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The Stopping Power of Sources

Implied Causal Mechanisms and Historical Interpretations in (Mearsheimer’s) Arguments on the Russo-Ukrainian War
  • Jonas J. Driedger EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: June 8, 2023
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Analyse & Kritik
From the journal Analyse & Kritik Volume 45 Issue 1

Abstract

The article analyzes arguments, made by John J. Mearsheimer and others, that the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was largely caused by Western policy. It finds that these arguments rely on a partially false and incomplete reading of history. To do so, the article identifies a range of premises that are both foundational to Mearsheimer’s claims and based on implied or explicit historical interpretations. This includes the varying policies of Ukraine toward NATO and the EU as well as the changing Russian perceptions thereof; the political upheavals in Ukraine in early 2014 that were immediately succeeded by the annexation of Crimea and the war in Donbass; and the supposed absence of Russian ‘imperialism’ toward Ukraine prior to 2014. Finding that these interpretations do not hold up in light of relevant and available data, the article qualifies and contextualizes the validity of Mearsheimer’s arguments, points to superior ones, and highlights the need for case-specific expertise when using explanatory theory to make sense of politically salient ongoing events.

Keywords: realism; Russia; Ukraine; international relations theory; offensive realism; revolution of dignity; NATO-Russia relations
Corresponding author: Jonas J. Driedger, Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF/HSFK) and Regional Research Center ‘Transformations of Political Violence’ (TraCe), Frankfurt, Germany, E-mail:

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Published Online: 2023-06-08
Published in Print: 2023-05-27

© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Editorial
  3. Editorial
  4. Focus: Democracy under Polarization
  5. Democracy, Civility, and Semantic Descent
  6. Informal Networked Deliberation: How Mass Deliberative Democracy Really Works
  7. From Prejudice to Polarization and Rejection of Democracy
  8. Ethics and Affect in Resistance to Democratic Regressions
  9. A Polarization-Containing Ethics of Campaign Advertising
  10. General Part
  11. The Stopping Power of Sources
  12. Discussion
  13. Practice Theory as a Tool for Critical Social Theory
  14. The Society of Singularities: Reply to Four Critics
https://doi.org/10.1515/auk-2023-2006
Keywords for this article
realism; Russia; Ukraine; international relations theory; offensive realism; revolution of dignity; NATO-Russia relations

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Editorial
  3. Editorial
  4. Focus: Democracy under Polarization
  5. Democracy, Civility, and Semantic Descent
  6. Informal Networked Deliberation: How Mass Deliberative Democracy Really Works
  7. From Prejudice to Polarization and Rejection of Democracy
  8. Ethics and Affect in Resistance to Democratic Regressions
  9. A Polarization-Containing Ethics of Campaign Advertising
  10. General Part
  11. The Stopping Power of Sources
  12. Discussion
  13. Practice Theory as a Tool for Critical Social Theory
  14. The Society of Singularities: Reply to Four Critics
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