible to a set of statements about the individuals of whom the collectivity is composed. Systems theorists, on the other hand, belong to the "holist school" which argues that in order to speak about a collectivity or system we need to introduce concepts which depend for their meaning upon the fact that they can never be reduced to a list of assertions about individuals. Charles HampdenTurner has pointed out that such "various philosophies and methodologies That is, systems of social science are in fact disguised value judgments".12 in theorists, with their concern for stability and equilibrium the status quo, tend to be ideological conservatives, who look for man's meaning in terms of knowable products-scientific or moral forces which exist prior to and independently of man. Phenomenologists, on the other hand, tend to be ideological liberals, who locate man's meaning in himself-in his values,
11. Alfred Schutz, Collected Papers: I. The Problem of Social Reality, edited by MauriceNatanson (The Hague: MartinusNijhoff, 1962), 5. For a recent interpretation of social reality from a similarkind of perspective,see Peter Bergerand Thomas Luckmann, The Social Constructionof Reality (Garden City: Doubleday-Anchor, 1967). See William James, Principlesof Psychology, Vol. I, chapterix, "The Stream of Thought,"224f, 289f; John Dewey, Logic, The Theory of Inquiry (N.Y.: 1938), Philosophy" (1941) in the collection Problems of Men (N.Y.: 1946), 316f; Henri Bergson, Matiere et memoire, chapter I, "La Selection des Images par la Representation"; Edmund Husserl, Logische Untersuchungen, II Bd., II, "Die ideale Einheit der Species und die neuen Abstraktions Theorien", translated by Marvin Farber, The Foundation of Phenomenology (Cambridge, 1943), chapterIX,251f. 12. Charles Hampden-Turner,"On the Future of American Political Science Education: Progress in Political Thought as Periodically Subversive." A paper presented at The American Political Science Convention in Chicago in September, 1971 (Ann Arbor, Michigan: University Microfilms), p. 5.
chapters ii, iv, vii, viii, xII; and the essay "The Objectivism-Subjectivism of Modern

ResearchNotes &Provocations 271 In this light, going back to perceptionsand individualuniqueness.13 be eitheran extremely one must Singer's originalassumption, supposedly conservativesystemstheorist (evaluatingconsistentlyfrom that "outer" liberalphenomenologist level) or an extremely onlyfrom"inner" (judging valuesand perceptions).To combineboth perspectives (to be a "moderto be logicallyexcludedin his view.Yet sucha synthesis ate") appears may be exactlywhatis required to build a humanistic scienceof international politics.That is, humanscholarshave no choice but to begin with a personal, subjectivevalue-stanceor take-offpoint (such as a human-needs orientation).But once this viewpointhas been made explicit,thereis no necessaryreason theoreticallyto exclude all data derived from other or disciplines. In fact, only by absorbing andtools the findings approaches resultingfrom the behavioralrevolutionin social science can a postbehavioralhumanisticscience of international politics come into being. One of the most incisiveaspectsof a phenomenological is its approach
stress upon the intentions of the researcher and the people involved in

of American politicalactivity.Behavioralists (such as Singer) background intendprimarily to makeinternational into a science. The pragmapolitics tism and scientism of Americanacademicideologyhavepredisposed such scholarsto seek concretenessand quantification as ends in themselves. Humanistic on the otherhand,havea different post-behavioralists, primary intention.Basically they seek to make studies in international politics relevant to humanneedsandproblems of socialjustice.14 to By attempting uncoveran objectivescienceof international politics"OutThere,"many behavioralists slip easily into the fallacy of reification-much as natural law theorists did sometime ago. The primary valueof suchtheoristsoften ends up being the discoveryof laws and stabilityfactorsin international politics ratherthan the impactof immediateinternational politics upon humanneeds. III. Dereifying andSimulation Models Systems,Balance-of-Power, and simulation modelshold Systemstheory,balance-of-power constructs,
13. For a detailed explanation of this conception of the liberal-conservative dimension see Silvan Tomkins, "Left and Right: A Basic Dimension of Ideology and Personality," The Study of Lives, edited by Robert W. White (N.Y.: Atherton, 1963), pp. 391-2. 14. The distinction between behavioralismand post-behavioralismis dealt with in
detail in Politics for Human Beings, chapter 9; as well as in The Post-behavioral Era,

edited by George J. Graham and George W. Carey (N.Y.: David McKay, 1972).

