'BLAME' AS INTERNATIONAL BEHAVIOR
A contribution to inter-state interaction theory*
By
HELGE H V E E M
International Peace Research Institute, Oslo
1. Introduction
The intention of this paper is to present
some ideas on the role of a dimension
which has relevance to several fields of
International Relations theory: to a theory of conflict, to the theory of sanctions, or generally to a theory of interstate interactions. This is the 'blamepraise' dimension.
Two assumptions lie at the basis of
the proposal that this dimension is worthwhile studying. First, that it may be
separated analytically as a specific form
of inter-state behavior. Second, that it is
related to some fundamental aspects of
the international system and its actors.
I postulate that high prestige or 'good
reputation' is of some value to all actors
in the system, and that consequently
they will seek 'praise' to avoid 'blame'.
Or, as North et al. have noted, the behavior of a state
can be viewed as adjustment activities in the
effort to achieve an optimal balance of unavoidable punishment to preferred reward.
1
The case for this postulate should be
relatively clear. The widespread criticism
of the United States' policy and presence
in Vietnam is and must be of some concern to the US government. The outside
blaming which the invasion of Czechoslovakia inflicted upon the Soviet Union
and allied states' leadership must have
been considered or at least strongly felt
afterwards by the same states. Even if
the super powers would probably be less
hurt by blame than smaller powers, they
4 Journal of Peace Research
would consider it to be in their 'national
interest' to be 'praised' or 'rewarded', and
to avoid being 'blamed' or 'punished'.
The case is also found in the informal
rule of the international system that bad
behavior ought to be criticized, i.e. it is
a 'moral obligation' for any actor in the
system to act out against those actors
who break the formal or informal standards of behavior of the system. Such a
view is seen behind the thinking of many
leaders of smaller states who see it as
their duty to act as the 'bad conscience'
of the world. In particular it is seen in
the philosophy of the 'actively neutralist'
countries.
'Blame' or 'praise' may also be deliberately chosen acts where others forms
of behavior are not available, or where
this particular form of behavior is preferred to other available forms. To some
states, particularly the small ones which
lack other resources, blaming may be
the only form available. In this respect
it may not even be related to any particular act or behavioral trend which 'deserves' blame.
2
2. Definitions and scope
By the term 'blame' I mean an act of
criticism, verbal or written, by one actor of another; it is an act of negative
evaluation. 'Praise' on the other hand is
understood as an act of approval or of
expressing positive evaluations. For an
act of blame or praise to be relevant to
international politics, it has to be communicated by a representative of the
50
Helge Hveem
blaming (praising) actor, the sender, and
recognized by a representative of the
blamed, the receiver, and/or by third
parties. A representative is an official
governmental or diplomatic person
whose status is recognized by formal
or informal conventions.
The role or junction of blame and
praise is at least potentially manifold.
It has potential relevance to four very
basic dimensions of international politics: the conflict vs. peace, the violent
vs. non-violent, the integrative vs. disintegrative, and the balancing or equilibrating vs. imbalancing dimensions.
To give some examples: blame is a
form of (negative) conflict behavior,
while praise (most often?) is peaceful
or peace-creating behavior. Further,
blame is a form of non-violent conflict
behavior. Even further, blame and praise
may have both integrative and disintegrative functions, depending on what
level of the system one is studying, and
on certain other factors. Lastly, blame
and praise may have consequences for
the internal equilibrium of an international system, both in the equilibrating
and the disequilibrating direction.
For analytic purposes, one may distinguish between four systems: the sender;
the receiver; the sender-receiver relationship; and the wider, environmental
system of sender, receiver and third
parties. Since I am particularly concerned with relational aspects of state
behavior, in state interaction I shall
focus on the latter two systems.
Blame and praise may be the result
of, result in, or in some way be related
to other forms of state behavior or
interaction between states. Blaming
another state is of course, or should at
least be, 'due to something'. In most
cases it may be seen as a response to
an act performed by another, but as we
know this is not always so: there is always the case of the alleged plot, sub-
version etc. and blaming in such cases
may be due to other factors or aims on
behalf of the sender. Acts of blaming
and praising of course will have to be
correlated with other forms of interaction to look after possible (causal) relations.
I should also stress that I chose to
focus on state behavior, i.e. the national
state is our unit. One could very well
have applied our ideas to interaction
between other units, e.g. intrastate units
interacting with corresponding units in
other states or with the very states themselves. Thus, in the case of the trade
union or the national students' association of one particular country voicing
very strong criticisms against some other
country with the result that an official
(state) protest (response blaming) from
the receiver is directed against the
corresponding official level of the sender, there might be the problem of
deciding what is state interaction and
what is not.
Blame (praise) may be act-oriented
(specific-oriented) or structure-oriented
(general-oriented). The act-oriented
blame aims at criticizing concrete political acts and change policy. The structure-oriented blame criticizes, seeks to
change or even destroy the structure of
the given system (ranging from the interaction system between the two actors
to the environmental, global system). A
third category would probably be actororiented blame, aimed at reducing an
actor's position, without necessarily
being aimed at structural change.
This distinction is made mainly for
analytical reasons; of course there will
be combinations of the two types of
orientation. Moreover, even if that has
not been intended by the sender, the
act of blame for the purpose of changing
policy may very often have the consequence of changing the structure, or
vice versa. To take only two, in this
'Blame' as International Behavior
respect, contrary examples: the blaming
of South Africa for its policy of apartheid is mainly oriented at changing this
very policy, but has probably had greater
success in lowering this country's prestige in the world and worsening its
structural position in other respects; and
the case of the victorious belligerents'
treatment of Germany after World War
I is probably an example of purposive
blaming oriented at reducing that actor's
prestige and position generally and
through this also changing its 'warmongering' policy.
There may seem to be an almost
necessary connection between act-orientation and structure-orientation, in the
sense that one empirically would find
very few cases where the two aspects
may be separated and did not in some
way and to some degree, go together.
Take the example of Sweden's blaming
of the US policy in Vietnam. It might
probably be stated (and I think some
Swedish official did it) that this kind of
blaming was only aimed at changing the
policy pursued and did not in any way
aim at attacking the very position or
prestige of the US government generally.
But US officials evidently did not take it
that way: they perceived the criticism
primarily as a means used by a Western
country (that was the bad thing) to
reduce its very prestige, in Swedish
opinion and in the world.
3
4
The forms of blaming or praising
behavior are many. One may distinguish between open and closed communication. Open blaming is the criticisms voiced in a speech by some state
official, or generally the acts of political
blaming which become generally or
publicly known (to a greater audience,
and to third states); closed blaming is
the way of criticizing through diplomatic
channels secretly and without calling
the attention of third states. But another
and a more important discrimination is
4
51
that between strong and moderate or
weak blaming.
