Rothbard’s Theory of International Relations and the State

Murray Rothbard is well known as an opponent of warfare perpetrated by states. This includes acts of war by states against other states, as well as acts of war by states against non-state organizations and individuals. Consequently, Rothbard’s historical scholarship and his political commentary is characterized by consistent opposition to aggressive warfare and imperialism as practiced by states in general, and by the United States government in particular. 

Rothbard’s normative analysis of foreign policy and international relations is quite clear in his many prescriptive statements calling for fewer wars, smaller wars, and more limited warfare in general. In this, Rothbard follows a long tradition of libertarian or radical “classical liberal” theorists. 

But did Rothbard provide us with a positive or descriptive analysis of international relations? That is, did Rothbard have a value-free theory of international relations describing the structure of the international system? The answer is yes if we extrapolate from his analysis of the nature of the state and how states interact with each other. 

The Fundamental Characteristics of Rothbard’s International System 

Rothbard’s description of international relations is characterized by four key tenets of states and their foreign policy: 

The international system is anarchic. States are controlled by an oligarchic ruling elite insulated from non-state actors, and a state’s foreign policy is primarily determined by the state’s elites who seek to preserve the system. Above all else, states seek to preserve themselves, and they seek to expand their own power, relative to other states, when possible. War can be a tool of domestic policy. In some cases, states tend toward war because wars offer an opportunity for states to expand the state’s power over the domestic population. 

The Anarchic System

In his essay “War, Peace, and the State,” Rothbard writes: 

In the modern world, each land area is ruled over by a State organization, but there are a number of States scattered over the earth, each with a monopoly of violence over its own territory. No super-State exists with a monopoly of violence over the entire world; and so a state of “anarchy” exists between the several States. 

This observation is hardly unique to Rothbard, and has been employed by international relations scholars from several different schools for many decades. Scholars differ on what they believe to be the implications and outcomes of the anarchic system, however. For Rothbard, the international system is characterized by violence partly because it is dominated by states—which are institutions founded on coercion. Rothbard recognizes, of course, that not all states are equally aggressive all the time. Some states are revisionist states and others are defensive, status quo states. This varies with the state of the international system at various times.  Moreover, state violence is often traced back to previous acts of state violence, as in the case of the post-World War I revisionist states which were reacting to the harsh provisions imposed by the victorious allies. Because states are focused on their own interests and preservation, states will only engage in international cooperation when it is of benefit to the state itself. What is of benefit to the ordinary people of each state—i.e., peace, freedom, and free trade—is rarely of primary importance to those who decide foreign policy.  

States Are Ruled by a Small Minority 

Central to Rothbard’s view of the state is the fact that “’we’ are not the government; the government is not ‘us.’ The government does not in any accurate sense ‘represent’ the majority of the people.”  This view has its origins in classical-liberal exploitation theory, and it is certainly reflected in Rothbard’s view of international relations. For examine, in For a New Liberty, Rothbard writes:

the normal and continuing condition of the State is oligarchic rule: rule by a coercive elite which has managed to gain control of the State machinery. There are two basic reasons for this: one is the inequality and division of labor inherent in the nature of man, which gives rise to an “Iron Law of Oligarchy” in all of man’s activities; and second is the parasitic nature of the State enterprise itself. 

Overall, Rothbard accepted the main tenets of elitism as he also shows when he writes: 

for the oligarchic rule of the State is its parasitic nature—the fact that it lives coercively off the production of the citizenry. To be successful to its practitioners, the fruits of parasitic exploitation must be confined to a relative minority, otherwise a meaningless plunder of all by all would result in no gains for anyone.

For Rothbard, this holds true whether or not a regime is allegedly a democracy, and the presence of democratic institutions does not fundamentally change a state’s behavior in the international sphere. Rothbard notes that, in evaluating state behavior in war: 

The theoretical reason why focusing on democracy or dictatorship misses the point is that States—all States—rule their population and decide whether or not to make war. And all States, whether formally a democracy or dictatorship or some other brand of rule, are run by a ruling elite. Whether or not these elites, in any particular case, will make war upon another State is a function of a complex interweaving web of causes, including temperament of the rulers, the strength of their enemies, the inducements for war, public opinion. While public opinion has to be gauged in either case, the only real difference between a democracy and a dictatorship on making war is that in the former more propaganda must be beamed at one’s subjects to engineer their approval. Intensive propaganda is necessary in any case—as we can see by the zealous opinion-moulding behavior of all modern warring States. 