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at least one assumption in common: that there is a "system" or set of interrelated elements "Out There" which can be discovered and manipulated towards equilibrium or stability.15In some respects, this is merely a new version of classic natural law assumptions, cast into terms of "scientific" respectability, but still subject to the criticisms raised by Hume long ago: any deductive proof of a matter of fact is impossible. In short, deductive theorists who begin with an assumed conceptual system tend to confuse relationshipsbetween ideas with relationshipsbetween facts. And such a methodology can never be used to demonstrate the existence of "matters of fact," much less any "necessary" causal relationships between facts.16 The mental process of moving from deductive abstractions to claims of concreteness and causality is, of course, reification. Such reificationis easily illustrated.For example, one influentialsystems theorist in internationalpolitics, Morton Kaplan, wrote the following in his System and Process in International Politics: "A social system is motivated as truly as an individual human being. .... If a political system has delusions of omnipotence, this is likely ... ," etc.17 Although Harold and Margaret Sprout (among others) pointed out the fallacies of such reification in systems theory some time ago, many theorists in international politics have yet to take these criticisms to heart.18For instance, consider the claims of the classic balance-of-power theorist, Hans Morgenthau, in a recent edition of Politics Among Nations: It will be shown in the following pages that the international balance of power is only a particularmanifestation of a general social principle to which all societies composed of a number of autonomous units owe the autonomy of their component parts; that the balance of power and policies aiming at its preservation are not only inevitable but are an essential stabilizing factor in a society of nations; and that
15. For various approachesto systems theory which all embrace this assumption see: Society for the Advancement of General Systems Theory, General Systems (Ann Arbor: Michigan, 1956), I, Part i; Talcott Parsons and Edward Shils, Toward a General Theory of Action (N.Y.: Harper and Row, 1962); and, David Easton, A SystemsAnalysis of Political Life (N.Y.: John Wiley, 1965). 16. See David Hume, Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40); and D.G.C. Macnabb, David Hume: His Theory of Knowledge and Morality (London: 1951). 17. Morton A. Kaplan, System and Process in InternationalPolitics (N.Y.: John Wiley, 1957), 253ff. 18. See Harold and Margaret Sprout, The Ecological Perspective on Human Affairs-with Special Reference to InternationalPolitics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1965), 34-41, 210. And also see Marion Levy's brilliant "Does It Matter If He's Naked Bawled the Child?"in Klaus Knorr and James Rosenau, eds., ContendingApproachesto InternationalPolitics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton, 1969).

ResearchNotes &Provocations 273 the instability of the international balanceof poweris due not to the of the principle faultiness butto the particular underwhich conditions the principle mustoperatein a societyof sovereign nations.19 assumeshere not only that a systemof necessaryrelationMorgenthau shipsexists "OutThere,"but thatthis systemis basedupon an inevitable is principleof a tendencytowardsstabilization. Morgenthau's "principle" Thatis, Morgenthauism unfalsifiable. falls intothe samecategory in which W.G. Runcimanplaced doctrinaire versions of Marxism,Freudianism, and Catholicism: "It is what is sometimesdescribedas the 'closed'characterof all three systemswhichrendersthem immuneto evidencein the way that a theoryin the naturalsciencesnevercan be. It is not that the holderof such a beliefmay neverchangehis mind,but that if he does the than by either the ice-cream process is better describedas 'conversion' model ('he decidedhe didn'tlike it afterall') or the natural sciencemodel
('his evidence failed to confirm his hypothesis')."
20