3. The measurement of blame
The task of constructing scales for the
measurement of the intensity of state
behavior along the non-violent to violent, or weakly to strongly blame-oriented behavior, have been taken up by several authors. Although starting from
somewhat different conceptions of the
range and forms of behavior, North et
al. in their crisis analysis, Rummel on
conflict behavior, and McClelland et al.
with their 'event-interaction' study have
all developed scales and methods, parts
of which may be adapted to my purpose.
In the following, I shall deal only
with the blame aspect of behavior or
interaction, as I am particularly interested in conflict behavior. This leaves
out a discussion of praise as positive
sanction, a type of behavior which
seems to be much neglected in literature.
On the other hand, although I have
started from the assumption that blame
and praise were the two ends of one
continuum, making blame-praise interaction a zero-sum game, I have the
feeling that this assumption under certain conditions may be wrong.
The diplomatic language, both as
open and as closed communication,
seems to be based on a cotume which
consists of relatively commonly shared
standards of behavior. When non-diplomatic behavior - the distinction between diplomatic, or formalized behavior and non-diplomatic is neither sharp
nor particularly important - is considered, classification is more problematic.
Rummel offers a typology of conflict
behavior, which ranks twelve more or
less distinct types of behavior from
'Anti-foreign demonstrations' as the
least, 'War' as the most conflicting type
of behavior. Zinnes has a corresponding
5
6
7
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Helge Hveem
number of categories, while McClelland
and his collaborators, Martin and Young,
use a higher number.
To some extent differences between
these authors are semantic or conceptual rather than theoretical and methodological. What they share is an emphasis
on non-violent forms of behavior, while
Kahn in his well-known escalation ladder concentrates on violent behavior.
While Kahn's scheme for my purposes
is too unspecific on the non-violent behavior side, I believe on the other hand
that the classification should not be too
specific or detailed either. Martin and
Young in their study have collapsed the
initial twenty-three into eight categories,
which seems to be more appropriate
both methodologically and theoretically.
Rummel on the one hand, Martin and
Young, and Zinnes on the other differ
in their ranking of one category of
blame, consisting of repulsion of diplomatic representatives or breaking of diplomatic relations etc., the former ranking
such acts low, the latter high. I am inclined to take the latter's position. As I
said before, it may be a problem to
decide what constitutes the bottom and
the top of the scale, i.e. what acts should
be considered the most moderate forms
of blame, and what acts occur at a point
where the conflict is escalated into the
threatening to use, or the outright use
of violence. Such problems evidently
will have to be decided on the basis of
empirical evidence.
8
9
One may introduce several indicators
of strong-weak blame to make the scale
even more discriminating, but this would
certainly make such a measure too overloaded. I venture only two. Open blame
is generally stronger than closed and the
blame voiced by the top representatives
of an actor is stronger than when it is
voiced by someone lower down in the
internal hierarchy of that actor. Id est:
it is more of a blame when it comes
from President Nixon than from some
State Department spokesman.
The scale which I propose is partly
my own and partly based on those already mentioned. It is:
(1) Non-official
blame:
anti-foreign
demonstrations, v i o l a t i o n s of R's property
in S, etc.
(2) Official
blame:
Political or diplomatic
talks,
exchanges;
indirect
criticism,
initial 'points' are m a d e , disagreement
verified.
(3) Mild blame: m e m o r a n d u m , request of
explanation, direct criticism.
(4) Medium blame: complaints, protests, accusations.
(5) Strong blame: strong protests, threat of
reprisals, warning, d e m a n d of excuse,
h e a v y criticisms, expulsion of private
citizens.
(6) Punishment: repulsion of diplomatic representatives, breaking of diplomatic
relations, breaking of cultural agreements, etc.
(7) Strong punishment: outright denunciation,
breaking of political or military agreements, withdrawal f r o m alliance, etc.
Blame, of course, may be combined with
other acts and thus be bolstered up by
or bolster up those other acts or means
of conflict behavior. In that respect, we
may distinguish between four levels:
(1) B l a m e used alone.
(2) B l a m e c o m b i n e d with the threatening of
concrete, 'physical' punishment, e.g. econ o m i c sanctions - w h a t in the K a h n
ladder is called 'subcrisis maneuvering'.
(3) B l a m e c o m b i n e d with the implementation
of s u c h threats, a n d / o r the threatening of
serious physical punishment.
(4) B l a m e c o m b i n e d with the implementation
of serious physical punishment, e.g. severe
sanctions, m o b i l i z a t i o n of troops, acts of
military reprisals or warnings, etc.
Clearly, this is where we reach the
'brink' in the escalation process, where
the limit between non-violent and violent
conflict is reached and by-passed, and
where blame stops being the important
act and becomes ritualistic, merely accompanying the other, stronger acts of
conflict behavior.
'Blame' as International Behavior
What we have so far looked into is
the distinctions between strong and
moderate blaming. There are at least
three other dimensions for the qualification of the act of blaming: its volume,
its support, and its scope. Let us briefly
state what they imply.
The volume of blaming is the number of times the blame is made at different time points during a given period.
The support of the blame is expressed
by the number of actors taking part in
the blaming. The scope of the blame is
the number of issues which the blame is
based on. In one single expression of
these dimensions — volume, support and
scope taken together - I have what I
shall call the blame intensity.
4. Blame: purposes and consequences
What are the purposes of blaming? And
what are its consequences - intended
and non-intended? These questions will
occupy us for most of the rest of this
paper. In discussing them I shall make
use of the four dichotomies introduced
earlier. I have already taken the position that blame is definitely a kind of
non-violent behavior. Thus, when it is
accompanied with or 'overrided' by
violent behavior in some form or other,
we should no longer occupy ourselves
with blaming as the main behavioral
aspect, since the violent aspects will
usually be considered more important,
both to the two parties concerned, and
to third parties.
This is the situation where blaming
is used, or has as its consequence, to
escalate a conflict possibly onto the
'brink' where other and especially violent means are taken into use. But the
act of blaming may also be used for the
purpose of de-escalating a conflict, for
instance in the sense that the blamer for
some reason compensates for reducement in the use of violent (or other nonviolent) means by increasing the blame
53
volume and scope. His reason may be
that he wants to keep the total conflict
with another actor at the same level, or
as high as possible, but below the level
of violent conflict.
