Mechanistic Assumptions and United States Strategy
| Author | Richard Stubbs,Robin Ranger |
| Date | 01 September 1978 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070207803300304 |
| Published date | 01 September 1978 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
RICHARD
STUBBS
&
ROBIN
RANGER
Mechanistic
assumptions
and
United
States
strategy
A
new
awareness
is
beginning
to
pervade
the
literature
on
strategic
theory.
The
problems
of
generalizing
across
time
and
across
cul-
tures
are
ever more
apparent:
as
one
analyst
has
noted,
'strategists
are
becoming
aware of
the
time-specific
and
ethnocentric
roots
of
their
strategic
wisdom."
Articles
of
faith,
such
as
the
assertion
that
the theorists
of
the
late
195os
and
early
196os
'provided
an
intellec-
tual
apparatus
which
seems
to
be
standing
up
to
the
test
of
time
and
is
perfectly
adequate
for
analysing present
strategic policies
and
most
of the
technological
and political
problems
likely
to
occur
in
the
foreseeable
future,'
2
are
being questioned.
Indeed,
the
're-
ceived
wisdom'
of
the
first
generation
of
theorists
is
being
sceptical-
ly
evaluated
not
only
by
second-generation
theorists
but
also
by
those who
have
been
given
the
responsibility
of
turning
theory
into
practice.
Fred
IklW,
formerly
head
of
the
United
States
Arms
Con-
trol
and
Disarmament
Agency,
noted
during
his
tenure
in
office
that
'perhaps
it
is
time
for
us
...
to behave
like
anthropologists,
sensitive
to
the uncertainties
in
our
views
of
the world
and
willing
to
study
our
own
cultural
straitjackets
as
well
as
those
of
our
ad-
versaries.
Such
relativism
will
permit
a
deeper
understanding
of
the
limitations
of
calculations
and
analyses
and
permit
us
to
de-
Richard
Stubbs
is
assistant
professor
and
Robin
Ranger
associate
professor
in
the
Department
of
Political
Science,
St
Francis
Xavier
University, Antigonish,
Nova
Scotia.
Professor
Ranger
is
the
author
of
a forthcoming
book,
Arms
and
Politics:
The
Politics
of
Arms
Control,
z958-68.
i
Colin
S.
Gray,
'Dtente,
Arms
Control
and
Strategy:
Perspectives
on
SALT,'
Amer-
ican
Political
Science
Review,
Lxx
(December
1976), 1254.
2
John
Garnett,
ed,
Theories
of
Peace
and
Security:
A
Reader
in
Contemporary
Strategic
Thought
(London
1970),
p
24.
558
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
velop
preventive
policies
that
pay
more
attention
to
uncertainty.'
3
Certainly,
improvements
in
strategic
theory
and
the
resultant
poli-
cies
can
be achieved
only
if
the
premises
and
assumptions
of
estab-
lished
theories
are
fully
understood
and
critically
reassessed.
This
article
is
part
of
the
reassessment
process.
Essentially
we
are
arguing
that
mechanistic
assumptions
have
played
a
crucial
role
in
pushing
the
development
of American
stra-
tegic
theory
along
questionable
lines.
First,
the
strands of
the
cultural
and
intellectual
web
which
have
fostered
a
mechanistic
view
of
strategic
conflict
are
detailed.
Secondly,
the
ways
in
which
the
bureaucratic
and
political
processes
have
bolstered
mechanistic
assumptions
about
strategic
policies
are
assessed.
Finally,
the
arms
control
policies
of
the
United
States,
rooted
in
these
mechanistic
assumptions, are
analysed.
Mechanistic
images
of
society,
and
also,
often
by
way
of con-
trast,
organismic
images, have
suffused
the
analysis of
many
a
phi-
losopher
and
social
theorist.
4
The
mechanistic
view
of
the
world
is
based
on
the assertion
that
the
world
may
be
divided
into
a
series
of
relatively
independent
and
closed
systems,
each
of which
is
com-
posed
of discrete
subsystems.
These
subsystems
are
linked
together
in
stable,
predictable
-
so
usually
quantifiable
-
relationships.
One
of
these
discrete
subsystems
is
assumed
to
be
dominant.
It
is
thus
able
to
affect
each
of
the
other
subsystems
at
will
while
in
no
way
changing the
other
links
within
the
system.
The
system
as
a
whole
is
usually considered
in
isolation
and
is
seen
as
an
aggregate,
equal
to,
but
no
more
than,
the
sum
of
its
parts.
The
nature and
product
of
the
whole
system
may
thus
be
fairly
easily
analysed
by
examining
the
various
possible actions
of
the
dominant
subsystem:
part
of
the
3
Fred
C.
IkW6,
'The
Prevention
of
Nuclear
War
in
a
World
of
Uncertainty,'
Policy
Sciences,
vu
(June
1976),
250.
4
Among
the many
interesting
discussions
of these
topics,
particularly
as
they relate
to
aspects
of
political
science,
see
Martin Landau,
Political
Theory
and
Political
Science:
Studies
in
the
Methodology
of
Political
Inquiry
(New York
1972),
PP
78-1i2;
Karl
W.
Deutsch, 'Mechanism,
Organism
and
Society: Some
Models
in
Natural
and
Social
Science,'
Philosophy
of
Science,
xvm
(July
ig5i),
230-52;
and
Donald
D. Searing,
'Models
and
Images
of Man
and
Society
in
Leadership
Theory,'
Journal
of
Politics,
xxxi (February
1969),
3-31.
The
following
discussion
of
mechanistic
and
organismic
models
owes
much
to
these
sources.
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