Most simulationmodels, particularly the popular INS ("Internation TEMPER and Simulation") ("Technological,Economic, Military, and PoliticalEvaluation outine") models,are also subjectto the self-fulfilling reification that Runciman refersto as the "closed"character of such systems.21 Simulation theoriststend to reify concreteeconomicand military indicators thatcan be easilyquantified andoperationalized, underthereby andpsychosocial modfactors.In addition,simulation ratingnonmaterial els normallyassume (1) rationality on the part of decision-makers, and will act to stabilizeboth theirown positionsand (2) thatdecision-makers the political"systems" in which they operate.To criticizethese assumptions in depth is a severalvolumeundertaking. For the purposesof this essay, sufficeit to say that ( 1) an emphasisuponconcreteeconomic,and factorsusuallymeansa deemphasis (to the pointof omission) of military andculturalfactors;(2) assuming that stabilindividualistic, humanistic,
ization of the status quo is the first priority means that social changes,
19. Hans Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, Fourth Edition (N.Y.: Alfred Knopf, 1967), 161. The italics are mine. 20. W. G. Runciman,Social Science and Political Theory (Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1965), 162. 21. Summariesof the complex INS and TEMPERmodels can be found in William D. Coplin, Simulation in the Study of Politics (Chicago: MarkhamPublishing Co., 1968), 7-111. Also see Harold Guetzkow et al., Simulation in InternationalRelations: Developments for Research and Teaching (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: PrenticeHall, 1963); and Clark C. Abt and Morton Gorden, "Report on Project TEMPER" (prepared for the Institute on Computers and the Policy Making Community, University of California, Lawrence Radiation Laboratory,April 1966).

274 Research Notes &Provocations and or revolutionary, will tend to be seen as "dysfunctional" evolutionary thereforewill not be evaluatedin termsof theirimportant nuances;(3) not only is "rationality" in the realworldof political a dubiousassumption rational but, as Nazi concentration decision-making, campsdemonstrated, simulation can be the aim of inhumaneand undesirable.If efficiency modelsin international politicsis not to replicatethe real world,they are useful only as heuristicfictions-like Plato's Republic.If, on the other hand, they do claim to replicatethe most dominantaspects of the real reifications that tend to promotethe world, they are anti-individualistic andpoliticalstatusquo. economic,military Politics IV. Towards A Phenomenology of International can be used to solve the level-of-analysis problemand to Phenomenology and "the as actor" nation-state abstractions such as "the dereifypopular forces in the international Moreover, process, phenomenology system." or value intentions to their thinkers make assumptions primary political consistencyin theirmethod explicitand to maintaina rigorousempirical of analysis. method-first developedby EdmundHusserl The phenomenological
-involves three basic steps:22 (1) Consciously attend to phenomena as they appear in experi-

makesrigorously ence. Thisdata-first applied phenomenolapproach of methods.For initiallythe observer ogy one of the most empirical as andlook freshlyat phenomena mustsuspendold valuejudgments if for the firsttime-as they actuallyappearto him in his experience.
(2) Reduce the phenomena to the aspects essential in their particular presentation to you by bracketing out the unnecessary. After

lookingat an objector actionfreshly,questionits taken-for-granted to its essentialaspects. aspectsto cut downits meaning in everyor experience wouldthispoliticalphenomenon assumptions been life not have possible? day Thismethodcan be easilyusedto "solve"the level-of-analysis problem of international thatplaguesthe literature politics.Roughlyspeaking,this
22. Edmund Husserl (1859-1938) fathered phenomenological philosophy in his
Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology, Boyce translation (New York:

(3) Examine the essences you perceive to uncover the workings of consciousness that make them possible. Or ask: without which

1931). For an expanded everyday explanation of phenomenology and applications of the method to internationalpolitics and to the other subfieldsof political science
see Politics for Human Beings.