As already mentioned, blame may be
a means of policy chosen due to lack
of other means which can be used: the
case of the small power with no means
of military or economic sanctions to inflict or threaten is evident. But it may
also, both by the great and the small,
be deliberately chosen among several
means which may be at hand, some of
them violent. When an actor in a conflict situation chooses the non-violent
way of acting to violent means, easily
available and in some respects perceived
as more 'effective', this might be said
to be an important aspect. In some ways
it may even be said to constitute a
positive element of conflict behavior,
since non-violent behavior is preferred
to violent (a preference which most often
should be considered positive, although
important exceptions, e.g. the liberation
of occupied or colonized areas, may be
found) and since it provides a 'safetyvalve' both in a bilateral relationship,
and in the wider multi-actor system,
which may release latent aggression under control.
McClelland has put particular emphasis on analyzing the sources of and reasons for external opposition toward the
United States, and he has made several
proposals to that respect. Briefly, they
are: differing national interests; differing
national 'style'; war companionships are
weakened, i.e. a weakening of old loyalties; 'secondary conflicts'; ideological
differences; and what he calls 'collision
courses'. McClelland formulates a research program which inter alia will aim
at finding the ratio of American 'outputs' toward other actors to the opposition (and threatening opposition) from
outside.
10
54
Helge Hveem
While the program is sufficiently concrete to be a useful guide to others, it
seems too much based on the source
which the author himself names the national interest. The intent of this paper
is to look as much as possible for symmetry in the relationship between the
actors as well as try to keep a symmetric
outlook ourselves.
North et al. are more in line with
such principles. They also present a
number of hypotheses on the behavior
of a sender-receiver relationship, and
of the international system, in situations
of varying degrees of reward and punishment, or differing perceptions of, expectations of such outcomes. The senderreceiver relationship is most systematically explored by Rummel who more
than anyone else has developed behavior
analysis on the level of the dyad.
While there are works in that direction in the Rummel 'school', the other
authors and schools mentioned seem to
be relatively free of theory which relates
state behavior to the structure oi the
international system, or to the structure
of the dyad (which of course is also an
international system). To me this aspect
seems to be the most interesting one. A
theory of blame behavior should take
notice of the fact that the international
system is stratified, that many senderreceiver relationships will be highly
asymmetric, and that there are varying
degrees and forms of distances between
actors.
Before I develop these problems further, I shall mention four factors which
will have some relevance both to the
purposes, the forms and the consequences of blaming. Three of the factors
relate to the sender-receiver relationship
primarily, the fourth involves third parties (which may also be involved in the
two first mentioned factors):
(a) The sincerity of the blame, i.e. the
degree to which the blame sent is 'be11
lieved' or taken for its 'face value' by
the receiver (and third parties). Several
factors may work in the direction of
reducing the sincerity behind the act of
blame, perhaps to the point where the
blame appears as 'quasi-blaming'.
One such factor may be that the relationship between sender and receiver
on other and important interaction dimensions has a content of active and
friendly exchanges. From the point of
view of the receiver - and of third parties, to the extent that they know of the
situation - the sincerity of the blaming
in such a context may be reduced, and
consequently its effect. Examples of this
kind of relationship are easily found, for
instance in the case of several small
actors vis a vis USA. Or, perhaps more
important and outstanding: the US
blaming of the Soviet-Warsaw pact
invasion of Czechoslovakia while at the
same time making it clear that other
basic relations, some of them stemming
from mutual interests, would not be
subject to sanctions.
12
On the other hand, the very fact that
an actor blames another while at the
same time keeping on with such other
friendly interactions as trade, official
visits, cultural exhibitions etc. with the
other one, may be increasing the sincerity of the blaming. That is: the fact that
the sender is considered a 'friend' gives
him more access, he is really listened to;
when you are criticized by an acknowledged friend, that most certainly has
to be taken seriously. It is evident that
such reasoning in fact lies behind much
blaming behavior and blame evaluations.
The essential question here seems to
be the historical background of the relationship between two given actors. A
relationship which has been built up
consistently and over some time and
which contains either positive or negative interaction on a range of dimensions (or the more important interac-
'Blame' as International Behavior
tional dimensions) is more decisive for
the sincerity to be attached to the sender
by the receiver than a more inconsistent,
short-lasting and single-dimensional relationship. We shall return to this point
later on, in another context.
Another part of this sincerity aspect
is what might be called the 'reducibility'
of the blaming - the tendency of the
receiver to rationalize, to explain away
the blame sent on him. The receiver may
for instance evaluate the blame as sent
for domestic political reasons: the leadership in the sender country uses the
act of blaming, the picking of some outside scapegoat, to bolster its own political position inside the country. Or perhaps a more genuine kind of rationalization: the receiver accuses the sender for
onesidedness, for having been misled by
propaganda, for not really knowing or
appreciating the policy or the motives of
the receiver.
(b) The second factor has to do with
what I shall call the blame tolerance
of the receiver actor, i.e. his ability to
stand blame without being affected by
it. That is: different actors may stand
different degrees of blaming in different
situations, so that the expected result
(e.g. change in policy) does not show
up. Factors which increase tolerance are
the political decisiveness or will (to oversee or exclude the content of blaming
from its information channels) of the
actor; an authoritarian (domestic) political system which may isolate that will
from outside or inside pressure; and the
power of the actor which can be used
to counteract or even prevent blaming
by deterring another actor from blaming
or for instance from escalating blaming
into more serious, violent acts, or which
can be used to 'buy out the blamers' foreign aid is the obvious example here
- or at least modify the blame intensity.
In connection with this last point, it
should be stressed that blame, even if
55
it is of a relatively high intensity, does
not de facto necessarily lead to change
in policy or position. But, our assumption then is that if an actor, under the
burden of a heavy blame volume, wants
to continue its policy or keep its position (e.g. capability to influence other
actors) it has to compensate for the
damage inflicted upon it by the blaming
through the use of such other means as
foreign aid, sanctions (for instance the
threat of withdrawing foreign aid) etc.
One example, which seems to be both
highly relevant and empirically correct,
is the reaction of actors in the so-called
'third world' to the US policy in Vietnam:
this has evidently not been so strong or
damaging as one for several reasons
would have thought (at least not among
the actual leaderships of those actors).
The reason for this of course may be that
these actors, contrary to expectations,
are not so interested in the Vietnam war
and therefore do not care to make evaluations of it and of the actors involved.
But it also seems safe to say that for a
number of actors, their economic dependence on the USA and related factors have been at least as influential in
the direction of non-blaming.
From this one may generalize that the
fact of being powerful, big is perhaps
the most important factor in the creation
of blame tolerance: the topdog stands
much more than the underdog. Or, the
topdogs may even stand an immense
intensity of blame, because they have
so vast resources to draw compensation
from or to deter blame with.
