A Neoclassical Realist Explanation of Offense and Defense in Israel’s Strategic Posture

Date

2025-8-6

Author

Arıkan, Mehmet Okan

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This dissertation explains Israel’s offensive and defensive strategic postures by employing neoclassical realism. Neoclassical realism considers the systemic impact rooted in the domain out of the state’s sovereign control as primary causal. However, diverging from neorealism, neoclassical realism incorporates both material and ideational variables through a co-consideration of international systemic incentives and domestic factors. Following neoclassical realism, the dissertation argues, Israel’s strategic behavior is an output of a process of causation originating from regional isolation, existential insecurity and offensive strategic tradition. These material, ideational and cultural elements are enduring products of historical social processes exerting causal powers conditioning decision makers to adopt offensive strategic posture. The impact of the material element, regional isolation, is primarily causal. The ideational and cultural elements, existential insecurity and offensive strategic tradition influence the domestic processes and so condition the perception and the response of Israel’s state elite. However, shift from offense to defense is possible with the emergence of two conditions in the international realm: Unilateral great power intervention and/or presence of major regional divisions through a crisis in the Middle East. In this setting, additional powers would intervene and disrupt the preexisting causal mechanisms. Complete explanation of offensive and defensive strategic postures necessitates transcending generic independent and intervening variables and explaining their causal mechanisms under these. To this end, the dissertation conducted historical comparative analysis with an explanatory six-case study. Within-case analysis identified context specific variables and explained their powers by building causal narratives through outcome explaining process tracing. Causal narratives were then evaluated through cross-case analysis with small-N comparison.

Subject Keywords

Neoclassical realism, Israel, Foreign policy, Strategic behavior, Causal mechanisms

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/115443

Collections

Graduate School of Social Sciences, Thesis