Research Notes & Provocations

275

problem involves the assumption that separable perspectives or levels of analysis exist that tend to be mutually exclusive. That is, I may investigate the phenomena of international politics from the level of individual decision-making or the nation-state level or the level of the international system. To mix these perspectives is claimed to be confusing or theoretically disastrous (according to theorists as J. David Singer). But the phenomenologist comes to a differentconclusion. Notice how the three steps of the phenomenological method (referring to the numbering above) can dissolve the level-of-analysis problem into a definition of personal intention, background and consciousness. (1 ) If the point of departurefor the observer is the lived world of "Here and Now," his immediate perception of international phenomena is not "Out-There," abstracted from his own subjective world. For example, I first consciously experienced international politics in traveling to Switzerland at 16. The international relations I experienced were made up of mutual intersubjective experiences: my cultural upbringingand perceptions conflicted with and adjusted to those of particular Swiss people. Though I had previously experienced Swiss watches and films about Swiss mountain climbing, these were not international politics for me. Even newspaper accounts of international conflicts involving lands like Switzerland were not meaningful politics in terms of my experience, but were just contemporary history. In the first instance, international politics for me meant my personal interactions with Swiss people-with people associated with another culture, another life-style, another place, another upbringing. (2) In reducing my firstexperience of internationalpolitics to its essence I find (a) a personal intersubjective experience between two or more people with different cultural backgrounds, (b) a foreign life-style and language, (c) vague memories of things I was taught and told about "the Swiss" and "Switzerland"-images of specific nationalities and nationstates, and (d) the meaning of specific social interactions-"the social reality"-was the result of the intentional construction of relationships of the people involved. International politics becomes meaningful through the subjective interactions of foreign people, foreign languages, and cultural symbols. The notions of "nation-state"or "the international system" only become meaningful to me by reference to their particular concrete expressions in my own personal experience. Likewise, others arrive at generalized notions about international politics through their particular experience and background. The subjective meanings of all people in specific places and times taken together is the intersubjective essence of international politics. (3) In trying to analyze the workings of consciousness that make possible the essences of international politics that I derived above, I dis-

276 ResearchNotes &Provocations covered a complex of subjectiveattitudesrangingbetween extremesof similarityand difference,cooperationand conflict,based upon personal
experiences and cultural upbringings.International consciousness involves the willingness of two or more people from different cultures to be empathetic enough to communicate their intentions by momentarily stepping into the shoes of each other in order to construct a particularsocial reality mutually defined in terms of similarities and diferences. Whether such

interaction leadsto conflictor cooperation dependsuponthepsychological involved-a resultof theirpersonal and ideologicalrigidityof the people in theirnationalcommunities. andnationalization needs,upbringing, V. Conclusion of international Thisessayrepresents merelya prefaceto a phenomenology Its of the level-of-analysis problem.23 politics based on a dereification focus has been upon the intention,basic assumptions,and languageof science scholarsin international politics.I have arguedthat a humanistic between the tensions must of international analyzing begin by politics and existingsocial facts that either specifichumanneeds and perceptions of thistensionconstitutes frustrate or helpto satisfysuchneeds.Awareness of the in the human for consciousness being question.Awareness political concultures various from of different consciousnesses people political scienceof international stitutesthe beginningof a humanistic politics on the part of politicalscientists."Sciencefor its own sake"becomesbitter if it fails to startwith andaim towardshumanneedsin a world reification for so manypeople as ours is. A social scienceof interso dehumanizing nationalpoliticsshouldopenly admitthat it beginswith the very human And to cultural coloredby particular of scholars, upbringings. perceptions to the to be relevant intend be humane, such a social science should of health and survival resolutionof politicalproblemsthat threatenthe theirbasicneedsfail to be satisfied. humanbeingswherever
23. This essay representspart of an on-going research project that will result in Press, Individuals and World Politics (North Scituate, Mass.: Wadsworth-Duxbury 1975). Other work relevant to this perspective includes: Kyung-WonKim, Revolution and InternationalSystem (N.Y.: New York University Press, 1970); Thomas Franck and Edward Weisband, World Politics (N.Y.: Oxford University Press, (Chicago: Henry Regnery Co., 1972); William Eckhardt, "Social Psychology and the Effectivenessof Human Systems"in Abraxas, i, 2 (Winter, 1971), 135-145; and
Politics for Human Beings. 1972); Hwa Yol Jung, editor, Existential Phenomenology and Political Theory