The development of the world's reactions to and views of the Soviet behavior
in Czechoslovakia and the reactions of
the Soviet Union to it will also be a
point of empirical reference on this. In
this case one would of course point to
the two other tolerance-creating factorswill and authoritarianism (at least the
last one) - as relatively more important
56
Helge Hveem
to explain that the Soviet Union, in spite
of relatively intense blaming from the
outside world, did not change its policy
of occupation. (This of course may be
due to other factors and the same would
be true in the case where the Soviet
Union did or do make a change and for
instance withdraw, but this we shall not
discuss here.)
From what I have just been saying, I
may once more stress that the stratification of international systems is an important variable in the whole setting of
blame tolerance and blaming effect. The
general hypothesis is:
13
the topdog
and at the
age, obtain
stands more
blame from
others
same time may cause more dammore effect in blaming others.
(c) The third factor is the frame of
reference - the very norm or value scale
used as the basis for blaming. There is
no clear international consensus as to
the relative strength of different acts of
blame, and this lack of consensus may
be even more felt when it comes to the
international, formal and informal standards of making judgements of actors.
There is the UN Charter, there is the
Human Rights Declaration, the Red
Cross Convention, etc. which in some
fields and to some extent at least must
be considered a general standard of inter-state behavior. But different actors
may put different emphasis on the various pieces of content in such standards,
and they most often do not give any
priority to the different norms or to any
hierarchy of values which can be universally applied. Blamer and blamed
may thus place different weight on one
and the same act or behavior system.
One may probably distinguish between universal (global) and regional or
sub-system norm scales, e.g. the UN
frame of reference may be different, in
some situations and to some actors, from
that of the Communist world, or the
Western world. Confusion or value
clashes may result when different frames
of reference are applied by sender and
receiver. In such a situation, third party
intervention as a 'judge' to the conflict,
may be particularly relevant.
(d) The saliency of the issues involved
in the blaming, or of the very blaming
itself, may be of some importance, particularly to the receiver. To the extent
that the issues, the cases, etc. for which
he is blamed are non-salient to him, he
will tend to reduce the importance of
the fact that he is being blamed. This
may also be true with third parties in
their position toward the sender-receiver
relationship. Correspondingly, the more
salient an issue is, the more seriously
will the blaming be taken.
5. Blaming capability and blame effect
Since I have expressed particular interest in the relation of blaming to the
structure of an international system, it
follows that what I called structureoriented blame will also be of particular
concern in the following. As I said before, however, this is no important limitation of the perspective since act- and
actor-oriented blaming will often have
structural consequences or vice versa.
As will be clear from what has been
said so far, structure-oriented blaming
has implications on both the vertical and
the horizontal axis of the structure.
Vertically, it has most often consequences for the rank or prestige of the
receiver, and thus for the rank distance
(or symmetry/asymmetry) between the
sender and the receiver. It may also
have certain consequences for the equilibrium of the given international system. Horizontally, it may have integrative or disintegrative functions, as
already mentioned. Along the horizontal
axis, it is also important to notice the
role of the concept of political distance.
14
'Blame' as International Behavior
By political distance I mean the generalized distance between two given actors in the system as measured by their
relative political position - their attitudes
or opinions on the more basic political
issues in the system. Studying the behavior of any set of actors within a larger system of actors - the global political system is the 'over-system' which
we superimpose on other smaller systems - the distance between two actors
is always seen as relative to (all) other
actors in the system. The anchoring or
reference points most often used are the
super-powers (ref. the series of UN
studies we have had in recent years) and I
think this both generally and in our
case is a valid measure since they both
in domain and scope are the systemdominant actors. The two super-powers are then chosen as end-points on a
continuum and the political position of
the different actors is induced from information about their attitudes on a
range of political questions, relative to
the attitudes of the two.
15
16
The concept of political distance,
apart from its role as a variable, structuring horizontally international systems
, for our purpose may be used in another
context - the calculation of the probability that blaming will have any effect
on the receiver. Such calculation may
be done by combining political distance
with rank in the system. Our hypothesis
concerning the role of political distance
is that the effect of blaming increases
with decreasing political distance. That
is: if an actor is blamed by some other
actor close to itself by political distance,
the effect is considered to be greater
both to its own position and to the
relevant international system than if it is
blamed by an actor at relatively great
political distance.
Combining the two hypotheses we
have made on rank distance and political distance, we arrive at the following
57
hypothesis, which is central in our
scheme:
The greater the rank distance (or asymmetry)
between the sender and the receiver, with the
sender being the high-ranking actor, and the
smaller
the political
distance
between
them,
the greater will be the effect of the blame.
Political distance is taken to tell you
something about a priori expectations
of blame, from the point of view of the
potential receiver and from third parties.
To take only one example: USA (or any
actors close to it by political distance)
would usually expect heavy blaming
from actors close to the Soviet Union.
Such blame would be very 'ritualistic'
at least in its consequences, and in the
way it is evaluated by many third parties
(if not by intention); it would be nothing
to be disappointed about or take really
seriously. The effect is zero. The blame
of the non-aligned, neutralist, i.e. those
actors which are situated between the
two super-powers at some political distance from both of them, would be more
to care about, not to speak of the blame
coming from actors close to the big one
(dominant not only in the global system,
but even more within 'its own' subsystem
or subsystems, its spheres of influence to
which the sender in this case may belong). This kind of blame would generally be highly unexpected (i.e. if it is
of a certain blame volume) both to the
blamed and to third parties. It would
definitely not be ritualistic, but break
with the rules of the system, which says
that you should blame your foes and
praise your friends.
The extreme case here is when the
small, close-to-the-big actor and in important respects dependent upon him,
criticizes him heavily (e.g. Norway
blaming USA). The not so extreme
would be that some middle-range power
or aspiring great power (depending on
the rank categorizations made) criticizes
'its own' super-power. This clearly has
58
Helge Hveem
been the case in the relationship between
USA and France under the Gaullist
regime.
We have now indicated the relationship between rank distance and political
distance when it comes to effect probability calculation. But evidently a third
dimension, what we above referred to as
the blame intensity - which was a combined measure of the volume, the support and the scope of the blame - must
be drawn in at this point. We shall do
that by constructing a combined formal
expression of all three dimensions. Or
more correct: two expressions, one for
the case where the effect (on the receiver) is studied, the other for the case
of the sender's capability of blaming,
his capability of creating any effect.
These expressions or formulas are called
blaming effect estimate and blaming
capability estimate, respectively.
From what we have said about the
role of the three dimensions, one might
conclude that political distance is essentially a means of reducing both effect and capability. The role of rank
(used here more or less synonymously
with power) seems to be somewhat different: when the focus is on the effect,
it has the same function as political
distance - reducing the effect. But in the
case of blaming capability, rank or
power has a 'positive' function of increasing that capability.