States Seek Self-Preservation

The implications of this are significant for Rothbard’s view of international relations. Because the state is controlled by an exploitative elite, the loss of state power could mean the loss of riches and power for the ruling class. Thus, the ruling class prioritizes preservation of the state as a means of preserving the ruling class’s own power.  

Moreover, the ruling class goes to pains to exclude public participation in foreign-policy decision making as much as possible. Historian Ralph Raico has noted, for example, that foreign policy institutions are consistently among the least democratic institutions in any state. This is shown in the preponderance of official government secrets in foreign policy activities and by the presence of shadowy anti-democratic institutions like the CIA. Secrecy, which is specifically designed to exclude ordinary taxpayers from the decision-making process, is central to modern states’ war making apparatus. 

The ruling class’s efforts to keep a tighter grip on foreign policy decisions is due in part to the fact that matters of war and peace are very high stakes for the ruling class. Rothbard writes in “The Anatomy of the State”: 

What the State fears above all, of course, is any fundamental threat to its own power and its own existence. The death of a State can come about in two major ways: (a) through conquest by another State, or (b) through revolutionary overthrow by its own subjects— in short, by war or revolution. War and revolution, as the two basic threats, invariably arouse in the State rulers their maximum efforts and maximum propaganda among the people. As stated above, any way must always be used to mobilize the people to come to the State’s defense in the belief that they are defending themselves. 

Fundamentally, states fight to preserve themselves and not to preserve or protect ordinary taxpayers and property owners, although the state’s propagandists work to hide this fact. Rothbard adds:   

The root myth that enables the State to wax fat off war is the canard that war is a defense by the State of its subjects. The facts, of course, are precisely the reverse. For if war is the health of the State, it is also its greatest danger. A State can only “die” by defeat in war or by revolution. In war, therefore, the State frantically mobilizes the people to fight for it against another State, under the pretext that it is fighting for them.

While revolutionary upheavals are always of concern to the ruling class, on a day-to-day basis, it is generally the war making power of other states that a ruling class fears. Thus, as Rothbard writes: 

inter-State relations must occupy much of a State’s time and energy. The natural tendency of a State is to expand its power, and externally such expansion takes place by conquest of a territorial area. Unless a territory is stateless or uninhabited, any such expansion involves an inherent conflict of interest between one set of State rulers and another. Only one set of rulers can obtain a monopoly of coercion over any given territorial area at any one time: complete power over a territory by State X can only be obtained by the expulsion of State Y.  

Given that victory in war is not guaranteed, however, it would therefore be a mistake to assume that states mindlessly pursue new wars and conflicts at all times. While it is true that wars can produce large gains for states in terms of expanding territory and power, wars can also be disastrous for states when wars go badly. Therefore, in many cases, states will opt for the maintenance of the status quo when that is perceived by the ruling class to be the best strategy for preserving the state’s survival.  Thus, Rothbard concludes that although warfare “will be an ever-present tendency of States,” it will nonetheless be “punctuated by periods of peace and by shifting alliances and coalitions between States” when aggressive warfare is perceived to be too risky. 

War Is Often a Tool of Domestic Policy 

States are generally open to expanding their power at the expense of other states. However, Rothbard notes that states also employ wars against foreign states as a means of consolidating power domestically.  

For example, in his essay “World War I as Fulfillment,” Rothbard explores how “the war came to the United States as the “fulfillment,” the culmination, the veritable apotheosis of progressivism in American life.” Specifically, the war—and its value as a means of expanding pro-state propaganda—offered the American state a chance to greatly expand socialist central planning and federal police powers. As Rothbard also noted many times, a similar relationship between war and the growth of domestic state powers could be similarly found with the Cold War. 

The potential benefits of growing state through international war is generally, in itself, not sufficient to induce a state to engage in risky warfare with peers. However, if the state has the opportunity to participate in wars against weak or distant states—as with the US’s many wars against small states after the end of the Cold War—this can provide a relatively “safe”—i.e., safe for the state—means of expanding state power. 

Conclusion

In these writings on the nature of the state, we find what constitutes Rothbard’s view of the international system as it is. States exist and they are each controlled by a self-interested ruling class. Unfortunately, this is the reality we have to work with. For Rothbard, the way things should be is another matter entirely, and in this area Rothbard maintained that the pursuit of peace and human rights requires consistent opposition to international war, arms races, conscription, police states, and all other institutions and strategies and enhance any state’s war making power.