In presenting these estimates, we
make use of the following abbreviations:
17
R
R
D
is the rank of
is the rank of
is the political
sender and the
SI is the sincerity
I
is the intensity
SA is the saliency
the receiver
k
is a constant
8
r
the sender
the receiver
distance
between
the
receiver
of the b l a m e
of the b l a m e
of t h e g i v e n issue(s) to
After this I may present the estimate
for the capability of blaming (C) as
and blame effect (E) as
The more precise measure of rank,
intensity, sincerity, and saliency will not
be dealt with in any detail in this context. Measures for ranking nations are
relatively many and well developed.
In a formal measure of intensity in addition to formal quantitative expressions
for volume, support and scope, one of
course will have to include a figure representing the position of the blame according to the blame scale I developed.
Sincerity may be defined as ranging between 0 as minimum and 1 as maximum
sincerity.
Political distance, however, should be
explained in some detail. I propose that
it is measured by UN voting behavior
over the period of one year because this
is probably the best indicator of a general political attitude or opinion position
developed so far, and because the USAUSSR continuum has been used by several authors already.
The scale of political distance could
of course be categorized in different
ways and by more variables than the
UN voting behavior. Clustering according to this variable might be used in the
sense that the clusters one finds are
taken as categories in the general scale.
But such voting clusters may and do
change over time; what we need then is
both adjustments of the scale, but also
some sort of a more durable category
set.
In Figure 1, a scale of seven categories
is constructed and each category described (the end-points are not counted
as categories). The scale may be used in
the USSR-USA relationship, but could
also have a more general application for
systems which are more or less polar18
19
20
'Blame' as International Behavior
ized between two relatively equally powerful actors. By counting the number of
categories between the sender and the
receiver, one gets the generalized political distance between them.
6. Blame and the international system
Blame behavior activity may and should
of course also be related to political
distance in any sender-receiver relationship, i.e. a system of any two actors.
This would in fact be necessary in order
to register all acts of blame behavior in
the total system. Such behavior in a
dyad may then be correlated with the
rank distance and the political distance
between the two actor components.
Concerning rank distance, my hypothesis would be:
Blame behavior activity tends to be positively
correlated with
rank
distance
in
the sense
that the high ranking will blame the low
ranking more
than
vice-versa.
This would be in accordance with topdog-underdog interaction on other dimensions.
The relationship between political
distance seems more problematic. A
common sense hypothesis would be that
blame behavior activity increases with
increasing political distance: the greater
the distance the less danger there is for
counter-blame or other measures from
the receiver. On the other hand, as has
been pointed out, the blame sent from
a great political distance tends to be
perceived as insincere and thus ineffective. Thus, it seems that the most interesting blame behavior - and perhaps
the most active, since actors at great
21
59
distance, knowing that their blame is
perceived as mostly 'ritualistic', will
probably tend not to be such active
blamers as would be expected - occurs
at some crucial 'middle political distance'.
Political distance may also be related
to the integration-disintegration dichotomy. Blame sent between actors at
great political distance will not have
any great effect, since the system in
this case will be rather disintegrated in
advance. Non-blaming within such a
system over a considerable period of
time, on the other hand, may have an
integrative effect.
When blame occurs between actors
not far from each other in political
distance however, it will most often
have a disintegrative effect on the relationship between them. Correspondingly, a lasting situation of non-blaming
between two actors at close political
distance will have an integrative effect,
possibly to the extent of making them
one single actor.
I have not considered drawing in geographical distance. This is due to the
impression that geographical distance is
not among the important factors for this
kind of interaction, or that at least it
is of decreasing importance. On the
other hand, research has shown that
geographical distance in the particular
sense of sharing borders is the one relatively important variable for explaining violent conflict behavior. This dimension then and its possible role in
this context should perhaps be considered. It might be that the blaming of a
22
60
Helge Hveem
neighbor in some important respects is
the most effective and the most fatal
kind of blaming.
If we now consider the global system,
where the USA-USSR continuum is
used as the main axis, we may make a
diachronic analysis which may give us
some insight into the functions of blame
and its relationship to other forms of
behavior.
The acts of blaming which have occurred in the relationship of every single
actor with each of the two super-powers
may then be analyzed and possible causal relationships may also be studied by
correcting for or drawing in major
events, such as those already mentioned:
the US Vietnam intervention, and the
Soviet Czechoslovakian intervention.
The plotting in or the clustering of the
other actors will result in the picture of
system changes indicated in Figure 2.
The idea is that the Figure in some
rough way gives a combined expression
to the effects of blaming communicated
from other actors to each one of the
two super-powers when both political
distance and rank are taken into consideration. The time points chosen are
arbitrary and may be changed. The line
drawn is of course highly tentative and
would indicate the average position of
the totality of actors minus the two
(n - 2). This in turn is an indication of
whether the system at any time point
is in equilibrium or not (as measured by
this single dimension). I think it is fairly
correct to assume that the average over
time will be somewhat to the US side
of the zero line taking the Western domination of the world system into consideration.
Our choice of events or concrete issues
as a reference for blaming of course is
not the only way of looking at it, although many actors probably do look
at it in that way. There is also the deliberately chosen symmetrical outlook
F i g . 2. A tentative assessment of the position
of the blame balance point of the universal
system
over time
T h e u n b r o k e n line drawn will represent the
average position of the n - 2 actors in the
system, vis a vis the t w o super-powers.
as the platform to 'start with'; the obvious case would be the Gandhi or
Nkrumah type of neutralism which
makes evaluations of the super-powers
based on symmetry (they are basically
equally good or bad) the point of departure.
This kind of analysis should evidently
be compared with analyses carried out
on other types of data but with the use
of very much the same behavioral and
structural dimensions. This would shed
more light on the questions of the fruitfulness of the theory or approach I have
outlined, but could also show interesting
relations between the dimensions which
have interested us here, and other dimensions. Some fundamental questions
could be answered, e.g.: Is there a right
of free speech, of free criticism, in the
society of national actors?
To the extent that concrete and identifiable events - acts performed by identifiable actors - are the basis of blaming,
the reference of evaluation, we need
some kind of a scaling of types of acts
according to what blame intensity they
'deserve'. This could for instance show
23
'Blame' as International Behavior
us whether or not it is so that big actors
get less blame than they deserve, small
more. But this is back to the problem of
the lack of universal norm systems mentioned above. I shall not go into this
problem here.
One should, as already indicated,
study the role of blame and praise
within different systems: the global super-power oriented system, the international multi-actor sub-systems, and the
two-actor systems. The question of possible correlations with other forms of
behavior or interaction should be studied to get an overall picture of the network of interactions or exchanges in the
system, the relations between affective
(blaming) and utilitarian (trading) behavior, between different types of affective behavior, etc.
7. The balance of blame
The problem of the equilibrium of any
given system poses certain questions.
How long can a system bear a heavy
blame volume from actors with high
capability and with the probability of
great effect placed on one or more of
its important (or system-dominant)
actors without being changed? How
long can any one actor, not very high
in rank and with relatively low blame
tolerance, stand up against heavy blaming from a number of other actors,
among them the more important, without losing position?
The first question raises another more
concrete or specific question: how long
could the US leadership have stood unaffected by outside blaming, keeping
up with its Vietnam policy and generally
pursuing the role of a 'policeman' in
the third world? And when at the same
time the Soviet Union's general image
became more and more of the Tashkent
peace-maker outlook - how long could
the global system (and sub-systems)
have been unaffected by this develop24
61
ment, in the sense that its equilibrium
would not have been changed?
There are several answers to these
and related questions. USA may be said
to be able to stand all the blaming she
could get through her vast resources.
And due to the (contended) fact that the
system's equilibrium or balance has
usually tended to be very much in her
favor, she could take the risk of losing
some of her position throughout the
world without seeing the balance - one
might call it the 'moral balance' - tip in
favor of the other party. Now the problem does not seem acute: USSR solved
it in Czechoslovakia.
France of the Fourth and the beginning of the Fifth Republic would be
an example of the not-so-high in rank
and the low-tolerance actor which could
not in the long run stand up against
heavy blaming from outside. Evidently
it was not only, perhaps not first of all,
the fact that she was blamed for her
colonial policies which made her withdraw from Indochina and Algeria: she
was to a large extent forced out. But
blaming seems to have played an important role. The more so perhaps in the
case of Suez 1956, where the three aggressors had to withdraw exceptionally
quickly having received heavy blaming
from both friends and foes. This is the
case where the two super-powers join in
blaming some third party. In that case
the probability that an actor could stand
the blaming without being affected is
relatively low and it becomes perhaps
more remote the lower that actor is in
rank. When the two great super-powers
join, there is an informal and inapplicable High Court (or perhaps rather police magistrate) decision.
The world has its enfants terribles or
outcasts - the actors blamed by all or
most of the other actors at some time.
They are middle-range or small actors;
the great power being an outcast is
62
Helge Hveem
rather improbable, unless having lost a
war, i.e. Germany, after the First and
Second, and Japan after the Second
World War. The obvious examples are
South Africa and Portugal. Why is it
that these actors, in spite of the relatively heavy blaming volume they are
subject to, do not change their policies
- why does blame not seem to have any
effect upon them?
One reason would be their high
blame tolerance, their authoritarian regimes, their will or fanaticism, or their
value systems which seem to be rather
different from those of most other actors. But it is probably as likely that the
explanation for the lack of evident effect
is their affiliations with important actors, i.e. the Western great powers: the
blaming of these actors is both moderate and - more important - has a very
low credibility, because of the other
kinds of relationships which they keep
with the two outcasts. Perhaps one important function of the blaming of such
outcasts is that it may be used to cement or hold together a difficult and at
the same time much needed unity of the
senders (the black African blaming of
the white Southern African is probably
one case in point).
The lesson to be drawn from our discussion of the effects of blaming on an
international system, especially its disequilibrating effect, would logically be
that to keep the necessary equilibrium
and symmetry, blame has to be distributed evenly at least between the dominant actors of that system. This point
is touching a much-used and much disputed rule in Norwegian political debates: when blaming the Soviet Union
(or USA) one should not forget the
other party's or side's bad acts; when
criticizing USA policy in Vietnam one
should not forget Soviet policies in Eastern Europe. Quid pro quo at any time
point!
This might be said to be a rather conservative, non-dynamic view which
seems to restrict somewhat the intensity
of blame which it may seem fair to send
on isolated time-points or on specific
events. Nevertheless, it seems to be one
of the informal international rules actually working. And the actors in question have usually been able to solve the
problem themselves by in fact showing
that blame 'deserved' may be distributed
relatively evenly.
Or, they have been able to control
blame, particularly from those actors
which stand relatively close to themselves (which fall within their respective
'spheres of influence'). The dominant
actors may point to the danger implied
in their being intensely blamed by 'their
own friends': this will tip the balance in
the favor of some other dominant actor
and thus threaten the senders themselves. Or, the dominant actor may only
point to the duty of close allies of not
behaving disloyally towards their defensor (if military relations are important)
or benefactor (if financial aid is important). Or, he may simply point to the
necessity of maintaining internal consensus, including non-blaming, within
the sub-system, as an aim in itself, or which is perhaps as likely the case - in
order that the dominant actor within
that sub-system will be able to maintain its dominance. An empirical point
of reference would be the last Communist world conference, where the invasion of Czechoslovakia was criticized
by some of the delegations, and where
the Soviet Union, moreover, tried without being particularly successful, to get
the conference to put the blame for the
Sino-Soviet border disputes on China.
In such cases, non-blaming becomes the
interesting type of behavior.
On a lower level, there is the equilibrium problem in the relations between
two actors. The one may feel that the
'Blame' as International Behavior
other is blaming him so much (more
than he himself blames the other) that
he has to retort, either by blaming or by
other means, just to keep some kind of
an equilibrium between them, so that
the other does not get a permanent
'moral superiority' or political grip on
him.
Or, one may have the case where an
actor starts blaming another actor, or
'over-blaming' him (blaming him more
than he objectively or relatively deserves) just to compensate for that other
actor's superiority over himself or possibly grip on him on other dimensions.
The case of Guinea, which has been
heavily blaming the USA for some years
while at the same time getting more aid
and investments from that country than
from any other country (including the
Soviet Union, which on the contrary
has been very much praised by Guinea)
might be an example of this kind of
relation. Of course it may also be
explained by the deliberate policy of
USA in this case not to let the fact of
being blamed by the recipient make it
cease giving aid to i t . It may want to
give it for other reasons.
63
presented in a complete matrix. Such a
matrix could cover both measures of
blaming effect and blaming capability
and measures of actual blaming behavior over a certain time period. Fig. 3
below may explain the point.
Fig.
3.
The matrix for presenting blaming
capability,
blaming effect and actual
blaming
behavior: the case of blaming capability
One rubric contains measures for the
sender-receiver relation, as follows:
25
26
8. The system as a field: a note on the
methodology
Instead of the linear model which has
been used so far, one should consider
using the sociogrammatic method, which
in many concrete international systems
would seem to tap more of reality than
the linear method. Moreover, it may
better visualize my theory.
Before discussing this point, we should
make it clear that the method of data
collection of course would have to include some ways of assessing the blamepraise relations in any pair of actors in
the system. This must be done by the
use of the variables we have discussed,
by operationalizing them for quantitative analysis, and the results may be
A similar matrix would then have to be
worked out for the case of blaming effect,
with information on the E , Eb etc.
estimates and the blame received by the
various actors from all other actors.
One step in the direction of improvement of the linear model would be to
make use of the geometric matrix, while
keeping the bipolar structure with two
dominant actors as checking points. The
less dominant or non-dominant actors
are plotted in relative to the two points,
but in the field; this is tentatively shown
in Figure 4.
This graph is in some ways more representative of the concrete international
system. But it still does not satisfactorily
deal with the recent developments toward some degree of multipolarity, e.g.
a
64
Fig.
Helge Hveem
4.
A
field
(geometric)
relationships
model
of
blaming
toward more than two dominant actors.
The very fact that Communist China
is not a member of the UN points to one
important argument against using the
data from the UN voting studies as a
basis for the construction of political
distance. And the emergence of China
- however much disputed - as a third
super power also speaks against the bipolar model. It may also be argued that
the position of gaullistic France would
be difficult to catch, even in the model
we have shown in Figure 4.
The logical thing then would be to
construct a third model based on three
or four dominant actors. But this raises
serious problems and, especially in the
case of a system of a greater number of
actors, might be quite impossible. If we
chose three dominant actors and set out
to assess the position of the other actors relative to the three, we might see
that there is not one single point which
might represent the position of the actor
in question relative to all three. What
we, at the most would get, is some rough
assessment of an area within which the
actor in question would be found.
We should probably have to construct
a cube to cope with this, but even that
would not be satisfactory. And in the
case of four dominant actors, it seems
quite impossible to construct any model
which could be used to visualize the
system.
NOTES
* This is a first draft paper. I am indebted to Professor Johan G a l t u n g a n d to t h e staff of the
International P e a c e R e s e a r c h Institute, O s l o , particularly N i l s Petter G l e d i t s c h and Kjell
Skjelsbaek for v a l u a b l e c o m m e n t s on the paper a n d the ideas presented. It c a n be identified as
PRIO-publication 2 0 - 9 .
1
Robert C. N o r t h , O l e R. Holsti, M. G e o r g e Z a n i n o v i c h , a n d D i n a A. Z i n n e s , Content
Analysis.
A
Handbook
with
Applications
for
the
Study
of
International
Relations
Crisis
(Evanston: N o r t h w e s t e r n U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1963) p. 147.
I am particularly thinking of t h e leading countries of the ' B a n d o e n g group', such as U n i t e d
A r a b Republic, Y u g o s l a v i a , India.
T h a t t h e result in t h e l o n g run of this b l a m i n g actually m a y be said to be quite the c o n trary is another thing.
T h e b l a m i n g reached a 'peak' w h e n o n e of the t h e n leading m e m b e r s of t h e S w e d i s h
government, Mr. Olof P a l m e , n o w P r i m e Minister of S w e d e n , participated in a d e m o n s t r a t i o n
i n S t o c k h o l m against the U S p o l i c y i n V i e t n a m a n d t o t h e support o f N o r t h V i e t n a m . T h e U S
g o v e r n m e n t recalled t h e U S a m b a s s a d o r t o S w e d e n a n d for s o m e t i m e there w e r e rather bad
relations b e t w e e n the t w o countries. O n e of the m a i n lines of t h o u g h t b e h i n d t h e A m e r i c a n
behavior towards the S w e d i s h b l a m e s e e m s to h a v e b e e n that they e x p e c t e d a declared neutral
or non-aligned country like S w e d e n not to take sides in controversial international disputes.
This v i e w w a s strongly rejected by the S w e d i s h g o v e r n m e n t w h i c h m a i n t a i n e d its right to
criticize w h e n e v e r a n d w h o e v e r it f o u n d it correct to criticize. T h u s , it t o o k t h e p o s i t i o n of
'active neutralism'.
Cf. N o r t h et al., op cit.; R u d o l p h J. R u m m e l , ' D i m e n s i o n s of Conflict B e h a v i o r w i t h i n and
b e t w e e n N a t i o n s ' , General Systems: Yearbook of the Society for General Systems Research,
2
3
4
6
'Blame' as International Behavior
65
V I I I (1963), p p . 1-50; C h a r l e s M c C l e l l a n d , 'Access to Berlin: T h e Quantity a n d Variety of
E v e n t s , 1 9 4 8 - 1 9 6 3 ' , in J. D a v i d Singer (ed.), Quantitative International Politics: Insights and
E v i d e n c e ( N e w Y o r k : T h e F r e e Press, 1967), pp. 1 5 9 - 8 6 .
F o r instance, there m a y be situations w h e r e praise is a f o r m of conflict behavior, and
correspondingly w h e r e b l a m e is n o n - c o n f l i c t behavior. B l a m e at least m a y h a v e the effect
of creating interaction w h e r e such did not exist, giving it a positive function in that respect.
Cf. H a r o l d N i c o l s o n , Diplomacy ( L o n d o n : O x f o r d U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1963, 3rd ed.).
R u d o l p h J. R u m m e l , 'A Social F i e l d of Conflict Behavior', Peace Research Society: Papers,
IV, C r a c o w Conference, 1965; D i n a A . Z i n n e s , ' T h e E x p r e s s i o n and Perception o f Hostility
in Prewar Crisis: 1914', in J. D a v i d Singer (ed.), o p . cit. p p . 8 5 - 1 1 9 ; M c C l e l l a n d , o p . cit.;
W a y n e R . Martin a n d R o b e r t A . Y o u n g , 'World Event-Interaction Study: P i l o t Study Report'
(University of M i c h i g a n , 1966) m i m e o .
T h e scales they p r o p o s e are:
6
7
8
Rummel
Zinnes
1. Shirking
2. N e g a t i v e sanctions
2.
3. E x p e l or recall a m b a s s a d o r
3.
4. E x p e l or recall l o w e r rank
5. Severance of diplomatic rela- 4.
tions
5.
6. A c c u s a t i o n s
6.
7. Protests
7.
8. Threats
8.
9. Mobilizations
10. T r o o p
9.
movements
10.
11. Military a c t i o n
11.
12. W a r
12.
Martin
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
and
Young,
McClelland
1. A c c e d e
Withdraw
Preventing press f r o m
2. R e q u e s t
m i s l e a d i n g public o p i n i o n
3. P r o p o s e
U s i n g events against
4. Bargain
opponent
Convey
C o o l relationship
5. A b s t a i n
Tolerating agitation against
Protest
others
6. Reject
Deny
R e p r o a c h i n g the other
7. A c c u s e
Conspiracy
8. D e m a n d
M a k i n g d e m a n d s , diplomatic
9. W a r n
rupture
Threaten
Getting m a x i m u m
10. D e c r e e
Mobilization
11. D e m o n s t r a t e
D e c l a r a t i o n of w a r
12. F o r c e
13. Attack
Destruction
1. A n t i - f o r e i g n demonstrations
collapsed
obligations
categories:
Withdraw
Collaborate
Bargain (mild): question, request, p r o p o s e
Bargain ( m e d i u m ) : accuse, c o m p l a i n
Bargain (defend): deny, reject
Bargain (strong): w a r n , threaten, d e m a n d
P u n i s h : break relationship, expel
C o e r c e : seize, f o r c e
9
H e r m a n K a h n , On Escalation: Metaphors and Scenarios, T h e H u d s o n Institute, 1965.
K a h n has 44 'steps' in his ladder, ranging f r o m 'Ostensible crisis' to 'Spasm or insensate war'.
Charles A . M c C l e l l a n d , ' A P r o p o s a l t o M e a s u r e a n d A n a l y z e O p p o s i t i o n and Threat A c tions of Other Countries directed t o w a r d U n i t e d States' Policies A b r o a d ' , D e p a r t m e n t of
Political Science, University of M i c h i g a n , January 1967 ( m i m e o ) .
T o m e n t i o n o n e e x a m p l e only, n o t w h o l l y i n t o the ' R u m m e l school', cf. N i l s Petter G l e ditsch, 'Rank T h e o r y , F i e l d T h e o r y and Attributive T h e o r y : T h r e e A p p r o a c h e s t o International
Behavior', paper written f o r t h e C o n f e r e n c e of secondary data analysis, Institut für vergleic h e n d e Sozialforschung, C o l o g n e .
I a m particularly thinking o f t h e affirmations o f t h e U S g o v e r n m e n t o n t h e e v e o f the
i n v a s i o n that s o m e of t h e major issues, such as negotiations on disarmament and reduction
o n the anti-missile programs, w o u l d n o t b e affected b y t h e invasion.
T h i s o f c o u r s e m a y b e d u e t o other factors a n d the s a m e w o u l d b e true i n the c a s e w h e r e
10
11
12
13
5 Journal of Peace Research
66
Helge Hveem
the Soviet U n i o n d o e s m a k e a c h a n g e in its policy, w h i c h d o e s not s e e m v e r y likely and
which will not be discussed here.
A s R u m m e l s h o w s , 'rank distance' i s h i g h l y correlated with 'power distance', and i n this
context the t w o c o n c e p t s are seen as m o s t l y s y n o n y m o u s . Cf. R u m m e l , 'A Social F i e l d of
Conflict Behavior'.
Our c o n c e p t i s n o t dissimilar t o t h e c o n c e p t u s e d b y R u m m e l - 'value distance', w h i c h i n
his terminology m e a n s 'the existence of m u t u a l l y i n c o m p a t i b l e or contradictory g o a l s or
values', cf. ibid.
This p o s i t i o n i n further c o n f i r m e d b y t h e findings o f Martin a n d Y o u n g , o p . cit. w h e r e
they find that the U n i t e d States a n d the S o v i e t U n i o n (in that order) are t h e m o s t active
senders of blame-related acts and the highest-ranking receivers.
T h e s e relations, a t least until very recently, h a v e n o t b e e n characterized b y small political
distance b e t w e e n the t w o . T h u s , the 'Western sub-system' h a s u n d e r g o n e s o m e c h a n g e since
the first m o d e r a t e v o i c e s of disapproval or criticism occurred in F r a n c e in the m i d d l e of
the 1950's.
See for instance Johan G a l t u n g , M a n u e l M o r a y A r a u j o and S i m o n Schwartzmann, "The
Latin-American System of N a t i o n s : A Structural Analysis'.
T h e reason f o r n o t m a k i n g this variable c o u n t stronger is simply the impression that it is
not so important or so potentially effective, especially as third parties, w h o s e evaluations m o s t
often c o m e into t h e picture rather strongly m a y b e expected n o t t o p l a c e s o m u c h weight o n
this variable as for instance t h e receiver.
Cf. H a y w a r d A l k e r jr. a n d B r u c e M. Russett, World Politics in the General Assembly
( N e w H a v e n : Y a l e University Press, 1965).
Johan Galtung, 'East-West Interaction Patterns', Journal of Peace Research, n o . 2, 1966,
pp. 146-77.
Cf. R u d o l p h J . R u m m e l , "The R e l a t i o n s h i p b e t w e e n N a t i o n a l Attributes a n d F o r e i g n C o n flict Behavior', in J. D a v i d Singer (ed.), o p . cit., pp. 1 8 7 - 2 1 4 .
T o s o m e extent, neutralism o f c o u r s e i s a l s o a reaction t o events d u e t o the likely discovery
that b o t h sides h a v e b e h a v e d badly or nicely.
T h e inside, d o m e s t i c A m e r i c a n blaming o f t h e p o l i c y i n V i e t n a m n o d o u b t has p l a y e d a n
important, perhaps m o r e important r o l e in that respect.
Guinea's trade (in 1966) w a s distributed, a m o n g its principal trading partners, a s f o l l o w s :
14
15
18
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Imports
U n i t e d States
Soviet U n i o n
China
Ex ports
2.5 billion G . F r .
1.3
1.1
-
France
U n i t e d States
2.5 billion G. F r .
1.8
-
26
Cases such a s G u i n e a h a v e raised m u c h criticism o f the U S f o r e i g n aid p r o g r a m i n C o n gress. T h e a r g u m e n t h a s b e e n that t h e U n i t e d States s h o u l d n o t trade extensively with nor
extend aid a n d technical assistance t o countries w h i c h b e h a v e unfriendly towards the U n i t e d
States. Such criticism h a s p r o b a b l y contributed m u c h to t h e reduction in recent years of
U S assistance t o the d e v e l o p i n g countries.
SUMMARY
This article presents a d i m e n s i o n of state b e h a v i o r w h i c h it p r o p o s e s h a s theoretical and
practical relevance to a t h e o r y of conflict, a t h e o r y of sanctions, a n d generally to theories
of inter-state interaction. Being primarily theoretical, the article discusses t h e r o l e of 'blame'
in international politics, b o t h as an isolated pattern of b e h a v i o r , a n d in c o n n e c t i o n with other
patterns of behavior. 'Blame' is seen as n o n - v i o l e n t , conflict behavior. It is related to the
stratification of international systems, and to t h e c o n c e p t of political distance b e t w e e n t w o
actors. Scales and estimates f o r measuring b l a m e , b o t h f r o m t h e sender's a n d t h e receiver's
point of view, are presented, a n d a discussion of m e t h o d o l o g i c a l p r o b l e m s i n v o l v e d in an
empirical test of t h e theory p r o p o s e d , is m a d e at the end.
'Blame' as International Behavior
67